He’d never really considered that it would be something coming his way though—because who the hell wanted to consider any of that shit? As he sat here, studying the drawing, he noted that his hand continued to go around and around. He wasn’t sure what to do about it, but, when he tried to stop and put down the pencil, he was almost subconsciously forced to pick it back up again. He shook his head.
“I don’t know what this is,” he muttered, “but it needs to stop.”
And, of course, stopping was something that he thought he was doing, but his hand wasn’t paying any attention to him. And then, understanding that he needed to address the spirit, he looked at his hands and asked, “What is it you need to do? What is it I need to know that I’m not getting?”
Almost immediately his hand started to write a name. Shivers went down his back, as his hand wrote, “Kate, Kate, Kate,” over and over and over again. Finally it stopped, and he stared down at the message on the notepad. But it wasn’t very much of a message; it was just her name, over and over again.
“What the hell,” he cried out. “What is it you want me to know about this? What am I supposed to do?”
He picked up the pencil and waited for an answer. But there was nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
Chapter 13
Kate knocked onthe second door. When the woman answered, Kate smiled, identified herself, and stated, “We’re just checking around the neighborhood and asking a few questions about whether you saw any of your neighbors out and about early in the morning on these dates.” Then she gave the dates of the four recent murders.
The woman looked at her in surprise. “Oh my, this is about those poor women, isn’t it?”
Kate nodded. “Yes, we’re just confirming some times and dates of people coming and going.”
“Well,” she began, “being runners, of course, they’re up early.”
“So you know they are runners,huh?”
“Everybody knows they are runners,” she stated, with an eye roll. “And, if you weren’t into running, you just weren’t on their radar. It’s not that they were mean or anything,” she hurriedly added. “It’s just that their whole focus was running.”
Kate nodded slowly. “And that’s an interesting thing, isn’t it? I’ve never met anybody who was quite so obsessive about running.”
“Me either,” she agreed. “I’ve never liked exercising, and thankfully I’m skinny, so it’s not as if I have to do it for weight loss or anything. Yet I know that my husband in particular always wanted me to do more to get fit.”
“Right,” she noted. “So, have you ever seen any of your neighbors head out for their runs?”
“In the morning, no,” she replied, “I like sleep too much.”
“Nothing ever wakes you? You haven’t heard or seen any signs of anybody at all?”
“Nope,” she said, “they used to go running in the afternoon, or the evening every once in a while, but I haven’t seen that very much either. Honestly, when you see something over and over again, you just block it out. It’s like it’s a normal thing, so you don’t even register that it’s happening.”
“That is very true,” Kate admitted, as she nodded. “If you do happen to remember anything,” she added, “could you give me a call?” She handed over her card.
The woman nodded. “I can. I just don’t know that I can be of any help.”
“Well, at this point in time,” Kate stated, “we have very limited suspects, and we’re just crossing ourTs and dotting ourIs just to make sure we don’t miss anything.”
“I know the husbands used to run,” she noted suddenly.
“I know the one did,” Kate murmured. “Did the other one run too?”
“They used to run together every once in a while.”
Kate stopped and stared at her. “Are you saying that the husbands of the two women who were murdered used to run together?”
She nodded. “They did. Not so much early in the morning. I don’t think at least”—she paused—“but then what do I know? Because honestly I’m not kidding when I said I don’t do mornings. So, I don’t really know what anybody was doing in the morning, but I used to see the husbands sometimes going out in the afternoon.”
“But not for a long time?”
“I presume no, not for a long time,” she replied, “not since Agnew’s accident.”