Jeff Lindsay - Dexter in the Dark: A Novel

I DON'T DREAM. I MEAN, I'M SURE THAT AT SOME POINTDURING my normal sleep, there must be images and fragments of nonsense paradingthrough my subconscious. After all, they tell me that happens with everyone.But I never seem to remember dreams if I do have them, which they tell mehappens to nobody at all. So I assume that I do not dream.

It was therefore something of a shock to discover myself late thatnight, cradled in Rita's arms, shouting something I could not quite hear; justthe echo of my own strangled voice coming back at me out of the cottony dark,and Rita's cool hand on my forehead, her voice murmuring, All right,sweetheart, I won't leave you.

Thank you very much, I said in a croakingvoice. I cleared my throat and sat up.

You had a bad dream, she told me.

Really? What was it? I still didn't remember anything butmy shouting and a vague sense of danger crowding in on me, and me all alone.

I don't know, Rita said. You were shouting, 'Comeback! Don't leave me alone.' She cleared her throat. Dexter-I knowyou're feeling some stress about our wedding

Not at all, I said.

But I want you to know. I will never leaveyou. She reached for my hand again. This is forever with me, bigman. I am holding on to you. She scooted over and put her head on myshoulder. Don't worry. I won't ever leave you, Dexter.

Even though I lack experience with dreams, I was fairly sure that mysubconscious was not terribly worried about Rita leaving me. I mean, it hadn'toccurred to me that she would, which was not really a sign of trust on my part.I just hadn't thought about it. Truly, I had no idea why she wanted to hang onto me in the first place, so any hypothetical leave-taking was just asmysterious.

No, this was mysubconscious. If it was crying out in pain at the threat of abandonment, I knewexactly

what it feared losing: the Dark Passenger. My bosom buddy, my constantcompanion on my journey through life's sorrows and sharp pleasures. That wasthe fear behind the dream: losing the thing that had been so very much a partof me, had actually defined me, for my whole life.

When it scuttled into hiding at the university crimescene it had clearly shaken me badly, more than I had known at the time. Thesudden and very scary reappearance of 65 percent of Sergeant Doakes suppliedthe sense of danger, and the rest was easy. My subconscious had kicked in andsupplied a dream on the subject. Perfectly clear-Psych 101, a textbook case,nothing to worry about.

So why was I still worrying?

Because the Passenger had never even flinched before,and I still didn't know why it had chosen now. Was Rita right about the stressof the approaching wedding? Or was there really something about the twoheadless bodies by the university lake that just plain scared the Dark out ofme?

I didn't know-and, since it seemed like Rita's ideas about comfortingme had begun to take a more active turn, it did not look like I was going tofind out anytime soon.

Come here, baby, Rita whispered.

And after all, there really isn't any place to run ina queen-size bed, is there?

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The next morning found Deborah obsessed with findingthe missing heads from the two bodies at the university. Somehow word hadleaked out to the press that the department was interested in finding a coupleof skulls that had wandered away. This was Miami, and I really would havethought that a missing head would get less press coverage than a traffic tie-upon I-95, but something about the fact that there were two of them, and thatthey apparently belonged to young women, created quite a stir. Captain Matthewswas a man who knew the value of being mentioned in the press, but even he wasnot pleased with the note of surly hysteria that attached itself to this story.

And so pressure came down on all of us from above; from the captain toDeborah, who wasted no time passing it on down to the rest of us. Vince Masuokabecame convinced that he could provide Deborah with the key to the whole matterby finding out which bizarre religious sect was responsible. This led to himsticking his head in my door that morning and, without any kind of warning,giving me his best fake smile and saying, firmly and distinctly,Candombl.

Shame on you, I said. This is notime for that kind of language.

Ha, he said, with his terrible artificiallaugh. But it is, I'm sure of it. Candombl is like Santeria, but it'sBrazilian.

Vince, I have no reason to doubt you on that. Myquestion is, what the hell are you talking about?

He came two steps into the room in a kind of prance, as if his bodywanted to take off and he couldn't quite fight it down. They have a thingabout animal heads in some of their rituals, he said. It's on theInternet.

Really, I said."Does it say on the Internet that this Brazilian thing barbecues humans,cuts off their

heads, and replaces them with ceramic bulls'heads?"

Vince wilted just a bit. No, he admitted,and he raised his eyebrows hopefully. But they use animals.

How do they use them, Vince? I asked.

Well, he said, and he looked around my little room, possiblyfor another topic of conversation. Sometimes they, you know, offer a partto the gods, and then they eat the rest.

Vince, I said, are you suggestingthat somebody ate the missing heads?

No, he said, turning sullen, almost likeCody and Astor might have done. But they could have.

It would be very crunchy, wouldn't it?

All right, he said, exceedingly sulky now. I'm justtrying to help. And he stalked away, without even a small fake smile.

But the chaos had only begun. As my unwanted trip to dreamlandindicated, I was already under enough pressure without the added strain of arampaging sister. But only a few minutes later, my small oasis of peace wasripped asunder once again, this time by Deborah, who came roaring into my officeas if pursued by killer bees.

Come on, she snarled at me.

Come on where? I asked, quite a reasonable question, Ithought, but you would have thought I had asked her to shave her head and painther skull blue.

Just get in gear, and come on! she said, so I came on andfollowed her down to the parking lot and into her car.

I swear to God, she fumed as she hammeredher car through the traffic, I have never seen Matthews this pissedbefore. And now it's my fault! She banged on the horn for emphasis andswerved in front of a van that said PALMVIEW ASSISTED LIVING on the side.All because some asshole leaked the heads to the press.

Well, Debs, I said, with all thereasonable soothing I could muster, I'm sure the heads will turnup.

You're goddamned right they will, she said, narrowlymissing a fat man on a bicycle that had huge saddlebags stuffed with scrapmetal. Because I am going to find out which cult the son of a bitchbelongs to, and then I'm going to nail the bastard.

I paused in mid-soothe. Apparently my dear demented sister, just likeVince, had gotten hold of the idea that finding the appropriate alternativereligion would yield a killer. Ah, all right, I said. Andwhere are we going to do that?

She slid the car out ontoBiscayne Boulevard and into a parking space at the curb without answering, andgot out of the car. And so I found myself patiently following her into theCentre for Inner Enhancement, a clearinghouse for all the wonderfully usefulthings that have the words holistic, herbal, oraura in them.

The Centre was a small and shabby building in an area of BiscayneBoulevard that had apparently been designated by treaty as a kind ofreservation for prostitutes and crack dealers. There were enormous bars on thestorefront windows and more of them on the door, which was locked. Deborahpounded on it and after a moment it gave an annoying buzz. She pushed, andfinally it clicked and swung open.