Psych: A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Read

Chapter Four

The asphalt was surprisingly soft under Gus’ back. When he was running, he could feel every pebble and shard of glass piercing the soles of his shoes. But now that he was sprawled out over the pavement, it felt soft, smooth, and pliable. Gus stretched out a hand and probed the ground with his fingers. The asphalt compressed under his touch as if it were stuffed with down.

Gus tried to understand what was happening. There was a faint possibility that he had developed super-strength to go along with his newfound ability to fly. But the aches in his muscles, the pounding in his head, and the screaming pain from his rib cage were suggesting strongly that he was not about to be sworn into the Legion of Superheroes. Which made it far more likely that what he was feeling under him was actually not the road where he’d fallen. He probed the surface again, and this time recognized the slip of sheet over mattress.

He was in a bed. But how did he get here? He might convince himself that he’d dreamed the whole thing, Veronica Mason’s trial included, if there was an inch of his body that didn’t hurt.

Using all the strength he could muster, Gus forced his eyelids open. A giant head filled his vision, sandy brows nearly brushing his own eyeballs. Gus let out a scream.

The giant head screamed, too, and moved away quickly. Gus’ eyes fought to focus.

“Dude, you’re awake,” Shawn said.

Gus squinted against the light and was able to make out Shawn’s beaming face over his.

“I was just checking to see if you were still breathing,” Shawn said.

“What happened?”

“You were,” Shawn said.

“Before that,” Gus said. “How did I get here?”

“Someone tried to kill us.”

Gus tried to recapture his last, fleeting memory. A red Mercedes flitted across his consciousness before his subconscious hauled it back with the other moments too painful to remember.

“With a car.”

“With a shotgun.”

There was something about a gun tickling the edges of Gus’ brain. For some reason, he envisioned what could only have been the mascot for the University of Idaho’s skeet-shooting team; a giant smiling potato holding a shotgun. And then it all came flooding back. The Echo. The shack. The attendant.

“He tried to kill us!”

Gus fought the screaming pain in his shoulders and moved his arms across his body, checking for spatter pattern. There didn’t seem to be any.

“Don’t worry, buddy,” Shawn said. “Nothing but soft-tissue damage. At least that’s what a fleet of doctors tells me.”

“Doctors?”

For the first time, it occurred to Gus to wonder exactly where he was. He managed to shift his eyes away from Shawn’s face, even his ocular muscles aching with the strain, to see the dull fluorescent tube throbbing on the ceiling, the small TV bolted to the wall, the cheery sailboat painting hanging over the institutional sink. He flexed his fingers over his chest and noticed that his starched button-down business shirt had been replaced with a flimsy sheath of slick, flameproof polyester.

“I’m in the hospital?”

Shawn patted him proudly on the shoulder. It felt like a sledgehammer on Gus’ bruises. “And they were worried about potential brain damage. I knew your brain was too strong for that.”

“Who was worried?”

“And I was right. They all agreed that everything was going to be just fine. As long as you woke up before-” Shawn checked his watch. “Hey, right under the wire. Good timing, buddy.”

“What if I didn’t wake up now?”

Before Shawn could answer, Gus heard the sound of a door opening across the room.

“Shawn?” It was a woman’s voice. Gus risked dislodging several vertebrae and twisted his neck so he could see the door. A pair of blazing red shoes, the toes more sharply pointed than the four-inch spike heels, appeared in the threshold. Gus could hear the heels digging divots out of the linoleum with every step. Forcing his head higher, Gus could make out a long stretch of tanned, muscular legs. He put his hand under his chin and forced his head up farther. The bare legs seemed to go on forever. Finally, far above the point where any normal piece of clothing would have ended, Gus saw a flash of hem. Blazing red hem.

The legs turned and moved assuredly toward the couch.

“I got the paper,” a female voice said. At least, those were the words she used. The voice itself seemed to be promising something much more enticing than the Santa Barbara Times.

“Thanks,” Shawn said, then turned back to Gus. “You and Tara haven’t been formally introduced. Although you have kind of met already. Well, you might have seen her as you sailed over her windshield.”

Shawn moved out of the way, and Gus’ entire field of vision was filled with the image of Tara’s upper thighs. He struggled to pull himself to a shaky sit so he could finally see what she looked like. And immediately wished he’d closed his eyes and slipped back into his coma.

The woman was almost as tall as Shawn, at least in those absurdly high heels. Her long hair was as black as crows’ feathers; her ice blue eyes burned out from lashes that were even blacker. Her lip gloss flashed the same fierce red as her minidress, although the gloss seemed to cover a few more square inches of skin. Tara’s lips parted in a smile, and Gus felt a mixture of terror and attraction he hadn’t experienced since Natasha Henstridge used her tongue to turn a suitor’s brain into shish-kebab in Species.

“I’m so happy you’re awake,” she said in a voice that seemed to promise joys and punishments Gus had only imagined when he was absolutely certain no one could ever read his thoughts. “We were so worried. When you went over the edge like that, I thought my heart was going to stop.”

“Thanks,” Gus said, then grabbed the only part of Shawn he could reach, the tail of his shirt. “Could I speak to you alone for just one moment?”

“We are alone,” Shawn said. “Well, alone with Tara, which is better than being alone alone.”

“Shawn!”

Shawn gave him a disappointed sigh, then turned regretfully to the woman in red. “Not quite himself. Needs a moment to put on his face.”

“I certainly understand,” Tara said. “I’ll be in the waiting room, reading about how amazing you are.”

Gus watched the legs amble out the door, then hissed at Shawn, “Do you know who that is?”

“She just told you,” Shawn said. “Her name is Tara Larison and-”

“Did she mention she’s also the devil’s daughter?”

“We haven’t really talked much about her family. She did say she has a cousin in medical school. That’s why she could be so sure you were alive after we found you.”

“Shawn, she looks just like Satana,” Gus said.

“Isn’t that a kind of raisin?”

“That’s a ‘sultana.’ Satana is the daughter of Satan, raised in Hell and banished to earth to live as a succubus.”

“When did you start going to church?”

“Every Sunday when I was little,” Gus said. “My parents insisted I pray for forgiveness for all the things you talked me into doing. But this isn’t from the Bible. It’s from Vampire Tales number two.”

“That would be one of your lesser-known holy books.”

“The whole story didn’t come out until Marvel Preview number seven.”

Shawn stared at him. “You’re saying she’s a character from a comic book.”

“Not just one. She was all over the Marvel Universe.”

“Gus, I know you hit your head, but you should be able to tell a few things about Tara. Like for instance she isn’t printed on cheap paper. When she talks, her words don’t appear in balloons over her head. And after long and hard study, I can guarantee she exists in at least three dimensions.”

“I know she’s not an actual comic book character,” Gus said. “I am awake enough to realize that. But if someone chooses to look just like the incarnation of all evil in the world, shouldn’t that send some kind of message?”

Shawn sat on the bed next to Gus, sending a shock wave through the mattress that made all of Gus’ muscles scream in pain. He started to pat his friend on the shoulder, but Gus’ obvious flinch made him reconsider.

“Maybe,” Shawn said. “But so should this. When you went over that cliff, she nearly went with you, she was trying so hard to catch you. She’s the one who guided the ambulance to where you’d fallen. She dug through garbage to make sure you were comfortable until they came. And she never stopped fighting for you. She insisted on staying here until you were awake. She badgered the doctors and nurses into giving you the kind of treatment they usually only give to people they actually care about. If you’d needed that surgery, I think she would have scrubbed up and joined in the operation.”

“What surgery?” Gus said.

“Nothing you have to worry about now,” Shawn said.

“And that’s in large measure because Tara fought so hard for you.”

Gus felt the familiar pang of guilt he experienced every time he caught himself judging another human being on physical appearances. And then he felt the equally familiar pang of irritation at feeling guilty about making that kind of judgment. Ever since his mother had caught him making fun of Bobby Fleckstein’s new glasses in second grade and made him sit in the corner for ninety minutes, Gus had felt guilty every time he made a snap judgment about another person. And since his careers as a pharmaceuticals rep and a detective both depended on his ability to size up a new contact immediately, Gus spent a lot of his time feeling guilty. And irritated.

“Okay,” Gus said. “I guess she isn’t really here to regain her powers so she can return to Hell and battle her father for the kingdom.”

“Glad we got that out of the way,” Shawn said. “You can come back in now, Tara.”

Even after his gracious concession, Gus half expected her to materialize before them in a puff of sulfur. Instead she clacked her way in, spike heels turning the floor into a cribbage board behind her.

“I didn’t realize how amazing you were,” Tara said, waving the newspaper.

“Not many people do,” Shawn said. “But I’ll be happy to make sure that you are one of the select few.”

“I mean what you did at that trial,” Tara said. “You told me you were there to give justice a helping hand. But this is much more than that.”

“I start out trying to lend an appendage, but once I’m involved, my whole body gets into it,” Shawn said. “If you’d like a further demonstration of the principle, I’m sure it can be arranged.”

Gus tried to focus enough to read the headline on the newspaper. No matter how many times he squeezed his eyes shut, every time he opened them he saw the same words: “Veronica Mason Innocent.” Of course that would be the lead-in story in any afternoon paper. But Santa Barbara didn’t have an afternoon paper.

Gus snatched the newspaper out of Tara’s hand and felt lightning bolts of pain shoot up him arm. He squinted through the tears of pain clouding his eyes and tried to make out the date above the headlines. “Shawn, this is tomorrow’s paper.”

Tara let out an excited gasp. “You get newspapers from the future?”

“Ever since a man named Lucius Snow saved my life as a child,” Shawn said. “He gave me the gift… and the great responsibility that comes with it.”

“That’s amazing,” Tara said.

“That’s not you,” Gus said. “It’s Kyle Chandler in Early Edition .”

“Next you’re going to tell me I don’t coach high school football in small-town Texas, either,” Shawn said. “That poor Jason Street. What’s he going to do with his life now that he’s in a wheelchair?”

“Shawn! This newspaper is from Wednesday. The trial was on Tuesday.”

“And on Thursday, it’s dollar day at BurgerZone.”

“What I’m trying to say, Shawn, is how long was I unconscious?”

“Not that long,” Shawn said.

“How long?”

“Remember Titanic?”

“Sure.”

“About that long.”

“That was only four hours,” Gus said. “She hit me before lunch.”

“Sorry,” Shawn said. “How long it felt.”

“Oh, my God.”

Tara kneeled down next to the couch and took Gus’ free hand. “It was a long, long night, and a longer morning,” she said. “But Shawn was with you every minute of that time.”

“And now we’re going to get the guy who did this to you,” Shawn said.

“The impound attendant?”

“Exactly. He’s hiding something, and he thought he could scare us away by waving his shotgun at us.”

“Actually, I think he thought he could scare us away by killing us,” Gus said.

“Either way, he was wrong. And we’re going to take him down.”

“Did the police find out anything?”

“The police?” Shawn said. “What do they have to do with anything?”

“Didn’t you call them to say he’d tried to kill us?”

“So they could bungle the case the way they did with Veronica Mason’s?” Shawn asked. “This guy is ours, and we’re going to make sure he pays for what he did. We’re going to spend every minute of every day uncovering his criminal conspiracy. We’re never going to stop until-Hey!” Shawn shoved the newspaper at Gus, pointing at a small boxed headline in the bottom right corner. “Look at that.”

Gus focused on a small headline that read “Local Businessman to Invest in Area, details page six.”

“Way to focus, Captain Attention Span,” Gus said.

“Just look,” Shawn said.

Gus managed to stretch his arms far enough apart to open the paper to the correct page. At least it was the page indicated by the tease. All Gus saw was a large ad promising that the junior partner in a major mattress company would commit suicide if he were forced to sell his stock at the insanely low prices his senior colleague had promised.

“‘You’re killing me, Larry?’” Gus read.

“Oh, we’re killing him all right-but Larry’s got nothing to do with it.” Shawn pointed to a small article running directly under the mattress chain’s generous delivery policy.

“‘A venture capitalist has pledged to invest several billion dollars in the Santa Barbara economy, helping local companies compete on a national playing field,’” Gus read.

“Keep reading.”

“‘Santa Barbara native Dallas Steele, who spent the last ten years as the managing partner of a New York investment bank-’” Gus stopped. “Dallas Steele? From high school?”

“Check the photo,” Shawn said.

Gus peered down at the tiny article. There was nothing but type. “There is no photo.”

“Exactly!”

Lost, Gus dropped the paper and stared at Shawn’s beaming face. Tara beamed beside him. “I don’t get it,” he said.

“No, he didn’t get it and we did,” Shawn said. “That jerk Dallas Steele comes swaggering back into town-”

“I don’t remember him being a jerk.”

“That’s the brain damage talking,” Shawn said.

“You said there was no brain da-”

“He was the biggest phony at Santa Barbara High,” Shawn said. “With his perfect hair and perfect GPA and perfect football season and perfect girlfriend.”

Tara looked confused. “He doesn’t sound phony to me. He sounds like the real thing.”

“That’s the worst kind of phony. The genuine kind.”

“You’re right,” Tara said. “No wonder you hated him.”

“He was always nice to me,” Gus said. “I mean, when you tried to rent me to the football team as a tackling dummy, he talked me out of it.”

“Depriving you of badly needed income, to say nothing of extra PE credit,” Shawn said. “And all so he could say he’d helped out some geeky loser.”

“He never called me a loser.”

“Everyone called you a loser, Gus,” Shawn said. “It was the parachute pants. Anyway, there’s only one loser now, and that’s international phony Dallas Steele.”

“It says here he’s a multibillionaire.”

“And he’s still not happy,” Shawn said. “He’s got to come back to Santa Barbara and lord it over us all. And that might have worked, if it wasn’t for us meddling kids. We knocked him right off the front page. He’s probably sitting in some palatial estate right now, leafing forlornly through today’s paper, wondering exactly how his high school nemeses Shawn Spenser and Burton Guster bested him.”

Shawn held up his hand for a high five. Gus tried to reach up for it, but his arm wouldn’t rise above his rib cage. He didn’t really understand why he was supposed to be fiving, anyway. Dallas Steele was a billionaire investor, and Gus had spent the last day in a near-vegetative state because he couldn’t scrape up the cash to ransom his company car.

“And just think how he’ll feel when he reads that we’ve crushed a criminal conspiracy that reaches into the highest levels of Santa Barbara society,” Shawn said triumphantly. “We may even take out some of his neighbors.”

Gus wasn’t sure that people in Steele’s economic bracket actually had neighbors, except in the way astronomers discuss neighboring galaxies. But that didn’t seem as important as the other question banging against his skull. “What conspiracy is that?”

“The phony impound man,” Shawn said. “We know he’s a criminal. We know he’s hiding something.”

“That doesn’t mean there’s a conspiracy reaching into the highest levels of Santa Barbara society,” Gus said. “Maybe he’s a loner. Or maybe his partners are even lower down than he is.”

“You can’t have the ultimate bad guy being some poor schmuck,” Shawn said. “Your really good villains are the wealthy elite.”

“You were watching another Law and Order marathon when I was unconscious, weren’t you?”

“That has nothing to do with it,” Shawn said. “You want your hero to go up against the entrenched power structure, a lone knight in dented armor tilting at the windmills of wealth and influence in what’s supposed to be a class-free America.”

“Didn’t we just free the widow of a multimillionaire by scamming a confession out of a woman wearing Wal-Mart’s bargain line?”

“Is that a trick question?”

Gus was spared answering by the arrival of a nurse, who shooed Shawn and Tara out of the room. After a moment she was joined by a doctor, who gave Gus a quick once-over and approved his release. Gus spent the next fifteen minutes filling out insurance paperwork and the following forty-five coaxing his fingers into bending sufficiently to button his shirt. At least it was a fresh shirt. Sometime in the night Shawn must have stopped by Gus’ place and picked up a change of clothes for him.

When an orderly wheeled him to the hospital’s front door, Shawn and Tara were waiting by her red Mercedes. They kept waiting as he made his way across the sidewalk. Each step was an agonizing ordeal, as he forced stiffened and bruised muscles to contract and relax. After what felt like another hour, he made it over to them.

“Tara’s offered to take you home, bud,” Shawn said.

“It’s the least I can do. If there’s anything else, please let me know.”

“Thanks, but you don’t have to,” Gus said. “You’ve already done so much.”

“Anyone would have done the same thing.”

“For a complete stranger? I don’t think so.”

“Well, we’re not strangers anymore,” Tara said. “I’d like you to think of me as your friend.”

“Works for me,” Shawn said.

“In that case, there is one thing I’d like to do before I go home,” Gus said, gritting his teeth against the pain. “If you wouldn’t mind driving back up that hill, I want to see the man who really is responsible. And put an end to his criminal enterprise, no matter how high or low it reaches.”

Shawn looked like he was going to argue; then he relaxed into a grin. He turned to Tara. “Do you mind making one quick stop?”

Gus sprawled out across the red leather of the backseat as Tara piloted them back to where she’d first seen him. Normally he would have used the travel time to work out an action plan with Shawn. But no matter how helpful Tara was being, it didn’t feel right to discuss their process in front of her. So Gus used the trip to experience every minor bump in the road as a wave of pain coursed through his entire body.

Which turned out to be just as beneficial a use of time as planning would have been. Because when the Mercedes pulled up across the street from the impound office, he heard Shawn mutter a confused expletive. Pulling himself up in the seat, Gus looked out the window.

The area in front of the shack was surrounded by police cars. Uniformed officers and plainclothes detectives stood outside the front door. Two EMTs loitered by their open, empty ambulance.

“What’s going on?” Gus said.

Shawn surveyed the scene. “I’d say you’re not the only victim of the criminal conspiracy. Looks like they’ve taken out one of their own. Or as they say in Law and Order-chung chung. ”