In Search of Healing

by Katie Holmburg

  Ignoring Jones, who had risen to his feet, he focused on calming Aletta down. He could get to the bottom of whatever caused this later. Gripping her hands as gently as he could, he forced her to meet his gaze. Although he could tell that she was embarrassed, panic still held the upper hand. Projecting calm, an emotion foreign to him at the moment, he held her eyes, causing her to focus solely on him and away from whatever it was that was causing her distress. He was relieved when she took that first breath, following his lead.

  After several breaths, he saw her color start to return to normal and she eased up her death grip on the chair. Seeing calm returning to her eyes, he stood and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. After making sure that she was still breathing okay, he turned and faced the captain, his face clearly conveying his anger at the situation.

  The captain shot him an apologetic look but remained focused on Aletta. When Aletta had calmed sufficiently she turned to the captain, her expression a mixture of shame and guilt. She whispered, “I’m sorry.”

  “No, this is my fault. I’d forgotten about that incident. The anniversary is approaching, isn’t it?”

  She forced out, “Yes sir, next week.”

  Lirim looked back and forth between them, not understanding what was going on. He’d noticed his partner’s lack of spirits and energy for the last few days but had no idea that it traced back to something more than weariness from their current case. However, it sounded like there was something larger that Aletta hadn’t informed him of.

  He growled, “What are you talking about, Captain?”

  Jones shook his head. “That’s up to Agent Sheridan on how much she wants to share with you.”

  He reluctantly acquiesced, understanding his point. However, he’d never seen Aletta so terrified and he wasn’t willing to stand by and do nothing. “You need to assign the case to someone else.”

  Jones shook his head, his regret obvious but unwilling to bend on this. “It has to be you and Agent Sheridan. No one else has the necessary contacts or connections in that world.”

  Lirim vaguely remembered that she’d mentioned she had been training to be an opera singer, but the subject had never come up again. He was regretting that oversight now, but he’d remedy that at a later date.

  He opened his mouth to argue when Aletta’s hoarse voice cut him off, “We’ll do it, sir. It just caught me off guard is all. I’ll be fine, don’t worry about me.” Reaching up, she briefly squeezed his hand reassuringly before returning her hand to her lap.

  He looked at her, but she kept her gaze on her lap, successfully hiding her emotions from him. However, the line of her back let him know she wasn’t going to budge from her insistence on accepting the case. With a decided lack of graciousness, he growled, “All right, we’ll take the case. Have Cara put the details on my desk. Agent Sheridan and I have to take the paperwork over to the prosecutors. They need it as soon as possible.”

  He offered Aletta his hand and tugged her gently to her feet. He was pleased that she didn’t resist him but worried when she still refused to meet his eyes. He would have to get to the bottom of whatever was going on, but it was going to take some finesse on his part. Now, if only he could figure out where to start.

  Two

  Aletta was grateful when Lirim suddenly dropped his objections and accepted the case. When she finally managed to regulate her breathing, shame had swamped her. She shouldn’t have succumbed to that panic attack, but it had appeared out of nowhere. Well, that wasn’t exactly true; she’d been staving them off all week, but she usually had some warning when one was about to occur. This one had literally blindsided her.

  She groaned internally. Of course, it had to happen in front of Lirim of all people. She’d been able to play off her exhaustion and depression for the past week as weariness from the case they were working, but that wouldn’t fly anymore. And if she knew anything about Lirim, it was the fact that he was stubborn. He wouldn’t stop digging until he discovered what was behind her meltdown.

  She felt a sharp stab of pain in her chest and her pulse sped up slightly. As horrible as it sounded, she wasn’t ready to share her pain with anyone, least of all with Lirim. She knew that it was unfair, but she couldn’t fight it. Lirim had shared the skeletons in his closet with her, from his aunt to his time in the Outlier war. However, she couldn’t even face her own skeletons, let alone let them out for others to see.

  She’d followed Lirim blindly out of the office, allowing him to gently guide her. She’d kept her step light and confident and her face relaxed but couldn’t tell whether she was actually fooling any of the other agents.

  Still, Lirim didn’t call her out or say anything about the recent conversation in the captain’s office. Instead, he waited patiently while she gathered the necessary papers off her desk and tucked them into her messenger bag. While she settled it comfortably on her hip, he walked over and swiped a similar pile off his desk. He fell into step next to her as they walked silently down to the garage. The silence should have felt tense and overwhelming, but instead it felt companionable and contemplative.

  She knew that he was mentally turning over everything that he knew about her, trying to figure out what had set her off. However, he wouldn’t be able to pinpoint it because she’d never shared it with him. The only reason the captain even knew was because it was in her file. It was one of the reasons that she decided to become a law enforcement officer.

  Other than Jones and Cy, no one in the department knew about the incident. And the only reason that Cy knew was because he had caught her in a weak moment when she was drunk and she’d blabbed the whole story to him. However, as soon as she’d sobered up, she’d tracked him down and sworn him to silence, a hangover pounding at her temples. He’d agreed and as far as she knew, he’d never breathed a word to another soul. The Lycan’s word was his bond and he never broke it. Unless she gave him permission, he would never speak of it again.

  She wasn’t even sure that he knew that next week was the anniversary of that incident. Although she’d spilled the whole story, she couldn’t remember if she’d told him exact dates or not.

  They reached the garage and Lirim held open the car door for her as had become their routine. Aletta had rather come to enjoy the small tokens of respect that Lirim offered her so unconsciously, from opening doors to pulling out chairs and always making sure that he walked on the street side of the sidewalk. He never made her feel like he doubted her as an agent but he had no qualms about treating her as a woman as well. He climbed into the car and they took off, silence filling the car.

  Aletta remained silent for the entire ride to the prosecutor’s office, her mind churning as she tried to figure out how to handle the situation that she had been thrown into. The past she’d completely walked away from had just come back and slapped her in the face. She kept her breathing even and her face neutral, unwilling to let Lirim know what an emotional mess she was at the moment.

  All during the ride, she wrestled with what she knew she had to do, but she couldn’t find a way around it. Being an agent at HSI was more than just a job to her, it was her calling. Every day she went into the office, she was keeping people safe and evil off of the street. She was helping people and she had found family, people that had her back no matter what.

  Truthfully, she wasn’t afraid of Lirim or what his reaction would be. She knew that he wouldn’t judge her, that he would hear her out completely and take everything in stride. But for her, it was staring her nightmare in the face and having to relive it again. She didn’t know if she was strong enough to go through this.

  She took a deep breath and focused, allowing her mind to settle. She had sworn an oath when she joined HSI, and she wasn’t going to break it just because it hurt. She knew what she had to do.

  * . * . *

  Leaving the prosecutor’s office, Aletta climbed into the car. She was grateful that Lirim had been so considerate, not asking her any questions. She knew that she’d probably fright
ened him earlier in the captain’s office when she’d had her panic attack. She’d appreciated it but she knew that she had to reroute his protective side before he started treating her like a delicate glass figurine.

  When he got into the car, she turned and faced him before he could start it. He was instantly focused on her completely. She said quietly, “I need to show you something. Please don’t ask any questions. I’ll explain it all afterward. Can you do that?”

  He nodded, his expression serious.

  “All right, I’ll tell you where to go.”

  He put the car into gear and turned right when she indicated.

  They drove silently for several minutes, Aletta only speaking to give him directions. They finally arrived at a private hospital. They pulled into the parking garage, then slowly made their way inside. The receptionist at the front desk greeted her by name. Aletta could almost feel Lirim’s carefully restrained curiosity. Aletta merely nodded to the woman as she walked over to the bank of elevators, her throat too dry to be able to force words out.

  They rode the elevator up to the third floor, and Aletta was thankful that this elevator didn’t have the same canned music that most other elevators had. Feeling Lirim’s concerned gaze, she glanced at him and offered a strained smile. This didn’t seem to ease his mind but she had nothing more to give.

  Exiting the elevator, she strode briskly down the right-hand hallway. Stopping before a door, she took a deep breath before entering the room, centering and calming herself. Smoothing her expression, she forced a cheerful smile and entered the room.

  Moving over to the bed where a young woman lay apparently asleep, she started chatting. “Hey, Lena. How are you today? I finally brought my partner with me to meet you. I think that you’d like him but you’d definitely give him a run for his money. He likes his routine. You, free spirit, would drive him crazy.”

  She absently straightened the covers and refilled the water in the vase of flowers. Sitting in the chair beside the bed, she tenderly grasped Lena’s hand. “So, I won’t be able to read you another chapter of the Starfire Chronicles. I’m on a case and I can only stay for a few minutes. As a matter of fact, you’ll probably be interested in this one. Remember how I joined HSI? Well, now they want me to go undercover at the opera. Talk about full circle, huh? I’m going to be very busy, but I’ll try to stop by as often as I can.”

  She held her hand silently for a minute before reluctantly letting go and standing up. She looked at Lirim but he merely looked at her. She smoothed a strand of hair from Lena’s face, then turned and made her way from the room. On the way back to the car, she struggled to find the words to explain.

  He remained silent, letting her gather her thoughts. He held the car door for her but didn’t otherwise push her to say or do anything. He started the car and Aletta assumed that he was taking them back to the office. Instead, she was surprised to find that he had taken them to the little café where they’d had their first open discussion about their partnership.

  It had quickly become one of their favorite hangouts and they usually went there at least once a week. Despite knowing that he’d brought her here to talk, she felt herself relaxing in the familiar comfort of the café. Their usual waitress, Anna, nodded at them as they made their way over to their usual table.

  Lirim waited until Anna had taken their order before turning his full attention to her. She sighed, knowing that her time for avoiding the subject had run out. Fiddling with the iced tea straw, she sighed again. She decided to approach the subject from a side angle rather than head-on. “Do you remember our first case? The interdimensional beast?”

  He gave her a rather exasperated glance, that said, ‘Duh, how could I forget?’, but nodded anyway. “Remember how I told you that I was training to become an opera singer?”

  He thought back over that encounter and nodded, although he was kicking himself for not following up more on it. “Yes, I remember. You still owe me that story.”

  She nodded slightly. “Well, this ties into that. Three years ago, I was in my final year at the music academy. I worked hard and I’d already had several offers for small parts. Nothing grand, mind you, but a good way to get into the opera world. At that time, I was living with Lena, who was also an opera major. We’ve been best friends since kindergarten and roommates for the entire time at the academy. Even though we were going into a highly competitive field, we were close, and nothing was ever going to change that.”

  Right then, Anna brought their meals. Aletta took advantage of the distraction to pull herself together. The last thing she wanted was to fall apart in public. After Anna left, she toyed with her fork but didn’t eat, not sure if she could get food past the lump in her throat.

  “It happened at the end of our final semester. We ran out of some items, milk, bread, etc., and Lena wanted to make a quick run to the store. This was about eleven o’clock at night. We had an audition the next day and I wanted to stay home and prepare for it. I flippantly told her to wait until tomorrow, we wouldn’t die over not having a few groceries for a day or so. She just laughed at me and went anyway.”

  She set the fork down firmly, stilling her fidgeting. She’d relived this night so many times in her memory, wishing that she could go back and beg Lena not to go, or go with her.

  “The grocery store was only ten minutes away from our apartment, my apartment. I still live in the same apartment that we were living in then. Part of why we loved that apartment was its easy access to everything.

  “I practiced my aria that I was going to sing the next day. However, when half an hour passed and she hadn’t returned, I started to grow uneasy. Still, I thought maybe she’d met a cute guy at the grocery store and lost track of time. She’d be back any minute. So I waited another half an hour and when she still hadn’t returned, I tried calling her.”

  She took a deep breath, shoving her emotions down ruthlessly. “Her phone was answered by a police officer. Lena had been mugged and left for dead in the grocery parking lot. She’d never even made it into the store, but was discovered by a cart boy when he went to gather the carts for the final time that night.”

  Lirim reached over to try and comfort her but she flinched away from the contact. It was hard enough trying to relive this, but if she accepted his comfort, she’d lose it entirely. He seemed to read this in her face and pulled his hand back, quietly motioning for her to continue.

  “The officer informed me that she was being transported to the hospital, but that it was touch and go. I think that he was trying to prepare me for the worst, but I was terrified. I ran to my car and headed for the hospital, not even bothering to change into street shoes. When I reached the hospital, she had been rushed into surgery to repair internal bleeding. The police didn’t have her family’s number, so I offered to call them. That was the hardest call that I’ve ever had to make in my life.”

  She felt tears start to form in her eyes and had to force the words past the lump lodged in her throat. “We waited for over five hours while they operated, until finally the doctors deemed her stable and moved her to a room for observation. Now all that was left was to wait for her to wake up.”

  “But she didn’t.”

  She nodded. “But she didn’t. Doctors can’t find the reason behind her coma. Her body healed and seems to be functioning normally. Brain scans indicate plenty of brain activity, so she’s not brain dead. She’s just not waking up. It’s been three years next week since it happened.”

  “So why didn’t you become an opera singer, follow both of your dreams?”

  She chuckled humorlessly. Lirim somehow always managed to cut to the heart of the situation. “They never found who did this to her. Someone who thought twenty bucks and her grandmother’s ring was worth Lena’s life. Don’t get me wrong, the police officers who responded did exemplary work. I’ve seen the files. There just wasn’t enough to go off of.

  I wanted to get justice for her and I wanted to make sure that other families didn�
�t have to go through what Lena’s family was going through. Her family was like a second family to me and their grief was overwhelming. I also blamed myself. I should’ve gone with her, I should’ve convinced her to stay home. I tortured myself like this for a week before I managed to snap out of it.”

  Lirim eyed her cautiously, “How did you do that? It’s really hard to get out of that cycle. Trust me, I know.”

  “It was actually Lena’s brother. I hadn’t eaten anything for days, I was barely sleeping. I was curled up in the chair in her hospital room, silently begging her to wake up. He came and perched on the windowsill next to me. We were both silent, then he spoke up abruptly, startling me. He said, ‘You’re an idiot.’” She chuckled slightly, remember the matter of fact tone that he had used.

  Lirim looked at her, puzzled as to why she was chuckling. “You find it funny that he insulted your intelligence?”

  “He was just so steady, so matter of fact. I shot up, sputtering and upset. However, he just calmly continued, ‘Aletta, do you really think that this is what my sister wants for you? For you to keep blaming yourself over a senseless act of violence? Neither of you could’ve predicted that this was going to happen, and we both know how stubborn Lena is. She was going to the store and she wasn’t going to wait until the morning. There was nothing you could’ve done to change her mind. And if you’d gone with her, there’s a good chance that you would be lying here in the bed beside her.’”

  “I argued that I should’ve somehow known, that I should’ve somehow managed to stop her, so he asked me, ‘How would you want Lena to feel if it were you in the bed? What would you want her to do?’

  ‘I’d want her to not blame herself, to keep living her life. I’d tell her she was strong and I’d pull through, and even if I didn’t, that she was strong enough to make it.’