Katherine wasn’t even asking questions; Sarah Jordan wanted to talk.
“Everything started out normally,” she said. “The same as it had been for months.”
As Sarah elaborated on what had happened the afternoon she overdosed her horse and killed him, Katherine pieced together what Ansel Shaver’s study was about. It sounded like Ansel and his fellow professors were combining biofeedback therapy with traditional drug treatment to measure the therapy’s influence on anxiety and dependence on medication.
Sarah sounded like she’d told the story before. “You know we’re supposed to do the visualizations at set times, right? But also if we start to feel a panic attack coming on. And I don’t know what triggered it, but I was definitely feeling the signs of one, so I immediately visualized the outcome and then tried to walk backward in my mind to make it smaller and smaller.”
Biofeedback therapy was a clinical process that focused on understanding and gaining control over involuntary stress responses like heartbeat, blood pressure, or breathing. By systematically learning the body’s reactions to stress through multiple sensor readings, a patient could then use techniques like breathing exercises or guided visualizations to learn control over those reactions.
Sarah’s voice began to waver. “But the visualization wasn’t working. For some reason, instead of walking backward, I felt like someone was pushing me forward.”
“I see.”
Biofeedback had a proven track record in treating things like migraine headaches and chronic pain. It had a growing record in treating anxiety, which meant that Ansel and his team were likely building on existing research.
As a clinical study, it was working off a very solid foundation.
“Not pushing me physically,” Sarah clarified. “But it’s like we learned in the lab. I took a breath and a mental step. Then another and another. It’s just that this time, the mental steps didn’t go backward like we practiced.”
“Right.” To Katherine’s mind, Sarah’s backward visualization sounded like a nightmare.
What had happened in that barn?
“It got worse and worse. After a certain point, I don’t remember what happened. People I talked to later said I wasn’t talking or reacting to anyone. I don’t remember any of it. I don’t remember going to Tucker’s stall. I don’t remember… anything.” She cleared her throat, but her voice was still hoarse as she continued. “It shouldn’t have ever happened, and I don’t know how it did. I did everything like we practiced at the lab. Tucker was… It probably sounds weird, but he was my best friend.”
“I’m so sorry, Sarah. I wish I could tell you why any of this happened.”
“I stopped everything for a while. I quit logging. I moved home. But then I started having trouble sleeping again, which is why I signed up in the first place. So I’m back on track now, and my sleep is way better again.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” Katherine’s heart hurt. Whatever happened had traumatized this young woman. She was more determined than ever to find out if there was a tie between Sarah and Justin. “And I’m so sorry about Tucker.”
“Thanks.” Sarah spoke to someone in the background before she returned to Katherine. “I wasn’t sure if I was still in the study since I’m not at school anymore. Does Professor Kraft want me to keep filling out my journal?”
“Professor Kraft?” Katherine had to be honest. This girl had bared her soul even if she’d done it unintentionally. Katherine wanted her to know she was trying to help. “Sarah, I need to be completely up front with you. I am not working with Professor Shaver on this particular study. I do work with him in a different department, but I contacted you because there was a different incident near school recently.”
“You’re not part of the biofeedback study?”
“I am not.”
“How did you get my name? They said it was confidential.”
“I’m looking into an incident that happened with Justin McCabe a couple of weeks ago, and someone mentioned what happened with you—”
“Something happened to Justin? Is he okay?” Sarah’s voice was alarmed. “I’m friends with one of his fraternity brothers. Justin’s the whole reason I was involved in the biofeedback study in the first place. He’s the one who told me about it. I know that technically none of us were supposed to know each other, but I promise we didn’t talk about it or anything. He volunteered to be part of it, and then he told me and… What happened to Justin?”
“He was involved in an attempted shooting at the Blue Wave Gym.” Katherine decided she could share anything that was already public knowledge. “He was carrying a handgun with an extended magazine at the gym.”
“What?”
“No one was hurt, but I believe he was arrested on attempted murder charges. The police are still investigating, and they didn’t put his name in the paper—”
“That’s not… You don’t understand—that’s not possible.”
“I know it’s shocking, but if you read about it in the papers, he was the student involved.”
A sharp laugh sounded across the line. “Is this a sick joke?”
“I’m sorry, it’s not. You’re not the first person to say this was out of character, so I know it must be—”
“It’s not shocking, it’s impossible.” Sarah’s voice rose. “Do they even realize what happened to his little brother?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I haven’t heard—”
“Justin and his family moved to the Central Coast after his little brother was killed in a school shooting. It happened when Justin was like thirteen years old. To think he’d do anything like that is absurd. He was like the only guy in his fraternity who was super pro gun control because of what happened. Being involved in a mass shooting would be, like, his worst nightmare ever.”
“I was there.” Katherine could barely force out the words. “I saw it. He did have a gun, and he was going to shoot people.”
“Then there’s something else going on, because he would never ever do that, Professor Katherine.” Sarah sounded like she was near tears. “Something is really, really not right with all this.”
What had Katherine gotten involved in?
“Sarah, if I give you my number, can you ask Justin’s family or friends to call me?” It was a risk, but Katherine felt like she needed Sarah on her side. “They might not want to talk to me because I was there that day and I gave a statement to the police, but I’m trying to figure out what was going on. I really want to help.”
“Why?”
“Because I agree with you. What happened to you, what happened with Justin, something isn’t right. Things are not adding up.”
And I don’t want to have any more violent visions of death.
Sarah said, “I’ll try to get their number, but I never met his family. I only knew him from my friend at the fraternity. They may not even talk to me.”
“Whatever you can do will help.” Katherine took a breath. “And for now, please keep our conversation confidential. I’m trying to help, but I could get into a lot of trouble just for speaking to you.”
Sarah was quiet for a long time.
“Okay,” Sarah finally said. “If you can help me and Justin figure out what happened, I won’t say a word.”
* * *
“You mean that boy had a little brother killed by a school shooter?” Megan was the first person Katherine called on her way home from work. “That poor family.”
Katherine had the car to herself. Baxter had a late meeting with his department, and one of his colleagues would be giving him a ride home. It was four o’clock, and traffic downtown was stop and go as students and staff started leaving school for the day.
“It happened in Southern California when Justin was thirteen,” Katherine said. “It sounded horrible. I looked up the news articles online after I got off the phone with Sarah. If they’d published Justin’s name in the paper, I’m sure the media would have made the connection. Th
e McCabes have been vocal in gun control debates.”
“Do you think…? Could Justin have been trying to make some kind of political point threatening people?”
“If my vision was correct, he wasn’t going to just threaten. He was actually going to shoot.”
“Do you think he…?” Megan let out a strangled sound. “I have no idea. It’s like Sarah said—it just seems impossible to go through that and then do something like he did. And I can’t imagine what that boy’s mother is going through right now. I’m heartbroken for them.”
“You know what would be worse?” Katherine made it past the clogged traffic on State Street and turned toward Valley Road to loop around the worst of the traffic. “If we hadn’t been there and someone had actually gotten hurt. Think about that, okay? Right now Justin is in jail for attempted murder and not murder.” And since Sarah had confirmed that Justin was involved in Ansel Shaver’s study, Katherine was starting to think there had to be a connection. “Did you find anything else out today? Any other students that popped up in the news?”
“I didn’t find anything,” Megan said. “Other than the usual stuff. Parties that went a little wild. Drunk and disorderly stuff. Shouting matches. Nothing extreme like what happened with Justin or Sarah.”
“But would something like what happened with Sarah have even made it into the news?” Katherine asked. “Unless something publicly criminal happened, people might try to keep it quiet.”
“Especially when things seem so out of character,” Megan said. “Toni called me earlier and said she asked around about what happened with Sarah. According to people she talked to—her cousin is a furrier I guess?”
Some of Katherine’s neighbors in North Beach were horse people. “Do you mean a farrier? Someone who shoes horses?”
“Oh my God, that makes so much more sense than what I was imagining.” Megan sounded relieved.
“Do I want to know?”
There was a long silence on the line. “Probably not.”
“Okay, moving on.”
“Toni called me earlier this afternoon after she talked to her cousin, ’cause she does the shoeing for the rodeo team since she used to be on it in college—you know, this really is a small town. I swear, y’all know each other like socks in a drawer.”
“Okay?”
“Anyway, Sarah loved that horse. He was a big part of her life. Something happening to him might have been her biggest fear. And then you have a kid like Justin who lost a brother to a mass shooter—”
“A random shooting could have been Justin’s biggest fear.” Something tickled Katherine’s brain. “What if part of this experiment was using that?”
“Using what?”
“The worst outcome. A subject’s biggest fear.” Katherine tried to relate it to something personal. “I have social anxiety, and my biggest fear is humiliating myself in front of a large group of people. It takes multiple forms in my head, but anytime I feel anxiety building, it’s usually related to that.”
“We need to find out who all was in that study.”
“I have no idea how to do that. There’s layer after layer of confidentiality papers to protect subjects in these studies. Just by speaking with Sarah, I’ve already put myself in a horrible ethical situation.”
“Well, how about talking to Justin McCabe?”
“I might be able to justify that because of the personal connection with the incident.” Katherine sighed. “I’m hoping someone from his family will call me, but I don’t know. I don’t think I can just march up to the jail and ask to talk to him, you know?”
Or did people do that? Could you just put your name on a list?
“Hopefully they’ll call,” Megan said. “Also, for the record, I can’t even imagine you humiliating yourself in front of people. You’re so far from ridiculous that it’s… ridiculous. I know, get a better vocabulary, Meg.” She cleared her throat. “I just mean you’re a very cool person and you’re clearly very smart.”
“Thank you.” Katherine felt a surge of warmth. “But remember, it’s anxiety. It’s not logical. I can prepare for a lecture for weeks, but if my anxiety is flaring up, I might be convinced that the lecture will go horribly wrong no matter how many people reassure me.”
“Do you take medication?”
“I do. I have for years. It helps a considerable amount.” Katherine suddenly realized that she had nothing planned for dinner and Baxter would be late from work. “Damn. I need to figure out something to make for dinner.” Hmmmm. What meal would complement psychic revelations and admissions of academic impropriety, Katherine?
She needed to tell Baxter what was going on. She dreaded it. Maybe not tonight.
“I love cooking, but I hate cooking dinner,” Megan said. “Does that make any sense?”
“Completely. If I have a full day to plan and prepare something, I enjoy it. Baxter and I cook together on weekends.”
“Same. Well, my husband doesn’t help me cook, but if I can spend all day cooking something slow and drinking a glass of wine, maybe listening to music? So fun. Especially back home if it was a big family event or neighborhood dinner and I had a girlfriend over to cook with me and chat all day.”
“I have no experience with anything like that, but it sounds wonderful.”
“It is.” Megan sighed. “But the act of making a meal every single night to shovel food into four ungrateful people just annoys the crap out of me.”
Katherine frowned as she turned in to the parking lot for the local grocery store. “They shouldn’t be ungrateful if you’re making them a home-cooked dinner every night.”
“Have you known teenagers in your life?”
She had a point. “I have, but I’ve never had to cook for them regularly.”
“I swear, I want to throw their phones in the microwave and watch them explode when they get them out at the dinner table. But I’m stuck because their father does the exact same thing, so what am I supposed to say? It’s infuriating.”
Katherine realized that Megan rarely referred to her husband by name. “What’s your husband’s name again?”
“Rodney. And the kids are Trina—she’s the oldest—Adam, and Cami is the baby. Of course, the baby is fourteen, but sometimes she forgets that and acts like she still likes me.”
“I have a hard time imagining anyone finding you unlikeable.” Katherine parked the car and grabbed the canvas bag she stored in the back seat pocket. “I think eventually you’ll even win Toni over.”
“Still crossing my fingers on that one. But as far as kids go, did you like your mother when you were fourteen?”
“Yes. She and my sister were the only ones who knew that I existed most days.”
“What about your daddy?”
“He was closer to my sister. She’s a brilliant mathematician, and she got her first PhD when she was twenty-one. She’s an actual genius.”
“Didn’t you start college when you were like fifteen? That doesn’t make you a genius?”
“According to my father, that made me slightly precocious.” She walked into the grocery store and grabbed a cart. “Unfortunately, geniuses and slightly precocious physicists still have to cook dinner when their husbands are working late. Tell me what to buy. I never know what to make.”
“Do you like Mexican food?”
“I’m a Californian. Of course I like Mexican food.”
“Then Katherine, my friend, tacos are always the answer.”
She turned her cart toward the butcher counter. “I can’t argue with that and I wouldn’t even want to.”
“Tacos may be my favorite thing about California.”
“I’m not sure our tacos completely make up for the outrageous property taxes, but they do help.”
“Other than you, I mean. I like you more than tacos.”
Katherine stopped and smiled in the produce department. “Thank you.”
“Jury’s still out on Toni though. She’s not tacos, she’s hot sauce. A little
goes a real long way.”
“Toni is hot sauce?” Katherine considered the comparison as she grabbed a few onions, a handful of serrano chilies, and some limes. “Okay, that’s fair.”
Chapter 13
Baxter was devouring the tacos. “These are delicious, darling.”
“Thanks. I was talking with Megan while I did the shopping and she suggested tacos. I don’t know why I don’t make them more often.”
Baxter’s smile was warm. “I’m so pleased that you’re spending time with her. She seems like a very nice person.”
“She is very nice.” Katherine reached over and squeezed his hand. “Careful—it sounds like she and Toni want to make Wine Wednesday a weekly habit.”
“I think that’s wonderful.” He took another bite, swallowed, and carefully blotted his mouth with his napkin. “Would you rather I find somewhere else to be on Wednesdays?”
“We’re not kicking you out yet. When we get to the spooky menopause rituals, I’ll let you know.”
“You mean I’ll be left out of the bonfires and naked dancing under the moon? I suppose it’s understandable, but I can’t say I’m not disappointed.” He finished off the last of his tacos and reached for her empty plate. “Have I mentioned lately that I wish we had someone with your sense of humor in the department? It’s nothing but humorless complaints from everyone right now.”
“That doesn’t sound like your clan.” Usually the math department was a friendly bunch even if they were completely uninterested in anything else going on at the university. If Baxter was wishing for someone with her admittedly anemic sense of humor, things truly must be dire. “People still unhappy about the renovations?”
He shrugged dramatically. “I can’t help that the building hasn’t been renovated since 1932 and the school wants to update it. It’s hardly a surprise. Margaret and I gave everyone two years of warning, but they’re acting like we dropped a bomb on them at the beginning of the semester.”
“What’s the main complaint?”
“That they’re going to have to move offices, of course. We’re splitting up the family for two whole semesters. You know they don’t like change.”
Runaway Fate: Moonstone Cove Book One Page 10