Wake to Darkness

“I’ll hold on to her. Come on, Rachel, she shouldn’t miss the fun just ’cause she can’t see.” He leaned forward and wrapped his arms around my dog. Myrt was facing straight ahead with her teeth showing and her tongue hanging out. She knew something exciting was about to happen. I recognized that look. She was eager. Up for anything as long as her eleven-year-old buddy was involved.

“How are you going to steer?”

Josh tightened his arms around Myrtle, then reached one-handed for the rope handle threaded through the nose of the sled, which children everywhere use to fool themselves into thinking they have a modicum of control as they rocket down steep, snowy hills. Myrt whined uncertainly, and he let go of the rope and scooted forward. “You’re gonna have to ride with us and steer,” he told me with a smile.

“No way am I going to fit on that th—”

“There’s room. C’mon, Rache, please? Try it. Just once.”

I heaved a gigantic sigh and plopped my ass onto the sled. I stretched my legs, one on either side of Josh and Myrtle, planting my heels against the front of the sled, and reached around them to grab on to the steering rope that wasn’t going to work, anyway. What had I gotten myself into?

Josh grinned at me over his shoulder, and I believe my heart grew three sizes that day. We all leaned forward and gave the sled a scootch or two, and the next thing I knew we were flying down the hill toward the back of Mason’s house. I heard high-pitched squeals and realized they were coming from me just before we all went over sideways and tumbled into the snow.

When he sat up laughing, Josh still had my bulldog safely in his arms. Myrtle wriggled free and bounced in the snow, chest down, butt up, and wiggling in delight. She barked happily, and I knew exactly what she was saying: “Again, again, again!”

Okay, so I was wrong. Doesn’t happen often, but it does happen.

I brushed the snow off myself and got to my feet. “I’m too old for this.”

Josh stood, too. “Nobody’s too old for this. C’mon, let’s do it again.”

“Yarf!” said Myrtle. Which meant, damn straight, we’re gonna do it again—and again and again until one of us is too tired to do it anymore. Three guesses who that’ll be, old lady.

What? She’s a very verbal dog.

* * *

Jeremy was messed up. Misty could tell. He couldn’t look her in the eye for very long. Aunt Rache said when someone couldn’t look you in the eye they were either hiding something, incredibly self-conscious or too distracted thinking about something else. Misty thought it was the third thing. He had a lot on his mind. She had to do most of the talking, but she was good at that.

“So where do you go to school?” she asked him.

“Holy Family. It’s private.”

“I go to public.”

“Oh.”

“Right here in the Point. Is that where you guys live?”

“A little south.”

“You a junior?”

“Senior.”

No encouragement to go on in his tone. Okay, whatev. She picked up a magazine from the coffee table. National Geographic. A good one to kill time with. Jeremy was kind of cute but a lousy conversationalist. “So what are you gonna do after graduation?” she asked after a bit.

“I don’t know.” He picked up his game controller, restarted his game.

Strike two, Misty thought.

“Maybe you should think about being a cop, like your uncle. I mean, you must have it in you, the way you saved their lives and all.”

“I wouldn’t want to have to do that again.”

Eyes straight ahead on the TV screen. He must be good, to be at the level he was in the game. Her mom would say that was only proof he spent way too much time gaming. Whatever.

“What was it like? Shooting that guy, I mean?”

He froze, didn’t look at her, just froze, and then the gunshot sound effects went off and the blood spatter on the screen told her someone had just offed him. Game Over.

He set the controller down and looked at her. “Not like shooting someone in the game.”

She smiled encouragingly and nodded at him to go on.

He shrugged. “He was just...he was. And then he wasn’t. I did that to him.”

“It bothers you.”

“Not really. I mean, he was gonna kill them. I didn’t have a choice. I’d do the same thing again. But it’s just...weird. How easy it happened.” He bit his lip, looking down. “Like how easy you go from being alive to being dead. Bam. Just like that. Like nothing happened, except you’re gone. You’re just...erased.”

She nodded. “This is creeping me out a little. Maybe a new topic?”

“Yeah, okay.”

He looked disappointed. Like he’d wanted to talk about it some more. “So...are you okay? I mean, you know, with your dad, and then that guy?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Mom made me go to therapy for a while after, but it’s all bull.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet.”

“I mean, if you pay someone to listen to you...”

“I hear you. And what do you say? You sit there trying to think up shit to take up the time, because you know it’s costing like a hundred-fifty an hour, and you wind up just making shit up.”

“Yeah.” He tilted his head to one side, looking her in the eyes finally. “You’ve been to therapy, huh?”

“Uh-huh. I lost like fifteen pounds during my first soccer season and Mom was just sure I was purging. You know.” She stuck her finger into her mouth and stuck her tongue out, the international symbol for gagging.

Jeremy smiled. It was very faint, just the slightest uptick at the corners of his mouth, but it was the first one she’d seen since they’d finished breakfast.

“Were you?” he asked.

“No. And gross. A halfback runs an average of eight miles in a game. I was just burning it off, that’s all.”

“Oh.”

“You play?”

“Not this year. Basketball, usually, but...not this year.”

“I wouldn’t, either, if it was my dad. I’m really sorry, Jeremy.”

“Thanks.”

She sighed and, not sure where to go from there, got up and paced to the double sliding glass doors facing the backyard. Looking out back, she grinned so wide it hurt, pulled her cell out of her pocket and started snapping pics. “Ohmygod, Jer, look at this!”

He twisted on the couch so he could see, then got up and came over to see better as Josh and her aunt Rachel came flying down the hill on a cheap plastic sled. The crazy dog was sitting right in the front, her ears flapping in the wind and her jowls pushed back so she looked like some kind of alien. “Aunt Rachel’s screaming her head off.”

“Look how big Josh is smiling,” Jeremy said. “He loves that dog.”

“I can tell. She looks like something out of Gremlins.”

He sent her a quizzical look. “Gremlins?”

The trio had reached the bottom and tumbled into the snow. They were already hiking back up for more.

“It’s an ancient movie my father insists on playing at least twice a year. Says it’s a classic.” She grinned. “I’ve got to get a few more pics. This is too good. I can blackmail Aunt Rache for the next six years with this.”

“Is it any good?” Jer asked.

“What?” She was holding up her iPhone, waiting for the right shot.

“The movie. Gremlins.”

“Oh. Yeah, it’s not bad. Actually, it’s pretty funny. We should see if we can stream it.”

“Right now?”

They were coming down the hill again. “Myrtle is so completely Mogwai.” Misty snapped and snapped. Then she put the phone in her pocket and looked at Jeremy. “Maybe tonight, if we hang that long. We can order Chinese and go pick it up.”

“Okay.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets and looked away. “What do you want to do right now, then?”

“See that other sled?”

His head came up. He wasn’t smiling, but he nodded. “You really want to do that?”

“Yeah, I really do.”

“Guess we’ll lose our asshole status. First, though, can I see your phone?”

“Sure.” She slid it from her pocket and handed it to him. He located the pics while she looked to see what he was doing, then he sent one to his uncle’s phone. She smiled. “Cool. He’s gonna love that.”

“I thought he was into your aunt before. But then we stopped seeing her and he didn’t mention her name at all.”

“I think she’s into him, too. Hell, we might end up cousins.”

“I hope not,” he said, and then a flush of red went right up his neck and into his face. He handed her phone back to her, turned and headed for the coat closet.

* * *

Mason was on his way home when he thought to check the phone while he was sitting at a red light. There was a text from a number he didn’t recognize that included a photo attachment, sent hours ago. He opened it and grinned. Rachel, Josh and Myrtle on a toboggan flying down the hill behind his house. Rachel’s eyes and mouth were wide open, and her hat—no, wait, his hat—was in the air behind her, so her hair was like a flag. Josh was smiling all the way to his ears—laughing out loud, Mason thought. The kid was going to be okay. And the dog... The dog was all flapping jowls and ears and gleaming teeth. She was wearing her goggles and her winter scarf, and looked like she belonged in a steampunk creature feature.

He felt something warm settle into his chest, and it pushed away the cold darkness that been squatting there before. He couldn’t wait to get home. And he thought what a great feeling that was.

As he stared at the photo, realizing it had come through several hours ago, a car blew its horn behind him and a new text message popped up, this one from Rachel’s phone. Ordered Chinese. What’s ur ETA?

He went through the light, then pulled off the road so he could reply. The other vehicle flew by him, and he secretly hoped for a speed trap up ahead.

20 min, he texted back. Want me 2 pickup?

Sent kids. C U soon.

On my way.

He looked at the phone for a long minute. Okay, there was some interesting stuff going on in his sappy regions at the moment. Stuff that bore further mulling.

He clicked the button to make the shot his background image. It made him feel good to look at it, and Rachel’s books were always saying when something feels good, pay attention to it. It was good advice, even if she didn’t always practice it herself and claimed to think it was complete bull.

He looked at her face, her full mouth wide open in a shout but somehow managing to smile at the same time. She’d relived a murder last night—lived it from the perspective of the victim. But today she was raising hell in the snow with her dog and his nephew. Yeah, maybe she didn’t think she practiced what she preached, but he was pretty sure he’d just been given photographic proof that she did.

He put the car back into gear, and headed onto the highway and back toward home.

* * *

I had more fun that day than I’d had since I got my eyesight back—not counting my one-nighter with Mason, which was the most fun I’d ever had. Ever. By the time the younger generation had been thoroughly exposed to the genius of Joe Dante through Gremlins and Gremlins 2, we had spent close to four hours in front of Mason’s gigantic TV. The sixty-inch HD was his country home’s one concession to modern design. Everything else looked rustic, even though he was wired for sound. He had the fastest internet connection I’d seen—essential, he said, for gaming. And his nephews loved their gaming.

We’d pigged out on Chinese, stashed the leftovers, and then re-pigged out between the two movies. We topped the evening off with warm chocolate chip cookies—the kind that came in preperforated squares you just broke apart and threw into the oven—and milk, because there was no point to warm chocolate chip cookies if you weren’t going to dunk them in milk.

And then, as the credits rolled, I looked around and realized I wasn’t in Mason’s living room anymore. I was lying on my back on the floor staring at the ceiling of a room that wasn’t familiar to me. The light fixture above my head had a ceiling fan attached—but Mason doesn’t have a ceiling fan—ivory-colored blades shaped like palm fronds or something. It wasn’t running. I tried to get a better look around me, because my current view only gave me a glimpse of the ceiling and the upper two feet of the walls. Oddly, though, I couldn’t turn my head.

Oh, shit. Oh shit oh shit oh shit, it’s another dream.

Something blocked out the light, and something else kicked me in the side, rolling me over so my right cheek was pressed to the floor, my right arm underneath my body.

Wake up, dammit. Wake up!

I felt something tear my blouse up the back, and I knew what was coming. The blade would be next. The cutting. I wanted to wake up. I wanted to scream. I wanted to scrunch my face up in fear, but I couldn’t move at all. I felt the warmth of tears welling in my eyes and spilling over, running along my nose and onto the floor.

If you can’t wake up, then look. See what’s around you so you can remember.

Hardwood floor under my cheek. Mint-green paint on the walls. A brown sofa with wooden claw feet and a crocheted blanket with too many colors to count. Black, white, orange, red—

The blade sliced a path of fire across my back and lower left side, and every ounce of reason left me. Inside, my mind I was screaming. But I couldn’t even open my mouth. I couldn’t breathe. I lay there, completely helpless as the knife cut deeper, and I prayed for death to come fast.

It didn’t.

4

1:00 a.m. Sunday, December 17

Mason had dozed off on the sofa. The kids had taken every other seat in the room, Jeremy in the reclining chair, Misty in the overstuffed one that matched the sofa and Josh was in a beanbag chair on the floor. Leaving him and Rachel the sofa. He didn’t know if it had been intended or not, but they’d taken opposite ends, partly because the corner between the arm and the back was the most comfortable spot on any couch, but mostly because they didn’t want to get too close to each other. In his case, he didn’t want to slip up in front of the kids, absentmindedly start rubbing her leg or something. You could get into a movie to the point that your body sometimes acted on impulse without bothering to check in first. That was how you could crunch through an extra-large tub of popcorn in the theater, only to look down later and wonder who ate your snack.

Like that.

He didn’t know what her reasons were, but he kind of hoped they were similar.

So he’d fallen asleep. And it looked as if they all had, except for Rachel, because she wasn’t on the couch anymore. Sitting up and frowning, Mason scanned the room for her.

She was on the floor, facedown, with her head turned toward him. Her eyes were open—wide open—and there were tears streaming from them. Something was wrong with her. Her entire body kept going rigid, then relaxing, then rigid again. Her dog was beside her, whining and pawing at her shoulder.

Mason swore and dropped to his knees, rolling her over onto her back, moving on sheer instinct. “Rachel, what’s happening? What’s going on? Can you talk to me? Rachel?”

He heard the kids stirring as he shook her, trying to rouse her. “Rachel?”

She blinked, then her eyes flashed even wider as she sucked in a sudden desperate breath that must have filled her lungs to bursting. A nanosecond later she opened her mouth to scream, but he clapped a hand over it to keep her from scaring the hell out of everyone and put his face right in front of hers. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m right here. It’s okay.”

She pulled away, scuttling out from under him. Then she sat up and reached around to her lower back, pushing up her shirt and running her palms over her skin. She was breathing fast and hard, her face damp with tears and sweat. And it was hitting him that she’d been having another dream.

“You’re at my house, Rache. You’re safe. You’re okay.”

“My back is bleeding.”

“No, no it’s not.” On his knees, he moved closer to her, ran his own hands all over her back, up and down her skin, then brought them around and showed her. “See? There’s not a scratch on you.”

She closed her eyes in obvious relief. “It wasn’t me.”

Josh was still asleep, thank God, but Jeremy was up now. Misty, too, standing beside him. “Was it another nightmare, Aunt Rache?” she asked. She looked scared to death for her aunt.

Rachel nodded. “Yeah.”

“Can I get you something? What do you want me to do?”

“I’m fine. I’m okay.”

“You don’t look okay,” Misty said.

Jeremy crossed the room, opened a built-in floor-to-ceiling cabinet that was original to the house, reached to the top shelf and took down a bottle of Black Velvet and a tumbler. He poured and brought the glass to her.

“Thanks, kid.” She slugged it back in a single gulp and set the glass down. Mason made a mental note to ask his nephew how the hell he knew where the liquor was kept. Tomorrow. It was one-something in the morning, and he needed some privacy with Rachel.

“Why don’t you two take Josh up to bed? Misty, there’s an empty bedroom up there you and Rachel can use for tonight. Jeremy will show you where the sheets and things are.”

Misty nodded, but instead of leaving, she crouched down and put her hands on her aunt’s shoulders. “Is that what you want me to do, Aunt Rache? It’s probably too late to go home, anyway.”

Rachel nodded. “I’m sorry about all this. I’m not the greatest company for you on this visit, am I?”

“Not really. But I’ll make you take me shopping to make up for it, okay?”

Jeremy was standing nearby, and Mason had fully expected him to argue about taking his brother up to bed, because he argued about just about everything these days. But when Rachel’s gorgeous blonde niece turned to him and said, “Well, what are you waiting for? You don’t think I’m gonna carry him upstairs, do you?” he scooped his sleeping brother out of the beanbag chair, and the three of them trooped up the stairs.

Mason helped Rachel up off the floor. She kept putting her hands to her back, as if it hurt.

“There’s another one, Mason,” she said.

He searched her eyes. “Another...murder?”

She nodded. “What did you find out about the last one? You never said.”

“Kids were around. And frankly, I didn’t want to think about it.”

“Think about it now,” she told him, eyeing the empty glass, then the cabinet across the room.

He sighed. “Full autopsy results won’t be in for a day or two, but on initial exam, the coroner said the pancreas was missing.”

“The pancreas? So...what organ did that woman get from your brother?”

He lowered his head. “His pancreas.”

She rubbed her back again, left of center. “I think maybe someone should check on whoever got his kidneys, Mason.”

“I will.” He pulled out his phone.

She put her hand over his. “Wait, I want to get this all down while it’s fresh. Everything I saw.”

“Shit, Rachel, you were memorizing details while someone was cutting out your kidney?”

“Just before. Get a pen and a notepad or something, will you?”

He nodded and let go of her for the first time. Hell, he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding on to her until then. Her hair was tousled, plastered to her face on one side by her tears. Her eyes were red, like she’d popped a blood vessel or two. Her cheeks were tear-stained, and he could see the pulse beating in her neck.

“Stop looking at me like you think I’m going to keel over, and go get a pen and paper, Mason.”

“I’m going.”

He looked around the room, moving to the same cabinet Jeremy had left standing open. It had cupboards above and below, a row of three drawers in between. He pulled open one of the drawers, rummaged around for a pen, yanked out a notepad, closed the drawer and reached up to close the cabinet door, too.

He paused when she said, “Bring that BV over here with you.”

He nodded. “I could use a shot myself.” He grabbed another glass and the bottle. Then he set the bottle, pad and pen on the coffee table, went to the kitchen for some ice and ginger ale. A minute later he was back.

She took the makings from him, and put the pen and pad into his hands instead. Then she poured the drinks and started talking.

“I was in a house, facedown on the floor. I think it was the victim’s house. There was a hardwood floor, light-colored, maybe maple. A brown sofa with claw feet. Mint-green walls. A god-awful afghan with a dozen garish colors. Looked like someone made it out of all the leftover yarn they could find. An orange throw pillow. I saw a couple of pictures on the wall, little kids, but they were old. You could tell by the haircuts and the fading. Looked like school pictures. Two kids, a girl and a boy. The boy’s a little older. Carrot curls and freckles, both of them. He had a plaid shirt on. She had a yellow dress with a white collar.”

He was scribbling as fast as he could. “Was there a clock on the wall that you could see?”

“No.”

“How about windows, anything that would tell you whether it was day or night?”

“No uncovered windows.” She bit her lip, nodded once. “There was a ceiling fan light fixture thing.”

“You said you were facedown.”

“I was face-up at first. I saw this ceiling fan with palm frond–shaped blades, ivory or cream. The fan was off, but the light was on. I think it was nighttime, because it was darker where the light didn’t touch the ceiling. Then someone kicked me over.”

“Did you see them?”

She shook her head.

“Not at all?”

“No, not at all.”

“Rache, if you were face-up, and they came close enough to kick you over onto your face, you would have had to have seen them.”

She frowned really hard, her brows drawing together. “No, something went over my face right before I felt the foot in my side. I remember, something covered my eyes.”

“A hand?”

“Maybe a piece of cloth. It didn’t feel like a hand.”

“Okay, okay. And then you felt someone kick you over?”

She nodded. “I was completely paralyzed. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t turn my head. Couldn’t even breathe. I could see, but I could barely move my eyes enough to get a better look around me. But I could feel everything.” She lowered her head and hugged herself, rubbing her arms up and down. “Everything.”

“I’m sorry, Rache.” He put a hand on her shoulder, kneaded it softly, repeatedly, like he could massage away the horror.

“It’s not your fault,” she said.

“I gave you his corneas.”

“You gave me my eyesight. You didn’t know it was gonna come with a downside.”

He lowered his head. “What else do you remember?”

“Just the cutting.” She reached out, took her drink, slugged half of it. “And praying to die fast.”

He swore softly, set the pen down and hugged her. He put his arms around her shoulders, and he pulled her to his chest. Her head rested against him, but her arms stayed at her sides, under his.

“Check on whoever got his kidneys,” she said again, staying stiff in his arms, not returning the embrace, but not pulling away from it, either. He let go, and she sat up straight again. “You had a list before, when we were looking at your brother’s recipients as potential killers. We need to check on whoever got the kidneys.”

“The list was just the hospitals. Not the patients. But I think we can trace them from there. There are probably two—two kidneys, two recipients.”

“It was the left one.”

He nodded and wondered why he didn’t doubt a word she said. Admittedly, there was some small voice of reason way down deep inside his brain saying Wait just a damn minute here. Saying they couldn’t be sure the victim she’d dreamed of was another of Eric’s organ recipients. That the dream might have just been a nightmare and not a real event. He could say those things himself. He’d said them before, after all.

But he’d been wrong.

He went to the computer and pulled up the list he’d wheedled from a transplant-unit nurse. His brother’s body parts were listed in neat rows, along with the hospitals to which they’d been sent. His kidneys were not labeled left or right. He had no idea if they should’ve been or not. There were two separate hospitals beside them, though. Piedmont Transplant Center in Atlanta and Strong Memorial in Rochester.