What No One Else Can Hear by Brynn Stein Page B

“Okay, buddy. Dr. Brown is going to go with you to your own bedroom, and he’s going to give you a shot.”
    He tensed. “I don’t like shots, Bear.”
    “I know, buddy. But, you can build a big wall if you want, and you won’t hear any noise or feel any tingles. Just a little pinprick from the needle.” I waited for his nod. “Then the shot is going to help you take a nap.”
    I waited for him to tell me he wasn’t sleepy, but it didn’t come. “Then, while you’re asleep, the doctors are going to look for those ouchies, all right?”
    “Okay, but Bear… I don’t want you to go.”
    “Aw, buddy. If I could stay, you know I would. You know that, right?”
    “You won’t stay away forever?”
    “No, buddy. Never ever ever.” It occurred to me, though, in this screwed-up situation, I didn’t have a clue if I’d be coming back anytime soon. “And if I can’t be here in person, bud, we can meet in the forest when I’m asleep, okay?” He nodded. “Remember, I won’t be there when I’m awake. Not because I don’t want to be, all right? You’ll just have to wait until I’m asleep.”
    I should have known the compassion couldn’t last long. “What is all this talk about forests? Is this a code to the boy that you have ways of getting to him even when we have you locked up? You scum .”
    “It’s not a code, I swear.”
    Time was up. “Friday” jerked me to my feet, none too gently, and between him and “Gannon,” I was almost pulled to the door. So much for calming Stevie down. He tried to get loose from Drew’s gentle hug, and Drew had to start holding on to him in earnest. The more Stevie struggled, the more upset he became. The last thing I saw and heard before I went through the door was Stevie breaking free from Drew, running down the hallway for all he was worth, and hollering, “ Bear !”

CHAPTER 9
     
     
    T HEY DROVE me to the precinct in silence, booked me, then threw me into a cell—thankfully a private one. I didn’t even want to think about how other prisoners might have treated me if they thought I was a child molester. Man, I couldn’t believe this was happening. I couldn’t think of anything they might have that would seem like evidence of something like this . I did know, or thought I knew, how they got their hands on whatever it was. Chuck did say, “This isn’t over.”
    The thing was, I’d never been sure what I’d done to piss him off—certainly not this much. This accusation didn’t have to be true to stick, and if it stuck, what was Stevie going to do? He’d be back to having no anchor, no help when the voices grew unbearably loud. He’d learned so much and could handle his empathy so much better than when I’d first arrived, even for short periods without me around. But had he learned enough to go through the rest of his life with no anchor?
    Did he even need one? Only Lilly’s case suggested that an empath needed a specific person to anchor them somehow. Was there only one chosen anchor, with all others being temporary? Or could he have a bunch of anchors? Could Drew and Dottie help him as well as I could? They had certainly helped him through all those years when I was looking for him, but not as well as I did when I showed up. Did that mean they wouldn’t be as effective now?
    Was Drew’s theory valid, that there was something about me in particular, more than just being chosen by Stevie for some reason? If that was true, it seem like a—well, if not a death sentence, at least a sentence to a lot of suffering. How long had Stevie searched before he found me? If I hadn’t answered, would anyone else have? Could he find someone to answer his calls now if I wasn’t available? I guessed we could go back to meeting in the forest like we had been, but that hadn’t been enough to help Stevie in his real life.
    Shit. This was a mess. My hat was certainly off to Chuck. This was a pretty good way to get back at me.
     
     
    S ARA ARRIVED early the next