by Brenna Lyons
“Nope. Not in this case.” He looked to Steven, and the older man nodded his consent. “What do you have in mind?”
“This was your idea, but I think I have a way. Do you trust me?”
Keith laughed lightly. “With my life. I’ll be right back.”
Steven watched him stride through the door before turning back to Katie. “What are you going to do?”
“Expend energy. As near as I’ve been able to figure it, I leach sugar from my bloodstream when I need to expend a great deal of energy at one time.”
“Well, you’re supposed to do that. I don’t understand. You can hardly run a marathon right now.”
She hesitated. “You’ll see, Steven. Please, just keep an open mind.”
He nodded uncertainly and waited for Keith to return.
Keith set the two cartons on the bedside table. “Now or later?”
“Later.” Katie laid her forehead to his and ran her hands through his hair. “Are you ready?”
“Don’t I get a kiss this time?” he asked in amusement.
“Later. I think we’ve given your grandfather enough of a show.”
“I’ll hold you to that.” Keith closed his eyes. “All of me with no regrets,” he whispered.
She closed her eyes and pulled his mind under her control smoothly. That accomplished, Keith walked to the far corner of the room to await her instructions.
“All right, Steven. This is the game plan.” Katie pulled a tablet and pen from the drawer beside her. “Come sit by me. Write on this pad, something for Keith to do or say, anything within reason. Show it to me but not to him.”
“Is this a joke?” he asked.
“Try me. An open mind, please.”
Steven nodded dubiously and took the pen and paper from her. His first message simply said The Pledge of Allegiance in his chicken scratch. Katie gave his instructions to Keith without looking away from the paper and without a sound.
“I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America—”
Keith droned on, as she arched an eyebrow at Steven. The old man took the pad back with slightly shaky fingers. He considered what he wrote next carefully. His second message was coffee with cream and two sugars. Steven wouldn’t meet her eyes when he handed it to her.
A trick. He’s trying to trick me somehow, but I can’t see how. She looked at Keith and considered what to tell him. “Grandpa says he wants coffee with cream and two sugars. What do you think of that?”
Keith laughed heartily. “Since when do you take anything but cream?” he asked.
“I don’t,” Steven admitted.
“You want your usual?” he asked slowly.
“No, skip it.”
Katie nodded. She wasn’t sure it was necessary to cancel that one since she hadn’t ordered Keith to get the coffee, but she did it anyway to be sure.
She offered the pad back to Steven. “Would you like to try again?” she asked.
Steven shook his head. He moved to Keith and checked his vitals. Finally, he checked his pupil response. “Sluggish,” he noted. “What are you doing to him?”
“Can I release him now, Steven? I’m—This is really wearing.”
He looked at her in surprise. “Release? By all means.”
Katie nodded and pulled back gently.
Keith looked at her in concern and brushed past his grandfather to press the first carton of milk into her hands. “Drink this,” he ordered, as she sank back into the pillows.
“All right,” Steven prodded. “Explain what I just saw. What did she mean—release you?” He checked Keith’s pupil response again while he spoke.
Keith sighed. “Okay, I’ll explain and Katie can correct me if I screw anything up. She has the ability to transfer information or commands directly to the appropriate centers of another mind after she logs in—like a computer.
“She ordered me to say the pledge. If she had ordered me to get you that sweet coffee, I would have done it, but she knew you were up to something. She asked me what was wrong with the request instead. That meant she was telling me to question the order instead of doing it.
“Until she releases a mind— I can act of my own accord. I know what I want and what I think, but her commands override anything I think or want if she chooses to exert it, only if she chooses to exert it.”
“That’s not possible.”
Katie groaned as she read the thought clearly in Keith’s mind. “I’m too tired to do that,” she complained. “Besides, you know how much I hate it.”
“Momentary insanity,” Keith agreed. “I wouldn’t let you do that right now.” He glanced at Steven. “She also reads intermittent thoughts, mostly mine.”
“What is she too tired to do?” he asked suspiciously.
“Force you to do something to make a point. I’m a willing subject, and I tire her. An unwilling one would put her back out.”
“Why the hell would you ever use something like that?” Steven demanded.
Katie shrugged. “Self defense, mostly.”
“Let’s say I believe you can really do it,” Steven began.
“I’ll prove it another time if you insist, but I prefer not to. I don’t particularly like doing it even with a willing subject.”
“Then why did you use it yesterday?” Steven was exasperated, now.
Keith cut in before she could respond. “Because she’s not the only person who can do this. Not nearly. She did it for me, Grandpa—for me and for her family.”
“So, you got into some sort of a psychic showdown?” he asked dubiously.
Katie nodded in response.
“With whom?”
She blushed deeply. “That would be difficult to explain.”
“Try me. I’ll keep an open mind,” Steven managed with the slightest edge of cynicism.
Keith stepped in again. “You’ve seen the MRI images. Some of that damage is very old.”
Katie ran a hand over her head in distaste. “What damage?” she demanded.
“What was the term you used? He branded you? You weren’t far off on that one.” Keith looked back to Steven. “This wasn’t her first showdown, but hopefully it was her last.”
“Keep going. You have my attention,” he prodded. Steven meant it that time. The MRI was something he couldn’t explain, she realized. “Who is he?”
Keith took a deep breath. “Do you remember a man by the name of Tiberius Monroe Matthews? He was a businessman who got shot by police in South Side twenty-seven years ago.”
Steven shook his head. “No. Should I remember him? For that matter, Katie must have been a baby then.”
“I was five,” she corrected him.
“You’d remember this,” Keith decided. “He was shot while he was trying to kill his granddaughter—his five-year-old granddaughter by the name of Katheryn Anne Adams.”
Steven looked at her in shock. “That’s a name I’ll never forget. It’s really you, isn’t it?”
“I’m afraid so.” Katie blushed in the memory of unwanted notoriety.
“Do you remember now? I read that you had complete trauma-induced amnesia about that night. One of my former colleges was your physician in peds while you were inpatient. You can imagine that you made quite an impression on everyone. Why would he do it?” he rushed on without waiting for an answer to his first question.
“I was dangerous to him,” she admitted weakly.
“Because you could control him?”
“No. I couldn’t control him, and he couldn’t control me. He was concerned that someday I’d be stronger than he would, and I would be able to control him. He liked to plan ahead,” she joked.
“Stronger than— He tried to kill you because you were competition?” Steven darkened in anger.
Katie nodded. “First, he tried to destroy my powers, but I was too strong for that. When I fought back—” She shrugged.
“Why not let him? Were they that important to you?”
“It hurt. Besid
es, the idea of being his virtual slave like everyone else was somewhere between terrifying and repulsive, even to a child. I don’t like using it. He had no such qualms.”
“Okay, so who were you fighting yesterday?” he asked, trying to get back to the subject at hand.
She winced. “Tiberius.”
“A ghost?” The cynicism was back with a vengeance.
“Not exactly. He tried something before he died. He only had limited success, but it was enough to cause a lot of trouble. He imprinted some of my memory cells with his personality—or maybe his will. He was alive, of a fashion. It was sort of like AI. He could improvise based on what was saved, but what little humanity he had was gone.”
“So, he staged a revolt?”
“He did that when I was fifteen. That was round two.”
“You won, obviously.”
“Sort of. It was like jailing him. Anyway, the big problems started when he found he could connect to another sensitive. Tiberius spent over a year winning his trust and loyalty and training his mind to do what he eventually took over and used him to do.”
“Why not simply switch brains?”
“Impossible for him. It’s what he wanted me to do. He wanted me to agree to pass him on. After all, he had cultivated a willing subject. As long as Tiberius kept him in the dark to what was really going on, he’d stay willing. If I passed him on, he would be capable of winning a revolt in that mind.”
“But, you refused to pass him on?”
“His willing subject was a child. Not that I’d want to free Tiberius anyway, but a child—” Katie sighed. “He was being lied to and controlled as it was. I had to end that. Keith was helping me.”
“How?” Steven demanded.
Keith shoved his hands in his pockets. “The little boy is a patient, Grandpa.”
“And you called her in?” he asked in disbelief. “That isn’t exactly standard operating procedure.”
“No,” Katie interrupted. “The child is my nephew. We were already working at opposite ends of the problem. If anything, Keith got dragged into the weird end of it.”
“By you?”
“No,” Keith cut in. “Katie tried to scare me off. She even proved to me that I was way out of my league. It was Ty dragging me in.”
“Why would he want you in on it?” he asked Keith.
Katie sighed raggedly. “He thought I’d give him his freedom to save Keith.” She faltered. “You might as well show him.”
Keith pushed his sweatshirt up to his elbow to bare his forearm and the welts Ty inflicted on him. He presented it to Steven. “This was a warning to her. It was supposed to land me in the ER, but Katie headed him off at the pass.”
Steven examined the welts with sincere interest. “How did she try to scare you off?”
“She—Well, I wasn’t a willing subject the first time she controlled me. Katie was trying to prove that I couldn’t fight him.” Keith sighed. “I’m ashamed to admit that I damn near punched her when she released me. I honestly think she expected that response.”
Katie nodded miserably. “I deserved some sort of retaliation. It was a low blow.”
“At any rate, I came to my senses before I hurt her.”
“How many times has she done that to you?” Steven demanded, red-faced again.
“Three,” Katie admitted. “The one for your benefit, the one when he wasn’t willing, and yesterday.”
“Why? What was the point?”
“It was the only way to protect him. If I had him, Tiberius couldn’t touch him.” She glanced at the welts on his arm. “I was afraid for him.”
Keith touched her face lovingly. “And she cried the whole time. I gave her permission to do it, but she hated every minute of it.”
“Okay, so is Tiberius still a threat?” Steven asked earnestly.
“No,” Keith assured him. “That was what the new showdown was all about. She freed Kyle and used him to destroy Ty for her.”
“How?”
“By branding out the memory cells that housed his will—the new damage the MRI showed,” he explained.
“I thought you said that kind of thing hurt?” Steven countered.
“It was excruciating, but it was the only answer,” she offered.
“You’re sure he’s gone this time?”
“I know what I’m looking for. He’s gone, and I should have no reason to deplete my sugar again.”
“That’s the only thing that does it?”
“More or less. If Kyle is in trouble, it’s a minor drain on me, but nothing like when I lay on the steam.”
“Well, then I don’t suppose it’s something I’ll ever have to treat again,” Steven suggested strongly, stopping short of making it Doctor’s orders.
He was still wary, and that hurt to see. Katie didn’t want Steven to be afraid of her. She nodded, trying hopelessly to put him at ease with the idea.
“In the meantime, I don’t think we should mention this to anyone else.” He nodded curtly and left the room, at peace with his decision.
Keith sighed. “One down. One to go.”
“What does that mean?” she asked warily.
“Mac wants the truth, the whole truth—today. How the hell do I convince him?”
Katie groaned as she switched the empty carton for the full one. “I wish I knew.”
Chapter Nineteen
“A hero only appears once the tiger is dead.” Burmese proverb
As it turned out, convincing Mac wasn’t their problem. Filling in the blanks was. To their surprise, Carol made an attempt at explaining Ty’s involvement and had Kyle give the older man a demonstration using the Go Fish cards.
When Mac arrived, he looked at them warily. He let the door swing shut behind him and leaned against it with his hands shoved in his pockets.
“What’s wrong, Mac?” Katie asked, avoiding reading him for fear of what she’d find.
“What’s wrong? I have a four-year-old powerhouse and his split personality powerhouse of an aunt, or so I’m told. I’ve got what could be two suicides and a natural causes or three murders, one of whom is a dear friend of mine. I shouldn’t be anywhere near this case, and I’m all over it. What isn’t wrong, Katheryn?”
She sighed. “Maybe the fact that I think it’s over?” she offered.
“You think it’s over?” Keith demanded. “What haven’t you told me this time?”
Mac grinned wryly at that one. “She’s good for that, Keith. Get used to it if you plan on spending the rest of your life with Katheryn.”
Katie felt her face burn. “I’m getting better at this talking thing, thank you. And, if you call me Katheryn one more time, I swear I’ll scream.”
“What am I supposed to call you?” Mac asked in exasperation.
“Katie.”
“The last time I called you Katie, I thought you and your father were both going to kill me,” he reminded her.
“Twenty years ago, Mac. People change.”
“You change?” He shot Keith a startled look. “You must have some effect on her.”
Keith shook his head. “Maybe getting rid of Ty affected her, or maybe becoming a mother made her change her point of view.”
Mac’s jaw dropped. “You’re having a baby?”
Katie blushed and nodded.
“I don’t think I’ll tell the other guys that just yet. They’re still trying to get their minds around the idea of you getting married. This would floor them.”
Katie put a hand up to still the flow of words. “Before you say it, that’s not why we’re getting married. We decided to get married first, and— Well, Keith’s not getting any younger,” she teased.
Keith sighed at her. “You age backward or something?”
“No, I’m Princess Pan.”
Keith looked at her in confusion.
Mac laughed harshly. “Don’t sweat it. It was her father’s nickname for Kath—Katie when she was little. She was a sprite, always in motion, laughing, causi
ng trouble—”
“Endless energy,” Keith noted.
Katie elbowed him roughly then feigned shock and rubbed his chest when he huffed out his breath. “Oh, honey, did I do that? I am so sorry.”
Mac tried to keep a straight face. “I think you deserved that one, Keith.”
He smiled sheepishly, rubbing his sore rib. “I think you’re right.”
Mac sobered slightly. “So, what haven’t you told Keith about Ty?”
“I—just need to check Carol and Kyle. I don’t think— Well, I guess I won’t know for sure until I check. Will I?”
Keith nodded in understanding. “You want to make sure Ty didn’t find an escape pod.”
“More or less. At the end—” She shook her head.
“You’re not quite sure if your hold was solid?” he guessed.
“Yeah. That covers it.”
Mac settled into a chair. “Okay. Fill in the blanks for me. Do I have murders or suicides?”
Katie took a deep breath. “Murders,” she admitted.
Mac paled, and Keith sucked in his breath audibly. Apparently, neither man expected her to blurt that out.
“Who’s going to jail?” Mac asked.
“Since the guilty party has been executed, can we skip the trial? I’m not even sure you can call what Kyle and I did justifiable homicide, since the victim has been dead and buried for twenty-seven years.”
“I’m not even sure I could explain murdering someone the way it was done,” Mac admitted.
“Do we really have to?”
“It’s probably better if we let the ME’s findings stand alone,” he decided. “But, humor me. For my own peace of mind, explain it.”
Keith put a hand on her arm. “Let me. After all, I have more first hand knowledge of this than you do.”
“What do you mean by that?” Mac demanded.
Katie drew his arm from behind her back, up and over her shoulder. She pushed his shirt sleeve up to bare the welts on his forearm.
Mac cursed solidly under his breath. “Christ. You too?”
Keith nodded. “I’m afraid so. It was supposed to be a warning to Katie, but she stopped him before he could land me in the hospital.”
“He didn’t want to kill you?” Mac questioned.
