Page 12 of In My Blood
“Is she breathing?” Kyle asked instead, obviously not talking to us.
“Got a pulse, but she’s as cold as ice. Covered in blood too,” another, more distant sounding voice replied to Kyle’s question.
“Talk to me”! Is my sister alive?” Rafe snapped.
“She is. She’s breathing, but she’s out. Probably sleeping, or possibly fainted, but her pulse is steady. She….she’s on the sofa and around her, all around her…it’s as you thought. There’s a body in pieces, and the floor is a blood bath. I’d say the body has been here for a day or more at least. It’s a woman, and there are signs of a struggle in this room,” Kyle explained.
“And Cara was in there…with that?” Rafe rasped, all of his earlier unshakeable control gone.
“Yeah, and for a while too, I’m guessing,” Kyle answered. “I’m going to try and wake her. I need to get her out of here and away from this scene. We’ll take her back to my offices where she’ll be safe. You can meet…” Kyle’s words were cut off by an ear piercing, hauntingly terrifying scream.
“CARA?!” Rafe cried, and we both leapt to our feet, desperate to do something, but how could we when we were still hours away and trapped in a tin can in the fucking air?
“Back off! Everyone back off!” Kyle ordered. The scream stopped but even through the headset Kyle used we could hear Cara’s distress as she pleaded through loud, hiccupped sobs for them all to stay away from her.
“Hey, it’s okay,” Kyle said, his voice loud enough to carry, but his tone calm and so much softer than he used to speak to everyone else since the start of the call. “My name is Kyle. Your brother….Rafe, right? He sent me here to take care of you untilhe can come. You’re safe. These men, they work for me, and none of us are going to hurt you.”
“NO!” Cara screamed hysterically, her voice so filled with fear and anguish it tore me apart, I had no idea what it had to be doing to Rafe. When I glanced up to him he had collapsed back in the plane seat and he had his head resting in his hands. “STAY AWAY! STAY AWAY FROM ME! JUST…Just g-get away! Please…” Cara screamed, the last words failing as her throat sounded raw.
“We’re not gonna come any closer, okay? We’ll all stay right where we are. I just want you to try and take some deeper breaths if you can, yeah? You need to try and breathe,” Kyle told her.
“Let me speak to her!” Rafe demanded, He lifted his head from his hands and pulled the cell phone closer to him.
“Your brother wants to speak to you. Here he is,” Kyle said, then there was a couple of clicks, which I guessed was him putting the call on loudspeaker on his phone. “Okay, she can hear you,” Kyle said.
“Cara? Can you hear me, sweetheart?” Rafe asked, his calm once again back in his voice, even though he looked like he was about to throw up.
“R-Rafe?”
“I’m here. I’m on a plane right now coming to get you, Cara. Me and Dio….we’re coming for you, but it takes a while. Can you…will you let these men take care of you until I can get there,Gioia?”
“She’s still looking a-at me, Raffy,” Cara uttered breathlessly, in little more than a whisper, but we heard her.
“Fuck! Get some sheets or something!” Kyle barked in a low voice.
“Close your eyes,Piccola,” I pleaded with her, knowing for sure now she was talking about her mother’s dismembered head staring at her as she spoke those terrified, trembling words. “Just close them and think about being home with all of us. It won’t be long and you’ll be back with Gia.”
“Kyle wants you to go with him to a safe place. Can you do that? Can you go with him for me, sweetheart?” Rafe asked her.
“NO! Rafe, no! I…I c-can’t! I d-don’t…..I….”
“Cara, remember to breathe. Deep breaths in and out. Nice and slow. You’re alright. We won’t let anyone hurt you now,” Kyle tried to soothe her when it became obvious she was struggling to breathe again.
“Don’t touch me!” Cara screamed at the top of her lungs, then there was some scuffling.
“Do not put hands on her!” Rafe raged.
“No one moved to go near her. She’s in shock. She’s also pale, way too thin and she looks exhausted. I think she’s been sat here with this body for at least the last twenty four hours,” Kyle told us.
“Fuck!” Rafe slammed both of his fists down on the table between us so hard that the thing rattled almost off of the fitting attaching it to the wall.
“What do you advise we do? It’s going to be another six hours before we can get there.” I asked, trying to maintain some calm and rationale.
“She’s gone into the bedroom and slammed the door closed. I can hear her crying, but her breathing already sounds a little calmer. For now I think the best thing we can do is leave her there. She’ll likely fall asleep through exhaustion eventually. I can stay close to monitor her, and if I become worried, my brother is a doctor. I could call him in if needed.”
“What kind of doctor? I can get a doctor there if Cara needs to see one. Is she hurt?” Rafe rattled off angrily.
“I didn’t see any injuries, so no – I don’t think she’s hurt. I was thinking more that we might need a doctor to come in and give her something to calm her down. And my brother is a medical doctor. He runs the emergency medicine department in one of the city’s biggest hospitals. I can assure you he’s very well qualified,” Kyle snapped back.
