Page 110 of The Last Straw

Charlie nodded, then left her in the kitchen with her recipe and her thoughts.

That night, as they were cleaning up after their meal, Charlie stopped in the act of putting away the leftovers to fork one last meatball from the sauce.

Wyrick glanced at him, secretly pleased when he popped it into his mouth.

“I can’t believe you have room for even one more bite,” she said.

“I don’t have room. I just love these meatballs. You are turning into the best cook.”

“I enjoy the challenge of conquering something I’ve never done before,” Wyrick said.

Charlie waved his dish towel at her like a white flag of defeat.

“I have already yielded to your wisdom and your skill, and now I have yielded to your skill in the kitchen. The only thing I have going for me now is that I’m bigger and physically stronger than you. So next time you need a wall kicked in, I’m your guy.”

He was laughing when he said it, but Wyrick couldn’t laugh.

“You were everything you ever needed to be before you even met me. You could do everything I did and find just as many lost people as we’ve done together. All I did was help you do it faster. And I will always need you to keep me grounded, and remind me that I am human and not a freaking accident of nature. I will always need you to bust a head or kick in a wall for me when the need arises. I am gratified that my cooking pleased you, and I’m going to the office.”

“Are you mad at me?” Charlie asked.

She stopped. “No. I’m mad at myself because I don’t know how to even say thank you without getting my...my...what is it you say?...getting all wadded up?”

“Getting your pants in a wad?”

She nodded. “Yes. That,” she said and left him standing with a dishrag in his hand.

Charlie saw the slump in her shoulders as she walked away, and knew the news of the latest video had shaken her newfound joy. He hurt for her, but he kept telling himself they would figure it out.

But Wyrick wasn’t so sure.

She felt something she couldn’t put a name to. It was as if the ground beneath the old mansion was crumbling at her feet. Were the walls high enough? Were the gates strong enough? Was there enough security on the grounds to keep the madness away?

Barrett Taylor was in jail, but in a way, so was she. She loved Charlie Dodge with all her heart. But he was here because of a duty he felt to keep her safe. He was always with her, and yet, she felt so alone.

She sat down at her computers and then paused, looking around at all of the technology and knowing that she had the world at her fingertips at any given time.

She also knew that everything she knew and could do, could be weaponized if it fell into the wrong hands. She understood things in the universe others had yet to even know existed, and she wasn’t about to show them, or explain it, because it would never be used for good. There was always going to be someone greedy enough for money and power, who was willing to walk over bodies and souls to get it.

The simple existence she’d known before that day on the boardwalk when her mother had taken her to ride the merry-go-round, was a painful memory she rarely revisited.

She kept thinking about that book in Sonny Burch’s apartment. The one his grandmother had given him. The one he’d used to hide his secrets. The Velveteen Rabbit. She needed to read that one day, just to see what was special enough to keep it.

She didn’t understand how someone could turn into a monster, when they started life with so much going for them.

And why had it been monsters who had created her? Why couldn’t she just have been born—like a regular child with normal parents—so she could have lived a normal life? But if she’d been normal, she would likely never have known Charlie Dodge, and that wasn’t something she would ever regret.

Wyrick thought of Bethie.

She’d cured Bethie’s cancer, just like she’d cured her own. But she would never forget that it was getting cancer in the first place that finally set her free.

So how could she be sad? Healing that child had set her free to live again, too, so she couldn’t regret one second of her decision. Whatever came from the video Lola Franklin had uploaded was on Wyrick’s head and no one else’s, and so it would be.

Last week she’d been an alien...and a demon...and today she was a healer sent from God. If that didn’t speak for the insanity of the human race, then nothing would.

She turned to the computer she had up and running and put her hands on the keyboard. Within seconds she was looking at images of choppers. She’d been chased on the ground and shot out of the sky, and she was still standing. She would be damned before she’d let other people’s madness dictate her quality of life.

She liked flying. The convenience and availability of having a chopper had been instrumental in helping solve many cases. Who knew when they’d need one again? She had the urge and she had the money. It was time to get her wings back again.

---