The Trouble with Angels (Angels Everywhere #2)(68)

"Sleep well.”

Her grandmother stood in the doorway, her hand on the doorknob. She hesitated, and Karen liked to think that maybe her grandma was saying a prayer over her the way she had that one night. She hoped that she was.

"I’ll sleep good,” Karen promised, but she wasn’t so sure about that. It never felt right when she wasn’t in her own bed with her own pillow that she could beat up and bend just the way she liked.

The room went dark when the door closed, and Karen kept her eyes wide open for a couple of minutes until they adjusted to the lack of light. She’d rather she was home. Not that she was afraid.

It was the dream that worried her. The last time she’d spent the night at her grandparents’ house, the nightmare had come. She didn’t want it to return.

It was a long time before Karen felt herself relax enough to fall asleep.

It happened then the way it always did. She was in a bedroom in a home she didn’t recognize when she heard her mom and her dad arguing. She was younger than she was now, probably only five, because she was sitting on the floor, playing with baby dolls. Doll clothes were scattered all over the carpet, and she was afraid her parents were angry because she’d made such a big mess.

The fighting grew louder and louder, and Karen covered her ears. But even that didn’t help. The words were cruel and ugly and seemed so sharp that they cut at her skin even though they weren’t directed at her.

Karen moved into the kitchen, where her mother and father were shouting, only now they were speaking in a foreign language. She couldn’t understand what they were saying any longer. But the words were just as ugly and spiked, so that each one hurt the other. Not just Karen, but each other. Her father’s face was bloody from all the words. Her mother’s, too.

Desperately Karen tried to get Maureen’s attention, thinking she could distract her mother easier than she could her father. But when she walked over and tugged at Maureen’s blouse, her mother ignored her and gestured for her to move away. Her hands, Karen noticed, had blood on them from all the ugly words.

Frantic now, Karen went to her father next and pleaded with him to stop and listen to her. But he was embroiled in the intense argument and ignored her.

Distraught by this point, Karen stood on a chair and screamed for them to notice her. But it did no good. She held out her arms to them, but they were always just out of reach.

Then there was a knife, a big one that looked like the kind hunters used. It appeared as if by magic. It was polished and gleamed in the light. Sometimes her mother was the one holding the knife, and at other times it was her father.

This time it was her father.

He raised his arm and pulled the knife back, all the while talking to her mother in the language Karen couldn’t understand.

Maureen’s eyes were round and terrified as she backed away. The knife grew bigger and sharper. Her mother’s voice pleaded with him. Karen still couldn’t understand the words, but she knew that her mother was afraid. Karen was afraid for her. Maureen ran and hid in the bathroom and locked the door.

This was the part that always confused Karen, because she could see through the bathroom wall as if it weren’t there. Her mother had a phone with her, and she dialed the police and was screaming that her husband was about to kill her.

But she had the wrong number, and the people on the other line didn’t care.

Karen was weeping by then, crying for her mother to dial 911. She pleaded with her daddy not to hurt her mother. Her dad didn’t listen, and neither did anyone else.

It was at this point that the bathroom door opened, and the stranger who had been her father walked in. Maureen stood inside the bathtub, her back flattened against the wall.

Karen tried to stop him. She threw herself in front of him and held on to his legs, but he moved forward, dragging her with him. Karen tried so hard to get him to stop, but he wouldn’t.

Her mother screamed, and Karen watched as her father lowered the knife, plunging it into her mother’s heart. When he drew out the blade, it was coated red with blood.

Karen screamed. Her mother was dead. Her father had killed her mother.

She screamed and screamed and screamed.

"Karen…Karen!”

Bright lights blinded her. Karen’s heart beat like a race car piston. Her skin felt cold and clammy, and her forehead was damp with sweat.

"Sweetheart.”

The soothing, gentle voice belonged to her grandmother. Karen clung to her, holding on as tight as she could as the image of her mother’s bloody body faded from her memory.

"It’s all right. It was a dream.”

Karen started to sob. She hated it when she cried, but she couldn’t make herself stop. "Sometimes I don’t think it’s a dream,” she whispered. "Sometimes I think it all really happened.”

"What happened, honey? Can you tell me about it?”

"No,” she said emphatically, and shook her head. She didn’t want to talk about it. Didn’t want to tell her grandmother about the knife and the blood and the hate.

Her grandma’s arms were wrapped around her, and she swayed gently back and forth.

Maureen stared at the television screen in the hotel room. It was like a thousand other hotel rooms she’d stayed in for these business trips. She was restless and not the least bit tired, although she’d been on the go since early that morning. By all rights she should be exhausted.