Alex Kava Bundle - Alex Kava [571]
Why couldn’t he breathe?
He had raced all the way from the airport, standing and pedaling, pumping and pushing his Ironman Huffy through red-lighted intersections, ignoring honks and slowing only to climb up the final incline. So of course he was gasping for breath. He just needed to stop for a minute. He leaned against the refrigerator, waiting to catch his breath. He was surprised to feel an immediate sense of comfort from the appliance’s familiar noisy hum. He was home. He was safe. At least for now.
He could feel the stupid refrigerator magnets digging into his shoulder blades—annoying little garden creatures his mom used to tack up his brother’s “artwork.” Like she was even a gardener. No way would she allow dirt under her fingernails. The thought made him smile, and he forced himself to remember each of the magnets, hoping the tactic would block out the image of all that blood. He closed his eyes—bunny, squirrel, raccoon, hedgehog. Was a hedgehog a garden creature? Had anyone really seen a hedgehog?
It wasn’t working.
The details had been scorched into his mind—that face all twisted in pain. Blood coming out of his mouth. And those eyes, staring without blinking. Had he recognized Gibson? Had he been able to see him? Of course not. He was dead. Wasn’t he?
Gibson shook his head and pushed away from the refrigerator. He stumbled into the living room and stepped over the laundry basket left at the bottom of the staircase. Then he took the steps slowly, counting them out in his mind, stopping when he reached number eight. Using the handrail, he pulled himself up, bypassing the creaky ninth step. Once he made it past his mother’s door he was home free. Sometimes she watched the five o’clock news in her room while she changed from work. He couldn’t risk her hearing him. How would he explain where he had been? And she would certainly ask, especially when she saw he was one smelly, wet glob. Even his hair was plastered to his sweaty head under his baseball cap.
As he got closer, he didn’t hear anything coming from behind her door. Maybe she wasn’t home yet. And then he remembered. Of course she wasn’t home yet. It was Friday. No work tomorrow, plus tonight was his little brother’s sleep-over. He remembered her telling him that she might treat herself and join the other ladies from the office for drinks after work. Was that tonight? Yeah, it was Friday night. He was sure of it. What a stroke of luck. Maybe things weren’t as bad as he thought.
Still, he hurried to his own room and closed the door behind him, careful to muffle the noise. He tossed his backpack on the bed, then he pressed his entire body against the door as if the extra pressure was necessary to turn the lock. He held his breath and listened again, not trusting his good fortune on a day where none had existed. He heard nothing. He was home alone. He was safe. And yet, he was shaking, not just shivering, but shaking like some convulsing idiot.
He wrapped his arms around his chest, but jerked them away when he felt the wet front of his T-shirt. He really was a sweaty mess. He had almost wiped out on his bike several times as he jumped curbs and sped through blind intersections. Now he pulled off his ball cap and threw it on his bed, then wrestled out of the T-shirt, getting tangled in it and almost ripping it at the seams just to be free of the smell of sweat and diesel and vomit. The stink reminded him that he had upchucked his fast-food meal, leaving it somewhere just past the exit ramp from the airport parking garage.
Finally, he allowed himself to turn on the small desk lamp. Immediately, he noticed the blood caked under his fingernails. He tried to dig it out, wiping it on the T-shirt. Then he opened his closet door, wadded up the T-shirt and stuffed it into an empty Best Buy plastic bag he found on the closet floor. He slung the