Before He Feels (A Mackenzie White Mystery—Book 6)

PROLOGUE He’d read the book at least a dozen times, but that was okay. It was a good book and he had even gone so far as to give each character his or her own voice. It also helped that it was one of his favorites—Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury. To most, it might seem like an odd book to read to the residents of a home for the blind, but everyone he’d ever read it to seemed to like it. He was nearing the end, and his latest resident was eating it up. Ellis, a fifty-seven-year-old woman, had told him she’d been born blind and lived the past eleven years in the home, after her son had decided he didn’t want the baggage of a blind mother anymore, and placed her in the Wakeman Home for the Blind. Ellis seemed to like him right away. She’d later told him that she told very few of the other residents about him because she enjoyed having him to herself. And that was fine with him. As a matter of fact, that was pretty much perfect as far as he was concerned. Even better, about three weeks ago she had insisted that they leave the grounds of the home; she wanted to enjoy his storytelling in the fresh air, with the breeze on her face. And while there wasn’t much of a breeze today—it was, actually, gruelingly hot—that was fine by him. They were sitting in a small rose garden about half a mile away from the home. It was, she’d said, a place she visited a lot. She liked the smell of the roses and the buzzing of the bees. And now, his voice, telling her Ray Bradbury’s story. He was glad that she liked him so much. He liked her, too. Ellis didn’t interrupt his reading with hundreds of questions like some of the others did. She simply sat there, looking into space she had never properly seen, and hung on each and every word. As he came to the end of a chapter, he checked his watch. He had already stayed ten minutes beyond his usual time. He didn’t have any others he planned to visit today, but he did have plans for later in the evening. Placing his bookmark between the pages, he set the book down. Without the story to distract him, he realized just how oppressive the southern heat was on his back. “Is that it for today?” Ellis asked. He smiled at the observation. It never failed to amaze him how well the other senses made up for lack of sight. She’d heard him shift on the small bench near the center of the garden, then the soft noise of the book being placed on his leg. “Yeah, I’m afraid so,” he said. “I’ve already worn out my welcome by ten minutes.” “How much is left?” she asked. “About forty pages. So we’ll knock it out next week. Sound good?” “Sounds perfect,” she said. She then frowned slightly and added: “Do you mind if I ask you…well, you know…it’s so dumb, but…” “No, that’s fine, Ellis.” He leaned in close to her and let her touch his face. She ran her hands along the contours of it. He understood the need for it (and Ellis wasn’t the only blind woman who had done this to him) but it still weirded him out. A brief smile came to her mouth as she made her way around his head and then removed her hands. “Thanks,” she said. “And thanks for reading. I was wondering if you had any ideas for the next book?” “Depends what you’re in the mood for.” “A classic, maybe?” “This is Ray Bradbury,” he said. “That’s about as classic as I get. I do think I have The Lord of the Flies lying around somewhere.” “That’s the one about the boys stranded on the island, right?” “Boiled down, yes.” “Sounds good. But this one…this Something Wicked This Way Comes is brilliant. Great choice!” “Yeah, it’s one of my favorites.” He was rather glad that she could not see the devious smile on his face. Something wicked this way comes, indeed, he thought. He picked up his book, well-worn and battered from years of use, first opened about thirty years ago. He waited for her to stand with him, like an impatient date. She had her walking stick with her but she rarely used it. The walk back to the Wakeman Home for the Blind was a short one. He liked to watch the look of concentration on her face as she started walking. He wondered what it must be like to rely on all of your other senses to move around. It must be exhausting to maneuver around a world without being able to see it. As he studied her face, he hoped, most of all, that Ellis had enjoyed what she’d heard of the book. He held his book tightly, almost a little disappointed that Ellis would never find out how it ended. * Ellis found herself thinking of the young boys from Something Wicked This Way Comes. It was October in the book. She wished it was October here. But no…it was the end of July in southern Virginia, and she didn’t think it could get any hotter. Even after planning her walk just before twilight, the temperature was still a cruel ninety degrees according to Siri on her iPhone. Sadly, she had come to know Siri well. She was a great way to pass the time, speaking in her snooty little robotic voice, filling Ellis in on trivia, weather updates, and sports scores. There were a few tech people at the home who always made sure all of her computer gadgets were updated. She had a MacBook stocked with iTunes and a pretty substantial music library. She also had the latest iPhone and even a top-of-the-line app that responded to an attached gadget that allowed her to interact in Braille. Siri had just told her that it was eighty-seven degrees outside. That seemed impossible, seeing as how it was almost 7:30 in the evening. Ah well, she thought. A little sweat never hurt anyone. She thought about just forgetting her walk. It was a walk she took at least five times a week. And she’d already taken it once today to meet with the man who read to her. She didn’t need the exercise but…well, she had certain rituals and routines. It made her feel normal. It made her feel sane. Plus, there was something to the sound of the afternoon while the sun was setting. She could feel it setting and hear something like a soft electric hum in the air as the world fell quiet, pulling dusk in with night on its heels. So she decided to go for a walk. Two people within the home said goodbye to her, familiar voices—one filled with boredom, the other with a dulled cheer. She relished the feel of fresh air on her face as she stepped out onto the main lawn. “Where the hell are you going, Ellis?” It was another familiar voice—the manager of Wakeman, a jolly man named Randall Jones. “My usual walk,” she answered. “It’s so hot, though! You be quick about it. I don’t want you passing out!” “Or missing my ridiculous curfew,” she said. “Yeah, or that,” Randall said with a bit of scorn. She carried on with her walk, feeling the looming presence of the home fall away behind her. She felt an open space ahead of her, the lawn waiting for her. Beyond that was the sidewalk and, half a mile later, the rose garden. Ellis hated the idea that she was nearing sixty and had a curfew. She understood it, but it made her feel like a child. Still, other than her lack of sight, she had it pretty sweet at the Wakeman Home for the Blind. She even had that nice man who came in to read to her once a week—and sometimes twice. She knew that he read to a few others, too. But those were people at other homes. Here at Wakeman, she was the only one he read to. It made her feel special. It made her feel like he preferred her. He’d complained to her that most of the others enjoyed romance novels or best-seller drivel. But with Ellis, he could read things he enjoyed. Two weeks ago, they’d finished up Cujo by Stephen King. And now there was this Bradbury book and— She paused in her walk, c*****g her head slightly. She thought she’d heard something close to her. But after pausing, she did not hear it again. Probably just an animal passing through the woods on my right, she thought. It was southern Virginia after all…and there were lots of woods and lots of critters living in them. She tapped her cane out ahead of her, finding a weird sort of comfort in its familiar click click noise as it struck the sidewalk. While she obviously had never seen the sidewalk or the road alongside of it, they had been described to her several times. She’d also put something of a mental picture together in her mind, connecting smells with the descriptions of flowers and trees that some of the home’s aides and caretakers had given her. Within five minutes, she could smell the roses several yards ahead. She could hear the bees buzzing around them. Sometimes she thought she could even smell the bees, covered in pollen and whatever honey they were producing elsewhere. She knew the path to the rose garden so well that she could have made her way around it without the use of her cane. She’d lapped it at least one thousand times in the course of her eleven years at the home. She came out here to reflect on her life, how things had gotten so difficult that her husband had left her fifteen years ago and then her son eleven years ago. She didn’t miss her bastard of an ex-husband at all, but she did miss the feel of a man’s hands on her. If she was being honest with herself, it was one of the reasons she enjoyed feeling the face of the man who read to her. He had a strong chin, high cheekbones, and one of those southern drawls to his voice that was addictive to listen to. He could read her the phone book and she’d enjoy it. She was thinking of him as she felt herself enter the familiar contours of the garden. The concrete was crisp and hard under her feet but everything else in front of her felt soft and inviting. She paused for a moment and discovered that, as was usually the case in the afternoons, she had the place to herself. No one else was there. Again, she stopped. She heard something behind her. Feel it, too, she thought. “Who is that?” she asked. She got no answer. She had come out this late because she knew the garden would be deserted. Very few came out after six in the afternoon because the town of Stateton, in which the Wakeman Home for the Blind was located, was a tiny speck of a place. When she had stepped outside fifteen minutes ago, she’d listened for the movement of anyone else who might be out on the front lawn and had heard no one. She’d also heard no one else on the sidewalk as she had come down to the garden. There was the possibility that someone could be out with the intention of sneaking up on her and scaring her, but that could be risky. There were repercussions to such behavior in this town, laws that were enforced by a tried and true southern police force that didn’t take s**t when it came to local teens and bullies trying to pick on the disabled. But there it was again. She heard the noise, and the feeling that someone was there was stronger now. She smelled someone. It was not a bad smell at all. In fact, it was familiar. Fear ran through her then, and she opened her mouth to yell. But before she could, suddenly, she felt an immense pressure around her throat. She felt something else, too, radiating off of the person like heat. Hate. She gagged, unable to yell, to speak, to breathe, and she felt herself sinking to her knees. The pressure tightened around her throat and that feeling of hate seemed to penetrate her, as pain spread throughout her body, and for the first time, Ellis was relieved that she was blind. As she felt her life slipping from her, she was relieved she would not have to lay eyes upon the face of evil. Instead, she had only that all-too-familiar darkness behind her eyes to welcome her into whatever awaited her after this life.