Page 59 of Intrepid

My eyes flipped open to a familiar face. A warm face. A face I’d prayed too many times to see.

No, it had to be a dream.

It had to be what they’d given me.

A trick, just like the other tricks they’d played on me. Telling me things that filled my brain, to the point I couldn’t remember their names, or how I’d gotten to that house. I couldn’t remember the night with the wood chipper because their lies seemed more like the truth, the more I listened.

But I remembered. Right then, I remembered everything, and all the memories crashed into me at once, stealing my voice.

I scooted back away from that face, couldn’t trust that it was real, and something tugged at my arm. A needle, like the one they’d put in me. Only the one in my arm right then was connected to a tube, and I glanced around to find I’d been placed on a bed. A white bed, with white sheets, and the smell of cleaning products and disinfectants in my nose.

A hospital?

Had they taken me to a hospital? Had I died in that house?

“Jamie? Take it easy, son.” The voice dragged me back to the face, my father’s face.

“Are …” My voice pushed through the tight throb in my throat, a dry, itchy lump. “You real?”

Tears formed in his eyes, as he set his hand on mine and gave a nod. “Yeah, son. I’m real.”

I lurched toward him, wrapping my arms around his neck, limited by the tubes and wires hanging off of me. My whole body shook with a sob, as I held on to him, not wanting to let go, for fear I’d wake up. I’d wake up and still be trapped inside that cage in the dark room.

“What happened to you, Jamie?” he whispered in my ear, still holding me.

I shook my head and more tears broke.

It was a dream. No, not a dream, a nightmare.

A loud squeal, like feedback in a speaker, slammed through my ears, and I clamped my eyes shut, shuttering the noise with my palms. Clutching my head, I curled into a ball, my teeth grinding out the spasms of pain hammering against my skull.

“What’s happening to him?” The panic in my father’s voice rippled down my spine, stoking the fear that branched through my veins.

“It’s the effects of the drugs he was given,” the voice from before answered.

“He seemed fine yesterday, when the investigator was here,” my father argued.

“It’s going to take some time for him to come to grips with what happened. Once he stabilized, I put in a psych consult, and according to his chart, Doctor Gregory from neuro has also visited him once. He seems to be suffering nightmares and delirium.”

Fox’s voice inside my head rose above the noise, and I could smell the menthol cigarettes on his breath, mingling with the disinfectant odors burning my nose. “You’re all right. Son, we found ya in some black meth junkie’s house. You got beat up pretty bad. Looks like he tortured ya a little. You’re gonna have some hallucinations for a bit. Your buddy didn’t make it. That junkie killed him. Didn’t leave a trace of ‘im.”

The story was all wrong, though.

“No. It was Fox and Gideon,” I murmured, as the memories spilled over the lies. “They …. They killed Eli.”

“Jamie?” With a frown plastered to his face, my dad tipped his head and glanced back toward the man standing behind him in the white lab coat, who I guessed to be a doctor. “Who are Fox and Gideon?”

“They … took us. They’re the ones who kept us. They tortured us and killed Eli.”

“Jamie, you told the investigator it was a meth junkie. Some black guy living out of an abandoned house. They made the arrest this morning.”

I shook my head. “Th-th-that’s wrong. It wasn’t a black guy. It was Fox and Gideon. And another guy.” With the heel of my hand, I thumped my temple. “I didn’t know who he was, some guy in a suit. They kept Eli in a cage.”

“Yes, that’s what you said. But you told the police that one guy acted alone.”

“Police?” A nauseating confusion settled over me, as my eyes shifted to the doctor and back. “I …. I never talked to the police.”

Fox’s voice filtered in again, clearer than before. “See, I got friends in high places, boy. Police. Lawyers. Hell, even a few doctors. All friends of mine. You tell them exactly what I told you. Not a word more. And nobody else has to get hurt.”