Элизабет Чандлер - Soulmates

"Expected Pat back by now," the sergeant was saying softly to the other officers as she approached. "He's talking to the O'Leary kid." The O'Leary kid? Will?

The officers turned around suddenly, and the sergeant's eyes met hers.

"Are you sure there's nothing we can help you with in the meantime?"

"You can give this to Lieutenant Donnelly," Ivy said, pulling out Caroline's envelope. She asked for a bigger envelope, then scribbled on it: "I have to talk to you as soon as possible." She wrote down her name, address, and phone number, then sealed Caroline's envelope within. She handed it silently to the desk sergeant and hurried outside. As she sped home Ivy couldn't stop worrying about both Ella and Philip.

When she pulled up in front of the house, she saw only her mother's car in the garage. Good, she thought, Philip was safe, and she'd have a chance to find Ella before Gregory arrived. Ivy took a roundabout route upstairs, passing through the dining room to make sure that she hadn't left behind any signs of her search. The clock was ticking steadily, though it was several minutes slow.

Ivy ran up the center stair two steps at a time. Hearing her mother on her bedroom phone, Ivy stuck her head in the door and gave a half wave, then continued on to her bedroom. The door was wide open, and Ella was not in sight. There were no round lumps in the bed, so Ivy checked underneath, thinking that after all that had happened, Ella might be hiding there. She wasn't, but Ivy noticed that the shoes and boxes under her bed had been pushed to one side, forming a wall.

She studied the wall, then gripped the quilt on her bed. Maybe Gregory had done this to corner Ella the day he cut her paw. Maybe it had helped him trap Ella when he shaved her flank. But there, as part of the wall, were the slippers Ivy had kicked off this morning. She straightened up slowly and saw that the door to her third-floor music room was open. She always kept it closed.

"Ella," she mouthed, the feeling of dread so strong in her she could not speak aloud. She couldn't even walk. She crawled over to the door and saw that the light was on upstairs. Gripping the door frame, Ivy pulled herself up, then slowly climbed the stairs. What had he done to her now?

Cut up another foot? Sliced a piece of her ear?

When Ivy got to the top of the stairs, she looked immediately under the piano, then beneath the chairs in the room. Finally her eyes went up to the window, the shadow in it.

"Ella! Oh, no! Ella!" The cat swung from a rope, dangling from a nail in the low ceiling. Ivy yanked at the rope, then lifted up Ella, but her body was limp. Her head hung down, her small neck broken. Ivy shrieked and shrieked, pressing her face against the dead body of Ella, still soft, still warm. Her fingers moved around Ella's ears, touching her gently as if Ella were just sleeping.

"Ella," she moaned, then started screaming again. "He killed her! He killed her!"

"Ivy! What's wrong?" her mother called.

Ivy struggled to get control of herself. Her whole body was shaking. She clung to Ella, rubbing her face against the cat's soft fur. She couldn't bear to let her go. "He killed her. He killed her!"

Her mother was coming up the steps.

"Gregory killed her, Mom!"

"Ivy, calm down. What did you say?" Maggie asked when she reached the top of the stairway.

"He killed Ella!" Ivy let go of the cat and stood between her and her mother.

"What are you talking about?" her mother asked.

Ivy stepped aside.

"Oh, my-" Her mother's hand went up to her mouth. "Ivy, what have you done?"

"What have I done? You're blaming me? You still think I'm crazy, Mom? It's Gregory. He's the one behind all this."

Her mother stared at her as if she were speaking another language. "I'll call the counselor."

"Mom, listen to me."

But Ivy could see that her mother was too frightened of what she saw, too afraid of Ivy and what she thought Ivy had done, to listen or understand.

Maggie picked up a folded piece of paper that had been left on the piano bench and turned it over and over without looking at it.

Ivy tore it out of her mother's hands, unfolded the note, and read: "I can hurt those you love."

She thrust the paper at her mother. "Look! Don't you understand? Gregory is after me! Gregory killed her just to get to me."

Ivy's mother backed away from her. "But Gregory is out with Philip," she said, "and-" "With Philip? Where?"

"I'll call Ms. Bryce. She'll know what to do."

"Where?" Ivy demanded, shaking her mother by the shoulders. "Tell me where he took Philip."

Her mother pulled away from her and cowered in the corner. "There's no reason to get so upset, Ivy."

"He'll hurt him!"

"Gregory loves Philip," her mother argued from the corner of the room.

She was moving sideways, edging toward the stairs. "You must have noticed how much he's played with him lately."

"I've noticed," Ivy snapped.

"He promised Philip they'd go hunting for old railroad spikes today," her mother went on, "and kept his promise even in this damp weather. Gregory is good to Philip. That's why I told him-though Andrew didn't want me to-I told him yesterday that he and Philip would soon be full brothers."

"Oh, no," Ivy said, sinking back against her stereo.

"I can hurt those you love"-she heard the words as clearly as if Gregory were standing next to her, whispering in her ear. She looked up at her mother and said, "Do you know where they've gone to look for the spikes?"

Her mother was backing slowly down the steps. "By the railroad bridges.

Gregory said he could climb up on the old one and get a lot of spikes for Philip." Maggie looked relieved to have reached the bottom of the stair.

"You come down now, Ivy. Leave Ella alone. I'll call the counselor. Come down now, Ivy."

Ivy started down the steps, and her mother fled from the bedroom. Ivy waited till Maggie was in her own room calling Ms. Bryce, then she rushed through the bathroom and Philip's bedroom and down the back stairs.

"Tristan, where are you?" she cried, running out to the car. She jammed her key into the ignition.

"Tristan, where are you?"

Ivy took off, her wheels slipping, her door rattling. She opened and slammed it again while she was speeding downhill. As fast as she drove, as dangerously fast as she took the curves on the wet asphalt, she felt as if she would never get there.

"Angels," she prayed, tears running down her face, "don't let him… don't let him."

As soon as he arrived at the top of the ridge, Tristan knew that Ivy wasn't there. Her car was gone. Maggie was standing at the edge of the driveway, clutching a cordless phone, looking distraught. "I don't care what meeting he's in, I have to speak to him."

What happened? Tristan wondered. Where was Ivy? He was still extremely groggy, like a person who had slept too long and too heavily. When he had fallen into this last darkness, it felt as if a force much greater than he, one more powerful than any he had ever experienced, had forced him over the brink and into the dreamless black.

"It's an emergency!" Maggie was shouting into the phone.

Tell me, Maggie, tell me what happened, Tristan thought.

"Andrew. Oh, Andrew." Maggie closed her eyes with relief. "It's Ivy-she's gone crazy. She's run off."

Run off where?

"I don't know what started it. She went upstairs and all of a sudden I heard her screaming. I went up after her, up to her music room. She-she killed Ella."

What?

"I said she killed Ella…. Yes, I'm sure of it."

Gregory killed Ella, Tristan thought.

"I don't know," Maggie moaned. "I told her Gregory had taken Philip to the bridges to collect railroad spikes."

Now Tristan's mind started clicking. Just before Tristan had fallen into the darkness, Gregory had shaved Ella's flank. Tristan had thought Gregory was just trying to rattle Ivy, but now he recognized it as a warning. Gregory was striking closer and closer.