Bad Thoughts

Chapter 17

Shannon’s eyes opened before the alarm went off. Susie’s small body was against his. He could feel her chest rising and lowering as she breathed. He could feel a moist heat coming from her body.

They didn’t talk much yesterday when she got home. There wasn’t much to say. He couldn’t tell her where he’d been and she was too worn out to blame him. The silence, though, was different than usual. There was nothing heavy or oppressive about it. It was almost comforting. Almost as if the last few years had been stripped clean. As if they still had a shot.

The alarm went off. Shannon watched as Susie started to stir. Watched as consciousness seeped into her. She pushed herself out of bed and turned off the alarm, and then turned and stood looking at him, her eyes struggling against the morning light.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

Shannon stretched lazily. “Better than I would’ve thought.”

“I didn’t know how you were going to look when you showed up yesterday. Whether you’d be all beat up or worse. At least you came home in one piece this time.”

“Seems like I did.”

“Yes, it does.” She sat on the edge of the bed and put a hand behind Shannon’s neck. “Maybe a few pounds lighter, but at least you weren’t coughing up blood or anything.”

“And no rat bites this year.”

Susie withdrew her hand from his neck. “That’s not funny,” she complained.

“No, I guess it’s not. I’m sorry. I just wish I knew what I’d been doing out there.”

Susie tried to smile at him but didn’t have much luck with it. After a while she got up and told him she was going to take a shower.

As Shannon lay on his back he found himself feeling strangely at peace. He thought about the two women, Rose Hartwell and the one in Boston, both lying dead with knives sticking out of their mouths. He tried to imagine what the woman in Boston looked like and came up with some vague impression. None of this affected his sense of well-being. The water for the shower turned on and Shannon listened to its soft drone. He let it numb his mind as the images crystallized and then faded away.

Later, as Shannon was shaving, he heard a muffled cry. He felt his heart drop to his feet as he ran from the bathroom. Susie was standing by the front door holding a newspaper. She turned to face him, her eyes pained, confused. “Rose-” she started, “oh my God…”

Shit, Shannon thought as he moved to her and held her.

There were a few curious stares as Shannon entered the squad room. Most of his fellow officers asked how he was doing. A couple, like Ed Poulett, just smirked. Joe DiGrazia looked relieved to see his partner. He got up from his desk and greeted him.

“I talked with your neighbor, Brad Hartwell, last night.” DiGrazia kept his voice low as he leaned his thick knuckles against Shannon’s desk and edged forward. “The guy didn’t seem too shook up about his wife’s murder.”

“As I was telling you before, they were having problems.”

“Yeah, well, let me tell you about your neighbor. He’s got a big mouth. He likes to talk. If he is involved, buddy boy, he’ll be bragging about it and we’ll nail him.” DiGrazia hesitated. “How’d things go with Susie?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Pretty good-”

The phone rang. Captain Martin Brady wanted Shannon in his office.

Brady looked uncomfortable as he sat behind his desk, his face frozen in a queer kind of smile. Sitting to the right of him was a man with a long, dour face. From the way he was grimacing it was a good bet he was suffering from some sort of intestinal problem. Shannon recognized him from Hartwell’s apartment. Brady nodded at Shannon and asked him to close the door.

“Enjoy your time off?” Brady asked.

Shannon told him it flew by.

“Well, good, good.” Brady pushed forward quickly. “I’d like you to meet Special Agent Douglas Swallow.”

“Glad to meet you,” Shannon acknowledged. Special Agent Swallow made no movement at the introduction. Shannon didn’t bother to extend his hand.

“Doug is out of the FBI’s Sex Crime unit,” Brady explained. “He’s helping out with the investigation of a couple of murders we’ve had. You know about that, though, don’t you?”

“Joe filled me in.”

“You investigated one of them?”

“As it turns out, I guess I did. At least somewhat.”

“Where have you been?” Agent Swallow broke in. His voice had a sharp crack to it.

“What?”

“You don’t understand English?”

“What’s going on here?” Shannon demanded of Brady.

Brady placed both his hands on his desk, palms up. “Doug has a few questions to ask you.”

“And why’s that?”

“Because of the way you reacted at Roberson’s murder site,” Swallow said. “Because your neighbor was murdered yesterday by potentially the same individual. And because no one knows where you’ve been the past week.”

Shannon took an almost imperceptible step forward. “I’ve been on disability leave,” he stated softly.

“They’re all good points, Bill,” Brady argued. “Now, we’re not accusing you of anything, but they’re good points and we’d like to understand things better.”

“Should I be getting a lawyer?”

“Not unless you’ve done something where you need a lawyer. Have you, Bill?”

Shannon shook his head. “I don’t need a lawyer.”

“Of course you don’t. We never thought you did. We just have some questions, that’s all. There’s nothing for you to get upset about. And nothing leaves this office.”

“Where have you been the past week?” Swallow demanded.

“I don’t know.”

A loud noise escaped from the FBI agent. Brady’s round, pudgy face seemed to deflate at the same moment as if a pin had punctured it. “That’s not helping any, Bill,” he started.

“I really don’t know,” Shannon explained. “Six days ago I blacked out. I came out of it yesterday.”

Agent Swallow looked incredulous. “You’re trying to tell us that you don’t-”

“That I don’t know where I’ve been,” Shannon said, nodding. “I came out of it in a basement of an abandoned building in Roxbury yesterday afternoon. That’s the first thing I remember since I blacked out.”

Brady and Swallow exchanged glances.

“This isn’t good, Bill,” Brady said.

“I’m sorry.”

“You’re trying to tell us you don’t remember what you’ve been doing?” Swallow demanded.

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“This so-called blackout…”

“A week ago Wednesday, I was sitting at the bar at the Black Rose trying to see how much bourbon I could pour into me. Next thing I remembered was yesterday.”

Swallow got out of his chair and started pacing. “This is bullshit,” he said.

“I’ve been sick,” Shannon tried to explain. “It’s what happened.”

“You willing to take a polygraph?”

Shannon shrugged. “If I have to.”

Swallow got within a half foot of Shannon, his face pinched, the skin around his mouth drawn tight. “If you have to, huh?” He shook his head. “Were you with anyone?”

“I don’t know.”

“I want an address for your abandoned building.”

Shannon gave it to him. Swallow slowly backed away and sat back down in his chair. Brady exhaled a lung full of air through his mouth, the noise escaping from him in a slow hiss. “This really doesn’t leave us much choice, Bill.”

“What do you mean?”

“You behavior has been, at the very least, erratic. And this doesn’t sound good at all.”

“I’ve been sick.”

“I understand that, but still…” Brady shook his head slowly, almost painfully.

“We need physical evidence from you,” said Swallow.

All Shannon could do was stare at him.

“We need a blood sample to match against-”

“Fuck you.”

“I thought you were willing to cooperate?” Brady asked.

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“And what the fuck are you trying to pull?” Swallow demanded, his face reddening, his lips receding into a razor-thin smile. “You give us this bullshit story about blacking out for a week.”

Dave Zeltserman

Bad Thoughts

“I told you I blacked out for five days-”

“Bill,” Brady said, “both your blood type and the type found at the Roberson murder site is O positive.”

“You think I had anything to do with that murder? Come on, Martin, O positive is the most common blood type out there.”

Brady let out a long sigh. “Unless you cooperate, I’m going to have to suspend you. At least until we can prove you didn’t have any involvement with these murders. If you give us a sample we can have it cleared up in-how long would it take, Doug?”

“With some luck, an hour. It depends whether we can rule him out with a quickie DNA test. If there are enough matches we’ll have to send the samples to Washington for a more complex analysis. If that happens it could take a couple of weeks to get the results back.”

“It’s all up to you, Bill. You can make it hard for everyone, especially yourself, or you can make it easy. Which way is it going to be?”

Shannon felt a hotness flushing his face. He looked at both men; Brady with his soft acquiescent smile and Swallow with his dour hostility. Fine way to treat a fellow police officer, he thought bitterly.

“Fine,” he said. “If Special Agent Swallow wants my blood, he can have it.”

“I’m glad you’re being reasonable,” Brady said. “Hopefully, we’ll get this cleared up today. Doug, if you don’t mind I’d like to talk to Bill privately for a minute.”

“I’ll be right outside,” Swallow said. He moved quickly as he left the office.

Brady shifted uncomfortably in his chair as he considered Shannon. “This business about blacking out…”

“I’ve been sick-”

“Yes, I’ve heard that before. You already told me you were drinking heavily. Are drugs involved?”

“No.”

“Just alcohol then?”

“I’m not an alcoholic.” Shannon hesitated. “This problem I have, it’s some sort of illness. I’ve been seeing a therapist about it.”

“This has happened before?”

Shannon nodded.

“And DiGrazia knows about it, doesn’t he?” Brady asked angrily. “Goddammit! And all these years Joe’s been lying to me about it.”

“I’m trying to work this out-”

“So when you have these blackouts you don’t know what you do, is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

“Martin,” Shannon started helplessly, “I’m trying to get help with this.”

“For all you know you could be killing these women.”

“No. Not a chance. I wasn’t gone when Roberson was murdered.”

“What do you mean you weren’t gone?”

“I hadn’t blacked out yet.”

“When do you have these blackouts?”

“After I’ve been sick-”

“Always the same time every year, is that it?” As Brady looked at Shannon his face softened. “What’s behind them, Bill?”

Shannon turned away. “I really don’t know. That’s what I’ve been seeing a therapist to find out.”

Brady started to say something and then closed his mouth. He sat back in his chair, his eyes glassy, his lips pressed tightly together. It became very quiet in the office. A painfully uncomfortable quiet. Finally, Brady told Shannon how much he didn’t like the situation.

“It’s something I can manage-” Shannon started.

“Obviously, it’s not. Not when you can’t function for weeks at a time.”

“It’s over, Martin. At least for this year.”

“Uh-uh.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m putting you in for a psychiatric evaluation. Pending the results, you’ll be assigned desk duty. You want to file a union protest?”

Shannon stared straight at Brady. His hands were shaking. He told the captain that he didn’t want to file a union protest.

“You sure? We can call your union rep right now.”

“I’m sure.”

“ ’Cause I don’t want to impinge on your rights-”

“I said I’m sure.”

“Okay, I need your service revolver.”

Shannon removed it from his shoulder holster and handed it to him.

“You have any others at home?”

“Me? With any unlicensed weapons? You should know I wouldn’t break any departmental regulations.”

Shannon turned to leave but Brady stopped him.

“Bill, remember, if I wanted you off the force you’d be off the force right now.”

“Is that all?”

“One more thing.” Brady paused for a moment. “This has been bothering me for several months. How did you know where to find Janice Rowley?”

“I really don’t know. I just woke up knowing I had to get in my car and start driving. I didn’t know I was going to find her until I did. Why, are you going to blame her death on me, also?”

Brady ignored the question. “Cooperate with Swallow. Let’s get this cleared up and over with.”

Shannon sat in a small windowless room, waiting for his test results. The room was no larger than a prison cell, about six feet by nine feet. The door was closed. Shannon had heard Agent Swallow lock it from the outside. Aside from the chair he was sitting on, there was no other furniture in it.

An hour passed before the door opened and Agent Swallow gestured for him to get up. He looked more constipated than anything else. He waited until Shannon had joined him in the hall before telling him the test results were negative.

“Tough luck, huh?” Shannon remarked as he turned to leave. He was halfway down the hallway before he heard Swallow barking at his back.

“I don’t want you anywhere near this investigation,” Swallow yelled, his voice straining to a croak. “You understand me?”

Shannon kept walking. There wasn’t much else he could do.