Reverb

  The car stops and they pull me out. Pain shoots through my wrists, into my hands, my arms, and a scream escapes my lips. We’re at a rural airfield, just one runway and a hanger-type warehouse next to a squat, two-story control tower. But by the angle of the setting sun, I guess we’re somewhere northeast of the city. Escorted to a small jet a few yards from the limo. My hands and wrists throb, the pain makes me light-headed as I climb the step ladder of the plane. Takes my eyes a moment to adjust to the dark interior. There’s a wet bar, an entertainment center with an enormous T.V. mounted to one wall, and an office area complete with an extensive computer set-up with several large monitors.

  I’m ushered into a tall leather seat. A steward shuts and locks the door to the aircraft and I hear the engines winding up. Agent Townes disappears and a few seconds later comes back with a small black case, sits down next to me and opens it. Inside is a needle and a small clear bottle.

  “Please don’t.” I almost get up but the steward throws me back into the seat and straps me in. Taste salt from my tears as I sit there and watch agent Townes insert the needle into the bottle and draw out the clear liquid. “There is no reason for this. I’m not resisting. Please don’t do this.”

  Townes unbuttons my shirt and pulls it off my shoulder exposing my upper arm and inserts the needle. The liquid burns as it goes into me. I close my eyes, feel warm tears fall.

  I hate this. I fucking hate this. Muffled voices. I open my eyes. Everything’s blurry. Can’t focus. Squint at someone coming from the cockpit towards me. Medium height, slight build, short, receding hair graying at the temples, dark wool suit. Harvard? “Howard? Is that you?” Fuck. It is. These people work for my father...

  Chapter Three

  I’m afraid to open my eyes. Bittersweet taste in my mouth. Feel sick from the drugs. I’m in a soft bed, under a plush, heavy quilt. Hear fire crackle, rain hitting glass.

  Elisabeth, Cameron where are you? If they hurt you in any way, I swear, I'll make it my life’s pursuit to hurt them.

  There’s something around my wrists. Bolt upright and open my eyes as I push the quilt back. My wrists are wrapped, and they ache, but I’m not restrained.

  Blink the room into focus, surprised, even relieved to see I’m in my old bedroom at Castlewood. There’s a fire blazing in the marbled fireplace, but the cold rain that pelts the thin leaded windows creeps moisture in, and the high ceiling keeps the cavernous room damp. The bedroom looks the same as a year ago, in fact, looks as I left it the day I’d moved out. The framed newspaper ad from the Globe for the Boston Pops Fourth of July, my last year in the States, is still mounted on the wall between the tall windows above the massive mahogany desk. Instruments still lay in their cases about the room, my old Powell flute, a ‘Swan’ Strad fiddle my father gave to me that his father had given to him, the Fender electric and an Ibanez bass I’d nixed. Took only two acoustic guitars when I left, almost twelve years ago now—the Gibson SJ200 my step-father gave me when I was five, and the Takamine 12-String my mother had given me on my thirteenth birthday, a month before she was killed.

  Halogen lights illuminate half the coffered ceiling squares, making the others look dark by comparison, which is why I notice the tiny red light on a small box directly in the center of an unlit square near the bedroom door. Looks sort of like a fire alarm, but it’s barely the size of a cigarette pack with a small glass-covered hole in the center. It’s a camera. I glare at it, feeling exposed and disgusted, then angry.

  I get out of bed, relieved to be dressed in my jeans and fleece shirt still, though my wallet and passport are gone, and I’m shoeless and don’t see them anywhere. Move towards the door, stare up at the camera.

  “Where’s ‘Lisbeth and Cameron? I’ll do anything you want if you promise me you’ll keep them out of this.” Not sure I’m actually talking to anyone. For all I know, the thing’s not even on, but I’m desperate. “Do you hear me, Edward? I surrender.” I hold my hands in front of me, my wrists together like a prisoner. “I’m not even checking the goddamn door. I’ll do whatever you want me to do.” My voice cracks. My eyes fill. “Fuck.” Wipe tears away but they come anyway. Sink to my knees. “Please, Edward. I’m begging you, leave them alone.”

  There’s a light rap on the door, then it opens. Howard moves into the bedroom only a few feet from the threshold.

  “Your father is expecting you in the study in ten minutes,” he says in his crisp, cultivated accent.

  I stand, glare at him, wipe my eyes and nose on my shirtsleeve again. He’s dressed almost as he was on the plane, in a dark wool suit, perfectly coiffed. “Where are they, Howard? Where’s Cameron and ‘Lisbeth?” He stares at me with contempt, but remains silent. Then he turns on his heels and is about to walk away but I go after him before he makes the doorway and block his path. I’m five inches taller, considerably more muscular, and at least thirty years younger, but, like my father, Howard still intimidates me. “Where’s is she, Howard? I know you know, you fucking prig, and you’re gonna tell me.”

  “Remove yourself from my path.” His gray eyes are fixed on me.

  Heat rush of raw fury. Slam his head into the threshold, but instead I unclench my fists so I don’t move on him. “Talk to me old man, or I swear I’ll make you.” Know I sound absurd, straight out of the movies, and cannot fault Harvard his disdain. Tears of frustration blur my vision. “Damn it, Harvard. Please. I need to know they’re okay.”

  “Ms. Whitestone and her son were not detained.” Howard stays fixed on me but remains expressionless. “To my knowledge, they are well.”

  My anger dissolves, my knees give way a little and I lean against the doorjamb for support, still blocking Howard’s path. His expression softens with my surrender, but otherwise he stands statue still with that stick up his ass. “Harvard, please, help me get out of here. Don’t let him lock me up again. For Christ’s Sake, do you have any idea what they did to me? Does he?”

  No response. No change in expression. Still stone cold.

  “I can’t handle going back there, Howard. I won’t.”

  “I’m aware what was done to you, and I’m sorry for your suffering, James. It was never intended, and it will serve you well to remember that. Now move aside.”

  I don’t, though I know he won’t say any more. I want to put my hands around his throat and crush his larynx in. But what’s the point. Howard’s already beaten me.

  “You now have five minutes.” He keeps his eyes fixed on mine.

  I step back, gave him ample room to move, watch him walk down the wainscoted hall, past Dutch masterworks of Vermeer and Rembrandt, marble busts of dead relatives on pedestals, the gold-leaf table with a huge floral bouquet, then he disappears down the stairs.

  If Howard is ‘aware’ what was done to me, then my father surely knows. My body tightens, my blood starts to boil and I tremble with rage as the idea takes hold. Can’t swallow. Can hardly breathe. Edward knew, and he did nothing.

  Five minutes, my ass. I’m gonna fucking kill him. Right now. It’s father or son. There’s no way in hell I’m letting the sonofabitch lock me up again.

  Make my way down the hall, the split staircase with the massive portraits of my ancestry lining the walls of the foyer gallery. It’ll be self-defense. ‘Imminent danger’ Liz called it. My heart races, pounds hard in my chest, reverberates in my throat. He let them torture me. He did nothing. And I hate him. I want him to bleed.

  Cold marble is under my bare feet as I move across the foyer to the arched threshold of the plush carpeted hall, and finally into his dim study. My father stands at the bar, holding a glass of what looks like brandy, staring at the collection of bottles along the terraced wall. He’s slightly hunched, his body considerably thinner. His face, reflecting in the mirror over the bar, looks aged and tired. Though his hair is still thick, it’s no longer salt and pepper but stark white. He runs his fingers through it, pulling it off his brow as he turns to me.

  “Would you care for a brandy, Jame
s?” He asks like he’s offering the topper to a satisfying meal.

  “No.” And I don’t give a shit about the harshness in my tone.

  Hit him. Go slug him. Pound his fucking face in.

  He looks so old.

  “Perhaps a smooth gin then?” He gets a shot glass from the metal rack at the end of the bar and retrieves a black, gold-labeled bottle of Nolet’s Dry, slowly pours me a shot.

  Rage crests. Can’t stop shaking. Can’t unclench my fists even though my nails are digging into my palms. Kill him and run. Get ‘em to kill me instead of catch me, and it won’t be suicide. I look around the room for a weapon. Mounted to one of the walnut walls is an elaborately sculpted family crest, with crossed swords. Take one down and run him through.

  Edward puts the filled shot glass in the center of the bar then takes a long, slow sip of his brandy before moving behind his desk. He studies me. “You look well. I’m pleased.”

  In two years, the man has aged twenty. His green eyes are set deeper now, surrounded by darkness, the tone of his skin a pasty white. Craggy lines cut across his forehead. Perhaps he’s got some fatal disease and is in the process of dying. Good. He deserves some hideous form of cancer that will ravage his body until his last wheezing breath.

  “You look like shit. And I’m pleased.” I glare at him. My father doesn’t flinch. “What do you want? What am I doing here, Edward?”

  He sits heavily in his leather chair and sets his glass down carefully. “Please sit down, James.”

  “Go fuck yourself, old man.”

  “Well, it seems we’ve been down this road before.” He takes another sip of his brandy, then smiles at me as if he has a secret.

  “What do you want from me, Edward? Haven’t you fucked with me enough?”

  His smile fades. “You’ll be please to know Elisabeth and her son are well. She seems like a fine woman, and Cameron sounds like a charming boy.”

  The hairs on the back of my neck rise. Place both my hands on his desk and swallow hard to still my quivered breathing. “What. Do. You. Want.”

  Edward doesn’t answer. Want to grab my father’s shirt collar and bash his head into the desktop. Instead I reach out and sweep everything off the desk. Edward jumps up as the crystal snifter, the desk lamp, his laptop—everything flies off his desk and hits the ground with a clattering thud. A few papers flutter in the air as they float down gracefully.

  “DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEY DID TO ME!?” I scream at him. “HOW COULD YOU LET THEM DO THAT TO ME? You’re my FATHER for fuck sake. How could you let them torture me!? How could you leave me locked up there KNOWING what they were doing to me? I HATE YOU! YOU ARE A MONSTER AND I HATE YOU, and I WILL NEVER forgive you for what you did to me!” I turn away to control my impulse to strike him. My head’s splitting open and I press my palms into my temples to stop the pulsing. Howard and several other men come into the room. “GET OUT!” I yell at them. “GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!” And my father must have indicated for them to do so because they leave, Howard turning back only to shut the doors after him, glancing at me with his thin-lipped, scornful frown as he does.

  “I am not asking for your forgiveness.” Edward is calm, collected. He stands behind his desk in that hunched position. He looks like a frail old man. “This meeting is not for me, James. It is for you. I’m hoping to enlighten you to the circumstances that led to my decision to have you incarcerated, and that this knowledge will help you to move off this mark and on with your life.”

  “What life!? You took it away. I’m wanted for murder, for trafficking a controlled substance, for escaping from a secured facility for the criminally insane. And you set it all up! How the hell am I supposed to move on with my life?”

  “The charges against you have been repealed.”

  “What?”

  “You have been exonerated. You are a free man.” Edward stares at me from behind his massive desk.

  “What are you talking about?” Vertigo. He gets distant. Everything spins. I look outside, through the tall, narrow leaded windows behind my father to find ground. It’s gray, looks cold. It’s always cold here.

  “The Crown Court has rescinded all charges with recent evidence that has come to the fore. Additionally, you were denied your civil rights, never made privy to council or court, unlawfully detained and illegally incarcerated. You’ve been acquitted of all drug charges, the unfortunate incident regarding Mr. William Ferrell, and granted release from Langside Priory Hospital. The Crown will not agree to any reparations attendant to the circumstances surrounding your arrest, however, if you choose to do so, you can pursue a civil action against them, and in all likelihood, receive a substantial settlement.”

  I’m still stuck on, “You’re a free man.” My knees feel weak. If I don’t sit I’m gonna fall. My entire body goes limp, as I slump in the rigid steel and leather chair across the desk from my father. Exhaustion takes me. It’s hard to think, gather my racing thoughts. “I don’t understand. Are you saying they found out you set me up? So what? I murdered a man. And I escaped from Langside. I wasn’t released. What the fuck are you talking about, Edward?”

  He sits down heavily, laces his huge hands in his lap casually. “Your case was appealed to the magistrate, then re-examined by the House of Lords. Your role in Mr. Ferrell’s death was determined to be self-defense. Your departure from Langside Priory Hospital was initiated by a medical emergency. Your release was granted retroactively. The ICAS and the PHS have each launched independent investigations of the facility. You’ve been given absolute immunity, James. Your records have been sealed and cannot be legally obtained by anyone. This unfortunate series of events is now past, and will no longer directly impact your life.”

  “‘Directly impact my life?’” I scowl at him. “Are you mad? You let them take a piece of me, Edward. And now I have to live everyday with what they did to me. And I’m now a killer, father. Is this who you wanted me to be!? Because I don’t know who this is! You took my life and ripped it apart, and I can’t go back now. I’m angry and scared out of my fucking mind most all the time. And I hope to hell what you did to me impacts you till the day you die, you fuck.”

  “Exhilarating isn’t it?”

  “What?”

  Edward stares at me. “Living.”

  I glare at him. My father twists everything. Arguing with the man makes me crazy.

  “Tell me, son, do you wish to go back to when nothing touched you but music?” Edward shakes his head.

  I just stare at him. Would have spit in his face, but I’m too tired.

  “You are who you have always been, James. Your experiences over the past two years simply brought to the fore aspects of your character yet utilized. I will offer no judgment on who you are, nor on what you wish to become. That is for you alone to determine. All I can offer you are some answers, and perhaps a broader perspective on your current interpretation of the circumstances that lead to my actions.”

  Edward has me by the balls again. We both know it. I have to know. Need to know why my father had me locked up and then abandoned me in hell. Edward alone can provide the answers, and he sits before me now, offering them. “Is this your attempt at penance, father?”

  “Perhaps.” Edward smiles, but it fades quickly. “Indulge me this one last time, and you may just learn some things about yourself, James.”

  I can’t move. Weight greater than gravity holds me in the chair. Stare at the man before me. He looks so tired. Old and tired. I feel like Edward looks. I nod for him to continue.

  Edward nods back with another weary smile. “At the time I met your mother, I was married to Kathryn, Ian’s mother, though we were estranged, and in fact, had not been together in the conjugal sense for years.”

  “Are you trying to justify fucking my mother while you were married to someone else?”

  His eyes narrow slightly but he does not look away. “I have no need to justify loving your mother. She was a consenting adult, and was privy to the truth from the be
ginning. When she found out she was pregnant with you, it was her choice to move back to the States and terminate our relationship. She refused to be a catalyst for breaking up my family. Your mother married Michael Logan two years after your birth, and I agreed to the adoption upon their request, their union offering you what I could not.”

  “You want a fucking medal for doing the right thing?”

  “James, will you give no quarter?”

  “Why should I?”

  Edward shakes his head, takes a deep breath and releases it slowly. “Ian was not as fortunate as you have been.”

  “Fortunate? You are insane, Edward.”

  He continues as if I’d not spoken. “My marriage to Kathryn Croft, then Countess of Aragon, was a business union. She was a socialite, an alcoholic and addicted to pain killers. In fact, died of a combined overdose in her late twenties, only three years after your brother was born.”

  “Half-brother.”

  He nods slightly. “It was, indeed, Ian’s birthright to take over the Trust upon my retirement or passing. It was all he had, and it was all I had to give him. It wasn’t until his teen years that I began to see this may not be feasible. While I relinquished my parental rights of you to your mother and step-father, that you were to retain the Whren name was also part of our agreement. Anna understood the significance of our lineage, the enormity of the Whren Family holdings. It was quite possibly the driving factor in her decision to leave me, instead of marry me.” His eyes flash with...affection maybe, picturing my mother. “She was unwilling to risk scandal of our affair or your illegitimate birth, afraid the media fallout might hurt you, or compel me to abdicate my position and renounce my title.”

  Picture my mom, her wide, white smile after we hit the snow bank. Imagine her stunning young face kissing my old man, and feel sick. “Why are you telling me this, Edward? What difference does any of this make now? Thrilling though it is traveling memory lane with you, I don’t want to hear about your affair with my mother.”