“You did?” Bess asked in genuine confusion.
“I did.”
“Well, I guess I’m flattered. Do you maybe want a drink? Or is this a social call?” She was suddenly grateful that Lucy had disappeared. The last thing she wanted was an audience. Or Lucy having a window into her private life.
“Sure, I’d love a drink. What’s good?”
“Uh, what do you like? IPA? Stout? Lager?”
Greg considered for a moment. “It’s too hot out for dark beer. How about an IPA?”
“You’re in luck. We just tapped this Deschutes Fresh Squeezed IPA. It’s sort of citrusy.”
“Sounds good to me. Thanks.” He accepted the beer and sipped it tentatively. “I can’t really stay long, but I did want to come by, tell you I had a nice time.” He reached for his wallet but Bess waved at him.
“This one’s on me. And, it was really great of you to stop by, but I’ve got to get back to work. It was nice to see you, though.” Bess gave him her practiced customer service smile.
“Oh sure,” Greg said, standing. “You know, I should go. I’ll call you later, okay?”
“Absolutely. But you didn’t even finish your drink.”
Greg was already out the door.
“The fuck is this?” Lucy said, coming up next to her and pointing to the full beer.
“We had a customer. Where the hell were you?”
“I had to pee. We really had someone come in and leave in the time I was back there? And they didn’t even finish their drink?”
“We really did, yes. Next time make sure someone else is up here to cover before you leave.”
Bess walked off with the beer in hand.
“Seriously?” Lucy called after her.
“What? He didn’t take a single sip. You think I should pour it out?”
“Not my business…”
“You’re right, none of it is.”
If Greg actually did call her, she planned to let him know his presence in her bookstore was not appreciated. She’d worked her ass off to be seen as an authority figure here, to be respected. All this focus on who she dated made her seem childish.
Bess closed up the store that night and, as usual, was the last to leave. The Rabbit Hole didn’t have its own parking lot, but there was a small free community lot across the street that customers and employees used. It was shared with patrons from the other businesses on the block as well, with the exception of Pat’s Deli on the corner, which had its own private lot.
The streetlights kicked on before the sun set and by the time it was full dark the area was washed in soft orange light and long, slender shadows. Bess’s sneakers scuffed across the pavement. She’d parked her white 2007 Oldsmobile Aurora in the farthest corner of the lot. Her cell phone was in one hand, her car keys in the other. The keys poked out through her fingers like little daggers, ready to punch holes into anyone foolish enough to sneak up behind her. It was a habit she’d picked up in college when late-night walks across campus were the norm.
She was only ten feet from her car when she noticed a white paper stuck under her windshield wiper. Unlike the occasional takeout menus left there, this appeared to be a fully blank piece of paper, it wasn’t even folded. Bess approached it slowly, scanning the lot for anything out of the ordinary, a person, a car, perhaps a large stack of papers.
Gingerly, she reached out and plucked the paper from her windshield. On the opposite side, in careful block letters: JULY 20.
“Feast Day,” Bess whispered.
3
THE DOOR HAD barely closed behind her and already Bess had kicked her shoes off and hung her purse on a hook. She headed straight for her computer, pulled up a search engine and typed: July 20
The results were not encouraging.
International Chess Day, Moon Day, Nap Day, National Fortune Cookie Day, National Lollipop Day…
This wasn’t working. Goddamn mysterious notes with their goddamn cryptic bullshit. She leaned back in her desk chair and closed her eyes. Taking a few deep breaths, Bess tried to calm her mind and focus on the facts.
Someone knew she’d received that transmission last night. And the note on her car validated her connection between the words in the transmission and Margaret of Antioch’s feast day. But Bess wasn’t sure if she should be nervous about the mysterious note, or someone’s apparent knowledge of the message she’d received. Every question she asked herself led to more and more questions. The only thing certain was that someone asked for help last night, and maybe it meant she was an idiot, but she intended to try and help.
When Bess heard her phone ringing she opened her eyes and reached for it.
“Hello?” she asked.
Nothing but silence on the other end. She rolled her eyes. Telemarketers waiting for her to say hello a second time before launching into their pitch. Instead, she hung up.
Turning her attention back to the computer, she tried a different search.
Antioch News July 20
There it was. The sort of headline she didn’t know she’d been looking for: Local Girl Still Missing.
Bess clicked the headline and read.
Antioch police are still searching for a local woman reported missing on July 20th. Amy Eckhardt went missing after driving her red ’03 Dodge Neon to a local store for dog food. Her roommate, Monica Bortles, called police when Amy still hadn’t returned home the next morning.
The Sheriff’s Office is in search of any information that could lead them to find Amy. She is described to be 5’07”, 145lbs., with strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes.
If you have any information on Eckhardt’s whereabouts, contact Detective Scott Howland at 270-555-2307.
Bess read the article a second time.
New York City. Norwich City. Marie. Mary Bea. Amelia Earhart. Amy Eckhardt.
So maybe a ghost hadn’t contacted her after all.
Bess’s mouth felt very dry, so she retrieved a bottle of water from the fridge. She took a long swig, but immediately choked on it when her doorbell rang. Leaning forward, she hacked spit-mingled water onto the carpet, gasping for air.
“The fuck?” she managed. The door blurred as she squinted at it through tear-filled eyes. Dizzy from the coughing, she walked over and got up on her tiptoes to peek through the decorative glass embedded at the top. She couldn’t see anyone, although her field of vision was pretty limited. Maybe her choking scared whoever it was away.
Bess poked her thin neck out the door and looked around. The light from her neighbor’s porch illuminated most of her yard and the lamplight streaming through her own front windows cast crooked shadows across the porch. She closed the door once again and turned the lock.
The melodic ring of her cell phone cut through the room.
Her heart thudded in her chest. She rushed to the phone and snatched it up.
“Hello?”
Silence.
“Carol? Is that you?”
The voice on the other end was almost too soft to be a whisper. It was well-articulated wind. “It’s not Carol.”
Bess’s eyes filled with tears and she bit back the scream that fought its way up her throat.
“Amy?”
A long screeching wail cut through the line. Bess winced and pulled the phone away from her ear.
“MARGARET!” The shrieking noise sounded neither male nor female. It was the sound of agony and rage made pure and given voice. “You be good now, MARGARET!”
“Who is this?” Bess screamed into the receiver.
Silence.
And then the whisper: “Find me, Bess.”
There was a roar—or maybe more of a ferocious gurgle—and the line died.
Bess dropped the phone. Her hands clasped at her chest as if to catch her heart before it could escape. Her mouth was open, but no sounds made their way out.