Hyper Lynx (The Lynx Series Book 6) by Fiona Quinn (ebook reader for pc and android TXT) 📗

And while it might have been chicken shit of me, I didn’t mention this to Dr. Carlon. She didn’t have information about my having advanced psychic skills. I was sure if I told her about the sensations, she’d think I was hallucinating—a big red flag for brain trauma survivors.

I wasn’t a hundred percent sure I wasn’t.

That was the crazy-making thing about having psychic skills. Until I had some kind of confirmation or affirmation, mostly the things that bubbled up for me just made me feel crazy.

Slowing to a stop in front of the red light, I looked up at the new construction, thinking about how I would walk this sidewalk to the library, pulling my red wagon behind me to load up with books.

In the blink of an eye, I remembered the kitchen at my old apartment. It was a day after dad’s funeral. Could there be information here?

I let the memory engulf me:

Spyder pushed open the door to the apartment with his arms full of grocery bags. He ducked his head to cross under the doorframe and moved directly to the kitchen to put away the food he’d brought. “How is she?” he asked, referring to Mom.

“Conflicted.” I focused back on the task of reading medicine bottles and making sure I put them in the labeled plastic prescription boxes in the correct numbers so Mom’s medication would be dispensed precisely.

I felt Spyder waiting for more information as the cupboards opened and then shut.

“She was all geared up to die, and now she doesn’t feel that she can. She missed her opportunity.” I snapped the lids shut on the pill dispenser. “She wants to go on and be with my dad, but then where would I be?”

The water ran at the sink, then stopped. “Is your mother asleep now?”

“Yes, I gave her a sleeping pill an hour ago—for my sake, not hers. I couldn’t stand her crying anymore. I needed a break.” The brown paper bags crunched as Spyder folded them to put away in the pantry. I stared out the window at the brick wall across the way.

When he came back into the main room, Spyder carried a sandwich on a plate with a sliced apple. “I don’t want you to think about this food. I just want you to eat it,” he said. Spyder was my godfather, but that’s not what I called him—I called him my second dad. He was stern with me, and his love for me was palpable and something I’d never question. He was a man of great serenity and a man of great depth. It surprised me today that there was so much turmoil in his eyes. I braced myself because I knew that something horrible must have happened to slide him away from his Zen-like quietude.

I wiped my mouth with a paper napkin. “Just go ahead and say it.”

He nodded. “The man who caused the car accident was named Memphymus Hanasal. His blood-alcohol level at the time of the accident was .24. He ended up in the emergency department for alcohol poisoning and survived.”

I mechanically chewed a bite of the sandwich. It was tasteless. I was also chewing on Spyder’s information; it was habanero hot, and the capsaicin-like information burned its way through my system. My eyes stung. I was panting. Sweat glossed my skin. I swallowed hard, trying to rid myself of the sensation. “So they’re charging him with what? Vehicular manslaughter? Murder? DUI? I’d like to be at the arraignment if it hasn’t happened yet. I want to see this guy. Look him in the eye.”

Spyder wrapped my hands in his and looked down at the floor. He was very quiet. For the first time in my life, I saw tears on his lashes. He shook his head slowly back and forth. I couldn’t make out what that might mean. My lips pulled down as if gravity had hooked into the corners and applied so much weight that the skin on my chin pinched.

“My dear, he has been let free.”

I tried to pull my hands back, my muscles bunching as if in a physical fight. Spyder didn’t let go of me. With one hand, he held me fast, and with his other, he petted down my arm. He continued until I forced my body to slacken.

“He has diplomatic credentials from the Almajidni.”

“There’s no such place.” Surely, there was. I’d just never heard of it.

Spyder sat still and waited for me to lift my chin and look him in the eye. “It is a small island country near the Gulf of Aden in the Arabian Sea. This man is the cousin of the king’s first wife and is married to one of the king’s daughters.”

“The first wife as in she is deceased, and he remarried?”

“First wife among three. She holds a great deal of power.”

“That means that Hanasal’s immune? But they could waive that, couldn’t they? The king could.”

“He could. He has declined.”

“This Hanasal guy, he’s been recalled to the island? He’s leaving the US?”

Spyder shook his head.

“So he’s here and moving on his merry way as if nothing happened? As if he didn’t kill Dad?”

Deep sadness, ocean-deep, turbulent, churning, Spyder’s eyes told me how profoundly this injustice moved him. Again, I was shocked to see, for the first time, something other than intelligence and placidity shining through his coal-black eyes. “I am afraid so. I am so sorry.”

I rocked back and forth in my chair, antsy for action, though what that meant, I didn’t know. “Why isn’t the United States putting more pressure on the king? I don’t understand.”

“It is a politicized world. That island has the potential to be of great importance to the United States, logistically. There will be no overt pressure.”

My eyelids slid shut. When I opened them again, it was as if