Approaching Menace Read online

  Hairs raised on Josie’s neck.

  The man’s shoulders slumped forward. The shadowed darkness didn’t hide the fact that his jacket fit badly. The legs of his pants fell toward the soles of his shabby dress shoes. Above these telltale items, her neighbor locked gazes with her.

  “Maurice, can I help you?” she asked, trying to still her voice.

  He didn’t answer. Instead, he shifted his bulk. His face remained bleak as it emerged from the light’s outer circle, and he came forward.

  Cropped with brown hair, Maurice Exely’s head seemed to tuck into his neck while he scurried. His pants flopped as he scooted across the cement behind Josie and out into her dark yard. Scuttling to the left, he neared the thick pampas grasses separating their lawn from his.

  Why had he been here? She had only seen him when he cut grass with his push mower. Most people in the neighborhood used riding mowers or hired grass cutters, but he always trudged away, sweating behind his machine. “Look at how neglected his lawn looks,” Sylvie recently pointed out, and Josie said he was probably depressed since his grandmother died. She told her mother not to worry. Soon Maurice would be out there again, getting his lawn as neat as before.

  Maybe he needs a ride, she considered. He had been standing in front of their garage. She wondered why he’d left so suddenly when she spotted headlights pulling into the drive on the opposite side of her yard. She glanced back to where Maurice ran. A shape slithered between the bushes’ green spikes. Then the branches closed together as though no intruder moved through.

  Josie knew little about him. She’d seen him walking downtown once. He’d never married. She had no idea what his voice sounded like. Soon after she moved here, his grandmother said he and Josie were the same age. Whenever Josie saw him since Mrs. Exeter’s death, he resembled a large lonely child. And never, not even while his grandparent lived, had those jackets or slacks fit him correctly.

  I could offer to fix them, she thought, then immediately dismissed the idea. Proposing to alter his clothes would say she had noticed a problem and that might hurt his feelings.

  Shaking her arms, she continued to feel her shoulders knotted. News of the murder and the thunder and lightning had combined to disturb her.

  “Josie! Hey, Josie!” a child called from a tan SUV parking on the driveway to her right. A smiling face framed by straight golden hair stuck out the rear window.

  “Hello to you, young lady,” Josie said and walked across to the Allen home. Six-year-old Annie Allen bounded out of the SUV with all the energy of a basketball team. She dove into Josie’s widespread arms and almost knocked her over.

  “We went get some ice cream,” Annie said

  Josie forced a scowl. “And none for me?”

  The child smiled, her shoulders lifting to a shrug near her ears. Behind her, a figure padded toward them.

  LauraLee Allen, on a perennial quest to lose thirty pounds, had to have looked absolutely stunning when she was slightly younger. With thick wavy hair slightly blonder than Annie’s, crystal blue eyes, and a constant tan, LauraLee retained much of that beauty.

  “Nope, only Annie got ice cream.” LauraLee swiped a napkin across the chocolate steaks staining her child’s chin. “Her daddy spoils her so much.”

  LauraLee glanced at Josie while attempting to hold Annie still and rub off the brown smears. “She sure likes you, hon. Ever since you watched her for me, she talks about you all the time. It’s Josie this and Josie that.”

  Josie smiled. “Any time.” More doors slammed as men slipped out the front doors of their SUV.

  “No wonder,” one of them said, walking near. “Our neighbor’s quite a girl.” Randall Allen smiled. His dark brown hair sported a fresh cut, and he wore a sports coat and slacks that fit him well, the exact opposite of the neighbor from the other side of Josie’s yard.

  The man who left the front passenger seat did not come near like the others.

  Annie screamed. “I gotta go make!”

  “Then hurry. I told you to go before we left,” LauraLee said and strode off behind the child scampering to the house, calling over her shoulder, “See you later, Josie. Come by soon. We haven’t gotten to visit lately.”

  “I will. Bye, Annie.”

  “Bye!” The girl half-ran and half-hopped to the door at their side entrance.

  Hurrying to her, LauraLee passed the tall figure headed in the same direction and unlocked their door. Josie did not recognize the man.

  The motion detector light had come on, and the stranger stopped and turned. He was older than Mr. Allen, with an unusual yellow cast lighting his slim gray beard. Some gray also seemed to mottle his black hair. Along with his tailored suit, he wore a bow tie. Through dark-rimmed glasses, his eyes studied Josie.

  She looked away.

  “How’s your family?” Randall Allen asked.

  “Everyone’s fine.” Josie tilted her head toward the man. “Mr. Allen, is that your new partner?”

  “Babineaux? Yes, he’s coming to dinner.”

  She shivered. “That horrible storm. It made the temperature drop.” She rubbed her arms. “Were you out in it?”

  “Yes, I almost had to pull over, but it didn’t last too long.”

  Lightning bolts crashed in Josie’s mind as clearly as if cameras were flashing. And then that dark void. Colin had been lost inside it.

  “I hate to drive in weather like that,” she said, peering at her house. Lights lit only one window. Colin was alone. “I need to get back. Nice seeing you, Mr. Allen,” she said and rushed back to her brother.

  * * *

  Lightning splintered the sky, making the air surrounding him crackle as he stepped out of his car. Trembling, he smiled. This display intensified his desire for the young woman. Weather like this drew out her fear.

  A few minutes later he stood inside the bamboo paneled office and stared out the window at the storm wrapping itself around the city’s morning skyline like a ravenous python about to devour breakfast. Thunder reverberated above the sound system’s easy listening music. He imagined the thunder rolling through his shoes and up his torso. She was somewhere out there.

  From behind the wide redwood desk smelling of polish sat the doctor who did not want to be called one. Shrink was more like it. The client knew the man at the desk liked that title even less, but he was one.

  Dr. Malcolm Hanover kept that aromatic unlit pipe clamped between his bleached teeth. The thunder’s complaint hushed. Hanover’s sound system made an annoying sputter. The clean straight nails of his fingers continued their tap, tap-tap, tap, tap-tap rhythm on that damn shiny desktop.

  Hanover stared from his red leather chair that creaked when he leaned his lanky body forward or back. Unblinking eyes gazed from beneath thinning hair that must have once been orange. If that hair hadn’t been slicked to the side, Hanover’s round face might not resemble a globe. If Hanover had any insight at all, decided the client, he would interpret his client’s plans and call the police and her.

  The client stirred, warmth spreading while he thought of her. Of what he would do to her. His eyes crinkled with his tight smile. Perspiration wet his armpits. Beyond the busy traffic he watched on Mobile’s main thoroughfare, she was waiting.

  He would let her know his intentions. And then, then he would do what he wanted

  Hanover rapped his fingernails on the desk, making the client’s forehead furrow. Those nail strikes were giving Hanover’s customer an order. Speak up. Give me a glimpse of what is going on inside you.

  No, thought the client. You will continue to see only the shell, a man in a suit, beyond the green plants strewn like a jungle beside your wall. Don’t you know your greenery carries the stench of musty soil?

  You obviously know little.

  The client watched the gray-blanketed afternoon. “Rain’s coming.”

  “So it seems.” Hanover’s tapping stopped.

  Outside, a crash resounded.

  “Thun-der,” said the clien
t. He liked the word’s sound, enjoyed the way it felt rolling through his mouth. And she—she didn’t like thunder at all.

  “Let’s get back to our discussion.” The chair squeaked as Hanover left it.

  We never had a discussion, thought the client; you did. His outer vision let him spy the doctor moving toward him.

  “You are here for a reason,” the doctor said. “I know it’s not of your choosing.”

  The client grunted. Absolutely not.

  “But you were accused of those atrocities.”

  And I will do them again.

  Getting no response, the therapist continued. “Because of that, you paid a price.”

  The client nodded, still staring outside but no longer noticing what was out there. Public humiliation for being accused had been much more of a price than was necessary. Hanover had no business mentioning those other things. He’d said that himself during their first session.

  “You were found guilty of the other charge.” The therapist’s voice rose in a tone hinting of superiority. “I know you had counseling. And I’m sure it helped.”

  Yes, I can control some urges now. Some of them. I cannot get caught stalking them.

  “But to make certain you won’t revert to that behavior, you need to meet with me. And the judge did not order you here to check the view outside.”

  Tension in the client’s shoulders released as he slammed his fists against the window. Its panes shuddered. He narrowed his eyes. Don’t you wish you could have witnessed their faces contorting right before their lives left?

  “Vicious things were done to those women.” Hanover’s voice scolded like a mean father’s while his words droned on.

  The client retained a wry smile, listening to rain now slamming against the window. What direction was it heading? Was this thunderstorm traveling east, right across the state line? Were thick black clouds building into monstrous shapes rushing along the sugary beaches of Florida’s coast and up to their town of Windswept?

  If not, it would be such a pity. Her terror of storms looked so delicious.

  Hanover coughed, a ploy to attract his attention. “Maybe I shouldn’t have brought up the murder charges, because even with all of the evidence, you did get off.”

  Eyeing thick rain sheets, the client wore a genuine smile.

  “But you were convicted of the other.”

  The client could feel Hanover stepping closer, moving into his space.

  Hanover went on, surely hoping to close in for the kill. “And what exactly made you do the things you did?”

  A flash of lightning made the suave doctor jerk toward the window.

  Watching Hanover’s stricken face, his customer gave the reply. “Fear!”

  Chapter 2

  Beethoven’s Fifth flooded the den, but Colin was no longer there.

  Josie peeked through the open door of the hall bathroom. His toothbrush stood in its holder beside an open tube of toothpaste.

  The door to his bedroom was closed. Since no light shone beneath it, Josie entered without knocking or asking permission.

  A glow from the hall draped across the red and white bed lamp, picking out the Biddy Football trophy on the shelf above his headboard. Colin still wore the clothes he’d had on, a sure sign of his exhaustion. He had pulled back the covers. He was asleep on his stomach, one leg straight. The other had his knee cocked, forming a small triangle. His right arm gathered his pillow into its crook.

  She leaned close to his face.

  His warm breaths sounded labored. Not nearly as bad as sometimes. No rattles.

  A good sign. Maybe he was getting better.

  The instinct came to take off his jeans and jersey and slip him into pajamas. She quelled that urge, wordlessly chiding herself for taking so many of their mother’s habits. Who else kept a house so tidy it seemed as if no one lived in it? This child’s body did not function perfectly. He didn’t need perfection thrust upon him.

  His legs stretched. The soles of his socks remained as white as if he had just put them on. His jersey stayed clean. Josie wished he could have gotten his whole outfit as filthy as other boys did when they played. Most of those kids would be settling down in front of TV about now, while her brother lay asleep, worn out from his treatment.

  She pulled the bottom edge of his jersey down over his back and then drew the top sheet above his legs. She touched his cheek. Cool. Josie peered at the crucifix that hung above the shelf holding his football and whispered a prayer for him.

  She pecked his cheek and grinned, knowing he would issue a mock complaint and wipe his face if she kissed him while he was awake.

  He had set his alarm. Feeling smug for the stolen kiss, Josie went out, softly shutting the door. Before she took another step, Colin’s barking coughs stopped her. She stared at his door, waiting long moments until the coughing stopped. Silently Josie cursed the reminder that he really wasn’t getting better.

  Remaining uneasy, she cleaned his machine with a solution that smelled of bleach and analyzed what else now bothered her. Mr. Allen’s new partner. Why hadn’t he come to meet her while the whole family stood near? Instead, he seemed to ooze out of their SUV and blend into the evening’s darkness. And Maurice?

  She pushed her focus away from concerns, wanting to focus on cheerful music instead. Someone began speaking on the stereo. “We will be watching a new low pressure system that’s building in the Atlantic.” The local announcer paused and his tone shifted. “The identity of the area’s second murder victim has not yet been revealed.”

  Josie turned him off. She’d had enough sour thoughts for one evening.

  * * *

  Sylvie’s door remained shut the next day once Josie’s alarm rang. She heard Colin’s ring moments later. He looked rested when they met. Josie came out of the hall bathroom, and he headed in.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “That’s for bulls.” Josie smirked, having given him the response he usually gave her. The silly reply was better than what she wanted to say. But she fought the urge to ask how he’d slept and if he felt well. She had done that so often at first. But her sibling knew his condition. The child seemed to accept his body’s frailty much better than she did.

  He had a good appetite today, eating two small bowls of cereal, one with milk and one without since his fluids were limited.

  “I’ll look for another glass to replace the one I broke,” Josie said, joining him at the table.

  He waved the idea away. “I can drink out of regular glasses, Josie.” The way he said it indicated his annoyance.

  “Okay, then I won’t look.”

  “Okay, good.” Colin’s voice remained young. He wanted to be taller, and Josie wished he would fill out more. He had already dressed in his khaki shorts and white knit shirt for school. Josie kept on her nightshirt. She covered it with a light robe and opened the front door right before he came through. He narrowed his eyes at her.

  She shrugged. “I’m just checking the weather.”

  His grimace told her he knew better. “Yeah, and you need to see what kind of clothes to wear today.”

  “Right.”

  He shifted past without saying goodbye. The grass still looked damp. Josie was surprised to note that some leaves of the red maples lining the long cement path to the sidewalk had begun to turn scarlet. Halfway down that path, Colin stopped to adjust his bulky mesh backpack. He cocked his head so that he could eye her. She had used the same excuse so often for coming to see him off after he had complained that his friends would think he was a baby if his big sister came out to the bus stop. Now she played this game, and every day his lips pressed together while he strode past her. But she was only checking the day’s weather. As though it would change much.

  He turned back. “Hey, Andrew called last night.”

  “He did?”

  “Yeah, when you went outside.”

  Josie smiled. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Brakes hissed as the school bus slowed
neared Colin’s stop. He hurried toward the sidewalk, calling over his shoulder, “He needed to keep working on that guy’s bike.”

  “Wait,” Josie called, and he looked at her. “Did he say anything else?”

  “Yeah. He said tell you stop trying to act like a mean mamma.”

  She grinned, waiting for him to smile. The bus stopped, and he climbed in without glancing back at her.

  She forced her gaze away from the street, attuning herself to the moment when her brother would glance toward their stoop to see if she was staring. She straightened her arms, locked the fingers of both hands, turned them backward and stretched. Her arms and spine elongated. She rose on her toes, hoping that while Colin peered out from the seventh seat, she would appear to be only taking a stretch outdoors. She would not let herself look at him.

  The yellow bulk left her outer vision, and she spotted someone with a balding head and lemon yellow shirt across the street. He was waving at her. “Good morning, Mr. Fletcher,” Josie called to return his greeting. He continued his usual early morning pruning of the ground beneath his many palm trees as she went back inside.

  She was almost finished showering when the water’s pressure lowered, letting her know her mother had risen and begun her own shower. Sylvie’s long ritual would turn her pink room into a steam bath with sweltering walls. Her bedroom door would be shut and the bathroom door open. After she would be done, Sylvie could nearly wring out the tassels on the domed canopy of her bed.

  Josie blew her long hair dry, dressed, and walked to Sylvie’s bedroom. The bed was already fixed. Half a dozen pillows rested in their nesting places. What surprised Josie in her mother’s inner sanctuary was that the walnut lap tray still sat atop her chaise lounge instead of being placed on the small table beside it.

  Josie felt her hair and clothes droop. “Morning,” she called through the multi-colored pastel shower curtain.

  “Good morning.” Sylvie’s voice sounded like she might be crooning to a male sweetheart.

  Josie waited while the steaming water continued to fall. Finally she decided to leave the room, or she’d have to dry her hair again. “Have a nice day,” she called.