Hit List Read online

  Hit List

  Title Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Hit List

  by Darcia Helle

  Smashwords Edition

  Copyright © Darcia Helle 2009

  All rights reserved

  Edited by Bob Helle

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. No part of this ebook may be reproduced, copied, or posted anywhere without written permission from the author.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely accidental.

  Sanity calms, but madness is more interesting.

  ~ John Russell

  Chapter 1

  It didn’t rain today. She thought it might but it didn’t. Not that it made any difference.

  The clock ticked in the background. That was the only sound. Tick-tock, tick-tock…

  She wandered about the house, clad in her worn-out terrycloth bathrobe. Her frizzy orange hair stood out from her head in a wild mass. Corinne had never been beautiful. That implied perfection, which she had never achieved. Nor had she ever tried. But once Corinne had possessed a commanding magnetism.

  She had large brooding blue eyes with dark lashes that curled at the tips. Her nose was just a bit too large. Full lips had once smiled often, while giving men something to fantasize about.

  She wouldn’t have been considered thin. Instead, she’d been shapely and always well toned. Her flame-colored hair, then a tamed curl, had demanded attention for her. And she’d received it. Quite often. She’d relished in that spotlight.

  Now she walked on too-thin legs, back and forth. The clock continued to tick. She listened, finding the sound comforting. Shivering, she wrapped the tattered robe tighter around herself. She felt as if she were a hundred. She was 48.

  Having exhausted herself, she sat in the chair by the window. The gray sky grew darker. Soon it would be night. “Damn you!” she shouted into the empty air.

  No one was there to respond. “Damn you,” she repeated. But this time the force was gone from her voice.

  ***

  Corinne didn’t know he’d come in through the back and was now standing in the kitchen doorway watching her. Ian rubbed his hands over his eyes. In the house less than two minutes and already his head throbbed. He didn’t think they could go on like this much longer. Guilt, anger, sadness, frustration. He experienced the entire realm of emotions, all at once, every minute of the day. Sort of like living out a jumbled combination of the movie Groundhog Day and a Freudian textbook.

  Ian forced himself into the living room. Her perfume assaulted him. His cough caused her to turn in his direction. Her red painted lips started to curve into a smile but straightened quickly. She’d been mad at him when he left and was evidently reminding herself to stay that way.

  “Hello ma,” he said.

  Corinne turned away, pulling her robe tighter around herself. She stared off at the television as if the blank screen held some mystical secret. He wanted to scream out every obscenity he could think of. Instead he ran his hand over the stubble on his chin and conjured up an image of a deserted island. The psychiatrist’s idea.

  Dr. Endicott had suggested that he create his own “happy place” in his mind. A place he could escape to when he felt on edge. What better escape than a deserted island? Of course, the trick never worked. As if he could possibly trick himself into relaxing on some deserted island in his mind, while standing in the midst of chaos with his crazy mother.

  Ian perched on the edge of the sofa and stifled a sigh. “Why didn’t you get dressed today, ma?”

  Corinne stood in a flurry of motion that somehow managed to make him dizzy. She fussed over the knickknacks on the mantel as she spoke. “They were outside today. I saw them. I saw them. I saw them outside today.”

  He tried to interrupt her singsong chatter but she continued fidgeting with the knickknacks, talking to the room as much as to him. “They saw me watching them. Watching them watching me.” An odd sort of tormented giggle escaped her lips. She said, “They have her. They have her. They know I can’t. I can’t. They have her.”

  “Ma, stop.” His voice came out sharper than he’d intended. He swallowed the dry lump and tried again. “Please, ma. Sit down.”

  She spun around. Her haunted eyes danced around the room, landing briefly on his but not lingering. “I saw them,” she said defiantly. “You don’t believe me. But I saw them.”

  “No one was watching you today, ma.”

  “How do you know that? Were you here?”

  Ian raked his hands through his hair. Where the hell was his happy place? Count to 10. Take deep breaths. Hell, he needed a damn tranquilizer. “No, ma. I wasn’t here. But we’ve been through this before.”

  Corinne began to chant. “Been through this. Been through this.” Then she stopped abruptly and sank back down into the chair. She clutched her robe. Suddenly she looked up. “What time is it?”

  He glanced at the antique clock on the mantel. “Almost five.”

  “Almost five?” Corinne said this as if stunned that the day had somehow managed to move forward without her. “I’m not dressed. Must be dressed. Must. Because they were here. No one believes me but they were here. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

  Ian stopped trying to make sense of the words. Now and then she fell into this pattern of incessant chanting. Repeating words and phrases until he wanted to rip out his eardrums to keep from hearing another sound. Eventually she would stop as quickly as she’d begun.

  At times they even had normal conversations. Oddly enough, those were the times that hurt the most. Because that’s when he remembered what his mother had been like before their world had been tipped upside down.

  Corinne stood and made her way down the hall toward her bedroom. Evidently it had suddenly become important that she be dressed. Ian shook his head and could only wonder at the scattered reasoning that ruled her mind.

  ***

  Fifteen minutes later Corinne emerged from her bedroom wearing flannel pajamas and fuzzy slippers. Ian opened his
mouth, about to remind her that she’d intended to put on clothes, not different pajamas. But he quickly snapped his mouth shut before any words escaped. He didn’t know why she’d chosen to get dressed at five in the afternoon. Nor did he know why she’d wound up in new pajamas instead. What he did know was that calling attention to the issue would only serve to increase his headache.

  She scurried past him without a word. Pans began clanging in the kitchen. The refrigerator opened and closed, cabinet doors thudded shut. All the normal sounds of someone cooking dinner.

  He closed his eyes, leaned his head back against the sofa. Sometimes it all seemed surreal. Not that long ago he’d had a normal life. Living in his own home. Attending occasional family dinners with his mother, aunt, uncle, and cousins. And enjoying them. Now he was living back in his childhood home, with a mother who had apparently overused her sanity. Family dinners consisted of his mother and himself.

  A loud clatter came from the kitchen, followed by muttering he could not understand. Ian sucked in a long breath and ran a string of curses through his mind. Damn his mother’s psychiatrist and all the psychobabble bullshit. Where the hell was he supposed to find a happy place amidst all this craziness?

  He pushed himself off the sofa. Hopefully she had just dropped something. He directed a silent prayer to God, Buddha, and anyone else who would listen to please give him his mother back. Did he even believe that was possible anymore?

  Ian found Corinne sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, hugging her knees to her chest and rocking back and forth. He stopped abruptly, listening to her quiet moans. Her back was to him but he didn’t need to see her face to know that she had gone far away in her mind. He’d gotten used to it by now. The odd trance-like state that simply took over her being. The saddest thing, the hardest part of it all, was the look in her glazed eyes. It wasn’t happiness she was finding in that faraway place.

  Chapter 2

  Corinne loved her rocking chair. Sometimes if she kept her body in constant motion, her mind would stay clear. She could form an entire thought and make complete sense when she spoke. But, as much as she relished those rare moments, she dreaded them even more. Because that’s when it began to make sense.

  They wanted her to tell them what was in her mind. What she had locked up tight inside. Ian. And that doctor with the chubby face and balding head. She always wanted to call him Dr. Hartley because he resembled that man on the TV show years ago. Of course he wasn’t really Dr. Hartley. His name was Dr. Endicott. And he claimed that he wanted to help her.

  Corinne didn’t trust Dr. Endicott. Maybe she would have trusted Dr. Hartley. He was kind. And his secretary had red hair, like her own. Carol was her name.

  Dr. Endicott’s secretary didn’t have a name. Oh, that was probably not true. Everyone had a name. But this secretary never told her name. Only took messages and answered the phone. And her hair was bottle-blonde, teased to perfection, sprayed into obedience.

  Corinne sat on the sofa, its cushions worn from the weight of too many rear ends. She missed her rocking chair. She missed her tattered robe and her fuzzy slippers. Too many words, too much of everything assaulted her senses.

  Ian had left her here. He’d promised he’d come back. He’d reminded her that he always came back.

  “Corinne?”

  She was startled to find Dr. Endicott sitting across from her. How had she forgotten that he was there? His chair, where he always sat. Sleek, mocha-colored soft leather. Well padded, too. His rear end didn’t sink down into a concrete ditch.

  She realized that he was waiting for her to answer. His face held that patient expectancy that must have come with his psychiatry degree. “I’m sorry,” she said. “What did you ask?”

  “I wanted to know whether there was something that you’d like to talk about,” Dr. Endicott replied. “You’ve said very little today.”

  His voice was like oil, thick and slippery. Corinne chewed her bottom lip as she thought about what to say. It didn’t matter, really. All the words wound up in the same place. Sort of like separating all your food on your dinner plate, just so that it could end up in a thick wad of goo in the pit of your stomach.

  Corinne sat up straighter, wiggled her butt to better fit the trench. She tilted her head as she thought, then said, “I wonder if geese can fly backward.”

  She had been mulling this over for days. People could walk backward. Dogs and cats could as well. Not that they seemed to enjoy it. But the ability was there, if needed. So could geese fly backward? If they flew into a narrow cave with no rear exit, would they be able to back out?

  She raised her eyes to meet Dr. Endicott’s. His were a pale blue that looked to her as if their color had been bleached out. He was still watching her with that patient gaze. She concentrated hard because she had to or she’d forget again.

  “I honestly don’t know,” Dr. Endicott replied. “Is that important to you?”

  “I’ve never seen geese fly backward,” Corinne said.

  “Nor have I.”

  Corinne sucked in her bottom lip. The wallpaper behind Dr. Endicott’s head had little pastel flowers scattered about. She’d had flowers in her garden once. Now just weeds grew there. She’d been telling Ian that they needed to pull out those weeds and buy new plants. Hadn’t she told him that?

  “Is there some reason you’ve been wondering about this?” Dr. Endicott asked.

  Corinne’s eyes darted back to his face. Always clean-shaven, as if he had an electric razor in his desk drawer. Maybe he did. But wouldn’t that be a bit compulsive?

  She remembered reading that some men had very little facial hair. He could be one of those men. Of course she couldn’t ask. That would be rude.

  “Corinne?”

  “Reason?” Corinne felt her eyes squinting. She was aware of doing this when trying to regain her focus. Silly habit. Squinting couldn’t help her focus inside her mind.

  “About the geese?”

  “Oh. I suppose not.”

  She thought she glimpsed a bit of frustration behind Dr. Endicott’s Ph.D. mask. But it was gone so quickly that she wasn’t really sure.

  “Okay then,” Dr. Endicott said as he stood. “Our time is up for today. Ian will be bringing you by again next week, if that’s okay with you.”

  Corinne rose, smoothed her skirt with the palm of her hand. “No one honestly cares if it’s okay with me.”

  She was right, which was why Dr. Endicott didn’t reply. He opened the door for her and stepped aside. Ian was waiting in the next room. In one of those chairs purchased by the dozens at Doctors R Us.

  Ian’s shiny blond hair was shorter now. Had he been to get it cut while she’d been with Dr. Endicott? Or had she somehow confused time again?

  Ian stood, shook Dr. Endicott’s hand. Ian was taller by at least three inches. For some reason this fact made Corinne feel better.

  The two men spoke, their voices taking on that hushed cadence people often reserved for hospitals. Maybe everyone used it with doctors, no matter where they were. Their words didn’t register in her mind. Their meaning didn’t matter to her. Just words, pouring over her skin but not finding their way inside. The world was like that sometimes.

  Outside, Ian opened the car door for her. She smiled at him. The inside of the car smelled like fried chicken. She noticed the take-out boxes on the backseat. She’d wanted fried chicken and it made her happy that Ian remembered. But by the time he made it around to the other side and slid into the driver’s seat, she’d already forgotten to thank him.

  Chapter 3

  Ian grabbed the oak plank and ran it through the saw. Halfway into it, he yanked the board away, realizing too late that he hadn’t readjusted his measurements. He swore loudly and kicked at the gravel beneath his feet.

  That was the third piece he’d ruined today. At this rate, not only would he lose all his profits but he’d also be putting out money from his own pocket in order to cover his screw-ups. In essence, he’d be paying his c
ustomers for the honor of allowing him to work on their homes.

  He desperately needed to focus his attention on his job. Personal distractions had no place in his business life. He glanced across the yard to find Rob, his partner, hard at work nailing pieces of the deck together. It was shaping up nicely. No thanks to himself.

  Ian’s cell phone chirped. He hesitated a moment before pulling it from his belt. The last thing he needed at this point in his day was his mother’s crazy rambling.

  Instead of his mother, his caller ID read Cindy Nash. His girlfriend. Almost as bad.

  “Hi Cindy,” he said. His voice held remnants of his frustration. Not that it mattered much. Cindy only noticed things that directly affected her.

  “Ian!” Cindy’s overly enthusiastic greeting pierced the phone. “I was starting to get worried. It’s been almost a week since I’ve heard from you.”

  The headache that had begun minutes ago now threatened to rattle Ian’s skull until it sprung open like popcorn kernels tossed in hot oil. “I’ve been busy,” was the only reply he could think of.

  Cindy continued speaking as if Ian had said that he missed her and couldn’t wait to see her again. “Tonight is that party at Elyse’s house that I was telling you about. I bought the sexiest dress. It’s black and oh so slinky. You’ll love it.”

  Ian raked his hand through his hair as he listened. He was positive that he hadn’t agreed to attend this party. He distinctly remembered telling her that he’d think about it. His way of stalling before saying no.

  Christ, he couldn’t stand Elyse. She was one of those women with more boobs than brains. Maybe the silicon had let loose and was interfering with her ability to think.

  “I can’t go, Cindy.”

  “What?”

  Ian recognized the tone. That single word actually said, “What the hell are you talking about?”