PSYCH: The Dah-Ling Store-It-Yourself (PG-13), Shawn/Lassiter.
The bad news is that one of Lassiter's highest profile arrests has just escaped from prison. The worse news is that his best hope of tracking him down is a sleep-deprived Shawn Spencer.
back to part one
Gus was just settling onto the Psych couch with a bowl of Rice Krispies to watch the latest episode of America’s Got Talent. Gus often dreamed of winning the prize, but what exactly he had done to get it was always slightly fuzzy. The one time he could remember the competition portion, he had been standing center stage spelling out the word aggiornamento to momentous applause.
Gus leaned forward, watching as the first person took the stage. He was bringing the first spoonful of Rice Krispie goodness up to his mouth when the stage disappeared in a wash of red and white, “Breaking News!” scrolling urgently across the screen. Gus dropped the spoon back into the bowl in irritation. Now he was never going to know if that guy in the orange cowboy boots could sing.
He was just reaching for the remote when a photo of Shawn appeared in the corner of the screen. Gus dropped the bowl of Rice Krispies and jumped to his feet.
Mary Merryweather clasped her hands on the news desk and stared out at the world solemnly. “SBPD consultant Shawn Spencer was apparently abducted by the fugitive Cyril Riner earlier this evening at the Dah-Ling Store-It-Yourself, who some of you may remember was the scene of the original crime.”
“It’s just awful, isn’t it, Mary?” co-anchor Mark Bender asked, shaking his head sadly for a moment before giving everyone a bright grin. “More details as they come in.”
“Oh my god!” Gus shouted. He grabbed his phone and dialed Shawn’s number in a moment of frantic confusion. “The person you are calling is not available to take your call right now,” a cheery female voice informed him. “The voicemail box is currently full. Please try again later. Goodbye!”
There was a click as his call was ended, and Gus tried to remember when he had last seen Shawn. He’d been claiming he was going to talk to Buzz, safe and sound in the police department. What could have happened in the three hours since he left him there? Gus shook his head in resignation and made a beeline to his car.
Who was he kidding? Three hours was more than enough time for Shawn to get himself kidnapped. Two weeks ago he’d managed it in less than ten minutes, and that time he’d been right out front.
Gus didn’t bother to follow the posted speed limits as he drove to the police station. He didn’t care if he got a ticket. Shawn had gotten enough of them in this car that he didn’t have a spotless record anymore anyway, and this was life and death.
He ran into the police station, and came to a stop just inside the doors, placing his hands on his knees to catch his breath before looking up urgently for help. “Have you seen the news?” he shouted. “Shawn’s been kidnapped!”
Everyone stopped what they were doing to turn and look at him. Henry was standing off to the side with his arms crossed, facing off with Vick. Lassiter was on the other side of the room beside Juliet, frantically writing something on the chalkboard that had been dragged into the center of the bullpen.
Juliet ran over and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “We know, Gus,” she said reassuringly. “We’re the ones that told them.”
Gus was overcome with an unreasonable rage, though he recognized most of it as misrepresented fear. “Then why didn’t anyone call me?” he demanded.
Henry cleared his throat. “I tried,” he said. “You weren’t answering your phone.”
Gus’s rage disappeared as quickly as it had come, and he was suddenly taken over by a debilitating sense of guilt in its place. He’d turned his phone on silent. He’d done it because Shawn always called to bother him just when America’s Got Talent was coming on and Gus hadn’t wanted to deal with him tonight. “We’ve got to find him!” Gus said.
“Gus, we’re doing everything we can,” Juliet said. “We’re going to find him.”
“You don’t know that,” Gus said, pulling away. “He could be dead somewhere! I never should have left him here alone. He hasn’t been himself lately. I should have stayed with him.”
“He’s not dead,” Lassiter said quietly, and nodded towards the chalkboard.
Gus approached it carefully. It was a timetable. Shawn went missing at 8:05 PM. He managed to get a call through to Lassiter at 8:57 PM. He’d sent him a few text-messages at 9:22 PM before cutting the conversation off abruptly. Gus scanned the messages that Lassiter had faithfully transcribed. LMAO. That’s what Shawn had sent them. Shawn was with some murderer and he was laughing his ass off.
Gus glanced at the clock. It was almost 10:00 PM. That was more than enough time for Shawn to have gotten himself killed. He felt sick again. Gus didn’t exactly enjoy being in mortal danger, but as long as Shawn was there, he could handle it. He couldn’t handle this not knowing, and he couldn’t stand the thought of Shawn out there alone without Gus to keep him in check. Shawn was not going to do as he was told, and this time he was going to get himself killed the same way he’d gotten himself a concussion from Drimmer.
Lassiter was standing beside him, fidgeting with the information on the board, moving a few things around, putting them back. “We have an APB out on Spencer and Riner,” he said. “We’re going to get about 30 phone tips an hour. Once we sort through them to the ones that might be the truth, we’ll find him.”
“How did this even happen?” Gus asked.
Lassiter kept his eyes on the chalkboard. “It’s my fault,” he said. “Spencer was following me.”
Gus thought it would be easy to blame Lassiter, but he knew Shawn too well to do it. “If he was following you, then it’s not your fault,” he said.
“It’s Shawn’s,” Henry said roughly, coming up behind them to glance dismissively at the board. “He had no business going out there in the first place.”
“He was trying to help me,” Lassiter said softly. He didn’t know where this sudden urge to defend Spencer had come from, and he valiantly fought it back down. “Not that it would excuse it.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Henry said. “And it doesn’t entirely clear you of guilt, either. You’ve all let Shawn get away with this little agency business of his for too long. I think it’s time you put a stop to it, don’t you? When we get Shawn back, I want him off your cases.”
Lassiter didn’t bother to mention he’d been trying to make that happen all along. Vick stepped in to try and appease him. “Henry,” she started.
“Don’t give me another speech about how damn valuable the kid is,” he snapped. “He’s not going to do you any good if he’s dead. This is the last one, the last time, you’re going to get him killed, Karen.”
“Let’s worry about that later,” she said calmly. “We’re all very upset right now. We don’t want to say anything that we can’t take back.”
Henry watched her speculatively. He knew what she was referring to. Henry could end Shawn’s career as a psychic private eye with just a few words. All he had to do was tell them that Shawn’s been lying to them for years. The way Karen was looking at him, though, he was pretty sure she knew it too.
Karen had always been a little ruthless. Henry had liked that about her right away. She didn’t care how the job got done so long as it got done. He was counting on the fact that hadn’t changed. “Fine,” he said. “First, you find him. We’ll talk about the rest after you do.”
He glanced back at the chalkboard, reading over Shawn’s messages quickly. “Is he talking in code?” he asked. “H n K? LMAO? What do these mean?”
Everyone looked at the ground. No one wanted to tell Henry Spencer what they meant. Gus decided it was up to him. “It’s just text-speak,” he explained. “They just mean goodbye. It doesn’t help us find him.”
“Goodbye?” Henry repeated, and snorted. “I just don’t get that text-ing thing. What about the phone call? What did he tell you?”
"Spencer told me that Riner was innocent," Lassiter said. "He wants us to look at the other suspects. He said Riner wasn’t going to let him tell me anything else."
"We know who has Shawn, that's who you need to be looking for," Henry snapped.
“You think I don’t know that?” Lassiter asked tersely.
Karen moved back between them. “I think we can all acknowledge that his messages aren’t going to help us. Does anyone want to venture a guess as to why that is?”
“What do you mean?” Juliet asked.
“Mr. Spencer is a very clever young man,” Karen said. “If he wanted to give us a hint about where to find him, he would have found a way to do it.”
“You don’t think he’s trying to,” Gus said.
“No, I don’t,” Karen said.
“God damn it,” Henry snapped, as he realized what she meant. “It’s because he’s working the damn case. He’s curious, and if he gets away, he won’t get to question the star suspect anymore.”
“So how are we going to find him if he doesn’t want to be found?” Juliet asked.
Henry pursed his lips. “That’s easy,” he said. “You’re not going to.”
x x x x x x
Cyril took one look at the broadcasts on the televisions and ran right through the red light, driving them out to a secluded area out of range of the shops. Shawn glanced back behind them nervously. “Is this one of those, ‘let’s go for a little drive’ moments?” he asked.
“This is awful, is what this is!” Cyril snapped. “I’ve already got everyone looking for me, and now they’re going to be looking for you, too.”
He pulled off the road into an empty lot, and then tore out of the truck, slamming the door behind him. Shawn followed him out, glancing around. “Just calm down. We can still do this.”
Cyril shook his head. “No, this is way above my head, okay? I’m not a hostage taking kind of guy.” He sighed heavily and then met Shawn’s eyes. “I think I’m going to have to let you go.”
Shawn was crushed. “You’re firing me?”
“As a hostage you’ve become a liability,” Cyril said. “Your face is all over the news. You’re going to be recognized.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, so are you! Though admittedly, mug shot is not your best look,” Shawn said. “You need me. I’ll be a better hostage, okay? I’ll stop text-messaging the cops and everything.”
“It’s not that, you’ve been great, really,” he protested. “I couldn’t have asked for a better captive.”
“I think that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me,” Shawn said, and grinned brightly. “That’s settled then.”
”What’s settled?” Cyril asked with a frown.
“We’ll go to the Hottie Tottie Tavern together,” Shawn explained.
“Why would we go there?” Cyril asked.
“Because that’s where we’re going to find James Clavor,” he said. “That’s the thing about career criminals, it’s exactly that, a career. They go out for the day, commit crime, and then return back home to all the same places. It’s why they keep getting arrested, everyone knows where to find them.”
“If that were true, then they would have been able to find him before this,” Cyril said.
“But they weren’t looking in the right place,” Shawn said. “How would you describe James Clavor? Tall, right? Close shaved hair. Big, though it’s mostly muscle, and most of it covered with tattoos-the snake you remember, the rest you forgot. Am I close?”
Cyril was excited. “Yes, that’s him, you know him?”
“Have you seen the inside of a police station recently?” Shawn asked. “I just described half the suspects there. Your buddy Clavor’s a generic grunt, and that’s served him well. Put him in a lineup and the victim will be hard pressed to tell him apart from the guy standing next to him. That’s why we need to get a name.”
“It’s been two years, you really think he’s going to be going to the same old places?” Cyril asked. “I’m not sure what he got away with when we robbed that place, for all I know he could be rich.”
“All that would mean is that he’s sticking twenties in the g-strings of his favorite ladies instead of lucky old George,” Shawn said. “Trust me. The guy’s a lifetime loser. He’ll be there.”
“I still think it would be best for you to go back,” Cyril said. “This manhunt for me is getting out of hand.”
“Lassie’s not going to stop hunting you just because you let me go, he’s not going to stop until he finds you,” Shawn said. “Which means we’ve got to prove you innocent before he does.”
“Okay, okay,” Cyril said. “You really want to go to the Hottie Tottie Taven?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Shawn said brightly.
x x x x x x
The Hottie Tottie Tavern didn’t really know what it wanted to be. From what Shawn could tell, it was part Tiki Hut and part Vegas showroom. They only got away with the blaring neon sign because the location was far enough from civilization that the oblivious suburban families of Summerland probably just thought it was the Venus star.
There were as many Harleys out front as there were cars, and a few Hell’s Angel wannabes were smoking around their bikes. Shawn tried not to make eye contact with them as they went inside.
The clientele ran the gamut from the wannabes outside to the balding, middle-age suburban dads, who had followed that Venus star and found out where girls are from. None of them looked like very appealing conversationalists to Shawn. “How about you talk to those guys?” he asked.
“Yeah, okay,” Cyril said. “I’ll start with them. But what about you?”
“I’m going to talk with the dancers,” Shawn explained.
“The dancers aren’t supposed to talk much, unless it’s dirty,” Cyril said. “Sheesh, haven’t you ever been to one of these places before?”
“Not really,” Shawn said. “Well, like once, when I turned eighteen.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Cyril demanded. “Are you seriously dating Lassiter?”
“I just don’t find this kind of tableau interesting because it’s one-sided, this is their 9-to-5, it’s just that it’s 9:00 PM to 5:00 AM instead of the other way around,” Shawn said. “Like, see, that girl there-”
He pointed to a girl slipping down a pole. She was wearing a fringe bikini top and a cowboy hat and not much else. “She’s trying to cover the dark circles under her eyes with make-up but it’s not really working. If you look closely enough you can see she’s trying to do the same thing with the varicose veins. She’s got a new baby at home, probably only a few weeks old.”
“Jesus,” Cyril said. “I don’t want to ogle a new mom.”
“You see my dilemma,” Shawn said. “It isn’t easy being prescient.”
“Okay, fine,” Cyril said. “You talk to the dancers, I’ll talk to the gawkers, and then we’ll meet up to see if we learned anything.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Shawn said. He wandered around to the other side of the stage, and one of the dancers spotted him right away. She started to approach, grinning sweetly, and grabbed him by the sides of his hoodie, before superfluously straightening them out.
“Hey, gorgeous,” she said. “You want a lap dance?”
Shawn had no illusions that he was walking around looking like the Hunchback from Notre Dame or something, but he figured that considering the usual clientele at this place, right now he was registering as movie-star good looking by comparison.
“I don’t really do lap dances in public,” Shawn explained, trying to disentangle himself. “I’m shy.”
“Really?” she asked, sliding a hand towards the waistband of his pants. “I find that hard to believe.”
Shawn caught her hand before it could reach its destination and glanced at her costume. It was a gold, Leia-inspired bikini, with little tassels hanging off the top. “I love the little tassels,” he said, gesturing to her chest area. “Are they the kind that spin?”
“No, they’re just regular old tassels, the kind that spin are special order,” she said, and gave a mock-sigh. “The boss never wants to shell out the dough for the luxuries. Well, you know how men are.”
“Do I ever,” Shawn said.
She smiled at him. “You’re a doll, you know that?”
“I have been told,” he said. “My Aunt Ruth used to dress me up and try to get me to live in the miniature house she kept in her backyard.”
“You’re funny,” she said. “What are you doing in a place like this?”
“I’m here to audition, actually,” Shawn said. “But I don’t think any of these uniforms are going to fit me.”
She laughed. “Yeah,” she said. “Your height could be a problem. Also, certain other things.”
Shawn grinned at her. If people ever bothered to speak with them, they would find that exotic dancers almost always made for fun, interesting people. “Shawn Spencer,” he said, holding out his hand.
“They call me Houston here, but you can call me Amelia, if you want. We’re not actually supposed to give out real names, but you seem pretty harmless,” she said, grinning.
“Nice to meet you, Amelia,” Shawn said. “That’s pretty common, huh? Using false names?”
“In a place like this?” she asked. “Honey, what do you think? You think all those strippers were really christened Bambi?”
“You’re messing with my world view, here,” Shawn said. “I’m starting to think this is why I could never find that nice girl I met at Nudes, Nudes, Nudes in the phone book.”
Amelia laughed, but stopped herself and bit her lip when she noticed her boss watching from behind the bar, obviously wondering why she was standing there laughing instead of shaking her groove thing. She pushed Shawn back into a chair and then got up on his lap. “Don’t worry,” she said. “This is a freebie.”
“That’s good, because all I’ve got is a $2.00 bill and some M&Ms,” Shawn said. “I’m actually just here looking for someone. He’s got a habit of giving out a lot of false names, too. You might know him as Jimmy, Daniel, or Dave? He’d have a cobra tattoo, probably a bad attitude.”
Amelia froze in her undulating to think about it. “There’s this guy, Dave, he’s got a cobra tattoo and he’s definitely got a bad attitude. He’s a regular. In fact, I think I saw him lurking around just a few minutes ago.”
“Do you think you could point him out?” Shawn asked.
Amelia glanced around but shook her head. “I don’t see him now. He must have left. He’s always hitting on us, you know. Talking about his big score. Saying someday he’s going to buy an island and whisk us away.”
“I hope you told him that kidnapping was a felony,” Shawn said, before carefully extracting himself from her. He reached into his pockets and placed the $2.00 bill in her hands. “He’s still watching,” Shawn explained, when she tried to give it back. “Keep it. They’re rare, you know.”
She grinned and stuck it down her top. “Thanks,” she said.
Cyril came up to them. “Well?” he asked.
“Cyril!” Shawn said brightly. “Cyril, this is Amelia. Amelia, this is Cyril.”
“Nice to meet you,” Amelia said. “I’ve got to head out. I’m next up on stage.”
“Break a leg,” Shawn called after her.
“Well?” Cyril asked again. “Did you learn anything?”
“I learned all kinds of things,” Shawn said. “For instance, did you know that strippers don’t use their real names?”
Cyril sighed. “About Clavor,” he said.
“Oh, right,” Shawn said. “Amelia says she knows a Dave with a tattoo. She thinks she saw him earlier. How about you?”
“I didn’t see him,” Cyril said, before giving Shawn a push towards the doors. “I want you to wait outside for a minute, okay?”
Shawn came to a stop just outside, causing Cyril to slam into him. He stared at a man standing a few feet away. He kept getting caught in the flare of pink light from the neon ‘Hottie’ sign right above his head, and he was lighting up a cigarette. Shawn noticed there was a winding cobra crawling up his right arm. “What about that guy?” Shawn asked, and pointed over at him.
Cyril gasped in disbelief. “Clavor!” he shouted, taking off running.
Clavor’s eyes widened as he caught sight of Cyril, and he pulled out a gun, throwing off a wild shot before taking off for his car. Cyril dropped down to the ground to avoid the bullet and Shawn threw himself against the side of the Hottie Tottie Tavern. They heard the sound of an engine powering up before either of them could get back on their feet.
Cyril ran for his truck, and Shawn took off following him, jumping into the passenger seat just as Cyril was driving off. “What are you doing?” Cyril demanded. “Don’t you have any sense at all? You don’t follow your kidnapper willingly into a car chase.”
“My last car chase was disappointing, we hardly broke twenty miles per hour,” Shawn said. “I thrive on new experience.”
Cyril pulled the truck onto the road after Clavor’s convertible in a wide swerve. “Nice car for a deadbeat,” Shawn said, and then ducked when Clavor turned to look back at them and fire off another shot.
When Shawn sat back up, there was a wide bullet hole in the windshield in the general vicinity of his head. He swallowed heavily.
Cyril slowed down and glanced at him. “Get out,” he said.
“What?” Shawn asked, confused.
Clavor fired shot off another shot and Cyril swerved again, but Shawn heard the bullet take out a headlight. “Get out of the car, Shawn, or you’re going to get killed. This isn’t your fight.”
“We’re going like eighty miles per hour,” Shawn protested. “I’m pretty sure jumping out of the car is only going to kill me faster.”
Cyril slammed on the brakes, slowing to a little under twenty miles per hour. “Now, Shawn, or I’m going to stop this car to throw you out and probably lose Clavor’s trail in the process.”
“But I can’t leave now,” Shawn protested, and then glanced at the glove box with a frown.
“You can, and you’re going to,” Cyril said.
Shawn glanced out the widow at the road. “You have to promise me something, you have to promise you’re going to look in your glove box.”
“What? What the hell are you talking about? Just jump!” Cyril slowed them almost to a stop. He leaned across to open the door, and before Shawn knew it he was tumbling along the highway like a weed.
“But you’ve got all my Red Bull!” Shawn shouted after him.
He had asphalt burns on the palms of his hands and the left knee of his jeans had ripped wide open, but he was mostly unharmed. No bullet holes. He checked.
Shawn slowly pulled himself to his feet, watching as the cars continued to speed along the road, disappearing as they outdistanced the neon lights. Shawn kicked at a rock in frustration.
With both Cyril and Clavor gone he had no choice but to go back home, and the thought of facing his father scared him a hell of a lot more than high-speed car chases or shoot-outs.
x x x x x x
The adrenaline and Red Bull had kept him going for awhile, but as Shawn dazedly made his way down the dark road back towards the Hottie Tottie Tavern, his body was starting to rebel. His knee was aching with every step, and his eyes kept slipping shut for a few minutes at a time.
He was trying to hold the image of James Clavor in his mind. He was pretty much the way Shawn had described, and that meant he was easy to forget. He was listing his features as he walked, mumbling them aloud to himself. In addition to the cobra there was a thorny rose and a Queen of Hearts, barbed wire drawn around both wrists. Tattoos were a little like barcodes, it made people easy to identify. They were the only remarkable thing about Clavor other than his above-average size.
Shawn could see the flashing neon signs as the Hottie Tottie Tavern came back into sight. A naked neon woman was bending over in the window, offering a drink, and while ‘Hottie’ flashed pink, ‘Tottie’ went blue, and Shawn blinked his eyes in the garish glare of it before reaching the payphone that had been set up beside the back exit.
He leaned his head against the grimy metal side and grabbed the phone, before scrambling around in his pockets looking for a quarter. All he had left were the M&Ms, so he’d have to call collect.
Now it was just a matter of who he should call.
x x x x x x
Lassiter was staring at the chalkboard, going over the information again and again. He should have been more forceful when he had Spencer on the phone, he should have pressed the reality of the situation home. The problem with Spencer was he didn’t take anything seriously, even when he’d been sitting on Lassiter’s couch, bruised and about to be killed, there’d been that resistance to acknowledge the situation with anything other than his strange sense of humor.
He was so distracted, that he didn’t even glance at the caller-Id when his cellphone rang. “Will you accept a collect call from ‘I-got-away-come-get-me’?” a woman’s voice asked cheerfully, Shawn’s tired voice coming through in the part where he was supposed to say his name.
“Yes,” Lassiter said urgently. “Spencer, where the hell are you?”
Henry and Gus both appeared almost instantly at his side. Henry was twitching to take the phone out of Lassiter’s hands, and Guster was just twitching.
"I’m lost in Summerland," Shawn told him tiredly. "I just got pushed out of a moving vehicle and I was being shot at.”
Lassiter held his hand over the mouthpiece. “Somebody trace this call!” he shouted, before putting the phone back to his ear. “Are you alright?”
"Maybe you missed the part about being shot at, and shoved out of a moving car?" Shawn asked him, before laughing. "Yeah, fine. I'm fine, but he drove off with all my Red Bull."
“Spencer, I need you to tell me exactly where you are,” Lassiter said.
“The Hottie Tottie Tavern,” Shawn said.
Lassiter paused. “Come again?”
“It’s a real place,” Shawn said defensively. “Coincidentally, so is James Clavor. I mean, he’s a real person, not a real place, but you probably figured that out. He’s the one that was shooting at us.”
"We'll be there soon," Lassiter said, glancing at Henry. "Your father wants to talk with you. I want you to stay on the line, okay?"
“You told my father?” Shawn demanded. “That was the one thing I asked you not to do.”
Lassiter didn’t bother respond, just handed the phone off to Henry and started shouting orders. “Do we have a location yet?” he demanded. “I want to send an ambulance just in case, he sounds out of it.”
“Shawn!” Henry shouted. “What happened? How badly are you hurt?”
"I'm fine, I told Lassiter," Shawn said. "But it's not as cool as it looks in the movies, you know. Jumping out of cars."
"You jumped?" Henry demanded.
"Jumped, pushed, it was kind of hard to tell the difference," Shawn said. “I think I’m gonna go lay down now.”
“Shawn, wait, I want you to stay on the phone-“
Henry cursed as the call was ended, and then rushed to follow Lassiter, with Gus close behind him. “Did you find him?” Henry demanded.
Lassiter nodded as he started down the steps towards the parking lot. “Yeah, it’s a strip bar just between Santa Barbara and Summerland. We’re closer so they’re giving jurisdiction to us.”
Juliet came speeding up to the curb in a police car, the lights and sirens already blaring. “Get in!” she shouted.
Lassiter climbed in beside her, and Gus and Henry got in the back. Juliet hit the gas and took off at a starting point of about sixty miles per hour. Lassiter itched to be in the driver’s seat himself, but they didn’t have that much time to waste. The cars ahead of them kept pulling out of the way, but Juliet didn’t slow to wait for them. Her eyes were straight ahead, and she determinedly barreled on, as though she intended to go through them if she had to. Lassiter decided after a moment that actually he couldn’t have done it better himself.
The ambulance came around the corner to line up behind them, and Lassiter tapped his fingers along the door, keeping track of it in the side view mirror.
“He’s probably fine,” Gus was saying. “Right? What did he say? Didn’t he say he was fine?”
“Yeah, that’s what he said,” Lassiter said.
Lassiter was caught between wanting to grab Shawn and hug him or grab him and shake him once he got his hands on him again, but when they actually make it to the Hottie Tottie Tavern, all he can see is Shawn laid out on the sidewalk, caught in the glare of the headlights, the knees of his jeans stained with almost as much blood as there was on his hands.
Henry made it to Shawn’s side first, with a paramedic jumping out of the ambulance behind them coming in a close second. Lassiter’s heartbeat was stuttering a little as he followed them more slowly, Juliet and Gus easily passing him by.
“Is he okay?” Guster demanded.
The paramedic looked confused. “He’s . . . just asleep,” he said.
“Come again?” Henry snapped.
“But I don’t want any more hot chocolate,” Shawn murmured, sighing deeply and arranging himself more comfortably on the sidewalk.
“Shawn?” Henry snapped, reaching out to lightly slap Shawn’s cheek. Shawn winced, but only turned away instead of waking up.
“Sir, please,” the paramedic, whose nametag read Darius, said. “Give me some space to work.” Darius rolled up one of Shawn’s sleeves and gave him a once over. “He’s got some cuts and abrasions,” he said, as he reached out to take Shawn’s pulse. “Possibly a minor tachycardia. Any idea what’s wrong with him?”
“You want a list?” Henry asked.
“He hasn’t been sleeping,” Gus stepped in. “And he’s been living off Red Bull for the last three days.”
Darius nodded. “That would do it,” he said. “I want to take him to the hospital for an IV and observation for the night, but I think it’s safe to say he’ll be fine.”
The other paramedic came over to join them, laying a gurney out beside Shawn. Henry got to his feet and stepped back, running a hand down his face before sticking his hands in his pockets and watching as his son was shuffled off into the back of the ambulance.
Lassiter came to stand beside him, and he felt very odd, strangely like a weight had been lifted.
Almost as if he’d been terrified all this time and only now was realizing it, almost as if he actually cared about annoying, meddling, insane Shawn Spencer.
“Is someone going to ride with him?” Darius asked, leaning out the back of the ambulance. Inside Shawn was talking on his sleep, protesting that the marshmallows were far too big.
Lassiter bit down on his lip. Even if he didn’t have work to do here, even if Henry weren’t the obvious choice, it wasn’t like he had any business holding Spencer’s hand.
“I’m his father,” Henry said roughly, pushing himself into the ambulance without further ado.
Gus was right behind him, but Darius barred his way. “Only one can go with him, sir,” he said.
Henry reached out to stop the progress of the closing door. “He’s family,” he said. “This is my other son. I think we can make an exception, don’t you?”
“Uh-“ Darius trailed off, unsure what to say. “Your son?”
Gus met the paramedic’s eyes smugly. “You got something to say?” he asked, and then crawled into the ambulance. “You know that’s right.”
Juliet let out a breath as the door shut behind Gus. “Thank goodness,” she said. “I really thought-“
She didn’t finish her thought, but Lassiter knew what she’d been thinking. He’d been thinking the same thing.
“Is that Shawn!?”
The ambulance was just starting down the road when Lassiter heard the shout, and he turned around to see a barefoot, half-dressed woman charging straight at him. He tried to stop her as she ran by, but she was all covered in oil and slipped right out of his hands.
She stopped in the middle of the road, tripping and catching herself with the palm of one hand on the ground, before regaining her balance and turning back around. “Is he alright?” she demanded.
“I’m sorry,” Juliet said politely, stepping forward. “Who are you?”
“I’m Houston,” she said, glancing back at the retreating ambulance. “That was Shawn, wasn’t it? Is he okay?”
“How do you know Spencer?” Lassiter asked her. “And what’s your real name?”
“Amelia Emerson,” she said reluctantly. “Shawn was in the Tavern, earlier tonight. He’s not in any trouble, is he?”
“Shawn was taken hostage by the fugitive Cyril Riner,” Juliet explained. “We’ve been looking for him. The paramedics said they think he’s going to be fine.”
Lassiter gave her a censuring glance for giving so much away, but it had the right effect on Amelia, who nodded and calmed down almost at once. “Cyril?” she repeated. “He didn’t look like much of a hostage taker to me.”
“You saw him?” Lassiter demanded. “Is he still here?”
“No, he left with Shawn,” Amelia said. “But Shawn didn’t-” she stopped herself from saying anything more, suddenly worried that it might not look too good for Shawn to say he’d been going with Cyril willingly. “He was fine when he left. Then we heard a gunshot, and when we came out they were both gone.”
“Do you know what they were doing here?” Juliet asked.
Amelia nodded. “Yes,” she said. “They were looking for Dave.”
“Dave,” Lassiter repeated wryly. “And does this Dave have a last name?”
“I don’t even think Dave is his first name,” Amelia said.
“That’s helpful,” Lassiter said, and Juliet discreetly hit him with her elbow. Lassiter winced and held his side, because her elbows were surprisingly pointy.
“Was this the first time you had met Cyril Riner?” Juliet asked.
Amelia nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Shawn too. But Dave comes here all the time.”
“Do you think you could describe him for a sketch artist?” Lassiter asked.
Amelia pulled her arms around herself and fought back a shiver, before glancing back at the road. “If it’ll help Shawn,” she said after a moment. “Can I go back inside?”
Juliet nodded. “We’ll send someone down, will you still be here in a few hours?”
“My shift doesn’t end until 4:00,” Amelia told them, and then went back inside.
Lassiter shook his head disbelievingly. “Spencer makes the oddest allies,” he said.
“And the strangest enemies,” Juliet said softly, and Lassiter couldn’t figure out why she was looking at him.
x x x x x x
Shawn woke up abruptly, sitting straight up with a strangled gasp and reaching out blindly to tear at whatever was piercing his arm. Someone reached out and caught his wrist before he could pull out the IV, and Shawn glanced around blearily to see his father sitting in the chair beside the bed.
“Leave it alone,” Henry said quietly.
Shawn took a deep breath to orient himself and then noticed that Gus had fallen asleep splayed across the end of the bed, snoring rather loudly and clutching at the sheets with both hands. There wasn’t a clock in the room, but when he glanced out the window it was already bright. It had to be eight or nine in the morning at least.
Henry slowly released the grip he had on Shawn’s wrist, before leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms, staring him down. Things were coming back to Shawn kind of blearily, and he slowly remembered getting into the truck with Cyril, being thrown out of the truck by Cyril, and being locked in a room and forced to drink nothing but mug after mug of steaming hot chocolate.
But that last part was probably just a dream.
“I hope you’re proud of yourself,” Henry said.
Shawn placed a hand to his head. He could feel a migraine coming on, piercing through both temples as though he’d been bolted like a modern-day Frankenstein monster. It didn’t help that the whole world seemed soft focus, and he felt as though he’d taken too much cold medicine, like in that commercial where the woman’s head floats away like a balloon. “Do we have to do this now?”
“I’m sorry, is now a bad time?” Henry asked. “Maybe I should wait and give this lecture at your funeral, would that be better for you?”
“Actually, that would be awesome,” Shawn said. “I think you’re onto something with this. If you save your lectures until I’m dead, you still get to entertain your favorite pastime, but I don’t have to listen to them.”
“Unfortunately, that would defeat the purpose of them,” he snapped. “Since what I’m trying to do is keep you alive.”
“I’m fine,” Shawn protested weakly.
Henry snorted. “Yeah, right. This is just like that thing with Drimmer. You never think, Shawn. You never stop and think.”
“You’re never going to let that go, are you?” Shawn demanded.
“It was two weeks ago, Shawn,” Henry yelled.
Gus bolted up from the bed, startled awake, and his eyes were wide and kind of frazzled. “What? What happened?” he shouted.
“Everything’s fine,” Shawn reassured Gus.
“No, it’s not,” Henry snapped, getting to his feet to glare down at his son. “Gus? Why don’t you go get yourself a coffee.”
Gus looked between Shawn and Henry for a moment, before reaching out to grab Shawn’s arm and give it a slight squeeze. “I’m glad you’re alright,” he said. “I’d lecture you but I think Henry’s going to do it well enough for the both of us, so I’ll just be in the café if you need me.”
“Gus, I’ll give you a million dollars if you don’t leave me here alone with him,” Shawn said.
“Someday you’re going to have to learn it’s pointless to try and bribe people with Monopoly money,” Gus told him, and then went out the door.
Shawn felt stripped down and vulnerable sitting in the hospital bed in the stupid flimsy green hospital gown, with his father looming over him. Shawn hated being vulnerable, and he always fought dirty when he was cornered. “Can we do this later?” he asked. “I don’t feel well.”
“No, Shawn, we can’t, because if we don’t do this now, you might not have a later,” Henry said. “You could have been killed, do you even get that? Is it even registering with you?”
“I was never in any danger!” Shawn protested. “Cyril wasn’t ever going to hurt me.”
“He threw you out of a moving car!” Henry shouted.
Shawn glared at him, and crossed his arms. “You’re taking that completely out of context!”
Henry turned away. “Let’s get to the point,” he said. “I want you to get rid of your little business. You’re done, Shawn. It’s gone on long enough.”
Shawn was incredulous. “Excuse me?” he asked. “I’m not going to do anything of the sort.”
“Yes, you will,” Henry said, “because if you don’t, I’m going to tell them the truth.”
“You’re not going to do that,” Shawn said.
Henry leaned against the wall, looking back to glare at Shawn. “Oh, I’m not?”
“No, you’re not, because you’d be guilty of perjury too, and anyway, it would be your word against mine,” he said. “It isn’t my fault my own father doesn’t believe I’m gifted. You can’t actually prove I’m not psychic.”
“I could make a pretty damn good case for it,” Henry countered. “I just need to tell them how you do it, I just need to tell them everything I taught you.”
Shawn felt a little sick. He knew that if his father really put his mind to it, he could do just that, and pull Shawn’s life right out from under him in the process. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d done it. “Why are you doing this? I thought this was what you wanted. Wasn’t it? Isn’t this what you trained me for?”
“No, Shawn, it isn’t! You could have done anything with what I taught you," Henry snapped.
"What does that even mean?" Shawn demanded. "I didn't want to do anything, I wanted to do everything. You've been from Santa Barbara to Miami and back again, but I made all the stops along the way. I've lived my life!"
Henry pushed himself away from the wall in agitation. "And what do you have to show for it?"
"Show who?" Shawn demanded, choking off the end with a bitter laugh. "Is there a tally? Some cosmic scoreboard? Mr. Lieson's kid has one up on me cause he’s got a pension plan and works nine to five?"
"Maybe he does," Henry snapped.
"If that's how you really feel, then I'm sorry for you," Shawn said. "Because I don't live my life worrying about what other people think."
"That's obvious, kid," Henry snapped. "Because if you cared at all what I thought--"
"What?" Shawn asked. "What, dad? I would have been a cop? I'd be miserable just like you?"
"I did what I had to," Henry said.
"Yeah, you did," Shawn said. "And what is it that you have to show for it that's so great? A wife that left you? A son that resents you? Or is that badge the only thing that ever meant anything to you?"
For a moment Shawn thought Henry was going to hit him, and half believed he’d deserve it, but what Henry actually did was worse. He just gave a little laugh and shook his head, before walking out the door without another word.
Shawn felt short of breath, and he reached out to grab the rail along the right side of the bed, gasping in order to take in air. It had been a long time since he had let his father get to him this way, and it had been years since one of their fights had this kind of edge to it, like maybe it was going to be the last one they ever bothered to have.
The last time they’d had a fight like this, Shawn had been gone for five years.
He closed his eyes, and breathed deeply until he wasn’t feeling light-headed. Then he ripped out his IV now that there wasn’t anyone to stop him from doing it, and stumbled to his feet. He was never overly fond of hospitals to begin with, at least not when he was the patient, and combined with his father’s accusations, he was feeling suddenly claustrophobic.
He found his clothes on one of the shelves in the closet. He pulled his ripped, blood stained jeans on and then threw his shirt over his head at the same time he forced his feet into his shoes. He was aching a little bit everywhere, but his hands hurt the most. They had been wrapped in gauze and had stopped bleeding, but the skin had been worn raw from where he’d tried to break his fall.
But his anger was like morphine-it drove him on. He started for the door, turning back only to glance at the sign on the wall to see what floor he was on. He was glad it was only the first, and followed an exit sign arrow to the left.
He was still pulling on his hoodie when Gus came around a corner, holding a cup of coffee. His eyes went wide, but Shawn didn’t stop to wait for him. “We’re leaving,” Shawn told him.
“What happened?” Gus asked, setting the coffee on a medical tray before jogging after him. “Where’s your father?”
“He left,” Shawn said, looking both ways to see which way would take him out. One way went to the maternity ward, so the other way it was. “Is your car here?”
“Yeah, they wouldn’t let me stay the night, so I took a Taxi home and came back this morning,” Gus said. “Not that I got any sleep.”
“That’s kind of ironic, huh?” Shawn asked. “I finally get some sleep and then you can’t.”
“Yeah, it’s hilarious. Would you slow down for a moment?” Gus demanded. “You haven’t even been released.”
“That’s kind of just a technicality, isn’t it?” Shawn asked. “I’m fine. I slept and everything.”
“You were practically comatose,” Gus protested. “You had a minor tachycardia!”
Shawn paused for a moment, and frowned. “Really? Is that the medical name for getting pushed out of a car?”
“It means you had a rapid heartbeat,” Gus explained.
“Oh, well, so what?” Shawn said, and started heading again for the exit. “That’s probably just because I had two cases of Red Bull in 24 hours.”
“That’s exactly what it was, you idiot!” Gus said, finally reaching out to grab Shawn’s arm and pull him around when he wouldn’t stop. “What happened with your father, Shawn? I haven’t seen you like this since before the last time you left.”
“It wasn’t anything new,” Shawn said. “He’s not happy with the way I’m living my life, so he thinks it’s his job to force a new one on me. Only this time it’s not going to work. This time I’m not giving up, I’m not running away. Not even if that’s what he wants.”
“That’s not what he wants,” Gus said. “He’s probably just scared. I know I am. We thought you were dead, Shawn.”
“I’m not, Cyril isn’t even a killer,” Shawn said. “I was safer with Cyril than I am when I go to the Laundromat.”
“I’ve told you this before, Shawn, your Laundromat is not run by vampires,” he said.
“Then why do they only come out at night?” Shawn asked. He turned back around, walking faster now that he had the exit in sight. “Well, regardless, my point stands. Cyril isn’t dangerous. I know people, you know that, so I thought that at least you would believe me.”
“Even if I did, it doesn’t change the fact that it could have gone very differently,” Gus said. “We didn’t know where you were, what was happening to you, we didn’t know if we were ever going to see you again. Maybe we could have handled it better if we hadn’t gone through the same thing just a couple weeks before.”
“Drimmer doesn’t have anything to do with this, I don’t know why everyone keeps bringing him up,” Shawn said. “Cyril’s case is entirely different, and that’s why I need to get out of here, so I can prove it to everyone else.”
“You have to wait a minute,” Gus said, trying to catch up to him. “We can’t just leave, Shawn, there’s-”
“Sure we can,” Shawn said, pushing out the doors. He stumbled a step back as camera flashes started going off like fireworks, and placed a hand to his already throbbing head. There were about three media vans and five newscasters, each of them surrounded by camera men, video guys, all of them holding out a microphone and speaking all at once.
“Mr. Spencer, how are you after your harrowing ordeal?!”
“Did Mr. Riner hurt you?”
“What were his reasons for holding you hostage?”
“How did you get free?”
“Why were you in the hospital?”
Shawn glanced over at Gus. “I tried to tell you,” Gus said. “They’ve been standing here waiting for you almost all night.”
“Well, let’s not keep them waiting any longer,” Shawn said, before stepping into the center of them all. “If you could hold your questions, please, I’d like to make a statement.”
The news people went silent with anticipation, and Shawn paused for a moment, letting the silence linger just a beat longer than necessary. “I was, briefly, taken hostage by Cyril Riner, but he is not a murderer and I was never in any danger from him. As a psychic, I feel very strongly about this, the spirits are quite certain. Riner is only on the run to prove his innocence, and I intend to help him do so in any way I can.”
The crowd went wild, uproariously demanding explanations, and Gus grabbed Shawn and started running. They managed to make it to Gus’s Echo without being trampled by rabid reporters, if only barely. Gus sped out of the hospital parking lot, looking nervously in the rearview mirror the whole time, like he suspected some crazed news anchor to jump onto the back of the car.
Shawn glanced behind him at the mass of reporters they had left in their wake. “That went pretty well, I think,” he said. “I’m a natural at this. I should have gone into television.”
“What the hell was that?” Gus demanded.
Shawn was about to answer him when Gus’s phone rung. Gus picked it up. “Uh huh,” he said. “He’s right here.” Gus tossed the phone into Shawn’s lap. “It’s for you.”
“Hello?” Shawn said.
“Spencer!” Lassiter yelled. “Did you just tell the media that Riner was innocent?”
“You saw that, huh? How did I look? I hope you couldn’t see the blood stains,” Shawn said. “How embarrassing! If I’d known I was going to be on television I would have worn my Goonies shirt. Knight Rider is so 1983.”
“Spencer!” Lassiter snapped. “You can’t go around telling the media that Riner is innocent because of some ‘psychic’ vision!”
“But I’ve already done that. That’s what we’ve just been talking about,” Shawn said. “I think the problem here is that you’re confused about the definition of can’t. I suggest you look it up. Gus is always singing the praises of the Oxford English Dictionary, but if you aren’t able to get your hands on one then any old Webster will do.”
“It isn’t in the dictionary,” Lassiter snapped. “Can’t is a contraction, not a word.”
“That’s the right attitude!” Shawn said. “Can’t isn’t in my vocabulary either. My first grade teacher always told us to turn can’t into can do. Isn’t that adorable?”
“Focus, Spencer,” Lassiter said. “The people need to know that Riner is dangerous.”
“I’d agree with you if Cyril actually was dangerous, but he’s not,” Shawn said. “Maybe you missed the part in my press conference where I explained this? The spirits have spoken. Cyril Riner is innocent. Problem solved.”
“It wasn’t a press conference, you’re not that important,” Lassiter told him. “And for the record, you looked awful.”
The dial-tone sprung up as the call was ended, and Shawn stared at the phone in disbelief for a moment, before turning to Gus. “He hung up on me!”
Gus tilted his head back haughtily, which Shawn knew always meant a lecture was on the way. He glanced out the window wistfully, but jumping out of two moving vehicles in two days was a little much even for him. “I’d hang up on you too, if I could,” Gus said. “What were you thinking?”
“Cyril is innocent,” Shawn explained. “The people have a right to know.”
“What evidence do you have, Shawn?” Gus demanded.
”I asked Cyril if he was innocent and he said he was,” Shawn told him.
“I’m surprised the police didn’t think of that,” Gus said dryly.
“I know, right?” Shawn said. “It makes you wonder what they’re doing in interrogations these days.”
on to part three
back to part one
Gus was just settling onto the Psych couch with a bowl of Rice Krispies to watch the latest episode of America’s Got Talent. Gus often dreamed of winning the prize, but what exactly he had done to get it was always slightly fuzzy. The one time he could remember the competition portion, he had been standing center stage spelling out the word aggiornamento to momentous applause.
Gus leaned forward, watching as the first person took the stage. He was bringing the first spoonful of Rice Krispie goodness up to his mouth when the stage disappeared in a wash of red and white, “Breaking News!” scrolling urgently across the screen. Gus dropped the spoon back into the bowl in irritation. Now he was never going to know if that guy in the orange cowboy boots could sing.
He was just reaching for the remote when a photo of Shawn appeared in the corner of the screen. Gus dropped the bowl of Rice Krispies and jumped to his feet.
Mary Merryweather clasped her hands on the news desk and stared out at the world solemnly. “SBPD consultant Shawn Spencer was apparently abducted by the fugitive Cyril Riner earlier this evening at the Dah-Ling Store-It-Yourself, who some of you may remember was the scene of the original crime.”
“It’s just awful, isn’t it, Mary?” co-anchor Mark Bender asked, shaking his head sadly for a moment before giving everyone a bright grin. “More details as they come in.”
“Oh my god!” Gus shouted. He grabbed his phone and dialed Shawn’s number in a moment of frantic confusion. “The person you are calling is not available to take your call right now,” a cheery female voice informed him. “The voicemail box is currently full. Please try again later. Goodbye!”
There was a click as his call was ended, and Gus tried to remember when he had last seen Shawn. He’d been claiming he was going to talk to Buzz, safe and sound in the police department. What could have happened in the three hours since he left him there? Gus shook his head in resignation and made a beeline to his car.
Who was he kidding? Three hours was more than enough time for Shawn to get himself kidnapped. Two weeks ago he’d managed it in less than ten minutes, and that time he’d been right out front.
Gus didn’t bother to follow the posted speed limits as he drove to the police station. He didn’t care if he got a ticket. Shawn had gotten enough of them in this car that he didn’t have a spotless record anymore anyway, and this was life and death.
He ran into the police station, and came to a stop just inside the doors, placing his hands on his knees to catch his breath before looking up urgently for help. “Have you seen the news?” he shouted. “Shawn’s been kidnapped!”
Everyone stopped what they were doing to turn and look at him. Henry was standing off to the side with his arms crossed, facing off with Vick. Lassiter was on the other side of the room beside Juliet, frantically writing something on the chalkboard that had been dragged into the center of the bullpen.
Juliet ran over and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “We know, Gus,” she said reassuringly. “We’re the ones that told them.”
Gus was overcome with an unreasonable rage, though he recognized most of it as misrepresented fear. “Then why didn’t anyone call me?” he demanded.
Henry cleared his throat. “I tried,” he said. “You weren’t answering your phone.”
Gus’s rage disappeared as quickly as it had come, and he was suddenly taken over by a debilitating sense of guilt in its place. He’d turned his phone on silent. He’d done it because Shawn always called to bother him just when America’s Got Talent was coming on and Gus hadn’t wanted to deal with him tonight. “We’ve got to find him!” Gus said.
“Gus, we’re doing everything we can,” Juliet said. “We’re going to find him.”
“You don’t know that,” Gus said, pulling away. “He could be dead somewhere! I never should have left him here alone. He hasn’t been himself lately. I should have stayed with him.”
“He’s not dead,” Lassiter said quietly, and nodded towards the chalkboard.
Gus approached it carefully. It was a timetable. Shawn went missing at 8:05 PM. He managed to get a call through to Lassiter at 8:57 PM. He’d sent him a few text-messages at 9:22 PM before cutting the conversation off abruptly. Gus scanned the messages that Lassiter had faithfully transcribed. LMAO. That’s what Shawn had sent them. Shawn was with some murderer and he was laughing his ass off.
Gus glanced at the clock. It was almost 10:00 PM. That was more than enough time for Shawn to have gotten himself killed. He felt sick again. Gus didn’t exactly enjoy being in mortal danger, but as long as Shawn was there, he could handle it. He couldn’t handle this not knowing, and he couldn’t stand the thought of Shawn out there alone without Gus to keep him in check. Shawn was not going to do as he was told, and this time he was going to get himself killed the same way he’d gotten himself a concussion from Drimmer.
Lassiter was standing beside him, fidgeting with the information on the board, moving a few things around, putting them back. “We have an APB out on Spencer and Riner,” he said. “We’re going to get about 30 phone tips an hour. Once we sort through them to the ones that might be the truth, we’ll find him.”
“How did this even happen?” Gus asked.
Lassiter kept his eyes on the chalkboard. “It’s my fault,” he said. “Spencer was following me.”
Gus thought it would be easy to blame Lassiter, but he knew Shawn too well to do it. “If he was following you, then it’s not your fault,” he said.
“It’s Shawn’s,” Henry said roughly, coming up behind them to glance dismissively at the board. “He had no business going out there in the first place.”
“He was trying to help me,” Lassiter said softly. He didn’t know where this sudden urge to defend Spencer had come from, and he valiantly fought it back down. “Not that it would excuse it.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Henry said. “And it doesn’t entirely clear you of guilt, either. You’ve all let Shawn get away with this little agency business of his for too long. I think it’s time you put a stop to it, don’t you? When we get Shawn back, I want him off your cases.”
Lassiter didn’t bother to mention he’d been trying to make that happen all along. Vick stepped in to try and appease him. “Henry,” she started.
“Don’t give me another speech about how damn valuable the kid is,” he snapped. “He’s not going to do you any good if he’s dead. This is the last one, the last time, you’re going to get him killed, Karen.”
“Let’s worry about that later,” she said calmly. “We’re all very upset right now. We don’t want to say anything that we can’t take back.”
Henry watched her speculatively. He knew what she was referring to. Henry could end Shawn’s career as a psychic private eye with just a few words. All he had to do was tell them that Shawn’s been lying to them for years. The way Karen was looking at him, though, he was pretty sure she knew it too.
Karen had always been a little ruthless. Henry had liked that about her right away. She didn’t care how the job got done so long as it got done. He was counting on the fact that hadn’t changed. “Fine,” he said. “First, you find him. We’ll talk about the rest after you do.”
He glanced back at the chalkboard, reading over Shawn’s messages quickly. “Is he talking in code?” he asked. “H n K? LMAO? What do these mean?”
Everyone looked at the ground. No one wanted to tell Henry Spencer what they meant. Gus decided it was up to him. “It’s just text-speak,” he explained. “They just mean goodbye. It doesn’t help us find him.”
“Goodbye?” Henry repeated, and snorted. “I just don’t get that text-ing thing. What about the phone call? What did he tell you?”
"Spencer told me that Riner was innocent," Lassiter said. "He wants us to look at the other suspects. He said Riner wasn’t going to let him tell me anything else."
"We know who has Shawn, that's who you need to be looking for," Henry snapped.
“You think I don’t know that?” Lassiter asked tersely.
Karen moved back between them. “I think we can all acknowledge that his messages aren’t going to help us. Does anyone want to venture a guess as to why that is?”
“What do you mean?” Juliet asked.
“Mr. Spencer is a very clever young man,” Karen said. “If he wanted to give us a hint about where to find him, he would have found a way to do it.”
“You don’t think he’s trying to,” Gus said.
“No, I don’t,” Karen said.
“God damn it,” Henry snapped, as he realized what she meant. “It’s because he’s working the damn case. He’s curious, and if he gets away, he won’t get to question the star suspect anymore.”
“So how are we going to find him if he doesn’t want to be found?” Juliet asked.
Henry pursed his lips. “That’s easy,” he said. “You’re not going to.”
x x x x x x
Cyril took one look at the broadcasts on the televisions and ran right through the red light, driving them out to a secluded area out of range of the shops. Shawn glanced back behind them nervously. “Is this one of those, ‘let’s go for a little drive’ moments?” he asked.
“This is awful, is what this is!” Cyril snapped. “I’ve already got everyone looking for me, and now they’re going to be looking for you, too.”
He pulled off the road into an empty lot, and then tore out of the truck, slamming the door behind him. Shawn followed him out, glancing around. “Just calm down. We can still do this.”
Cyril shook his head. “No, this is way above my head, okay? I’m not a hostage taking kind of guy.” He sighed heavily and then met Shawn’s eyes. “I think I’m going to have to let you go.”
Shawn was crushed. “You’re firing me?”
“As a hostage you’ve become a liability,” Cyril said. “Your face is all over the news. You’re going to be recognized.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, so are you! Though admittedly, mug shot is not your best look,” Shawn said. “You need me. I’ll be a better hostage, okay? I’ll stop text-messaging the cops and everything.”
“It’s not that, you’ve been great, really,” he protested. “I couldn’t have asked for a better captive.”
“I think that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me,” Shawn said, and grinned brightly. “That’s settled then.”
”What’s settled?” Cyril asked with a frown.
“We’ll go to the Hottie Tottie Tavern together,” Shawn explained.
“Why would we go there?” Cyril asked.
“Because that’s where we’re going to find James Clavor,” he said. “That’s the thing about career criminals, it’s exactly that, a career. They go out for the day, commit crime, and then return back home to all the same places. It’s why they keep getting arrested, everyone knows where to find them.”
“If that were true, then they would have been able to find him before this,” Cyril said.
“But they weren’t looking in the right place,” Shawn said. “How would you describe James Clavor? Tall, right? Close shaved hair. Big, though it’s mostly muscle, and most of it covered with tattoos-the snake you remember, the rest you forgot. Am I close?”
Cyril was excited. “Yes, that’s him, you know him?”
“Have you seen the inside of a police station recently?” Shawn asked. “I just described half the suspects there. Your buddy Clavor’s a generic grunt, and that’s served him well. Put him in a lineup and the victim will be hard pressed to tell him apart from the guy standing next to him. That’s why we need to get a name.”
“It’s been two years, you really think he’s going to be going to the same old places?” Cyril asked. “I’m not sure what he got away with when we robbed that place, for all I know he could be rich.”
“All that would mean is that he’s sticking twenties in the g-strings of his favorite ladies instead of lucky old George,” Shawn said. “Trust me. The guy’s a lifetime loser. He’ll be there.”
“I still think it would be best for you to go back,” Cyril said. “This manhunt for me is getting out of hand.”
“Lassie’s not going to stop hunting you just because you let me go, he’s not going to stop until he finds you,” Shawn said. “Which means we’ve got to prove you innocent before he does.”
“Okay, okay,” Cyril said. “You really want to go to the Hottie Tottie Taven?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Shawn said brightly.
x x x x x x
The Hottie Tottie Tavern didn’t really know what it wanted to be. From what Shawn could tell, it was part Tiki Hut and part Vegas showroom. They only got away with the blaring neon sign because the location was far enough from civilization that the oblivious suburban families of Summerland probably just thought it was the Venus star.
There were as many Harleys out front as there were cars, and a few Hell’s Angel wannabes were smoking around their bikes. Shawn tried not to make eye contact with them as they went inside.
The clientele ran the gamut from the wannabes outside to the balding, middle-age suburban dads, who had followed that Venus star and found out where girls are from. None of them looked like very appealing conversationalists to Shawn. “How about you talk to those guys?” he asked.
“Yeah, okay,” Cyril said. “I’ll start with them. But what about you?”
“I’m going to talk with the dancers,” Shawn explained.
“The dancers aren’t supposed to talk much, unless it’s dirty,” Cyril said. “Sheesh, haven’t you ever been to one of these places before?”
“Not really,” Shawn said. “Well, like once, when I turned eighteen.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Cyril demanded. “Are you seriously dating Lassiter?”
“I just don’t find this kind of tableau interesting because it’s one-sided, this is their 9-to-5, it’s just that it’s 9:00 PM to 5:00 AM instead of the other way around,” Shawn said. “Like, see, that girl there-”
He pointed to a girl slipping down a pole. She was wearing a fringe bikini top and a cowboy hat and not much else. “She’s trying to cover the dark circles under her eyes with make-up but it’s not really working. If you look closely enough you can see she’s trying to do the same thing with the varicose veins. She’s got a new baby at home, probably only a few weeks old.”
“Jesus,” Cyril said. “I don’t want to ogle a new mom.”
“You see my dilemma,” Shawn said. “It isn’t easy being prescient.”
“Okay, fine,” Cyril said. “You talk to the dancers, I’ll talk to the gawkers, and then we’ll meet up to see if we learned anything.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Shawn said. He wandered around to the other side of the stage, and one of the dancers spotted him right away. She started to approach, grinning sweetly, and grabbed him by the sides of his hoodie, before superfluously straightening them out.
“Hey, gorgeous,” she said. “You want a lap dance?”
Shawn had no illusions that he was walking around looking like the Hunchback from Notre Dame or something, but he figured that considering the usual clientele at this place, right now he was registering as movie-star good looking by comparison.
“I don’t really do lap dances in public,” Shawn explained, trying to disentangle himself. “I’m shy.”
“Really?” she asked, sliding a hand towards the waistband of his pants. “I find that hard to believe.”
Shawn caught her hand before it could reach its destination and glanced at her costume. It was a gold, Leia-inspired bikini, with little tassels hanging off the top. “I love the little tassels,” he said, gesturing to her chest area. “Are they the kind that spin?”
“No, they’re just regular old tassels, the kind that spin are special order,” she said, and gave a mock-sigh. “The boss never wants to shell out the dough for the luxuries. Well, you know how men are.”
“Do I ever,” Shawn said.
She smiled at him. “You’re a doll, you know that?”
“I have been told,” he said. “My Aunt Ruth used to dress me up and try to get me to live in the miniature house she kept in her backyard.”
“You’re funny,” she said. “What are you doing in a place like this?”
“I’m here to audition, actually,” Shawn said. “But I don’t think any of these uniforms are going to fit me.”
She laughed. “Yeah,” she said. “Your height could be a problem. Also, certain other things.”
Shawn grinned at her. If people ever bothered to speak with them, they would find that exotic dancers almost always made for fun, interesting people. “Shawn Spencer,” he said, holding out his hand.
“They call me Houston here, but you can call me Amelia, if you want. We’re not actually supposed to give out real names, but you seem pretty harmless,” she said, grinning.
“Nice to meet you, Amelia,” Shawn said. “That’s pretty common, huh? Using false names?”
“In a place like this?” she asked. “Honey, what do you think? You think all those strippers were really christened Bambi?”
“You’re messing with my world view, here,” Shawn said. “I’m starting to think this is why I could never find that nice girl I met at Nudes, Nudes, Nudes in the phone book.”
Amelia laughed, but stopped herself and bit her lip when she noticed her boss watching from behind the bar, obviously wondering why she was standing there laughing instead of shaking her groove thing. She pushed Shawn back into a chair and then got up on his lap. “Don’t worry,” she said. “This is a freebie.”
“That’s good, because all I’ve got is a $2.00 bill and some M&Ms,” Shawn said. “I’m actually just here looking for someone. He’s got a habit of giving out a lot of false names, too. You might know him as Jimmy, Daniel, or Dave? He’d have a cobra tattoo, probably a bad attitude.”
Amelia froze in her undulating to think about it. “There’s this guy, Dave, he’s got a cobra tattoo and he’s definitely got a bad attitude. He’s a regular. In fact, I think I saw him lurking around just a few minutes ago.”
“Do you think you could point him out?” Shawn asked.
Amelia glanced around but shook her head. “I don’t see him now. He must have left. He’s always hitting on us, you know. Talking about his big score. Saying someday he’s going to buy an island and whisk us away.”
“I hope you told him that kidnapping was a felony,” Shawn said, before carefully extracting himself from her. He reached into his pockets and placed the $2.00 bill in her hands. “He’s still watching,” Shawn explained, when she tried to give it back. “Keep it. They’re rare, you know.”
She grinned and stuck it down her top. “Thanks,” she said.
Cyril came up to them. “Well?” he asked.
“Cyril!” Shawn said brightly. “Cyril, this is Amelia. Amelia, this is Cyril.”
“Nice to meet you,” Amelia said. “I’ve got to head out. I’m next up on stage.”
“Break a leg,” Shawn called after her.
“Well?” Cyril asked again. “Did you learn anything?”
“I learned all kinds of things,” Shawn said. “For instance, did you know that strippers don’t use their real names?”
Cyril sighed. “About Clavor,” he said.
“Oh, right,” Shawn said. “Amelia says she knows a Dave with a tattoo. She thinks she saw him earlier. How about you?”
“I didn’t see him,” Cyril said, before giving Shawn a push towards the doors. “I want you to wait outside for a minute, okay?”
Shawn came to a stop just outside, causing Cyril to slam into him. He stared at a man standing a few feet away. He kept getting caught in the flare of pink light from the neon ‘Hottie’ sign right above his head, and he was lighting up a cigarette. Shawn noticed there was a winding cobra crawling up his right arm. “What about that guy?” Shawn asked, and pointed over at him.
Cyril gasped in disbelief. “Clavor!” he shouted, taking off running.
Clavor’s eyes widened as he caught sight of Cyril, and he pulled out a gun, throwing off a wild shot before taking off for his car. Cyril dropped down to the ground to avoid the bullet and Shawn threw himself against the side of the Hottie Tottie Tavern. They heard the sound of an engine powering up before either of them could get back on their feet.
Cyril ran for his truck, and Shawn took off following him, jumping into the passenger seat just as Cyril was driving off. “What are you doing?” Cyril demanded. “Don’t you have any sense at all? You don’t follow your kidnapper willingly into a car chase.”
“My last car chase was disappointing, we hardly broke twenty miles per hour,” Shawn said. “I thrive on new experience.”
Cyril pulled the truck onto the road after Clavor’s convertible in a wide swerve. “Nice car for a deadbeat,” Shawn said, and then ducked when Clavor turned to look back at them and fire off another shot.
When Shawn sat back up, there was a wide bullet hole in the windshield in the general vicinity of his head. He swallowed heavily.
Cyril slowed down and glanced at him. “Get out,” he said.
“What?” Shawn asked, confused.
Clavor fired shot off another shot and Cyril swerved again, but Shawn heard the bullet take out a headlight. “Get out of the car, Shawn, or you’re going to get killed. This isn’t your fight.”
“We’re going like eighty miles per hour,” Shawn protested. “I’m pretty sure jumping out of the car is only going to kill me faster.”
Cyril slammed on the brakes, slowing to a little under twenty miles per hour. “Now, Shawn, or I’m going to stop this car to throw you out and probably lose Clavor’s trail in the process.”
“But I can’t leave now,” Shawn protested, and then glanced at the glove box with a frown.
“You can, and you’re going to,” Cyril said.
Shawn glanced out the widow at the road. “You have to promise me something, you have to promise you’re going to look in your glove box.”
“What? What the hell are you talking about? Just jump!” Cyril slowed them almost to a stop. He leaned across to open the door, and before Shawn knew it he was tumbling along the highway like a weed.
“But you’ve got all my Red Bull!” Shawn shouted after him.
He had asphalt burns on the palms of his hands and the left knee of his jeans had ripped wide open, but he was mostly unharmed. No bullet holes. He checked.
Shawn slowly pulled himself to his feet, watching as the cars continued to speed along the road, disappearing as they outdistanced the neon lights. Shawn kicked at a rock in frustration.
With both Cyril and Clavor gone he had no choice but to go back home, and the thought of facing his father scared him a hell of a lot more than high-speed car chases or shoot-outs.
x x x x x x
The adrenaline and Red Bull had kept him going for awhile, but as Shawn dazedly made his way down the dark road back towards the Hottie Tottie Tavern, his body was starting to rebel. His knee was aching with every step, and his eyes kept slipping shut for a few minutes at a time.
He was trying to hold the image of James Clavor in his mind. He was pretty much the way Shawn had described, and that meant he was easy to forget. He was listing his features as he walked, mumbling them aloud to himself. In addition to the cobra there was a thorny rose and a Queen of Hearts, barbed wire drawn around both wrists. Tattoos were a little like barcodes, it made people easy to identify. They were the only remarkable thing about Clavor other than his above-average size.
Shawn could see the flashing neon signs as the Hottie Tottie Tavern came back into sight. A naked neon woman was bending over in the window, offering a drink, and while ‘Hottie’ flashed pink, ‘Tottie’ went blue, and Shawn blinked his eyes in the garish glare of it before reaching the payphone that had been set up beside the back exit.
He leaned his head against the grimy metal side and grabbed the phone, before scrambling around in his pockets looking for a quarter. All he had left were the M&Ms, so he’d have to call collect.
Now it was just a matter of who he should call.
x x x x x x
Lassiter was staring at the chalkboard, going over the information again and again. He should have been more forceful when he had Spencer on the phone, he should have pressed the reality of the situation home. The problem with Spencer was he didn’t take anything seriously, even when he’d been sitting on Lassiter’s couch, bruised and about to be killed, there’d been that resistance to acknowledge the situation with anything other than his strange sense of humor.
He was so distracted, that he didn’t even glance at the caller-Id when his cellphone rang. “Will you accept a collect call from ‘I-got-away-come-get-me’?” a woman’s voice asked cheerfully, Shawn’s tired voice coming through in the part where he was supposed to say his name.
“Yes,” Lassiter said urgently. “Spencer, where the hell are you?”
Henry and Gus both appeared almost instantly at his side. Henry was twitching to take the phone out of Lassiter’s hands, and Guster was just twitching.
"I’m lost in Summerland," Shawn told him tiredly. "I just got pushed out of a moving vehicle and I was being shot at.”
Lassiter held his hand over the mouthpiece. “Somebody trace this call!” he shouted, before putting the phone back to his ear. “Are you alright?”
"Maybe you missed the part about being shot at, and shoved out of a moving car?" Shawn asked him, before laughing. "Yeah, fine. I'm fine, but he drove off with all my Red Bull."
“Spencer, I need you to tell me exactly where you are,” Lassiter said.
“The Hottie Tottie Tavern,” Shawn said.
Lassiter paused. “Come again?”
“It’s a real place,” Shawn said defensively. “Coincidentally, so is James Clavor. I mean, he’s a real person, not a real place, but you probably figured that out. He’s the one that was shooting at us.”
"We'll be there soon," Lassiter said, glancing at Henry. "Your father wants to talk with you. I want you to stay on the line, okay?"
“You told my father?” Shawn demanded. “That was the one thing I asked you not to do.”
Lassiter didn’t bother respond, just handed the phone off to Henry and started shouting orders. “Do we have a location yet?” he demanded. “I want to send an ambulance just in case, he sounds out of it.”
“Shawn!” Henry shouted. “What happened? How badly are you hurt?”
"I'm fine, I told Lassiter," Shawn said. "But it's not as cool as it looks in the movies, you know. Jumping out of cars."
"You jumped?" Henry demanded.
"Jumped, pushed, it was kind of hard to tell the difference," Shawn said. “I think I’m gonna go lay down now.”
“Shawn, wait, I want you to stay on the phone-“
Henry cursed as the call was ended, and then rushed to follow Lassiter, with Gus close behind him. “Did you find him?” Henry demanded.
Lassiter nodded as he started down the steps towards the parking lot. “Yeah, it’s a strip bar just between Santa Barbara and Summerland. We’re closer so they’re giving jurisdiction to us.”
Juliet came speeding up to the curb in a police car, the lights and sirens already blaring. “Get in!” she shouted.
Lassiter climbed in beside her, and Gus and Henry got in the back. Juliet hit the gas and took off at a starting point of about sixty miles per hour. Lassiter itched to be in the driver’s seat himself, but they didn’t have that much time to waste. The cars ahead of them kept pulling out of the way, but Juliet didn’t slow to wait for them. Her eyes were straight ahead, and she determinedly barreled on, as though she intended to go through them if she had to. Lassiter decided after a moment that actually he couldn’t have done it better himself.
The ambulance came around the corner to line up behind them, and Lassiter tapped his fingers along the door, keeping track of it in the side view mirror.
“He’s probably fine,” Gus was saying. “Right? What did he say? Didn’t he say he was fine?”
“Yeah, that’s what he said,” Lassiter said.
Lassiter was caught between wanting to grab Shawn and hug him or grab him and shake him once he got his hands on him again, but when they actually make it to the Hottie Tottie Tavern, all he can see is Shawn laid out on the sidewalk, caught in the glare of the headlights, the knees of his jeans stained with almost as much blood as there was on his hands.
Henry made it to Shawn’s side first, with a paramedic jumping out of the ambulance behind them coming in a close second. Lassiter’s heartbeat was stuttering a little as he followed them more slowly, Juliet and Gus easily passing him by.
“Is he okay?” Guster demanded.
The paramedic looked confused. “He’s . . . just asleep,” he said.
“Come again?” Henry snapped.
“But I don’t want any more hot chocolate,” Shawn murmured, sighing deeply and arranging himself more comfortably on the sidewalk.
“Shawn?” Henry snapped, reaching out to lightly slap Shawn’s cheek. Shawn winced, but only turned away instead of waking up.
“Sir, please,” the paramedic, whose nametag read Darius, said. “Give me some space to work.” Darius rolled up one of Shawn’s sleeves and gave him a once over. “He’s got some cuts and abrasions,” he said, as he reached out to take Shawn’s pulse. “Possibly a minor tachycardia. Any idea what’s wrong with him?”
“You want a list?” Henry asked.
“He hasn’t been sleeping,” Gus stepped in. “And he’s been living off Red Bull for the last three days.”
Darius nodded. “That would do it,” he said. “I want to take him to the hospital for an IV and observation for the night, but I think it’s safe to say he’ll be fine.”
The other paramedic came over to join them, laying a gurney out beside Shawn. Henry got to his feet and stepped back, running a hand down his face before sticking his hands in his pockets and watching as his son was shuffled off into the back of the ambulance.
Lassiter came to stand beside him, and he felt very odd, strangely like a weight had been lifted.
Almost as if he’d been terrified all this time and only now was realizing it, almost as if he actually cared about annoying, meddling, insane Shawn Spencer.
“Is someone going to ride with him?” Darius asked, leaning out the back of the ambulance. Inside Shawn was talking on his sleep, protesting that the marshmallows were far too big.
Lassiter bit down on his lip. Even if he didn’t have work to do here, even if Henry weren’t the obvious choice, it wasn’t like he had any business holding Spencer’s hand.
“I’m his father,” Henry said roughly, pushing himself into the ambulance without further ado.
Gus was right behind him, but Darius barred his way. “Only one can go with him, sir,” he said.
Henry reached out to stop the progress of the closing door. “He’s family,” he said. “This is my other son. I think we can make an exception, don’t you?”
“Uh-“ Darius trailed off, unsure what to say. “Your son?”
Gus met the paramedic’s eyes smugly. “You got something to say?” he asked, and then crawled into the ambulance. “You know that’s right.”
Juliet let out a breath as the door shut behind Gus. “Thank goodness,” she said. “I really thought-“
She didn’t finish her thought, but Lassiter knew what she’d been thinking. He’d been thinking the same thing.
“Is that Shawn!?”
The ambulance was just starting down the road when Lassiter heard the shout, and he turned around to see a barefoot, half-dressed woman charging straight at him. He tried to stop her as she ran by, but she was all covered in oil and slipped right out of his hands.
She stopped in the middle of the road, tripping and catching herself with the palm of one hand on the ground, before regaining her balance and turning back around. “Is he alright?” she demanded.
“I’m sorry,” Juliet said politely, stepping forward. “Who are you?”
“I’m Houston,” she said, glancing back at the retreating ambulance. “That was Shawn, wasn’t it? Is he okay?”
“How do you know Spencer?” Lassiter asked her. “And what’s your real name?”
“Amelia Emerson,” she said reluctantly. “Shawn was in the Tavern, earlier tonight. He’s not in any trouble, is he?”
“Shawn was taken hostage by the fugitive Cyril Riner,” Juliet explained. “We’ve been looking for him. The paramedics said they think he’s going to be fine.”
Lassiter gave her a censuring glance for giving so much away, but it had the right effect on Amelia, who nodded and calmed down almost at once. “Cyril?” she repeated. “He didn’t look like much of a hostage taker to me.”
“You saw him?” Lassiter demanded. “Is he still here?”
“No, he left with Shawn,” Amelia said. “But Shawn didn’t-” she stopped herself from saying anything more, suddenly worried that it might not look too good for Shawn to say he’d been going with Cyril willingly. “He was fine when he left. Then we heard a gunshot, and when we came out they were both gone.”
“Do you know what they were doing here?” Juliet asked.
Amelia nodded. “Yes,” she said. “They were looking for Dave.”
“Dave,” Lassiter repeated wryly. “And does this Dave have a last name?”
“I don’t even think Dave is his first name,” Amelia said.
“That’s helpful,” Lassiter said, and Juliet discreetly hit him with her elbow. Lassiter winced and held his side, because her elbows were surprisingly pointy.
“Was this the first time you had met Cyril Riner?” Juliet asked.
Amelia nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Shawn too. But Dave comes here all the time.”
“Do you think you could describe him for a sketch artist?” Lassiter asked.
Amelia pulled her arms around herself and fought back a shiver, before glancing back at the road. “If it’ll help Shawn,” she said after a moment. “Can I go back inside?”
Juliet nodded. “We’ll send someone down, will you still be here in a few hours?”
“My shift doesn’t end until 4:00,” Amelia told them, and then went back inside.
Lassiter shook his head disbelievingly. “Spencer makes the oddest allies,” he said.
“And the strangest enemies,” Juliet said softly, and Lassiter couldn’t figure out why she was looking at him.
x x x x x x
Shawn woke up abruptly, sitting straight up with a strangled gasp and reaching out blindly to tear at whatever was piercing his arm. Someone reached out and caught his wrist before he could pull out the IV, and Shawn glanced around blearily to see his father sitting in the chair beside the bed.
“Leave it alone,” Henry said quietly.
Shawn took a deep breath to orient himself and then noticed that Gus had fallen asleep splayed across the end of the bed, snoring rather loudly and clutching at the sheets with both hands. There wasn’t a clock in the room, but when he glanced out the window it was already bright. It had to be eight or nine in the morning at least.
Henry slowly released the grip he had on Shawn’s wrist, before leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms, staring him down. Things were coming back to Shawn kind of blearily, and he slowly remembered getting into the truck with Cyril, being thrown out of the truck by Cyril, and being locked in a room and forced to drink nothing but mug after mug of steaming hot chocolate.
But that last part was probably just a dream.
“I hope you’re proud of yourself,” Henry said.
Shawn placed a hand to his head. He could feel a migraine coming on, piercing through both temples as though he’d been bolted like a modern-day Frankenstein monster. It didn’t help that the whole world seemed soft focus, and he felt as though he’d taken too much cold medicine, like in that commercial where the woman’s head floats away like a balloon. “Do we have to do this now?”
“I’m sorry, is now a bad time?” Henry asked. “Maybe I should wait and give this lecture at your funeral, would that be better for you?”
“Actually, that would be awesome,” Shawn said. “I think you’re onto something with this. If you save your lectures until I’m dead, you still get to entertain your favorite pastime, but I don’t have to listen to them.”
“Unfortunately, that would defeat the purpose of them,” he snapped. “Since what I’m trying to do is keep you alive.”
“I’m fine,” Shawn protested weakly.
Henry snorted. “Yeah, right. This is just like that thing with Drimmer. You never think, Shawn. You never stop and think.”
“You’re never going to let that go, are you?” Shawn demanded.
“It was two weeks ago, Shawn,” Henry yelled.
Gus bolted up from the bed, startled awake, and his eyes were wide and kind of frazzled. “What? What happened?” he shouted.
“Everything’s fine,” Shawn reassured Gus.
“No, it’s not,” Henry snapped, getting to his feet to glare down at his son. “Gus? Why don’t you go get yourself a coffee.”
Gus looked between Shawn and Henry for a moment, before reaching out to grab Shawn’s arm and give it a slight squeeze. “I’m glad you’re alright,” he said. “I’d lecture you but I think Henry’s going to do it well enough for the both of us, so I’ll just be in the café if you need me.”
“Gus, I’ll give you a million dollars if you don’t leave me here alone with him,” Shawn said.
“Someday you’re going to have to learn it’s pointless to try and bribe people with Monopoly money,” Gus told him, and then went out the door.
Shawn felt stripped down and vulnerable sitting in the hospital bed in the stupid flimsy green hospital gown, with his father looming over him. Shawn hated being vulnerable, and he always fought dirty when he was cornered. “Can we do this later?” he asked. “I don’t feel well.”
“No, Shawn, we can’t, because if we don’t do this now, you might not have a later,” Henry said. “You could have been killed, do you even get that? Is it even registering with you?”
“I was never in any danger!” Shawn protested. “Cyril wasn’t ever going to hurt me.”
“He threw you out of a moving car!” Henry shouted.
Shawn glared at him, and crossed his arms. “You’re taking that completely out of context!”
Henry turned away. “Let’s get to the point,” he said. “I want you to get rid of your little business. You’re done, Shawn. It’s gone on long enough.”
Shawn was incredulous. “Excuse me?” he asked. “I’m not going to do anything of the sort.”
“Yes, you will,” Henry said, “because if you don’t, I’m going to tell them the truth.”
“You’re not going to do that,” Shawn said.
Henry leaned against the wall, looking back to glare at Shawn. “Oh, I’m not?”
“No, you’re not, because you’d be guilty of perjury too, and anyway, it would be your word against mine,” he said. “It isn’t my fault my own father doesn’t believe I’m gifted. You can’t actually prove I’m not psychic.”
“I could make a pretty damn good case for it,” Henry countered. “I just need to tell them how you do it, I just need to tell them everything I taught you.”
Shawn felt a little sick. He knew that if his father really put his mind to it, he could do just that, and pull Shawn’s life right out from under him in the process. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d done it. “Why are you doing this? I thought this was what you wanted. Wasn’t it? Isn’t this what you trained me for?”
“No, Shawn, it isn’t! You could have done anything with what I taught you," Henry snapped.
"What does that even mean?" Shawn demanded. "I didn't want to do anything, I wanted to do everything. You've been from Santa Barbara to Miami and back again, but I made all the stops along the way. I've lived my life!"
Henry pushed himself away from the wall in agitation. "And what do you have to show for it?"
"Show who?" Shawn demanded, choking off the end with a bitter laugh. "Is there a tally? Some cosmic scoreboard? Mr. Lieson's kid has one up on me cause he’s got a pension plan and works nine to five?"
"Maybe he does," Henry snapped.
"If that's how you really feel, then I'm sorry for you," Shawn said. "Because I don't live my life worrying about what other people think."
"That's obvious, kid," Henry snapped. "Because if you cared at all what I thought--"
"What?" Shawn asked. "What, dad? I would have been a cop? I'd be miserable just like you?"
"I did what I had to," Henry said.
"Yeah, you did," Shawn said. "And what is it that you have to show for it that's so great? A wife that left you? A son that resents you? Or is that badge the only thing that ever meant anything to you?"
For a moment Shawn thought Henry was going to hit him, and half believed he’d deserve it, but what Henry actually did was worse. He just gave a little laugh and shook his head, before walking out the door without another word.
Shawn felt short of breath, and he reached out to grab the rail along the right side of the bed, gasping in order to take in air. It had been a long time since he had let his father get to him this way, and it had been years since one of their fights had this kind of edge to it, like maybe it was going to be the last one they ever bothered to have.
The last time they’d had a fight like this, Shawn had been gone for five years.
He closed his eyes, and breathed deeply until he wasn’t feeling light-headed. Then he ripped out his IV now that there wasn’t anyone to stop him from doing it, and stumbled to his feet. He was never overly fond of hospitals to begin with, at least not when he was the patient, and combined with his father’s accusations, he was feeling suddenly claustrophobic.
He found his clothes on one of the shelves in the closet. He pulled his ripped, blood stained jeans on and then threw his shirt over his head at the same time he forced his feet into his shoes. He was aching a little bit everywhere, but his hands hurt the most. They had been wrapped in gauze and had stopped bleeding, but the skin had been worn raw from where he’d tried to break his fall.
But his anger was like morphine-it drove him on. He started for the door, turning back only to glance at the sign on the wall to see what floor he was on. He was glad it was only the first, and followed an exit sign arrow to the left.
He was still pulling on his hoodie when Gus came around a corner, holding a cup of coffee. His eyes went wide, but Shawn didn’t stop to wait for him. “We’re leaving,” Shawn told him.
“What happened?” Gus asked, setting the coffee on a medical tray before jogging after him. “Where’s your father?”
“He left,” Shawn said, looking both ways to see which way would take him out. One way went to the maternity ward, so the other way it was. “Is your car here?”
“Yeah, they wouldn’t let me stay the night, so I took a Taxi home and came back this morning,” Gus said. “Not that I got any sleep.”
“That’s kind of ironic, huh?” Shawn asked. “I finally get some sleep and then you can’t.”
“Yeah, it’s hilarious. Would you slow down for a moment?” Gus demanded. “You haven’t even been released.”
“That’s kind of just a technicality, isn’t it?” Shawn asked. “I’m fine. I slept and everything.”
“You were practically comatose,” Gus protested. “You had a minor tachycardia!”
Shawn paused for a moment, and frowned. “Really? Is that the medical name for getting pushed out of a car?”
“It means you had a rapid heartbeat,” Gus explained.
“Oh, well, so what?” Shawn said, and started heading again for the exit. “That’s probably just because I had two cases of Red Bull in 24 hours.”
“That’s exactly what it was, you idiot!” Gus said, finally reaching out to grab Shawn’s arm and pull him around when he wouldn’t stop. “What happened with your father, Shawn? I haven’t seen you like this since before the last time you left.”
“It wasn’t anything new,” Shawn said. “He’s not happy with the way I’m living my life, so he thinks it’s his job to force a new one on me. Only this time it’s not going to work. This time I’m not giving up, I’m not running away. Not even if that’s what he wants.”
“That’s not what he wants,” Gus said. “He’s probably just scared. I know I am. We thought you were dead, Shawn.”
“I’m not, Cyril isn’t even a killer,” Shawn said. “I was safer with Cyril than I am when I go to the Laundromat.”
“I’ve told you this before, Shawn, your Laundromat is not run by vampires,” he said.
“Then why do they only come out at night?” Shawn asked. He turned back around, walking faster now that he had the exit in sight. “Well, regardless, my point stands. Cyril isn’t dangerous. I know people, you know that, so I thought that at least you would believe me.”
“Even if I did, it doesn’t change the fact that it could have gone very differently,” Gus said. “We didn’t know where you were, what was happening to you, we didn’t know if we were ever going to see you again. Maybe we could have handled it better if we hadn’t gone through the same thing just a couple weeks before.”
“Drimmer doesn’t have anything to do with this, I don’t know why everyone keeps bringing him up,” Shawn said. “Cyril’s case is entirely different, and that’s why I need to get out of here, so I can prove it to everyone else.”
“You have to wait a minute,” Gus said, trying to catch up to him. “We can’t just leave, Shawn, there’s-”
“Sure we can,” Shawn said, pushing out the doors. He stumbled a step back as camera flashes started going off like fireworks, and placed a hand to his already throbbing head. There were about three media vans and five newscasters, each of them surrounded by camera men, video guys, all of them holding out a microphone and speaking all at once.
“Mr. Spencer, how are you after your harrowing ordeal?!”
“Did Mr. Riner hurt you?”
“What were his reasons for holding you hostage?”
“How did you get free?”
“Why were you in the hospital?”
Shawn glanced over at Gus. “I tried to tell you,” Gus said. “They’ve been standing here waiting for you almost all night.”
“Well, let’s not keep them waiting any longer,” Shawn said, before stepping into the center of them all. “If you could hold your questions, please, I’d like to make a statement.”
The news people went silent with anticipation, and Shawn paused for a moment, letting the silence linger just a beat longer than necessary. “I was, briefly, taken hostage by Cyril Riner, but he is not a murderer and I was never in any danger from him. As a psychic, I feel very strongly about this, the spirits are quite certain. Riner is only on the run to prove his innocence, and I intend to help him do so in any way I can.”
The crowd went wild, uproariously demanding explanations, and Gus grabbed Shawn and started running. They managed to make it to Gus’s Echo without being trampled by rabid reporters, if only barely. Gus sped out of the hospital parking lot, looking nervously in the rearview mirror the whole time, like he suspected some crazed news anchor to jump onto the back of the car.
Shawn glanced behind him at the mass of reporters they had left in their wake. “That went pretty well, I think,” he said. “I’m a natural at this. I should have gone into television.”
“What the hell was that?” Gus demanded.
Shawn was about to answer him when Gus’s phone rung. Gus picked it up. “Uh huh,” he said. “He’s right here.” Gus tossed the phone into Shawn’s lap. “It’s for you.”
“Hello?” Shawn said.
“Spencer!” Lassiter yelled. “Did you just tell the media that Riner was innocent?”
“You saw that, huh? How did I look? I hope you couldn’t see the blood stains,” Shawn said. “How embarrassing! If I’d known I was going to be on television I would have worn my Goonies shirt. Knight Rider is so 1983.”
“Spencer!” Lassiter snapped. “You can’t go around telling the media that Riner is innocent because of some ‘psychic’ vision!”
“But I’ve already done that. That’s what we’ve just been talking about,” Shawn said. “I think the problem here is that you’re confused about the definition of can’t. I suggest you look it up. Gus is always singing the praises of the Oxford English Dictionary, but if you aren’t able to get your hands on one then any old Webster will do.”
“It isn’t in the dictionary,” Lassiter snapped. “Can’t is a contraction, not a word.”
“That’s the right attitude!” Shawn said. “Can’t isn’t in my vocabulary either. My first grade teacher always told us to turn can’t into can do. Isn’t that adorable?”
“Focus, Spencer,” Lassiter said. “The people need to know that Riner is dangerous.”
“I’d agree with you if Cyril actually was dangerous, but he’s not,” Shawn said. “Maybe you missed the part in my press conference where I explained this? The spirits have spoken. Cyril Riner is innocent. Problem solved.”
“It wasn’t a press conference, you’re not that important,” Lassiter told him. “And for the record, you looked awful.”
The dial-tone sprung up as the call was ended, and Shawn stared at the phone in disbelief for a moment, before turning to Gus. “He hung up on me!”
Gus tilted his head back haughtily, which Shawn knew always meant a lecture was on the way. He glanced out the window wistfully, but jumping out of two moving vehicles in two days was a little much even for him. “I’d hang up on you too, if I could,” Gus said. “What were you thinking?”
“Cyril is innocent,” Shawn explained. “The people have a right to know.”
“What evidence do you have, Shawn?” Gus demanded.
”I asked Cyril if he was innocent and he said he was,” Shawn told him.
“I’m surprised the police didn’t think of that,” Gus said dryly.
“I know, right?” Shawn said. “It makes you wonder what they’re doing in interrogations these days.”
on to part three