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"Noooooooooooooo!" he screamed. The rocks were only several feet
away now.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Carson awoke in his bed just as he was about to hit the rocks - the
sheets were scattered onto the floor and he was wet with sweat. The
dusk colored light from the window painted the walls a burnt orange.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Carson sat up and looked around the room like an animal being
stalked.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
He rushed to the door and began releasing the locks. He opened the
door slowly.
"A few more minutes and I was going to break in," Frank Tessler said.
Carson waved on his feet and Frank grabbed him in a bear hug to
prevent him from falling. Carson took hold of the floor again.
"What's going on? I haven't heard from you in two days," Frank
looked at his friend closely. "You look like shit! What the hell are you
doing?"
"Nothing," Carson said moving nervously into the house.
"Gosh, you reek," Frank said.
Carson walked into the living room and sat down on the edge of the
sofa. Frank sat on the love seat. Empty glasses with dried liquid
peppered the coffee table along with a few empty beer cans. Several
bags of potato chips and pretzels lay opened on the table. The glass
tabletop was stained with watermarks and spilled sour beer.
"This place is a pigsty!" Frank said. "Listen, I know it's tough with
Linda missing, but you can't just sit here and drink your life away.
You've got to help find her. People at the hospital are worried about you
and we have to find out what's causing this craziness."
"I have nothing without Linda and you sound like my mother. What
good doing anything without her? She is everything."
Anthony Samuel Policastro 269
"She's is everything and she isn t. You have to go on and especially
now if you want her back. You have to pull yourself together and fight
back!"
"Oh what the fuck do I know? The devil may really have risen up,
taking people to hell. Maybe, it's the end of the world. Maybe, we're all
being punished for being so greedy, and heartless, and unconcerned
about our fellow human beings! I don't know what to believe anymore,"
Carson said between tears.
He watched his friend cry for a few moments and then took a deep
breath.
"But, if you want Linda back you have to do something! Get out of
this rut."
Carson looked at him and then looked away in disgust at his
surroundings.
"I know, but it seems so hopeless. I really don't know what to do."
The two men sat in silence for a few moments.
"Two women came by yesterday, and they said they could find
Linda," Carson said. "But, I didn't believe them and threw them out.
They were weird and I didn't trust them. One said this cult kidnapped
Linda and they planned to make her the devil's bride. I just couldn t take
it."
"Can you get in touch with them?" Frank said. "They could be the
only lead we have right now."
"I think so. Look around for a small pad. It's around here
somewhere," Carson said looking around. "It has her number on it."
"This it?" Frank said picking up a small white pad from under the
coffee table.
Carson looked at it.
"Yeah, that's it."
"Chantress? What kind of name is that?" Frank asked staring at the
handwriting.
Carson shrugged.
"Maybe, she made it up. It s nice. I like it," Frank said. "What she
look like?"
270 Absence of Faith
"I don't know," Carson said. "Tall, thin, long black hair, clear skin.
What else you want to know?"
"Oh."
"Her friend is better looking."
"Really? What s her name?"
"Yanni."
"Ok, now I m convinced you re on something."
"No, really that s her name, the same as the famous musician. That s
how I remembered it."
"Well, here. Call her!" Frank said handing the pad to Carson.
"I sort of don't want to talk to her. I was wasted when I saw them."
"You want your wife back or not? Now call!" Frank said.
Carson walked into the kitchen and picked the telephone. His head
ached. He stared at the phone not wanting to call, but he did.
The Hunter - Chapter 46
People who met Jack Graham said he was like a cloud floating
through life, being pushed in this direction or that at the slightest breeze
or suggestion. But people who were his friends knew he was different.
Beneath his easy-going, fluid personality was an aggressive, cunning,
and clever predator, who held the record for the most deer bagged in
one season at the Red Bank Gun Club. Some said his passiveness was an
act, but his real friends knew he was staking out those around him as if
they were prey, and his easy-going charm left them all the more
unsuspecting. His modus operandi worked well for him in the jungles
of Vietnam, and it worked well for him now in business. Jack was not
malicious. His stalking had just become a way of life for him, almost an
unconscious habit that he sometimes didn't realize he was doing. It was
one of the reasons Jack wasn't surprised when Homer Whitehead called
him one evening.
"Hello, Jack. We need your help. It may require two weeks of your
time for a few hours each day. You think you can do it?"
"Sure. Why not? What it is?" he said in his usual agreeable tone.
Homer explained the details to Jack and Jack agreed.
On the first night of his assignment, Jack went to Stokes' office
dressed in a light gray suit. Big-boned and muscular with a full-face and
a red beard, Jack's presence had an intimidating effect on most people he
272 Absence of Faith
approached. It was one of the reasons he had done so well in his own
business selling security equipment. He literally scared people into
buying his equipment and services, he would say. Stokes told other
doctors that Jack was a new candidate for the hospital board of trustees
and that he had to give him a brief tour of the facility, but the real reason
was so he could point out Nurse Janice Doherty to him. Jack memorized
her face, her figure and noticed her walk for several minutes as she
moved between patient's rooms and the nursing station. The whole time
Jack talked and joked with another nurse sitting behind the nursing
station.
That evening Jack returned to the hospital about an hour before
Nurse Doherty would end her shift. He parked his four-wheel Jeep
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