Tygers Page 20

  Keith started leaning forward with her to get a second hand on him for safety. “It’s okay,” he assured her quietly.

  As the sound of his voice reached the child, Kyle startled and launched to his feet, breaking his aunt’s tenuous hold on him violently. Kyle started skidding on the loose stones at the edge, and Katie threw herself out to wrap her arms around his chest. It was a desperate move and one that Keith instinctively knew was going to pitch them both over the edge. He grabbed Katie around the waist and yanked her backward, throwing his own weight into the move and hoping that her grip on Kyle was as good as it looked.

  All three of them cried out in fear as the view below struck them. They landed in a heap, and Keith wrapped his arms around them while they all shook. Finally, he pushed up and looked down at the woman and child beside him. Kyle was wrapped in Katie’s arms, his head resting on the pillow of her chest. He seemed to be in good shape though a little confused.

  Katie concerned him more. She still shook almost convulsively. She was pale, and her eyes were wide and unfocused. Her jeans were shredded at one knee and stained with blood and ground-in dirt. Keith touched her face gently, and she started to cry.

  Good sign, he decided. “It’s okay,” he crooned to her. “We’re going home now.”

  Keith tried to lift Kyle from her arms, but she held him tighter to her. He sighed in understanding and lifted both of them so that Katie found her feet. She hoisted the child further onto her hip.

  Kyle looked up at him sleepily. “I need Ty,” he whispered with a wide yawn.

  Keith started to turn, but her voice stopped him.

  “No,” Katie said with quiet conviction. “Not Ty, Kyle.”

  The child looked at her in a mixture of surprise and anger. “I want him,” he demanded.

  Katie’s features hardened in a way Keith had never thought they would around Kyle. Her eyes flashed dangerously. “No more Ty, Kyle,” she ordered.

  Keith stepped toward her cautiously. “Katie, maybe we should discuss this. He needs his comfort object. We can’t just take it away—”

  She cut him off acidly. “That—thing is no comfort. Trust me on this one.”

  He shook his head and bent to retrieve the toy. As he held it out to Kyle, she dropped the child to his feet and backed away. When Kyle hugged it to his cheek, she grimaced and shook her head. Katie turned on her heel and walked away as if she was never coming back.

  “Katie?” Keith called out hesitantly, leading Kyle after her with a hand on the child’s shoulder.

  She met his eyes before turning them back to the climb down. Keith couldn’t read her expression. The only thing that came to mind was something between cold detachment and sadness. He watched her the whole way back. Katie stayed several yards ahead. She wouldn’t look at them. She didn’t speak. She acted like the toy was an enemy, but that didn’t make much sense.

  When they reached the city steps, Carol was talking to the officers. She ran past her sister to scoop her son into her arms. Katie watched long enough to see the stuffed tiger held to Carol’s shoulder before the muscle at the back of her jaw tightened and she walked away with her arms crossed over her chest.

  Keith moved to intercept the police officers closing on Katie, sure that she had no intentions of talking to them in her present mood. He explained what he believed happened. Based on Kyle’s reactions, he theorized that the child left the house semi-conscious, possibly sleepwalking, and was lost and frightened upon awakening. Overall, the questioning took little time, and he joined Carol and Kyle at the kitchen table.

  The young woman smiled at him gratefully. “Thank you, Keith. Can I get you breakfast since I dragged you out of bed for this?” she offered.

  He rubbed his eyes with the pads of his fingers. “Actually, I need to talk to Katie for a minute. I take it she’s cleaning up?”

  Carol’s voice was suddenly uncertain. “She didn’t come in with me. I thought she was still outside with you.”

  A sick certainty dawned in his mind, and he rose to his feet. The walk home seemed longer than the two blocks warranted, and he was suddenly exhausted. At his house, Keith sank to the front steps and buried his face in his hands. Her car was gone. He knew it would be. For whatever reason, he blew it again.

  Chapter Ten

  “I’ll do my dreaming with my eyes wide open, and I’ll do my looking back with my eyes closed.” Tony Arata

  “Dream as if you’ll live forever; live as if you’ll die tomorrow.” James Dean

  Katheryn parked in her driveway, but she sat with her hands on the steering wheel for a long time without moving. When she finally dragged herself into the house, the phone was ringing. Without missing a beat, she unplugged the phone in the living room from the wall and kept walking.

  In the bathroom, she ran her hand through her tangled hair and surveyed it in the mirror grimly. It was going to take an hour to get these knots out. Katheryn ran a tub of hot water and sank into it with a groan and a hiss, as the water covered her battered knee. She scrubbed off the dirt, and moreover, the feeling of Ty’s touch. She let some of the tension seep out of her.

  “Ty. Tiberius. Damn him,” Katheryn cursed him aloud. “What the hell am I supposed to do about it?” she demanded of the cosmos at large.

  The old bastard wasn’t even subtle about it. As if he ever had been?

  “Shut up,” she muttered dangerously. No, Ty had laid it all out for her beautifully. He knew about her fear of heights. Hell, he had caused it. He should know. Out on the plateau, there was no rational thought left. That’s how he got past her defenses. She cursed herself again for coming back to this damned city.

  Oh, Ty got her all right. He would have been content enough if she had lost her balance and fallen when he revealed himself. As it was, he got a finer prize. It was a chess game now. Katheryn could block him, but Kyle couldn’t. It was up to her to win this once and for all—somehow.

  But how could she fight the old man? The best Katheryn could do at fifteen was to block him out of her mind. She hadn’t tried to learn offensive uses. Katheryn knew there was such a thing. Ty had certainly been good enough at it, but damned if she knew how he did any of the things he did with it.

  Katheryn only figured out one weakness, if it could even be called that. He could only act, see, hear, and interact through Kyle. Kyle or her—if she ever let him in, which she had no intentions of doing. She was safe here, away from them with herself fully shielded from them.

  She groaned at the thought. She had to fear a four-year-old child because of the mad ghost who was using him. How crazy did that one sound? The positive side of the coin was that Katheryn could stop Ty again temporarily simply by whatever means she cut Ty out of her own mind—if she knew what that was.

  Sobered again, Katheryn gritted her teeth and inspected the damage to her knee. She massacred it when she fell, but it would heal. The injuries that chilled her were the welts on her forearm. She received those compliments of Tiberius. It wasn’t a cut. It hadn’t even been physically inflicted. Keith would probably label it psychosomatic—or maybe a self-inflicted injury during a delusion or hallucination. In truth, it was none of the above. The old man still had it after all these years. The only question was why he needed one of his gifted heirs to make the whole thing work.

  Katheryn got out of the tub and dried off. Her robe seemed sufficient to her, but she decided against sleep. She needed a game plan, not nightmares.

  The blinking light on the answering machine in the kitchen beckoned her. She retrieved an iced tea and considered ignoring it, but it might be Carol. With all that was going on, worrying about Katheryn was the last thing her sister needed.

  She punched the button and the machine roared to life. “Message one.”

  “Katie, if you’re there, answer please.”

  She rubbed her temples at the sound of Keith’s voice.

  “I’ll call you again later, but I need to know what happened out there.”

  “N
ot likely,” she declared as she drank a mouthful of the tea. Those were more problems. How was she supposed to explain any of this to Keith? Well, she really didn’t need to. Katheryn had never planned to despite the lie she told him at his office. She shouldn’t feel squeamish about the fact now.

  To make matters worse, Ty wouldn’t hesitate to include Keith in their little game, especially if he knew that Keith was important to her. She had to get Keith out of the line of fire. But how would she manage that without telling him? Of course, telling him would only make him think she was nuts. Katheryn sighed. What a catch twenty-two this one was.

  “Message two.”

  “Katie. Damn it. Please, don’t ignore me.” His voice changed. It was suddenly heartbreakingly pitiful. “Please pick up the phone. I don’t understand. Please, I really need to talk to you.”

  Katheryn dropped her head to the countertop. “Yeah, right,” she spat. “What am I supposed to tell him? I have to tell him something—or just break it off again.” That thought made her heart sink. Katheryn couldn’t do that, but he was going to expect some sort of explanation that she didn’t want to give. Maybe she could just plead temporary insanity from the panic.

  More lies? Oh, Katie.

  “Shut up,” she grumbled at the female voice she couldn’t seem to lose.

  “Message three.”

  “Katie? Look, I’m trying to understand, but I’ll be honest. I don’t. Call me. I’m hoping you’re there. I know this morning was terrible, but—”

  She hit the stop button. “You have no idea, and I hope you never do,” she muttered.

  Old memories of Ty filled her mind. “Damn it,” she cursed. How was she supposed to fight him? Ty was pure evil. He had a sadistic streak a mile wide. At the same time, he was stronger than she was. He had a lifetime of more than twice her own to learn what she had been actively avoiding all these years.

  Katheryn sighed. She was tired, and she was arguing in circles. It was time to get some sleep—or try to. Somehow, she was sure that Tiberius would guest star in a restless slumber instead.

  * * *

  Keith paced his living room. Where the hell was she? He called five times in the first few hours after she left. He considered driving over to her house, but two things kept stopping him. If she wasn’t answering him, she needed space. If he pushed it, he would only push her further away.

  In addition, if she wasn’t there, what more could he do but worry? She was an adult. He couldn’t even report her missing for twenty-four hours. It was better to believe that Katie was avoiding him than that something worse was wrong.

  He uttered a long stream of curses and grabbed the phone again. One more call, Keith promised himself. If Katie didn’t answer, he would go to check on her. He held his breath as the phone started ringing on her end. After three rings, he was about to give up. His car keys were in his hand when Keith heard her voice. The simple hello, mumbled sleepily into the receiver, filled him with relief.

  “Katie, are you all right?” he asked gently, curbing the mindless urge to yell at her for scaring him for the last four hours.

  “Um-hmm. Yeah, just tired.”

  “Good. Look, I need to talk to you.”

  “Talk,” she replied simply.

  He thought she was getting more coherent, but he couldn’t be sure. “Katie, what happened out there? What don’t I know about Kyle’s relationship with Ty?”

  She was silent for a long moment. When Katie spoke again, he could tell she was fully awake. “Keith, you need to leave this alone.”

  “I need to understand,” he countered.

  “I can’t explain this to you, not any way that you would understand. I can tell you that this is not something you can cure. You can’t analyze this one.”

  “Can’t analyze what? You’re not making sense. Kyle is a kid, a confused kid but a kid.”

  “Not Kyle,” she stormed. “Don’t you see?” She sighed raggedly. “Of course, you don’t see. Kyle isn’t the problem, remember? Ty is. You can’t do anything for Kyle until—Oh, hell. Now, you really think I’ve cracked.”

  Keith shook his head in wonder. “Katie, Ty isn’t real. He’s an imaginary playmate, an extension of Kyle’s psyche, his imagination,” he soothed her.

  “Dammit, Keith. Think what you like. I know who Tiberius is. You don’t.” Katie paused, and her voice dropped to a whisper. “Please, leave it alone. You don’t know what you’re getting into here.”

  “Tiberius? Katie, who is Tiberius? Look, if you’ve located this person, you gave me your word you’d back out and let Mac and I take care of it. You have to let me know what is going on.”

  “I haven’t located him yet.” She growled in frustration. “I shouldn’t have tried. You’re determined to get yourself killed, aren’t you? Drop it, Keith. For God’s sake, back off before you get yourself hurt.”

  “Hurt by who? I need information. Help me so I can help Kyle—and you.”

  “You can’t. God help me, I wish you could. He won’t hurt you if you just stay away from Kyle. Believe me, Ty won’t appreciate you trying to help him.”

  “Kyle needs help,” he argued.

  “I know,” she whispered. “Let me work on it. I need time, Keith. I need to locate him.”

  His heart started racing. “Then what, Katie? If this man is dangerous—Please, tell me what this is about,” he begged.

  “I can’t. It’s—It will sound crazy. I just need to figure out how to flush him out and get rid of him, first. Once I do—Things will be different then.” She sounded distracted.

  “Then, you’ll let us take over?” he asked pointedly.

  “Yes. Promise me, Keith. Promise me you’ll let it go for a little while, a few weeks at most.”

  “I can’t do that, Katie. You know I can’t.”

  She sighed. “I was afraid of that. I have my course and you have yours. I’ll talk to you later. I need to think this through.”

  “Katie, please don’t. I want to see you.”

  “Let me figure this out, first. I’ll call you.”

  Keith sighed. “Soon, please.”

  “I will.” She hung up without saying goodbye.

  Keith stared at the phone in his hand for several long minutes before hitting the disconnect button.

  Katie couldn’t be cracked. There was someone very dangerous behind what was going on, and she knew who it was. She might not know how to find him, but she knew him. Why wouldn’t she just tell Keith? Katie seemed so sure that it would end badly if she did, but what could she possibly do about it alone?

  He shook his head. Keith couldn’t drop it. Kyle and Katie both depended on it. He was sure of that.

  His mind took a new path suddenly. If Katie knew this man personally, it was almost a given that Carol knew him. Katie and Carol were too close for many big secrets to be kept between them, but the question was whether or not Carol would tell Keith those secrets. Until it was paramount to Kyle’s safety, there were some pretty damn big ones that she kept from him for her sister.

  Keith dialed the phone again. This time, it picked up on the first ring.

  “Hello,” Carol called out calmly. She seemed to have recovered from her shock nicely. He shivered at how quickly she recovered from most of the things he had seen and heard in the last few weeks. Too fast, his mind argued yet again.

  “Carol, it’s Keith. How’s Kyle doing?”

  “Fine. He’s napping right now.”

  “Do you have a minute to talk?”

  “Sure. What do you need?”

  “Who is Tiberius?” he asked bluntly. If she were lying, maybe he’d hear her hesitate. Keith kicked himself for not doing this in person. He’d like to see her expression to be sure.

  Carol sucked in her breath audibly. Paydirt. He had a winner.

  “Jesus! Tiberius? You did say Tiberius, didn’t you?”

  “Is something wrong?” he asked calmly.

  “No. Not really. I just—haven’t heard that name in a
long time. It’s a bit of a shock hearing it coming from you.”

  Keith swallowed. “What connection does he have with Kyle and Katie?” He prayed it wasn’t a former lover of hers that he didn’t know about. That would be more than he could stand right now.

  “Our grandfather. Kyle’s great grandfather. He was my mother’s father.”

  Keith breathed a sigh of relief. “Kyle sees him?” he asked gently. He had never heard of the man before, but that didn’t mean Kyle hadn’t met him when he was younger.

  “No. Of course not,” she thundered.

  He furrowed his brow. The reaction was much more intense than he counted on, much more than Carol usually displayed. “What can you tell me about him?”

  “I don’t know much. The house I live in was his years ago. Tiberius. Tiberius Matthews was his name.”

  “Do you know where to find him?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Carol, where is he?” he demanded.

  “He’s dead, Keith. He died when I was three. Didn’t you know that?”

  Keith couldn’t breathe. “He can’t be the right person,” he decided.

  “How many men named Tiberius do you know, Keith?” she countered dryly. “It’s not exactly a common name. I should have known—”

  “Known what?” he asked in confusion.

  “The plateau. Katie should never have gone there this morning.”

  “Why? What is so special about the plateau?”

  “That’s where Tiberius died,” she replied simply.

  “He fell? That’s why she’s afraid of heights?” he guessed.

  “No, they shot him.” Carol seemed distracted.

  “Who did?”

  “The police, of course.”

  “Why?” The entire conversation was making less and less sense by the minute.

  “He tried to throw her over—or he threatened to. Either way, she didn’t say a word for days afterward, and not much then.”

  Keith’s blood ran cold. “Who, Carol? Who did he threaten?”

  “Katie, of course. Who else? Why do you think she’s so afraid of heights?”