Silo

Chapter 31

I wasn't sure where Keith took Tyler or what he planned to do with him. To be honest, I didn't care.  

We argued for a bit about where to keep him. I wanted him as far away from Meredith as possible. Keith disagreed. He wanted him close by, claimed that the last thing we needed was for Tyler to get loose without us finding out until it was too late. At this point, it didn't matter to me. So long as he let Evan triple-check the knots he used to bind Tyler's arms and legs, then he could drop that little prick wherever the hell he wanted. 

Hearing Tyler admit to terrorizing Meredith, to plotting mine and Evan's death, was a little more than I could handle. When Keith offered to take care of him, I gave him the green light and worried more about Meredith and what was going through her mind.  

She was finally asleep. I don't think she was tired, rather emotionally spent. It took more than an hour for me to convince her that Tyler was not staying permanently. She still clung to my knife though; even sound asleep I struggled to pry her fingers from the blade. 

Smoke drifted from Keith's room into mine, and I got up to make sure Meredith was still asleep before I left. Keith's room had no ventilation shaft, was basically a shoebox with a mattress on the floor. I couldn't figure any reason he'd be holed up in there alone right now, starting a fire that could smoke him out in a matter of minutes. 

"He finally shut up?" I asked from his doorway.  

Tyler had woken up fighting, ranting about who he was going to kill first and how. Evan still topped the list with me coming in a close second. He mumbled something about saving Meredith for last and enjoying what little she had left to offer. That's when I hit him myself, sent him stumbling back into the realm of unconsciousness. 

"He is now," Keith said as he tossed a bundle of paper into the fire, the flames briefly surging to life. "I gagged him." 

I smiled, impressed that Keith had shown enough restraint to keep Tyler alive. Pulling a crate up to the fire, I kicked off my boots to warm my feet. "Why didn't you tell me was alive when you first saw him?" 

Keith looked up, obviously caught off guard by my question. "I was going to, just wanted to wait until we got back here. Then I saw her and the way she backed herself into that corner. Jesus, Jake, she was even afraid of Evan. Evan for Christ's sake."  

I silently laughed to myself. In Evan's defense, he was initially afraid of her too. "Either way," Keith continued, "The Tyler we knew would never let that happen, never mind actually..." 

"She knew, you know," I said, grabbing a stack of paper from Keith's pile and tossing it into the flames. "She's got a timeline in the back of her journal. It has the names of everybody on our team, including you and me." 

Keith nodded. "I figured as much. She may have been quiet, but I never thought she was dumb," he chuckled, silently reading something from the paper in his hand before he tore it up and tossed it aside. "I asked her not to say anything to you, pretty much begged her to let me handle it. Gotta say, Jake, I'm surprised she did." 

I didn't have the energy to wrap my mind around that little bit of information; the thought of Keith and Merry being in agreement on anything was still inconceivable. 

Keith saw the look of confusion cross my face and reached back, tugging Tyler's wallet out of the stack of things he'd stripped off him. Unfolding it, he pulled out Tyler's pictures, laid them out side by side on the cracked floor. 

"Look at them," he said, nudging a picture of Tyler and Katie in my direction. Next to it was a team photo and one me on the mound. "This was the only Tyler you knew. Even earlier, when you realized what he'd done to Meredith, what he'd gladly do again if given the chance, you wanted to keep him. Fix him. You honestly think you would've had the stomach to kill him...to kill one of your best friends if that is what it came to?"