Katana (5 page)

I snorted. Who did they think I was? Some sort of psycho who hid in parking lots looking for groups of innocent men to beat up?
Right.

As they continued their joking, Quentin politely butted in to ask again when I would be able to leave. Only then did they realize that I wasn’t taking the situation as lightly as they were. After clumsily putting away their notepads, they said I was free to go. They turned to leave, but not before the older of the two officers, the one with a thick gray mustache even though his hair was brown, touched me lightly on the arm.

“I got a girl your age at home.” He leaned so close that I could smell the spearmint gum in his mouth. “I’ve seen lots of things … and … well … ” The words he didn’t say buzzed in the air like flies around roadkill. He scratched his chin. “Let’s just say, there are some very bad people in the world. Promise you’ll be careful?”

I tried not to shrink under his gaze, his eyes locked on mine, challenging me to tell him anything but the truth. “Uh, sure. I’ll be careful.” When he didn’t immediately move I added, “I promise.”

The cop studied my face for another moment before nodding once. “Good.” He glanced at Quentin, adding, “Take care, you two,” before following his partner out the door.

“That was weird,” Quentin muttered from the doorway after the cop was out of earshot.

“I know, right?” I hugged my arms across my chest to ward off the chill that had settled inside my bones. “I mean, why was he so worried about me being careful? They caught the bad guys. What else is there to worry about?” I didn’t need to tell him about the voice in my head. As far as I was concerned that was a one-time thing, the effect of adrenaline.

“Exactly,” he said. “Those guys are safely locked away. Though, I guess it couldn’t hurt if we were a little more cautious.” He shrugged. “We could buy some pepper spray or get one of those alarm apps for our cell phones.”

I nodded, even though the idea of having to carry around pepper spray made my stomach twist. Obviously, I understood that it was better to be safe than sorry, but every time I looked at the little canister dangling from my key chain I would be reminded of Weasel, the way he’d licked his lips before—no. It was best not to think about it, to just let it drift away like a bad dream.

“Ri-Ri, you’re shivering.” The nearness of Quentin’s voice startled me; I was so lost in my thoughts I hadn’t noticed him move. He grabbed my jeans and socks from the bedside table and tossed them to me. “Take these. You must be freezing.” He motioned to the hospital gown.

“Thanks.” I slid my feet out from under the blanket and slipped them inside last night’s asphalt-stained pants.

After I pulled my socks on, Quentin handed me my shoes. “Better?”

“So much,” I lied, hoping he didn’t notice my fingers shaking as I tied the laces. The last thing I needed was for Quentin to know my trembling had nothing to do with the cold.

6

S
eated in a wheelchair outside the hospital, I watched clouds made from cotton candy tumble and change shape as I waited for Quentin to get his car from the lot. It was like the sky itself dared me to be unhappy on such a beautiful day.

I covered my eyes and sank lower in the chair.

Behind you!

I was so stunned by the appearance of the voice in my head that I didn’t realize I’d twisted in my wheelchair and grabbed the wrist of my assailant until he was on his knees before me.

Only it wasn’t an assailant.

An acne-scarred hospital orderly stared at me in wide-eyed shock from the armlock I’d placed him in. He took several ragged breaths before managing to say, “You forgot your meds.”

“Oh, God.” I released my grip on his wrist.

The young man fell back and scrambled away from me like a crab. Once he’d put some distance between us he cautiously stood up, rubbing the elbow I’d bent at a gross angle. He released his breath in a hiss. “What are you? Some sort of martial arts expert?”

Good question. If only I knew the answer. “You shouldn’t sneak up on people like that!”

He narrowed his eyes. “I’ll remember that. And maybe you should take a couple of these.” He tossed a pill bottle at me, which I caught in one hand. “They’ll help you relax … so you don’t break someone’s arm or something.”

A wave of nausea rolled through me. I’d almost snapped his wrist, just like I’d done to Weasel last night. Only this guy had done nothing wrong. What was going on with me? Was I becoming dangerous to be around?

“Get some rest,” the orderly said, his eyes still wide. He walked backward into the hospital, staring at me the whole way.

“Impressive,” a new voice announced.

I whirled around in my chair to find the Asian guy who’d visited my room earlier standing next to me with his arms folded.

I glared at him. “What do you want now?”

His chocolate eyes bore into my own. “It appears I was wrong about you.”

After studying him for a moment, I realized it was a good thing Debbie wasn’t here. She would have signed him on as a model in a second. The brooding types always sold the most underwear. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means I can help you.” His English was clipped and tight, as if each word he spoke might be the end of his sentence. He pulled a business card out of his pocket and handed it to me: Black’s School of Martial Arts. The name Kim Gimhae was neatly written across the bottom in pencil.

I turned the card over in my hand. “What’s this for?”

“So you can call me and we can discuss this.”

I frowned. “Discuss what?”

Kim leaned toward me, and I detected the scent of sandalwood—warm and earthy. He kept his eyes focused on the parking lot and lowered his voice to a whisper. “The doctors told you that you went into shock, right? The police probably said that adrenaline helped you fend off your attackers.” His eyes flicked to mine and he shrugged. “You can believe them if you want.” He lowered his voice further, so it was little more than a hiss. “Did you hear whispers in your head last night, Rileigh?”

My chest convulsed as fear squeezed my heart into pulp. Impossible. How could he know about the voice? Who was this guy?

Before I could ask, Kim straightened. “Now that it has begun, people will be looking for you—dangerous people.” He eyes swept over the parked cars and I couldn’t help but follow his gaze, half expecting someone to come charging at us as we spoke. Instead, a woman got out of her car gathering a balloon bouquet behind her.

“If she charges us,” I whispered, “just dive behind that rose bush over there. The balloons won’t stand a chance.”

Kim frowned at me. “You should take your safety a little more seriously.”

“So everyone keeps telling me,” I mumbled.

He went back to scanning the parked cars. “It is only a matter of time before they find you. I can help. Call me when you’re ready.”

I shoved the card in my pocket, making a mental note to toss it into the nearest trash can the moment he was out of sight. “And how will I know when I know when
I’m ready?
”
I made air quotes with my fingers.

He looked at me, the intensity in his eyes melting the sarcastic grin from my face. “You’ll be ready when you realize just how much trouble you are in.”

7

M
y nerves were frayed worse than my favorite pair of American Eagle destroyed-wash jeans. It was bad enough that I was attacked at the mall and spent the night in the hospital, but now I had some freaky Asian guy telling me that he knew the truth about the voice inside my head?

I was quiet when I’d climbed into Quentin’s Mini Cooper. I’d even turned on the radio ear-bleedingly loud to discourage talking. But when he pulled out of the hospital parking lot a knot in my chest loosened. And the farther away we drove the more it unwound until, for the first time since before the attack, I could breathe. In fact, once we’d turned onto the interstate I felt a teensy bit embarrassed I’d allowed that Kim guy to get to me. After all, I
had
met him in a hospital. He could have been a patient himself. Maybe he had a head injury, or more likely, escaped from the mental ward. Both possibilities were more realistic than a group of dangerous people coming after me just because I had a rush of adrenaline.

We arrived at my house in South City at ten in the morning, which was nothing short of a miracle. The trip that should have taken forty-five minutes took twenty. The day Quentin got his driver’s license I learned he could bend the laws of space and time with his driving. I’m not sure how, exactly, because I usually kept my eyes hidden behind my fingers. Today was no different, and when I heard the familiar sound of my chipped driveway crunching beneath the tires, I dropped my hands.

Quentin casually flipped the sun visor back into place. Warp speed was nothing new to him.

After my pulse slowed from a gallop to a trot I asked, “Wanna hang for a bit?” When Quentin had sent Debbie a text to let her know we were leaving, she texted him back to say she’d pick up my car at the mall and then had to make a quick stop at the office before coming home. Debbie’s and my version of quick were very different and I didn’t really feel like being alone at the moment.

He turned to me and smiled. “Sure thing.”

“Can you grab the toaster?”

Quentin turned to the beaten box in the backseat. “What is it with you and this thing? You don’t really want to give it to your cousin, do you? It’s probably broken.”

Just like me. I knew last night had done something to me, something that wasn’t as obvious as the dents in the toaster. I could feel the strangeness of my own change
fluttering inside of me with each breath. “Just bring it inside,” I snapped.

Quentin held his hands up in surrender. “Sorry I said anything.”

I knew I should apologize, but I was afraid that if I opened my mouth the sob building in the back of my throat would break free. Instead, I bit my trembling lip and climbed out of the car, crossing the small yard to the front door of my house. I was home. The nightmare was over.

Be vigilant. We are being watched.

I fisted my hand inches away from the storm door handle as spiders with ice-crusted legs crawled down my spine. I wanted so badly to believe the voice sweeping through my head during the attack was the result of stress. But now, inches away from my home, it called to me again. What did it mean?
Who
was watching?

Reflexively, I turned on the porch stoop to see if I could spot a threat. The street was empty. Several months ago I helped Quentin research a paper on paranoid schizophrenia and I ran through the symptoms in my head. Hearing voices? Check. Obsessively anxious? Check. Unreasonably suspicious? Check.

The bones in my legs melted to mush one by one. I couldn’t go crazy. The damage to my reputation would be horrible and just
forget
about scoring a date to senior prom. I clung to the door handle to keep from melting into a quivering puddle.

Quentin frowned as he walked up beside me. “Are you feeling okay?”

I chose my words carefully. “I’m so tired I could pass out right here.” Which wasn’t technically lying, but that didn’t stop a wave of guilt from washing over me.

“Totally understandable.” He whipped out the key that Debbie had given him last year after I’d locked myself out of the house three times in a row. He pushed the door open. “Let’s get you in the house, then. Nothing takes the welcome out of a welcome mat like an unconscious girl on the porch.”

I allowed him to usher me inside and collapsed onto the couch with a blanket. Quentin brought me Shawnee, my stuffed black Labrador, and continued to scuttle around my house straightening things, as he always did when he came over. I tried to sleep, but my racing mind refused to shut down. Frustrated, I turned on the TV in the hopes that it would distract me, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the voice whispering in my head. What did it mean? Was I losing my mind or was it something else altogether? And more importantly, was there a way to get rid of it?

I tried to come up with answers, but found none. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more my head ached. Exhausted, and with a promise to figure it all out later, I wandered into the bathroom and popped two of the pills from the bottle the orderly had given me at the hospital.

Next, I pulled my favorite sweatpants from the hamper—the ones with a star printed on the hip—and after a quick change, made my way back to the couch. I wasn’t sure if it was the stress of the previous night, the medication, or a combination of both, but sleep did not come easily.

As I dreamed, I found myself in a place I almost remembered, slipping from the arms of a man with a face I could not see. I gripped him tighter as our entwined fingers, slick with sweat, slid apart, leaving me completely alone in a black room.

Out of the darkness I heard him scream.

8

I
t’s not too late, you know.”

Against my better judgment, I cracked my eyelids open.

Debbie stood before me in a form-fitting strapless pink dress. A wide fuchsia belt cinched her thin waist.