Secrets

by Dana Lyons

  In the alley around the corner from Dreya’s apartment, he parked within view of her Audi, watching the time.

  “The trick is to get her alone,” he whispered. “You’re supposed to be getting a new case today. Come on now, send two of them ahead.”

  As he predicted, two of the men got into her car. “That’s right.” When they drove off, he smiled.

  “And now, only one remains.”

  * * *

  Dreya took her shoes off and left them by the front door of her apartment. Inside, she went straight to the shower and stripped, dropping her clothes in the sink. She quickly bathed and washed her hair.

  The bathroom door opened and Rhys delivered fresh clothes and undergarments. “Need help?”

  “No, I’ll be out in a minute and then I just have to dry my hair.”

  “Take your time, Jarvis isn’t going anywhere.”

  He closed the door, and she stepped out of the shower, her hair wrapped in a towel. She dried off and got dressed. Then she pulled the towel down and brushed out her hair, complaining. “Nobility’s making me need a haircut twice a month.”

  She bent over to dry her hair upside down. Barely a few minutes into it, the bathroom door opened while she was bent over. “Hey, you told me to take my time,” she began, when she spied a pair of shoes Rhys would never wear. Before she could react, a burn hit the back of her exposed neck.

  All went dark.

  9

  Waiting for Dreya to arrive, assistant Director Herb Jarvis sat in his office, chair swiveled to give him a view out the window. “I should have listened.”

  He had been warned Lazar’s file was over his head, but he didn’t care—at the time. A humorless chuckle struggled free. “You’d think I’d know by now when to back off.”

  Lazar is a Pandora’s box.

  “I wish I hadn’t opened it.”

  Anthony Lazar, a brilliant madman. Does his genius justify his madness? Or does the insanity negate the genius?

  A glance toward Dreya’s office showed part of her team had showed up before her this morning. Undoubtedly, good men. “Well,” he announced, “it’s going to be all hands on deck if—”

  A commotion erupted in Dreya’s office. Sinclair was on his cell phone, exclaiming, “What?” Kingston jumped up, and the two ran for the elevator. Before he could rise and stop them, they darted down the stairwell.

  “See? Lazar. All you have to do is mention his name, and bad things happen.”

  * * *

  On Dreya’s apartment floor, Rhys moaned, still severely groggy from the drug injected into his neck. He dropped the cell phone and fell back.

  Simon and Quinn are coming. Dreya, where’s Dreya?

  He drifted back asleep, falling deeper and deeper. Darkness surrounded him, not from the drug, but from a void. A void blacker than anything he knew. A void that frightened him.

  “Come on, Rhys, get yourself up.”

  Simon’s voice. Rhys smiled and knew relief now that his brothers were here. They’d help him find her.

  “What happened?” Quinn asked.

  “Where is she?” Simon added.

  Rhys’ smile faded. If they didn’t know where she was, then the void he perceived was—

  His eyes shot open. “I can’t sense her at all.”

  The lost expressions on their faces echoed his fear. “You, too?”

  “She’s absolutely gone,” Simon whispered. “I don’t even feel her in my mind, usually there’s at least something.”

  “A thread,” Quinn said. “The connection to her. It’s gone.”

  Rhys struggled to get up, then wobbled over to a chair. As he sat, Simon and Quinn both stripped and transitioned. After tracking all over the apartment, they returned and stood before Rhys.

  New shoes. It’s our strangler. He has her.

  “Call Jarvis and get a CSI unit over here.”

  They transitioned and dressed. While Simon made the call, Rhys went to the bathroom and splashed water on his face. The hair dryer and her brush were on the floor, but all her contact cases and solutions were missing.

  He rubbed his eyes and stared at his face in the mirror, trying to remember what happened. Slowly his eyes drifted closed again and he leaned his forehead against the mirror. All he wanted to do was sleep.

  A knock at the door startled him. Simon stuck his head in and asked, “You, okay, man?”

  “No,” Rhys mumbled. “I must have been hit with a horse tranquilizer.”

  Simon helped him out the door and onto the couch. He fought to keep his eyes open, but he wanted to sleep, to slip away from the heartbreak waiting in the void. His mind was lost without her.

  Dreya, where are you?

  He started to sag sideways when Quinn sat next to him, propping him up. Simon took the other side. Quinn said, “Open your eyes and tell us what you remember.”

  Rhys lifted his head and forced his eyes open. Blinking and squeezing his eyes tight, he said, “The door. I answered the door.” The emptiness of the void haunted him, pulling him into despair.

  “What else?” Simon asked, shaking him.

  He struggled to keep his head from lolling side to side. In the background, he heard people walking in, cases being opened.

  Ah, good. The FBI is here. But where’s Dreya?

  With his eyes closed, he remembered now. “A delivery guy with a large crate.” He exhaled, wanting to berate himself for the lapse, but that wouldn’t help find her. “He had the wrong address.” He smiled, recalling. “He was a total klutz, dropped his clipboard. I bent down to pick it up, like a fool.”

  An EMS tech squatted in front of him. “What happened to you, sir?”

  Rhys meant to wave him off, but the tech pulled back one of Rhys’ eyelids and shined a light across his pupil. “You’re heavily sedated, sir.” He then picked up a wrist. “And your pulse is weak. I recommend you take it easy for a couple hours. Most likely, you were injected with an animal tranquilizer.”

  While the tech offered his opinion, Rhys let his head fall back, all the while thinking.

  Waiting for you to get out of my way so I can go and find her.

  A surprising telepathic response came from Simon. Where do you think you’re going?

  To fly. To look for her. To find her.

  Quinn joined in. You can’t even stand.

  What I can’t stand is the emptiness.

  I know. She’s not there, Simon commiserated.

  Even at night when she’s asleep, Rhys protested, I wake and feel her presence in my mind. How could she be gone like this? Beneath the tranquilizer, panic struggled to rise. I lost her on my watch.

  Don’t go there, Quinn said. “Could happen to any of us, even her.”

  Rhys’ guilt was less forgiving. He pushed to stand, but fell back down. Quinn and Simon lifted him up. “Come on, dude,” Simon said. “You’re going to bed before you fall and hurt yourself.”

  They got him to the bedroom. He tumbled into bed, his head on her pillow, smelling her scent. A lurch of anxiety tried to rise, but his mind followed his body into the depths of the tranquilizer. Oblivion took him.

  Later, voices swirled, intruding into his mind. A door opened; the voices came closer. Bright light tried to pierce his eyelids. The sound of handcuffs unlocking. A wash of cold on his arm and a sharp stab. He opened one eye and tried to focus. “What are you doing?”

  Simon released his arm and set a syringe on the bedside table. “You were given Xylazine. I did a little research, added in the math on bird metabolism, and made you a cocktail of vitamins to help you kick off this drug. You should feel better soon.”

  Rhys pushed himself upright. “You handcuffed me to the bed?” He struggled as though every neuron and synapsis moved through thick red clay.

  “Well, you were talking crazy. You think you can stand?”

  Simon helped to steady him. “Don’t worry, the injection of vitamins I gave you will help. Can you shower?”

  He nodded, but ve
rtigo made him regret the move. He grabbed the wall, cursing his frail human body. “Help me in.”

  Simon turned the water on. Rhys leaned on him as he slipped out of his clothes. He stepped into the shower, letting the pelting hot water wake up his scalp, his face, his eyelids, his chest. Gradually life flowed back into his body and he turned the hot water to cold and scrubbed down briskly.

  Drying with the towel helped further invigorate his body. He was more like himself by the time he dressed and walked out.

  A feast of meat covered pizza, garlic knots, steak sandwiches and fries waited for him on the dining table. His stomach rumbled and he glanced outside. “What time is it?”

  “You slept all day. It’s 7:30 P.M. Time to eat.”

  Rhys sat and pulled off a slice of pizza. “What happened while I was out?” he asked around a mouthful. He was suddenly starving.

  “CSI did a full sweep. Too early for news from them,” Quinn said.

  Simon pushed a steak sandwich towards Rhys. “I helped uniforms canvas the area. Most everyone had already left for work. One woman ‘maybe’ saw a van pulling out of the alley, but she doesn’t remember what color it was. She was going the opposite direction, late for school with a car full of kids.”

  Tackling the steak sandwich, Rhys nodded for Quinn.

  “Back at the coffee shop I checked the security video. He must have known where the cameras were and kept his face turned away the entire time.”

  Rhys motioned him to continue. “We interviewed all the staff. No one remembered seeing him. Before we arrived, he stood with his face turned and a phone in his ear. We showed up and he suddenly got in line, pulled off to the side, until we got in front of him, and then fell all over her.”

  Still chewing to satisfy his ravenous appetite, he motioned for more. “CSI dusted the coffee shop, but nothing has popped,” Simon added.

  The vitamins Simon gave him were working. “What’d you give me?” He downed a large glass of water and reached for another slice of pizza.

  Simon grinned. “A metabolic booster to help you burn off the tranquilizer and an appetite stimulant to aid the process.”

  Rhys finished off his pizza, wiped his mouth, and tilted his head back. He closed his eyes and reached out to her, but she wasn’t there. Part of him panicked. Nobility said, trust her. “Have you heard anything from her?”

  “Nothing,” Quinn said.

  “Same here.”

  “What do you think that means?” Rhys asked.

  “No one knows that much about telepathy,” Simon offered. “It could be she’s unconscious below theta level, as in an induced coma. More likely he hit her with the same tranquilizer you got.”

  The thought of her unconscious at the hands of a monster made Rhys shiver.

  “Or,” Quinn said, “she may be out of range. We don’t know what our range is, so that’s impossible to gauge.”

  With nothing else to add, silence claimed the room. Rhys shook his shoulders, ready to go to work. He told Simon, “Whatever you gave me did the trick.”

  “You ready to fly?”

  He unbuttoned his shirt. “Until I find her.”

  “Quinn and I will work this end.”

  “Hey,” Quinn said, grabbing Rhys’ arm. “We’re going to find her. In the meantime, she’s Noble smart until we get there.”

  * * *

  Dreya was cold and alone.

  You will never be alone.

  The thought gave her comfort, but a small pop of anxiety followed with a burning question.

  Where are they? Rhys? Quinn? Simon?

  She tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry. The troubling thought returned and she had to ask.

  Where are you?

  She checked in her mind for their presence, but they weren’t there.

  How?

  On the heels of that question came panic.

  Why?

  Rising consciousness pieced together the next question.

  Where am I?

  A sniff said the sheets weren’t from home.

  Not home. How can that be?

  She dragged one eye open.

  Oh, there’s Rhys sitting in the chair.

  But she still wasn’t at home. Another ping of anxiety and she squinted the open eye, but that didn’t bring him into focus. She asked again.

  Where are we?

  No answer came. Instead, a void occupied the place in her mind where she normally found him.

  “Where are you?” she managed to say. She tried to lick her lips but her tongue was like glue. “Drink,” she croaked.

  He came to her, lifted her head and brought a cold bottle of water to her lips. “Easy, now. Don’t gulp.”

  The water was cold. She gasped with relief when it hit her mouth and swallowed more, taking the bottle from his hand. He returned to his chair and sat while she drank. She emptied the bottle and fell back onto the pillow.

  Drugged. Why am I drugged?

  The coffee shop. The man ran into her and she remembered the feel of cold drinks and ice tumbling down her back. Her shoes squished when she walked. She kept her eyes closed, letting her mind work things out. She was too loopy to stand up.

  Why?

  A rapid-fire stream of images churned through her brain. She recalled fleeting and disconnected moments, of her falling, of riding a distance with the smell of wood and cheap new shoes, of being carried like a rag doll. She opened both eyes and blinked until the man came into focus.

  Not Rhys.

  This man was medium height and build, light brown hair, brown eyes, no distinguishing features or markings. Nobility shouted, ‘Not true! See him.’

  “I’m Dreya.” She squinted at him, and recognized a familiar cheekbone. “I remember you. You were at the bar.”

  She wasn’t bound, but she didn’t know what he wanted, didn’t know what he planned to do with her, didn’t know what was going to happen. Having been at the bar, he knew what she was capable of. A glance around revealed a bare basement with no hand tools or implements in view. “Tell me your name, your real name.”

  He seemed momentarily stunned and placed his hands over his eyes. She remembered his traits.

  Invisible. Maybe he’s tired of being invisible.

  Suddenly, he blurted, “Martin, I’m Martin.”

  “Hi, Martin. Do you mind if I sit up?” He motioned for her to go ahead, and she struggled to sit up on the air mattress. “Where are we?”

  The absence of Rhys, Quinn, and Simon in her mind inflamed her panic. She wanted to know why she had no telepathy. Are we in Paris, she wondered, or the bottom of a missile silo?

  “We’re not far,” he answered.

  He rubbed his hands together and then on his pants, anxious, building himself up to something. His answer ‘not far’ told her nothing at all.

  Engage, engage, engage.

  “Martin, talk to me. Tell me why we’re here?”

  A tear trickled from his eye. With it came a wave of relief plunging into her mind. But following this came a jumbled mix of anger, sadness, shame--and guilt so intense she had to turn her face from the turbulent onslaught.

  “What do you want?” she gasped, and held a hand up, as if that would ward off the unseen. Unbidden tears gathered in her eyes; she couldn’t bear the level of pain he was throwing off. “Why, Martin? Why do you hurt so? Talk to me.”

  He sobbed. “I knew you were different; when I saw your eyes, I knew you would understand.” He choked before struggling to ask, “Tell me, Dreya. Tell me what you see.”

  She fumbled to understand his words.

  He saw my eyes?

  The thought was paralyzing. But her eyes and mind instinctively sought micro-reads even while her heart cringed at what she would learn. Nobility hovered in the background and kept her panic at bay.

  She squinted and tilted her head, inspecting him. Her eyes automatically adjusted, sending a flood of information to her brain. More tears gathered in her eyes. “What happened to you? W
hat brought you so much pain?”

  “You see my pain?”

  “I see a little boy who never felt loved.” The words brought a rush of empathy as she understood, as she felt his misery at growing up without love. The tears poured down her face, and she couldn’t stop the words. “Come here, Martin, let me hold you.”

  A part of her screamed ‘What are you doing?’ for he was a serial killer of young women. But Nobility revealed to her his broken heart, his damaged mind, his ruined life, his hope and despair.

  She opened her arms.

  He rose, sobbing, staggering under a lifetime of emotions. She swung her legs off the side of the bed as he dropped to his knees in front of her. She closed the portal in her mind, and drew him in as he placed his head in her lap.

  Before Nobility, observing his pain would have been difficult to witness. But now, his sobs and cries ripped through her, drawing more tears to her eyes. She placed her hands on his head and stroked as he cried, pulling his hair away from his face, soothing his grief with touch.

  His crying slowed and he reached for a box of tissues next to the bed. He sniffled, blew his nose, and sat back on his heels.

  “Your eyes are all swollen,” she said. “You should rinse your face in cold water. It’ll feel good.”

  The emotional pressure from him eased as he stepped into the bathroom. She wiped her face and stood, glancing around.

  A basement. Where?

  “I’m going to leave, but you should know there’s a combination lock at the top of the stairs.”

  Letting me know he still has control.

  “I brought you a tray.” He pointed to a hotel service tray with a metal cover. “Please eat.” He backed up and pointed to a clothes chest. “You’ll find clothes in there.” He turned and walked up the stairs. She heard the combination lock spin. After the door closed, a deadbolt snapped into place.

  She rinsed her face and lifted the cover on the tray to reveal a gourmet meal--one of her favorites from a local restaurant. Starving, she sat and ate, enjoying every bite.

  The clothes said he meant to keep her alive for a while. The meal told her they were within a certain distance of the District and that he knew more about her than she knew about him. She pinched the bridge of her nose.