Guarding Light

by Mckoy, Cate

  Catlyn was just leaving the bathroom in her room when her mother, Clancy, Sara and Jack walked into the room. The nurse had remade her bed while she was using the facilities. Now she carefully assisted Catlyn back into her bed, seeing she was comfortable, leaving the call button next to her hand on the bed, the nurse left her with her visitors.

  Catlyn's mother walked up and hugged her. "Oh, good, they removed your I.V. and catheter." Catlyn blushed at her mother's nonchalance in mentioning something so private in a full room. Catlyn knew it was the pre-nurse in her.

  Everyone ignored it. Clancy pulled up a chair for her mom and took another for himself. Catlyn gave her friends a quick glance. She saw them unclasped their hands. Jack got the last chair in the room for Sara and stood behind it with his hands on Sara's shoulders.

  For some reason, Catlyn couldn't take her eyes off the gesture. It left her feeling weak and shaky. She looked into Jack's eyes. They were an intense green, his expression grim. Their gazes remained locked, a silent communication.

  Catlyn's attention didn't switch until her mother lightly touched her. "Detective Clancy has something to tell you about the case."

  Catlyn's eyes switched to Clancy's. He was frowning. "Did you arrest him?"

  "No. It seems J.T. Dark has an alibi for the time of your attack." Clancy reluctantly imparted.

  Catlyn shrugged it off. "He's lying."

  "He has corroborating witnesses."

  Catlyn, ignoring her mom's staying hand, flung back the sheet and weakly stood holding the side of the bed. "They are all lying!"

  At Catlyn's edict everyone shared uncomfortable looks. "What?" She questioned not missing the exchange.

  Clancy cleared his throat. "His witnesses are above reproach."

  Catlyn shook her head as her tears started again. "So because he's rich and white you believe him over some little black, no, some little hysterical nigger? That's what he called me while he raped me."

  "Catlyn!" May Lyte exclaimed.

  "No mama. He's lying. They are all lying. J.T. Dark raped me! He tackled me, kicked me in my side, stomach, dragged me into the woods, raped me in my privates." Heartbrokenly she stuttered. "N-n-not ju-st my v-vagina. He raped my behind, m-m-my mouth too!"

  May's and Sara's tears streamed down their faces. Clancy bowed his head. Jack's eyes shone brightly with misery, his jaw like iron as he clenched his teeth.

  Catlyn started heaving, "S-so, h-h-he get-s, gets away with it 'cause he and his f-f-friends are lying."

  May stood and circled the bed, started to take Catlyn into her arms. "Don't touch me! Never touch me!"

  Clancy lifted his head. "That's just it Catlyn, his witnesses are not his friends." Pausing, Clancy pinned her with a look before adding. "They're yours."

  For Catlyn the room titled and started to spin. She looked at Sara who was slowly nodding her head. In slow motion her gaze turned to Jack's. Green clashed with brown. Catlyn limped towards Jack, stopping a few inches from him, their chests almost touching. "S-say it. I dare you to say it." She whispered into his face.

  Jack looked deeply into her eyes, with the tears he had been able to keep at bay finally falling, he whispered back. "J.T. couldn't have been the one to hurt you. He was with me and Sara."

  Catlyn screamed, drawing her hand back and delivered a solid smack to Jack's face, ignoring the pain that course through her injured hand. Immediately a red mark appeared on Jack's face. She started pounding on his chest, backing him to the wall. Jack did nothing to protect himself, allowing all her blows to make contact. "Liar, Liar…Why? Why are you doing this?"

  Catlyn's next scream hinted of insanity, filling the room and possibly the entire ward. Suddenly Jack caught her to his chest, quickly lifting her and placing her on the bed. A doctor and a nurse burst into the room. Catlyn continued to scream. "Liar, Liars, you're all lying!"

  The doctor and nurse took over in trying to restrain Catlyn. The nurse had a syringe. May Lyte held one of Catlyn's wrists, trying not to hurt her. Catlyn continued to scream. "You'll pay. All of you will pay. Liars, will pay!" Her ranting continued until the drug took effect, her pledge ringing with stark sincerity.

  THE END

  Chapter 3

  February 2012 (25 years later)

  Jack Anthony Gard stood beside the body of a young African-American girl as the coroner's assistant zipped the black bag. He sighed, feeling every one of his forty-two years. God another one! She made number five. In the past eighteen months the city of Newburgh had been littered with young African-American girls' bodies. Raped, tortured, mutilated. All dumped within blocks of each other. The area was comprised of several blocks in the thick of the ghetto known as the Flats and the Heights. The area before the buildings started to rise and fan out towards the bluff was the Flats, anything after the main incline to the very tip of the bluff was the Heights and after the bluff was the Hudson River.

  Emergency vehicles scattered across the area, some with their lights still flashing. A large group of onlookers were being held back by officers and yellow police tape which cordon off a large grid surrounding the body. Jack looked at the faces, trying to see if there were any repeats from the last body dump. Of course in this neighborhood that may not mean much, other than the fact that the person actually lived nearby. Being an ogler was not a crime.

  Jack noticed several news vans further up on the opposite side of the street. The vultures had arrived. Terrific!

  Jack felt a tap on his shoulder. "What the hell is the C of Ds doing out here?" Sara Mint, formerly known as Sara Dolson, his high school girlfriend, asked. Great, he thought. Just what he needed, feisty award winning journalist, Sara 'Sunshine' Mint. Ignoring her question, Jack turned and made his way to his car a block away, parked off to the side.

  "One of your pet rookies let you pass the line, Sara?" Jack was annoyed.

  Sara kept pace with him. "Come on, Jack. Can't you give me something?" Her voice was sugary sweet.

  "Forget it, Sara. That coquettish sweetness doesn't work with me." Jack opened the door of his unmarked car.

  Sara shrugged. "It used to."

  Jack paused, not getting in the car. He looked at Sara. She was still beautiful. Still golden blonde with bright blue eyes, sexy even in her tailored business jacket and skirt, an open black pea-coat, but she didn't stir him and hadn't in a long time. "Not anymore. That was high school."

  With that parting retort, Jack got in his car and sped away. He didn't need Sara glorifying this lunatic in the Newburgh Times Record. She was an ok reporter but she had a way of picking and choosing which details she used for articles. It grated on his nerves. It seemed all her stories had a slant designed to make him and his men look like Mayberry rejects. Bias, Mayberry rejects. The aforementioned lunatic was going around terrorizing the black community. He had enough problems with the crime that has been running rampant on his watch. The very last thing he needed was another pat story from Sara making him look like a bungling idiot.

  The city of Newburgh's crime was on the rise. It had been making national news repeatedly. All over the last few years, from gangland shootings, gang initiation killings, robberies, drug wars, turf wars, on and on it went. Sara's stories often made it seem as though the criminal element went unchecked, as if there were no police presence. And Jack knew that just wasn't true. He knew their stats. He ate, slept, breathe their stats. Last year officers handled 31,034 calls for service, which was the equivalent of more than one call for service for every resident of the city, as though the entire population had called. Officers additionally generated over 6,300 incidents reports in that time which resulted in 3,651 arrests. The Department investigated 11 Homicides, 7 Rapes, 195 Robberies, 310 Aggravated Assaults, 284 Burglaries, 724 Larcenies and 66 Auto Thefts.

  And recent crimes had made the national news once again creating the impression that the City of Newburgh was a hotbed of crime some sort of wild-west in the east. The more heartbreaking of these crimes had been a little boy gone missing w
hile in the care of his mother's boyfriend. The boy's body had been found in a duffle bag in a small field in the Flats. The boyfriend was eventually charged and convicted. Then a mother of four drove herself and the kids into the Hudson River, right off the Newburgh Landing. All had parish but the eldest child who, at the time, had been the tender age of ten. And now, some asshole was reducing the black female population in a most gruesome manner. Jack didn't know what the fuck was going on in his city but he knew his men were doing their job and doing it damn well.

  He had been harsh with Sara due to her last story which implied the city of Newburgh hadn't taken a black woman's missing teen seriously, implying that if the teen had been white the entire force and S.W.A.T. would have been called. Jack had been livid when he read the story. And even more so when Sara had failed to report that the teen was found unharmed with her friends on an impromptu road trip.

  Well enough was enough!

  He had a meeting in the morning with a special section of the FBI, a splintered group of the BAU (Behavioral Analysis Unit) known as the HCD (Hate Crimes Division). Jack pulled into the station's underground parking in the Tower Building. He had several files that needed work and his signature. Then he could go home to bed and hopefully to sleep. Sleep had evaded him since the murders started. They were disturbingly reminiscent of the crime which had changed his life forever back in 1988.

  Catlyn Lyte. The name whispered through his mind. Throughout the years he had often thought of her. Wondering what had become of her, questions whorled around in his head whenever he thought of her, always the same questions, how was she? Had she ever recovered from the horrible thing that had happened to her? Where had she gone when she left Newburgh so abruptly almost immediately after being discharged from the hospital? Was she still shy? Was she still gorgeous? Was she still sweet and sexy? Did she still taste so good? Did she still hate him?

  At the last question Jack felt a bone deep weariness take a hold of him. He opened his office, turned on the light, smiling when he saw post-its with terse instructions on neat stacks of papers. Tasha!

  'Sign these' and 'For your approval' and 'Your dinner is in the fridge. Eat it' Jack tossed that one in the garbage and then broke out laughing as there was another one directly under it reading 'What'd I say?'

  Thank God for Tasha. She had been a godsend when she had shown up looking for work 12 years earlier. Jack admitted his life had become a wreck. Tasha had come breezily into his office stating he needed her in the worst way. Remembering her from his time with Catlyn he couldn't resist hiring her after she more than proved her qualifications for the job.

  Jack shied away from one of the reasons he hired Tasha being a tenuous connection to Catlyn. If Catlyn ever looked up her old friend Tasha, she would also find him. He knew it was crazy and he would never admit it to anyone. Pushing his wishful thinking aside, he quickly finished his work. Obediently nooked the meal Tasha left for him and gulped it down and left for home.

  He knew just from the day he had he would need some help falling asleep. He stopped at the Mobil on the Run bought a six pack, driving home he prayed with the FBI arriving, tomorrow would be a better day.

  ****

  Catlyn Lyte stood over the bathroom sink, staring at her reflection in the mirror. She stared for several long minutes. Sometimes she saw the little girl that had been lost in 1988. Other times she saw exactly what she was, a thirty-nine year old, overworked, overtired, civil servant.

  "What do you think you are gonna see by staring at yourself like that?" Jose Sanchez asked from the doorway.

  Catlyn caught his eye in the mirror. "Nothing."

  "Well, you're staring like you see a ghost or something." He came into the bathroom and sat on the toilet lid. "Getting antsy about returning home?" Jose put quotes in the air with his fingers.

  Catlyn titled her head, considering Jose's question. "No, not antsy."

  "Then what?" he persisted.

  Catlyn knew Jose would annoy her until she gave him something real. His tenacity was part of what made him one damn fine lawman. "I am just not looking forward to it that's all."

  She turned away from the mirror and went into the room and lay down on the bed. Indicating the hotel's open connecting door she said. "Is there a reason for this visit?"

  "Don't get pissy with me. I came to offer you some of the pizza I ordered."

  "I am not pissy."

  Jose sat on the end of the bed, his tone serious. "Yes you are. I am betting it has something to do with your hometown. In all the years I've known you, you have never visited. Why?"

  "I don't want any pizza, thanks." Her tone and look were dismissive.

  Jose nodded, getting off the bed, heading to the connecting door between the two rooms. "See, pissy."

  Jose shut the door. Catlyn reached for the remote, knowing she would get no sleep tonight. Tomorrow she was meeting with one of her betrayers. In twenty-five years there wasn't a day she hadn't thought of those who had destroyed her innocence. Tomorrow she would be meeting with the person whose betrayal had hurt the most. Jack Anthony Gard, Chief of Detectives, city of Newburgh, NY.

  ****

  Tasha entered Jack's office carrying a steaming mug of coffee. "Morning, Chief."

  Jack looked up from his computer. "Morning."

  "Did you eat breakfast?" Tasha set the coffee down in front of him.

  "Tasha, could you stop with the nagging wife routine?" He sipped at the coffee. Perfect, as always.

  "Boy, if I was your wife I'd kick your ass. My man wouldn't be working eighteen hour days." She smiled wide. "I'd keep you too busy in bed."

  Since the first day they met Tasha was able to make him blush and still was one of only two women who could make him blush. "Stop, go type something and send in the FBI guys as soon as they get here."

  About an hour later Jack was going over the latest preliminary M.E. report on the young girl from last night. Her cause of death was like all the others, exsanguination. After raping and torturing these women, the animal had let them bleed out. They needed to capture this psycho before anymore citizens were killed. He was about to go to the 'murder room' where all the pertinent information was tagged on the case when his phone beeped. He pushed a button. "Yeah, Tash?"

  "Uh, Jack the FBI is here…"

  "So what are you waiting for? I told you to send them right in."

  "But, uh, Jack…"

  "Tash, just send them in." He disconnected, stood and put his suit jacket back on that he had taken off earlier. He straightened his tie as his office door opened. Tasha hurried over blocking Jack's view of the agents that entered the room.

  "Jack, I think you should excuse yourself for a minute and talk to me…"

  "Tash, I don't have time. Bring in the case packets for the agents."

  "But, Jack…" Tasha persisted.

  "Is there a problem?" a male voice enquired.

  Jack moved around Tasha offering his hand to the agent. "No, no, of course not, my assistant was just going to get the updated case packets for you. Hi, Jack Gard, Chief of Detectives." The two men shook hands.

  "Supervisory Special Agent Jose Sanchez, HCD. My partner, Supervisory Special Agent …"

  Jack had been reaching his hand out when he looked into the eyes of Sanchez's partner. "Catlyn!"

  Green clashed with brown. Jack froze with his hand out, staring while some of his questions were answered. Yes, she was ok. Yes she was still gorgeous. Seeing her cold eyes, YES she still hated him.

  "That's right, Catlyn. I wasn't aware you two know each other." Agent Sanchez split a look between him and Catlyn. Jack waited to follow her lead.

  "We don't." She said. "I'm Catlyn Lyte."

  Clearing his throat he stretched out his hand again. "Jack Gard."

  Catlyn looked at the hand he offered, ignoring it, she dipped her head. "Gard."

  The other woman who could make him blush just did. At a lost for a few seconds he heard Tasha's voice. "Please right this way. We hav
e everything all set for you."

  Jack found himself once again thanking God for Tasha. Holy shit! Out of all the ways he dreamed meeting Catlyn again, this didn't come close. This was in an alternate universe.

  Bringing up the rear he followed Tasha and the agents into the murder room. Against a whiteboard the victims' timelines were listed under each of their pictures. The agents went towards the board, both looking it over silently.

  Tasha came over to him, handing him a folder. Last night's victim, slipping the photo out, tacking it to an empty column on the board he took up a marker and quickly put in the information on the latest victim.

  The two agents watched as each item was added. When he was done Jack placed the folder on the conference table.