by Sharon Sala
“Her uncle has asked for her to be transported to Stillwater Hospital.”
“I see no reason to deny,” he said.
“Thank you. I’ll let him know,” Rutherford said.
Flynn got one last glimpse of Tara as the doors closed, and then they were gone.
He headed for the SUV on the run. They wasted no time in leaving. Once again, they were behind her, but this time, they were following her home.
WHEN PAT GOT the news they were on their way back, he called Mona.
“They rescued her. They’re on their way to the hospital here in Stillwater.”
“Thank the lord! I’ll meet you there, okay?”
“Yes, and Mona . . .”
“What, honey?”
“Thank you for being here for me. I wouldn’t have made it without you.”
“It’s what you do for the people you love.”
Pat took a deep breath and closed his eyes, letting the words wrap around his heart. “For the people you love?”
“Yes, like you and Tara, and don’t get all in a panic. I didn’t commit you to anything except maybe a hug.”
He grinned. “I can handle that. See you soon,” he said and ran to get showered and changed.
Chapter Ten
THE AMBULANCE RIDE back to Stillwater was the end of a nightmare. The EMT kept talking to her, judging her ability to comprehend and answer against the side-effects of a possible concussion or a more serious head injury.
Between answering his questions, trying not to stare at Henry who was floating up near the ceiling, and talking to Millicent, she wasn’t getting any rest.
“Are you doing okay, Tara? Are you still cold?” the EMT asked.
“A little,” she said. He promptly got another blanket and added it to the one already on her. “Thank you. That feels good.”
He gave her shoulder a quick pat, unaware Henry was floating right above him blowing kisses at Tara. She had to close her eyes to keep from laughing. Then she heard Millicent’s voice, and she heard something she’d never heard from her before. Fear.
You need to take some self-defense classes. This can’t ever happen again.
Tara shuddered. Trust me. I don’t want a repeat, but knowing karate won’t protect me from a Taser.
Silence.
Millicent?
I do not approve of this century’s weapons of choice.
But this is the century I live in, so I’m stuck with what’s here, right?
Tara heard a snort.
Logic is highly over-rated.
Tara stifled a grin. Millicent did not like to be thwarted.
You’re different now. You know that, don’t you?
Tara frowned. Different how?
Those spirits who saved you were very old and very powerful. Henry and I couldn’t even get close to you. It was terribly frightening for us.
But why am I different?
It’s what you came back with . . . what they gave you. Besides the abilities you were born with, you now have the ability to see into people’s hearts. You will know when people lie. You will see their evil, and you will see the good. It is something rare and very valuable, my child, and it is your responsibility to use it in the service of others.
Tara frowned. My child? Millicent had never called her that before. Why did—understanding dawned. “OMG.”
The EMT looked down. “Are you okay? Are you in pain?”
“No.”
Millicent!
Silence.
Henry!
Nowhere to be seen.
Flynn heard her. Tara? What’s wrong?
OMG. Flynn! Millicent was talking to me and referred to me as her child.
Well, she helped raise you, right?
She NEVER said that before. EVER.
So what’s the big—Oh. Wow! Really? Your Mother? Does this mean Henry might be your father, too?
I don’t know, but I will find out.
Don’t be mad that you didn’t know before. Think about it. You can’t tell a little kid stuff like that.
Silence.
Tara?
I’m here. I’m thinking.
Think about me while you’re at it, because I’m sure thinking about you.
Tara closed her eyes. Flynn O’Mara was fast becoming the second most important person in her life. It was something to sleep on, and she did.
“THERE THEY COME!” Pat said, pointing to an ambulance pulling up to the ER entrance. Even though Pat now knew Tara was safe, he didn’t relax until he saw her face.
Mona was clutching his hand, anxious to see both of their children.
Tara squinted against the bright light of day as they wheeled her out of the ambulance, but when she saw her uncle waiting, she struggled not to cry. For a time, she’d been certain she would never see him again, and she reached desperately for his hand as they wheeled her past.
“Uncle Pat!”
“Tara . . . sweetheart. Thank God, thank God!” he said, as he ran along beside her.
“Welcome back, honey,” Mona said, then saw the bruises and swelling on Tara’s face and bit her lip to keep from crying as Pat followed them inside.
The detectives pulled up a couple of minutes behind the ambulance. Flynn jumped out on the run and went straight to his mom and hugged her.
She threw her arms around him fiercely. “Don’t ever scare me like this again, okay?”
Rutherford caught the look she gave them and could see she was upset that they’d taken Flynn along. He glanced at the kid. “She doesn’t know, does she?”
Flynn shook his head.
Mona frowned. “Know what?”
Rutherford shrugged. “That’s his story to tell.”
Flynn sighed. “Come with me, Mom. We need to talk.”
He led her off into the waiting area as the ER team began assessing Tara’s condition. Pat had given them her medical history earlier, and thanks to a heads up from the EMT team transporting her, they had a portable x-ray waiting.
Once again, everything happening to Tara was out of her control. She followed their orders, answered their questions, reassuring everyone again that she had not been molested, and wanted all of this to be over, and for her life to be back to normal—at least her version of normal.
But then she remembered Millicent’s warning. She’d come back different. Like she wasn’t already different enough? Now she was also a walking, talking, lie-detector/exorcist? She didn’t want to be seeing the evil in people. She wasn’t even eighteen years old yet. OMG! What was up with that?
“Okay, Tara. You said the kidnappers Tased you on the leg,” Doctor Cash asked.
“Yes. I turned around to run and then felt pain on the back of my left leg and went down. That’s the most painful thing ever. I couldn’t think or move.” The re-telling was enough to leave her voice shaky and thick with tears.
“We better take a look at that,” Cash said, and then saw the detectives in the hall trying to get his attention and excused himself. “Nurse, remove her jeans, and I’ll be right back.”
When the nurse came at Tara with a pair of surgical shears, she groaned. The jeans were old, but she didn’t have that many pairs.
“Do you have to cut them?” Tara asked. “I can take them off.”
The nurse smiled. “Oh, we won’t ruin your jeans, honey. All we’re gonna do is turn this pair into summer shorts. Now, how far up on your leg did they Taser you?” the nurse asked, as they rolled her over onto her side.
Tara pointed to about halfway between her hip and knee and then listened to the snip of the scissors as they cut through the fabric to reveal the small wounds.
When Doctor Cash came back, he eyed Tara curiously and then inspected the small burn wounds, which didn’t seem to be infected.
“When can I go home?” Tara asked.
“Not tonight, for sure. I was just informed that when the detectives found you, you weren’t breathing.”
Shock swept through Pat so fast he
staggered. “Oh my God! Tara! Is that true?”
“I don’t know. I don’t remember anything except leaving with the spirits.”
Doctor Cash frowned. “Excuse me?”
Tara sighed. “After we got to the cabin, the men got angry because I kept telling them I couldn’t find what they were looking for. When they came at me, I became surrounded by a couple of centuries’ worth of Choctaw spirits. They kept the kidnappers away from me, and in the meantime scared them enough that they all ran away, leaving me behind.”
The doctor was listening, but she could tell he thought she’d been hallucinating as a result of her head injury.
“So, if the kidnappers ran off, then how did you wind up on the floor of that cabin without a pulse?”
Tara felt like screaming. “This is so frustrating and complicated, trying to make people understand my life. Look, all I know is that when the spirits left, they took me with them. Maybe my body wasn’t breathing because I was so far away, but I wasn’t dead. I knew all the time I was coming back.”
Cash’s eyes narrowed, then he turned and pointed to one of the nurses.
“Get Doctor Vernon on the phone.”
“Who’s Doctor Vernon?” Pat asked.
“He’s the head of Psychiatry here at—”
Tara hit the bed with her fists, rattling the IV on the pole and making the other machines they’d hooked her up to beep and alarm.
“No! Look, Doctor Cash, the bottom line is that I’m a freak. I see and talk to ghosts, and no shrink is going to change that.”
The doctor’s eyes widened. “Wait! Are you that Tara . . . from the tornado?”
“Yes.”
His lips parted, and he took a deep breath.
“Cancel the call to Vernon.” He stared at Tara curiously. “Choctaw spirits? Seriously?”
She nodded.
“Freakin’ amazing,” he muttered. “But you’re still staying overnight.”
Tara sighed. “Okay.”
AFTER SETTLING Tara into her room, cleaning her up, and feeding her for the first time since she’d been taken, she’d quickly fallen asleep from exhaustion. Pat went to dinner with Mona and Flynn and got one more bit of news along with his food.
Mona glanced at Flynn. “Tell him what you told me.”
Flynn sighed. His mother had freaked. He had no idea how Pat would react, but it had to be told.
“What’s wrong?” Pat asked.
“Nothing is wrong. But I haven’t told Mom or you what happened to me after I woke up from the coma.”
Pat frowned. “Are you okay, Flynn? If you have problems, we can get help.”
Flynn stared at him just a moment and then spoke. “No, I’m not blacking out. I’m not having seizures, and I have no memory loss.”
Pat’s eyes widened.
“And no, this isn’t a trick. What happened to me, changed me.”
Pat looked at Mona in disbelief.
“Yes, he’s reading our thoughts. In fact, he can hear everyone’s thoughts, and it’s driving him crazy. Tara has been helping him learn how to focus and block. And here I thought all I had to worry about was his GPA.”
Flynn shrugged. “It’s not my fault.”
Pat shook his head in amazement, and then in a gesture of understanding, put his hand on Flynn’s shoulder. “You don’t know it yet, but you have just been given the answer to every man’s prayer.”
Flynn frowned. “Like what? This isn’t a joke.”
“No joke, son. Think about it. It’s been the downfall of man ever since woman entered the picture. We never know what we do wrong and never know what they are thinking. But you do. Wow. If you play your cards right, you’ll never make a wrong move as long as you live.”
Flynn grinned. “I never thought of it that way.”
Mona rolled her eyes as the waiter arrived at their table.
“Is everybody ready to order now?”
Pat grinned and then pointed at Flynn.
“He’s ordering for all of us.”
Flynn laughed, and just like that, the thing he’d feared most had come off without a hitch.
MILLICENT WAS standing at the end of Tara’s bed, staring at the girl who was turning a woman. Henry was beside her. The secret they’d kept from Tara for all these years was out. The question now was what to do about it?
Henry, what are we going to do?
He shrugged.
You’re no help.
He spun into the corner of the room with his arms folded and frowned.
We knew this day would come, right? And we owe it to her to be truthful, right?
Henry nodded.
Fine. Then it’s settled. We answer whatever questions she asks. She’s waking up and—Drat! Company’s coming. Later.
Tara opened her eyes and rolled over onto her back just as someone knocked on her door. “Come in,” she called out.
The door opened, and Nate Pierce entered. He went straight toward her without speaking, stopping at the foot of her bed.
“You should have let me take you home.”
She sighed. “You are so right.”
“You are okay?”
“Yes, but I need to talk to you about what happened.”
“I’m listening.”
“Your ancestors saved me,” Tara said.
Even though they’d prayed for this to happen, the fact that it had and she knew it was surprising. He managed to pull himself together and moved closer. “The tribe beat the drums, asking the Old Ones to watch over you.”
Tara grabbed his hand and started to cry. “They came in a burst of light, with so much energy it blew the doors open and all of the glass out of the windows where I was being held. There were thousands and thousands . . . so many I couldn’t see faces, only shapes and they said they had been summoned to protect Mynkushi. Who is that? What does it have to do with coming to me?”
Nate’s voice was shaking. “They came for you. They have given you a name . . . Little Moon.”
“Oh, wow,” she whispered, and leaned back against the pillows as the tears rolled down her face.
“Are you okay? Do you want me to go?” Nate asked.
“No. You’re the only one who can help me make sense of the rest of it.”
He looked startled. “There’s more?”
“When they left, they took me with them. I had no pulse when Flynn and the detectives found me.”
His hands were shaking. “I need to sit down,” he said, and pulled up a chair.
Tara’s voice grew soft with awe and wonder. “There are other dimensions in time and space. I saw and understood everything they wanted me to see. There are no words in this world to describe what I saw, and there are no colors here that compare to what was there. They kept telling me that I had a task in this world that would not be easy, but that I would succeed because my heart was pure.”
Nate shook his head in disbelief. “I hear you talking and feel like I should be on my knees in prayer. You are a blessing to all who know you, Tara Luna, and I am proud to call you my friend.”
“Thank you for sending them, because they kept me safe until my rescuers arrived.”
He bowed his head. “You are most welcome, but there is something you need to understand. When the Old Ones named you, they gave you a Choctaw soul to live in harmony with the one already within you. You will be welcome in both the world of the white man and the world of the First People. I will still call you Tara, but our people will know you as Mynkushi. You are a sister to me. It is so.”
Tara smiled. “Before I only had Uncle Pat, and now I have the whole Choctaw tribe as family?”
“Pretty much,” he said, and briefly touched the top of her head. “You should rest. You know where I am if you need me. Welcome back, Mynkushi.”
And just like that, he was gone, leaving Tara speechless and struggling to understand the ramifications of what he’d told her. It made what Millicent said about the gift she’d come back with a little easier to und
erstand, but she still didn’t know what she was supposed to do with it.
She closed her eyes and then felt Millicent on the bed beside her. There were so many questions rolling around in her head, but the only one that mattered was the one that came out of her mouth.
“Are you and Henry the spirits of my parents?”
Yes.
“OMG.”
Are you mad?
“Well, no,” Tara said, and then burst into tears.
THE WHOLE REST of the day, Tara felt them near her. Even when she couldn’t see or hear them, she knew they were there. Doctors came and went while Uncle Pat sat by her bed.
Every now and then she’d catch him looking at her with tears in his eyes. She knew he felt guilty because all this had happened, but the bottom line was, there was nothing he could have done to protect her. It was a sad state of affairs that psychics could use their powers to help everyone else but themselves.
Mona and Flynn had come and gone twice. Once to bring Pat something he needed from home, and once bringing Tara a chocolate malt from Braum’s Ice Cream store. With a mouth too sore and swollen to chew, she’d downed it a spoonful at a time while Flynn watched her without speaking.
He heard her thoughts. He knew about Millicent and Henry, and that she was both elated to know they had never left her, but devastated she would never be able to hug them or see them as they’d been. They’d taken on personalities from their past on purpose so as not to give themselves away until she was old enough to process it. He also knew that she had already decided never to tell Pat. He’d earned the parent status by sticking with her all these years, and she didn’t ever want him to feel less than that.
When he and his mother finally left, she’d looked at him once, acknowledging that she’d “let” him into her sadness and trusted him to keep the secrets.
Rutherford and Allen showed up late in the afternoon to check on her and give her an update. Rutherford was carrying a stuffed white teddy bear, and Allen had a box of chocolates.
When she saw them come in with the presents, she smiled.
“My heroes,” she said.
They both grinned.