by M. Leighton
“I was afraid you wouldn’t believe me and that they’d take me away from you.”
“Who?”
“Whoever gave me to you in the first place.”
“Oh, Mercy, that’s—”
“You asked,” I said. Then, after a deep breath, I went on. “Anyway, skip ahead to the first day of college. I was walking to school when it happened again. I watched it. I mean, I’ve sorta gotten used to it over the years. It wasn’t until I saw Lisa Bauer alive in class that I really started to freak out.
“I didn’t really know what to do. I knew people would think I was crazy if I told anyone. Couldn’t tell Lisa. Couldn’t tell the police. But then, it started bothering me so bad I had to go to the cops. Long story short, that’s when I met Grayson. He didn’t really believe me either. Until Lisa turned up dead, that is.
“After that, I started having these dreams. I didn’t know it at first, but they were of the man who’s been killing the young girls uptown. So, I’ve been telling Grayson everything that I dream of so maybe he can catch the guy.”
“Then why haven’t they caught him?” Mom asked.
“It’s not that easy. He’s been smart and careful and the only break Grayson got was when the guy left some evidence behind, evidence I think he left on purpose.” I took another deep breath before launching into the next part, the most difficult part.
“But why would he—”
“Let me finish,” I scolded gently. “He’s been leaving messages. For me, I think. And when he left the last one, he knew they’d look at his blood in comparison with mine and then they’d see that we’re related.”
Mom gasped. Dad stood stoically up against the sink.
“Related?” Mom was pale as a ghost.
“Either my biological father or possibly a brother.”
Mom closed her eyes against what I was saying.
“I know this is painful for you guys, but I’d rather you hear it from me than from someone else. And I have no idea how this could end up, how public my part in it could become.”
Mom opened her eyes and looked at me. There was pain mingled with determined devotion shimmering in their depths. “Mercy, we love you no matter what. And we’ll stand by you no matter what.” She reached over and squeezed my hand.
I didn’t expect how much better that simple statement would make me feel. “I know, Mom, and I appreciate it. You know I would never want to hurt either of you. You’ve been so good to me and I could never repay that. That’s part of the reason I kept this from you to being with.” I looked at Dad as I spoke, too. He was just watching me with a curiously blank expression. I think he was in shock.
“We love you, Mercy. You’re our daughter. Nothing in the world could change that,” Mom said, smiling her sweet smile.
I returned it.
“So what’s next?” she asked.
“Grayson is going to see if he can dig up at least my mother’s identity and we’ll start there.”
I knew Mom wouldn’t like that and I could tell by the change in her expression that she didn’t.
“Well, you do what you have to do to make sure that psycho is taken off the streets,” she said, nodding encouragingly. Then she looked up at me as if something terrible had just occurred to her. “Mercy, are you in danger?”
“No, Mom.”
“Are you sure? Would you tell me?”
“I’m sure, Mom. And, no, I probably wouldn’t tell you, but we don’t have to worry about that because I’m not in any danger.”
That might have eased her mind a tad, but not much.
Dad cleared his throat and finally spoke, pushing himself away from the sink. “Well, young lady, you’d better start telling us when you’re running around with this Grayson. I want to know where you are and what you’ll be doing. You might be eighteen, but you’re still my little girl,” he finished, reaching out to tug on one of my stray curls.
“I will, Dad. The only reason I didn’t tell you before was because I was afraid of what you’d think. But now that you know everything, there’s no reason to hide it from you anymore.” I stood to my feet, suddenly exhausted. “You just can’t tell anybody anything that I tell you. It might compromise the investigation and Grayson would kill me,” I said with a grin.
“Grayson, huh?” Mom said with a devilish gleam in her eye.
I just smiled. I wasn’t going to hide that either.
“I say we all go to bed before the sun comes up, ok?”
“You go on, sweetie. We’ll just be a few more minutes,” Mom assured.
I knew they’d have to stay up and discuss me and my crazy life for a while longer without me there listening.
When I crawled into bed two minutes later, it was with a lighter heart than I’d had in a long time.
********
I was sure I’d just fallen asleep when the phone rang. Blearily, I shuffled to the end of the bed and grabbed my cell off the dresser. I made a mental note to start keeping it on the nightstand.
Without looking at the screen, I knew who it would be.
“Hello?”
“Rise and shine,” Grayson said playfully.
“What time is it?”
“Almost 11:00.”
“How do you function on no sleep?”
“Eh, trick of the trade,” he replied. “Listen, how would you feel about a road trip?”
I perked up almost instantly. A road trip? With Grayson? What I wouldn’t give…
“I could be convinced,” I teased.
“I found your mother,” Grayson said soberly.
My lighthearted mood went straight out the window.
“Where?”
“Why don’t I just tell you about it on the way?”
I didn’t really like that answer, but it might be something that was better discussed in person so I went along with him. “Alright.”
“I’ve got to take care of a few things here before we go. How about I pick you up in, say, two hours. Oh, and pack an overnight bag just in case,” he said casually.
My stomach didn’t react casually, however. A legion of butterflies started flapping their wings all at once and I felt all warm and gooey inside.
“Ok. I’ll be ready.”
“See you soon,” he said and then he disconnected.
I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked at it. That was almost a goodbye. He really was learning.
I hopped out of bed, energetic all of a sudden, and went for a granola bar and coffee before I got into the shower. When I walked into the kitchen, Mom and Dad turned to look at me. They were both almost exactly where I’d left them hours before. The only thing that had changed was their clothes.
“Did you guys sleep at all?” I reached for a coffee mug and poured some hot brew from the pot Mom had on the warmer.
“Some,” Mom said vaguely. That meant none.
“Well, just to let you know, Grayson called and he’s located my biological mother. We’re going to see her today. It’ll probably be an overnight trip. He didn’t say how far away she was, but he did say to bring a bag, so...” I trailed off as I sipped.
“Do you want us to come? Maybe we’d—”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Mom. This is an ongoing investigation. If I weren’t a material witness or whatever they call me, he probably wouldn’t even be taking me.”
Dad pulled his phone out of his pocket and walked into the living room.
“I doubt Dad would be good in a situation like that anyway,” I whispered. “He might try to attack her or something.” I grinned.
“I wish he would,” Mom said seriously.
In all actuality, Mom would probably be the more likely of the two to try and beat my biological parents to death. She was like a momma grizzly. She didn’t want anybody messing with her cub!
I was munching on my granola bar when Dad came back into the kitchen.
He sighed. “Looks like I’m going to have to fill in for Bob Aldrin at a meeting i
n Philadelphia this weekend. Leave today and come back Monday night.”
“What? Why?”
“His wife’s in the hospital. That was John calling just now. They’re desperate.”
“I didn’t even hear your phone ring,” Mom said, obviously disappointed. “Do you have to go?”
“It was on vibrate. And yes, I have to go. I hate to do it with all that’s going on with you, Mercy,” he said, turning his attention to me. “Do you think you could reschedule with Grayson?”
“Dad, do what you have to do and I will, too. There’s nothing that you can do for me by staying here.” And then I thought of Mom. “Mom, will you be alright for the night by yourself? I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Oh, gosh, Mercy. I don’t know. I’m only forty-nine years old and you expect me to stay a whole night by myself. What will become of me?” Mom didn’t wear sarcasm well.
“Ha ha,” I said dryly.
“I need to pack,” Dad said, glancing at his watch. “Mercy, what time are you leaving?”
“Grayson will be here in two hours.”
“You’ll leave before I will. Come get me when he gets here.”
“Dad, please don’t—”
“I’m not going to embarrass you. Just come and get me.”
“Alright,” I said, rolling my eyes.
********
Two and a half hours later, I was buckled into the passenger seat of Grayson’s Charger and we were speeding along I-83.
“So are you going to tell me where we’re going or just keep me in suspense for the rest of the trip?”
Grayson resituated behind the wheel, leaning toward his door a little and turning his body to face mine. He was relaxed behind the wheel, guiding the car with his thumbs.
“It took some digging to get to the right people at the hospital, but I finally found a woman who remembered you being dropped off there. Evidently she knows your parents,” he said glancing at me.
I nodded. “Was it Irene Tuddle?”
“That’s the one,” he confirmed. “You know her?”
“I’ve never met her, but Mom went to school with her I think. I’ve heard them talk about her.”
“Well, she was very helpful. She remembered you because of the way you looked when your mother brought you in,” he said carefully.
I’m sure he was trying to be delicate, thinking I might not know. I hadn’t told him about my conversation with Mom the other day, when we’d talked about this very thing.
“I’ve already heard about the markings and the bruises. Go on,” I prompted.
“She managed to get your mother’s name. Apparently she was pretty frightened and didn’t know much about Safe Haven Laws. She’d brought you in for medical care when she ran into Irene.”
“Medical care? For the bruises you mean?”
“No. According to Irene, your mother thought someone was trying to kill you and may have poisoned you so she brought you in.”
I’m sure Grayson was thinking something similar to what I was: this just keeps getting better and better.
“Great!” I said. “So had I been poisoned?”
“They found no evidence of poisoning, but your mother was- she was pretty, um—”
“Crazy,” I supplied.
“Well, that’s kind of what they were thinking. Irene said that she was paranoid and saying all sorts of strange things. Said it was easy to talk her into leaving you for Safe Haven. Told her it was best for you, for your safety.”
“Irene talked her into leaving me?” My mother hadn’t wanted to dump me off just anywhere so she wouldn’t have to keep me? That was a nice surprise.
“So it would seem. Irene said that she really pressed your mother to leave you to ensure your safety of course, but also so that your mother could get some help. Said she told your mother that she had the perfect couple in mind that would take good care of you.”
“My parents.”
“Exactly. Irene said your mother was hesitant at first, but she finally agreed to do it if Irene promised not to tell anyone who you were with. She said she didn’t want ‘him’ to find you.”
“Him?”
Grayson nodded.
“Meaning, who? My father?”
“That’s what I think, but only one person will know for sure.”
My mother. “So where is she?”
Grayson hesitated for a fraction of a second before he told me. “She’s in the Scenic Vista Mental Health Facility in Scranton.”
“Scranton? Why Pennsylvania?”
“She wanted to be far away from…somebody and this was the only facility that would accept a patient out of state with no insurance.”
“He must be pretty bad if she’s been hiding from him all these years,” I concluded.
“I’m hoping she’ll tell us all about him.”
I turned my head to stare out the window and quickly became lost in thought. After that, Grayson and I didn’t broach too many serious topics. In fact, we didn’t talk much at all. The silences weren’t uncomfortable, though. We both had a lot on our minds and I doubted he was bothered by the lack of conversation any more than I was.
We stopped for dinner a couple hours from our destination. My appetite wasn’t very big, but that didn’t stop Grayson from chowing down. He ate a cheeseburger, a chicken sandwich, fries, an apple pie and drank a large Coke. I surmised that his metabolism must run at breakneck speed all the time.
By the time we’d arrived at the hospital, it was full dark and I was full nervous. Getting onto the grounds wasn’t as much of a problem as getting in to see my mother proved to be. Turns out they were much more agreeable to me seeing her than Grayson. The nurse told us that men upset her.
“Maybe I could go in first and talk to her. Then you could come in,” I suggested to Grayson.
I could tell that Grayson didn’t like it, but without a court order, they didn’t have to let him see her and I think he realized doing it this way might be our only option. Plus it was past visiting hours. They didn’t have to let either one of us in to see her at all.
“Alright,” he said abruptly. “But I want you to come and get me as soon as you can.”
“I will,” I promised.
I turned to the nurse that we’d been talking to about seeing her. I nodded. “I’m ready to see my mother.”
“Your mother? Girl, why didn’t you say so?” The chunky little diva-of-a-nurse grabbed me by the arm and practically pushed me through the door in front of her.
We walked through several halls that looked identical. All the walls were a pale, soothing blue and all the floors were a gleaming, bright white. Doors dotted the hallways, each one locked with a heavy duty mechanism and each having a tiny window toward the top.
I heard muffled moans and deranged laughter coming from the rooms as we passed and I became a little uneasy, wondering if it was a wise choice to do this without Grayson. But when the nurse stopped in front of one of the doors and pulled out her keys, I realized that the time for misgivings had come to an end. I was about to meet my mother.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The nurse pushed the door open slowly. It creaked on its rusty hinges, echoing eerily down the hall. The sound seemed to stir up the other patients, their moans and cries becoming louder and more agitated.
I followed her into the room and looked around. There was a tiny metal-frame bed pushed up against the wall to the left and a small metal table pushed up against the wall to the right. One metal chair was pushed underneath it. The other had been pulled up in front of the window and in it sat a small woman.
Her back was to me. She sat with her knees drawn up to her chest, head tilted back, staring out the window into the dark night beyond.
Her long coppery hair hung in a tangled twist over the back of the chair. She didn’t move a muscle when we entered.
“Miss Debbie,” the nurse said cheerfully. “Your daughter’s come to see you.”
“I don’t have a daughter,” th
e woman said softly.
My heart sank. What if Grayson was mistaken? What if Irene had gotten it all wrong?
The nurse looked at my suspiciously so I scrambled to find out if this was my mother before she kicked me out.