Tygers

by Brenna Lyons

  “I’m not Kyle.”

  “Ty?”

  “Yes.”

  He heard the voice deep in his mind. A fresh pain gripped him, and a sudden calm passed over him. The welts burned while the rest of his skin cooled.

  “You know what to do,” the voice continued in an eerie, soothing tone.

  Peter turned and walked out into the hall. In the bathroom, he pulled out a razor blade from the pack. He traced the line of one of the welts and the burning eased. He traced a second one. A third. The effect was a cool calm. Peter worked furiously, eradicating the painful sites one by one until his entire body was blissfully cool and comfortable.

  He sank to the floor, abruptly exhausted from his healing efforts. Beautiful colors danced before his eyes and red silk brushed over his body. As Peter closed his eyes, he heard vicious laughter.

  Pain gripped his entire body at once and he spasmed to the assault, landing awkwardly on the tile. Tears fell from his eyes and burned over the cuts on his cheeks. Then, blessed unconsciousness obliterated everything and silenced Ty’s awful laugh.

  * * *

  Katheryn O’Hanlon shot upright in bed and stifled the bloodcurdling scream behind her lips. Joan wasn’t counting on a wake-up like that when she invited her friend to spend the week on her farm. They met at Vericon the previous year while Katheryn was living in Massachusetts and Joan was visiting her niece and hit it off immediately. So, when Joan suggested she stay at the farm in Vader while Katheryn did research on Seattle, she took the older woman up on the offer.

  Katheryn groaned as she looked at her watch. She should have screamed after all. It was ten o’clock, and Joan would be long gone.

  She tried to still her heart as she reached for the phone. Once she talked to Kyle, Katheryn would be able to relax. She let the phone ring a dozen times before hanging up in disgust.

  “Okay,” she argued with herself, “maybe Tasha took him out for the day. Maybe they’re at the park.”

  She growled in frustration. “They’re not. You know they’re not. Dammit!” Katheryn swung off the bed and grabbed her suitcase. She dialed the airline while she threw her clothes in the bag. Her ticket changed for the afternoon flight back to Greater Pittsburgh, she pulled on her clothes, ran a brush through her hair, and threw her toiletries in her suitcase. Katheryn glanced at her tired, bruised eyes in the mirror and decided she looked much older than her thirty-two years. A quick note to Joan and she was on her way to the airport in the rental car.

  She cursed herself the whole way there. Reactionary, flighty, insane! What was wrong with her? But, Katheryn didn’t need to answer that one. Kyle was wrong with her. This damn plague in her head was wrong with her. This damn birth defect. This mistake of nature. She was a mistake of nature that should have died long ago.

  After she checked in, Katheryn paced nervously at the gate. Finally, her pager buzzed and she sprinted to the pay phones to punch in the number her mother left.

  “Katheryn?” Dianna answered.

  “I board in thirty minutes, Mother.”

  “But, I thought—” Dianna reverted to her characteristic calm reserve. “He’s in Mercy. When will you arrive?”

  “If all goes well, between ten and eleven.” She paused. “How is he?”

  “He needs you.”

  “I know. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “I understand.”

  Katheryn bit her cheek to hold back her anger. This time, it wasn’t Mother’s fault, after all. “I have to go. They’ll be calling my flight soon.”

  “Of course. I’ll see you tonight, Katheryn.”

  “Sure.” She hung up and repositioned her backpack on her shoulders. “No, Mother,” Katheryn bit out under her breath. “You have never understood. You never will.”

  * * *

  Carol stared at Kyle through the glass. His blood sugar was stabilized, an alarming anomaly that seemed to have something to do with his trauma, though no one knew exactly what. He didn’t fight the IV. He didn’t fight anything. He just stared.

  “Mrs. Thompson?” The young detective next to her spoke softly, and she nodded as she faced him. “I’m sorry, but I need to ask these questions.”

  She nodded again and took a deep breath. “Of course. I’ll tell you what I can.”

  “You came home early?”

  “Yes. My babysitter called and told me that Peter came home and sent her away.”

  “That was a concern?” His eyes didn’t leave the pad, but Carol could see a muscle tense in his jaw as he waited for her answer.

  “Yes,” she admitted quietly. “He hadn’t been physically abusive to Kyle, but we were having problems. I was discussing leaving him. He’s not—stable.”

  He met her eyes, and Carol could read the unspoken sarcastic ‘obviously’ in his expression. She sighed at the thought that Mac was going to have a long talk with her about that one.

  “What happened when you got home?” he continued, ignoring her sigh.

  “I started searching for Kyle. No one answered my calls. He was on his bed with a wide-eyed stare and that awful handprint on his face. I tried to get him to answer me, but he wouldn’t. I headed back to the bathroom to get a cool compress and was trying to decide whether to call 911 or take him to the emergency room. That’s when,” Carol shuddered reflexively at the memory, “I saw Peter on the floor.”

  “You didn’t check him for a pulse?”

  “I may not be a doctor, but I know no one can lose that much blood and live.”

  He nodded grimly. “You requested Mercy instead of Children’s or South Side?”

  “Kyle’s doctor practices here. It’s easier that way.” She shrugged.

  “Okay. I just need a little more information.”

  Carol gave him names and phone numbers for Tasha and Bobbie. My alibi, she thought ruefully. Unless the medical examiner decided it was suicide, she’d need one. She shuddered at the thought. Suicide? Who was she kidding? No one suicides by slicing himself up like that.

  Mom was at work, and Katie was in Washington State. Surely, no one would think Kyle was capable of killing a full-grown man. Who else would want Peter dead? A drinking buddy? A cuckolded husband? Peter wasn’t well loved. That much was true.

  The problem was Kyle. Did the person who killed Peter simply not know their son was there? What did Kyle see? Carol prayed he only saw Peter’s body, then grimaced at the thought that he saw that much. Did Peter cause the bruise of a hand rising on Kyle’s cheek? Who else would? Surely, if Kyle saw the killer—If the killer knew—Carol couldn’t finish the thought. Because of that thought more than anything else, she didn’t complain when Mac assigned an officer to her son’s door.

  Carol watched Kyle while he slept, knowing that he would be no better when he woke. She cringed when she considered the nightmares he would have, and she prayed he wouldn’t scream. Katie had screamed, sometimes every night. While Katie’s traumas lay in Carol’s house, Carol’s lay in their mother’s home. Carol would never live there, as Katie would never spend the night in Grandmother’s old house.

  The door opened behind her, and Dianna came in with a tray of food. She set it on the wheeled table and pushed it in front of her younger daughter. “Eat this. Starving yourself while you worry won’t help. Believe me, I know.”

  “How did you ever survive this?”

  “Your father—” Dianna shook her head and looked away abruptly as she realized that her daughter had no such comfort. Even if Peter weren’t dead now, he would hardly be a comfort or help.

  Carol nodded. “Did you reach her?”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “She was at the airport getting ready to board her plane. She’ll be here tonight.”

  “Good,” Carol decided bitterly. “If anyone can reach Kyle, Katie can.”

  Dianna sighed and sank into a chair beside her younger daughter. “I don’t like it any more than you do.”

  “You don’t understand, Mom. She�
��s been warning me for months.”

  “Do you really think your sister will tell you, ‘I told you so’?”

  “No, not Katie, but I’ll know. Why is she more in control of my life than I am?”

  “Do you do what she tells you?” Dianna asked pointedly.

  “You know I don’t. But she’s never wrong, Mom. When I don’t listen, there’s hell to pay.”

  “So, take it as advice instead of orders. Katheryn doesn’t want to order you around. She just wants to protect you like she always has.” She trailed off sadly.

  “Do you know that? You don’t, do you? None of us really does, and we never will.”

  Dianna nodded in understanding and pushed the tray closer. None of them would ever know. Even the people who had been there had no clear memories. Katie least of all!

  * * *

  Katheryn dragged her luggage to the front of the Westin William Penn and had the doorman call a cab for her. She cursed the system of the Airport Limo, an overrated name for a pint-sized bus that ran between the airport, Monroeville and downtown. With foresight, Katheryn could have called ahead and arranged a driver to meet her and take her directly to the hospital, but she had been too upset to think straight, and she was too exhausted to see straight, let alone drive a rental.

  She tipped the doorman and settled into the yellow cab. “Where to?” the driver asked.

  “Mercy Hospital.”

  “With luggage?”

  “Want to make a great tip?” she offered. Two extra hours of travel time and a trip through town with her suitcase in tow had taken their toll.

  “What’s involved?”

  “Drop me at Mercy and drop my luggage at the Hampton Inn for me.”

  “How do I do that?”

  “They have my reservation. Just tell them to page me if they have any problems or questions.”

  “Okay, I guess.”

  “It’s worth an extra twenty to me.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  Dropped at Mercy with only her backpack and wallet, she checked at the desk and headed off to room 526.

  At the door, an officer stopped her. “I’m sorry. You can’t go in there.” His authoritative voice annoyed her.

  Katheryn tried to keep her temper in check. She had incredible respect for men and women in uniform, but she was tired. “Look, Carol is expecting me.”

  “Mrs. Thompson isn’t in there, and it’s after visiting hours.”

  “I’m not here to see Carol, and visiting hours don’t exist for close family of pediatric patients,” she informed him.

  “It’s all right, Turner. Back off and let her in,” a new voice ordered.

  Katheryn’s mouth lifted in amusement before she turned to look at the plain-clothed officer at the corner of the hall. “Hi, Mac. Gone gray on me, huh?”

  Mac laughed heartily. “We all get old someday.”

  “Not me. I’m Princess Pan, remember?”

  “I knew you’d show up here eventually.”

  “Like a bad penny.”

  “Can I ask you a few questions before you go in?”

  She looked at the door in concern then sighed. “Sure, Mac. Lead the way.”

  “These chairs here okay with you?” He waved at the small waiting area.

  Katheryn nodded her agreement and followed him down the hall. She sank into a chair and groaned in relief as she rubbed her hand over her eyes.

  Seeing Mac wasn’t a surprise, though his pot belly and gray hair ground into her how long it had been since she had the pleasure of his company. They took turns, she decided. When Dad died, it was Uncle Michael who played father to her, a place that Katheryn usually humored him with. When Michael died, it was Mac, a situation that she protested. Katheryn made it clear to him that she would accept him as a friend, though he shouldn’t expect her to take him into her confidence. She would consider his advice but not follow his orders. Her uncles may think Katheryn needed a father, but they were wrong. She didn’t need any of them. Katheryn wasn’t in the needing business, but Mac was her stand-in, and she guessed that Bruce was next.

  “What’cha need, Mac?” Katheryn asked, breaking the silence they had fallen into.

  “You were out of town?”

  Katheryn dug in her front pocket and handed him the crumpled plane ticket complete with its boarding stub. “Vader, Washington with a writer friend named Joan Chambers. Want her number?”

  “Just for the record, Katheryn. You’re not really a suspect. We just have to rule everything else out.”

  “Sure. 306-555-8703. I’m surprised I’m not a suspect. It’s no secret that I didn’t like Peter.”

  “Yeah, but we know you ladies. What happened— Well, we don’t suspect the family.”

  “What did happen, Mac?”

  He met her eyes and his jaw tightened reflexively. “Someone sliced him up.”

  “With a knife?”

  “No. A razorblade, we think.”

  Katheryn screwed her face up at the thought.

  “Gonna use it in one of your books?” he teased.

  “I hope not. Yuck.”

  Mac stared at his notepad in surprise. “You called Carol’s house this afternoon?”

  She nodded. “I decided to leave early and stop by to see Carol and Kyle. I called to ask what Kyle wanted me to bring him from Seattle. No one answered the phone.”

  He nodded and put his notebook away. “So, how’s it going?”

  Katheryn leaned back and studied the ceiling. “Goin’ fine.”

  “Anyone special on the horizon?”

  She laughed. “You know, I never understood why you guys were so interested in my love life.”

  “Because your dad would be.”

  “Well, I’m fine, Mac. You don’t have to worry about me.”

  “Force of habit. Half of my guys have been worrying about you since you were five. Half of the Hazelwood guys have been worrying about you since you were two. Give us old fogies a break. We’re doing our best.”

  “Yeah, I know it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to see Kyle.”

  “Sure. You take care,” he cautioned her.

  Katheryn nodded and started away. That had been more painless than she expected. This time, the young officer stepped aside for her.

  Inside the room, she surveyed the sleeping child. Kyle’s dark blonde curls were damp with sweat and matted to his head. His deep blue eyes were closed to her in a restless sleep. A dark red/purple bruise of a handprint glowed like a beacon on his cheek, and her anger spiked again. Katheryn laid her head back against the door and took a ragged breath.

  Outside, she heard the officer start talking. “Hey Sergeant, who was that woman?”

  “That’s Dianna O’Hanlon’s older girl, Katheryn.”

  “No kidding! I’ve never met her. She sure doesn’t look like the rest of them. I wouldn’t have guessed.”

  No, Katheryn wasn’t anything at all like the rest of them—until Kyle. With her black curls and deep brown eyes, she bore little resemblance to her nephew, but they were the same cursed souls. In fact, Katheryn inherited their biological father’s dark hair and eyes, while Carol was a virtual copy of their mother.

  When Jamie O’Hanlon—the only father Katheryn ever knew—entered their lives with his hair like spun gold and lively green eyes, she looked like the proverbial black sheep people accused her of being once he died. But while he lived, Katheryn had a protector, a confidant, an advisor, and a kindred spirit.

  Now, there was Kyle. Katheryn had given up hope of ever finding another kindred spirit. Kyle had always been her double, though he had been largely unaffected up until now. Peter was dangerous to him, but Peter could have been handled if Carol had taken action. Katheryn shook her head in annoyance. Now, it was too late. This day would mark Kyle forever, as Katheryn had been marked at not much older. He shouldn’t have to suffer this.

  Chapter Two

  “If a man could pass through Paradise in a dream, and have a flower p
resented to him as a pledge that his soul had really been there, and he found that flower in his hand when he woke—Aye, what then?” Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  “When your dreams tire, they go underground and out of kindness that’s where they stay.” Libby Houston

  Carol watched as Katie slept in the chair in Kyle’s room. She had no doubts that her sister had been there all night and less that her comfort had not been called for yet. The friendship between her sister and her son wouldn’t bother Carol if it weren’t so damned spooky.

  Katie had been visiting their mother when Kyle tumbled off of a slide and broke his arm the previous year. By the time Carol got him across the Tenth Street Bridge and through the Armstrong Tubes to Mercy’s ER, Katie had traveled the other direction and met her at the desk. The problem was that Carol hadn’t called her. Katie knew Kyle was hurt and went to the hospital after checking that they weren’t at home. Unless Kyle needed an airlift to the trauma unit at Allegheny General, Katie knew Carol would take her son to Mercy. So, that’s where Katie went.

  Katie had been a strange child, but with good cause. She was stranger still since their dad died. Suddenly, the nightmares got worse, worse than Carol ever remembered them being, though Mom assured her that they were much worse and much more frequent the first year when Carol was too young to form a lasting memory of it.

  On top of that, Katie was answering questions that hadn’t been asked. If the fact frightened Katie, Carol couldn’t tell. It just seemed to piss her off. Of course, there wasn’t much that didn’t piss Katie off back then. Finally, she stopped answering thoughts. Carol wondered if Katie wasn’t able to hear them anymore or if she simply refrained from showing it. She guessed it was the latter.

  Now, Katie was curled up in a hospital chair with the nephew, who was sure to be far too much like her, sleeping a few feet away from her. Kyle murmured in his sleep, and Katie mirrored it. Carol took a step back warily and looked from one to the other several times. Kyle sat up and looked around wildly just as Katie pitched forward, gritting her teeth and burying her face in her hands. Carol cried out in shock, and the door crashed open.