Closing his eyes, he tried to roll onto his back. A sharp sting knifed down his neck, wrenching a groan from his lips.
“Let me help.” A hard kick to his ribs flipped him over and left him gasping for air.
Lyle Mason bent close, the mask gone, his face a maniacal blend of firelight and shadow. “Been waiting for you to wake up. Gotta have a talk with you, Flynn. It’s long overdue.”
Gripping Caden under the arms, he dragged him backward. Caden kicked out, trying to snag his legs, but the movement was sluggish, hampered by his stupor. Mason flung him against the stone wall. His shoulder hit with an audible smack, igniting a burst of pain.
He spat blood from his mouth. “What do you want?”
“You forgot her, didn’t you?”
Caden’s head spun. “Who?”
“Not the right answer!” Lyle cracked him across the face. “I knew you forgot. I knew she meant nothing to you.” Fisting his hands in his hair, he yanked frantically, as if trying to rip the dirty strands from his skull. He paced in a tight circle, bent his head back, then screamed at the ceiling.
Definitely unstable, a prime candidate for West Central.
Had Lyle tossed his gun, or was the revolver somewhere in the igloo? Even with the small fire Lyle had kindled, the interior of the bunker was festooned with shadow. Strewn among the old chemical containers Caden spied a few crumbled packages—crackers, chips, and jerky—along with a raggedy blanket and a six-pack of beer. Lyle must have been living in this place. It wasn’t the same bunker where Caden had conversed with Cold, but there were numerous igloos scattered throughout the warren of the TNT.
“Lyle, stop and listen.” Caden wet his lips, his mouth dry. He tried to ignore the incessant pounding in his head, splinters of pain taking root behind his eyes. “You’re confused. There was a man. Lach Evening—”
“No.” Whirling, Lyle stabbed a finger in his direction. His eyes blazed with fury. “I have nothing to say about him. Only her.”
Caden hedged, fearful of setting off another explosion of anger by questioning who “she” was.
Lyle bent forward, hands locked on his knees. Behind him, the fire crackled and hissed, spitting embers into the air. He sucked on his lips, then blew out like a fish. “I want you to say her name.”
“She…” Caden racked his memory. Someone from the past. Someone from high school who’d mattered in a way no other girl had.
“You’re not answering me.” Lyle’s fingers twitched.
Shit.
The name struck Caden in the same instant he met Lyle’s demented gaze head-on. “Lottie.” He should have realized sooner.
Lyle blinked, the fall and rise of his eyelids mimicking the slow wink-stare of an owl. He recoiled as if slapped. For a split second, the deranged fire dimmed in his gaze. “You do remember.” Rubbing his palms against his jeans, he squatted on his haunches, a grotesque hobgoblin backlit by firelight. “She loved you.” His face hardened, carved by hate. “She died because of you.”
Caden swallowed. Behind his back, he flexed his hands, trying to force circulation through his bound wrists. Needles pinged up his arms. “Lyle, I never did anything to Lottie.”
“That’s the problem. You ignored her.” Tugging on his shirt, he squeezed the soiled fabric repeatedly, a nervous tick. “Except once. You gave her a ride home from school.”
Caden clenched his jaw, struggling to remember. He’d barely spoken to Lottie. She was backward and shy, a plump girl shunned by the more popular kids in school. His crowd. If he’d given her a ride, it would have been in kindness, not to take advantage of her.
“Yeah. I remember now.” He forced himself straighter, drawing his knees to his chest. He scraped his wrists against the rock behind him. With enough friction he might be able to fray the binding. Lyle didn’t seem to notice the effort, focused somewhere in the past.
Damn Evening. The guy had really fucked up Mason’s head.
“There were some girls giving her a hard time after school.” The memory was spotty, but piecemeal enough to stitch together. “Three or four of them, surrounding her. She looked scared.”
Lyle bobbed his head.
“I was driving by and stopped.” If he could get Lyle close enough, he might be able to scissor his legs around Mason’s neck. Render him unconscious. He kept his gaze pinned on Lyle’s face as he scraped his wrists against the rough stone. A trickle of blood sluiced into his palm. “I asked Lottie if she wanted a ride, then drove her to your house.” An innocent offer, an innocent ride. How could Lyle possibly connect that to his sister’s death?
“That was all it took.” Lyle sat on his heels and dragged his fingers across his cheek. In the limited light, his nails looked green, packed with dirt beneath the tips. “You rescued her, and from that moment on, all she did was talk about how she wanted to be with you. I told her you were out of her league, that you’d never be interested in a girl like her. I tried my best to make her see reason, but she’d come out of her shell. It took weeks to work up her nerve, and what did she do?”
Caden’s gut plummeted. Oh, fuck. “She asked me to the spring dance.”
Lyle’s lip curled in a snarl. “And you turned her down.”
“I already had a date.”
“It didn’t matter!” Lyle bellowed the accusation, spittle flying from his mouth. “You wouldn’t have taken my sister, anyway. You crushed her.” He scrambled to his feet, his chest rising with the whistling hiss of his breath. “I found her at home…on the flat roof outside her bedroom. It’s where we’d go to talk. She was sobbing, crying her eyes out. You made her feel ugly, like a fool. Silly Lottie thinking Caden Flynn would want to be seen with her.”