Recoil

by Evelyn Drake

  “So the internship and her moving away was your idea?”

  “It sure was. Danny said that if she did well during the internship that they company would sponsor her through college with the understanding that she would come back and work for them afterward. It was going to be a whole new life for her, Detective Sohbier.” Despite her brave appearance, another tear escaped to slip down Mrs. Trizola’s cheek. She looked down and fussed with the skirt of her dress again, and her hands were gently shaking. “It’s a fine shame, that’s what it is. A fine shame.” She looked up to meet Tobias’s gaze. “You catch who did this. You catch them.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Tobias said. “I will.”

  By the time Tobias was headed back out to his car, the sky had taken on the deep, dark gray of early night. His cell phone vibrated in his pocket. Digging it out, he looked at the screen and then stopped in his tracks.

  Roberts: Attempted homicide at club. Victim survived. Ambulance on site.

  Oh, God… Kyle!

  Tobias ran the rest of the way to his car. He wanted to get there before that ambulance left, and he broke every traffic law to do it. By the time he reached The Derriere, a stretcher was being pushed toward an ambulance with its doors standing open.

  Getting out of his own car and sprinting to the stretcher, Tobias’s heart was thundering as fear flooded his body. But it was the pale, delicate features of a woman—her head held motionless in a brace—that he saw when he caught up with the stretcher.

  Tobias’s heart failed to beat, and he had to cough to try to set its rhythm right. His mind raced. What’s her name? Ginger! Her ghost white face looked stark yet beautiful against her flaming hair.

  “Ginger.” His fingers found hers as he kept pace with the stretcher. They were so slender and small and cold against his warm touch. Her eyes pivoted without moving her head, and her pupils were dilated, making her pretty green eyes almost appear black. “Ginger, who did this?”

  Her lips parted and a small noise came out, but it wasn’t any kind of noise that could be tied to a specific word.

  She tried again. Again, just a noise passed her lips.

  “Sir, you’ll need to step aside,” the paramedic nearest him said as they neared the ambulance.

  Tobias slowed his step as he moved to the side, but he kept his arm outstretched for as long as his reach kept them connected. When the tips of her fingers slipped off of his, he felt the loss. His chest was heavier and the world was less bright. He winced when the ambulance doors slammed and, as it drove off, suddenly the world seemed to move forward again.

  Tobias turned, taking in the bystanders. Several of the dancers, wearing robes, were huddled together. They looked scared, as they should be given that someone was picking off their numbers one-by-one.

  “That’s it. I’m out of here,” said a tall beauty with rich, mahogany skin. She headed off across the parking lot.

  “Your purse is inside,” one of the girls called after her.

  “I don’t care. I’ve got my cell phone. I’ll call Uber. My purse has got nothing in it that I need more than my life.”

  Tobias followed her, breaking into a jog to keep up with her quick step.

  “Miss, I need you to stay until we’ve taken your statement.”

  She whirled on him. “I was with Mary-Ann, at her office, working out my dance schedule for next week. Chandler”—she pointed back toward the club’s doors at a large man dressed in the club’s dark bouncer clothes—“was there too. I wasn’t dancing when that first girl was killed, and I’m quitting. I wanted to pay off my home faster, but this isn’t worth it. I’m out.”

  Tobias got her contact information and then let her go before heading back to the club’s front. Uniformed police were already there, canvassing the area, doing interviews and collecting contact information.

  Spotting Roberts, Tobias gave him a wave and then waited until Roberts was able to break free from interviewing one of the club’s patrons.

  “Do we know what happened?” he asked once Roberts reached him.

  Roberts leafed through his notebook and then stopped on a page. “Sarah ‘Ginger’ Walsup fell from the roof at approximately 6:18 pm. She appeared to have been up there smoking. The owner/manager, Mary-Ann Feckle, says that it was common for Ginger to go up there to smoke. Said that she felt safer smoking up there than standing outside the club’s back door. A group on their way into the club heard a scream and then the sound of something ‘slamming pavement.’ When they went to check on the noise, they found Ginger, and they reported that Ginger was ‘out cold’ at that time.”

  “They didn’t see anyone else up on the roof?”

  Roberts shook his head. “No, sir.”

  “Is someone ready to be on hand at the hospital for Ginger in case she’s able to provide any information?”

  “Yes, sir. Dispatch said that someone was en route.”

  Tobias nodded and let Roberts get back to his work before heading over to the area roped off where Ginger hit the ground. The pavement was clean of debris with no visible signs of blood.

  Craning his neck, Tobias looked up at the roof. Again, nothing appeared out of place at just a glance.

  Moving around the corner of the club to its front, Tobias scanned the crowd, looking for Kyle. His fears grew louder in his head. Images from countless murder scenes invaded his thoughts, and the face of each victim fought to morph into Kyle’s likeness.

  The decision to head inside the club was twofold. He wanted to find Kyle, and he needed to get up to the roof. Yet, inside where people milled aimlessly around or huddled into small groups waiting to be interviewed, Kyle was still nowhere in sight.

  Tobias waved to one of the officers and got directions for how to get to the roof. Heading up the back stairs, Tobias was nodded through by the officer standing on guard of the crime scene at the roof entrance. The officer held the door open and Tobias stepped out onto a stark, open, and flat roof that was rimmed with a raised, three foot ledge. While he could hear voices floating up to him from below and the evening’s light was changed periodically by the flash of an officer’s flashlight or squad car lights, the roof seemed barren. It felt like another world, removed from the one below.

  Tobias walked to the spot from which he estimated that Ginger had fallen—or had been pushed. The backstage cameras that the owner/manager, Mary-Ann, had promised to install hadn’t been installed yet, but of course it had only been forty-eight hours since the first death. That hadn’t allowed much time for the promised change to be implemented.

  Eying the rooftop, nothing looked out of place. On the ground were the smoked butt ends of cigarettes used up and abandoned. There weren’t a lot of them, but there were enough to give credence to the idea that this was a regular smoking spot for Ginger. Tobias fingered a small burn spot on the raised ledge that had the appearance of being a favorite spot for Ginger to smudge out her cigarettes.

  “Ginger,” he whispered, “what the hell happened?”

  His cell phone rang and Roberts’ name flashed on the screen.

  “What do you have?” Tobias asked by way of answering the phone.

  “Sarah ‘Ginger’ Walsup died on the way to the hospital. Suspected brain aneurysm caused by head trauma.”

  Tobias expelled all of his breath.

  “And,” Roberts continued, “Therman Johnson was released from jail earlier this afternoon.”

  “Someone bailed that psycho stalker out? Do we know where he is?”

  “No, sir. No one knows of his current whereabouts.”

  Fuck!

  “Thank you,” Tobias said, ending the call. They weren’t the word he preferred to use the most, but it was what he went with.

  The sound of the roof’s door opening pulled Tobias’s attention out of his frustrations.

  “Sir, Kyle Rivers has asked to be allowed up to speak with you in private,” the uniformed officer on watch announced. Tobias could see Kyle’s looming figure silhouetted behind the offi
cer.

  Tobias nodded approval. “Make sure he understands not to touch the door and to keep his hands in his pockets.”

  The uniformed officer relayed the information and then allowed Kyle to step through. The officer returned the door to its closed position after Kyle had passed.

  Alone on the roof with the whole world moving forward around them, time seemed to stop for Tobias as he looked at Kyle. The man stood in silence with his hands shoved deep in his pockets, just as instructed. And, he looked as if he wished he could shrink in on himself.

  “Someone keeps killing them,” Kyle said, his voice thick with emotion. “I’m supposed to protect them, and I keep failing.”

  Did he do it? Tobias checked in with his gut as he studied Kyle.

  Motive—rage based in sexual confusion?

  Opportunity—it’s happening at the club while he’s here.

  Means—the guy’s as big and strong as a titan.

  Did he do it?

  No.

  “We’ll figure this out, Kyle. I swear. We’ll catch who’s doing this.” He closed the distance between them, his heart melting when Kyle leaned his head down to rest his forehead against Tobias’s.

  “How do I stop the killings?”

  “You don’t. I do.” Tobias lifted his lips to meet Kyle’s.

  Maybe it wasn’t the place or a time to share a kiss, but life had a way of stealing the chance to be with the one you love—and Tobias wasn’t going to let any more chances to be with Kyle slip him by.

  14

  Kyle

  Kyle laid on his back in bed, staring at the ceiling of his bedroom in the early morning light. He considered all the choices he’d made in his life—those that had been his to make—and he wondered at what he could have decided differently to lead to a present that didn’t include two people dead, people who were under his protection.

  “I’m a failure,” he mumbled to himself, “and someone died because of it.” On top of that, after last night’s attack, The Derriere had been shut down until further notice by Mary-Ann. People—including himself—were losing their paychecks. Of course, that was nothing compared with losing your life, which is why Mary-Ann had made the decision to close the club’s doors until the killer was found.

  Kyle tossed a hacky sack ball into the air above his face and caught it. It was his zen thing to do when he didn’t know what to do with his feelings or which way to go with his life. He threw it again just as the image of Tobias’s face came into his mind.

  Gay…

  He could still remember the things his parents had said about him and Tobias. He remembered his father’s anger and his mother’s tears. But when his mother stopped crying, she was angry, too.

  They’d called him names. They’d told him he’d burn in hell, and then they locked him in the basement to give him a taste of hell. They never beat him. They never struck him. They just let some guy come in and electrocute him so bad he’d thought his jaw was broken. Then had come rewards and punishment through food. But they’d reward and punish his body, not his mind.

  He was a fifteen year old boy. What did they expect his body to do when they showed him some guy sucking on a cock long and thick enough to be a summer sausage?

  “I’d never do that to my child, not any of it,” he said to himself. He was still trying to figure his parents out, fifteen years after their deaths. He knew that they’d loved, but maybe they’d loved wrong…

  Yet, he remembered the laughter and the love his home had before his parents had found out about him and Tobias. The difference in his life before they’d found out compared with after had been a change Kyle had never been able to make sense of. The day his parents had found out about Tobias, Kyle lost everything. He lost his freedom, his parents, a loving home that he felt safe in… and Tobias.

  Had it been worth it?

  Swinging his feet out of bed, Kyle remained sitting on the mattress’s edge, staring at his feet as he traced circles with his big toe on the hardwood floor. It was cold, but he didn’t mind.

  His eyes went to the side, looking at his cell phone sitting on his bedside table.

  “Am I gay?” he asked himself.

  “Does it matter?” he answered himself by way of another question.

  He wanted Tobias to meet the most important person in his life—Monica. He wanted Tobias to meet the woman who had saved him.

  Stretching an arm, Tobias retrieved his phone and brought its face to life with the swipe of his thumb. He stared at it and then put it down on the bed beside him. Gazing in front of him with his hands pressing into the mattress on either side, Kyle eventually twisted to look at the phone’s face again. It was dark with sleep.

  He pursed his lips and slouched forward, putting his elbows on his knees. Then he leaned back again on his hands and craned his neck once more to look at the phone.

  “They aren’t here. They’re dead, and they made choices that weren’t healthy. They did things wrong. I didn’t do things wrong. I just did me. That’s all. Just me.” It was a mantra that Monica had drilled into his head for years. It had taken him a long time, but the value of what she had been trying to teach him was finally sinking in and taking hold. The words were starting to sound like truth more than just words.

  Kyle picked up the phone, searched his contacts and hit dial. He was working on autopilot and didn’t feel the surge of nerves until the call was answered.

  “Hello? Kyle? Are you okay?” It was Tobias’s voice and he sounded worried.

  “I am. Everything’s good,” Kyle answered, unable to keep the smile that now stretched from ear to ear out of his voice.

  “Did… did you need something?” Tobias finally asked when the silence had stretched too long, and Kyle wanted to hit himself in the head.

  I’m blowing it!

  “Um… you wanna come to dinner?” Kyle’s stomach turned upside and air struggled to move in his chest. Finally, he gave up and simply held his breath.

  “Kyle, I can’t.” Tobias’s cleared his throat and the sound of his voice grew even softer as if trying not to be overheard. “You’re a murder suspect.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” Kyle said, waving his hand as if that fact meant nothing even though Tobias’s words had made him wince. “I just thought you could come to dinner, here, at my house. You could”—his mind raced—“interview Monica as a character witness. Dinner would just make it—what did you say about the pizza?—it would just create an environment inductive to open sharing.”

  Tobias’s laughter from the other end was warm, and it made Kyle’s just-faded smile bloom again. “Yeah, I could do that,” Tobias said, and Kyle could hear the man’s own smile in his words.

  “Great!” Calm down, man! Too eager! “Uh, about eight o’clock?”

  “Works for me.”

  “Great, see you then.” The call ended but Kyle’s feelings of being on cloud nine lingered. He fell back on the bed, still smiling from ear to ear as he stared up at the ceiling.

  “You still got to tell Monica she’s making dinner for company tonight,” he reminded himself, that part of himself wanting to protect him from sailing emotionally too high trying to put a damper on his mood. It didn’t work, even imagining Monica’s scolding look.

  “Who am I kidding,” he said to himself. “She’s going to be happier than I am!”

  Getting out of bed, Kyle flew into a routine of jumping jacks, push-ups, sit-ups, plank, star-plank and spiderman plank crunch, headstand push-ups, high-knee jumps, and finally wrapped things up by going for a six mile run.

  As soon as he got home he was greeted with the smell of a stack of walnut pancakes. A stack of bacon big enough to make him embarrassed at the thought of ever meeting a pig sat heaped on a platter in the center of the table.

  “Kisses then shower!” Monica exclaimed, and then barked, “and make it snappy,” when Kyle jogged for the bathroom.

  He was back five minutes, a rolled towel wrapped around the back of his neck to cat
ch the water from his still dripping hair. Leaning across the table as he sat, he gave Monica another kiss on the cheek.

  “This all looks amazing,” he said, lifting a plate to pile food on. There were scrambled eggs as well, and he served himself a generous portion.

  On the other side of the table, he could feel Monica’s eyes boring into him and he did his best to look everywhere but directly at her. Inside, his nerves had turned into a whirlwind inside his belly as he worked up his courage to announce the night’s evening guest. Other than Veronica, he’d never had anyone home, and she’d slept on the couch. Inviting Tobias home was different. It was everything.

  “What gives?” Monica finally asked. “You keeping secrets?”

  “No, ma’am,” Kyle said automatically and then cleared his throat as the truth caught up with his brain. “It’s just, I’ve invited someone home for dinner tonight—with both of us—and I was hoping that was okay with you.”

  Monica’s eyes narrowed to laser intensity. “And who might this person be?”

  Kyle cleared his throat again before trusting himself to talk. He even stalled by taking a big bite of pancake, but his nervousness had him swallowing it down whole without almost any chewing. He choked and had to take a sip of milk, but his distress did not distract Monica’s questioning eyes. “Tobias,” he finally said. “Tobias is coming to dinner.”

  Monica slapped the tabletop with her hand hard enough to make all of the dishes shake, and a smile lit her face to crinkle her eyes into furrowed grooves at their corners, but Kyle thought that it only made her look more beautiful.

  “Yes, I’ll make dinner!” Monica exclaimed. “It’s about time you got off your pansy ass and went after the one person who matters the most to you.”

  “He doesn’t matter the most to me,” Kyle said, not missing a beat. “You do.” Instantly, Kyle’s words were rewarded by Monica blushing the prettiest pink he’d ever seen.

  “Now, go on,” she chided, but she was still smiling just as big. She took a perfectly balanced bite of eggs and bacon, getting in both flavors, before speaking again. “That boy’s someone you can build a future with—a tomorrow—or he can help you let go of your past. He’s invaluable, more than me now, and it makes me happy and proud beyond words that you’re finally inviting him home.”