Missing You by Harlan Coben

Author:Harlan Coben [Coben, Harlan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Tags: Fiction, General, Thrillers, Suspense
ISBN: 9780698148635
Google: Te8PAAAAQBAJ
Amazon: 0525953493
Barnesnoble: 0525953493
Goodreads: 18114060
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2014-03-13T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 23

Aqua shut down after that. He just kept singing the same thing over and over: “Watch out for people who belong in your past. Don’t let ’em back in your life.”

When she Googled the lyrics on her phone, it all came flooding back to her. The song was “Demon Lover” by Michael Smith. They had all seen him live in some dingy venue down in the Village twenty years ago. Jeff had scored the tickets, having seen him perform in Chicago two years earlier. Aqua had come with a fellow cross-dresser named Yellow. The two ended up working a drag-queen act out of a club in Jersey City. When they broke up, Aqua naturally claimed: “Aqua clashes with Yellow.”

The lyrics didn’t trigger any more information. She found the song online and listened to it. It was eerie and wonderful, more poetry than song, the story of a woman named Agnes Hines who loved a boy named Jimmy Harris, who died young in a car crash and then came back to her years later, after she was married, in that same car. The song’s message was clear: Keep past lovers in the past.

So was Aqua’s ranting just influenced by a favorite song? Had he simply listened to it and felt that if she kept searching for her demon lover Jeff, they’d both end up bursting into flames like Agnes and Jimmy? Or was there something more?

She thought about Aqua now, how Jeff’s dumping her and returning to Cincinnati had affected him. He had already gotten worse, but Jeff’s departure really set him off the rail. Was he already institutionalized when Jeff left? She tried to think back. No, she thought, it was after.

It didn’t matter. None of it mattered, really. Whatever mess Jeff had gotten himself into—she assumed there was a mess because you don’t change names for no reason—it was his concern, not hers. Despite his insanity, Aqua was the brightest man she had ever known. It was one of the reasons why she loved his yoga so much—the small truths he spoke during mediation, the little vignettes that rang deep, the offbeat way he had to teach a lesson.

For example, singing an obscure song she had last heard nearly two decades ago.

Aqua’s warning, coming from a diseased mind or not, made a lot of sense.

Brandon was awake when she got back from the precinct. He had two black eyes from his broken nose. “Where were you?” he asked.

“How are you feeling?”

“Sore.”

“Take some more painkillers or something. Here, I brought you a couple of cupcakes.” She had stopped at Magnolia Bakery on the way from the Central Park Precinct. She handed him the bag. “I have a favor to ask.”

“Shoot,” Brandon said.

“They caught the man who assaulted you. That’s where I was. At the precinct.”

“Who is he?”

“That’s the favor part. He’s a friend of mine. He thought he was protecting me. I need you to drop the charges.”

She explained, trying to be as vague as humanly possible.

“I’m still not sure I understand,” Brandon said.

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