Chapter 6
She didn't stay for the next installment of the performance. Despite Lenaghan's superb talent, she'd had enough; the man gave her the worst kind of feeling—a fearful disgust that she could base on nothing but her intuition.
Scully set her barely-touched drink down and slipped out between the crowd as they resettled around the piano. She crossed the parking lot and climbed into her car. Once in, she exhaled a long breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. The last lingering rays of May's late sunset washed over the sky, their maroon and magenta shreds reflecting on the silent tops of cars crowding the lot. Scully rolled her window down and waited for Mulder to realize she'd left the bar.
Her eyes fell on Lenaghan's blue pick-up across the lot. A man with short black hair sat in the driver's seat. He held his hand out of the window, ashing his cigarette. Scully frowned… Mulder was right: Lenaghan had a driver. How did she misremember such an obvious fact? In her mind, the memory was still clear: Lenaghan hopping out of the driver's side.
Mulder walked out of the bar and crossed the lot toward Scully.
"You didn't want to stay for the whole show?" he asked when he got in. "I have to say, I was very impressed with him as a musician."
She swallowed, staring out the window. The piece really was beautiful, when considered apart from the artist.
Mulder paused, watching her. "So, what did he say to you?"
"He, um… said that he's in the business of selling sleep." She faced Mulder.
"What?" he chuckled uncertainly. "Is that some kind of euphemism?"
She shrugged. "He said he sells sleep."
"How—drugs?"
She stretched the token Lenaghan had given her toward Mulder. "Apparently, all I have to do is put this under my pillow."
He studied the trinket. "This is…pewter, or tin." He rolled it between his fingers. "It's cheap. There's an inscription here, but it's mostly rubbed off."
"Can you read any of it?" She leaned to peer at the coin.
He shook his head. "'Chucky-Cheese?'"
She rolled her eyes and looked back out the window.
"Well," he said, "at least now you can't have any doubt that he's the guy."
"How do you figure?"
"Scully," he frowned, "he 'sells sleep'? That doesn't sound shady to you? Give me one context in which that is an innocent declaration on anyone's part."
She shifted. "Maybe, it was just some wacky attempt to sound original while picking someone up at a bar."
"He didn't strike me as a man who has to work hard for female attention. Didn't you notice all the women burning you alive with their stares?"
"Still," she took the token back from Mulder's fingers. "It's a huge leap to say he killed those women, who, by the way, don't seem to display an identifiable cause of death."
Mulder scratched his chin, thinking. "What if, and bear with me here, what if their deaths were a sacrificial offering?"
"What?"
"Think about it Scully," he said, growing excited. "You've had experience with occult homicides. The way that body was displayed, wrists up, doesn't that smack of ritualistic undertones?"
"Maybe, but—"
"And considering the many myths in folklore about how musical talent can be obtained…through darker channels—"
She turned and stared at him. "Mulder?" She arched her eyebrows. "Please tell me you're not trying to suggest Lenaghan sold his soul to the devil."
"Maybe one soul wasn't enough."
"Mulder!" She slumped back with an exasperated sigh. "Why do you always insist on making these fantastic reaches, when basic logic tells us two things: this," she held up the token, "is nothing but a lame attempt to seem mysterious, and," she raised her voice as Mulder tried to interrupt again, "Lenaghan was performing in front of a crowd every time a death in this case occurred—sometimes in another town."
"Scully, I'm not saying an actual deal with the devil was made—or that such a contract is even possible—I'm only saying that the ritualistic undertones of the crime-scenes may suggest the work of someone who imagined such a deal in the works."
Scully bit her lip. It was plausible; her own background in the field brought up precedents of misguided labors of occult murder. It was plausible there was a more purposeful significance to the position of the body, apart from, or hand-in-hand with, the stark resemblance to Ophelia.
"As for his alibi," Mulder pointed across the lot at the blue pickup. "Doesn't it strike you curious that Lenaghan's aide sits the show out in the truck?"
The man with the short black hair leaned his wrist out the window again, ashing his cigarette onto the gravel.
Scully narrowed her eyes at the figure. The driver wasn't mentioned anywhere in the report of the FBI's interrogation of Lenaghan.
"Was he on the list of suspects?"
"Not to my knowledge," Mulder shook his head. "Which is odd—because I bet the aide's alibi would have been exactly this: the incriminating circumstance of waiting alone in parking lots outside of the bars where the women were last seen alive." Mulder leaned over the wheel and checked above. "Parking lots with no video cameras."
"That is… odd. Maybe Skinner simply didn't let you in on the fact that he was a prime suspect."
Mulder shrugged. "Maybe. Skinner seemed so frazzled about the case though—so nervous about the mother's pressure for answers and her cries of incompetence on the Bureau's part. I doubt he would have been so upset if he had a strong suspect like that driver there under his belt."
"So… What are you saying? They simply didn't think to question him?"
Mulder looked at her sideways. "I think that maybe… they just didn't see him."
"What?" She turned and paused, biting her lip. She hadn't seen the driver either. "Mulder, if you're basing that on what I said in the diner earlier, please remember that I'm very sleep-deprived this week. I just made a mistake. My mind slipped up… from exhaustion."
He nodded, still studying her carefully.
"Well, what now?" she asked.
"I'm going to circle around—drop you off at the motel and come back here to stake out the aide and Lenaghan."
"I want to stay," she protested.
"No, you—need some sleep."
Scully twirled the token between her fingers as she sat on the motel bed. It glittered in the low wash of the bedside lamp, the worn inscription catching some legible definition here and there, but not enough to make out the full words. The tin coin stared back at her, bleak and seemingly entirely un-valuable. Lenaghan's soft, slithering voice came back to her: Put it under your pillow before you go to bed. If you like how you sleep, you can come to me again.
She felt silly—like a child about to try conjuring the Bloody Mary at her first sleep-over party. Every logical fiber of her being ridiculed what she was about to do. Yet, she had to admit, too, to a prickle of curiosity.
She slipped the coin under her pillow, shut off the lamp, and lay back. Twenty minutes went by in the fashion familiar to her nights as of late: her staring at the ceiling somewhere up in the darkness, no inclination toward sleep whatsoever, mind wandering and wide-awake. She was almost disappointed; some innocent part of her had wanted to believe this would work—just for the relief such a fantastic spell promised to bring her exhausted self.
Then, Scully registered a soft, vibrating pulse.
It was faint, almost indecipherable, and it sourced at the back of her head, humming rhythmically, though the pillow—through her brain it seemed. She moved to sit up and check if the coin was the source, but the pulse quickly moved down her neck, along her limbs, her legs, spreading a pleasant, kneading warmth. She felt her body grow limp, heavy, like it was sinking into a bath.
Her lids drooped.
She opened her eyes to a bright light, blinking against its gush.
Faint sounds registered around her—piano-playing somewhere far, far away, echoing toward her as if it was played in a house a block away. Just beside her, she heard the splash and ripple of water.
A fountain came into view against the sunlight.
Around it, a garden painted out, unfolding as though it was just a second ahead of the speed of her eyes adjusting.
She gasped when she saw it in full.
It was beautiful—surreally, exquisitely, almost painfully rich in color and fragrance, overwhelming her every sense. She could register every petal, every pistil and bobbing stem. She reached over and brushed a fingertip against a leaf, and it touched her skin, silk-soft, sending a pulse of pleasure and wonder to her very toes.
A voice, in the back of her mind it seemed, said "You're dreaming. This is a dream."
"I'm dreaming," she repeated, looking around.
I'm dreaming, she thought; the idea sent her into pure amazement. She knew she was dreaming, but the picture remained crystal clear. It seemed real—more real than reality: every detail was available to her, and she felt herself present, able to move through it freely, able to enjoy it for what it was: a waking dream.
A lucid dream…
She looked around, breathless from the beauty of the sight. It held still under her eyes, supple and available—not at all like the harsh scramble of memories and information her brain usually regurgitated during its sleep cycle.
The garden breathed, alive with glittering colors. Things she could have never thought of displayed before her. Pink birds that folded their wings like flowers dipped in and out of a blossoming tree. The pebbles on the sand path under her feet caught a bright blue glint. Salamanders, camouflaged yellow and blue to match the sand, rested in the sunlight, their long bodies curving, so delicate and pretty.
Scully looked up the path.
A house sat ahead—a house with warm sand-colored walls and large windows. A long veranda wrapped its length toward the back. It looked pleasant, accommodating—like a vacation house.
Scully walked toward it.
It amazed her how she could feel everything—the scent of the flowers, the gentle breeze on her cheek, the warmth of the sand on her feet. It amazed her that she could register all of this, and yet the certainty never wavered: this was a dream. She experienced the logical and the fantastic in one wonderful phenomenon: knowing none of it was real, and… being able to brush her fingers along the polished cedar railing of the veranda.
She held still, soaking it all in. Her blood felt like it was pumping through her like honey—thick, warm, and so sweet. Her limbs moved when she wanted them to, and when she paused, they shivered, almost aching from the warmth of the air.
She heard a sound.
Scully turned and saw another figure on the veranda—at the far end, by the bend around the house.
"Mulder," she chuckled, surprised.
He looked back at her. He looked just like himself—every detail of him in tact, down to the gray t-shirt and jeans he was wearing today.
He turned and walked out of sight, around the corner of the veranda.
Scully stared, and then she followed.
She rounded the house. The veranda stretched along the side, and out to the back, where the railing was wide, flowering vines twirling about columns. Out ahead, the view opened onto a lake. The water glittered, still and perfect, reflecting rushing pinks and cool minty greens on its surface. The water beckoned. It seemed so cool and refreshing.
Scully felt him step up behind her.
"It's a beautiful lake, isn't it," Mulder said.
His voice—it was his voice, his scent even. Scully frowned. Something about it—something about Mulder being there. This wasn't how she'd dream of him. This wouldn't be what Mulder would say…
He stepped closer behind her. She could feel everything, every moment.
His arm slipped around her waist, warm, familiar—but… tender, slow... caressing. Everything in her rushed.
"Mulder, what are you doing?" she whispered, on reflex.
And again, the voice in the back of her head assured, "This is a dream. It's not really happening. Let go."
Mulder's fingers brushed her stomach. He drew closer. Her heart sped up. She could feel everything; she could smell him, feel the warmth of his touch. Her blood pumped, slow, pulsing, drenching her to the core with pleasure.
"Muld—" she began, still resisting.
His fingers brushed her neck, pulling back her hair, and then he pressed his lips to her skin.
A moan slipped out of her.
She felt them—his lips on her neck as he pulled her back, to his chest. He opened them wider and kissed her again, just under the ear. His lips traced up.
"Scully," he whispered, his breath tickling her ear, sending her to madness with pleasure. "Scully,"
"What?" she breathed.
"Scully—"
Scully shot up in the motel bed.
She stared at the room, pulling her hair back from her forehead. A knock descended on the door.
"Scully," Mulder called, "Scully, you awake?"
"Yeah," she called back, trying to gather herself. "I'm up."
He opened the door and stepped in. "Skinner's on our ass for poking into his—" He paused, staring at her. "Are you alright? You look… flushed."