Free Serpent's Kiss by Ed Gorman

was.
        A woman answered, "Hello."
        He said nothing for a time.
        "Hello?"
        He was afraid to speak.
        "It's you, isn't it?"
        "I-I don't know your name."
        "They said you might be confused, honey. The electroshock you've had recently and everything."
        "Who are you?"
        "You really don't know?"
        "No."
        "I'm your wife. Karen."
        "Who am I?"
        She paused again. "Honey, I'm afraid. For you, I mean. You can't walk around in this condition."
        "A while ago I rode by in a bus… I saw a police car there."
        "Two of the detectives came back."
        "They're looking for me."
        "Yes. But you haven't done anything really. Nobody's been hurt. They'd just like to get you back into Hastings House."
        The thing in his stomach shifted again.
        "I'm afraid," he said. "There's something in my stomach."
        "In your stomach?"
        "Yes. Some thing . There's no other way to describe it."
        "There's something in your stomach?"
        "Yes. I know how that must sound but-there is."
        She sighed. "Honey, can't you see that you really need to go back to Hastings House? They want to help you. They really do."
        "I can't."
        "But why not?"
        "I'm not sure."
        A pause again. "This morning Cindy heard about your escape. While I was in the bathroom, she went into the living room and turned on the set. She saw your picture."
        "Cindy?"
        "Our daughter. She's six."
        "My God."
        "She's afraid she'll never see you again. She's been crying all day."
        "I'm sorry. I-I'm just so confused."
        "Won't you let me help you, Richard?"
        Richard. So that was his name.
        "What's my last name?"
        "Oh, darling."
        And then she started to cry.
        He couldn't stand the sound of it, her tears. He'd made her cry. And made his daughter cry. Why couldn't he help them, stop running the way she wanted him to, turn himself in?
        "I'm sorry," he said again.
        He hung up and left the booth, pushing the dog out on the sidewalk as he did so.
        The dog barked at him.
        Richard just shook his head and walked away.
        

4
        
ROB LINDSTROM
        
MAY 12, 1989
        
        THE THIRD MURDER was not so easy.
        A) The police were looking for him and moving around in the city was dangerous. B) The confusion was getting very bad now. Sometimes he had no idea who or where he was, almost as if he were phasing in and out of a fever dream. C) The thing in his stomach was making him nauseous till the time.
        In the bureau he found the same manila envelope with the same photos he had come to dread seeing. They reminded him too much of what he'd done to the two women.
        Now there was a new name in the envelope.
         Doreen Jackson.
        He crumpled it up and threw it in the corner.
        He went into the bathroom and barfed.
        When he came out he went into the living room and collapsed into the chair.
        Sweat beaded his forehead. His teeth were chattering. He was hot and cold. He couldn't decide which.
        He kept clamping his hand on his stomach.
        The thing inside him kept coiling and uncoiling. He slammed his fist against it.
        For a moment it stopped writhing.
        He lay back in the chair.
        He had brought something with him from his last pass through the kitchen. Now, in the half light of night, streetlights and car lights framing the paper blinds, he raised the butcher knife up to his eyes and looked at it.
        He eased the point of it down to his belly.
        The thing was writhing again.
         You sonofabitch. You! Fucking sonofabitch, he thought.
        He pressed the butcher knife against his belly.
        An abortion was what he needed.
        He tried to find the humour in this, in a man