The Other Brother Read online

  On his left there was a bank of what appeared to be mini refrigerators set in a wall. Beside the coolers there was a set of double doors, like you would find in a hospital ER.

  But this wasn't a hospital, he realized.

  He was in a morgue.

  I'm not dead! What the fuck am I doing in here?

  He remembered what had brought him there, however. The gunfight back at the crib. Seeing Mama die. Taking bullets from those motherfuckers.

  His vow of vengeance.

  No matter what, I'm going to get you for this....

  Fury electrified him like a cattle prod touched to his flesh.

  He tried to sit up it felt as though heavy iron plates lay on his chest. By the time he was sitting upright, sweat had popped out on his skin.

  A thin sheet covered him. Underneath, he was nude.

  Most of his body was numb. He d been to the dentist once, to get a cavity filled and had gotten a shot of novocaine to deaden his tooth to the pain. His entire body felt as though it had been injected with that shit.

  He grasped the edge of the sheet and tore it aside. He swung his legs to the side of the table, groaning from the exertion.

  His legs were so weak that when he slid off the table, he almost crashed onto the floor. He leaned against the edge of the table to keep his balance.

  There was a large desk, on the far side of the room. No one sat behind the desk but there was a wrapped sandwich and a bag of Jays potato chips sitting on the surface, evidence that someone would be returning soon.

  His stomach craved food. He walked-staggered to the desk and grabbed the sandwich. He took a huge, sloppy bite.

  It was only a turkey and cheese sandwich on wheat, but it was the best thing he d ever tasted in his life.

  He stuffed it into his mouth, chewing savagely, making soft, animal-like sounds of pleasure. As he consumed the food, strength and sensation returned to his muscles and nerves.

  He recalled taking a shotgun slug in the shoulder and a bullet in the chest, but he didn't feel any pain in those regions of his body. Puzzled, he checked the entry points of the gunshot wounds. A snarl of fresh scar tissue covered his shoulder and there was a puckered slash on his chest, thanks to the nine millimeter. These wounds should have killed him.

  But he was alive.

  It was a miracle.

  He had finished the sandwich and was reaching for the potato chips when someone entered the room via the double doors. A tall, broad-shouldered white man with dark hair and glasses. He was dressed in scrubs and was bringing a can of Coke to his lips.

  "What the " the man said, eyes stunned behind his lenses. He dropped the soda on the floor.

  He had to stop this guy before he got away, told everyone what had happened. After the shit that had gone down at the crib, the cops would wanna haul his ass back to the joint, and he wasn't having that.

  He did the most natural thing. He shouted at the white guy, "Stop! "

  As he spoke the command, electrical current seemed to sizzle up the channel of his spine and explode in his brain like a thunderclap. He blinked, feeling drunk on ... something. Power?

  The man had stopped. In midstep. He looked a figure in a wax museum.

  He felt a peculiar throbbing in the center of his forehead. He touched it. It was a vein.

  The white man was still frozen. Chest rising and falling. Eyes twitching. But still suspended in place.

  Understanding flooded him.

  He had told this man to stop, and the man had obeyed.

  Somehow, surviving death, coming back from the Other Side, had gifted him with some sort ofpower. It made sense. That was how it happened in the movies, after all.

  He grinned at this amazing discovery.

  Then, finding a metal stapler on the desk, he stalked across the room and smashed the guy in the head with it, knocking him unconscious. He stripped him of his clothes and dressed in them himself.

  He probably looked like a felon in scrubs, not a doctor or whatever this guy had been, but the disguise should be good enough to get him out of there and back on the street.

  Once he hit the streets again, it would be time for revenge.

  First, the niggas who had attacked him and his mother.

  Next, his father... .

  Gabriel burst out of the dream. Chest heaving, he looked around.

  He lay sprawled on the couch in the family room. The television was on, playing some Stephen King movie.

  He sighed, lay his head against the cushions.

  The dream had been like a film in its own right. It had been so realistic, yet so strange. He'd been in Isaiah's viewpoint, experiencing Isaiah's twisted thoughts, too.

  Had his dream merely been influenced by the article he'd read of Isaiah's return from death? Stuff like that had happened to Gabriel before. Many times, he'd watched a particularly vivid film and later dreamed of some element of the movie.

  Or was there another answer?

  Had he dreamed of what had actually happened to Isaiah?

  Much later that night, after Isaiah returned from his errands, he slept.

  He dreamed, too.

  He dreamed of driving a Lincoln Navigator on a highway in a blinding rain and getting smacked by an tractor-trailer. He crashed through a guardrail, tumbled down an embankment, slipped into darkness, and hurtled toward a radiant doorway ... only to be turned away before he merged into the ethereal light.

  The dream then dissolved into him standing in front of a bathroom door. He reached toward the door. But the knob twisted and the door floated open, independent of his touch.

  And his palms began to tingle....

  Isaiah awoke from the dream shortly thereafter. He lay in the darkness, gazing at the ceiling.

  He was quite sure that he had dreamed of something that had happened to Gabriel. He knew all about the accident.

  But that wasn't what perplexed Isaiah. Something else did.

  The door that had opened on its own.

  Did Gabriel have some sort of power, too?

  Chapter 40

  r arly the next morning, after a night during which he'd managed maybe two hours of restful sleep, Gabriel went to Lowe's to purchase paint and brushes. When he attempted to pay for the items with a credit card, the clerk, a young black woman, handed the card back to him.

  "It's been denied," she said, and gave him a you knew better than that look.

  "Denied? That's not possible. Try it again, please."

  She swiped the card again. Waited, and then shook her head and handed the card back to him.

  "Okay." He handed her another card. "Try this one"

  She tried that one. With the same result.

  What was this? There was nothing wrong with these credit cards.

  "Wanna go for strike three with another one?" she asked.

  This was exactly what he needed. A comedienne.

  "Let's try my debit card. This one has to work 'cause I know I have funds in my bank account" He handed the card to her.

  She accepted it dubiously. Swiped it. Then turned to him as if he were the most trifling man walking the earth.

  "Strike three," she said.

  "This can't be" He had at least a few hundred dollars in that checking account, and more in savings. "Are you sure something isn't wrong with your system?"

  "It's been working fine all morning."

  Gabriel flipped through his wallet. He had only a fivedollar bill and no more credit cards.

  "I'm going to run out to my car for a minute," he said. "I'll be right back."

  In the Corvette's glove compartment he'd stored an emergency stash of fifty dollars in cash; he'd learned to do that because sometimes computer systems could be offline when you needed to purchase something. He peeled off a twenty and returned inside the store to pay for the items.

  "Handle your bidness, honey," the clerk said, bagging his purchases.

  Gabriel hardly heard her. He couldn't figure out what was wrong. He'd never had a prob
lem with his credit cards-he paid them in full each month and the account balances were well below the limits and he knew for a fact that he had money in his bank accounts. He'd checked his statement online only a few days ago.

  It was yet another problem to investigate. As if he didn't already have enough issues.

  When it rained, it poured.

  Gabriel drove directly to Dana's condo. He hadn't called her beforehand to announce that he was visiting. She wouldn't want to see him. But he needed to see her.

  On Saturday mornings Dana usually went to an LA Fitness in Midtown to work out. He wanted to be at her home when she returned.

  He approached her front door. Isaiah's spray-painted message looked even more vulgar and offensive in the daylight. Residue from the almost-murderous rage Gabriel had experienced last night stirred in him.

  I'm gonna get you for this, Isaiah.

  Muttering under his breath, Gabriel cleaned dust and grime off the door with a towel and then opened a can of burgundy-red paint, the same color as the door.

  He was applying paint to the wood in steady strokes when Dana appeared in the corridor. She wore an Emory T-shirt and athletic shorts and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail.

  Displeasure twisted her face.

  "What're you doing here?"

  "I'm repainting the door."

  "Painting the door isn't going to change what you did. I want you to leave."

  "Listen" Gabriel dipped the brush in the can. "Isaiah did this, Dana. He admitted it to me when I talked to him last night. He's trying to drive us apart-and I'm not going to let that happen"

  "I don't want to get into this right now." She came forward. "Get away from my door. I'll repaint it later by my damn self."

  Gabriel moved aside. He inhaled a deep breath and concentrated on summoning his energy, as he'd been practicing.

  His telekinesis awakened, power sparking across his palms.

  "You sure you don't want me to help?" he asked. And when Dana turned to spit another nasty remark at him, he caused the paintbrush to sail through the air, rest against the door, and slide downward in a smooth stroke.

  Dana's mouth dropped open.

  "Yeah, I did that," he said. "We need to talk, baby. I've got a lot to tell you"

  Chapter 41

  r abriel asked Dana to sit at the dinette table. Then he told I her everything.

  He explained the onset of his psychic ability, including his theory for how he'd acquired the talent after his concussion; he told her what he'd learned about Isaiah from Sean's background investigation; he related Nicole's chilling experience with Isaiah; and, lastly, he described the hyperrealistic dream he'd had last night and his ideas of the paranormal talent Isaiah possessed.

  Dana listened silently without interruption. As he talked, she got up, brewed coffee, poured herself a mug, and gave one to him, too. Gabriel interpreted the gesture as a small sign that she was coming around to his side again.

  "That's everything," he said. "I know it's crazy, Dana, and I wouldn't believe it myself if it weren't happening to me. But, as you can see .. ." He floated a container of coffee creamer through the air and placed it on the other side of the table. Dana gaped, amazed. "This is as real as it gets"

  Dana pursed her lips. She stared at a spot on the table, a look that came over her when she was immersed in deep thought.

  He waited a moment. "What do you think?"

  She looked at him. "I believe you"

  "You do?"

  "My med-school professors would kill me if I admitted this, but I do think that some people are gifted with ESP, psychic powers, what have you" She sipped her coffee, a faraway gaze coming into her eyes. "When I was a little girl I remember people saying that my great aunt was born with a veil, which supposedly gave her second sight. I don't recall seeing her do anything to demonstrate her ability, but I remember that folks from the neighborhood would come to her house to get her advice on their marriages, relationships, children, finances, whatever. Auntie Bell was like the neighborhood treasure"

  "You never told me about her"

  "She passed a long time ago when I was nine. Since I've been in the medical field I've tried to adopt a more logical, scientific approach to things-and probably been a little bullheaded about it sometimes." She smiled, embarrassed. "But I've seen what you can do with my own eyes"

  "How about the stuff I've told you about Isaiah? Do you believe that, too?"

  "I do," she said. "You wouldn't make up anything like that. You have no reason to lie, and neither does Nicole."

  Finally Dana was on his side.

  She reached across the table and grasped his hand.

  "Baby, I owe you an apology," she said. "I'm sorry for not trusting you. You deserved better than that from me. I never should have doubted you"

  He put his other hand on top of hers and held it tight.

  "I wasn't acting like the most rational man in the world," he said. "I can't blame you for everything."

  "But I never gave you much of a chance. When I heard about Isaiah, how he never knew this side of his family, my heart went out to him. I know how it feels to be abandoned, Gabe. I let my sympathy for him get in the way of me supporting you"

  Gabriel kept quiet, letting her get her words out.

  "I should've stood by you," she said. "God, the terrible things I said to you... " She bit her lip, shaking her head. "Can you please forgive me?"

  "Forgiven" He kissed her hand. "Let's put this behind us. I need you, girl."

  "You've got me. I won't ever doubt you again."

  Smiling at him, she brought the carafe to the table, and refreshed their coffee.

  "Have you eaten breakfast yet, babe?" she asked, rubbing his shoulder.

  "Nope"

  "How do mushroom and cheese omelettes sound?"

  "Sounds delicious to me. I'm starved"

  "I need to get some food in me before I can do the heavyduty thinking we need to do," she said. "I have a lot of questions."

  "While you cook," he said, "I want to use your computer. I have some other questions, too-about my bank accounts"

  Dana had set up the spare bedroom as a guest room and home office. She kept a late-model Dell laptop on the desk.

  Sipping coffee, Gabriel logged onto his bank's Web site. He entered his username and password to access his account.

  His checking account, which had boasted a balance of several hundred dollars earlier in the week, had a zero balance. His savings account, in which he had kept around a thousand dollars, had also been drained.

  Full withdrawals had been posted on both accounts. Wire transfer transactions, processed yesterday, had sent his money to an unidentified receiver.

  Taking it all away, little brother.

  Gabriel had no proof that Isaiah was responsible; he didn't need any evidence. He knew.

  Gabriel accessed his other investment accounts, which he maintained with various financial-services companies. Diversification of his assets had paid off. He had close to thirty thousand dollars spread around, and all those funds were intact.

  Then he went to the Web site of Experian, one of the three primary credit bureaus. He went to order the online credit report.

  "Dana?" he called. "Can you come in here for a see?"

  She came inside a minute later, wiping her hands on a towel. "What's up?"

  "I need to buy an online credit report but I can't use my credit card to pay for it. Can I use yours? I'll explain in a moment."

  "Okay." She left the room and came back with her bank debit card. She stood behind his chair as he entered the payment information and hit SUBMIT.

  He drummed the desk, waiting for the report to appear. "I hope this isn't as bad as I think it is."

  The report finally appeared. Gabriel scrolled down the page.

  His stomach plummeted.

  "Oh, my goodness," Dana said. "Is that right? It can't be, can it?"

  Gabriel put his hands to his face. He didn't want to look a
t the screen any longer.

  New credit accounts had been opened in his name in the past month. Accounts for clothing stores, a classic-cars dealer, a car-stereo company, electronics stores, and MasterCard and Visa cards. Eleven accounts, in total. His existing credit cards had been maxed out, too.

  The balance of the accounts was approximately one hundred and forty thousand dollars.

  "Isaiah did this, didn't he?" Dana said. "He stole your identity and ran up all these bills."

  Gabriel massaged the bridge of his nose. He laughed-a bitter sound. It was the only alternative to crying like a baby.

  "Isaiah," he said softly. "You sneaky motherfucker."

  "I'm so sorry, Gabe," she said. "This is terrible."

  Gabriel only stared at the screen. Numb. Disbelieving.

  Dana took his arm. "Let's go eat. We'll talk about what we're going to do next"

  She led him out of the bedroom. His legs wobbled. Isaiah had been pummeling him like a heavyweight champ. Gabriel was still standing. But barely.

  "Voila," Dana said, placing plates on the table. "Breakfast is served"

  The omelette looked delicious. But Gabriel only picked at the edge of it with his fork.

  Dana, lifting a slice of omelette to her lips, put her fork down against the plate. "Baby, you've gotta eat"

  "I'm not hungry anymore," he said.

  "I know you're upset-"

  "Upset? We've just found out that Isaiah has completely fucked up my credit and will force me to declare bankruptcy. `Upset' isn't the right word. There isn't a word to describe how I'm feeling right now. How about up-fucking-setpissed-off-as-hell furious?"

  Dana waited for him to finish.

  "This ruins our plans," he said. "You think we'll be able to buy anything as a married couple with a bankruptcy on my record? Not for a helluva long time."

  "You won't have to declare bankruptcy. You can report it as an identity theft. They'll take those charges off your report"

  "Maybe," he said. "That's what I'll try to do, but that process will be a nightmare and could drag on forever, and my credit will be in the toilet in the meantime."