All was right with the world. I opened my eyes. Next to me Jade sat, her lush body clothed in a silvery-blue one-piece that matched her eyes. She looked over at me and smiled, and my heart thundered. My fingers were entwined around hers.

I closed my eyes again, breathed in deeply, and let it out slowly. Tension seeped out of my muscles, and I melted further into the lush towel covering my chair. The sun’s rays heated my skin, and then a cool breeze drifted over me. I moved my feet on either side of the chair and wiggled my toes in the sand.

“Are you relaxed?” came a voice from across the breeze.

I nodded my head slightly. Yes. I am relaxed.

Whispers met my ears, voices… Something landed on my cheek. Probably a bug. I swatted away, but still it was there, pressing on my skin.

And the whispers became louder.

“Come on, boy,” a voice whispered. “You think you can take me on? Do it, boy. Show me how strong you are.” And then an eerie chuckle, black and evil.

I rose from my chair to face my tormentor.

“Come on, boy. Show me what you got, boy.”

I cowered, rolling into a ball to the sand.

“You think you’re so tough, don’t you, boy? You can’t hurt me. You’ll never know who I am. I’ll never answer for what I did to you.” And then the eerie demonic cackling again.

The cackling that brought the rage rising through me.

I stretched out on the sand. Get up. Get up and show him. Get up and show him you’re not a scared little boy anymore. Get up, Talon. Get up.

My muscles tensed, and I grabbed hold of something… It felt like the leather arm of the chair, but when I looked down, it was just a handful of sand.

Get up, goddamnit. Get up.

I summoned my strength, called on every bit of fortitude and courage I possessed, and I stood. I stood my entire height of six feet three, and I towered over the masked maniac who taunted me.

“Decided to get tough again, boy? Show me. Show me what you’ve got.”

I pulled my hands into fists and forced myself toward him.

For once, I noticed his eyes. They were brown, brown and evil.

With all my strength, I pushed him down and landed on top of him in the sand.

“How do you like that, boy?” I taunted. “How do you like that?”

I punched his nose, the blood spurting on my face. And then, as he coughed and sputtered, I put my hands around his neck. His arms flopped at his sides, the tattoo of the flaming bird seeming to move as his muscles flexed.

“You like that, boy? You like how I choke you like that? Do you, boy? Tell me. Tell me you like it.”

With a jolt, I was back in my lounge chair, the sun shining on my face. Jade was beside me, her hand still entwined with mine.

 

I opened my eyes, and I was in the hunter-green recliner in Dr. Carmichael’s office.

“How do you feel?” Dr. Carmichael asked.

She was right about hypnosis not necessarily being relaxing. I had a push me-pull you sensation going on inside my muscles. They were both relaxed and tensed, if that made any sense. Of course, it made as much sense as any part of my life had in the last twenty-five years.

“I’m not sure how to answer that,” I said.

“Do you remember anything about the session?”

I nodded. “I remember being on the beach.”

“Yes, that’s how I guided you to relaxation. Then what?”

“I felt very good. Jade was beside me. And then…”

“What?”

“A man appeared.”

“Did you know this man?”

I gulped and nodded. Brown eyes. The man with the tattoo had brown eyes. Something new. “Yes. I mean, I don’t know his name, and I’ve never seen his face. He always wears a mask.”

“He always wears a mask in your dreams?”

I gulped again. “In my dreams. And in reality… When I knew him.”

“Was he the man you were strangling?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

“I guided you back to your dream when you fell asleep with Jade. That’s what you were remembering—what you were dreaming about when you ended up with your hands around her neck.”

I nodded.

“So you weren’t strangling her, Talon.”

“I know I wasn’t. I would never hurt her. But the fact is, despite that in my dreams it wasn’t Jade who I was strangling, in reality, it was.”

Dr. Carmichael nodded. “But at least now we know it wasn’t her you wanted to hurt.”

That did little to console me. “What if it happens again?”

“I don’t think it will, now that we’re starting to work through it. But if you’re scared that it might, just don’t fall asleep with her. Until you’re sure.”

I closed my eyes a moment. “That’s pretty much what I had decided anyway.”

“Now tell me about this man you were strangling. You say you knew him.”

“Yes.” My heart pounded.

“Is it someone from your time in the military?”

Oh, if only. People expected military personnel to have posttraumatic-stress disorder, expected them to have problems coping. If only it were that simple.

“No, it wasn’t someone from the military.”

“Then who was it?”

This was it, the moment of truth. The time of reckoning. Time to spill my guts.

“He was a man, one of three men, actually. He kidnapped me, beat me…molested—”

No, that wasn’t a strong enough word, and I had vowed to be honest, to get through this no matter how hard it was on me.

I cleared my throat. “He… He…raped me.” I squeezed my eyes shut. “When I was ten.”

Chapter Thirty-Four

Jade

“Hello, Wendy,” I said to the receiver. “This is Jade Roberts again from Snow Creek.”

A heavy sigh whooshed through the phone line and into my ears. “What can I do for you, Jade?”

“You can tell me about the relationship between Larry Wade and Daphne Steel.”

Silence for a few moments. Then, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I have reason to believe that Larry Wade and Daphne Steel were half brother and sister.”

And again, silence.