The Edge of Recall (39 page)

Smith eyed her. “That doesn’t strike you as strange?”

“He’s her therapist.”

Yes, but to what degree did a therapist insert himself into his client’s life? “Just give her a while. Let her realize she’s safe.” Was she? Or was she trapped somewhere by the monster in her mind? “I don’t know how long it’s been since she’s slept.”

“If she were sleeping, we could wake her.”

“There’s no point going out in the storm.” He slipped onto the couch and nestled her head in his lap. “Give her until morning. Then we’ll decide.”

Genie frowned. “Are you sure?”

He wasn’t sure of anything but did not want to give her up to anyone else when he’d promised they’d get through this together. “It’s only a few more hours.”

Bair nodded. “All right. Till morning.”

When Bair and Genie had gone upstairs to their respective rooms, Smith stretched out alongside Tessa and held her tightly against his chest. He wanted her to know without doubt that he was there. “Hang on, Tess. Hang on.” With his face immersed in her hair, he succumbed to sleep, opening his eyes only when the light of dawn came through the uncovered windows.

The landscape had been transformed by a thin layer of snow. Cottony gray clouds draped over the mountainside—more snow to come? He shifted. Tessa hadn’t stirred or given any sign of waking.

Bair came down the stairs. “Has she …”

“Not yet.”

“I’ll brew some tea.” He headed to the kitchen with which he’d seemingly grown familiar.

Genie came down, assessed for herself that Tessa had not awakened, and joined Bair in the kitchen. Smith got up from the couch, went upstairs to wash up and change clothes. Back downstairs, he took the offered mug and sipped. Bair had brewed the tea the British way, with the leaves loose in the boiling water. The agony of the leaves, that method was called, and produced a more robust effect—as human suffering brought out the deepest essence of an individual?

He rejoined Tessa. Was it arrogance to think he understood her situation better in the time he’d spent with her than the doctor who’d treated her for years? Or did he see with a fresh eye that something was off, even if he couldn’t tell what?

He leaned closer, noting a mottling on her skin where the sleeve of her coat had slid up. She looked bruised, even though she hadn’t fallen or hurt herself. All the while she’d screamed, her limbs had gone rigid, but she hadn’t beaten her arms on the ground or him.

Genie joined him. “How’d she do that?”

“I don’t know.” He lifted the lower edge of her coat and shirt. Her side and back were bruised, as though she had absorbed her father’s beating. Impossible. It must be a physical reaction to her extreme strain.

Genie frowned. “What happened out there last night?”

“Nothing that would have caused this.”

Genie leaned close. “Tessa, can you hear me?”

Without opening her eyes, Tessa started softly keening.

Genie turned away. “I’m calling Dr. Brenner. We need to bring her in.”

Smith didn’t argue. Dr. Brenner might be necessary, but his own conviction had not lifted. He had promised he’d battle the monster to the death, and they were not clear of the labyrinth yet.

Daddy!
The nightmare had never been so awful. She couldn’t find him, and the labyrinth itself had turned against her. The walls were closing in, the path getting narrower, darker. It followed no pattern she’d ever seen. If this path led to the center—what would she find there?

The hedge tore at her and she beat it back with her arms and fists.
Daddy? Daddy, where are you?
The hedge grew too close, engulfing the path. She had to press sideways to keep moving. When she looked back, the walls had closed in behind her. If she stopped, the labyrinth would swallow her.
Daddy, please. Where are you?

She pushed against the hedge with all her strength, but it wasn’t enough. It had almost grown together.
Please. Please!

She felt someone at her back, a strong arm pushing back the hedge, pressing her on. She tried to look but couldn’t turn her head. She had to reach the center. Or be smothered in the hedge and die.

Smith buckled Tessa into the seat beside him in the Jeep Wagoneer. He cradled her head in the crook of his neck while Genie followed the directions Bair read off to the Cedar Grove care facility. Dr. Brenner had said he would meet them there, and though they had wakened him, he was waiting when they arrived. “Bring her through here,” he directed Bair, who carried her limp in his arms.

They passed through the office bearing his name on the door to a smaller room with wall cabinets, a burgundy leather couch in the center, and a matching chair on casters. “Lay her down there.”

Bair eased her onto the couch. Dr. Brenner pulled back an eyelid and shined a penlight into her eye. He examined the bruising on her arms and stomach and straightened. “How did she get these?”

Smith shook his head. “They appeared with no explanation.”

The doctor pressed her mottled forearm, then lifted his finger. “There is an explanation, probably psychogenic bruising, or extreme distress bursting capillaries.” He straightened. “There’s no need for you all to wait. I’ll be admitting her.”

“No,” Smith said. Bair and Genie had started back out, but he wasn’t leaving. “I’ve brought her to you, but I’m not going anywhere.”

“This is no time to argue.”

“I promised her.” He sensed the animosity the doctor masked, but he was not letting Tessa out of his sight. Their standoff lasted only moments before Tessa resumed keening.

“Close the door behind you.” Dr. Brenner ordered Bair and Genie as he rolled the chair near the couch and sat down. “Tessa. Can you hear me?”

The soft wailing continued. Smith stood behind her, unwilling to surrender his post.

“I know you can hear my voice,” Dr. Brenner said in a smooth, even tone. “Wherever you’ve gone, I will bring you back. I’m going to count. …”

Smith clenched his jaw and prayed. Dr. Brenner might think so, but he was not God. There was only one source of absolute power.
Help her, Lord. Find her, wherever she is. Be her strength, her
protection, her champion.

With a cry she burst through the smothering foliage into the center. The hedge formed a solid circular wall around a dim space.
Daddy?
She was alone, without even the one who had given that final thrust. She took a step toward something shining. A thin bronze cross holding the crucified Christ.

Another step. Tears streamed. She had thought she would find him, thought her daddy waited there if she could only reach him. “Daddy!” The scream tore out of her throat.

Peace, child.

It was not her daddy’s voice. She wasn’t sure it was a voice. But she knew it. Deep inside, deeper than she’d ever gone on any path, with any meditative intention, and still the response she found was, “Daddy?”

Reaching out, she touched the cross and sank to her knees. “I didn’t help him. I didn’t make them stop. I didn’t tell what I knew. I was afraid.”

I know.

The sense of that knowing was deeper than any human knowledge. It went inside and knew all of her, every path she’d walked, every stumble, every fall, everything that had happened. It knew her yearning, knew her fear.
He
knew her need and touched it.

The joy that filled her had no edges. It would not cut and leave her bleeding. He would never abandon her.

Tessa’s shriek had pierced more than his ears, but Smith remained still and silent. One wrong move and Dr. Brenner might eject him. Three different approaches had failed to bring her to consciousness. Once again the doctor checked her eyes. They were not rolled back, but whether she saw the light he shined there it was impossible to tell.

“Tessa. This is Dr. Brenner, and I’m—”

She opened her eyes. Smith fought a smile at the fact that she hadn’t waited for his command, count, or instruction. She’d come back on her own, and he wanted to shout with triumph.

“Hello, Tessa.” Dr. Brenner’s smooth tone hardly expressed the relief he must feel. “Don’t get up.”

“How …” Her hoarse voice scraped through her throat.

“Smith brought you here.”

She looked up and Smith reassured her with a smile. She lowered her gaze to the doctor, whose benign manner suddenly seemed forced.

“I understand you’ve been doing some work without me. That was dangerous, though perhaps … fruitful.”

“I remembered something.”

“And I’d like you to tell me about it.”

She blinked, then nodded.

“With your permission, I’m going to use a voice recorder.”

“Why?”

“So that I can refer to it as we continue to process the trauma.”

Smith searched Tessa’s face for discomfort, but it didn’t seem to concern her. She trusted him, even after he’d sold her out to the sheriff. Given her limitations, that said so much.

Dr. Brenner fiddled with the handheld recorder he pulled from a drawer, then expelled an impatient breath. “It’s not charged. Just a moment.” He went to the outer office with the door closing behind him.

“Smith.” Tessa moistened her lips with her tongue. “Can I have a drink of water?”

He located the cooler but, in circling the couch, bumped the open drawer. It tipped onto the floor. Tessa sat up while he knelt to gather the scattered contents.

“Stop.”

He looked up at her surprisingly strident tone. “What?”

“That picture. Give it to me.”

He handed over the snapshot she indicated.

“That’s … that’s Dr. Brenner.” She pointed to the first of two men in front of a small aircraft. Her finger trembled. “And that’s my dad.” Her knuckles whitened. “He never said he knew my dad. All this time …”

The door opened. Occupied with the recorder, Dr. Brenner entered, then glimpsed her sitting up and frowned. “I didn’t want you to get up.”

“You knew my dad.” She sprang to her feet. “You were part of it.”

He saw the photo in her grip. “No, Tessa.”

She shook. “Were you there with a bat? Did you murder him?”

He drew himself up. “I was not there. I was not part of it.”

“You knew him! This is your picture with him.”