Linwood Barclay - Never Saw It Coming

He slammed down the phone. If the police had been listening, the damage was done. They’d know he’d been having an affair. They’d know he and Laci had been seeing each other for weeks now.

Not good, not good at all.

Laci’s call left Garfield rattled. He tried to tell himself he was going to get through this. He had to keep his wits about him. Even if the police found out he’d been sleeping with Laci, it didn’t have to mean he’d had anything to do with this business about his wife.

They hadn’t found a body. Or her car.

And he was as sure as he could be that they never would.

Pull yourself together, he told himself.

The doorbell rang.

Jesus, he thought. They really were listening to his phone, and now they wanted to question him about Laci, about whether he’d killed his wife to be with this other woman.

He took a couple of deep breaths, composed himself, and strode through the living room to the front door. He pulled the curtain back first, to see who it was.

It was a woman.

A woman with green parrot earrings.

Keisha Ceylon was ready with her “I feel your pain” smile. First impressions were everything. You had to come across as sincere, so you couldn’t overdo the smile. It had to be held back. You didn’t want to show any teeth. No empty-headed Stepford Wife/Jehovah’s Witness smile that looked like it had been pasted on. You had to get into the moment. You had to believe you were on a mission. And you had to look as though you were sorry to even be here, that if there was anywhere else on this earth you could be, you would.

But you were compelled to be here. You simply had no choice.

She saw the man pull back the curtain to get a look at her, and gave him the smile. Almost apologetic.

Then the door opened.

“Yes?” he said.

“Mr. Garfield?”

“You a reporter? We did the press conference yesterday. There’s nothing else I have to say at this time.” He leaned out of the door, looking past her down to the street, wondering, maybe, if a news van was nearby.

“I’m not a reporter, Mr. Garfield.”

“What do you want, then?”

“Let me give you my card,” she said, handing one to him.

He glanced down at it. The card read: KEISHA CEYLON

Psychic Finder of Lost Souls

Under that, a web address and a phone number. “What the hell is this?” he asked.

“Like it says there, I’m Keisha, and I’m so very sorry to trouble you at such a time. But I think, if you’ll be kind enough to give me a moment, you won’t regret my knocking on your door.”

He looked at the card again. “Psychic finder. Sounds like total bullshit to me.”

Keisha smiled. Not too much. Made the smile look just a little sad. “I encounter that a lot. Maybe it would be better if I just put the word ‘consultant’ on there, but that would be a misrepresentation of the type of service I provide.”

“A consultant,” he said, slipping her card into his shirt pocket.

“I consult for people who find themselves in situations such as yours, Mr. Garfield.”

“So you’re what, some kind of psychic detective? Like that Medium woman on TV?”

“Actually, a bit, yes.”

“You have a nice day, Miss Cylon.”

“That’s Ceylon,” she said, and put a palm on the door as he started closing it. “Let me ask you one thing before you send me away.”

“What’s that?” he said.

“Are things going so well in the search for your wife that you’re willing to dismiss all other avenues?”

She could see the hesitation in his eyes. She said, “I’m not going to kid you, Mr. Garfield. What I do, it takes a leap of faith, I know that. And I’m not always right. It’s not an exact science. But what if there’s a chance, maybe just one chance in ten-a hundred, even-that I can help you find Mrs. Garfield, isn’t that a chance worth taking? If it isn’t, tell me, and I’ll leave here and never trouble you again.”

He held the door, frozen. It was wide enough that he could still see her, but not wide enough to allow her in.

After several seconds of hesitation, he opened it wider. “Fine, then.”

She stepped into the house. There was a small foyer, and a living room to the right with a couch and a couple of soft armchairs. A set of windows along the front, the blinds letting in very little light, and a second, smaller window, on the side wall, where the blinds had not been closed tight.

“Do you mind if I sit down?” she asked. It was always a lot harder for them to throw you out when you were sitting down.

He pointed to an armchair. Before she could sit, she had to move a ball of green yarn with two blue, foot-long knitting needles speared through it. She tucked the bundle over to the edge of the chair.

“Have you ever heard of me?” she asked as he took a seat across from her on the couch.

“No,” he said.

She nodded. “Well, it’s not as though I’m famous or anything. But I do have something of a reputation. Just last week I helped a couple find their son. He’d been depressed and they were worried he might do harm to himself. We found him just in time, too.”

“My wife was not depressed,” Garfield said.

Keisha nodded. “Of course. Every case is different.”

He eyed her as though she might already have had a chance to pocket the silverware. “Why don’t you tell me what it is, exactly, that you do.”

“As I said, I offer my services to people when they’re in crisis. When they desperately need to find someone. Do you mind if I ask you a couple of questions first before I start getting into how I do what I do?”

“I suppose not.”

“I saw you and your daughter-Melissa, is it?”

He nodded.

“I saw you on the news, making your appeal. Asking for information about Mrs. Garfield, asking her, if she was watching, to come home so you could stop worrying.”

“That’s right.”

“I was wondering, what sort of tips have the police received since then? I’m assuming they’ve been in touch.”

“There’s been nothing. At least nothing helpful. A couple of nuts called in.”

Keisha nodded sympathetically, as though this was about what she expected. “And aside from waiting for tips, what other efforts have the police been making to find Mrs. Garfield?”

“They’ve been trying to trace her movements since she left the house Thursday night. That’s the night she does the grocery shopping, but she never got to the store.”

“Yes, I knew that.”

“And her credit cards haven’t been used. I know they’ve been showing her picture around to all the places she usually goes, talking to her friends, talking to people she works with. All the things you might expect.”

Another sympathetic nod. “But as with the tips, nothing very helpful. Is that what you’re telling me, Mr. Garfield?”

“It would seem so,” he said.

Keisha Ceylon paused for what she thought was a dramatically appropriate period of time, then said, “I believe I can help you where the police cannot.”

“Is that right?”

“The police do what they do, but they are not trained to-what’s the phrase? — think outside the box. What I offer is something more unconventional.”

“I’m waiting.”

She looked him in the eye. “I see things, Mr. Garfield.”

His mouth opened, but he was briefly at a loss for words. Finally he said, “You see things.”

“That’s right, I see things. Let me make this as simple and as straightforward as I can, Mr. Garfield. I have visions.”

A small laugh erupted from him. “Visions?”

Keisha was very careful to maintain her cool. “Yes,” she said simply. Draw him out. Make him ask the questions.