Haunted (13 page)

He caught Rae doing a rearview mirror check, too. “No. Like I said, it’s just a feeling, an eyeballs-on-my-back kind
of thing.”

All Anthony wanted was to have whoever was after Rae and whoever had snatched Jesse in front of him. He
would pummel them until his hands bled and love every second of it. If he could just remember where he’d seen
that scorpion tattoo. Let me tell you some of what the book said. That way we can get down to work as soon as we
get to my house,” Rae suggested, pulling him out of his thoughts.

Her house. They were getting way too close to her house. The lawns were getting bigger. The houses were getting
bigger, too. Bigger and cleaner looking.

Like someone spent all day buffing up every inch with a toothbrush.

“You know what? I think we’ve got more important stuff to spend time on,” Anthony said. “After Jesse’s back and
after we get whoever’s after you put away, then we can-”

“Forget it, Fascinelli,” Rae interrupted. “You’re not weaseling out of this.”

She meant it. That was clear as freakin’ glass.

Sweat started popping out all over his body. He could hardly read. He could hardly do a simple math problem. But
when it came to sweat-he was A-plus all the way.

Anthony turned onto Rae’s street, then pulled into her driveway next to the Chevette already sitting there. Great.

Her dad was home. And he was some kind of college professor or something. He was going to take one look at
Anthony and realize.

“I know. I feel the same way about the Chevette,” Rae said, obviously misreading the pained look on his face. “But
my dad thinks it’s cool. He specializes in Arthurian stuff, so he doesn’t have the greatest grip on reality.”

Arthurian stuff. Anthony had no idea what that was. He hadn’t even met the guy, and already Rae’s father was
making him feel stupid.

Rae gave the door handle a quick rub with her sleeve-she hadn’t put her waxy stuff back on yet then got out of the
car. Anthony got out, too-what choice was there?-and followed her into the house.

“Are you hungry or thirsty or anything?” Rae asked.

“No,” Anthony answered quickly.

“Then let’s just go back to my room,” Rae said, starting down the hall, which had been painted with fluffy clouds.

“Dad,” she called over her shoulder.

“I’m home. And I brought one of my friends from group.”

“That’s nice,” a male voice called back.

“He’s relieved that anyone will even come over,”

Rae whispered. “Other than you, Yana’s the only person who has since The Incident.” Rae opened one of the
doors and ushered him into her room. It was… sophisticated. That was the word that came slowly-into Anthony’s
mind. The walls had been painted to look like green and black marble, and there was a black leather chair in front of
the black desk.

Total Cardinal room. Just standing in it ramped up the sweat production.

“So, um, sit down and let’s get started,” Rae said.

Anthony glanced at the black leather chair. If he sat in that thing, he was afraid he’d leave a wet streak across the
back. But it was the only chair in the room.

Anthony cautiously sat down on the edge of the bed, which felt somehow not right.

Rae grabbed a binder off her desk and a magazine off her bedside table, then she sat down next to Anthony. He’d
been thinking she’d take the chair, but now he’d have to contend with the grapefruit smell of hers on top of
everything else.

“Okay, I want you to read a page of one of the articles in here out loud.” She passed the magazine over to him.

“Sorry it’s Glamour. I meant to buy something more manly, but I spaced.”

“Whatever,” Anthony mumbled. The choice of the magazine was way low on the list of his problems right now. He
flipped past the pages and pages of glossy ads, trying not to look too closely at the babes, especially the ones in
their underwear. Not that he had to worry about that other problem right now. He stopped on the horoscope page,
figuring it was as good as anything. He opened his mouth, then closed it. He couldn’t do this. Couldn’t. Even if he
wanted to-which he didn’t-he couldn’t. There was no way he would even be able to force out a sound. It was like
even his teeth were sweating now.

“It’s just me,” Rae said, her voice all gentle and understanding.

Just her. Yeah, like that made it easier. She’d seen his workbook. She’d gotten some of his thoughts.

But that wasn’t the same as actually hearing him attempt to read in his completely pathetic way.

He shot a glance over at her. She was waiting.

And knowing Rae, she’d just keep on waiting and waiting and waiting. She was as stubborn as… as stubborn as
he was.

He stared at the first word in the first paragraph.

“Libra,” he said, getting an image of a scale. He moved his eyes to the next word. His finger itched to underline it
because that helped him focus, but he kept both hands wrapped around the magazine.

“Don’t”-he got an image of one of those circles with a slash through it-“bet”-a picture of a pile of poker chips
flashed into his head. Then he hesitated.

He knew the next word was an easy one. It was only two freakin’ letters long. Focus, he told himself.

Focus. “On,” he said. Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of Rae making a note in her binder. Great. He
really needed a permanent record of his humiliation. Anthony swallowed. Or tried to. His throat felt about as wide as
a piece of wire. Then he moved on to the next word. Crap. Another little one that everyone in the entire world would
know with no problem.

Everyone except him. He moved his finger over until it was positioned under the word. He didn’t care if it made him
look stupid. Not being able to come up with the word at all would make him seem a lot stupider.

“An,” he managed to get out. He looked at the next word. An image of a blond in a thong filled his head-“easy.” A
picture of a clock replaced the blond-“time.”

He had to stop and think again. Another one of those freakin’ baby words. And he didn’t know what it was. He felt
like a giant hand had just clamped down on his head, pressing through the bones of his skull, squeezing his gray
matter.

“Screw it.” Anthony thrust the magazine back at Rae and leaped to his feet. With two long strides he was at the
door. “We shouldn’t be wasting time with this, anyway,” he said, turning to face her. “Maybe the tattoo parlors in
town keep records of who gets what kind of tattoos.”

“It’s worth a shot,” Rae answered. “We can work on the reading more later.” She stood up and took one step
toward him.

“Frank,” Anthony burst out.

“What?” Rae asked.

“Frank. That’s the name of the guy with the scorpion tattoo on his hand. I met him at a keg party I went to with my
friend Gregg,” Anthony explained.

“Just Frank. No last name?” Rae said.

“Gregg will know how to find him. Can I use your phone?” He didn’t wait for her to answer. He rushed over to her
bedside table, snatched up the sleek black phone, and punched in Gregg’s number. He let out a low curse when an
answering machine picked up. “Gregg, it’s Fascinelli. I need to ask you something right away.

Call me at-” He looked at Rae. She told him her number, and he repeated it into the phone. “First thing, Gregg, all
right?” Anthony hung up, hoping Gregg wouldn’t be too high to focus on the message.

“So, I guess we don’t have to hit the tattoo parlors,” Rae said. She sat back down on the bed and picked up her
notebook.

“Yeah, but I can’t concentrate on anything else now. I don’t know how you can, either. With Jesse missing and
everything,” Anthony said.

“Don’t you want to know what the words you had trouble with have in common?” Rae asked, ignoring him.

“They’re all freakin’ baby words,” Anthony answered, flopping down next to her.

“They’re all words that don’t have images associated with them,” Rae countered. “They’re all words the book said
a lot of people with dyslexia would have trouble with.”

Anthony looked over at her, but he didn’t say anything. He was afraid of what would come out if he tried.

“Just stick with it for ten more minutes. Less than that if Gregg calls first,” Rae urged. “We’ll take one word that
was a problem for you-” She flipped open the magazine and found the spot where he’d had his little meltdown.

“We’ll take and and come up with a visual for you. That’s it. It won’t even be ten minutes.

Just try it, okay?”

Anthony knew when somebody was trying to feed him a line of bull. And Rae wasn’t. More than that, she really
seemed to care if he said yes or no. It was important to her somehow. “One word,” he finally agreed.

Rae jumped up and darted over to her closet. She pulled out a big plastic box and an old sheet.

She spread the sheet on the floor, then sat down with the box in front of her. “We’ll use clay,” she said as she
opened the box.

“Clay, yeah,” Anthony repeated, as if he actually had some idea what she was talking about. He walked over to the
sheet and sat down across from Rae. She gave him a lump of yellow modeling clay and took a lump of blue clay for
herself. “Make a hand,” she instructed. “Doesn’t matter how good it is.”

You can do that, Anthony told himself. About a minute later he had something that looked pretty much like a hand.

Close enough, anyway. He wanted this whole deal over with. “Now what?” he asked Rae.

She quickly finished up the last two clay fingers she’d been working on. “Now you take your hand and my hand-”

She passed him the blue clay hand she’d made. It had wrinkles and knuckles and everything, even a ring on one
finger. “And you link them together so they’re hand and hand. Keep the word and in your head as you connect
them.”

Anthony obediently joined the hands by smushing the clay fingers together. And, he thought. And, and, and, and,
and.

“So hopefully, next time you see the word and, you’ll get an image of the clay hands, and that-”

Rae was interrupted by the phone ringing.

Anthony snatched it up. “Gregg?” he burst out, then he nodded at Rae to let her know it was Gregg.

“Remember that guy we met at that party a couple of months ago, Frank something? Brown hair. Tattoo of a
scorpion on his hand.”

“With the girl in the Daisy Dukes?” Gregg asked.

“Yeah! Yeah! Him,” Anthony exclaimed. “Do you know where he lives?”

Gregg hesitated for so long, Anthony wanted to reach through the phone and strangle him.

“Dude, he lives right next door to the house where the party was. That’s why he was there,” Gregg finally said.

“Thanks.” Anthony hung up without saying goodbye. “Ready to roll?” he asked Rae.

“Always,” she said, snagging her jacket off her desk chair. “Dad, we decided to go out and grab some food,” Rae
called as she led the way back to the front door.

“Bring your cell,” he called back.

“He likes to be able to be in touch all the time since I got out of the hospital,” Rae explained as they headed to the
car.

“That’s cool,” Anthony answered. He could almost feel his blood slamming through his veins as he got behind the
wheel and pulled back onto the street. They were getting close now. Very close.

Maybe they’d even have Jesse back by the end of the night.

Even though I’m not good at reading, I’m good with directions, Anthony thought. He’d only been to the house
where the party was one time, but he remembered exactly where it was. He didn’t even have to think about how to
get there. He just drove.

Fifteen minutes later he was pulling into a parking spot about a block away from the place. He figured he shouldn’t
have his car exposed, just in case.

“What do you think?” he asked as they got out.

“The one on the left or the one on the right? All Gregg said was next door.”

“Let’s go right. Right for Rae,” she answered. It was her usual confident tone, but he could hear a slight shake in
her voice. “So, do we have a plan here? Or are we just going to say, ‘Hi, we know you have Jesse. Give him back’?”

she asked.

“First we’re going to make sure the guy even lives in one of these houses,” Anthony answered. “Gregg isn’t
always that clear about stuff. If Frank’s home, I’ll give him some bull about hearing there was a party at his place.

That should get us inside. You can do your fingerprint thing. If we find out Jesse’s there, we call in an anonymous
tip to the police. Jesse’s mom’s already filed a missing persons, so they’ll know they should be looking for him.”

“Okay. A plan. Good,” Rae said as they cut across the front yard, maneuvering around the toys lying all over the
place. When they reached the front porch, Anthony tilted his head from side to side, cracking his neck, then rang the
doorbell. This is it, he thought when a woman answered the door, only opening it halfway. She was wearing an old
terry cloth robe with big stars on it, but she’d definitely been the one in the Daisy Dukes at the party.

“Hey, I heard you and Frank were having a blowout over here. But it looks like I got the wrong night,” Anthony
said.