Gabby winced. “They were hurt?”
“They took off and joined ’em.” The older woman shut the door to the bedroom with more force than necessary. “Which means they won’t be welcome back here when they’re done. Blackout or no blackout, Tom and I have our standards and we’ll stick by them.”
“You two are doing a good thing here,” Gabby said, still feeling her way in the situation. She got a good vibe off Lennie and her husband, and Ty must have felt the same or he would’ve insisted they stay together. But assuming that this James person was actually Liam Shea, where did that leave them? What was Shea trying to prove through the Wellbrook Halfway House?
“This is Kayleigh,” Lennie said, breaking into Gabby’s thoughts. “Kayleigh, honey, say hello to Miss Gabby.”
“Why?” The word came in the sulky tones of a preteen girl, one who’d been sitting alone in the darkness and didn’t want anyone to know she cared.
“I think you two will be able to figure that one out for yourselves,” Lennie said cryptically. Then, before Gabby could protest, she’d turned and left the room, shutting the door in her wake.
Silence echoed in the room, a tense, resentful quiet broken only when the girl said, “What are you, some kind of social worker? And why the hell are you here so late?” A glimmer of hope entered her tone. “Did you find my grandma after all?”
Gabby’s heart broke on the question. She knew how it felt to have a family finally give up. But she also knew what pity felt like, so she said only, “I’m a computer teacher. As for why I’m here so late, that’s a really long story.” She paused, not sure where to go from here. “Lennie must be proud of you for not going with the others.”
Sullenness flashed to outright anger in a second. “Is that supposed to be some sort of a joke?”
“No,” Gabby said simply, sensing too much of herself in the girl to take offense. “Why would it be?”
“What are you,” Kayleigh snapped, “blind or something?”
“As a matter of fact, I am. That means you’re going to have to explain it to me.” Gabby paused, then asked again, “Why’d they leave you behind?”
There was a long silence. Then, a quiet answer. “Because I’ve got a wicked limp and they say I slow them down.”
“Oh.” Gabby winced to hear the echo of her words to Ty earlier that night. I’ll slow you down, she’d said, when she’d really meant that even if he told himself he didn’t mind that she was different, it would grow old eventually. He’d think of how much easier it would be if she could see and do all the things other women could see and do, how much more of an asset she could be to the case, to his career, to his—
Stop it, she told herself fiercely. Ty isn’t Jeffrey. The situations aren’t the same.
For one, she and Ty weren’t in a relationship; maybe part of her had wanted to imagine that online chitchat and e-dates counted as a relationship of sorts, but she’d never expected it to progress beyond that, had never planned to meet him in person. Now that she had, it was even clearer that nothing could happen between them. If her blindness would’ve been a liability in Jeffrey’s world—at least according to Jeff—she knew for real that it would be far worse in Ty’s.
In Jeff’s world of corporate up-and-comers, being blind meant she used the wrong fork sometimes, or fumbled ungracefully when important people were watching. In Ty’s world, it could mean the edge between life and death.
The thought, which came out of nowhere, brought an involuntary shiver. Part fear, part temptation, it shimmered in her belly like prescience.
“I wasn’t always like this, you know,” Kayleigh said. From her tone Gabby knew she was trying to prove how much she didn’t care what the grown-ups thought of her, even though she so clearly did care. “It happened when I was nine. I was fooling around with my brother, Ben, out on the fire escape. Mama told us to knock it off and come inside, but we started wrestling instead, and I fell…” She trailed off, but Gabby could fill in the rest, partly from her own experiences, partly from knowing what sort of things could land a child in the custody of protective services.
Her heart ached for the girl, but she knew Leonore hadn’t brought her up here to pity the child, so she took a deep breath and said, “You wanted to know how come I’m here so late? I came here with a Secret Service agent. We’re looking for the man who’s responsible for the blackout.”
She didn’t know whether it was supposed to be a secret that the blackout wasn’t due to power plant overload in the wake of the recent heat wave, but she figured it couldn’t hurt to tell this one child…and it might even help.
As she’d half expected, Kayleigh scoffed. “Yeah, right. A spy working with a—with someone like you. I don’t think so.”
“Not a spy,” Gabby corrected. “A Secret Service agent. They’re more like bodyguards than spies. Very, very smart bodyguards.” Bodyguards who liked classic cars and rock and roll, and talked to her in the dead of night when the rest of the world was asleep.
“Still…how come he’s working with you instead of someone else?”
Circumstances, Gabby thought, but aloud she said, “Because I know things he doesn’t. I know this city pretty well, and I can move around in the darkness better than most people. Some of what you need light to see, I can tell from echoes of sound, or from the smell, or vibrations in the air…” She shrugged. “Sometimes I’m not even sure how I can tell something, only that I can.”
When she said it like that, she realized being blind didn’t sound like such a handicap. Then again, she was telling the kid what she needed to hear, that being different wasn’t the end of all the fun stuff.
Only some of it.
“Well, that’s kinda cool,” the girl admitted. “But I don’t have any spidey senses. I’ve got a crooked leg and a cane that makes my arm hurt when I use it. Ain’t no spies going to come looking for my help.” She paused, and Gabby wished she could see the girl’s face when she continued. Her voice was so soft it was nearly inaudible. “There ain’t nobody going to come looking for me.”
Although Gabby couldn’t see Kayleigh’s expression, the wistfulness came through loud and clear, even through the remaining ring of teenage attitude. They didn’t want me, it said. They left me behind and went on with their lives, and I don’t know how to catch up.
Because she knew how that felt, because she knew how much that hurt, Gabby decided to do something she hadn’t done in a long, long time.
She took a deep breath and started the story where it began. “When I was your age, I could see just fine….”
* * *
Ty’s head hurt by the time he left the small room that served as Tom’s office for the business end of running the Wellbrook Halfway House.
The painful pressure drummed in his sinuses and behind his eyeballs, and it wasn’t just the product of low blood sugar and nearly forty hours without sleep. It also came from confusion. Denial. The battle between what he knew in his heart and what he’d just been shown.
As he climbed to the second floor, using his flashlight to light the way up the creaking stairs, he tried to figure out what was real and what was the trick. He knew there had to be a trick. It was the only logical explanation for the letters Tom had shown him.
He just wasn’t sure anymore who was the tricker and who was the trickee in this scenario, and he was looking forward to discussing it with Gabby on the way to their next stop.
The very thought had him hesitating midstep.
Since when did he talk things out? He’d never been much of a joiner, preferring to keep his own counsel and gather all the evidence before passing judgment. On the protection details, he was part of the team, yet also a man apart. He didn’t hang out with the other agents, didn’t do the beer-and-ballgame routine. That was partly because his freelancing assignments with Eclipse took up a good chunk of his spare time, and partly because he didn’t really need anyone else. He was fine by himself. At least he had been, until he met Gabby online.
The worst part was, having kissed her once, he was itching to do it again, to do more, to explore the sort of chemistry he’d never expected, the kind of attraction he hadn’t been braced for.
“Focus,” he muttered to himself, and crossed the short distance from the stairs to the doorway Tom had indicated. Gabby was inside, talking to a girl.
The door was thin, and made of a wooden shell over a hollow interior, which explained why he could hear the voices quite clearly.
But there was no real explanation for why he didn’t knock or twist the doorknob and let himself inside.
Instead he clicked off the flashlight, and listened.
“I grew up near Miami, and I pretty much did whatever I wanted from the age of twelve,” he heard Gabby say. “I smoked, drank, raced cars, stole, fooled around with guys who were way too old for me. You name it, I tried it at least once, usually twice, to make sure I wasn’t mistaken the first time.” Her voice sounded different than usual, with an added vibrancy that suggested that no matter what had come of those years, not all of the memories were bad ones.
The revelation wasn’t that much of a surprise. Over the past few months, and more strongly in the past few hours, he’d begun to suspect that Gabby had hidden layers, hidden histories.
He pressed closer, straining to hear as a second, younger voice said, “Your parents took off, too, huh?”
“No, they were right there in Miami, still married and doing the best they could to raise me and my sister, Amy.” Gabby paused. “I guess I was an exception to the rule that dysfunctional families make dysfunctional kids. I was a juvenile delinquent who grew up with two parents, a sister, a dog and a nice house. I just…. I don’t know. I wanted to live every second of my life. I wanted to see it all, to do it all, to try everything right away.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” the child said, her voice suddenly sounding far older than it had before.
“Yes, there is,” Gabby contradicted quietly. “It was selfish and self-destructive, and I…well, I got what was coming to me sooner than even my father predicted during the worst of his famous ‘why can’t you be more like your sister’ lectures.”
This time when she paused, Ty imagined her taking a deep breath, pictured her looking somewhere inside herself, her luminous brown eyes focusing inward. The mental picture was so clear he thought he could’ve reached out and touched her, except they were separated by the door and he was listening in on a conversation he had no part of.
This is what it must be like for her, he thought. A soundtrack with no picture. Voices only, leaving the rest to the imagination.
Which made him wonder how she pictured him, what she thought of him.
And whether he had any right to ask.
“What happened?” It was the girl’s voice, but it might as well have been Ty asking the question. Even though he could guess at least part of the story based on hints and conjecture, he found himself pressing closer to the door, needing to hear it in her own words.
“I was fifteen. I was with this boy.” Gabby laughed, but the false sound couldn’t hide the crack of pain in her voice. “Isn’t that how these stories always start? Anyway, we were racing his souped-up old Camaro against some rich kid’s daddy’s Jaguar. He missed a turn and the Camaro skidded into a parking lot, hit a minivan and flipped end-over-end.”
When she paused, the kid prompted her with, “You hurt your eyes?”
“Yes, though I didn’t know it then. At the time, we both walked away from the crash, and lucky for us, nobody was in the parking lot when we hit. We didn’t kill ourselves or anyone else, though the Camaro and the minivan were total losses.”
She broke off, and Ty sensed that she was skimming over stuff she didn’t want the kid to know. Important stuff. Stuff that made her voice go rough when she said, “A few weeks later I started having trouble with my eyes. Things were going all blurry. I couldn’t see stuff on the board at school, I couldn’t read very well…and it just kept getting worse. Problem was, I’d pulled the ‘poor me’ routine just about every other time I’d gotten in real trouble, and my parents were sick of it. The more they told me to get over it, the madder I got, until I just stopped talking about it. By the time they figured out something really was wrong with my eyes and took me to a doctor, it was too late for the doctors to reverse the damage to the optic nerve. The ocular surgeons went in and corrected the problem so it wouldn’t get any worse, but they said I’d never get back the sight I’d lost.”
“Did you?”
“Nope. I was legally blind before I hit my sweet sixteen, moved away from home a month after my birthday and haven’t been back since.”
“Your parents kicked you out for going blind? That really stinks.” The kid sounded more resigned than outraged, reminding Ty that he’d been damn lucky in the family department, and he owed his parents a phone call when all this was over.
The thought of the future—and the present—had Ty clicking on the flashlight and reaching for the doorknob. But before he got the door open, Gabby said, “They didn’t kick me out, I went. It was easier for all of us. Besides, I—” She broke off and turned when Ty entered the room.
“Who’re you?” the kid demanded. She was maybe thirteen, crinkle-haired and old-eyed, with a blanket thrown over her legs even though the air in the small room was still and uncomfortably warm.
Before he could answer, Gabby’s features softened, then clouded again. “Ty. How long have you been there?”
“Not long.” He didn’t elaborate because he didn’t want to lie to her any more than he wanted to admit he’d been eavesdropping.
In the glow of the flashlight, he noticed how her pink button-down shirt clung to her curves in the humidity, outlining the generous swells of her breasts and giving a glimpse of cleavage. He noted, too, how the yellow light cast her skin in warm, golden tones and glinted on her chestnut hair.
As many times as he told himself to stop noticing the body of a woman he didn’t plan to pursue, he couldn’t seem to kill the awareness or the low throb of need.
Instead of dealing with any of that, he went with the practicalities of the situation, and their deadline. “I’m sorry, Gabby. We need to go.”
Gabby glanced toward Kayleigh. “Can I have one more minute?”
“Sure, but make it quick. I’ll be outside when you’re ready.” Ty left the room and shut the door behind him, his thoughts a messy jumble of lust and reality. This time he crossed the hallway and leaned on the wall and told himself not to listen.
That didn’t stop him from wondering, though, and imagining what it could be like to kiss her with no reservations between them, no danger and no ticking clock—just a man and a woman together because they wanted to be.
Chapter 7
TyJ: Are you awake, sweetheart?
CyberGabby: I’m here. Can’t sleep?
TyJ: Funky dreams. What’s your excuse?
CyberGabby: Remember that idea I was telling you about for 3-D Web imaging? I started putting together a prototype the other day and it’s really coming along. I can’t seem to put it down long enough to go to bed.
TyJ: I can guarantee you wouldn’t have that problem if I were there…
CyberGabby: Hah. Big talker when there’s no chance in hell of that happening. You want to tell me about the dream?
TyJ: I’d rather talk about your prototype. Or you could tell me what you’re wearing.
CyberGabby: Naughty boy…
[Instant message initiated June 6, 3:08:28 a.m.]
2:35 a.m., August 3 3 Hours and 3 Minutes until Dawn “That the spy?” Kayleigh challenged once Ty was gone and the door had shut behind him.
“I told you, he’s a Secret Service agent, not a spy. But yes, that’s him.�
� Gabby nearly sagged back against the bedroom wall, wishing she were as cool as her voice had sounded.
How much had Ty overheard? She had to assume he’d heard all of it—and she hated that he’d heard it that way. She would’ve told him the story if he’d asked. Instead, he’d gotten the watered-down, G-rated version.
Maybe that was best, she thought on a faint slide of disappointment. He’d already known that she was estranged from her family. Now he knew why, more or less.
“He’s superhot,” the child observed, her voice sounding too old, too worldly for a kid her age.
Gabby knew she and Ty were on a deadline, but she couldn’t stop herself from saying, “Describe him to me.”
There was a stunned pause. “Holy crap, you can’t see him. You’re running around with a guy who looks like he should be in the movies, and you don’t even know it.”
“Never mind, I shouldn’t have asked. Besides, we have to go.” Gabby stood, swiping suddenly damp palms on her wrinkled shorts. “I just wanted another minute alone with you so I could be sure you got what I was saying earlier. I didn’t tell you about what happened to me to scare you or make you feel bad for me. I wanted you to know…life changes when something like that happens, but it doesn’t mean it’s over. When I moved here, I went to a wonderful school and met people like me. They taught us to mainstream, to function in the sighted world. They taught us to be stronger rather than weaker.”
Gabby paused, realizing that she was the fatal flaw in her own argument. She’d managed less than six months in the real world before she got her heart broken and, perhaps more important, her ego badly dented, and she’d gone into full retreat mode. So much for stronger rather than weaker.
“Ain’t no school for lame-os,” Kayleigh said, picking up on another flaw. “And even if there was, I couldn’t pay for it. There’s just regular school, where they make fun of me, and the streets, where they take off on me.” She lowered her voice and muttered, “Just like my ma did.”
Gabby’s heart ached for the child, and she wished she knew what Lennie had hoped to accomplish by putting them together. As far as she could tell, she’d just made things worse, dangling a solution and then snatching it away. Oops, sorry, kid. That won’t work for you.
Lights Out Page 9
