Blood Brothers (4 page)

Broken stained-glass windows loomed high above her head. There were gaping holes in the eaves, and patches of rotted wood on the roof, but they were impossible to reach.

How would she ever get him here? There was no way she could carry him; she couldn't just drag him through the cemetery.
Like I dragged that headstone through the hall and onto the porch, that headstone with Angela's name on it . . .

Her panic grew worse; her thoughts grew jumbled. What was she going to do about that headstone, anyway? She had to get home, make sure it was still hidden. What if Irene went out to get the morning paper and discovered the headstone instead?

“No!” Lucy whispered angrily to herself. “He's not Byron's brother; Byron would have told me!”

“I don't know!”

She couldn't answer that—didn't
want
to answer that. She had to find shelter, but there were no doors along here, no way to get in, no place to be safe.
“Hurry,”
he'd said,
“hurry before it comes back.”
Just a few months ago she'd have thought he was crazy; she'd have left him there and called the police, and her conscience would have been perfectly clear. Just a few months ago she wouldn't have listened, she wouldn't have believed him at all . . .

But that was months ago.

And that was before.

Before her world had turned upside down.

He'd known something was out there in the cemetery, watching from the shadows, slipping through the fog.

And she'd known it, too.

In fact, she realized now that she'd known it all along, ever since that first cold chill of danger near Byron's grave. That sinister presence haunting her, as merciless as any recurring nightmare . . . that nameless specter she'd be forced to recognize one day . . .

She remembered the message in her notebook, the message that had so mysteriously disappeared—disappeared without the slightest trace, just like that phantom among the headstones . . .

Lucy was half frozen. She sloshed through a mire of slush and snow, waded through dead, tangled shrubbery. Wind pierced the thin fabric of her shirt and gnawed her bare hands. And no matter how hard she tried to concentrate, her mind kept filling with thoughts she didn't want to think about and memories she wanted to forget.

Wanda Carver's death hung over her like a pall—the visions she'd had of it weighed her down with guilt. She'd come here alone this morning for no other purpose than being close to Byron. She longed to feel the companionship of his spirit, a haven of peace and solitude where she wouldn't be blamed or judged. A refuge where she could sort out her thoughts, where she might understand what was happening and why.

And now this.

This mysterious stranger, bleeding to death in the Wetherly mausoleum. This stranger who claimed to be Byron's brother. She didn't even know his name.

Each encounter had led Lucy straight into tragedy and heartbreak.

Where would
this
one take her?

“Damnit!”

The ground was more slippery behind the church, and Lucy was forced to slow down. She noticed a door at the top of some steps, but it was boarded over with thick wooden beams. Frustrated, she turned and looked back at the cemetery. She'd felt so strong when she'd gotten here this morning, so capable and determined—and now, though that resolve hadn't entirely disappeared, it
had
taken a dramatic and unexpected shift.
Why are you so shocked?
Hadn't she told herself this was all she could ever expect from now on? An isolated world that became more surreal with every day? Bad surprises at every turn?

Lucy stared miserably at the old building. Where else could she go? She should never have come here in the first place—it might already be too late. As if there weren't enough deaths on her conscience already . . .

And then she spotted the cellar.

At least, she guessed it was a cellar. One of those old-fashioned ones, with double doors slanted up from the ground and opening from the middle. The door handles were looped together with a heavy chain, but there didn't appear to be a padlock. Lucy squatted down and began tugging. Apparently no one had used this entrance for a long time—the chain was heavily caked with dirt and rust, some of the links embedded into the rotting wood of the doors. After several minutes of intense struggling, she finally felt it give way, and it rattled to the ground.

Lucy hesitated, an ironic thought flitting through her mind. This was breaking and entering, wasn't it? Even though she didn't intend to take anything, wasn't she still breaking the law?

Yet trespassing into a church was far better than letting someone die, she told herself. And with that bitter reality hanging over her, she went to work on the doors.

They opened fairly easily. As a wave of dank air washed over her, Lucy peered down into a pitch-black hole, then steadied herself against the outer wall. The darkness . . . the musty smell . . . it was almost like being back in that cave again, and it took her several seconds to catch her breath.
Go on!
Yet she couldn't make herself move, and the pale morning light seemed to hesitate at the very threshold of those cellar doors.
Like an entrance to the underworld,
Lucy thought, then wondered why she had. It might be run-down, but it was still a church.
What a weird comparison to make.

Very carefully, she inched forward. To her relief there was a rickety flight of stairs, and as her eyes began adjusting to the gloom, more of the interior came into hazy focus. It wasn't as cold down here as she'd expected. Fresh air was already blowing in behind her, thinning out the stale, stagnant odor of neglect. She continued slowly to the bottom of the steps, wishing she had a flashlight. Silence lay thick around her, as thick as the spiderwebs crusting the walls and rafters. No footprints had disturbed the dust upon the concrete floor. Whatever parts of the cellar were being used for storage, it was obvious this tiny, cramped room hadn't been touched in quite a while.

Yet through the dim shadows, Lucy could definitely see clutter. Stacks of folding chairs and tables, cardboard boxes and wooden crates of every shape and size, a broken lectern, everything shrouded in layers and layers of dust. Stained-glass cutouts were piled on a desk; panes of glass were angled into a corner. Mysterious shapes lurked under drop cloths. An open carton held a jumble of crosses and crucifixes, while another was stuffed with candles. There were old clothes jammed into grocery bags. From crooked picture frames along one wall saints gazed down at her, martyrs beheld her with wide and glassy stares, while Jesus himself in various poses seemed to follow her movements with a sad, forgiving smile.

In a matter of seconds, Lucy had scanned the entire area, her gaze finally coming to rest on a door in the opposite wall. It was hardly noticeable, camouflaged as it was between floor-to-ceiling shelves, and when she tried the knob, she found it locked from the other side. Backing away, she took one last inventory of the shelves and their contents—urns and incense burners, candlesticks, smashed bows and ribbons, vases, dirty altar cloths, and plastic flowers tangled into pathetic bouquets.

Definitely not the Hilton,
she thought
.

But a perfect room for hiding.

Warmer and drier than outside, at least. And out of the way, where nobody ever came.

And it wasn't exactly as if she was doing anything wrong, she told herself.

After all, the stranger was wounded and helpless.

What possible harm could he be?

He was lying just as she'd left him, sprawled there on the cold floor of the mausoleum.

Blood had thickened around his clothes and congealed beneath his arms.

When Lucy couldn't see him breathing, she thought he was dead.

It seemed an eternity that she stood there, paralyzed with fear, praying to be wrong, begging for a miracle. He looked
so much
like Byron—how could he possibly
not
be related? Just seeing him like this, suffering like this, ripped Lucy's heart in two.
You can't die! It's like losing Byron all over again!

And suddenly, more than ever, it didn't matter to her what the truth turned out to be—who this stranger really was, or why he'd shown up here out of nowhere on this particular morning.

All that mattered to her now was that he
lived
.

She hadn't been able to save Katherine. She hadn't been able to save Byron. But she
would
save this stranger. This brother of Byron's, this nearly identical twin of Byron's—she would
not
allow him to die.

She gently placed her hand upon his back. There was an almost imperceptible rising and falling of his shoulders, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

“It's all right—it's me,” she told him. “And I've found a place to take you. I just don't know how I'm going to get you there.”

Had he understood her? Lucy couldn't be sure, so she gently stroked his forehead, smoothed his hair from his eyes. He was burning hot with fever. His hands were ice cold. Was his body still fighting, she wondered—or was it giving up?

“Please.” She tried one more time. “Please let me bring someone. Please let me call a doctor—”

“Won't . . . help.”

“Don't say that. Don't even think it.”

“Can't . . . do anything . . .”

“Yes, he
could
do something for you, if you'd
let
him!”

“Already . . . already healing . . .”

Healing!
Frustrated, Lucy pressed her hands to her temples and shook her head. “No, you're
not
healing! Don't you understand, you're very, very sick!”

But of course it wouldn't do any good to argue with him—he was still incoherent with shock; he didn't even know what he was saying.

“Let me . . . lean on you,” he whispered, and once again Lucy placed a calming hand on his forehead.

“We can try. But it's dangerous for you to move.”

“More . . . dangerous . . . here.”

In spite of herself, Lucy glanced back over her shoulder, out through the gates of the mausoleum, out to the cemetery beyond. The fog had practically vanished, leaving cold, gray light in its wake. Snow clouds hung low over the trees. She could see the black silhouette of the old church looming against a sunless sky.

“If you won't let me call a doctor, then at least let me call a friend,” Lucy urged. “Someone we can trust, who won't tell anyone—”

“Help me up.”

Later she would wonder how the two of them ever made it to the cellar.

How she'd slipped her arms beneath him, oh so gently . . . coaxing him onto his good side . . . easing him up so that his head rested on her shoulder. Feeling his heart beat so faintly against her. Feeling the shallow whisper of his breath against her cheek.

She'd tied the sleeves of her coat around his neck to keep him warm. And she'd told him not to be afraid.

She didn't recall pulling him to his feet.

Suddenly he was just there, with one arm draped around her, and his body leaning unsteadily against hers. And yet he seemed curiously weightless . . . so very light to carry . . .

Later, when she tried to remember it, it would seem almost like a dream—how they'd managed that slow and tedious walk together through the cemetery.

As though time had magically suspended until the exact second she felt those wooden stairs beneath her feet and suddenly realized that the two of them were safe inside the hiding place.

She guided him to the farthest corner—a practically invisible spot behind some old trunks and suitcases—then eased him to the floor. To her relief the makeshift bandage seemed to be holding, so she decided to leave it for now. It was still inconceivable to her that he could even be alive. He must have superhuman strength to have lasted this long.

Quickly she began making a mental list. She'd have to bring food and water—no doubt he was badly dehydrated. And she'd have to bring clothes—his were soaked with blood. A pillow, blankets, first-aid kit, though she had no idea what difference any of that could possibly make in the shape he was in. Splints and stitches seemed useless—hopeless even—but she could at least clean him with antiseptics and bandage him, give him something for the pain. She had the medicine Dr. Fielding had prescribed for her after the accident—between that and all the drugs Irene took on a regular basis, there was sure to be something that would help.

It amazed her, really. How much calmer she was beginning to feel now, even though the situation was still so critical and so very surreal. She wouldn't let herself consider the probable outcome or how she'd be forced to deal with it. Better to believe that there would be time later for all the questions she needed to ask, all the answers she needed to know. Better to focus right now on making him feel comfortable and cared for and safe.

Gathering all the drop cloths she could find, Lucy took them outside and shook them. She used some soiled rags to wipe dust and cobwebs from the corner. Then she spread one of the drop cloths on the floor, emptied out the bags of old clothes, arranged them into a pallet, and topped them with another large cloth. The crude bed smelled of mildew, but at least it was thick and relatively soft. Until she could bring supplies, it would have to do.