Pretend You're Here: A Dystopian Crime Thriller Novella (A. R. Shaw's Novella Collection)

  Pretend You’re Here

  A Dystopian Crime Thriller Novella

  A. R. Shaw

  ARShawBooks.com

  Copyright © 2021 by A. R. Shaw

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Contents

  Introduction – Forbidden

  1. Departure

  2. New Destiny

  3. Jeff Gaber

  4. A Trip

  5. Awakening

  6. Restraint

  7. The Escape

  8. Home

  9. A Visitor

  10. An Encounter

  11. A Citizen

  12. Denial

  13. An Errand

  14. An Intruder

  15. No Way Out

  16. Horror

  17. I Do

  18. Loved

  19. A New Resident

  20. The Pretenders

  About the Author

  Also by A. R. Shaw

  For Darlene

  The heart of another is a dark forest, always, no matter how close it has been to one’s own.

  Willa Cather

  Introduction – Forbidden

  I slipped my fingers between his and closed them over the space in between.

  “Can we talk?” he whispered in that way that made me weak.

  I swallowed.

  He couldn’t see my face with his head lying over my middle, and I was thankful for that because he wouldn’t see the tears sliding down the sides. By his tone, I knew he meant to break a vow he’d made long ago, and I couldn’t let that happen. But of course, I’d known this was coming for a long time…edging nearer every time we met.

  Running my fingers through Owen’s damp hair one last time, I’d miss him; these stolen moments were wrecked. He didn’t know that yet. Nor did he know the missing part came next.

  “Of course,” I said, doing a fantastic imitation of not lying.

  This was the last time we’d meet again in a room alone. I knew what love was and what it wasn’t. After spending a week on assignment with this man, I saw nothing but trouble on the horizon. Love made your heart beam and bleed into your soul. Not love might affect other parts of your body, but it never reached that rare destination. That place where Owen lived. There’s a clear distinction, and I knew not long after we started meeting this way…we’d gone too far. At first, I thought it was just me…but no. The way he held me. The way he looked in my eyes. The way his hands shook before he touched me as if he’d longed for the link since the last time we were together. The way his lips met mine. There was no way around the fact that I was in love with him, and he…loved me without a doubt. And despite that fact, though personal relationships were strongly discouraged in the department, Owen was married which went against everything I stood for.

  “It’s not about the case,” he said, lifting his head, and his eyes met mine.

  I brushed the river away from my eye. “I…figured that.” I sat up and pulled the sheet up over myself, and he stared at the barrier for a moment and then got up and slipped his legs into his pants at the side of the bed, his belt still in the loops hanging open.

  “I’ve been thinking…what? Don’t look at me like that. Are you okay?”

  I grabbed the free water bottle I’d left on the nightstand. The ones they give you when you sign in at the front desk if you have a special membership. My hand went straight to my head, and I used it to hide my eyes from him.

  He wasn’t going to do this now if I could prevent him.

  “No…don’t,” I said. “I’ve got to get back.”

  “Steph, I…”

  I couldn’t handle it. I dropped the sheet and rushed Owen, leaning my bare skin against his chest, my hands covered his whiskered mouth. “Please don’t. Please…don’t say it.”

  It was wrong. In my gut, I knew the truth, but in my mind, I couldn’t help but want him forever. My heart raced every time I neared Owen Garner. I knew it was mutual because he drew lazy circles with the rough tip of his index finger against my shoulder. I would miss this.

  The moment I’d met him, he stared first at my eyes, they softened, and then he’d smiled. His eyes lingered on my lips after that…tearing right through my defenses like no one I’d ever met in my life. We’d both tried to fight the insistent desire at first.

  Owen was my superior, after all. In fact, in the beginning, to conceal his emotions, he did the classic thing guys do. When they don’t want someone to know they’re attracted to them, they insult them at every turn, just like a little boy pulling a braid. He found ways to fault my procedures, and no matter how minuscule the infraction, he’d let me know my failings at every chance.

  I would look into Owen’s eyes, which stared at me with admonishment, but then the hardness would soften and linger a little too long.

  I’d smile.

  He’d brush his hand through his own hair and turn away from me. It was only a matter of time before either of us could contain ourselves. I loved him like no other, and no one had ever come close to making me feel this way.

  But Owen had a wife, and I gave in to the unspoken feelings between us. This was my fault. I was weak, and that weakness scared me to death.

  My mother drowned in a bottle over time due to his careless affair. I never forgave my father, and the habit eventually led her to an early death. He died too, without me, somewhere on the other side of the country with a new wife I’d never met. I emphatically vowed I’d never be that person; I’d never steal a man from another woman. I would never cause that kind of pain that destroyed my mother. To me, that was a sin beyond all others, especially when children were involved. And Owen had a son.

  He’d made a liar out of me. I’d been weak a moment too long. He had a son with eyes the same shade of brown as his own. And when Owen looked at her…I knew it was the same way he looked at me. I’d met them at picnics. I’d covered for Owen when his son broke his arm last year. And when his wife met me for the first time, I’d held her hand a moment and smiled as I looked right into her eyes. I smiled at her too. Such betrayal…just like my mother was betrayed. So this was why I cried inside as Owen held me against him. Only I knew the impending pain of losing him and destroying what we shared together. I had to fix the sin. It wasn’t too late. I knew it had to be done, and it had to be done now.

  1

  Departure

  “What do you mean she’s gone?” Owen nearly yelled at Agent Rodgers. He tried to control his emotions but had a hard time containing his outrage. How could she do this to him without even saying goodbye?

  She’d been quiet for a few days. Too quiet. She’d even stopped answering Owen’s texts…then nothing…silence. Finally, he’d called her, and when it went to voicemail, he’d said, “Steph, I don’t know what’s going on, but please meet me. I miss you.”

  She texted back a few hours later, “Plate and Pint, 6pm.”

  Her eyes did not meet his when he slid into the booth across from her. “Hi,” he said, like approaching a scared puppy.

  She was a little distant before, but nothing like he sensed now. He’d reassure her that things would work out. They’d be okay. But he was wrong.

  “Hi,” she said low but with an edge and slight cut of her eye.

  The waitress showed up then, and they ordered th
e usual beers, nothing adventurous. It wasn’t time for adventures…he’d gleaned that much without a word since he sat down. And when the waitress walked away, he reached for her hand across the sticky table, and she just stared at his cuff, and then he noticed that wasn’t what she was staring at, at all. She was staring at his ring.

  “Steph…”

  But then the beers arrived, and they took sips instead of speaking while the rain poured outside.

  She shuddered, and he tried to hold her eyes again, but she kept avoiding him. She’d created distance between them even though he was right across the table.

  “Steph, come on….”

  “Owen, we can’t keep doing this. I’m…leaving, Owen.”

  He smiled. Steph couldn't leave him; that would be like losing a lung. She was a part of him...attached. He couldn't believe the words coming from her. He reached for her hand across the table again. "I… we're fine. You'll see. Everything will work out."

  She pushed her nearly full beer slightly forward and pulled her hand back from his tight grasp, grabbed her purse, and without looking back at him again, got up and left.

  Watching her run through the rain to her car, Owen realized she never looked back. Not even once.

  She’s just upset. It’s not an ideal situation, I know that. I’ll give her a few days. She’ll be fine.

  Several days later, Daniel Rodgers stood up from his office desk and gathered a file together while he said in a low but strained tone, “You know damn well why she left, Owen. She transferred. Leave her alone. She’s trying to make a new start, and thanks to you, I have to replace a damn good agent. Owen—what the hell were you thinking? My God, you’ve got Penny…and Jack.”

  Owen stared at the back of Daniel’s head as he walked by. Apparently, it was a rhetorical question, and Owen knew he was wrong…knew better than to have an affair. Christ, Owen loved his wife. Why he would put his marriage in jeopardy confounded even himself. Yet, he was inexplicably drawn to Steph. She was an addiction that he wasn’t willing to give up. He had to forget her. If that’s what she wanted, he had to move on.

  2

  New Destiny

  I stayed in a hotel in Bellevue that night. He’d never think to look for me there…if he was looking for me. I’d packed up my tiny apartment the day before, and my few belongings were making their way by moving truck as I cried myself to sleep. I knew I was doing the right thing—leaving Owen and Seattle behind. There was no way we could work together. There were no special promises or arrangements we could make without falling right back into the same situation. I couldn’t function around him. The attraction was too great, and I knew this without even giving it a trial run.

  The following day, I’d left Seattle in the rearview mirror as I crossed over Snoqualmie Pass and drove seven hours into a new future—a new course that would end in Boise, Idaho. I’d set this new course on my own, and due to my past weaknesses, I resolved to be stronger, less foolish, and once again, become a person I could live with.

  I wiped my eyes for the last time and sped through the drizzling rain to a new horizon. I would mold my own future and not let a casual desire ruin my chances at a real relationship again.

  Despite how I felt about Owen, it was guilt over my weakness that haunted me even more. In a way, I was running from the responsibility, not from Owen. He made me weak, and that scared me because, if anything, weakness wasn’t one of my typical attributes. I'd worked too hard proving myself to gain the position I held in the FBI. As a Special Agent, I mainly dealt with shipping imports in Seattle, meaning kidnappings. Still, in Boise I’d deal mostly with missing persons. There’s a distinction. I wish my mom were around to confide in today, although I know what she would have said: “This is a do-over. Pick yourself up and move forward. It only takes one step and then another.”

  As the evergreen trees whipped by the windows, those words brought me back to the long drive, and the encouragement settled my mind. I sat a little higher in my seat and stretched my back. The drizzling rain gave way to partly sunny skies, and I drove onward.

  3

  Jeff Gaber

  One year later, I woke up to the buzzing alarm clock sitting on my nightstand. After I showered, I stared into the mirror before applying my makeup. I barely noticed the birthmark on my cheek anymore; while growing up, the mark had prompted more than one trip to the school office.

  I smirked, remembering my mother’s embarrassment when she had to pick up her dainty daughter from the principal’s office. Must you always resort to violence? My mother would try to contain a hint of a smile afterward. I was always the smallest in my class, and even as an adult, I only topped out at five foot three. My size and career path meant that it was a challenge to be taken seriously, and this past year in Boise had been no different.

  Luckily, my new partner, Ben Rupp, was a happily married, goofy, balding, fortyish kind of guy. He knew I preferred Earl Grey over coffee, salads over hamburgers, and he shouldn't call me before ten in the morning on the weekends. Above all, he was kind. He knew why I’d transferred and never mentioned a thing about my past. He let my do my job. More importantly, he let my keep my dignity.

  I finished styling my short brown hair and dressed in a Highland wool, slate-brown suit. The days in Boise were getting colder as fall turned the leaves of maple trees from green to brilliant orange, and I was finding it more challenging to keep myself warm. Boise had four full seasons, whereas Seattle usually hovered somewhere between spring and fall. I had a new coat on order, but it had yet to arrive.

  Just like he did every morning, Henry rubbed his gray fur across my legs and meowed. He was a condition of this new life…a loneliness aid. I’d picked him up from an animal shelter. He kept to himself pretty much but just seeing him in the window waiting for me as I returned each day filled me with a sense of belonging. At least I wasn’t coming home to a cold, empty apartment.

  Henry didn’t play well with other cats. I’d learned that from the overnight boarding facility I’d last used. I’d been told that he was “too independent.” I had smiled and agreed, and then knew that Henry and I were the perfect match. So as I filled the automatic feeder that would last him five days and scratched him behind the ears and around the collar. I said, “Bye, Henry. Behave.” Then I rolled off the accumulated cat hair with the sticky cylinder I kept by the door and hurried from my apartment to my car through the crisp early-autumn air.

  I packed a bag before heading out and tossed it into the trunk, knowing that by day’s end, my partner and I would be heading eight hours north of Boise and staying in a little town called Coeur d’Alene. We’d been investigating a man there by the name of Jeffery Gaber in connection with several missing person’s cases. By tomorrow night, we planned to have him in custody and head back to Boise. If all went well, of course. We were prepared to stay longer if necessary but hoped it would be a quick overnight trip.

  4

  A Trip

  Halfway through the drive, I couldn’t take Ben’s country music anymore; four hours was enough of the twangy tunes he belted along with. We had a long-standing deal: whoever drove selected the music. It was the only way to stay sane and not want to drive off the nearest rocky cliffs, and there were many of those in that part of the country.

  I smiled from the driver’s seat when Ben returned to the black Lincoln Town Car after paying for the gas and grabbing a few extra treats for the road. In his hands, he held a bag of cheese puffs and a soda. Then he handed me a package of salted sunflower seeds.

  “I should confiscate those. I’m telling on you. That’s not even food, Ben,” I said, pointing to his snacks.

  “Pshh, you wouldn’t do that to your partner. I gotta eat,” Ben said playfully, and I chuckled. The truth was, Ben’s midsection had expanded recently. Some people ate to deal with stress, and Ben’s wife was battling breast cancer. She’d been given a fifty-fifty chance of survival, and Ben hated to leave me on my own given the fact that at times our job was d
angerous. I knew this even though we never talked about it. That was why we were doing our best to make this a quick trip—just get into Coeur d’Alene and come back as quickly as possible.

  Soon the car smelled of cheese puffs and sweet soda. Ben burped with abandon. “Seriously, must you?” I asked as we passed through Hayden, Idaho.

  “Yes, I must,” he said and reached into my purse to pull out the wet wipes I kept in there to clean off the neon-orange powder from his fingers like a mother of an out-of-control toddler.

  Then he pondered, “What do you think of this Gaber guy? What kind of whack job is connected to so many missing person’s cases, and yet no one will rat him out?” He shook his head. “I mean, who does this? We’ve not found one connection to a sex ring, no dead bodies, just missing people with no connections. Some rich guy who buys people. What is he doing with them all? There’s young and old, rich and poor, black, white, Hispanic…there’s no set pattern. Gay, straight, male, female…he doesn’t seem picky or biased.”

  “Well, we haven’t confirmed he’s responsible for all the kidnappings. We only know he's related to some of them. But, luckily, we're able to connect the dots to Coeur d'Alene. So we can at least hold him for using one of the victim's credit cards until we find out what he's really up to."