“Just leave me alone,” she wailed as she started slapping him over and over again on his chest and arms, each one stinging her hands. It felt crazy and horrible and sensational all at the same time.
His arms crushed her in a vice grip, pinning her arms down to her sides. She flailed and kicked to no avail as he stomped down toward the lake. One moment she was in a fit of rage, the next she was completely submerged under the icy waters of the lake.
She came up spitting mad and gasping for air. He hauled her up by the shirt.
“Settle down or you’re going under again,” he warned.
She kicked out in fury and down under the frigid waters she went. By the third dunk, she was sobered quite thoroughly and realized it was useless to fight him. He was too strong for her and determined to win.
“Fine!” she screamed out as she came up for air the third time, “Fine, I’ll stop. Just don’t dunk me again.”
Her body was shaking violently as her body tried to fight hypothermia. The fight was completely drowned out of her and she was suddenly fatigued and weary.
Brennan hauled her out of the lake and to the car. Numb inside and out, she let him strip off her pants and top and wrap her in a thick blanket which he pulled from the trunk of the car. Without a word, he put her in the front seat and shut the door. Her teeth where still chattering when he slipped into the driver’s side and turned the heat to full blast. They sat there in silence as the heat filled the car.
As her muscles relaxed from the warmth, she settled into the blanket and gave him a trepid sideways glance. He was staring out his side window so she saw only his profile. His jaw was clenching and she imagined he was still struggling with his temper. Then, she noticed that his clothes were soaking wet. Of course, there was no way that he would have managed to stay dry through that fiasco. An image of the ridiculous scene they’d just displayed came to her mind. She laughed.
He turned and gave her an incredulous look.
“You think this is funny?”
Suddenly serious, she kept her voice calm but hard.
“No, I don’t think anything about this whole fucking mess is funny,” as she spoke, everything that had happened in the last few months came to a head, “I don’t want to have bricks thrown through my window. I don’t like be attacked by crazy old men with a vendetta to hash out. I don’t want to be here in goddamn Redding, California where I’m still just the girl who stabbed her rapist father to death. I don’t want to be chasing my tail in circles trying to catch your ruthless, amoral boss, which I can’t even do lately because I’m trying to find a thirteen year old girl who I care about but hurt her anyway. I don’t want to be burying my fears and sorrows in a bottle anymore, but it’s all I know how to do right now. But more than anything, I just want the nightmares to stop and this hole that’s in the center of my chest to go away.”
Her chest was heaving with pent up emotion. Brennan’s eyes flickered back and forth, searching her eyes. In one swift motion, he pulled her to him and closed his mouth over hers.
She’d been desperate for that kiss ever since she’d had that brief taste of him before. She may not have admitted it to herself before, but now, as she opened her mouth to invite him in, she knew it. There was no denying it.
As she swept her tongue over his, he hesitated, as if surprised by her reaction. Sensing he might pull away, she reached up and clutched his hair in her fingers, pulling him closer. An animalistic growl rumbled in his chest. The deep chill that had soaked through to her core was now replaced with a burning inferno of heat. Through the mist of her passion, it occurred to her that Brennan could kill her so quickly, so easily. With her mind and emotions mixed up and betraying her as she struggled with her recent failures, she felt desperate and weak. Those were emotions that she abhorred. The thought trickled into her mind and she flirted with it. She pressed her throat to his lips and quivered not just from passion but with the idea of what it would be like if he killed her right then and there. The nightmares would end. The history would cease to exist. She’d never had thoughts like that before. But suddenly the option was more than tempting.
FIFTY
His arms were filled with her. His mind was consumed by her. The sweet taste of her made him heady and irrational. But underlying that passion, that need to satiate his desire, was another, more ruthless instinct.
Though Brennan had taken his daily supplement and had been successful at curbing his unnatural and ingrained yearning for weeks, the smell of her just under his nostrils, so close and so warm, triggered that hated thirst. It made him sick to his stomach to think of how badly he wanted to give in to both desires. Which was the strongest, he wasn’t sure.
As if sensing his weakness, she tipped her long neck back and exposed it to him, daring him. With her fingers in his hair, she pulled him closer until his lips touched the smoothness of her skin. The pulse was quick and strong under his lips. His body was straining. His muscles were taught and he sensed that the smallest provocation would send him over the edge. Not for the first time, he didn’t trust himself.
Unable to resist, he kissed the small dip in her throat. When she spoke, the desperation in her voice made him hesitate.
“Just do it.”
Confusion segued to startling realization as it dawned on him what she was suggesting, but he didn’t pull away. With his lips still to her throat, he closed his eyes and fought the raging war within. It would have been so easy to sink his teeth into her flesh. God, he really was a monster.
She spoke again softly, the encouragement in her voice near pleading. He saw a tear run down the side of her neck.
“Just do it. I can’t do this anymore. I just want all of it to go away.”
Her raw emotion and pure vulnerability slapped him back to his senses. Pulling back, he looked into her face. The pain was pure and unhindered. Her typical thick bravado was nowhere to be found. Only the depth of her and who she was, what she feared, was exposed in that moment.
Guilt and shame plagued him, but, more than that, everything about her haunted him. The overwhelming thirst and temptation which had engulfed him only minutes before was squelched and drowned with her sorrow. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he found reprieve as he realized he would never have to fight that demon ever again. He’d overcome it in that one split second of transformation.
Tipping her chin down, she looked at him with wet, brown eyes.
“Why?” she asked.
Ignoring her plea, he pulled her to him and held her against his chest. He held her there for a very long time, the silence of the car enveloping them in a protective embrace. When her body finally relaxed and he felt her earlier sadness drift away, he ran his palm down the side of her neck, over the swell of her breast and trailed across her rib cage in one long caress. She sucked in a gasp of air.
As if she’d bitten him, he jerked back.
“I’m sorry, are you okay?” he asked.
Tenderly, she grazed her fingertips over the spot on her left side.
“It’s my ribs. I think they’re a bit bruised.”
“Oh…I thought that I’d hurt you.”
She smiled and cupped his cheek with her hand.
“I’m okay. Really.”
“I shouldn’t have done that,” he shook his head,
“What…kissed me? Why not? Didn’t you like it?”
“That’s not the issue. Of course I liked it, but…”
“But what, Brennan?” She dared.
“But, like you said before, we’re on the opposite sides of things. I had no right to do that.”
“You’ve got a lot to learn about women. You don’t kiss them and then turn around and talk about how you shouldn’t have done it. It’s a real ego killer. Second, you have every right. I don’t know when you’re going to get this Brennan, but you’re free to do whatever you please now. You are no longer someone’s prisoner.”
“I’m not having this conversation with you,” he said, then opened the d
oor, slid out and slammed the door behind him.
*
She watched him stomp out in the snow, glad for a few minutes to gather her own thoughts. She hated to admit it, but she was just as confused and frustrated as he was. It didn’t help that she could still feel the effects of the alcohol.
Within minutes, Brennan had slipped back into the car with a gush of cold night air.
She was quiet and waited for him to speak first. He reached to the gear shift then paused. He looked at her.
“I found them.”
She knew exactly who he was talking about.
“Okay. What did you find Brennan?”
He spoke clearly, concisely, and she could hear how heavy his heart was with every word.
“It didn’t take long. With the information you gave me, I just followed the trail. Apparently my dad died of a heart attack four years after I disappeared,” He paused, “ and my mom had an emotional break down and has been living in the state mental hospital in Eugene, Oregon.”
Her heart was breaking for him.
“That’s only a four or five hour drive from here. You need to go up there.”
“I know,” he nodded, “I need you to go with me.”
Hadn’t she offered to help him in any way she could? So why, now that he was asking for her to follow through, was she panicking inside?
“I…I’m not so sure that’s a good idea, Brennan,” she said, “I mean, we still haven’t found Carmen.”
“You will,” he said with confidence.
Frustration welled up within her. “
I’m not so sure anymore. We have absolutely no leads,” she hung her head and mumbled, “I can’t imagine where she could be.”
Brennan’s hand closed over hers.
“We’re going to find her. I promise. The whole town is looking for her. Even Victor.”
Shyla’s head snapped up.
“Why? What does he care? I don’t want him anywhere near her.”
“I know you aren’t a fan of his, Shyla, but like it or not, he has contacts and ways of getting things done that the rest of us can’t. He has a better chance of finding her than anyone else does.”
“I don’t care. I don’t want his help. He can just stay the hell away from me and Carmen. Besides, he wouldn’t help me if his life depended on it.”
“Maybe not you, but he’d help the girl, help the town. It would make him look good, and they’d have to show favor.”
Of course, she thought, his motivation was purely selfish.
“I still don’t like it.”
Brennan’s hand tightened around hers.
“Look at me, Shyla.”
She tipped her head towards him.
“I know you’re worried,” he continued, “but it wouldn’t hurt for you to be away for a day or two. It might even be good for you. The authorities, your friends, are working around the clock. All I’m asking for is a day, maybe two. We could leave first thing in the morning and be home within twenty-four hours. I have to go. I have to talk with my mother. But I need someone with me. I need you.”
All resolve crumbled away with that last statement. Never in her life had Shyla felt needed before. Why did life have to be so complicated?
“Fine, I’ll go, but I’m holding you to the twenty-four hour deadline.”
FIFTY-ONE
The plan was that they leave by seven a.m. Brennan had suggested that since it was nearly two in the morning when he dropped Shyla off at her apartment, that they wait one more day so she could rest. But she’d insisted that a few hours was all she’d need. Anything beyond that was a waste of time, she’d said.
So, only five hours after he dropped her off, he was back in her parking lot with a piping hot vanilla latte, ready to go. He had already chugged down a double. She might be able to cope after only a few hours but with his health fading faster each day, he needed all the help he could find to muster the energy to keep going. His benefactor had said six months, but, over the past week, his strength had waned further and he doubted he had more than four.
As she slid into the passenger seat, she reached for the coffee.
“It would be really nice if this had a bite to it.”
“Sorry,” he smiled, “it’s just coffee, I’m afraid.”
“Eh, I figured,” Shyla gave him a sly smile, “So what’d you tell the boss man? Did you tell him we’re running away together?”
Brennan found her quipped sarcasm amusing. It was amazing how she could maintain her stoic front through nearly any scenario.
“I told him that I was going up to Oregon to follow up on a lead about my parents and kept it at that. He didn’t ask any questions. I guess he knows that it would be pointless to argue and I don’t think he would begrudge me seeking that knowledge. He doesn’t feel threatened by it. Nor should he.”
She kept her eyes straight ahead on the road ahead of them.
“You two have quite the bromance going on.”
“Bromance?” he laughed, “Where do you come up with this stuff?”
Brennan was pleased when they eased into a simple conversation for the first hour of the drive before slipping into a comfortable silence. The drive was beautiful. Once in Oregon, the terrain was flatter as they drove north. The farther they went the cloudier the sky became and Brennan tried not to think of it as an ominous sign.
Then again, he was trying not to think much at all. The idea that he might actually see his mother for the first time in over ten years had him feeling twitchy and uncertain. It had upset him to find out she was in a mental hospital and he wasn’t sure what to expect. Would she be coherent? Would she recognize him? If so, how would his sudden appearance affect her? How would it affect him?
It was too much to process so he shoved it aside and gave Shyla a quick glance. She had drifted to sleep with her head resting on her bent arm against the door. Her mouth was parted slightly and he could hear the soft in and out of her breath. Suddenly, there was nothing else in the world that mattered. She was in his life for whatever reason and he didn’t ever want to think of a time when he might be without her. It was like a bomb of revelation bursting inside his head, a single point of knowing which settled in his heart.
She must have felt the weight of his stare. He smiled when she opened one eyelid with trepidation.
“You look pretty when you sleep.”
Uncomfortable with the compliment, she sat up and yawned. Her pony tail had loosened. A few stray strands framed her face. Keeping one eye on the road and another on her, he watched as she tugged the hair tie free and the rest of her dark hair cascaded over her shoulders and down her back. Now she was not just pretty, she was absolutely striking.
“Why don’t you ever wear it down?” he asked, mesmerized. He wanted to reach out and touch it like he’d done the night when he’d caught her in Victor’s office.
Shyla had pulled the sun visor down to look in the tiny mirror and was brushing her fingers through it violently, as if its very existence angered her.
“It’s a nuisance. I hate it.”
“Hate’s a pretty strong word.”
She flashed him an irritable look.
“Yeah, well, I feel fairly strongly about it, so I guess that fits. I’d love to just cut it all off.”
“So why don’t you?” he asked, puzzled.
A certain kind of sadness passed over her features and she rested her hands in her lap, staring down at them.
“Because,” she said, “my mom loved my hair. She would have never wanted me to cut it. On nights when she didn’t have to work, she would sit and brush it and tell me stories of her childhood or of when I was a baby.”
Brennan sensed her nostalgia and feared that he was treading on dangerous ground by pressing forward.
“Those seem like wonderful memories to me, so why such harsh feelings?”
“Because it can be beautiful, but it can also be a curse. When someone’s coming after you, the first thing they reach for is your
hair. They can grab onto it and have you on your knees in seconds as stinging tears of pain and shame slide down your cheeks.”
She suddenly turned and stared into his eyes. It was hard to focus on the road with her blatant gaze tearing open his soul. The picture that she was painting in his mind with only a few key words had him feeling raw with emotion. How could her father have hurt her like that?
“I see,” was all he could say. He was at a loss for words. The car was silent as she finished tying her hair back. It struck him odd that her feelings toward her hair, the love-hate relationship she had with it, reminded him of his relationship with Victor. Within those first few months of knowing him they’d developed a real friendship, but recently that bond had slowly eroded away as the undertones of Victor’s personality made themselves known. Now all that was left was the sense of being indebted to him.
*
His world felt smaller, tunneled down into a very small existence which consisted of only the steps he was taking forward, the steps which would lead him to his mother. The atrocities he’d been subjected to in the institute, the horrors he’d committed of his own free will, were nothing to the shock that was setting in as he walked down the hallway of the small facility where his mother was residing.
It was less of a hospital and more a small clinic. He was glad to find that it was very clean, even comfortable, with décor that encouraged the feeling of home. Except for the nurses and the nursing stations at each end of the hallway, it felt like a small living facility with a central commons area. Not quite the sterile, lifeless facility that he’d pictured. There was no similarity between it and where he’d been kept for the last decade. For that, he was grateful.
After talking with the nurse for some time, he finally convinced her to let him see Clara Miller. She had insisted that she had no living children but when Shyla held up the missing person’s flyer, the woman had taken in a sharp breath.