Snake Skin

by CJ Lyons

  "It's your wildest fantasy come true, isn't it? Me kneeling in the dirt, letting you do anything you want to me."

  Her fingers teased him—Christ! He dropped the vest and her shirt, took her hands in his, twisting them away from his growing erection.

  "You want me to use my mouth instead?" She asked, looking up at him, shaking her hair back from her face, grinning wide.

  It took him two breaths to clear his mind. "What do you want, Cindy?"

  "My manager says if I can get an exclusive of Fletcher's capture or an interview with him, it would double my signing bonus with the network. We're talking seven figures here, Burroughs. You'd do that for me, wouldn't you?"

  She licked her lips, then leaned her head forward, mouth wide open.

  "No." He stepped back, as far away from her as he could, releasing her hands to fumble his fly closed again. Fool, the primitive part of his brain screamed. The part that drove him back to her bed time and again.

  Arching her head up, her breasts not quite popping free of their restraints, she knelt on her hands and knees. "You sure? Last chance—you know how much you'll love it. I need to be punished for driving your kids away from you, for poisoning your marriage." Her pout was marred by the greedy gleam in her eyes. "Don't you want to punish me, Burroughs? Give me what I deserve? Treat me like the whore in the dirt that I am. Don't you want to feel like a hero, like a real man?"

  "Just go away. Leave me alone." She was the one on her knees, but he was the one begging.

  He found his car keys in his pocket, unlocked the Impala and dropped into the drivers' seat before he could change his mind. As he spun out of the parking lot, he could see her in his rearview mirror, still kneeling on the ground, laughing.

  Chapter 37

  Monday, 12:49 am

  "She's my baby, you can't keep me from her!" Melissa Yeager's shout turned the heads of everyone in the fourth floor hallway.

  "Ma'am, please, this is the pediatric floor," the doctor, who looked young enough to be a patient himself, cautioned her. "I'm sorry, but she doesn't want to see you or her father. It would be best for Ashley if—"

  "I know what's best for my daughter. You can't keep me from her." Melissa shoved past him, glared at the hospital security guard until he stepped away from the door, and barged into Ashley's hospital room.

  Footsteps announced the arrival of the doctor following on her heels. "She's suffering from dehydration, some abrasions that we debrided, and shock."

  His words bounced off Melissa. She stood frozen, staring down at her daughter.

  Ashley, dressed in a hospital gown, lay curled up in a ball, shivering despite a mountain of blankets and the room's oppressive heat. Her eyes were closed so tight they pulled her face into a mass of wrinkles.

  At first Melissa felt concern. "My God, what did that monster do to you?"

  "Our preliminary examination didn't reveal any other injuries," the doctor told her.

  She could see that was true. Sure, Ashley's hair was matted, her color a bit pale, but she was fine. Seemed fine. Just like always.

  "Ashley, dear. It's your mother. Open your eyes. C'mon, Ashley, don't you want to go home?"

  Ashley pulled away with an animal-like snarl when Melissa touched her exposed wrist. She pulled her body farther under the covers and squeezed her eyes tighter.

  Melissa's fear shifted into anger. She knew this posture, knew it all too well—Ashley's way of getting her own way, tormenting her mother into giving in to whatever her current demands were.

  For two days Melissa had suffered through hell, been half driven mad with fear that her daughter was dead or worse, and now Ashley was back and she was fine. Just fine. Except she still insisted on making Melissa out to be the badguy.

  "Ashley. I know you're awake. Open your eyes and look at me. Now." Steel lanced through Melissa's voice. She wasn't going to take this crap—not after what Ashley had done. "Do you have any idea what you put me through? Running away like that? I was worried sick."

  The earnest pediatrician laid a hand on her arm. "Please, Mrs. Yeager. Let's talk outside, let Ashley rest."

  "There's no need to patronize me, young man. I know what's best for my daughter. And it's to go home with me."

  "We need—"

  "I need you to make whatever arrangements necessary for me to take my daughter home. She's suffered enough, I certainly don't intend to allow her to remain here in the care of strangers."

  "No." The single syllable ripped through the room like a predator shredding its victim.

  Startled, Melissa looked down at her daughter. Ashley's eyes were open—wide open, the whites showing all around, making her look like a madwoman.

  "Ashley, dear. You're coming home. With me."

  "No."

  "Don't argue with me, young lady—"

  "I'll kill you."

  The words struck Melissa like a hard slap. "What did you say? You don't talk to me like that—"

  "I'll kill you! Kill, kill, kill!" Ashley sat bolt upright, throwing her blankets aside. The veins and muscles in her neck were tight, popping out like a wild animal's. Her teeth were bared, seeking blood.

  Melissa stepped back. "Maybe a night here would be best…"

  "You're not my mother. I have no mother, no father," Ashley continued in a voice that made Melissa hug herself. A voice hovering on the primordial edge of audible, humming with danger. "If you touch me again, you're dead. I'm dead. Everyone is dead. Everyone is dead. Dead, dead, dead…"

  Ashley collapsed, falling out of bed, her body limp, not breaking her fall, eyes wide open but unseeing. The doctor quickly rescued her, gently returning her to bed, replacing her covers. Ashley didn't seem to notice. It was like she was in a trance.

  "Has she ever done anything like this before?" the pediatrician asked as he guided Melissa back out to the hallway. "Experienced delusions or catatonia?"

  Melissa nodded, unable to speak for a moment. "When she was young, she used to have staring spells. Day dreams. The doctors tested her, said nothing was wrong, that she was just a sensitive child and it was her way to block out excessive stimulus. She's always been high-strung."

  She stared beyond him to Ashley who stared directly into the overhead light without blinking, drool escaping from the corner of her mouth.

  "I think this is more than daydreams," the doctor said, shutting the door on Ashley—or the girl who used to be Ashley.

  Melissa felt something twist and break inside her. She covered her mouth with her palm, but that didn't stop the tears from gurgling out. She never cried, hated crying, it meant you were weak, a failure. But still the tears came—like never before.

  "It's all my fault," she whispered. "All my fault."

  "You made it," Megan said, bouncing, waking up Nick from where he lay snoring beside her in the hospital bed.

  Lucy threw her purse under a chair and wrapped her arms around her daughter, practically smothering her. The damn oxygen monitor screeched in alarm.

  She ignored the beeping and buried her face in Megan's hair, kissing her, clutching her, needing her touch.

  "Mom, Mom, I can't breathe," Megan finally said, forcing Lucy to reluctantly release her. "You okay, Mom? You look like you've been crying."

  "I've been better," Lucy confessed. "How are you doing?"

  "Well—" Megan slanted Lucy a "I think I might seriously be in trouble here" look. "Maybe Dad should tell you."

  Nick eased his weight from the bed and crossed around it to join Lucy. She felt the weight of his gaze as he took inventory. He said nothing, didn't have to, merely wrapped an arm around her waist and snugged her to his side.

  "Tell me what?" Lucy said. "Did the doctors find something?"

  "Not exactly," Nick said. "More like they're finally on the right track." To Lucy's surprise he arched an eyebrow and gave Megan his sternest look. "Go on, tell her."

  "Well…" Megan tilted her chin down and looked up, batting her eyelashes shamelessly. "I kind of saved someone to
o. Just like you do, Mom. Only, I guess I should have told you guys."

  Lucy frowned, glancing from one to the other. Neither appeared too concerned. She shook her head, in no mood to play mind games and too tired to puzzle it out. "I've had a really, really bad day, Megan. Why don't you just tell me and we'll deal with the consequences later."

  "Okay. Remember how you said maybe I could have a cat? I kinda already do." Megan sat up straight, spurting words as if a dam had burst. "He's real cute, orange and fuzzy all over, and he's an orphan, so someone had to save him. He lives under the back porch. I've been feeding him and taking care of him and now he comes when I call him, like he knows his name."

  "Megan—" Lucy started. Nick squeezed her waist and she stopped, letting her daughter wind down.

  "I feed him, give him fresh water and make sure he's warm enough and now he's getting fat and he's sooo cute and friendly, and I've been the one responsible for him." Megan beamed up at Lucy. "You said I could have a pet once I proved I could be responsible. So I did."

  "The important thing," Nick interjected before Lucy's blood pressure spiked into brain-bursting-stroke-range as she tried to follow her daughter's demented logic while she could barely stay on her feet, "is that Megan's been playing with a kitten. The doctors are thinking her fever and swollen glands and everything are caused by Bartonella."

  "Who's that?"

  "Mom." Megan rolled her eyes. "You're funny. Bartonella isn't a who, it's a what. Dr. Scott said it's a tiny bacteria that got into my blood and it's what's been making me sick."

  "Cat scratch fever," Nick translated.

  All she could think of was the inane song by that name. Lucy felt herself wavering, steadied herself against Nick's sublimely solid body. "Cat scratch—that can be serious."

  "It can be if they don't catch it in time," Nick admitted. "But the doctors said if the tests confirm it, all Megan will need is a few days of antibiotics. To be on the safe side, they've already started them."

  Lucy glanced at the new bags of fluid dangling from the IV pole. "So, everything's going to be all right?"

  "If it is cat scratch, yes." Nick intertwined his fingers with hers, squeezing tight. Lucy squeezed back, turned to look him in the eyes, making sure he wasn't hiding anything. Nope. Crystal clear, he was telling the truth.

  "What about the cat?"

  "Boots," Megan chimed in. "His name is Boots."

  "Do we have to—" She couldn't bring herself to say it, not with Megan staring at her like that. "Is it contagious?"

  Nick shook his head, smiling. "Nope. Boots will be fine. Although the doctor said we should get him checked out by a vet and started on his shots and flea medicine."

  "So I get to keep him, right? Dad said it was up to you, but he always says that when he wants to say yes but thinks you'll say no, but you don't want to say no, not when I did what you said and proved myself responsible and saved him just like you save kids and—"

  Lucy did the only thing possible to stop Megan's rambling. She gathered her not-so-little girl into her arms and squeezed the oxygen from her lungs. Nick joined her, making a loud, squealing tangle of arms and legs on the hospital bed, bouncing in time with the beeping of the oxygen alarm.

  Finally they separated, Megan's cheeks red from giggling, Nick smiling his sloe-gin lazy grin of contentment, and Lucy afraid to exhale for fear it might break the magic moment.

  Jimmy slid into the seat at the hospital cafeteria table, his stomach growling at the smell of chilimac, French fries, and apple pie. The couple at the table beside him didn't even look up, they were so embroiled in their argument. Jimmy shamelessly eavesdropped as he ate—after all, that was why he was here.

  "Why won't you even go up to see your own daughter?" the wife demanded. She was a skinny, high-strung, high-pressure type, all angles and planes and sharp edges.

  Jimmy started with pie. Never know when you might die, so start with the good stuff, Alicia always said. It was good—especially for hospital food.

  Gerald Yeager pushed the remnants of his own pie around with his fork. "You heard what the doctors said. She's in shock, traumatized. We shouldn't push her."

  "Coward. You just don't want to face what you drove her to!" Melissa's voice screeched past Jimmy, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. "You should have seen her, she looked awful. And the things she said to me—she'd rather be with that, that, pervert than come home."

  Jimmy hid his smile with a sip of milk. He licked his milk mustache away, restraining his impulse to simply shoot the man and woman and put them out of Ashley's misery. She was such a good kid, didn't deserve such lousy parents.

  Good thing she had him now.

  He'd only half finished his fries—they weren't as good as the ones at the Tastee Treet—and chilimac when Melissa stood.

  "Where are you going?" Gerald asked.

  "Back up to Ashley. Maybe she's calmed down by now."

  Gerald blew his breath out in a long-suffering sigh. "Melissa, they have her under sedation, they're sending her to Western Psych tomorrow, they're not going to let you disturb her."

  "Disturb her? I'm her mother." She spun on her heel and stalked away. Gerald didn't even watch her leave, simply shook his head and returned to his food.

  Jimmy bused his table and followed Melissa onto the elevator. She got off on the fourth floor. He kept riding up to the top of the tower. Fourth floor, that was interesting—Lucy's daughter was on the fourth floor as well.

  The elevator stopped at the top then started back down. This time Jimmy stabbed the button for the fourth floor.

  He stepped out, looking up and down the two hallways leading from the elevator bank. No signs of any guards loitering outside a patient's door. The clerk at the nursing station looked up. "Can I help you?"

  "I'm trying to find Ashley Yeager," Jimmy said, flashing his ICE credentials too fast for the clerk to read.

  She didn't even glance at them. "I'm sorry, sir. We don't have any patients by that name. Maybe if you check at the security desk downstairs?"

  "Thanks, I'll do that." Jimmy got on the elevator before the clerk could question him or call for assistance. Lucy must have already given the staff instructions, trying to avoid reporters, no doubt.

  He whistled soundlessly as the floors whizzed past. Too bad she'd forgotten that he already knew where he could find one special little girl.

  All he needed was to pick up a few supplies from his storage locker, make a few phone calls, and he'd have everything he needed to get Ashley back where she belonged.

  With him. Safe and sound.

  Chapter 38

  Monday, 1:32 am

  Content that she'd be able to keep Boots, Megan had fallen asleep, sprawled across the hospital bed in blissful abandonment. Nick had sweet-talked the nurses into giving him some bandages and they were now in Megan's bathroom where he was changing Lucy's dressings.

  He was none too happy when he saw the surgeon's handiwork. Even less so when Burroughs called. She'd asked him to take over guarding Ashley inside her room, two doors down the hallway. She trusted Burroughs a lot more than any hospital rent-a-cop, knew he'd get her if Ashley woke up and seemed ready to be interviewed.

  Learning that Ashley was only two doors away hadn't made Nick any happier. He relented once she told him about the barn and the conditions of Ashley's captivity.

  "Sounds like pretty classic brainwashing," he said, smoothing antibiotic ointment between her stitches as she leaned over the sink.

  "You always say there's no such thing as brainwashing."

  "I say you can't depend on information obtained by torture. Brainwashing is a different matter. The Vietnamese and Russians had some very effective, scientific approaches that were reproducible."

  She jerked her head up at that. "You mean scientists studied it?"

  "Decades ago, yeah. Under the right circumstances you can make a person forget or believe or do almost anything—if they're already inclined to forget, believe, or do it.
"

  "So Fletcher forced Ashley to live out her greatest fears, got her totally disoriented, and then he convinced her that only he has the power to save her?" She frowned, remembering the barn and the way a short ten minutes in the place had impacted her. "But Ashley's smart, she'd see right through that, wouldn't she?"

  Behind her, Nick shrugged as he taped a length of gauze over her stitches. "Not if she didn't want to see. You said she loved this Shadow World, that she drew pictures of a girl in distress and a hero who helped save her…"

  "All girls dream of that, it's conditioned into us with every fairy tale we're told."

  "Ashley felt her real life was so bad that she'd take any possible escape. I wouldn't be surprised if she'd considered suicide in the past." He helped her back into her blouse and turned her around to face him. "She was damaged goods before Fletcher ever got his hands on her, don't be surprised if she never totally recovers from this."

  Lucy wrinkled her nose at him. "Is this more of your 'you can't save the world' philosophy? What happened to the handsome, young idealist I fell in love with?"

  "He's still here. Just now he has a wife and child who are his world. As long as they're safe, that's all that matters." He bent down to kiss her, his hands feathering down to her waist, pulling her close. "I'm sorry we fought earlier. I really needed—wanted—you to stay."

  "I couldn't. I just—" Lucy glanced through the crack in the door to where Megan lay sleeping, surrounded by hospital paraphernalia. "I couldn't."

  "Because of your father, what happened when you were a child."

  "No. Because my world is a world of possibilities. That's how I need to think so that I don't leave any stone unturned, I have to imagine every possibility no matter how remote. Or how awful. And, the one fact I'm dealing with is that the worst possible thing any parent can imagine has happened to their child. If I sit here and open the door, even the tiniest slit, to the possibility of that happening to my child..."

  "Lucy, nothing is going to happen to Megan. She'll be fine.