by Mary Calmes
"Baby."
I didn't answer.
The shower curtain moved slowly and I looked up and found Sam.
"What are you doing in here?"
"I have blood all over me... it's in my hair."
"Jesus," he breathed, yanking the shower curtain all the way open so he could turn off the water.
I was sitting in the tub, knees drawn up to my chest, hugging them to me.
"Baby, the water's freezing."
"Is it?"
"You let it run cold."
I couldn't really tell the difference.
He grabbed towels and effortlessly picked me up before sitting down on the edge of the tub with me in his lap. He wasn't careful as he dried me, going for fast instead of gentle.
"How long have you been in here?"
"I dunno," I barely got out through chattering teeth.
"Shit." He sighed, standing up, carrying me out of the bathroom to the bedroom.
"I wanna move into your place. Don't sell it—let's go there."
"Baby—"
"Caleb watched me sleep last night after you left... I'll never feel safe in that apartment again."
He made a noise deep in his chest before his voice came out, hard and gruff. "As soon as they release the crime scene, I'll have movers there first thing, okay?"
I trembled hard and he threw back the sheet and blankets before he put me in bed, covering me completely, even my head. "I was so scared, Sam."
He didn't answer but I heard the jingle of his belt buckle, the thump of boots hitting the floor, the sound of fabric as it slid off his skin.
"You were right.... I should have been more afraid this whole time."
The covers lifted as he slid into bed beside me. His bare chest was pressed to my back, his arms wrapped around me, his face down in my shoulder as he eased my ass against his groin. Nothing sexual about any of it, just him wanting to warm me, hold me, make me feel safe. And it worked like magic, because with him I was bulletproof, and the heat radiating off the man was incredible.
"You're like a block of ice, J. I gotta get you warmed up."
I shivered hard, feeling his body heat start to seep into me. "I know a way to warm me up."
He held me tighter in his arms. "Don't tease me—just rest."
"Okay."
He cleared his throat. "When they called me.... It was a mistake to leave you."
"No. You had to talk to Susan. Tell me what she said."
"I will later."
"I thought I was going to die, you know?"
I felt him tremble.
"I didn't want to die, Sam."
"They told me you tried to save Caleb—ended up using your shirt to try and stop his bleeding."
"Is he gonna be all right?"
"Yes."
I was relieved. "Why did he come after me?"
"He was always going to. It was inevitable."
I nodded.
"You're amazing."
I ignored the compliment. It didn't seem like the time to give any or take them. "Is Caleb at the hospital?"
"Yes."
"He's not gonna die, right, Sam?"
"Right."
I was quiet, savoring his warmth, and he tucked my head under his chin as he hugged me tighter.
"Close your eyes."
I did, even though I was sure there was no way I could ever sleep again.
"I'll be right here. I won't move."
Which turned out to be all I needed to hear. Safe there in his arms, I was out in seconds.
Chapter Seventeen
Sometimes people try and make decisions for you because they feel they know what's best. I have an issue with this kind of thinking. For instance, two weeks later, when Susan Reid wanted me to go with her to the hospital to see Caleb, Sam and Dane made a decision not to tell me. Unfortunately for them, Gwen called me, told me what her mother wanted, and I went alone to meet her at the psychiatric hospital in Evanston.
We sat together, Susan and me, in the area just outside the heavy metal door and talked. I apologized for thinking she was crazy. I told her I would have sent her a card but Hallmark didn't make one for mistakenly assuming someone was a homicidal maniac. There was no flower that conveyed that sentiment either. She gave me a trace of a smile as I passed her a dozen yellow long-stemmed roses. They were for friendship, and she thanked me.
"Why did you do it?" I asked her gently.
She took a settling breath, the tears welling in her eyes.
"I'd already lost one of my sons and my husband... I couldn't lose anyone else."
"But Caleb... he could have killed again. If not me, then eventually Dane."
She shook her head. "I don't know, Jory, I wasn't thinking straight. I'm still not.... I just... I lost my life when I gave Dane up, I just didn't know it."
I nodded.
"I was obsessed with getting him back, making him a Reid... I didn't think of what it would do to Daniel... or to Caleb."
"Sure."
"Caleb was always the most sensitive, so attuned to me, and when I told him... I think he felt like I'd been lying to him all those years."
I watched her face, the worry lines around her eyes and the shadows under them. She looked completely drained, the weight of the world just crushing her.
"And Daniel... he's asked me for a divorce. After so long, he can't even bear to look at me anymore. And I know it's my fault. If I had never given Dane up or kept the fact that I did to myself, taken it to my grave... none of this would have ever happened."
How could I argue? It was true on some level.
"Dane didn't want us, and that made Caleb angry.... I just had no idea that he had it inside of him to kill people. I never knew."
"They told Sam he has two complete and separate personalities."
"Yes. When he was killing those poor men... when he's Caleb, he could never do that. The part of him that is your friend, Jory—he truly loves you."
I knew that. The problem was that the other guy in his head wanted my brains splattered on a wall.
"They don't expect him to ever make a recovery. He's been this way far too long."
"So why are we here?"
"To talk to him. He asked for you."
"What will happen to him?"
They said that after he's released from this observation, after they determine his fitness to stand trial, then he'll be moved to a facility in Wisconsin, long-term."
"How long is long-term?"
"I suspect forever."
"I'm sorry."
"It's for the best. I don't want him to hurt anyone else."
"Can I ask you something?"
"Of course."
"Why were your fingerprints on the knife they found in Caleb's apartment?"
"He showed it to me once, had me hold it.... I had no idea I was being set up at the time. It's not a place your mind goes to when you're just chatting with your child."
"Sure." I nodded.
"Something else?"
"Yeah. Were he and Greg friends?"
"Great friends. I loved Greg too. If Caleb ever comes to realize that he himself killed Greg, that will probably kill him."
I wanted to comfort her, I just didn't know how.
Tears rolled down her cheeks. "Oh Jory, the way you're looking at me... my God, the capacity for love you have, for kindness. You're such a good boy, Jory. Your mother did such a good job with you."
I didn't tell her it was all my grandmother's doing. Annie Keyes had loved me fiercely and desperately with everything she had up until the day she died. My mother was gone; the only person she had left to love was me. I still missed my grandmother, and I wished she had been able to meet Sam and Dane. She would have been crazy about both of them, especially Sam. Stubborn and gruff were her favorite kind of people.
"Jory?"
"Sorry." I smiled at Susan Reid. "I zone out a lot."
She sighed, curling her fingers around mine. "It's scary in there. I need to let you k
now that."
"It's okay," I assured her, patting her hand before I eased my hand free.
She was comforted, and we rose at the same time to go to the door.
I had to empty my pockets, and when the door locked shut behind me after we were buzzed in, I had a moment of uncertainty. There were orderlies everywhere, huge, muscle-bound guys that squinted at us as we walked by. The guards at the nurses' station were armed with batons and the nurses moved nowhere without an escort. After we checked in, an orderly took us to Caleb's room. I was expecting a big room with a bay window; the reality was a tiny room with bars across a sealed pane of glass. There was no escape to be had that way. A breeze on his face would be a luxury for Caleb.
He was sitting in a chair when we walked in. On the desk in front of him was one of those 64 packs of crayons and lots of paper. My guess was that a pen was out of the question for the immediate future. There were books, thick ones that most people said they would read before they died. But Caleb had time now to take on all the great Russian novelists. In fact, all he had was time.
"Jory," he said, and I moved quickly into the room. My name was slurred, and that broke my heart.
"Hey." I smiled at him, moving to kneel beside the chair so he wouldn't have to look up at me.
His hand went instantly to my cheek, but it was like he didn't have control over it completely. It trembled and he moved it robotically, poking at me rather than the smooth glide of his skin over mine.
"Jory, what did I do?"
The look in his eyes... helpless, lost, forsaken. I couldn't breathe. I stood up and he grabbed my hand with both of his, his face imploring me for an answer.
"I'm not sure, buddy, but they'll figure it out."
"Don't go, okay? Stay here and talk to me."
Talk about what? How I still felt one way about him but feared him at the very same time? How Greg had made the car bomb that had blown up Sam's car, but that Caleb had been the one to plant it, since Greg was already dead?
Everyone was amazed that I could separate the Caleb I loved from the murderous man that had nearly killed the love of my life... but I could. I had never actually seen Caleb try and hurt Sam, I had only seen him try and hurt me, and hurting me I could forgive. And it was funny that I could, but my brother could not, Dane having completely shut himself off from the Reids, dealing with his father through his lawyer, paperwork being the only contact the two men had. Dane, as well as Aja, had a standing restraining order for Susan Reid. Her giving him up at birth he could have cared less about. The fact that she had lied to protect Caleb and he had come after me, that was bad; but that he might have eventually come for him, thus putting his wife in the line of fire... this was unforgivable.
I had consoled Susan with the promise that someday he would thaw. I had a feeling that when he had his own children, when he felt that bond, he might turn to her or his father and look for reconciliation. But until that time they would both have to wait and hope.
"Jory?"
Zoned out again; it was troubling, that. I looked down at Caleb. "I gotta go, buddy—but I'll come back."
He nodded and gave my hand a tug to get me close to him. But I couldn't hug him, I wasn't that strong. I patted his shoulder instead, and the sigh rose up out of him.
Stepping back, Susan Reid was suddenly on me, grabbing me tight, startling me a little with the ferocity and quickness of her movement. I was good and creeped out, there was no denying it.
"You've been better to me than my own son."
It was still no time for compliments, and I didn't want that one anyway. She was not allowed to be critical of Dane. I pulled free and stepped back beyond her reach. "I'll call you."
"Please," she said with a longing that made me cringe.
Because we both knew I wouldn't. This was the end of the road for Susan Reid and me.
I turned and went to the door. What made me look back was beyond me, but I did. I shouldn't have. I told myself I would be back to see Caleb, sit with him, bring him books or paints—whatever you took to a hospital, whatever they would allow. When my eyes flicked to his, I froze where I was.
Caleb's eyes, which seconds before were liquid with tears, were now narrow slits of ice. His head was dipped forward just slightly so that he was looking sort of up at me, his jaw clenched, his face a study of rage. The hatred was etched in every line, in the slightest quiver of his upper lip, like he was ready to snarl or bite. I had no doubt that if the medication would have allowed him to rise, he would have lunged for me and strangled me to death right there in that room. I reached out and grabbed the doorframe.
"Jory?"
I couldn't even turn to look at Susan. I was suddenly terrified that every time I closed my eyes for the rest of my life I would see Caleb's eyes at that moment. See him rising at the foot of my bed every night, remembering his words that he had watched me sleep. He would become my own personal bogeyman if I let him.
I bolted from the room, not caring if it was weak or not. I went to the front desk, collected my things, and walked with the orderly, even though I wanted to run, scream to be let out. I kept my emotions in check, outwardly calm and unaffected, inside just churning as the door was opened and I was released from the padded side of the door that kept people in to the hard metal side that kept people out. I didn't stop until I was outside under the awning, watching the rain come down in streams. I took deep, gulping breaths of air, calming slowly, joyful with the knowledge that I could go and never return. I was free.
* * * *
When I was young, there would be those nights when I was scared. Things that went bump in the night, I was sure were coming for me. My imagination was boundless, and I was able to make even the most ridiculous terrors seem plausible. On those occasions, I was certain that I would not live to see the dawn. Into the nightmare would come some seemingly mundane noise—the cycling of the refrigerator, a barking dog, the flushing of a toilet—just something that would remind me that there was a world outside my paranoia.
It was comforting and I appreciated it, and so when Sam called to remind me that I was running very late for his captain's wife's birthday party downtown, the note of irritation in his voice soothed me. He was annoyed at me, and that grounded me.
I felt even better when I got to the enormous hotel ballroom where the party was being held. There were lots of people, so I could blend easily into the crowd. I looked for anyone I knew, and when I spotted Patrick at the bar, I knew Sam had to be close. I leaned in on the very end and was rewarded with a view of my man. I was not the only one looking.
There was a cluster of women looking over both him and Pat. I would have waved to Sam to get his attention, but the hand on my back took precedence.
"Hi, Jory." Ersi Cantwell, Pat's wife, smiled at me when I turned my head.
"Hi there." I smiled back, leaning in to kiss her.
She gave me a peck on the cheek before sighing heavily.
"My God, every time we come to one of these things it's the same. Do you see the vultures checking out my man?"
"Yes, ma'am, I do." I chuckled. "They seem interested in Sam as well."
She gave me a dismissive wave of her hand. "Gimme a break, they have no chance with Sam... Sam's gay. Patty, on the other hand...."
I gestured at the sparkling red dress that hugged her hourglass shape. "Sweetheart, in that dress, why on earth would you be worried?"
She was gorgeous. With her hair up in a ponytail, wearing sweats and doing the laundry, she was gorgeous. And now she was worried about someone snatching her man when she was all done up, looking like a million bucks? I didn't understand women at all.
"You are so good for my ego." She squinted at the women on either side of Sam and Pat now. When both men were led to the dance floor, I was surprised. I'd never seen Sam dance.
Ersi and I leaned on the bar as Stephanie Diaz walked up beside us. She looked confused.
"What?" I asked her.
"Are those your men out there
?"
Ersi grunted.
"Why aren't you guys... oh," she said after a minute of watching Sam and Pat on the dance floor. Her face scrunched up like she'd tasted a lemon. "Never mind."
Ersi snorted; I couldn't hold back the grin.
"Wow." Stephanie whistled. "That is some bad dancing."
I pointed over at Chaz, who was dancing with some other woman I didn't know. "Who's that?"
"His ex-partner's wife."
I tipped my head. "She's cute. She seems to like Chaz."
She pinched me hard.
"Owww." I chuckled, turning to her as she leaned into me, her arm around my shoulder.
"She more than likes him, she always has."
I turned to look at her face. "Whaddya wanna do?"
"Kick the crap outta her, but Chaz would be mad."
We were silent for a few minutes, all three of us.
"You know, Jory," Ersi said distractedly. "Sam told us that you were worried we didn't like you."
I turned and looked at her.
"It's not true." She sighed. "We both like you a lot. You act like us... you act married... and we both think that's wonderful. I just wanted to tell you that. I know a couple of the girls think it's just a phase, Sam being with you and all, but me and Steph—we know it's the real deal. We can tell the difference."
I stared into her eyes and she smiled. When I looked at Stephanie, she had the same soft expression in her eyes.
They both actually liked me—when had I missed that? My gaze returned to Ersi.
"Just so you know, okay, so we're all clear."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome." She sighed, looking back at her man.
"God, I hate these things."
But they had never had me along before.
"Move," I ordered her, standing up and shedding my trench coat, suit jacket, and tie. I unbuttoned my dress shirt and took it off, as well as the cotton T-shirt underneath.
"Not that I don't appreciate the floor show," Ersi teased me, arching one eyebrow, "but honey, what—"
"Just," I gestured for the iridescent red satin shirt that she was wearing to cover the sweetheart neckline of her dress.
"Gimme that."
"Jory, I'll look like a whore without the shirt on."
"You'll look hot," Stephanie assured her. "You've got perfect boobs, girl—show 'em off."