The Dance Read online

  Nina stroked his cheek. “I think that’s enough contemplation for the night, lover.”

  As she rubbed his face, a voice filled his thoughts, urging him to relax. He found it hard to resist. His eyes grew heavy, and the need for answers faded away.

  “Perhaps this will all make more sense tomorrow,” he mumbled as he drifted to sleep.

  Chapter Two

  Jarred awake by a loud ringing, Detective Tom Wiley abruptly sat up in bed, simultaneously flinging his arm out at the offending noise. A brief clatter followed by a muted thud told him he just knocked his phone off the nightstand. He quickly leaned over and retrieved the receiver from his shag carpet.

  “Hello?”

  “Tom, sorry to bother you at this hour, but I thought you might want to see this.”

  “What’s up? Did we just catch a new case?” He ran his fingers through his coal black hair as he pulled the curls away from his eyes.

  “It’s—It’s— You will just have to come see for yourself, man.”

  “Relax, Jack. I’m on my way as soon as you collect yourself enough to give me the address.” He snatched a pad and pencil.

  After he jotted down the information, Tom was dressed and out the door in a flash. That foreign tremble in his partner’s voice that told him this wasn't an ordinary murder scene. Detective Jack Henson had been with the department for over a decade and never had such a frightened reaction to a murder scene.

  “Christ, the man’s a rock,” he whispered to himself. “What the hell could have gotten under his skin like that?”

  Tom cursed under his breath as he turned into the neighborhood. He had to maneuver his way carefully through the sea of squad cars to find a place to park near the house. He pulled himself from behind the wheel, watching neighbors jostle each other about to as they jockeyed for the best positions to see what all the hubbub was about.

  “Step aside,” he repeated curtly as he elbowed his way through the crowd.

  Tom walked by the police officers standing in the yard, barely acknowledging their nods. He ducked under the yellow crime scene tape that stretched across the front door and froze as he crossed the foyer.

  Blood coated the railing of the stairs to his left. A dark red stain ran down the wall and spread across the carpet. He ascended the steps slowly, artfully dodging the coagulating pools that had gathered there.

  Tom watched Detective Henson emerge from the master bedroom, pulling the door closed behind him. Jack rubbed his jaw with a shaky hand, then loosened his tie. His eyes darted back and forth as if were struggling with where to begin.

  “He’s back,” was all his partner could manage after clearing his throat several times.

  “Who’s back?”

  “The Puppeteer,” Jack replied in a whisper, as if just say his name would summon the monster from the depths of hell.

  Tom left Jack in the hall and opened the door; though he knew what he would see before he ever stepped into the room. The bodies of Carl and Terri Joyner rested at the foot of the bed, stripped of all of their clothing, bound together by heavy duty fishing line. They stood almost completely erect, held up by wires attached to the ceiling fan. Their killer took the time to wind the line through their arms, legs, even the tops of their heads. So many lacerations covered their bodies; The Puppeteer would’ve had no problems finding places to attach his strings.

  He pointed to the broken lamp on the floor by the nightstand. “Get this over to the lab for analysis. The Puppeteer always used blades, not blunt objects. Maybe one of our victims was able to leave us a clue.”

  “What’s it been seven… eight years?” Jack had collected himself enough to return to the room.

  “Yeah, about eight,” Tom replied absentmindedly, continuing to search for evidence.

  “I just assumed he died or something. The way the murders just stopped like that. Serial killers don’t just quit on their own.” Jack shoved the lamp into a plastic sack. “It’s impossible, right?”

  “Well, he appears to be as alive and unwell as ever,” Tom quipped. He studied the bloodstains on the CD player by the bed. “He always did like to listen to music while he ‘worked’, didn’t he?”

  “Plenty of prints on there, maybe he has gotten sloppy in his old age,” he heard Detective Anna Perez say somewhere behind him, her camera clicking rapidly as she took pictures of the crime scene.

  Without bothering to offer her a glance, Tom waved in the direction of the couple in the middle of the room. “Those aren’t his. I am sure he made one of them push the buttons.”

  “How can you be so sure?” she insisted.

  He swung around. “Who the—?” Tom choked on the rest of his words.

  Detective Perez looked as stunning as always, even wearing a baggy tracksuit. With her plump rose-colored lips turned down in a frown, her almond-shaped eyes threatened to burn a hole through him if he didn’t finish his sentence in a more civilized tone. But then it might be more fun to bait her.

  “When did workout clothes become acceptable attire for a crime scene?”

  “When I received the call on my way home from the track,” she answered. “But since you never work out, I guess you don’t have to worry about that.”

  “Hey, I put in my time at the gym.”

  “Oh, sorry. My mistake. If you’re done puffing your chest out, perhaps you could fill me in on why you’re so sure his prints aren’t on the CD player.”

  “You’re obviously too young to remember, but I worked this case the first time around.”

  “Yeah, I can see you did a bang up job with that,” she retorted before returning her attention to her camera. “Let’s hope you can do better this time.”

  “Listen here—”

  “The Press has arrived, right on time.” Jack groaned, staring out the window.

  “Keep them out of here,” Tom snapped at the officers by the door. “We can’t let the details of this case get out. It’ll start a panic that’ll sweep across the entire city,”

  “They should be panicked,” one of the officers replied. “You remember what this freak did last time.”

  “I know it and you know it, but they… they don’t need to be none the wiser. I like our sleepy little city just the way it is,” he replied with a shake of his head.

  “You mean the way it was?” Jack sighed. His hands found their way to his pockets.

  “Yeah, the way it was,” he conceded with a sigh of his own. “We’re gonna get this son of a bitch. He’s ours this time; just you wait and see.”

  They walked out of the house and into the flashing bulbs of cameras.

  “What happened in there, detective?” a reporter demanded, one of the many who vied for his attention.

  “No comment,” Jack replied while Tom ignored the man.

  “Come on fellas, give us something,” Mark Sampson urged, reaching for Tom’s arm as they walked by.

  Tom whipped around and pushed the man hard. Mark went sprawling into the grass. “Keep your fucking hands to yourself,” he warned the over zealous reporter.

  Mark jumped to his feet and rushed forward.

  Jack stepped in, halting the reporter’s advancement before he could do anything they would all regret. “You’ll get your quote when we have something to tell you,” his partner said.

  “Your boy needs to learn some manners,” Mark muttered in reply.

  “Yeah, right,” Tom shot back in disgust before storming off toward his vehicle.

  Frustrated, Tom slammed his fist on the hood of his car. He needed to learn some manners? He yanked the door open with a grunt. Fucking reporters… they’re nothing but bottom feeders. He started to slide behind the wheel, but paused halfway in when he noticed Jack still talking to Mark.

  “What the hell is that all about,” he wondered. He chastised himself for jumping to conclusions. It was common knowledge that Jack and Mark knew each other since high school, but Jack had never once let Mark use their friendship to pry loose information about
an active case.

  Tom dropped into the driver’s seat, slammed his door and fired up the engine, his mind heavy with thoughts of the scene he just left. He hoped they were wrong, but the similarities were just too many to ignore.

  “Please let me wake up in a few minutes and see that this is just a nightmare,” he prayed as he steered his car towards home.

  Nearly ten years ago he had walked into the living room of an apartment and stared at the birth of a monster. Two women, suspended by fishing wire, became the first victims. The Puppeteer had tied their bindings through holes punched in the ceiling. With their mouths pulled open and back, sewn into smiles, and their upper eyelids tied to their bangs, they looked more like props from a horror film than people. At the time, he had wondered if they were still alive when the fishing line was weaved through their limbs. The coroner later confirmed the line was strewn post-mortem. He was ashamed for being relieved by that little fact when their deaths were clearly still brutal.

  He received a call to a similar scene once a month for two years. The crime scene was always slightly different, but each had two victims and their faces all shared the same twisted smile. It wasn’t enough for the monster to have his victims perform for him. It was as if he wanted them to enjoy the experience. And despite the brutality of the crimes, The Puppeteer was always careful, leaving nothing behind that would reveal his identity.

  Then, as abruptly as they began, the murders stopped. Month after month went by without so much as a hint of his return. The city began to relax, return to normal, and let out a collective sigh of relief. The killing time had passed, or so they had thought.

  “Sick bastard,” Tom spat as he threw his car keys on the coffee table. “Why couldn’t you have just stayed away? What brought you back to us?”

  He unbuttoned the cuffs of his shirt, rolling them up his arm as he paced back and forth between his living room and kitchen. He grabbed a towel from the counter and wiped out a glass from the sink before retrieving a bottle of Jack Daniels from the cupboard.

  “Yeah, this ought to do the trick.” Nothing else would put him to sleep, or chase the images from his mind.

  *****

  The sun was just coming up as the empty bottle fell from Tom’s fingers. He sat up on the edge of the couch and held his head in both hands. The room was spinning, but that wasn’t what was really troubling him at the moment.

  “No, I guess it wasn’t a dream. The maniac has come home,” he said to the empty room. The scene from the night before replayed over and over in his mind relentlessly.

  “You won’t slip through my fingers this time.” He smacked the coffee table with the palm of his hand. “Not this time.”

  Chapter Three

  Thank you for seeing me on such short notice, Dr. Pearlman.” Kyle looked at the desk, the wall, the floor, pretty much anywhere but the doctor’s face to avoid making eye contact.

  He hated talking to his psychiatrist. It always reminded him that he didn’t have the strength to help himself. It made him feel like less of a man. It made him feel weak.

  “Hell, who am I kidding? I am weak or else I would be able to deal with her myself,” he muttered as he sat on the couch.

  Dr. Pearlman smiled down at him from his chair. “What are you talking about, Kyle?”

  “It’s not important.”

  “So, what’s on your mind?”

  “I don’t think the Haldol is working, Doc.” He rubbed his temples between his thumb and forefinger as he spoke.

  “What makes you say that? Are your symptoms beginning to resurface?” Dr. Pearlman ventured hesitantly.

  Kyle knew his illness had a way of making the good doctor a bit nervous, and a full relapse would be bad for all concerned. “Resurfacing? To tell you the truth, they never really went away. They just seemed… well, manageable when I first started the medicine. Now… well, things are worse than I ever remember them being.”

  “Are you feeling suicidal again or have the hallucinations crept back into the picture?”

  “There are days when I am not sure I ever wake up. The whole world seems like a dream, if that makes sense,” Kyle tried to explain as he stared at the clock above the Doctor’s head.

  “I understand what you’re trying to tell me,” he replied in a compassionate tone. “Is one of the hallucinations about your mother?”

  “Of course not!” Kyle snapped, letting his eyes meet the Doctor’s for the first time since he entered the room. “How many times do I have to tell you to leave my family out of this? I may not have had a model upbringing, but my mother isn’t the cause of my problems. Are you trying to piss me off again? You remember what happened the last time we discussed my parents, don’t you?”

  “I’m not trying to upset you, Kyle. It is just… You mentioned something about dealing with her as you sat down. I just assumed you were talking about your mother.”

  “Oh, I guess I did, didn’t I?” Kyle let himself relax again. “The her in question is Nina, a woman who has recently come into my life.”

  “Is she real? Or…” Dr. Pearlman let his voice trail off.

  “I don’t know. She seems real. Her touch is warm and her hand is firm, but some of the things she does are impossible for me to believe actually happened. It’s kind of hard to explain.”

  “Well, whether she is real or imagined, she has obviously gotten under your skin. How does she make you feel when you are with her?”

  “Like a man ought to feel,” Kyle replied smugly.

  “And how is it a man should feel?”

  “You don’t know?” Kyle looked at him quizzically. “Aren’t you a man?”

  “Humor me. I want to know what you think it means.”

  “She makes me feel powerful, desirable. She makes me feel larger than life.” He grinned as he thought about her. “When I’m with her, anything and everything seems possible.”

  “It sounds like she is doing you a world of good.”

  “Yeah, I can see some definite benefits to having her in my life.”

  “Then, what seems to be the problem?”

  “She makes me… do things, things I am sure I shouldn’t be doing.” He took a deep breath.

  “Are you really doing them or do you just think you are? You said it yourself; your dream world and your real world are merging.”

  “I hadn’t thought of it like that. What I do in my dreams is nobody’s business but my own. I can’t get in trouble for what I do in my head.” Kyle felt the weight of guilt easing from his shoulders almost instantly. “My God… you’re a genius.”

  “That’s why you pay me the big bucks, Kyle.”

  “You’re worth every penny, Dr. Pearlman. You always seem to know just what to say to make me feel better.” Kyle suddenly wondered why he dreaded seeing Dr. Pearlman in the first place.

  “Well, you know what they say… a happy mind is the first step towards a healthy mind.”

  “So, if we up my dosage, then everything I thought has been happening will just go away again.” Kyle wondered how much of his life would remain if that happened.

  “I don’t see any reason for us to increase your medication, Kyle. It doesn’t seem like a bad place that you’re in right now. Besides, if we up your dosage, we run the risk of making your new lady friend go away. In fact, I think maybe we should stop the medication altogether,” he echoed Kyle’s thoughts.

  “Maybe you’re right. Thanks, Doc. Do you want to hear about some of my hallucinations? They are really quite fascinating.”

  “If you don’t mind sharing. You know I’ve always been fond of interpreting dreams.”

  “I would be delighted to—”

  “Kyle, I think you had better come up here and see this,” Nina called from the top of the basement stairs.

  “Who was that?” Dr. Pearlman asked, still smiling down at him.

  “That would be the lady of the hour… Nina.”

  “Well, you had better go see what she wants.”

 
“Yeah, I guess your right. It isn’t polite to keep a lady waiting,” Kyle agreed as he returned the strings to the hook on the back of the couch.

  He took a moment to straighten the doctor’s tie. He regretted sewing his mouth into a smile. It made some of his sessions a little uncomfortable. It was rather unnerving to find yourself crying over some detail only to find your shrink smiling back at you, always smiling, never truly understanding.

  “Oh well, too late now.” Kyle sighed as he inspected the fishing line that held Dr. Pearlman’s eyelids open. “I would ruin his face if I tried to fix it at this point.”

  “You had better hurry or you’re going to miss it,” Nina hollered, clearly agitated that he didn’t jump when she snapped her fingers.

  “I’m coming!” Kyle shouted more harshly than he intended.

  He could hear the TV as he climbed the stairs, recognizing the music instantly. Something big must be happening.

  We interrupt this program to bring you a special news bulletin. We take you now to Mark Sampson, broadcasting live from the scene of a double-homicide.

  “I am standing outside the home of Carl and Terri Joyner. The fact that two people died wouldn’t normally be enough to interrupt your programs, but the manner in which the victims met their end certainly warrants immediate attention. You, the public, must be warned that a monster has reared its ugly head again in our great city. The Puppeteer has returned. Please take extra precautions to ensure your safety until the police are able to apprehend this fiend.”

  “Fiend? You are not a fiend; you are an artist.” Nina flicked at the reporter’s image on the screen. “If they could only see your partners while they are still fresh, they would be more understanding.”

  “Shh! I can’t hear what he’s saying,” Kyle hissed as he leaned closer to the television.

  “So what? He is just badmouthing you at this point. Why do you care what he has to say anyway? He obviously can’t see that you are a visionary.”

  “We will give you more information as it becomes available. Until then, lock your doors and take every precaution necessary to ensure your safety. Stay tuned to Fox22 News at 9:00 for the full story.”