# This ebook is published by Fictionwise Publications www.fictionwise.com Excellence in Ebooks Visit www.fictionwise.com to find more titles by this and other top authors in Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Mystery, and other genres. NovelBooks, Inc. www.novelbooksinc.com Copyright ©2003 by Anne Manning NOTICE: This work is copyrighted. It is licensed only for use by the original purchaser. Making copies of this work or distributing it to any unauthorized person by any means, including without limit email, floppy disk, file transfer, paper print out, or any other method constitutes a violation of International copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines or imprisonment. "Love, I have something I have to tell you." “Annabelle?” Gaelen's voice, surprising as it was, didn't startle her. She'd expected him, could almost remember him telling her he was coming, to wait for him. Annabelle turned toward him. He waited, his hands slightly raised. Was he offering to hold her? He must have seen the question in her eyes. He raised his arms higher, open, waiting. She stood up, not knowing if she could even take the two steps to bring herself within his protective embrace. Gaelen must have seen that, too, because he took the steps necessary and enfolded her, holding her against him, seeming to absorb into his own body the shaking of hers. He was so warm, so solid, and his arms felt so good around her, she just gave up trying to be strong. “I'm sorry,” she said, wiping at the wet spot on his shirt where her tears had soaked through. “Don't you dare apologize, darlin'. I'm here, and we'll make everything right.” His arms tightened around her and he breathed deeply. She looked up at him. “You're so sweet to be so concerned about Erin.” He squeezed her tighter, then he pulled a linen handkerchief from his pocket. “Here.” He wiped her eyes and held the handkerchief to her nose. “Like a good girl, now.” Obediently she blew her nose. He folded the handkerchief and put it back in his pocket, then sat on the side of the bed while Annabelle again took her seat in the ugly plastic chair. A rueful chuckle escaped her throat. “I never knew where the saying came from before, but I do now.” “What saying?” “You know the one. Sleeping like a log?” The strangest expression crossed Gaelen's face, unbroken by even a trace of a smile at her little joke. His sky-blue eyes flicked over to the bed, then away. Annabelle could have convinced herself she saw disgust on his face. “Love, I have something I have to tell you.” The tone of his voice forced her to obey him, her heart beating with dread. “Annabelle, do you remember when you were a young girl,” he started, “maybe, twelve or thirteen or so, you heard a ruckus from the back yard, the tool shed? You went out there. Do you remember seeing something?” His pause was full of uncertainty she could actually feel. “Something unusual?” “How do you know about that?” “Just tell me what you remember seeing.” “I can't talk about that now, Gaelen.” “Please, darlin', remember and tell me.” Spurred by the urgency of his voice, she pulled up the memory, trying to see the fantastic vision again. “I saw a boy, maybe five or so years older than me. He was crouched in the corner of the shed.” She felt her blush zoom up her face. “He was, ah, naked.” This is a work of fiction. While reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the characters, incidents, and dialogs are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and review. For information, address NovelBooks, Inc., P.O. Box 661, Douglas, MA 01516 or email [email protected] NBI Published by NovelBooks, Inc. P.O. Box 661 Douglas, MA 01516 NovelBooks Inc. publishes books online and in trade paperback. For more information, check our website: www.novelbooksinc.com or email [email protected] Produced in the United States of America. Cover illustration by Nathalie Moore Edited by Melanie Duncan ISBN 1-59105-072-3 for electronic version ISBN 1-59105-097-9 for trade paperback To Tink, Kathryne Overton, the best critique partner any writer ever had. CHAPTER ONE Erin is in the psychiatric ward. That's what her mother had said. Annabelle didn't let herself think about it. Not yet. She didn't have enough information to start going off the deep end.One of us has to stay calm , she thought. Here she was, at the University of North Carolina Medical Center, where she'd been told to go, after driving from Raleigh-Durham airport through a storm-darkened day that matched her mood. The huge building stood cold and spare. People came here for help, yet it seemed to Annabelle a heartless place. She pulled her too-light windbreaker around her to ward off the wind and dashed for the automatic doors. People littered the area like discarded candy wrappers. The buzz of whispered conversations filled the air. Skirting the oversized potted palms, Annabelle approached the information desk sprawled in the middle of the lobby. The elderly volunteer looked up from a supermarket tabloid.The Weekly Investigator , Annabelle noted with approval. “May I help you?” the volunteer asked. “My sister, Erin Tinker, is a patient. Can you tell me where to find her?” “Certainly. How's that spelled?” The woman bent her blue hair toward the computer screen in front of her, hunting and pecking the last name, T-I-N-K-E-R. Instead of the six strokes it usually took, with all the backspacing and correcting it took more like twenty. Finally, the woman looked up. “I'll need some identification, please. A driver's license will do.” Annabelle breathed a sigh. Here it came, she thought, as she pulled her wallet from her jacket pocket. After a moment's digging, she handed over her driver's license. “Umm, let's see, Miss Tinker.” The volunteer glanced up, her old eyes twinkling. Okay, okay, get it over with. Annabelle pasted a smile she hoped was tolerant on her lips. “Annabelle Tinker? That's just sodarling ! How imaginative. You aren't a fairy in disguise, are you?” The old woman gave the license back. “No,” Annabelle said, wishing for the millionth time Walt Disney had never learned to draw. “Here's your pass, dear. Clip it to your blouse while you're in the hospital. That way the brute squad won't toss you out.” The woman smiled. “Now,” she said, motioning with her hand, “take that elevator right there to the eleventh floor and, when you get off, turn right. Your sister's in Room 1135.” “Thank you.” Annabelle took the pass and turned toward the elevators.Eleventh floor? Were they crazy putting crazy people on the eleventh floor? What if someone tried to jump? She squashed the concern. It was none of her business if they put the psych ward on the roof. She had all she could handle taking care of her mother and sister. The elevator's electronic voice announced the eleventh floor and Annabelle got off, turning right as the receptionist had instructed. “Darling, oh, I'm so glad you're here!” Annabelle looked toward the voice and saw her mother coming, histrionic sails billowing. “Mom, what happened?” She hid a wince as she realized she'd blurted out the wrong question, an open-ended one which would give her mother the opportunity to go on ... and on ... and on. Immediately, she tried to remedy the mistake by focusing her mother on the present. “Why is Erin here in the psych ward?” She laid her arm around her mother's shoulders and led her to a couch in an out-of-the-way lounge, where they sat down, allowing her mother to draw a big breath. Tamping down her impatience, Annabelle tried to remember it hadn't been that long since Dad died. Mom needed time to get used to being alone and taking care of herself. Now this. “I don't know,” Susan Tinker finally said. “Erin and Lucas left the house on Saturday night to go to a movie. The next thing I knew, it was four in the morning, and the police were banging on the door.” She shivered and Annabelle hugged her closer. “Oh, I wish your Dad were alive! He'd know what to do.” Annabelle bit her tongue. “Mrs. Tinker?” A tiny young woman wearing a long white coat over green hospital scrubs stood beside them. “Erin wants to see you.” “Oh, thank you, Dr. Duncan. Is it all right if we go in?” “Of course, Mom,” Annabelle said, more sharply than she'd wanted. “Just a moment, please.” The doctor, a redheaded sprite of a thing, with wire-rimmed glasses on her upturned pixie nose and the small, delicate features Annabelle had always wished for, sat down beside Annabelle's mother. “I do want to warn you to be prepared for some pretty wild things. Erin has apparently had some sort of shock. Frankly, I'd have to diagnose her as delusional based on my preliminary examination.” Finally!Annabelle sat up, energized. Data. Facts. Evidence. Something concrete to grab on to. “What makes you say she's delusional, Doctor?” At the doctor's questioning look, Annabelle gave a tight smile and added, “I'm Erin's sister, Annabelle.” “Ms. Tinker, nice to meet you.” Dr. Duncan smiled sadly, offering her hand for a quick shake to acknowledge their introduction. “I'll let you hear it in Erin's own words. Let me caution you, though. Don't argue with her. Go along with her if you think you can be convincing. Sometimes these cases become worse when they think they're being patronized. We don't want to upset her further by making her think we don't believe her. It could lead her to paranoid fantasies of persecution, which could result in more aggressive behavior.” “Oh,” Susan moaned. “Come on, Mom,” Annabelle said, setting her hand under her mother's elbow and helping her to her feet. “Thank you, Dr. Duncan.” Dr. Duncan smiled and nodded. “It's that room there.” Annabelle smiled in answer, knowing it didn't come off, and led her mother toward the room. “I can't, Annabelle.” “Yes, you can. Erin needs us.” She pushed open the door, and then pushed her mother through. “Annabelle.” Erin sat up, arms reaching. Releasing her mother, Annabelle practically ran to her sister's bedside, wrapping Erin in a hug. “Oh, honey, what on earth happened?” “You won't believe me. Nobody believes me.” Annabelle remembered the doctor's warnings. “Try me.” Erin glanced up, then over at her mother. “Mom, can you listen now?” Erin's tone forced Annabelle to study her more closely. She was calm. Her eyes were clear. There was nothing of a cloudy, crazed look in them. Her hands were steady as she reached forward for her mother to come closer. Their mother was the one who needed a sedative, but she did come to the side of the bed to sit in the ugly brown plastic armchair. Annabelle moved its tattered twin beside it, but, instead of sitting, she grasped Erin's outstretched hand in her own. “All right, sweetheart,” their mother said, her voice slow and loud, as though talking to a small, rather backward child, “tell me.” Eyes rolling upward, Erin sighed. “Mom, I'm nuts, not deaf.” She shared a smile with Annabelle before adding, “At least, they think I'm nuts after they heard what I told them.” “What did you tell them?” Annabelle asked. With a big breath, Erin sat up and gripped Annabelle's hand. “He disappeared. Poof. Gone.” “Who?” “Lucas. We were parked at the lake, making out in the back seat of his car and—” “Oh, Lord!” Her mother hid her face in her hands. “Please, Mom, not now. I know I was stupid, but—” “You mean he ran out on you?” Annabelle asked, her temper rising at the man's irresponsible behavior. “No!” Erin snapped her lips shut. “No,” she said more calmly. “Hedisappeared . He, ah, well, we....” She sighed. “He, you know, wasfinishing .” “Oh, God.” Erin ignored her mother. She leaned toward Annabelle, eyes wistful. “It waswonderful . But when he ... you know ... this bright, shiny, filmy radiance flashed behind him, and I screamed. Then his eyes got all wide, and he ... you know. Then he disappeared.” She sat up closer. “Vanished. Poof. There was a pinpoint of light flittering around like a firefly, and then it flew away.” Erin grew quiet, her gaze focused somewhere far off. Annabelle watched, a prickly feeling increasing as Erin's brow furrowed. “It was space aliens. It must have been,” Erin announced. Annabelle fell backwards into the chair behind her. It was worse than she'd thought. Her sister was certifiable. Was there any treatment? Erin frowned and stared at the door. “She was listening.” “Who?” Annabelle glanced around. “Dr. Duncan. Didn't you see the door close?” Annabelle was getting more worried by the minute. “I think looking in on you is part of her job.” “No. She's spying on me. She's one of them,” Erin insisted. “One of who?” “The aliens. Haven't you been listening?” “Honey,” Annabelle said, taking Erin's hand, “there aren't any space aliens. Lucas didn't disappear.” “Then where is he?” How could she tell her poor, sick sister her lover had taken a powder? Boys never changed. And Granny had been so right. They never buy the cow if they can get the cream for nothing. “I know what you think. You think he got what he wanted and took off,” Erin said, correctly reading Annabelle's mind. “He didn't. We're going to get married. He loves me. He said so. He showed me he did. Something took him away, and nobody believes me, and nobody is looking for him, and what if they do awful things to him?” Erin's voice had grown louder and more strident. “I've got to find him! He needs me!” She tore the covers off and threw her legs over the opposite side of the bed. Before either Annabelle or her mother could react, Erin was out the door. “Erin! Come back!” Annabelle flew down the hall after her sister, but was too late to stop the two large, burly men under Dr. Duncan's quiet direction from taking two each of Erin's limbs and carrying her back to her room. “Let me go! Let me go! I have to find him! I have to find him! Let me go!” Erin kicked and screamed and fought, using teeth and nails and feet. The two men carried her as though she weighed nothing. They ignored her cries and the hysterical bucking of her body as she hung from her arms and legs between them. “Get her in bed and wait there for me.” After giving these directions, the pixie-like doctor turned to the Tinker women. “You'll have to leave while we get her sedated.” She gestured toward the waiting area and started off down the hall. Annabelle followed her. “Doctor, what happened? She was so calm.” Dr. Duncan stopped and turned. “What did she do, exactly?” “She was telling me what happened to her boyfriend.” “What did she say? Her exact words if you can remember them.” Annabelle struggled to bring the picture to her memory—Erin lying in the bed, animated and funny, but worried about Lucas. “She said they—” A warmth flashed over her cheeks. She felt she was betraying a confidence, yet the doctor had to have the information she needed to treat Erin. “They had sex in his car by the lake.” “Theywhat ?” The vehemence in the doctor's voice, the edge of disapproval, bothered Annabelle. It hadn't occurred to her that a doctor, especially one as young as Dr. Duncan, would be a prude. After all, this was a college town, filled to overflowing with young, healthy people, some free of parental supervision for the first time, surrounded by a double pheromone cocktail. “Of all the stupid...” The doctor's whispered words jerked her back the present. “Excuse me?” she asked, confused by the change in the doctor's attitude from shock to irritation. Dr. Duncan clamped her lips together. “I'm sorry. Please, go on.” “When...” she paused, glancing into the doctor's eyes. “Well, Erin said when he, ah....” “Ejaculated,” the doctor helpfully offered the clinical word. “Yes. Well, when he did, Erin says he vanished.” The doctor stared at her for a long time. Annabelle stared back, waiting for a question. A comment. Something? Dr. Duncan stared. And stared. She couldn't be sure, but Annabelle though she saw a twinkle of humor in the doctor's green eyes. And did the corners of her little bow mouth tip up in the threat of a grin? “Let me get this straight,” she finally—finally—said. “Lucas Riley had his orgasm, and then he vanished into thin air?” The deep growl of masculine laughter behind her made Annabelle jump before she could form an answer. She jerked around, alarmed by the unexpected sound. The two orderlies had come up behind her. Now they stood, waiting for Dr. Duncan's orders, hands in their pockets, deep chuckles still rumbling from their chests. Their humor stuck Annabelle in her indignant bone. “What exactly is so funny about this?” Annabelle asked sharply. “Nothing, ma'am,” one said, though he raised his hand and whispered behind it, too loud for Annabelle not to hear it. “Sounds like the lad had a good time.” Another deep rumble of amusement followed. “This is not funny!” “Indeed not.” The doctor directed a glare at them. The two men responded not by smothering their grins, but merely by directing their eyes to the floor. “Is there anything else I need to know?” the doctor asked. “Well, only that she seemed so calm, and then she said something about space aliens taking Lucas off for experiments and that you, Dr. Duncan, were spying on her. She said you were one ofthem . The space aliens.” The doctor didn't seem offended. In fact, her response was quite positive. “Excellent,” she said, exchanging a glance with the orderlies. “Gentlemen, would you stay with Miss Tinker while I speak with her sister?” “Certainly, Doc.” The two men left them alone. Dr. Duncan crossed her arms and drew a breath. Annabelle mimicked her, knowing serious words were coming. “You must not be fooled by the calm façade, Ms. Tinker. Your sister is very disturbed. She is displaying clear, paranoid delusions, and now she's involving me in them.” She pursed her lips as though thinking over her words. “That may help us, or it could hurt our course of treatment. We'll just have to wait and see. I'm going to sedate her and let her rest. I suggest the same for you and your mother. We'll call you when she wakes up.” “Please let me stay with her.” The doctor's frown prompted Annabelle to add, “My sister has always been levelheaded and sure of herself, doctor. You can't imagine how unnerving it is to see her like this, but I think I can help keep her calmed down, now that I'm aware of how serious her condition is. Please let me stay.” “I don't know...” “Annabelle, what's going on? Where's my baby?” Her mother interrupted, wringing her hands together, nearly tying her fingers in knots. Dr. Duncan stepped up to her, taking her hands. “Mrs. Tinker, I'm going to sedate Erin so she can rest. Go home and get some sleep.” “No, no, I won't leave her!” Susan's tone was as frantic as Erin's had been before she'd flown out of her room. “Mom,” Annabelle said, taking over the situation. “I'll be here. Go home and try to sleep. You can't help Erin if you collapse from exhaustion.” Her mother calmed. Dr. Duncan stepped back, allowing Annabelle to manage her mother. “I'll never be able to sleep. I'll just stay, too.” “Oh, no.” Annabelle shook her head. “Absolutely not. The doctor is going to give you something to help you sleep. You are going home, taking a pill, getting into bed and sleeping. I'll stay with Erin and call you if there's any change, for better or worse.” Susan held onto Annabelle's hands and soon her breathing was slowing to match Annabelle's consciously slow breaths. “Doctor, can you give my mother something to help her sleep?” “I'd be glad to.” The tiny woman went to the nurse's station. While she was gone, Annabelle sat her mother down. “Thank you, Mom. This will be better, I promise.” “All right, dear,” Susan sighed. “I'm sorry I'm so useless.” “You're not useless,” Annabelle offered helplessly. Susan gazed at her, her eyes swimming. “I know I am, but you're an angel to try to say otherwise. Just like your father was an angel.” She sighed. Annabelle wished she could say something to help. “If there'sany change?” “Yes, I'll call. Promise.” Susan wrapped her in a big hug that went on and on. “Thank you for coming so quickly.” Annabelle squeezed back, breathing in the subtle fragrance of her mother's ginseng soap. It was a familiar scent, comforting. Something that said, “Everything's going to be okay,” in spite of her own sick feeling this situation would blow her own life completely to Neptune. Whatcha gonna do?It was what her Dad had always asked in such situations. Somehow it had always turned out okay. Except when he'd said it about himself, and the illness that smothered the life out of him. Whatcha gonna do? Her mother's gentle chuckle shook her. Annabelle realized with a start she'd spoken the mantra aloud. “Oh, how I've wished to hear those words today! You sounded just like your father.” Susan squeezed tighter. “Thank you.” Was that all it took? Susan eased her embrace and stood back a step. “I'll be all right, dear. You take care of Erin, and I'll be good.”