Mind Games

by M. J. Labeff

  “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but I can only imagine.”

  Her exhale fanned warm breath across his face, and he could nearly taste her. He stepped back, sickened by her cloying citrusy scent. She had some explaining to do, and he wasn’t about to let her worm her way out with a cheap seduction. He pulled his hands from her shoulders, stepped back, and folded his arms across his bare chest.

  “I didn’t expect you to think about Dana after we made love, let alone whisper his name, or maybe it was more like a sigh the way you said it.” He did his best to mimic her soft female voice.

  “I know, Derrick. I’d be crushed if you called me by some other woman’s name.”

  He lifted his crossed arm and held his hand up to stop her from saying anything more. “You just said you weren’t calling me him.” His jaw clenched, and he paced the floor.

  She followed behind his footsteps. “I-I wasn’t. Honest, I wasn’t. What I meant was that I’d be hurt if I thought you called me by some other woman’s name.”

  “Okay, but that still doesn’t explain why you called me Dana.” He stopped abruptly and she smacked into the back of him. He arched forward then revolved on his bare feet.

  She stepped back, pulling the robe tighter around her. “Derrick, I’ve wanted you since we were kids. Since those first couple of summers you spent in Crystal Cove. You have to believe me. It’s like we talked about earlier—fate intervened when we found each other in LA after all this time.”

  “Explain about calling me Dana.”

  She flopped down on the couch and sat knock-kneed with her chin resting in the palm of her hands. She pulled her lips together and pouted then blew out her breath.

  “I haven’t been with another man since Dana. All that talk about my father had me thinking about his death for some reason. I just blurted out his name. I really wasn’t calling you him.”

  “Hmm. Help me make the connection between your dad and Dana.”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “This is useless. We’re not getting anywhere, and I think I better leave before I say or do something I’ll regret.”

  He picked his shirt off the floor and put it on. He didn’t bother with fastening the buttons. He needed to find his socks. He needed to find his shoes. He needed to get out of her house.

  “Please, Derrick, let me explain,” she said, while he dressed.

  “That’s all I’ve been asking you to do. Obviously, you can’t, or you’re trying to come up with something clever.”

  “No, no that’s not it at all.”

  “I’m sure this isn’t how either of us expected our first time to end. I’ll say I’m sorry for leaving, although I don’t feel I owe you an apology. When you’re ready to move on, call me.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. The room’s walls seemed to close in on him. He turned and rushed from her bedroom to the front door. Sparrow’s bare feet pitter-pattered behind him. Her hand rushed up his back, pulling on the fabric of his shirt. He arched forward, breaking free, pulled open the door, and walked straight into Detective Tony Sargent.

  “Whoa, sorry there, Derrick.” Tony stepped off to the side, but Derrick didn’t cross the threshold. “I should’ve guessed you might be here.”

  Derrick struggled to gain composure. What were the odds Dana’s brother would be standing right in front of him? “I was just leaving.” He noticed how Tony cocked his head to one side, looking past Derrick to Sparrow and back to him again. Derrick fumbled with the buttons on his shirt.

  “Hi, Tony, what brings you by?” she said, nudging her body between Derrick and the doorframe. Derrick was uncomfortable that she’d come to the door in the silk robe, knowing she was naked underneath.

  “I was going through Dana’s stuff and came across something unusual. I was hoping you could shed some light on things. I should’ve called first. Looks like I walked in on something.”

  The smirk on his face didn’t get past Derrick. So Tony dropped in on Sparrow to question her about his brother’s things? Didn’t the guy have another girlfriend of Dana’s to bug?

  “Now’s not a good time,” Derrick said, and turned to look at Sparrow, hoping she’d make the decision to ask Tony to come back another time. Suddenly, he wanted to stay and work things out with her. After seeing Tony, he’d decided he’d like to hear her explanation about whispering Dana’s name.

  “Come in,” she said, and reached for Derrick’s hand.

  His fingers curled around hers. He wouldn’t abandon her without knowing the reason for Tony’s visit. They each grabbed a chair and took a seat at the kitchen table.

  “Sparrow, do you remember this?” Tony asked.

  He laid the naked photo of her down on the table.

  Derrick looked from the photo to Sparrow and couldn’t believe his eyes. The seductive temptress in the photo was her. The color drained from her face. She reached across the table and turned the photo over.

  “That was a very long time ago,” she said, casting her eyes downward on the table. “Your brother liked to take pictures.”

  Tony flattened his hands against the table and spread apart his fingers. “Did he take photos of other girls?”

  “I don’t know. I never found any, if that’s what you’re asking. The longer I was with him the more I realized he had an unusual sexual appetite. I only let him take the one photo, and shortly after that we broke up.”

  Derrick reached across the table and took her hand. He gave it a gentle squeeze. She still wouldn’t look up at him or Tony. Derrick looked over at Tony and then down at the photo. Tony put his thick index finger on top of the photo and scooted it across the table to Sparrow.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to embarrass you,” Tony said. “Can I ask you a couple of questions? I know this is hard, but Dana’s dead, and I feel like I didn’t even know my own brother, or why he took his life.”

  Derrick caressed her hand with his thumb. She lifted her head. Tears glistened in her eyes. “What do you want to know?”

  “You said Dana had an unusual sexual appetite. Was he into anything weird?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. He’d want to experiment, but I wouldn’t.” She looked down at the table, shaking her head. “He was into rough sex, like asphyxiation.”

  “My God. Did he ever hurt you?”

  She let out a deep sigh. “No. He cheated on me. That hurt.” She blew out her breath. “Physically did he ever hurt me? Not really—I mean, he’d push me around a bit, but I wasn’t black and blue, if that’s what you mean. Dana had a way of being menacing. He’d back me into a corner and glare at me and act like he was trying to restrain himself from hitting me. I was too stupid to figure it out. I should have walked away, but I hung in there until he hit me. Then I got out.”

  Tony’s fingers lightly beat the top of the table. “I didn’t know. It’s hard to imagine my brother being that cruel.” He loudly inhaled and exhaled. “How’d you find out he cheated?”

  Hurt shone in her eyes, and Derrick could tell the painful memory about Dana’s cheating bothered her still. And that bothered him. He’d thought she’d been over Dana, considering his philandering ways. He couldn’t believe she had tolerated his indiscretion and allowed him to treat her badly. She had loved Dana enough to put up with his abuse and had probably thought she could change him. He didn’t see Sparrow as that kind of woman. Not after the way she’d handled Sly and Angel out at High Point.

  “Some mornings, if I didn’t have a yoga class to teach, I’d go to Dana’s and surprise him with breakfast. Well, it was me who was in for a surprise. I opened the back door and started to fix a tray with fresh fruit and bagels in the kitchen. I left the food on the table and went back to his bedroom and saw him in bed with another woman. They didn’t even know I was there. I left so fast I forgot to take the breakfast with me. Dana called me, confessed, and begged my forgiveness. I forgave him.”

  Derrick had heard this story before, and he’d suspected Dana never gave
up his cheating ways. Sparrow might have had a crush on him when they were kids, but Dana was her first love.

  “I’m sorry Dana didn’t treat you better,” Tony said. “He had a reputation, but I thought he’d started to settle down after you two got together.”

  “I’m sure I don’t know half of what Dana did while I was out of sight and out of mind. I knew I wasn’t enough for him.”

  “In what way?”

  She wiggled in her chair. “I couldn’t hold his interest in the bedroom.”

  Neither man could meet her eyes.

  Derrick’s hand clung to hers. He caressed her palm with his thumb. She deserved better, and he hated that he had almost walked out on her. He couldn’t imagine the thoughts running through her head after they had made love. Dana had to have made her insecure in her sexuality and shaken her confidence. Perhaps she’d recalled a painful memory and had whispered his name.

  “Thanks for your honesty. I know this is hard,” Tony said, and scooted his chair back from the table then continued, “Sounds like none of us were aware of Dana’s secret life.”

  “Wait a minute,” Derrick said. “Sit back down.”

  Tony dropped back into the chair and clasped his hands together in front of him on the table. He cocked his head toward Derrick, raising his eyebrow. “You got something to say?”

  “Tony, there’s something you should know about the night Dana and I had that fight.”

  Tony’s jaw ticked in his cheek. “I know all about how you sucker-punched my brother over some girl. He told me how you got all upset because she decided to leave the party with him.”

  “That’s not exactly what happened. You really don’t know. Do you?” Derrick leaned back against the chair and expanded his chest with a breath of fresh air. Tony had more to learn about his little brother.

  “Know what?” Tony asked, folding his arms over his chest.

  “Your brother lured her away from the party and forced himself on her. I watched him drink too much and come on to every girl with a pulse. Normally, he’d have no problem getting laid, but that night he’d been so fixated on this one girl. Jessica. I’d seen him talking to her before at the beach, and they seemed friendly. She was hot and most of the guys hit on her.”

  “Get to the point,” Tony said, drumming his fingers along the sides of his arms.

  “We got into a fight because after I realized he’d disappeared with her, I went to this one spot on the beach where he took most of his dates. I heard Jessica begging him to stop, and he kept telling her to stop fighting it and that it would feel good if she’d just relax. When he saw me coming up on them, he asked me if I wanted a piece of her.” Sparrow gasped and clasped her hands over her mouth. Derrick laid his hand across her arm. “I’m sorry you have to hear this, Sparrow. I thought maybe you’d heard the truth over the years.”

  She shook her head and dropped her hands from around her face. “I-I didn’t know. Go on.”

  Derrick turned back to Tony, leaving his hand on Sparrow’s arm, trying to comfort her. “That’s when I pulled him off her and swung at him. He called me a pussy because I wouldn’t… Well, you get the picture, right?”

  Tony arms fell from around his middle. He pressed his hands against the table. His fingers started the light drumming again. “What happened to the girl?”

  Derrick leaned forward in the chair and rested his arms against the table. He looked Tony dead in the eyes. It was about time Detective Tony Sargent knew the damn truth about that night. “Dana went back to the party and left her crying there with me. I took her home.”

  Tony didn’t blink. “Obviously, she didn’t press charges against Dana,” he said between gritted teeth.

  Derrick leaned in closer to him. “She couldn’t. Things with her and Dana had gone too far, and when she changed her mind he wouldn’t stop. I got there too late. He’d already…” Derrick exhaled. He leaned forward, forcing the weight of his body to rest on his forearms. “She was scared. We were all drinking, none of our parents knew we were there, and we were all afraid of getting into trouble.”

  “All of you were afraid of getting into trouble? Sounds like you were the hero. Why didn’t you convince Jessica to go to the cops?”

  Derrick slumped forward against the table and squeezed Sparrow’s arm. “I brought ecstasy to the party that night. It was a dumb thing to do. I couldn’t jeopardize getting into college. I was applying for an accelerated medical school program.”

  “You could have lied to me. It’s not like I can arrest you now or anything.”

  “I know. But I only added to Dana’s state of mind and poor judgment that night. He partied hard, and I knew it.”

  “Sounds like you got scared straight.”

  “Damn right.”

  * * *

  Tony recognized the familiar look of remorse in Derrick’s eyes. He guessed Derrick had lived with the guilt of that night over the years. In the short span of a few hours, Tony had learned things about his brother he would have refused to believe unless he had heard them from Dana himself. A look of anguish spread across Sparrow’s face, and regret creased Derrick’s. Their somber expressions convinced him they had told him the truth. If Sparrow knew anything about the hidden room in Dana’s home, she would have told him.

  His cop instincts sizzled through him.

  The contents hidden within the secret room had him concerned. His detective’s mind started to turn scenarios over in his head, and he didn’t like the possibilities he had come up with. He would dig deeper into Dana’s past and his penchant for sex, ignoring the fact they were brothers, to get to the truth about Dana’s life. If Dana had hurt other women, they had a right to know he was dead. They had a right to feel safe again.

  “I don’t know that I want to turn this woman’s life upside down after all these years, but do you remember her last name or where she lived?”

  Derrick peeled his hunched body up from the table and leaned back against the chair. The anxious look in Sparrow’s and Tony’s eyes fixed on him. “Jessica Thaylor.”

  Tony’s eyes slid shut. Her name meant something to him. “Any chance her dad is Judge Thaylor?”

  “And now you know why we were all scared shitless,” Derrick said.

  Tony tilted his head back and stared up at the ceiling. He dropped his head to his chest and then glanced over at Derrick. Derrick had protected Dana all those years. A decision he seemed to regret now. The assault charges his brother would have faced were severe. He had waited a long time to tell anyone about what happened that night on the beach. Derrick could have gone to the cops after the fact. Tony doubted the police would have pursued charges against who supplied the booze and drugs. The party was long over. It wasn’t like they could have stomped onto the beach and found illegal substances on the kids. Derrick was too young to know that at the time, and Tony understood his concern about getting into college.

  “I wish Dana and I could have resolved our differences, but I couldn’t be friends with him anymore, not after that. And, as you know, he took some cheap shots at me, telling our friends I wasn’t into girls so he didn’t want to hang out with me. Fortunately, my Dad’s contractual commitment to building this community was finished, and that was the last summer we spent in Crystal Cove.”

  “And you, Dana, and Jessica went your separate ways and kept this secret,” Tony said, shaking his head, trying to remember they were only kids. Kids who had made bad decisions that might have reinforced his brother’s poor judgment and whetted his increased sexual appetite that ultimately led to his death. He recalled Sparrow’s comment about Dana being into asphyxiation. Could someone else have been with Derrick the night he hung himself? Could he have been in some exotic sexual interlude that had gone badly?

  Derrick’s voice broke his silent inquisition.

  “Like I said, we were all afraid of getting into trouble, and Dana, well, he had a way of manipulating things to make you believe he’d done nothing wrong. I’d been friends with h
im long enough to see him talk his way in and out of plenty of situations. I was just happy to get out here then.”

  Tony didn’t want to talk about Dana anymore. His head swelled with unanswered questions, and he thought it might pop. “So, why’d you move back?”

  “I want to make difference.”

  Sparrow reached for Derrick’s hand and smiled at him. She beamed with pride.

  “Ah, the hospital on wheels. It makes people around here nervous,” Tony said. “They don’t want to believe the outside world is influencing their kids, or that the kids on the outside are sneaking into Crystal Cove.”

  “Yeah, I know. I only come through Crystal Cove every once in a while. But maybe if the Mobile Health Clinic RV had existed when Dana and I were teenagers, Jessica wouldn’t have been so afraid to ask for help.”

  “We’ll never know,” Tony said, looking back at Sparrow. “If you’ll excuse me for a minute, I have some things I found at Dana’s that belong to you.”

  Tony stretched his thick legs before he pushed himself up from the dining room chair and walked out.

  * * *

  Derrick covered Sparrow’s hand with his. “I’m sorry to have relayed that story. I really thought you might have heard rumors over the years.”

  “Never. But you’ve got to remember, back in those days the age gap between us was significant. It would’ve been old news by the time was I older.”

  “I suppose you’re right. I should’ve said something to someone about that night. It’s too late now, and look at what Dana’s done to you and God only knows who else.”

  “Hey, it’s not your fault. I thought Dana was different. It wasn’t until we dated for a while that I started to see his dark side.”

  The door flew open and Tony walked in carrying a box and several yoga mats in the crook of his right arm. “I guess these belong to you.” He set the box and yoga mats on the floor. Sparrow raised her eyebrows in surprise. A crinkle of lines formed across her forehead. “Those aren’t mine. I didn’t practice yoga at Dana’s.”