A Horse with No Name Pt. 02

The question felt awkward and I think Lisa felt it too. I was surprised by her sudden appearance and the fact that she just walked in the house without knocking, so it took me a moment before I was able to respond.

"I bought a computer," I said.

"Why, you already have a good computer," Lisa said.

"The people that abducted me also took my computer."

"Sorry."

"Come on in my office and let me show you what I am doing," I said.

I showed Lisa the document I was creating. I told her that I would use it to record as much of my history as I could recover and then memorize it to create a set of pseudo memories of my previous life. Lisa spent several minutes reading what I had written and then elaborated on some of the things that she had told me the night before.

I told Lisa that I could not get on the internet because I didn't know my password and I didn't know who my internet carrier was.

"I want some pizza," Lisa said.

"You want pizza?"

"If you do, but that's not why I said that. I want some pizza the password to connect to your modem," Lisa said.

"How do you know my password?"

"You don't remember, but I spent a lot of time here. You gave me the password so that I could get on the internet with my notebook. By the way, your internet provider is SA. All the employees get access through SA's server."

I typed in the password "iwantsomepizza" while wondering if I would still be able to access the internet through SA after all that had happened. It took all of five seconds for my home page to appear, that home page being the SA search page.

"Now I do want some pizza," I said. "Where do I normally get pizza?"

Lisa turned my computer to face her and typed something then turned it back to me. On the screen was the web site for a local pizza restaurant. I clicked on the 'Order Online' button and when I put my name in, my address popped up. I gave Lisa a questioning look and she said, "You order a lot of pizza from them."

"What should we get?" I said.

"Pepperoni? Whatever you want is fine with me, but you better order a large," Lisa said. "George will be here, probably before the pizza arrives."

"George is coming here?"

"He wants to apologize for his behavior at 42^nd Street the other night."

The timing was interesting, George arrived 20 minutes later and walked into the house without knocking, just like Lisa had and he was carrying a pizza.

"Look what I found," he said as he entered. "A large pepperoni pizza, just what the doctor ordered."

George walked over to me and I reached my hand out to shake his but he pulled me into a bear hug and picked me up off my feet. He put me down then stepped back and said, "Man I am so sorry about the things I said to you the other night. I am ashamed that I doubted you. I believed the story about you stealing the Interapp software. I just hoped that this hasn't damaged our friendship beyond repair."

"Don't worry about it. I am not holding any grudges about what people may have thought. There was a brief period when I even believed that I might be guilty. We are starting fresh here. How about we sit down and drink some beer and eat some pizza?"

While we were eating I told George that I would like to get some background on our friendship starting with how we met. The conversation continued through two slices of pizza and two beers each. After eating we moved into the living room. That's where things became uncomfortable. Lisa sat on the sofa and I took a chair facing her. George then sat on the sofa to Lisa's left.

Lisa started to say something and George looked at her and did kind of a double take. It took me a second to notice what George had reacted to. George had spotted the diamond ring on the ring finger of Lisa's left hand. That ring had not been on Lisa's finger Wednesday evening when we met at 42^nd Street Oyster Bar, and it wasn't on her finger the previous night either.

It appeared to me that the three of us had become a very awkward triangle. It seemed that George was not happy that Lisa was wearing her engagement ring. My guess was that George and Lisa became more than just friends sometime during the last six months. I think for George, it was love for Lisa, I don't know. Maybe she just needed someone on whom to lean. With the appearance of the ring, I think Lisa was making a statement. To her, my reappearance meant that we were still engaged. My problem was that I didn't know either of these people, at least not anymore.

Lisa was a beautiful girl and I could see that it would be very easy to become sexually attracted to her, but I felt no love for her. In time, would I fall in love with Lisa? I didn't know. If I decided to try and establish a loving relationship with Lisa, would I be able to keep George as a friend? If I could not do either of those things, would I be hurt?

While I was musing about our situation I lost the thread of the conversation that was going on. Lisa noticed and called me on it. "Are you listening?"

At that moment I did not want to talk anymore, so I made an excuse hoping to get them to leave. "I'm sorry, but I have a migraine headache coming on. I think I need to call it a night. I hope you don't mind."

"Is there anything I can to make you feel better?" Lisa asked.

I could see the pain on George's face. "There is nothing you can do for this," I said. "These headaches just come on and I have to be in dark and quiet place until it passes." It was BS, but was a plausible excuse because of my head injury.

I waited fifteen minutes after Lisa and George left, then I called Kate. I asked her how she and Megan were doing and after she finished updating my on things in Brodricksburg she asked me what I had been doing.

I told her about my call with my Uncle, Patrick Murray. Before I could even start telling her anything about the call she started asking me questions. She seemed so happy that I had found my uncle. Kate's attitude changed when I told her about getting a visit from Lisa and the Andersons the previous night. She listened to what I had to say, but she didn't ask any questions or comment on anything I told her about that meeting. It was obvious that Kate didn't like hearing about Lisa, so I didn't mention that Lisa had been to the house again that day.

I told Kate about buying the computer and how I was putting my life history together.

"I'd like to read that," Kate said.

"Tomorrow I will take pictures of my house and then I'll send you the pictures and a copy of what I have written so far.

We talked for another fifteen minutes and then I told Kate I would call her tomorrow and said good night.

Chapter 17 -- Dead End

Monday morning I slept late. When I finally got out of bed, I felt lost. I had no job and nowhere to go. I made breakfast and sat watching the morning news while I ate. After breakfast, I poured myself another cup of coffee and went up to my office.

I opened a box of photographs from 1997 and began studying each one. Most of them were pictures of me. Some had my mother in them, and others showed an older woman that I guessed was my grandmother. One photo caught my attention. It showed my grandmother talking to me while I was sitting at an old oak roll-top desk, the very same desk that was sitting in my office. That explained why that desk felt familiar to me.

I had about finished looking at all of the pictures in that box when my phone rang. The call was from Detective Monroe asking me to come down to the station. He didn't give me any hint as to what he wanted to see me about, and that made me very uncomfortable.

An hour and a half later I was shown into a conference room and told that Detective Monroe would be along shortly. He showed up ten minutes later.

"Thanks for coming in," Detective Monroe said.

"Did I have a choice?"

"Actually, you did. I am sorry if I gave you the impression that you were called in to be questioned," Detective Monroe said.

"Okay, then why am I here?"

"I just wanted to give you an update on the case, and it's not good," Detective Monroe said. "The FBI apprehended Jeff Peterson in Winston Salem yesterday. He was cooperative during questioning but did not provide us with all of the answers we need.

"Mr. Peterson admitted that he and Mr. Pruitt abducted you from your home and transported you in your car to Pennsylvania. They planned to drive to an old farm owned by a relative of Mr. Pruitt's near Fishkill, NY. That is where they were going to kill you and bury your body. They had to change their plans when they ran into a snowstorm in Pennsylvania. Mr. Peterson said that the snow was blowing so hard that they were having trouble seeing the road in front of them. He said that they got lost and made a wrong turn and ended up eastbound on Interstate 78 near Allentown.

"Mr. Pruitt said that they would not be able to get to his cousin's farm, so he decided to dump your body out in the country somewhere and head back south. Mr. Peterson said that he had no idea where they were when Pruitt stopped the car near an open field.

"Mr. Peterson said that they pulled you out of the trunk half dragged you out into the field. When they reached a low spot in the middle of the field, Pruitt handed Peterson the shovel we found in the trunk of your car and told him to start digging a hole. Peterson said that the ground was frozen solid and he could not penetrate the ground with the shovel.

"Mr. Peterson said that they were freezing and beginning to panic when Pruitt came up with the idea of stripping you naked and bashing in your head and leaving you. Pruitt said that by the time anyone found your body they would never be able to identify you.

"Mr. Peterson claims that Mr. Pruitt was the one that hit you with the baseball bat. I guess he thought that would make a difference for him somehow.

"We asked Mr. Peterson who they were working with. He said they were not working with anyone. He said that it was just the two of them that abducted you. We ask him why they abducted you and he said that they were told to. We told him he wasn't making sense. If they weren't working with anyone else, who told then to abduct you? Mr. Peterson said some guy hired them to grab you and take you far away from North Carolina and make sure no one would ever find you. We asked him who the guy was, but he said he didn't know. He said he never saw the guy. Mr. Peterson said that Pruitt made the deal.

Mr. Pruitt claims he doesn't know this guy either. He told us that some guy told him he had a job for him that would pay very well, and if he was interested he should meet him in JC's Pub that night. Pruitt said it was dark inside the bar and the guy had a beard and mustache and was wearing a ski cap and sunglasses. Pruitt said the guy never stood up, so he has no idea how big or small he might be. Pruitt said the guy offered him ten grand to get rid of you."

"So we still don't know who set this whole thing up?" I said.

"No, not yet. We seem to be at a dead end right now." Detective Monroe said. "There is something that you need to know. The crime scene techs determined that the mess we found in your home office was made by someone searching your office after you had already been abducted."

"How do they know that?"

"It was that blood spatter we found in your office. There was blood on the floor underneath the papers scattered around the room, but there was no blood on any of the papers. That means the blood was already dry before those papers were dropped on the floor. Pruitt and Peterson both swear that they did not take your computer or search your office."

"When do they think that happened?"

"They could not determine when that may have happened but it is possible that the person that searched your house is the person that planned the theft of Interapp. He waited at least a day after Pruitt and Peterson took you away to go to your house to take your computer and search your office.""That is worrisome. Have you been watching the employees at SA? Anything suspicious there?"

"So far no one has done anything to raise our suspicion. Maybe after tomorrow, we'll get some action," Detective Monroe said.

"Why, what is happening tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow there will be a news release detail your story and say that we have arrested the two people responsible for your abduction. The report will say that we expect at least one of the suspects we have in custody will help us identify anyone else that was involved in the crime. That should scare anyone else that was involved into action."

"Are you saying that I should be worried?" I said.

"Not necessarily. You don't present any risk to the perpetrator; his worry will be what our two guests in lockup might be able to tell us, but it wouldn't hurt you to be careful."

I left the meeting feeling disappointed. I had hoped that once Pruitt and Peterson were arrested, they would tell the police who set this whole thing up.

When I got home, I ate some lunch and then headed back to my office to pour through more photographs. I wanted to find pictures of my father and Uncle Patrick and Aunt Helen.

I had just started looking at pictures when my phone rang.

"Hey, Mike, it's George. How about meeting me at 42nd Street for a beer around 5:30? There is something I would like to talk to you about."

"Sounds like a plan, I'll see you there." I probably sounded a lot more enthusiastic about meeting George for a drink than I felt, but since I had so few potential friends in Raleigh, I didn't want to risk losing one of them.

Later in the afternoon, I got a call from Lisa asking me what my plans were for the evening. I told her I was meeting George at 42nd Street, but beyond having a couple of beers I didn't have a plan. Lisa said that she might meet us there.

When I got to 42nd Street, George was already leaning against the bar waiting for me. Before I could say anything, George handed me a Red Oak Amber. I looked at the bottle and then at George.

"Oh, shit. You don't remember that either. Red Oak Amber has been your beer of choice ever since I have known you."

I thanked George and took a swallow of the beer. "This is good. I guess it still is my beer of choice."

"Some things never change," George said, "So, what do you hear from the police? Any leads?"

"They aren't telling me anything," I said. "Detective Monroe, the detective leading the case told me there would be a news release about my case tonight, but he did not elaborate any more than that." Not completely true, but I figured that if I acted like I didn't know anything, people wouldn't ask me a lot of questions, but that didn't work with George.

George wanted to know everything about what happened to me.

"Did you recognize the guys that took you? Would you recognize either of them if you ever saw them again?" George said.

"I have no idea if I knew who they were or not," I said. "I have no memory of what happened to me before I came to lying in the field, naked and freezing."

"You once told me that you held out a few lines of code from an application you were writing. You reasoned that the application would be useless to anyone who might hack into your computer and steal it," George said. "I thought maybe the reason no software applications with the functionality of Interapp has shown up on the market over the last six months is that you held back a few lines of code. You didn't happen to find any flash drives or anything like that lying around your office at home did you?"

That question put me on alert. Why would George care if I did remove some lines of code from the Interapp files? And is it possible that is why someone searched my office?

"My house has been searched three times, once by my attackers, once by the police and once by me," I said. "Nothing like what you are talking about has turned up."

I decided it was time to change the subject. "Lisa called me this afternoon, and when I told her I was coming here to have a drink with you, she said she might meet us here." That bit of information didn't seem to be good news to George.

Lisa joined us a few minutes later and said that Sonja and John were also on their way. At that point, the conversation turned to trivial matters until George happed to look toward the entrance and said, "This isn't good."

"What's that?" I said.

"That asshole Kaplan just came in," George said.

"Who is Kaplan?" I asked.

"Tony Kaplan, he is one of our sale's manager," George said. "Shit, he spotted us, and he is headed this way."

"Hey George, how're you doing Mike?" Kaplan said.

"He doesn't know who you are, Tony," George said. "Did you forget that he has amnesia?"

"Oh yeah, sorry about that Mike, I'm Tony Kaplan." We shook hands, and Kaplan said: "So what's going on with the investigation?"

"I don't know. The police won't tell me anything," I said.

"Tony, you might want to make yourself scarce because John and Sonja are on their way here," Lisa said.

"Oh, well maybe I should go join my friends in the restaurant," Kaplan said. "Mike, you and I need to get together and have a chat. Maybe we can meet sometime later this week."

"I have been pretty busy, but give me a call when you want to get together," I said.

After Kaplan walked away, George said, "You aren't really going meet with him are you?"

"I don't know, is there a reason I shouldn't?"

"Because he is an asshole of the first order," George said.

"What was it about the mention of John and Sonja that made him, turn tail and run off like that?" I said.

"Tony almost caused John and Sonja to split up. There were at least two times when you had to hold John back from attacking Tony," Lisa said.

"How did he almost split John and Sonja up?"

"It's not common knowledge, but since you knew about this when it happened I guess it's all right to tell you about it know," Lisa said. When Tony came to work at SA, he already knew Sonja. They had a bit of history together. Sonja loves John but she had some weird connection to Tony, and he was doing his best to exploit it. Tony spent months trying to seduce Sonja, and he very nearly was successful. John was very patient with Sonja the whole time this was going on, but in the end, John did something that they have never told us about, but it broke the spell Tony seemed to have over Sonja."

"So Tony doesn't bother Sonja anymore?" I said.

"No, he has moved on to other targets. He seems to like married women. He is probably with someone else's wife right now." George said.

"Did Mr. Stanley know what was going on?"

"Dave? Not until after it was over," George said. "I think Dave had a talk with Tony and let him know that he was on very thin ice. Now, as long as Tony doesn't mess with any of the women in the company, Dave doesn't care what Tony does on his own time."

When John and Sonja arrived, John suggested that we get a table in the restaurant.

"John, if you don't mind, I'd feel more comfortable down here in the bar area where it isn't as crowed and noisy," I said.

"That's fine with me. Let's pull a couple of tables together," John said.

As we were pulling tables together, George whispered to me, "That was quick thinking, Mike.

The rest of the evening was fun. I was beginning to understand why these people were my friends.

When I got home, I called Kate. Kate spent a lot of time talking about Megan and things going on at the hospital; then she asked me how I was feeling and what I was doing to fill my days. I sensed that Kate wanted to know what was going on between Lisa and me, but she wouldn't come right out and ask me. It's a good thing she didn't ask because I didn't know what was going on between us.

After talking to Kate, I stayed up to watch the eleven o'clock news. I was the lead story. The local news anchor told the story of my abduction and the attempt to kill and leave my naked body in a snow covered field in eastern Pennsylvania. They showed pictures of Henry Pruitt and Jeff Peterson and said the two men were in custody and that the detectives believed that they would soon know who else might have been involved.