by Erin Hayes
She straightened up and pasted on a smile. “Okay, Taggert, let’s unpack.”
He promptly dumped the contents of his backpack into a drawer and shoved the pack under the bed with his foot. “I ain’t hungry.”
“We can skip dinner.”
“He’ll find us here. We gotta get outta Michigan.”
“I know. I’m saving for it. I have to return the money I stole from Eddie.”
“We still got two grand.”
Martina rubbed her forearms briskly. “You never did tell me where you got that money from.”
She looked earnestly into Taggert’s face but he pulled away and tromped into the bathroom. “I’ll take the couch.” The door slammed shut.
Martina cringed. If it was drug money, there was more ahead to fear than Hal.
It was still dark outside Tuesday morning when Martina shook Taggert awake. “I don’t have to be at the Senior Center until ten, I’ll drive you to school your first day.” He groaned and rolled over.
“Time to shower.” She yanked the covers off him and he sat up groggily, rubbing his eyes. When she was satisfied he wouldn’t fall back asleep, she went downstairs to pack their lunches in the communal kitchen. She worked quickly, keeping her head down and ignoring the young mother with twin boys who kept trying to start a conversation.
At seven thirty they took off in the direction of Grove High School, driving through a back-street shortcut Sadie had told her about. They wove their way in silence for a couple of blocks.
“Nervous, Tag?”
He twisted his mouth. “Can’t be any worse than the last dump.”
She opened her mouth to reply, but he jabbed his fist teasingly against her shoulder. “It’s a joke, Mom. I’ll be fine.”
She threw him a bewildered look. What was he so chipper about all of a sudden? He’d better not be planning on finding new buyers at this school. If he got kicked out now, the judge would lock him up, and they’d be stuck in Michigan long enough for Hal to finish what he’d started.
At seven forty-five she pulled up in front of the gray school building and gave Taggert a hug. “Pick you up at three.” She watched him walk in through the main door before she pulled out and drove slowly back to the shelter. She still had plenty of time to get ready for her first day at the Senior Center.
At nine-thirty, she went downstairs and waved good-bye to Sadie on her way out through the attached garage. She kept the windows cracked as she drove, enjoying the birds squawking in the trees that lined the quiet street. This was the kind of neighborhood kids should grow up in. Not a dumping ground of used needles and old tires like their street had become. Humming contentedly, she reached over and turned on the car radio.
A loud crash drowned out the oldies music. She lurched forward, her seatbelt locking across her chest. Trembling, she slammed on the brakes and craned her neck around to see who had rear-ended her. Squinting through the glare of the morning sun, she glimpsed a thickset figure lumbering out of a white Dodge RAM, crowbar in hand.
Hal’s gonna kill me.
Chapter Thirty-Five
A dark fog slowly released its grip, unfurling thick fingers and returning Kyra to time and space. She opened her eyes and struggled to focus on something familiar.
She blinked several times to clear her mind and glanced at the digital clock on her dresser. Nine-fifteen. No wonder it was light out. She’d slept hard. The glimmer of an unwelcome memory wedged its way back into her mind. Brenner’s olive-skinned brow crinkling like a corrugated sand dune. Molten eyes flashing. The invasive power in his repetitious voice. Waking up in his office and seeing the medics, the police.
She shuddered, an icy draught fingering the nape of her neck. Brenner’s eyes had been oddly vacant—glass balls in sockets. They had locked position with hers, like a missile acquiring its target, annihilating any possibility of escape. Even his expression had altered, almost as if he’d taken on another personality. Had he used some kind of mind control technique on her? She sat up slowly and swung her legs over the side of the bed. There was something very wrong with the esteemed psychiatrist and she was never going anywhere near him or his diabolical practice again.
Later that morning, she was reaching into her car for a bag of groceries when her dad’s BMW pulled up in front of her house.
“We need to talk,” he said.
He helped her carry the groceries inside and then pulled out a couple of stools at the kitchen island.
“I overheard you and Bridget arguing the other night,” Kyra said, sinking down beside him.
“We were worried about you.”
“Worried enough to have me committed?”
His face tensed. “Dr. Brenner thinks you may have residual trauma to your brain from the accident. He recommended an in-house psychiatric treatment program, but I realize it has to be your decision.”
“I want nothing to do with him after what happened,” she said. “He’s using his practice to dabble with the dark side.”
Her dad grimaced. “You can’t seriously expect me to believe a reputable psychiatrist is channeling demons.”
“So you think I’m the crazy one? Or do you still think I’m a druggie?”
“Not anymore.” He let out a heavy sigh. “You’re not going to like what I have to tell you, but I had to do it. I had to be sure.”
A sickening wave undulated through her stomach. She slowed her breathing and waited for him to continue.
“After what happened at Dr. Brenner’s office, I went through your house looking for drugs.”
“What?” Kyra leaped from her stool. “How dare you!” Her voice shook as she spat out the words. “I can’t believe you would do something so outrageous.”
He rubbed his hand vigorously across the back of his neck. “I had to make sense of what’s been happening.”
“And it makes perfect sense to violate my privacy.”
“No! I—”
She cut him off with a hollow laugh. “It explains everything, right? It’s all just been a crock of paranoid hallucinations, every junkie’s life experience.”
He shook his head, his knuckles tightening on the kitchen counter. “Jim suggested it. He’s been a cop a long time, he knows the signs. Neither of us wanted to entertain the possibility at first, but then when you kept coming up with all this crazy stuff—”
“So Jim’s alleging I’m drugging myself into heights of ecstasy that make me hell on wheels. No wonder he’s been so hostile, pulling me over for a trumped-up traffic violation, interrogating me at my house, off the record.” Kyra glowered at her dad. “Well, did your undercover mission turn up anything incriminating?”
“I found her card,” he said quietly.
Kyra’s thoughts tumbled together. Mom’s card. He’d rifled around in her private papers too.
An involuntary sound came out of her mouth. If he’d found that gun license application she’d picked up yesterday—
“The card was lying open in a drawer. I saw your mother’s signature.”
Her pulse hammered in her ears. “It’s a lie, isn’t it? About Bruce ... ”
“I’m sorry, honey.” He dropped his gaze. “I suspected from the beginning, but I never told your mother that I took a paternity test. It didn’t change how I felt about you. I just needed to know where I stood in case Bruce ever showed up again.”
He reached over to lay a hand on her shoulder, but Kyra backed away. “All this time, you knew. You’ve been lying to me about everything.” She paused and bit her lip. “I want you out of my house. I don’t even know who you are anymore.”
“Kyra! Listen to me! I wanted to keep you and Bridget together, to protect you.”
“I don’t need your kind of protection. You’re an imposter. I need you to leave, now.”
His eyes bulged, his forehead creased in pain. “I’m sorry it had to come out this way, honey.”
“Please. Just leave.”
She watched in silence as he reached for his key
s and exited the room. The front door slammed shut and she winced as if a bullet had entered her skull. Just like that, he was gone. Was there anything left in her world that hadn’t imploded?
Her breath caught in her throat. How was she going to break the news to Bridget? Half-sisters. Even the word had a ring of deformity to it. She sank back down on the barstool and laid her head on the counter.
After a few minutes her phone chirped and she jerked herself up. She reached for her purse in a daze and stared at a text from Bridget. Need 2 talk 2 nite. V. imp. Trepidation prickled over the back of Kyra’s neck. She set the phone on the counter and stared at Bridget’s photo on the screen. Whatever was on her sister’s mind, it was nothing compared to the news Kyra had to break to her.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Kyra’s hands trembled as she sipped her Cabernet. Bridget nibbled on a cracker and made a few halfhearted comments about her day but the conversation quickly lulled. Kyra toyed with a piece of Brie in her napkin. Now? Or should she let her sister go first?
Bridget shifted forward on the couch and set down her wine. “I have something to confess,” she said, discarding her customary lightheartedness. “I know Dad’s been pushing you to agree to an in-house treatment program. At first I thought it was a terrible idea, but the truth is, as time went on, I was beginning to lean in that direction. It was all those things you kept imagining that weren’t really there. You know—like the death wish notes.”
Kyra gripped the stem of her glass and stared at it, willing it to shatter and break the tension in the room. A lump formed in her throat as she waited for Bridget to finish.
“The thing is, after what happened at Dr. Brenner’s office the other day, I don’t feel comfortable with the thought of you being under his care. There’s something really wrong about him. That’s why I have to tell you this.” She averted her eyes and twisted the beads on her bracelet. “Dad had Dr. Brenner draw up the paperwork for your involuntary commitment.” Bridget hesitated and looked directly at Kyra. “He hasn’t signed it yet. But if he does, Brenner will put you in a facility.”
Kyra’s skin crawled like the tread of a million tiny caterpillars. She flexed her cramped, fisted fingers and took a deep breath.
“He doesn’t have the legal right,” she said, flatly, fixing her gaze on her sister.
“What?”
“Greg Williams is not my real father.”
Bridget’s face drained of color, confusion spreading over her features. “What are you talking about?”
“Remember the jewelry Dad gave you last week from Grandma?”
Bridget frowned. “What about it?”
Kyra reached for her purse to retrieve the envelope with her mother’s card. “There was a note in that package for me, from Mom.”
“Mom wrote to you?”
“I’ll read it to you.”
She cleared her throat and gripped the card, determined not to let her voice crack until she was finished.
“Is it ... true?” Bridget whispered, when she was done.
Kyra nodded. “Dad had a paternity test done. He’s known all along.”
Bridget sat like a statue, perfectly composed on the white, slip-covered couch, her face pale and taut. “I wish I could siphon her blood from my veins.”
“He lied to us too.”
“But he kept us together, didn’t he?” She got up and held out her arms to Kyra. “We don’t have to let her destroy us. She can’t take away any more than she already has.”
Kyra hugged her sister until they were Velcroed in a warm embrace. Bridget would stand by her. Half-blood or not, there was a trail of trust between them that no one could shatter, from this world or any other.
“I’ll make us some tea,” said Bridget, briskly. She disappeared into the kitchen and returned a few minutes later with two steaming mugs. “I still can’t believe Dad hid this all these years.”
Kyra reached for a mug. “Who knows what else he’s hiding? He told me an in-house treatment program was my decision, but I’m not sure I trust him anymore. If he signs that paperwork to have me committed, I need to have a game plan.”
“Let’s jump on the web and see if we can find out where you stand legally. And we can do a little research on Dr. Brenner while we’re at it.”
“What kind of research?”
“Background check for starters. Anyone with a PhD is floating around in all sorts of articles in cyberspace. We can track down where he’s worked, what he specializes in. Let’s face it. We don’t know anything about the man or his practice. Maybe we can find some patient reviews and see if he’s as reputable as Dad was led to believe.”
Kyra sipped her tea while Bridget powered up her laptop and logged onto the Internet. She tapped on the keyboard for several minutes, pausing intermittently to scroll down the screen.
“Anything?” asked Kyra, pulling up a chair.
“It says here commitment proceedings usually follow a period of emergency hospitalization of up to seventy-two hours. A judge has to sign the order but doesn’t make a determination about whether the statements on the application are true or not.” Bridget let out a low whistle. “Yikes! Thank goodness they didn’t haul you off in the ambulance from Dr. Brenner’s office. If he had testified you were a danger to yourself and others, he could have filed for a Court Order of Hospitalization, according to this.”
Kyra’s stomach twisted. “So, it doesn’t even matter if Dad’s my biological father or not. Dr. Brenner’s vote is what counts.”
“Sounds like it. Let’s see if I can find out anything about the infamous doctor.” Bridget clicked open another tab and punched in Dr. Damon Brenner. She pulled down the sidebar and scanned through the search results.
“Impressive scholarly accolades and hospital ratings. Several distinguished recognitions for research.” Bridget continued scrolling, her eyes trained on the screen in front of her. “Check this out. His PhD dissertation was titled ‘Seductive Rape of the Mind.’ That’s creepy.”
Kyra leaned in and tapped a fingernail on the screen. “It says here he authored a book called A Post-modernist View of Thought Control.” She strained to read further down the page. “Google it, let’s see what it’s about.
She wrapped her fingers around her mug, soothed by the warmth, while Bridget clicked on the title and scanned a couple of pages of results. Kyra’s eyes glazed over. A hot bath would be just the ticket after this long, emotion-filled day. The computer screen drifted out of focus as she envisioned stretching out her aching joints in the tub. She startled when Bridget dug her fingernails into her arm.
“Look at this picture! It’s Dr. Brenner at Cornell University back in nineteen ninety-two.”
Kyra set down her mug, and leaned forward to study the fuzzy photo Bridget had pulled up. She glanced at the text below it and flinched, the blood leaching from her head. The screen wove before her eyes, as the words slowly registered.
Rhonda Brenner, wife of eminent Cornell University Professor Dr. Damon Brenner, leaped from a bridge on the college’s north campus yesterday in an apparent suicide. Dr. Brenner, who authored the controversial book, A Post-modernist View of Thought Control, was unavailable for comment.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Trembling, Martina reached for the gear shift and screamed when Hal’s face appeared at her window. He placed a shushing finger to his lips and grinned at her as he ran his hand up and down the length of the crowbar in his fist. In one swift move he wrenched the door open and pressed the cold, steel bar into her neck.
“Please,” she begged. “Don’t hurt me, Hal.” She scanned the deserted street, hoping another vehicle would miraculously appear. The only sign of life was a black cat slinking across the asphalt.
Hal unclipped her seatbelt, and pulled her out of the car by her hair. “Shoulda finished you off a long time ago, you thieving piece of trash.”
She struggled helplessly as he yanked her in the direction of his truck and threw her in on the passenge
r side. She flattened her palms on top of her stinging scalp and rocked forward on the seat, moaning softly.
Hal climbed in behind the wheel, slammed his door shut, and cranked the engine. He turned and leaned into her face, the stench of whisky on his breath. “I reckon you might be thinkin’ how sorry you are you disrespected me by leaving me like that.”
“Please, Hal. Just let me get out. You’ve been drinking.”
“Too good for me now, is that it?” he growled, his rank spittle landing on her cheek. “Got yourself some highfalutin friends and you’re bailing on me? Where’d you put the money you ran off with?” He grabbed her by the back of her head and rammed her face hard into the dashboard.
She sat up slowly, holding her nose between her fingers, warm liquid trickling down her face. This couldn’t be happening.
“Whose house you been hiding out at?”
She couldn’t tell him. She had to keep Taggert safe. “No one’s. I was sleeping in my car.”
“Don’t lie to me. You been at that rich cat’s place?”
“No! I don’t even know where she lives.”
Hal slammed the gear shift into drive and the engine screamed as the truck lurched forward. Still holding her nose, Martina fumbled with her right hand for her seatbelt. “Are we going home?”
Hal snorted and stuck his elbow out the window. “One of us is.”
The contents of her stomach heaved as Hal’s threat registered. He was talking like a madman. Like he was going to kill her. She had to do something to bring him to his senses. Now.
“We need to call Taggert, make sure he’s okay.”