Read Experiment in Terror 02.5 The Benson for Free Online Page B

sickening thud. The world goes black. The lights go off and I find myself on my knees, my leggings ripping open on the cold hard floor.
     
    “May?” I cry out and raise the camera, hoping to see her blue form through the darkness. I only read my own heat and no one else’s.
     
    I slowly get to my feet and try to flick on the flashlight with my own hand.
     
    Cold fingers reach over my elbow in a stealthy grasp. I can feel the ice through my jacket.
     
    I am yanked harshly to the side until I crash into a wheeled laundry bin and another hand grabs me by the face and pulls me over the side and into it.
     
    All I can think about is the painful cold that comes from the grasp, as if permafrost is entering my veins and creating a sheet of ice on my face. And then I find myself face first in a laundry bin, smothered by a million towels and pulled deeper and deeper into them until I can’t breathe and I can’t scream and I can’t move. I can only drown here.
     
    The blackness behind my eyes grows darker somehow, as if the dark has a million different shades and nuances and I was only scratching the surface. It’s a different kind of obsidian, one that signals the end, finality. I don’t want to succumb to it, but all I can see is this blackness, and all I can feel are these hands that won’t stop pulling me deeper, that won’t let go, and my thoughts become less…and less…and less…
     
    “Perry!”
     
    I think I hear my name but it sounds too far away to be real. I think of May and wonder where she came from.
     
    “Perry!”
     
    My name again. It sounds familiar.
     
    There is a rush of noise and light and commotion and I feel more hands grabbing me. Only these ones are warm and though they are strong, I can feel the care seeping through them.
     
    I think of Dex. And remember where I am.
     
    I put my hands at the bottom of the bin, and push myself off. As I do so, they come in contact with something beneath one of the towels. I’m afraid it’s the remains of whoever was pulling me down before, but I still close my fingers around it as Dex yanks me out of the bin and into the harsh fluorescent light of the room.
     
    I cough wildly, trying to find my breath as Dex keeps his hands on either side of my shoulders, steadying me. As the air hits my lungs and my wincing subsides, I notice Pam standing beside the door, a key in hand, her face in a look of absolute terror.
     
    “Perry,” Dex says. “Perry look at me.”
     
    I manage to look at him. His dark eyes are searching mine relentlessly, his brow furrowed, his stance tense.
     
    “Are you OK?” he asks.
     
    I nod, feeling relieved and embarrassed all at the same time.
     
    “Was I sticking out of the laundry bin?” I ask with trepidation.
     
    He nods and I see a hint of a smile tug at the corner of his mouth. It would have been a comical sight, my giant ass in the air and all.
     
    “I leave you alone for five seconds…” His tone is light but he knows there is more to the story. And that I’ll fill him in on it later.
     
    “What’s in your hands?” Pam asks, looking at them with curiosity.
     
    I glance down and see I am holding a rectangular cover of well-worn leather. I open it carefully and see what I thought I would see. A checkbook filled with writing. The possible proof that Parker Hayden was murdered and not a victim of suicide.
     
    I walk over to Pam and place the item in her hands. She looks up at me surprised and confused.
     
    “You may want to run this by a historian. Or even the police,” I say. “There’s a chance that Parker Hayden didn’t commit suicide after all. It could be a cold case file. A very cold case.”
     
    I feel extremely cheesy as I tell Pam that. No surprise, Dex says, “Wow, I leave you for one minute and suddenly you’re CSI: Portland.”
     
    I give him a tired smile. I’m ready to go home.
     
    *****
     
    A few days pass when I get a call from Dex. We’re not at the point where we call each