The Greatest Secret

Disclaimer: Nope, don't own iCarly

A/N:

Chapter 160 (Fear strikes him)

Tyrone tapped his foot gently on the tile floor of the diner he was eating at. It was an Asian restaurant and he was currently eating sweet and sour chicken with some hot and sour sauce on the side. He had a lot to think about, quite an enormous amount of stuff was hitting him in recent years. All the things that Marissa had accused him of, he hadn't done any of that. The only thing he was truly guilty of was letting one of his gang members go after Jake Krandal, in the thinking that he was Jonah. He hadn't sanctioned Jake's murder.

"What started all this?" His guest asked in a quiet voice. Across from Tyrone was Shane Johnson, the same person who had been caught in between Carly and Sam a while back. He was still angry about the entire thing. Now that Tyrone had a suspicion, he wanted to use Shane for something. Anything at all. Shane was stirring some Wonton Soup with his spoon and eyeing the soup with narrow eyes. "Why are you so against Freddie and his family?"

"A lot of anger…a lot of confusion…" He lifted his head up and stared at a small pipe at the ceiling. He felt deeply that this place needed to put some tiles up there as well. Maybe get Robert Irvine from the Food Channel to use this restaurant in one of his Restaurant: Impossible segments. "Back in '82, I'd gotten out of a bad divorce with my ex. I know she divorced me because I was angry, but can you blame me? My father told me that I was a mistake." Shane's eyebrows rose as Tyrone stared off into the distance, as though he was just talking to himself. "A product of rape, that was it."

"That's bad…you just learned that?"

"Yeah, my own dad…didn't tell me who my mother was, but apparently she was dead. I was pissed, it threw me off my game. He told me it was because of that arranged marriage bullshit, started telling me what that was all about, so I decided I wanted no part of it. Refused my son from marrying into that life…" Shane slurped his soup and closed his eyes.

"Let me guess, it's come around to bite you in the ass now."

"I'm losing my entire family…I still have my granddaughter, but I'm afraid they'd brainwash her." Shane scoffed and turned his head to the side, stunning Tyrone for a bit.

"Please, arranged marriage…what the hell do you think it is, old timer?" Tyrone's lips parted to speak, but Shane looked back into his eyes and continued talking, preventing him from speaking. "Arranged marriage is different in various cultures Mr. Shay. Let's talk the Benson-Davidson clan, shall we? My grandmother has worked for the Davidson family for a couple years before she met my grandfather, of whom she never actually married." He reached into a backpack next to him and pulled out a journal. "This is a copy of my grandmother's journal from when she was really young. She started working as a maid from the age of sixteen, then when she turned twenty, she went to work with someone other than the Davidson's. Let's see here…"

Tyrone raised his eyebrow as Shane opened the book to the first pages of the journal, he felt a feeling of confusion and eagerness to hear what was in that journal. "So she worked as a maid, huh…"

"She met the whole clan. Here we go…She was born in 1950 to a Vietnamese family, moved over to the states in 1966 where she needed to help support her family. She says in her journal that she was a maid for Era Davidson's family and learned so much about the culture they had. The people there get to have their choice, that's what Dirdan 'Dan' Davidson wanted. The prospective couple should at least date and find out if they like each other enough, then when asked if that's the one they wanted, it was their choice." Tyrone's heart sank momentarily and he muttered quietly to himself.

"I don't know, I still think there's a problem with it…I mean so young?"

"They have to be twenty, Mr. Shay. No younger. Their mate is selected at the age of 12 or 13, they have to spend time together and then marry at twenty. That's how the Davidson clan does it." Tyrone groaned and shrugged it off, still unsure of what to believe. Shane shouldn't be biased, considering he never talked to them, but he did have some knowledge. "When I was going to Ridgeway, I was curious, so I talked to Freddie about it during class once. He explained the culture, he didn't explain who his fiancé was though. I have my suspicions."

"So do I, and that's what I wanted to talk to you about." Shane raised an eyebrow as Tyrone forked his chicken and brought it to his mouth. He chewed for a moment, then swallowed. "I think his fiancé may be Samantha Puckett."

Shane's eyes widened for a bit and he quickly cleared his throat. "Sam? Carly's friend? Why would you think her?"

"Because she and Freddie, they're always together. They even got locked in school together a couple days ago. So here's what I want you to do…If you'll do it for me." Shane frowned as Tyrone set his fork down and sighed. "I don't want to hurt them, but I want to keep that girl out of that lifestyle. I can't protect Carly because she's with her dad, who is marrying Marissa, but Sam…she's lived with the Bensons for years, when her mom died, she named Marissa as her legal guardian."

"You expect to pry her away from her legal guardian?"

"No, but if she is, then maybe I can convince her family to pull her away." Shane chuckled lightly and Tyrone took another bite. Sure it could be difficult, if Sam were the girl, to pull her away. Her family would have to fight for custody. "Anyway, how I want you to figure this out is…I've noticed over the years that Freddie can have a mean streak, so if Sam is the one…what if you tried to seduce her? Kiss her?" Shane gagged once and closed his eyes, pain was clearly expressed in his face. Tyrone knew what he might be thinking about, getting beaten by either Freddie, Jonah, or anyone else for that matter, and chances were he didn't want to do that. "If Freddie gets upset enough, then there's a pretty good chance that she is his fiancé."

"Okay, but you do know there might be love involved with those two, right?"

"Love? Don't get me started on love…" He frowned and stared down at his bowl with a slightly angry expression. What was love good for? He thought Angeline loved him, but she left him. He thought his father loved him, but that had been a lie. "I've not seen Angeline since the divorce. I've not talked to my father in over thirty years. People have come, people have gone, and you want to sit here and tell me about love?"

"You broke your son up from Marissa nearly thirty years ago, did you not?" He nodded his head and watched with despair as Shane smirked back at him. "Then explain why he and Marissa are getting married now after all this time? I think it could very well be love. Honestly old timer, your son and grandson probably did well to get away from you."

"Can we not talk about that, please?"

"Separation anxiety?"

"No, I just don't want to talk about that."

"Fine by me. So, say I do this for you…what do I get out of it, besides a possible black eye from either Sam or Freddie?"

"You're still upset about what happened, right?" Shane rubbed the back of his neck and groaned as he recalled flying down the elevator shaft. "Well if you do this, maybe you're getting them back a little? Taking the rug from under their feet? Nah, not good enough…I'll pay you some money."

"What do you intend to do anyway? Ship the Bensons off to India or something? Look what happened with Agim."

"Not me…someone else was after his family. Probably the same people after Zamira."

"Yeah, you have to hate serial killers. My gramps was one, actually…" Tyrone raised an eyebrow and wanted to know more. Before he could ask Shane to elaborate, his phone began ringing. He lifted his hand up and Shane moved his eyes over to the phone.

"Hold that thought…" He looked at the phone and saw Spencer calling. His eyebrows rose up and he quickly answered, he was actually happy that Spencer was calling him. "What's going on?"

"Granddad, I have a question. This has been bugging the hell out of me…"

"What?"

"I just got done prosecuting someone named Mitchell Shay. Shay, gramps, there's another person with that last name. Is that a coincidence?"

"Another Shay? No, of course not." He turned his eyes to Shane as Spencer continued to go on about this Mitchell Shay, a murderer. He rolled his eyes and sighed, though Shane seemed a bit curious. "Look Spencer, I was born in '37, I think I would know if there was another."

"How can you be so sure? You said it yourself a while back, your own father lied to you. Maybe he never told you."

"I'm telling you, there are no remaining Shays. I am the last Shay. Do you understand? There are no other Shays. You, Carly, Robert, none of you are even Shays. The Shay line started with James Shay who had a son in 1849 with a woman born in 1830. She died in 1852, so they had one kid. William had one kid, Brandon. Brandon had my father, never spoke of another kid in the line. So I was Devlin's only child. There are no other Shays. James Shay was an only child."

"Grandpa, I know there's another Shay out there somewhere. Devlin had two sons. Keyton Shay was his other kid. I know because we found something out at the reunion about him…"

He scoffed and threw his hand up in the air. "Keyton Shay? I've never heard of him." Shane's eyes flicked up from his soup, then over to the journal next to him. Tyrone caught the action and stared skeptically at the youth. "You would think…I would have known if I had a brother. Or a cousin for that matter…if this Mitchell Shay would be related."

"Impossible," Shane interrupted from under his breath. Tyrone blinked and glanced over to see Shane reading through his journal.

"What are you talking about?"

"My grandmother doesn't write about a Mitchell Shay."

"Hold on Spencer…" Tyrone brought his phone to his shoulder and stared in silence at Shane. "How the hell would your grandmother know about any Shays?"

"Because she worked for one, he was my grandfather." He furrowed his brow and relaxed his body as Shane went on to explain who his grandmother was. "I didn't know her all that well, she died a while back. She writes in her journal that she was terrified of this man, feared for her life if she ever left him. His name was Lionel Shay."

"Lionel Shay…"

"Yes. She writes that every ten years on Friday the 13th, he kills a member of the Shay family, in order to cleanse their evil." His jaw dropped and he flinched as he tried to imagine that happening. "She writes that he revealed to her just when it began, when he was only 13, going on 14. He killed Brandon Shay by cutting off his life support. After that, Grandma was around to know about each Shay he killed. When he murdered his own sister in 2003, he told her that if she wanted to leave, she could. She did."

Tyrone's stomach churned inside and a feeling of fear, mixed in with disbelief, shot up inside. How could there be another Shay if he'd never heard of it? He was so close-minded to everything around him that he consistently refused to believe anything that didn't make sense to him. "I don't understand. Your last name is Johnson…not Vietnamese at all."

"I know. My grandmother's name was Kim Pham. She passed away in 2007 in our family home, heart attack. She never changed her name, she wasn't really married to this Lionel person. They had a daughter, my mother, Jennifer Pham. When she was young, grandma told her to leave far away, so she moved here where she met my father, Todd Johnson. Dad died in 2000, by the way. Would you like to read this journal? I have another copy of it back home. Grandma's got everything down. However, she doesn't write about anyone named Mitchell. Also…your father's name is in this too."

"What?" His eyes widened as Shane pushed the journal to him. He slowly peered down at the leather book, his hands shook fearfully as he tried ineffectively to swallow his fear.

"As for your plan…I'll do it, only because I know you're not going to like what's in that book. I'll try to figure out how I'm going to go about it, so until then, see you later. I'll uh…I'll talk to Mom and see if she knows anything about the Shays. Maybe Grandma talked to her."

"O-Okay…" He waited as Shane pushed off and walked away from the table. When he was gone, Tyrone slowly opened the journal up. With a quivering jaw, he slowly put the phone to his ear. "Spencer…there's nothing about a Mitchell Shay, but…I have to let you go."

"Granddad, is there something wrong?"

"Don't worry about it." He slowly closed his phone, ignoring whatever else Spencer was saying, and pushed the phone into his pocket. He didn't want to burden his family with anything else. "My dad's in this book? I've not talked to him since 1980…Sure he'd be dead by now, but…" He shook his head and felt a pang in his heart as he read through the journal.

Within a couple hours, Tyrone was standing in a cold wind, his hair flying off to the side as leaves flying by him. After searching, he'd found what he was looking for. He was staring down at his father's grave. Devlin Shay, October 31, 1903-May 13, 1983. Not far from the grave was Brandon's tombstone. Brandon Shay, September 12, 1870-September 13, 1963.

The stories were etched beautifully in Kim Pham's journal, Lionel Shay told her so well what had taken place. A tear fell from his eyes as he gripped the journal tightly in his hands. How had he never known his father was going to be murdered? What if this man were to come after him? What would happen? No, he couldn't find him, that's what Kim said. Lionel didn't even know where the hell he was, but he sure knew about the others.

And he told me when we met, he was not a dangerous man. He's a killer, a vicious killer, whether he believes he's doing right or not. He was born on September 15th, 1949…He was almost fourteen. His father was Keyton Shay, born in 1926 by Devlin Shay and a woman that Devlin felt was to be his wife. She left him. Brandon was 93 and on his deathbed with Lionel on September 13th, 1963. Lionel says that's when he wanted to cleanse the Shay family of their evil. Brandon confessed to having killed the wife of Dalmat Davidson, with the help of Devlin, no doubt. He also confessed to killing Dirdan's three year old son, Birim. That's when Lionel grabbed the life support tube, holding onto it until Brandon had a heart attack…

Tyrone swallowed hard as the sweat dripped down his neck, his hands shook and he slowly fell back on a stone bench next to his father's grave. "I had a brother, you never told me I had a brother." He'd found Keyton's grave nearby. When he did, his entire world came crashing down upon him. Keyton Shay, January 5, 1926-July 13th, 1973. Why did he feel like there was something missing? There had to be a reason his father never spoke of Keyton, a reason that he'd never even heard of the guy.

July 14th, 1973-My heart's going a million miles a minute, I need help, but I don't want to leave. I can't leave him, he might kill me. He'd just killed his own father! It was gruesome, I was there! I had to watch it happen! Poor Mr. Keyton Shay, poor, poor man. He was working in his workshop when Lionel went in with a hammer and hit him many times. He cut off all of the man's limbs and shot his eyes and mouth with a nail gun. Oh my god it was gruesome! I don't know why Lionel kept his head intact, but he burned Mr. Shay's body from the neck down, complete ash! At least Keyton wasn't aware who was attacking him…Lionel struck from behind. That's mercy, right? Tell me it's mercy. Oh god! I don't understand though, Keyton wasn't like his father and grandfather, he wasn't evil. It may be too late, Lionel my think he's evil…

He suppressed the urge to vomit as he remembered that entry. His hands had been shaking so badly and he almost felt like Lionel was creeping up on him. He set the journal down next to him and brought his hands to his face, sobbing lightly. Was he evil? Was he bad? Was he mislead? What was the problem here that he was facing, besides possible death? Would his son even know? Was that what Devlin was thinking about when he died?

Devlin Shay, an eighty year old man still working at a factory. It's May 13th, 1983. This man was pure evil. Lionel told me that Devlin assaulted someone and had a child named Tyrone, but to this day he does not know where that child is. He only knew where Devlin was. This man, this violent man…He helped murder someone in 1931, Ciara Davidsion. Then again, I think that was Dalmat's wife. In 1961, he had a fight with that Besim Davidson, trying to take that man's wife away, but failed. He had back problems ever since, and I think that's what happened here…He confronted Devlin in front of a factory grinder. The old man was so cocky, so evil, so sure of himself that he taunted Lionel. He claimed he enjoyed everything he'd done and wasn't sorry for it. Then he went on to say something that really hurt him…Lionel punched Devlin in the jaw and the old man stumbled backwards, but somehow his back was thrown out and he fell into the grinder. Blood went everywhere, it was scary!

Tyrone had to hand it to Besim, fighting for his wife like that, it was a very noble thing to do. He knew Freddie would do the same for his fiancé, at least. The tale of his father's gory demise had shaken him so much that he just didn't want to think anything more about it. He'd read of Isabel Manten. The poor girl was just sixteen in 1993. Her grave was next to her mother's just a few plots away. Isabel Manten, January 6th, 1977-August 13th, 1993, and Connie Shay, June 8th 1961-June 13th, 2003.

Isabel had been looking at her homework when Lionel entered from behind her, he used a screwdriver and stabbed her in the neck. When she was still breathing and gasping for air, he ended up stabbing her again in the head. Kim wrote in her journal that Lionel didn't want to be that violent with the young girl, he expected her to die from the first blow. As for Connie, he was merciful to her. Since she was his sister, he didn't want to be too violent. This time, he only spiked the woman's drink with a powerful sleep aid to knock her out. After that, he tied her wrists and legs with rope and threw her body in the lake, letting her drown without waking.

Tyrone knew Lionel might search him out, after all, he was the last Shay left. Could he try to find Jennifer and Shane? Maybe, maybe not, it was hard to tell. That was his own bloodline, but if he wanted to get rid of the Shay bloodline, then he might. Suddenly an intense feeling gripped at his heart, he'd just had Shane do something that might be construed as pretty bad. If so, Lionel might view it as evil! "No…"

"There are other things to worry about besides Lionel Shay." Tyrone's head flew up and he turned his eyes to see a young girl watching him closely. She had brown hair with black tips and seemed rather skinny. She had a backpack on and a journal in her hand. "Tyrone Shay, I presume?"

"Y-Yeah, who are you?"

"Nora Dershlitt…I was hoping to talk to you."

Looks like the ever mysterious Nora has made contact with Tyrone, Shane's a Shay, and Tyrone's beginning to realize a whole bunch of stuff. Dang, hope you enjoyed the chapter