Open your mind to an exciting but creepy paranormal thriller. Ken Hughes breaks into the genre promising to transcend suspense to a whole new level.
It is refreshing to see an author’s debut transcend the genre of fiction, adding to it a fresh, new perspective of a paranormal thriller. SHADOWED is compelling, suspenseful and irresistibly entertaining. Hughes proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that he can create a spine-tingling thriller with gutsy twists and page-turning suspense. You will not be disappointed.
—Ace Antonio, author of
THE CONFESSIONS OF SYLVA SLASHER
Paranormal thrillers are a dime-a-dozen these days, and they more often than not involve handsome, brooding undead heroes, but SHADOWED is refreshingly different. Author Ken Hughes has created in Paul Schuman a protagonist who is very much human, despite a superhuman ability, and it is his very humanity that makes him so believable. He may have the gift to enhance his senses at will, but it’s plain old-fashioned courage that ultimately proves his most effective attribute. Written in a clear, straightforward style particularly suited to this genre, from the first page, I was pulled in, wanting to know more about Paul’s and Lorraine’s abilities, and equally important, the backdrop of intrigue and scandal that the story plays out against.
Fast-paced, well-plotted with a likable protagonist and an ending that leaves the story open for a sequel, SHADOWED is a helluva fun read, and won’t disappoint fans of either normal or paranormal-genre thrillers.
—Leslie Ann Moore, author of the award-winning
GRIFFIN’S DAUGHTER Trilogy
Ken Hughes gives us a complex hero who has a power but feels powerless, and he makes us shiver as a villain of great cunning pulls the strings of the powerful. Family, honor, and guilt, with a little romance thrown in, make SHADOWED a great read.
—Robin Morris, author of
MAMA
Ken Hughes's distinctive voice ensnares us in the life of an ordinary young man desperate to cope with his suddenly super-human senses, and the reader anxiously prowls the cold winter days and menacing nights beside him, chasing after every clue. Paul Schuman could be anyone we know -- that is why the shadows pull us in.
—Judith Swanson, writer
SHADOWED
KEN HUGHES
North Hollywood, CA.
Copyright 2012 by Ken Hughes - SmashWords edition
Cover: Ghislain Viau
This book is available in print at most online retailers.
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
He can hear a whisper across the block… and can’t remember why.
Open your mind, to a city where mystery chases up and down office back stairways, turns brother against brother, and plays out on frozen sidewalks where lives may be shattered if the enemy even looks at the ragged man passing by in the crowd—and even that man cannot guess what memory will be next to batter his mind.
Paul was no detective, no thief, only a student trying to get some distance from his father and brother. When he found himself marked by the power to enhance his senses, he had only that treacherous gift and what few tricks he dared to teach himself, to search for some explanation—or at least the chance to give it meaning by exposing a few petty corruptions.
Paul thought if he lived in poverty to keep his existence secret from the world, at least nobody could force him to use that gift as a weapon against others. But just when he thought he was untouchable, the last thing he expected shakes his world and drags him into the perils of his family, his power, and two women who each have a different claim on his life.
As Paul begins to play cat and mouse with enemies he can’t even name, he must break every rule that’s kept him alive, in every frantic chase and every gamble he makes to break his family free. And all the while, he knows his greatest enemy may still be what lies behind his own secrets.
If you think you know everything a paranormal thriller can do, take a closer look.
About The Author
Ken Hughes has been living for storytelling since his father first read him The Wind In The Willows, and everything from Stephen King’s edge to Hayao Miyazaki’s sense of wonder has only fed that fire. He has worked as a technical writer in Los Angeles at positions from medical research to online gaming to mission proposals for a flight to Mars. For more about his stories, songs, and his Unified Writing Field Theory, see kenhughesauthor.com.
To we five Hugheses, for forming so happy
and honest a family I had to look this far afield
to break my hero's heart. Thank you, for everything.
Chapter One
Too loud, too many voices inside talking and jostling to be heard, battering at his Opened hearing… Paul flinched back, couldn’t keep himself from a gasp, and that thundered in his senses too.
But it’s in there, somewhere.
And he couldn’t start hesitating, outside the grand old house in the twilight. Instead, he refocused his power on its second story, finding the half-sheltered region that lay one ceiling above the party. He stepped forward as he did, his feet awkward with most of his will reaching forward. But the echoing in the air ahead, a few footsteps and so many sounds spilling upward through the floorboards, all shifting and mingling and drumming within the rooms and inside his mind…
He broke off the connection and felt the air's chill seeping into his face. The cold felt too deep, as if he’d been standing there for whole minutes instead of mere moments.
I couldn’t have been lost in it for that long—could I? Still, even now, he couldn’t be sure.
Paul glanced at the people drifting past on the path to the door. I don’t need to do this; the real work here will be late at night, anyway. I could be back reading in bed in half an hour.
But crowds had their uses too, and he couldn’t let fear hold him back. Squaring his shoulders, he shifted onto the path and headed toward the door.
As with most buildings, his first glimpse from inside neatly fleshed out the impressions he’d already formed. The converted mansion was filling up slowly; one young couple lingered in the foyer to wind up their conversation before they reached the main rooms where eager, cynical, young, old, and middling visitors milled about.
First things first. Paul paused at the outer door, looking like just another scruffy young man, perhaps more hesitant than some to join the bustle beyond. Fiddling with his coat to stall, he glanced back at the door and Opened his sight.
From three paces away, the outer face of the lock sprang into his vision, showing him every trace of the plate’s shape and size, enough to compare to the types of locks he knew—
The door lurched around, swinging his self with it for an instant before he let the connection go. Paul kept the wave of dizziness from showing on his face and waited for the visitor to walk by, thinking ruefully of how movie spies could always pick any lock at a glance.
He focused again. The old brass shape wasn’t right; its style might be a Weismann, or at least it looked more like the older models—
“You in or out?” a voice bellowed.
Paul jumped, his trance shattering.
An older man, with thinning hair and a caged dog on his shirt; he spoke again. “Can’t just stand out here. You only here to impress your girl, or you want the lab to get away with it?”
Paul allowed himself a grim smile. “No, I’m here about LifeLab alright.” But how much do the people around here know? He added “I still can’t believe they’d do that.”
“Of course they did! They think they can do anything as long as it isn’t on baby bunnies.” But instead of saying more there, he went on “But, do you think it all just started with one lab’s experiments, like everything was okay before then? You know how many unwanted dogs are in this city?”
As the activist kept talking, less and less about LifeLab and its secret, Paul could only steal another glance past him to throw his power at the door again. The lock’s contours filled his sight again, with a view closer than it would have been through any magnifying glass. The shape still didn’t seem like a Weismann, and the size was wrong for…
“…we may never get them all. But we’ll shut that lab down, count on it!” the man finished.
No, you really won’t. Paul felt himself scowl and turned away to partly hide his face as he muttered, “Bet you will. I’ll go take a look,” and headed inside.
“…blog all you want, they won’t…”
“…ever since Jackie had…”
“…sure, I used to eat…”
The conversations flowed around him, pulling at him under the vaulted ceiling’s echoes as he made his way through the main room. As he’d thought, the Animal Alliance—or at least its crowd tonight—seemed to be a mix of young dabblers, longtime believers, partisans of all types, and all the random curiosity-seekers that had come for drinks in plastic cups and an earful about the group’s sudden accusations against LifeLab.
Not that Paul had expected the Alliance rank and file to know much about what had really happened with it.
As he passed a grand stairway, his eyes wanted to follow the deep, stained wood of the banister upward, and the blessed quiet there. But that floor was still far from empty, and wouldn’t even give him this crowd to blend in with. At this hour, the best he could do was stay down in the thick of it, and plan his approach for searching the place later.
And I’d better not Open my sense of smell—not with this many bodies!
Paul moved toward the next of the several rooms, staying near the wall to slip around one older woman gesturing with her drink. The front door had probably kept the same stiff, ancient lock since when the group’s benefactor had lived here; but judging from the newer, gleaming chairs and tables he passed along the poster-covered walls, much of the place had been modernized so some of the back doors might be less trouble.
The rooms weren’t really full, either. There in the center, and there toward that side and that corner, a few loud or angry voices rose up and drew more of the people into eddies around them. In other areas, the space was clearer and the people murmured more quietly. A burly young man lumbered past him with an oversized TV screen in his arms, and Paul couldn’t help noticing the rasp and wheeze of his struggling breath. Paul half-turned, tempted to help him, but then made himself move on.
Maybe it’s just their youth. So many in the crowd were in their early twenties too, still trying to argue out what they’d decide to believe in, even at this cause’s own recruitment drive. I might have been here with them, if things had been different. And he’d been one year away from being one of the journalists who could report stories like this himself…
But, no point in wishing things were simpler. Or that he could leave this sincere, well-meaning crowd to fight it out with LifeLab’s lawyers after what he’d done.
He reached the kitchen. A few people—all women, despite the group’s noble ideals—were busy setting up fresh plates of snacks. Beyond them, through the back room, he could see the outer door. A moment’s focus showed him everything he needed about that lock: it was an Ames 50, one he could probably have worked with just the selection of keys he carried with him, even before he returned with his more obvious lock picks.
Now, the hard part. He snatched a couple of flyers from a table and moved to stand in a corner, camouflaging his stillness behind their images of animal abuse and neglect.
Then he closed his eyes and Opened his hearing.
Not to focus on the babble of the crowd; instead he linked his sense to the wall behind him. Beyond the noises echoing back from the room, between the simple paths of wires’ steady pulses, he listened for the irregular squeals of electronics or other alarms or cameras.
It had taken most of a year to learn to distinguish those from the sounds of basic wiring—that he could do it at all almost made Paul wonder if he were sensing more than enhanced sound.
This end of the room was clean. Still holding the flyers up to ward off attention, he strolled toward the next corner. As he moved, he focused on the wall again, struggling to make his connection with the sounds within it—despite all the noises around him.
“We should just break in and get their rats out,” someone said. “And get some real proof, too!”
Paul froze, but even as he did, he knew the tiny woman to his right was only wishing. One of the two men with her was already saying “And how far do you think we’d get, against a labful of guards and all?”
Right, Paul thought as he moved on. Of course, I slipped in and out without a trace, alone.
He worked his way to the far corner of the room, and knew he’d studied enough of the layout to be sure he could get in later; if there were any alarms beyond that, he’d find them then. So… time to go back, maybe rest up for later?
Still, he looked around at the crowd. Of course a wide-open call for recruits like this would be the least likely time for whoever was responsible to let their guard down. There’d be no “Don’t talk so loud about how all the evidence against LifeLab is fake.”
But all the same, he picked out the smaller knots of people, the isolated twos and threes that just might be muttering about actual secrets, and carefully extended his hearing toward one.
Control, control was everything. Like picking out a distant face while never meeting other people’s eyes, he struggled to reach the first corner without his attention drifting away. But no, that couple was only talking about who else they’d seen here, so Paul withdrew his link and steadied his breathing as he looked around for his next choice.
These three were farther away, and hearing them was like finding one current within a lake of sound—but he found them, to share and listen in on their talk about the turnout and the drinks and the presentation…
Something bumped his shoulder. His muscles went limp, his balance eluding him even as he knew he was toppling forward. He broke the last of the trance an instant before he stumbled against a table, and fell.
Pain tore through him, most of it fading in a moment as his nerves settled. Behind the pain were the voices, the whispers, and the circle of staring closing in around him. Smooth, Paulie, he thought viciously as he got his feet under him. His knee burned.
One middle-aged man stepped forward, half out of the crowd. “You alright?”
“Fine, fine…” Paul muttered as he lurched upright, trying to look as if he had only ordinary embarrassment to worry about.
But the man didn’t move. He said, “Look, are you sure?”
And something in the man’s intent gaze set off alarms, not from any flicker of power but from Paul’s endless looking over his shoulder. I wasn’t that zoned out, and this guy’s not just another visitor, he’s a cop! Or a reporter, or someone else who noticed too much.
“Really, I’m fine,” Paul said as he waved the man away and turned to walk. He fought to move smoothly, showing nothing to suggest that his slip had meant he was drunk or worse, nothing that would need a second look. His knee throbbed with each step.
He didn't risk Opening now, and for an endless instant, his ordinary hearing couldn't catch any sound of the man turning away, as if he were still watching Paul.
Possibilities flashed through Paul’s head—the cop dragging him to a drunk tank as a lesson to the activists, then his control of his power breaking down until he moved to a psych ward and then the attention of anyone ruthless enough to believe someone could have such useful abilities… None of those were likely, but he’d taught himself that there was no moment that the worst couldn’t happen.
Then he heard him turn and walk away.
And Paul found himself locking his hearing onto the investigator’s footsteps before they melted into the crowd. It took a second for his wits to catch up with the instinct: even with his control fraying and the risk of this man noticing him, there was more at stake than being sure the “officer” wasn’t still watching. The real question was, Why is someone like this here at all?
The man was already two knots of people ahead of Paul, moving with a smooth stride that sounded purposeful even at a modest pace. Paul held his focus on that stride, then weakened it a moment to free his attention to take a few paces after him, and then back to refocus on the footsteps again.
Those footsteps provided a good rhythm, and rhythm was one of the better ways he’d learned to stay in motion while keeping his connection from going deep enough to lose himself in. Besides, he could keep partiers between them to act as a screen, since he didn’t need his eyes to track his quarry.
“Can you tell me where James Koenig is… James Koenig…” the man was asking. He sounded more like a cop each time he spoke.
A name… just those two words that might save Paul from hours of searching… He pushed harder to be sure he didn’t miss another word, and then drew back at the first muzzy sensation of losing control again.
He knew he was still being careless, when he didn’t even know if this man was looking into the activists’ frame of LifeLab at all. And if the police are preparing to expose things, do I even need to get involved? –But that only made it a race for him to get the truth out first.
With a steadying breath, he slid behind a trio of students and paused to focus more tightly. But as he did, a drunken voice beside him said, “How ‘bout you? I bet you don’t tell your family about coming to these things, do you?”
Family? Paul couldn’t keep from spinning around at the thought, but he clamped down on his reaction. He managed to give the boy in the college shirt a noncommittal, “Well, not really.”
He turned away as if it hadn’t been two years since he’d seen Dad and Greg, one more thing he’d left behind forever as he tried to cope with his power.
His connection to the cop’s footsteps was gone.
It figures. As he glanced around, another row of people blocked his view. He took a quick step around them, but put his weight squarely onto his hurt knee and barely caught his balance. Gritting his teeth, he used his will to extend his hearing out in a quick sweep—but he still couldn’t catch the investigator’s voice. Instead, he moved another probe more slowly above the floor, snaking through the echoes of the different footsteps.
After one endless moment, he caught a rhythm that seemed like the cop’s steady stride. Paul dodged around another partygoer and at last spotted the back of the cop’s head—a tangle of sparse hair over a rumpled coat—walking away.
Almost gasping aloud in his relief, Paul set his focus on him and edged back behind cover again. He could never let anyone notice him—especially not with this case and what was at stake.
“Can I have a word, Mr. Koenig? My name’s Reid.” And something rustled in Reid’s clothing, as if he were taking out…
“About what, Detective?” The other voice sounded almost calm at what had to be the sight of a badge.
Then they both began walking, and Paul could picture that Detective Reid had motioned his suspect to step aside with him. Is he trying to talk with him, or just rattle him by letting his friends notice him with the police?
Paul edged to the side and Opened his vision long enough for a good look at the man across the room with the cop: thirties, plump, with reddish hair already starting to gray.
“So,” Reid began as they reached the corner. “It looks like this group’s claims against LifeLab may not be as true as they seemed.”
He let the words hang there, as if waiting for a response. But James Koenig didn’t give one.
Reid went on. “That’s the weird thing. Even if LifeLab wasn’t doing those experiments, the photos were so ugly, and they were so close to the way the lab does work… and then, we have to wonder just how that reporter got those photos out of the lab…”
He can’t think Sarah Gomez stole the files herself, can he? I never thought they’d blame her ...
Paul pressed his focus closer on Koenig, not watching his face now but following his breathing. Still steady, no signs of nervousness.
When Koenig didn’t reply, the detective added “One odd thing might not be noticed. But, to get both just the right dirt, and get it at all despite their security… anyone who looks would think it was someone who knew all about the lab.”
Koenig didn’t answer at first, but a moment later, he must have reconsidered: “What are you saying? I never even worked in Trials when I was there.”
“I know.”
And again the cop waited. Paul didn’t need to glance over to know he was staring at Koenig’s face, searching for any trace of his nerve breaking.
At last Reid said, “Well, one way or another, the truth is going to come out. It’s still more a civil matter than a proven criminal one, so far. And I’m sure you’ll call me if you think of anything else.”
Paul could just make out the snap of a business card being handed over before Reid began walking away. This time, Paul let him go, keeping his hearing locked on their mutual suspect to see how he’d respond.
Is this it, a simple ex-employee from LifeLab who’d faked a couple photos to attack the people he’d parted ways with? Except, the detective had no idea what those lies had set in motion. And I have no excuse, for rushing off to dig up more dirt the moment I heard the press was interested, never mind if there was any truth to it.
It had seemed to be just the latest chance to bring one more truth to light while earning a few pennies… but instead Paul had crippled the lab and risked a good reporter’s career.
Paul kept still, watching James Koenig from the corner of his eye and Opening his hearing again and again, always carefully letting it drop. He couldn’t risk losing himself in his senses now, but he had to know if the detective’s warning would make Koenig do anything that would lead him to new evidence. And yet Koenig just stood still as the crowd began shifting and slowly clearing a space around one wall.
Then an older man wearing one of the better suits in the room walked up to Koenig. “What was that all about, James?”
“Just some questions. Nothing important.”
“The video’s almost ready.”
Paul watched them move into place near a big screen that some of the others were setting up. Gradually, the crowd quieted and waited for the video to start. Paul glared harder at Koenig, not studying him but just trying to accept that a disgruntled lab worker had outwitted him without knowing he existed. The plump man still showed no sign of worrying.
Opening his hearing again, Paul cast around the room, trying to catch whispers from the people who seemed to be the other Animal Alliance leaders gathered near the screen, and then just to search tidbits from random conversations, but still found nothing about Koenig or their frame.
Finally, he moved a few steps closer to an older, sophisticated-looking woman in a fine gray dress and muttered, “You think they’ve really got the goods on the lab?”
“Shhh,” she replied. “It’s starting soon.”
Paul drifted to the back of the room near the broad staircase. A few more people were coming down it now, but a moment’s frustrated probing still picked out one or two witnesses moving around above. Of course.
“Have you seen what that lab is doing?” a voice called to the crowd. It was the man who’d checked on James Koenig after the detective left.
As the people began roaring their angry answers, Paul clenched his fists. Whatever they could let the crowd “see,” it was his fault. Not Koenig’s, not Sarah’s…
When they dimmed the lights and every eye turned to the big screen, the old thought came to Paul again, and he slipped up the stairs as the crowd blinked in the sudden dark. Because, I still know nothing about why I have this power, but it has to be for a reason!
His knee hurt with the first step, and by the time he reached the top of the stairs, he was well aware how reckless he was being, when he could have simply come back after the people had gone anyway. Even if nobody here thought he was out of place, only two things had ever protected him in his work: his senses and his determination to stay clear of risks. Only stuntmen jump out of windows to escape.
The upstairs hall was almost empty, decorated with only a painting here and there from the old mansion’s past and a few water-stained boxes stacked in one corner. Lights shone from a doorway as two young men walked out of that room.
Paul kept going, barely glancing at them, and his bluff worked: they did the same.
He was still being reckless, he knew. But he strolled from one room to the next as if he were just a curious recruit, looking for a sense of what they kept up here. And what they kept seemed to be mostly empty space, with boxes and posters and other publicity props scattered here and there.
Downstairs, he could hear more angry rumblings that sometimes rose to shouts as the video went on. That raw anger was different from his last few cases, and all the little lies of city officials and double-dealing businesses.
To his relief, the two men he’d passed soon headed downstairs. And he saw another good sign in the corner: file cabinets, not computers. He’s never had much luck with passwords, but those cabinets’ locks would be easy to bypass later.
He Opened his hearing to catch more of the crowd below, just to be sure they weren’t planning to storm the LifeLab gates that night. Not that they’d go that far, but he’d done so much to fan those flames—and bringing out bits of the truth, the truth, is all I have.
Somewhere below, someone said, “Koenig.” Paul started, and cast around for the source. The voice was Detective Reid’s again.
“And you never met him before then?” Reid was whispering. A woman began gushing about how recent a convert Koenig was and how hard he always worked, but she said little that would help Paul before the conversation died down again.
And I stuck my neck out up here without even thinking that the detective would stick around after he tried leaning on Koenig. Paul kept an ear on him now, but the only voices he heard down there were the video and the reactions to it. And at least Reid seemed to be staying down there; Paul glanced at the oak tree beside the window and tried not to imagine having to climb out. I’m taking too many risks just to vindicate Sarah from what I—
Sarah? Paul frowned. Why am I thinking of the reporter and not that I helped a liar attack the lab?
He steadied his focus on Reid, who was still not moving, and considered. Sarah Gomez was just the latest reporter he’d sold anonymous information to. And he’d only toyed with the notion of ever contacting her again, if he did want to do work that was more like an ordinary journalist, at least before his tip to her had gone all wrong.
But no, the thought of contacting her had been crossing his mind more after the story had gone bad. After he’d glimpsed how brave she looked when she refused to talk about her elusive source, with her job on the line. Brave and… attractive, not that he…
“Schuman and Son.”
Just a whisper, a ripple that barely reached Paul’s hearing, where it was still focused on the detective. Paul searched frantically through the echoes of the angry crowd, trying to locate the source of that name—my own name, and that voice couldn’t be…
“…admit, we’re always interested in possible clients,” the voice was saying, and now Paul knew it was Lorraine speaking. “But mostly, I was curious about all of you.”
“I’m afraid our movement doesn’t usually hire PR firms,” someone replied. It was the group’s leader again, who had so recently been shouting to the crowd.
“I suppose not; my work’s done then.” And it was Lorraine’s laugh: easy, friendly.
Not the same way she’d laughed with them, though, never like she’d laughed with the joy of being Greg’s wife, or to make the whole family laugh in return—
Paul’s knee twinged in midstride. He hadn’t even realized he was moving, but he pulled up short at the top of the broad staircase.
“Unnh, did you have to show that one?” Lorraine asked, and the rabble-rouser sounded almost embarrassed as he began whispering about bringing different animal-rights causes together.
The voices weren’t so far beyond the stairs. Paul edged forward, just enough to peep over and down. The shifting wash of colors from the video screen gave more than enough light for him to spot them—even if she hadn’t given a sad little sigh just then.
He saw the top and back of her head, and the even paler silver-blue gleam of a fine silk blouse. The kind of outfit she’d seemed uncomfortable wearing once. But she’s had years learning to be a Schuman now…
She started to glance around, and Paul ducked back before he came into her view. Why am I watching her now? She probably hates me. And he’d tried, he’d been sure he’d kept Dad’s and Greg’s names out of the exposé about what they’d tried to cover up—of course he couldn’t remember who’d dragged them into it, not with his first night’s rush of power twisting his mind into knots…
“Are all farms really like that?” his sister-in-law was asking.
“That’s one of the milder ones,” her guide said.
Paul peeked down again. She was distracted now, watching the screen. He tried to stop staring, but he couldn’t pull his gaze from that blond head, or how far away she was, his whole family was, the whole life he’d thought he had, and I can’t—
A tremor went through her; Paul ducked back again as her hands started to clutch at her head. His hearing sharpened and he heard her moving, stumbling away. He peeped around again but she was already out of view.
“Ms. Schuman? Are you alright?”
“I… don’t know…” she said weakly, her voice sounding choked with hesitation. No—with fear.
Paul crouched down lower on the stairs. He had to move, had to help her, but one voice after another was stirring around her, closing in to watch. It couldn’t be, this can’t be happening…
His hearing focused beyond the others, and filled with Lorraine’s ragged breathing. He heard her say one word, the faintest, most fragile whisper.
“Paul?”
Good God, it’s impossible—She couldn’t have seen him, let alone… But what he’d heard was all too real. He stood up and glided down the stairs like moving in a dream.
The crowd was still mostly watching the video, bathed in the images from the pound and the room’s half-light. It took him a moment to pick out her shape behind one knot of figures.
He still couldn’t believe it, but Lorraine was huddled there, leaning against the wall, hands pressed over her eyes. Four, five, seven people had turned halfway toward her, even though she’d barely made a sound.
He could see the detective was still on the far side of the room. He wasn’t looking over, but no doubt he would soon. And somehow it’s my fault.
Paul slipped forward, using every advantage he had among people slowed by the weak light, ignoring the throbbing in his knee. He slid around them, past them, he had to move faster…
When he got close, he reached right between the gathered onlookers to grip her shoulders and lean in next to her still-covered face. As softly as he could, hoping the faintness itself would draw her attention, he said “Let it go. Let it go… it’ll pass…”
“It… you…” she gasped.
“I’m here. Just let it go.”
It was all he could think to say, but through her shoulders he could feel her trembling ease. Her breath steadied, and she drew her hands down and looked back at him, shock still glittering in those blue eyes. Slowly she turned away.
Then, in an almost normal voice, she said to the others “I’m alright… I guess I need some air.” And she pulled herself up and started walking for the door.
Paul fell into step behind her, not glancing at the faces that followed them. Let them think the explanation is something simple. Something possible.
Lorraine walked steadily, except for a tiny falter in one step, when she stopped at her chair to grab her coat and purse. She didn’t say a word until they were outside.
“It’s so cold!” She shivered and hugged the coat to her, but didn’t put it on. Instead she turned around to him. “Paul… how did you…?” Her voice faded away.
“Keep your eyes moving when it starts. Back and forth, don’t focus on one thing. That should usually keep you from…” God, how can I put it into words… “being pulled in. Can you do that?”
“I…” She swung her head to one side, then another, more slowly. Then she turned and stared right at him. “But, how?”
Her words were still quiet, but they seemed to hang there in the cold air.
“I know what happened to you. Somehow, it happened to me two years ago. I’ll try to show you… how to handle it,” he added weakly.
I’ll try. Even though I’ve just destroyed your life. And Paul knew he still didn’t actually know much more than what he’d just told her about the power.
“I need your help,” she was saying, insistent.
“Right. I said I’d try.” As he watched her, his vision blurred. He began to understand how much he was risking. “But please realize, I haven’t seen Greg or Dad in years…”
A hopeless protest rose in him, for her not to tell her husband she’d seen him. Everything he’d tried to do, all the secrets, the dangers… Now he was the one who couldn’t seem to breathe. It would be so easy to admit he’d told her everything he knew and then just slip away. But could I leave her to face what I’ve been through, alone? Just seeing her gain the power had shown him more than he’d ever known about it…
His head was spinning. “Two years,” he said again weakly.
“Are you sure?” And she took a step toward him.
“What?” He shook his head, trying to clear it. Why was she looking at him so intently, as if all her doubts a minute ago had just been pushed aside? “I don’t think…” he began awkwardly. “I mean, I ran away from you all. I don’t think I can ever go back.”
“Paul!” Lorraine caught at his arm, and he barely jerked out of her reach. More gently, she said, “Paul. Greg asked me to go out tonight, but… he’s been in the hospital, for days. And someone broke into our home.”
Chapter Two
Paul couldn’t say a word.
“It was the night after his car crash—and he’s fine,” Lorraine added, just in time for him to feel the stab of guilt for not asking at once. “Mostly bruises. They wanted to keep him for observation, but he should be out of the hospital in a day or two—”
“Oh.” It was the only thing Paul could say.
His brother. His brother, his secret, someone out there—At least he’s still alive… His thoughts kept spinning, tumbling and couldn’t settle.
“I came home and found the lock smashed in,” Lorraine said. “And whoever it was had searched the house. All of it,” and she shivered again.
She was talking faster now, he voice low, but Paul could only stare. This can’t be happening! Whatever it is is going to catch me in the wreckage, worse than her and Greg…
“Just a few things were stolen,” she went on. “That’s the worst of it. We can’t even know if it was robbery or… something else. So we can’t know if they’ll come back. Or even if his accident was an accident.”
“Oh,” Paul said again. He glanced back at the path up to the mansion, glad nobody was passing by. Quietly, he said, “And the police say…”
“Didn’t you hear me, Paul? A few jewels and things were gone, just like a robbery. We almost didn’t report it at all.”
“Why not?” The question was out of his mouth before he remembered he wanted her not to think of him as someone who spent his days dealing in secrets.
But Lorraine only glared at him. “We wanted to protect Schuman and Son’s reputation. You know better than I do how the business always comes first, and Greg and your father wondered if the police would even look that far into a simple robbery.”
Her words came faster and faster now, pouring out. “Sure enough, the police only said there was nothing to explain. The same as they did about the crash. So we just put in new alarms and said we’d move on. But I need answers.”
“What answers?” Paul asked, then winced inwardly. I’m just digging myself in deeper.
Lorraine turned away, looking down the street, as if she’d vented all of her thoughts and needed a moment to gather more. “Answers about… well, whether someone did come after us. And why, and so, what we could do about it.” She turned her gaze back now to search Paul’s face. “Greg and his father say it’s just a robbery, but I keep worrying there’s a reason. And I don’t think it’s anything I did, I’ve been racking my brains about it for days… and I haven’t really done much that was separate from Greg since we married.”
From anyone else, those last words would have been a reflexive denial—or else spoken with a bit of embarrassment. But he remembered how happy she had been to be part of Greg’s life.
I can’t believe I’m measuring out the amount of devotion in the family I left!
Paul snapped “You really think they’d tell me more than you, after the way I vanished? Or are you asking me to investigate my brother and my father?”
I just had to say ‘investigate’! Now he’d almost admitted he could—or that he almost could—and how he’d been spending those years since his disappearance; if she doesn’t guess how much I’ve done, at least she can’t let it slip to one of the people I’ve exposed, or can’t force me to keep fixing her problems, or judge me. But this was still so out of his depth—He watched her eyes, trying to guess what she suspected.
“I’m asking you to protect us,” she said. “And I shouldn’t have to ask.”
Paul held her gaze, but it was all he could manage for one breath, then another. “That’s easy to say,” he finally muttered. “You’re still new to the family. You don’t really know how long Dad and Greg and I had been arguing, over everything from baseball to, well, you and your place with them. And now you think some trick senses are going let me somehow go all through the city to track down some—”
His eyes went wide. Track down? What if I’m the one who’s been tracked down, by one of my cases, and they’re going after my family…
He shook his head. There was no way, not when he’d rebuilt his whole life to keep himself invisible and leave every tie to his past behind.
“Listen.” Lorraine’s voice was softer now, and she took a small step toward him. “I’m due to visit Greg now. You can come and see how he is, or… at least use the drive to explain what's happening to me.”
“All… right,” Paul sighed. Maybe she’s in denial, trying to focus on the other events in her life before she comes to terms with what the power can do to her. At least she’s able to mention it.
He went on “But you’re just starting to learn about your power, and you don’t know how it can sneak up on you sometimes. So I’d better drive, unless you want—”
He bit off the words another crash, realizing how cruel they’d be after she’d almost lost her husband in one car wreck. Or maybe they’d just be cruel to me, the way Mother died. He braced himself for the explosion.
“Besides,” and Lorraine actually smiled, “you’re a guy.”
Paul had to laugh then, as she dropped the keys in his hand and started down the street with him a step behind. The block felt oddly quiet after their argument, but he knew that could only last for so long.
The night grayed away the colors of the line of parked cars, but Paul Opened his sight a moment, and sure enough, there was the shamrock green of the little Toyota she’d always driven. Then he sighed. I could have asked her to test her own power looking at it in the night. It could have been her first lesson.
It had been a while since he’d driven anything, the way his senses just might surge away while he was behind a wheel, but his body settled into the seat naturally enough. As he turned the key, he shot a questioning glance at Lorraine beside him.
“He’s at St. Central,” she said.
He would be. Hearing the hospital’s nickname from a Schuman didn’t even sound the same as hearing it on a routine day. The last place where he had seen his family, the place where his power had struck him… but he shook off those thoughts now, not ready to believe fate itself was trying to trap him.
He kept the car at a safe twenty-five miles an hour at first, trying to settle his thoughts as much as control his senses. Whatever else happened, he couldn’t let Lorraine go through the horrors of understanding her power all alone. But this break-in they had… and do I even want to see Greg again? His fingers clenched on the wheel, glad the street was fairly quiet at this hour.
From the corner of his eye, he watched Lorraine, as she sat so still with her hands folded in her lap. She already knows what no other human being knows about me.
And now he had to show her how to control a power that was so obviously good at finding secrets, without letting her guess how he’d been using that power himself! If she connects my being at Animal Alliance with the files that were stolen to start its accusations…
Paul bit his lip hard, trying to focus on the road ahead. I thought I’d left all this behind. But here he was, driving right back to where it had all started. It had been Lorraine’s dying mentor that St. Central had juggled insurance rules to raise the bill for. And when Greg’s answer to that was to cut a deal with them that covered up what the Schumans knew—and Paul had had to…
The light ahead turned red, and he pulled the car up and took a deep breath.
“About that break-in,” he said. “I’m not sure I can be much help.”
“What? You’ve just shown me you have…” Even enclosed in the car, she dropped her voice to a whisper, “…you have this talent. And now you say you can’t do anything?”
“I’m showing you what I have, what we have. And our ‘talent’ can’t pull answers out of the air or anything. There’s a lot it can’t do. Plus, I’m not a trained cop, and I don’t have underworld contacts, or any of the things someone would need to play detective about a robbery.” He couldn’t think which would be worse: getting them killed because simple crime was so much more violent, or letting her or anyone know about how many quieter secrets he did work with and what that would lead to.
“But your talent can fix this,” she said. “It has to.”
“You still don’t understand what ‘it’ is.” Not that I know so much more…
The light turned green, and he took a breath as he nudged the gas. Maybe that was the key; if he could explain their power to bring down her anxiety about it, and also head off her suspicions about how he was using it.
“Lorraine.” He spoke slowly, reasonably, while keeping his eyes on the road. “What we have is the power to increase our five senses by connecting them to whatever we focus our attention on. That’s all it is; it doesn’t mean we can get easy answers to any question we want.”
Lorraine said nothing, and he continued.
“And yes, it does mean it has a danger. The way your senses locked up at the party? That’s a risk you have to learn to live with now. But the thing is, you can resist it too, learn to keep it from happening.”
He glanced over at her. She was sitting quietly, watching him. He gestured toward the office building sliding past their window.
“Try practicing now. Just focus your mind on something there and then let it go. See if you can let it go before we drive past it. As long as you can learn to recognize when your attention on something is starting to Open your senses, you can keep it from happening when you don’t want or from lasting longer than you want. Then you can control it. Try it.” He motioned to an approaching streetlight.
“So… that’s all it is?” she asked slowly. “And you’ll help me with it, and you’ll find out who broke into our home.”
No I didn’t agree to that! Paul caught himself before he snapped that at her, and concentrated on keeping the car steady. “Look… if you’re thinking this power is going to change your life, you’re right—but that means you have to take control of it. And you have to start now. For instance, have you thought about what it’s going to do to you and Greg? Are you so sure you can stay with him?”
“Don’t even joke about that,” she said coldly. “And don’t try to distract me. We need to figure out who broke into our house.”
Who’s trying to distract whom? Paul was losing count, but he said “Don’t you think you can just ignore what’s happening to you. Think about this: you got the power when I was focusing mine too closely on you. Don’t pretend you forgot what that flood of senses did to you, and it’s going to keep happening. And, what if some day you do that to Greg?”
“Oh.”
That one dazed sound was all she said, but Paul knew he’d broken a little of her denial. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It scared me, too. I don’t know what this means yet, but you’ve got to understand how this works.”
“You mean,” she said slowly, “you changed me? And you’ve changed other people like this before?”
“I said I don’t know what happened to you. If it was me, I’m sorry, and I am trying to help. I don’t think I’ve ever ‘changed’ anyone else, nobody I’ve known in the two years I’ve had… this. But,” he had to add, “that may not mean much for you. Not much of those years has been spent around people.”
She didn’t answer, and he couldn’t say more. For a long moment, they sat quietly and Paul watched the street signs, looking for the next turn toward the hospital.
“Paul…” She spoke softly, and he glanced over. She was looking out the window now, but he didn’t think she was trying out his exercise for her power. “Paul, do you think the power does come from being touched by someone else’s power? Or is it… something else?”
“I never thought so. But I never knew much about that until tonight, Lorraine. I don’t even have clear memories of the night the power came to me, only that I was at the hospital. Since then, believe me, I’ve looked at everything that was in the whole building, and there are no clues.”
He stopped a moment. I’m getting too close to admitting how many nights I’ve gone spying around the hospital. Paul didn’t like how much that implied about the skills he’d lived by since.
He tried again. “There just wasn’t anything unusual in that environment, and there’s no sign in my genetics, either. Not from anything I could learn about my family, for generations back. None of us seemed to do anything like this, and I never did before, either. And of course now the other one to get it isn’t a Schuman at all,” and he gestured to her. “So I don’t know.”
“You really don’t.” It seemed to be sinking in to her, a bit of how much he’d been living with.
“I just remember it came to me,” he added, not wanting to reveal that he was still struggling to understand what that meant about any kind of purpose for him, even before adding her to the mix.
“There’s something else,” Lorraine said, almost hesitant now. “That was you who told the media about St. Central’s insurance tricks when you left, wasn’t it? Did all of this give you some kind of compulsion to…”
“The power never makes me do anything. I told you, what you have to fight is it locking your senses up on something. Or do you really think I’d drag the family through that?” he added, trying to make it sound light, as if there were nothing to worry about. But he felt a tightness in his throat as he said it; he had leaked that information, yes, but he’d picked evidence that would lead the investigation away from how Dad and Greg had known. And he still wondered, who had found the rest of the papers…
Fumbling for a joke, he said “I might as well ask if you did it. Curtis was your friend, and even though Greg and Dad made that deal to get him the money, they did it by covering up everything they’d found about what St. Central put him through. So, was it you getting revenge?”
“That is a joke, isn’t it?” and she looked almost hurt. “I’d never turn on the family like that, you know that.”
“Of course.” He tried a different joke. “But only because I know you. We Open our five senses—we don’t read minds.”
“Oh.”
The word seeped out of her, and Paul could hear real relief in it. If she’s fighting to focus on the break-in, what must it be like for her now, hearing the boundaries of her world pulled apart and rearranged with every new sentence we say? Had she been thinking just seconds ago of what other barriers might have broken, and now she was trusting again that she could think her own thoughts?
He drove on without another word, trying not to imagine how easily Lorraine could destroy everything for him, if word made its way to any of the liars he’d exposed. He didn’t even want to see Greg or Dad again after he’d left, but she was so determined.
The vast parking lot was just where he remembered it, not too far from the hospital. The car glided into an empty space all too neatly, no more delays before he had to choose.
They had just gotten out when she stepped suddenly around the car to stand in front of him, eyes locking on his. “Paul. Please…”
Meeting her gaze, he braced himself. “What?”
“Paul, I can’t let Greg know about this thing. Not yet.”
He could only stare. “You can’t?”
“Let me figure this out first. Please. He doesn’t have to know about you if you don’t want.”
Trying not to smile too widely, he said, “Deal.”
Together they made their way to the front entrance, blending in with the scattered visitors who had night business at St. Central. He and Lorraine weren’t standing in lines, but Paul felt as if he were falling into step with something else—his months of discreetly exploring the hospital for answers. The sharp smell was the same, even though he was careful not to Open to it.
After they had passed by the main desk, the crowds grew thinner. The lights seemed a little dimmer, and the orderlies and nurses walked more quietly. Lorraine clipped a “Regular Visitor” pass onto her collar; of course, at this hour, the hospital rules limited who could visit. Paul took a moment to picture them trying to deny his family those special passes, and how his father or Greg would force past their objections, even after the Schumans’ harsh history with this place.
Still, he dropped back and stayed a few more steps behind Lorraine. His second-hand wardrobe might stand out if he walked right next to her in her Schuman-quality outfit. He kept his hands “adjusting” his coat and walked confidently, as if there surely had to be a pass clipped on it just under his fingers.
“Lorraine!”
The voice made Paul half turn, and he froze to see the figure advancing behind them. The quiet corridor picked up the echoes of that stride, steady and sweeping along like a force of nature in one compact frame, my father is walking right toward me… in the very building where he’d last seen him, the place where Paul had ruined his father’s scheme and then left his life. There was not a single person or corner for Paul to step behind now. He was walking right toward them, and Paul couldn’t move…
And he walked right past Paul and drew Lorraine into step with him, never even noticing his son in his ragged clothes. Paul stared, not knowing what to think.
“I didn’t know you were coming by,” Lorraine was saying. As if, after two years in the family she still couldn’t call him Dad or Ian.
“I wanted to see him. Besides, this gives me a chance to thank you for keeping on top of his accounts while he’s in here.”
As they spoke, Paul let them pull away, at his father’s rapid pace. For the moment, it was just so much easier to stay clear and listen.
“Well, of course,” Lorraine answered. “Greg would never forgive me if we started falling behind.”
“But then, you’d be more helpful if you’d convince him to put down his phone now and then while he’s here. Don’t let the nurses keep confiscating it.”
Paul winced, as much at the familiar, so-reasonable tone as at the judging edge his father never quite kept out of his voice.
But where Paul or Greg would have protested, Lorraine only laughed. “Convince Greg? You’re a stubborn pair, you know.”
Before he could answer her, a buzz came from his pocket. He muttered, “Of course, now,” as he drew out his own phone and told her, “You go on ahead.”
When Paul saw his father start to turn back, he ducked behind a corner he’d been keeping near.
“No, we found some new art. You should have a scan of it now. If you give it a look, we can still get the release out tomorrow…”
The rhythm of our lives. Dad, Greg, and he had fought so long to give the firm every advantage, even when Paul had wanted to start journalism school instead. Now, watching his father walk by, Paul thought about how easy it would be to step out and join him. But nothing about his family or his new life was easy.
When his father was gone, Paul moved quickly after Lorraine. Unless St. Central had reshuffled the wards in the last year, she must have headed somewhere up along the next left turn.
The rooms he passed were a mix of silence and quiet voices now. A nurse in the hall gave him an odd look, but he kept walking as if he had no reason to doubt he belonged here, and she turned back to her cart. As he approached each doorway, he Opened his hearing for any familiar sounds.