Desert Places (Andrew Z. Thomas/Luther Kite Series 1)

Lightning, black…

Pain and darkness. The throbbing of an interstate beneath me. Muffled jazz music…

I opened my eyes to pure darkness. My hands were cuffed behind my back, feet bound with thick rope, and an aching thirst wrenched my gut. Through chapped, splitting lips, I gave voice to a broken scream. An antique moon appeared, huge and yellow. The shadowy figure of a man reached toward me, and I felt the prick of a needle. When I groaned, he said, “This will all be over soon.” Darkness again…

Sunlight flooded across my eyelids. On my back, sweating, I perceived the softness of a mattress beneath me and a pillow supporting my head. My hands and feet were no longer tied, so I pulled a blanket over my eyes to block the sun.

Be packed and ready to go at 6:00 a.m. tomorrow.

Sitting up, I looked for the alarm clock. I wasn’t in the Motel 6.

In the small square room, my bed rested flush against the back wall, one window at the level of the bed showering brilliant sunlight into the room. Black iron bars stretched across the window, and I knew they were for me. The rough, unembellished walls were built of mud red logs, each a foot in diameter, and the floor was stone. The only other furniture consisted of a bedside table, a chair, and a tottering desk pushed against the opposite wall, beside a closed door. I moved to the window and gazed through the bars.

A vast expanse of semiarid desert stretched out before me, the land flat and ridden with low homogenous vegetation. No power lines, no pavement, no signs of civilization outside this tiny room. I felt utterly alone. The sky was turquoise, and though warm in my room, I judged from the intensity of the sun that it was torrid outside.

Turning from the window, I noticed a piece of paper on the desk across the room. I stepped onto the stone floor, cold as steel despite the intolerable heat, then crossed the room and lifted the sheet of paper off the desk.

Before we meet, let me emphasize the futility of escape, deception, or destroying me. If you’ll open the middle drawer of the desk, you’ll find an envelope. Take a moment to look inside.

When I opened the envelope, I gasped: photos of me reaching down into Rita Jones’s grave, a crudely sketched map of my lake property, disclosing the location of four bodies, and three typed pages giving details of the killings and revealing in which closet of my house the paring knife could be found. There was also a newspaper clipping regarding the sentencing of a man whose name (along with all other pertinent information) had been blacked out. Across the headline, he’d scribbled “innocence takes the punishment for my crime.” I returned to the letter.

Prayers for my health and safety are in order, because there is another envelope with a map, showing where the bodies really are and telling where the knife really is. In two months, someone will deliver that envelope to the Charlotte Police Department. If I’m not there to stop them in person, you, Andrew Thomas, will go to prison. People have been convicted with less evidence than I have against you, and I’ve already put two individuals on death row for my crimes. (Like the newspaper clipping?)

Last thing. Know that your mother’s safety hinges on your conduct here. Now, you’ve had quite a journey. Rest as much as you like, and when you’re ready to learn why I’ve brought you here, knock on the door.

I returned to the bed and, leaning against the barred window, looked out again upon the desert. My eyes filled with tears as I beheld the wilderness. Aside from the windblown motion of the tumbleweeds dispersing their seed, there was no movement. It was a wasteland, a deadened landscape, which at another time might have been serene. But in my present condition, it only enhanced the foreboding. Wiping my eyes, I rose from the bed, and my heart galloped as I approached the door.

4

A slot six inches high and a foot wide had been cut into the center of the sturdy wooden door. I knelt down and pushed on the metal sheet, but it wouldn’t budge. Standing again, I drew a deep breath. Weak and hungry, it was impossible to know how long I’d lain unconscious in this room. My arms were sore and speckled with needle pricks.

Timidly, I knocked on the door and then retreated to the bed. Footsteps soon approached, clicking softly against the stone outside. The metal panel slid up, and I glimpsed another room: bookshelves, a stack of records, a white kerosene heater, a breakfast table ….

In place of the panel, a flap of bubble wrap descended. Someone stood before the opening, though only a form without detail, blurred behind the sheet of quarter-size plastic bubbles.

“Come here,” he said. I inched toward the door. When I was a few feet away, he said, “Stop. Turn around.”

I turned and waited. The bubble wrap crinkled, and I assumed he’d lifted the plastic and was now appraising my condition. After a moment, he said, “Come to the door.” The slot had been cut at waist level, and when I reached the door and knelt down to peer out, he said, “No, no, don’t look at me. Sit with your back to the door.”

I obeyed. Though it terrified me to be in proximity to him, I emphatically reassured myself that he hadn’t brought me into a desert just to kill me in my first moments of consciousness.

“How do you feel?” he asked, and in his voice I sensed true concern. He sounded nothing like the man on the phone. His voice had a slight buzzing quality, as if he spoke with the aid of a speech enhancement device. Though his voice was familiar, I couldn’t place him, and I distrusted my perception after spending an indeterminate number of hours unconscious under a slew of narcotics.

“I feel groggy,” I said, my tone as demure as possible. I didn’t want to excite him.

“That’ll wear off.”

“You wrote those letters? Killed that teacher?”

“Yes and yes.”

“Where am I?”

“Suffice it to say that you’re in the middle of a desert, and were you to escape, you’d die of thirst and heat exhaustion before you reached the outskirts of civilization.”

“How long will I—”

“No more questions regarding your quasi-captivity. I won’t tell you when or where you are.”

“What will you tell me?”

“You’re here to get an education.” He paused. “If you only knew. The substance of your learning will become manifest, so be patient.”

“Can I please have my things?”

He sighed, the first sign of frustration boiling under his breath. “We’ll talk about that later.” Then his voice softened, shedding its edge. “Pretend you’re an infant, Andrew. A tiny, helpless infant. Right now, in your room, you’re in the womb. You don’t understand how to use your senses, how to think, how to reason. Rely on me for everything. I’m going to teach you how to see the world again. I’ll feed your mind first. Fatten it up on the most brilliant thinkers in human history.” A white hand pushed through the bubble wrap and dropped a book onto the floor.