Books by Maggie Shayne (27 page)

He’d looked so real! So real and alive and wonderful that for the briefest instant she’d been tempted to fling herself into his arms and sob her heart out.

It would feel so good to have Richard’s arms around her again. Just once more, to have him hold her and…

And she
had
seen him—
clearly.
There’d been no trick of the sun, nothing distorting her vision. How could she plainly see Richard’s golden blond waves on a dark-haired man? How?

Oh, God, she was frightened.

No phone book in sight. She turned in a slow circle, scanning the room, and the shaking that emanated from her core intensified.

Forget the damn book. She’d just call Information and get the number.

She pressed a hand to her chest as if that would calm her racing heart, and she felt the pendant lying against her skin.

Bartholomew! Yes, she should call Bartholomew. He could help her. He was close by, and she could trust him.

Trust him, when he blabs your business all over town
?

But he meant well, she told herself. And she ignored her better judgment, deciding to call him. But in her state, she couldn’t remember his number either. She could get
that
from Information, though. She reached into her pocket for a pen and instead found a folded slip of paper she didn’t remember putting there.

And suddenly she went very still. As her hand closed around it, a soft, soothing warmth spread into her palm, up her arm, all through her body. She withdrew the paper, staring at it. It was almost pulsing with an unseen energy. She unfolded it, but her hands shook so badly, she couldn’t read it even when she held it in front of her nose.

Annie licked her parched lips and smoothed the paper onto the gleaming hardwood telephone stand with sweat-slick hands. Why was she feeling this sense of importance about the note? Why was she bothering to read it at a moment of such intense crisis? She was supposed to be calling Information, getting a number, asking for help…

“It’s all right,” the note said in an spiky scrawl. And it was as if someone were holding her hand, squeezing it, whispering the reassuring words right into her ear.
It’s all right. Everything’s going to be all right. Really, it is. I promise.
And for some reason, Annie believed the voice.

She opened her eyes and read the rest of the note. “It’s all right, Annie.
You’re
all right. Believe that, with everything in you. Soon you’ll understand.” It was signed S.D.

Sara Dawson?

Annie shook her head. Sara hadn’t given her any note. How… ?

The trembling was beginning to ease. She had no idea why, or how, but it did. She forced her breathing to slow and regulate, and her stomach stopped churning.

A blanket of warmth and comfort settled around her shoulders. What had happened? What had changed?

Annie blinked rapidly and looked from the paper to her hands holding it. Steady now. Her pounding heart had gentled. Her pulse no longer throbbed in her temples. The dizziness, probably brought on by spiraling blood pressure, was easing.

What the hell?

The words of a child—words that had nothing to do with what was going on in Annie’s mind—had calmed her as surely as a shot of Valium. Why, for God’s sake? And what did the note mean? Sara couldn’t have known of Annie’s troubles. So why say “It’s all right,” as if offering comfort? And what did she mean by “Soon you’ll understand”? Understand what? Not these hallucinations she seemed to be having. Sara had no way of knowing about them.

Did she?

Annie couldn’t help picturing the quiet girl with her strange, soulful eyes. No. No, of course she couldn’t know. She was a young girl, not a psychic.

Still, for some unidentifiable reason, a frantic call to her doctor or to her retired psychiatrist neighbor regarding strange and troubling symptoms no longer seemed nearly as important as having a serious discussion with young Sara Dawson.

Annie couldn’t explain the sense of calm and well-being that descended over her. She was curious, of course, about Sara. Disturbed that the girl seemed to know so much about Annie’s personal life. But not upset for some reason—as she probably should be.

Later. She’d be upset later. First… she’d just talk to the girl. Find out who’d been telling tales. It was obvious Sara meant well, even if she had been listening to gossip a bit more than she should.

Annie picked up the phone, and the number she dialed was one she knew too well to have to look up. She only prayed Mrs. Watkins would still be in the office at this hour. Chances of it were pretty good. The woman spent more time at the school than at home. Nothing went on there that she didn’t know about Hell, they barely needed a computer system with her around.

When her crisp-apple tone came through the line, Annie almost breathed a sigh of relief. “I’m so glad you’re still there. This is Annie Nelson, Mrs. Watkins. Could you do me a favor and pull the file on one of my students? I need her home address and phone number.”

Mrs. Watkins, as usual, was only too happy to be of help. “Which student, dear?”

“The new girl in English Ten. Sara Dawson. That’s D-A-W—”

“Ms. Nelson… Annie… there’s no new girl in that class.”

Annie bit back her impatience and tried again. “Of course there is. She just started a couple of days ago. I don’t know, maybe she’s not on the computer yet, but her name is—”

“There is no Sara Dawson registered in this school, Annie. And there hasn’t been a transfer since Bobby McArthur last May.” Her voice softened to the tone of a worried mother. “Now, honey, you know me. I’d know if there was.”

She
would
know if there was. So why
didn’t
she? There was a long pause as Annie blinked at the receiver.

“Dear, are you all right? You want me to send someone over there? What’s—”

Annie glanced up, her eyes drawn by some force beyond her control. And she saw him. Richard, lumbering down the road in that old familiar gait, making a beeline for her front door.

He looked so good.

She wanted to run to him… and she wanted to run away. She longed for him. She was terrified of him. Was he her husband or a stranger? A lover or a ghost? Reality or madness? She didn’t scream. She held the phone in an iron grip. “I’m fine, Mrs. Watkins. Thank you.” And she replaced the receiver.

She got to her feet, turned the lock on the front door, and watched as he came closer. He looked toward her, but she didn’t think he could see her through the sheer curtain. It was dim inside, but still bright out there.

“I love you, Richard,” she whispered. “But please go away. Go away and leave me alone.”

Then she turned and walked through the dining room and the kitchen to the back door. And as soon as she was outside, she ran.

She couldn’t look out again and see him standing on the porch, staring back at her. Not now, not after all this. She needed help, someone she could talk to about this, so she could figure out what was going on, why she kept seeing Richard’s face on some other man. Some stranger. And there was only one place she could go to get it.

Octagon House. Bartholomew Cassius. He could help her. And he would; she knew he would. She cut through the backyard and around behind the house next door. Then she raced to the road and crossed it, heading onto Mariposa. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Richard, his back to her, mounting her front steps now, ringing her doorbell. If he turned around…

She ran faster, not even slowing her pace when she’d passed the gas station and was beyond his range of vision. She pressed on, and her legs cramped, and her lungs burned. Hot tears squeezed out of her eyes from the exertion as well as the trauma. She was pushing herself too hard, but she couldn’t stop. With every stride she felt sure the devil himself was on her heels, chasing her, gaining on her.

She turned the corner onto Gladding Street and picked up the pace again, jogging past the school. Her lungs were screaming now. Fire burned up the backs of her calves, and her heart thundered. She stopped at the foot of the steep incline and stared up the road just ahead of her.

Octagon House was up there. It sat like a squat emperor on a hillside throne, its dark window-eyes gazing haughtily down at her, reminding her for just a second of Bartholomew’s eyes. Just as glassy and emotionless. A ripple went up her spine, momentarily chasing her panic into a quiet corner. Something cold touched her nape, and a warning prickle crept along her arms.

Don’t go up there
.

She shook herself free of the ominous feelings. It wasn’t difficult. She only had to picture the man she’d seen standing, dripping wet, on her porch, staring in the window at her. She only had to picture herself screaming as she looked out at the face of her dead husband.

Desperation tugged her onward. Of their own volition, her fingers found and caressed the pink tourmaline suspended around her neck. It warmed at her touch. And as she drew closer, she knew she was doing the right thing. Something in the house seemed to draw her, call to her, and the unreasonable fears faded as this new sense of purpose took over. A sense that not only did she want to go there, she
must
go. It was too potent to resist.

“Ms. Nelson,” someone called. “You all right? You look a little…”

She shook her head, waving a hand to silence the encroacher. Her eyes never wavered from their focus on the house. The feelings of confusion lost ground with every step she took. The sounds of her own inner fears seemed to come from a distance as the lure of Octagon House grew stronger. Once or twice she tried to shake the eerie sensation like a dog shaking water from its fur, but it clung.

Her pace slowed. One step at a time, she moved up the hill. And the farther she went, the more trancelike her state became. She could barely feel the pavement beneath her feet now. And her eyes picked out the flat, tar-coated octagonal roof in the distance and fixed themselves on it, on the way the blackness shimmered in the early autumn heat.

She barely registered the cries at first. Terrified screams gradually penetrated, and then the rumble of tires on rough pavement, moving at high speed, and the blast of a horn.

The screaming had form. Words. And it took a second for their meaning and the urgency in their tone to penetrate her fogged mind.

“Look out! I can’t stop! Get out of the way!”

She was jolted out of her spell. And as if released, her gaze sprang away from the heat shimmers emanating from the black roof and widened at the danger right in front of her. The car swerved crazily, barreling down the steep incline, its nose seemingly aimed right at her midsection.

She made a move as if to lunge out of the way, knowing already that it was too late. There wasn’t even time to scream.

And then something hit her, but it wasn’t the car. Just as big from the feel of it, though.

Like a torpedo launched from the opposite side of the road, a body flew into her, taking her with it into the ditch at her left. Somehow the projectile she’d boarded turned as it flew, landing hard on the ground beneath her, cushioning her fall. She felt the heat of the car as it careened past, heard the impact of it hitting something farther along the road, then the long, lonely sound of the horn.

There were voices, shouts. Feet pounding over pavement. Annie shook herself, automatically encircling her belly with both arms, her first thought for the baby. But there were arms already there. Big, strong arms, that held her gently from behind and beneath her. And there was a hard body stretching the length of her back, and a breathless whisper, close to her ear.

“Are you hurt?”

She didn’t turn. She couldn’t, the way he held her. “I… no.”

“And the baby? It’s all right, you’re sure?” As he spoke, one of his palms flattened against her abdomen. Right on cue, the baby kicked, hard and furiously. And there was soft laughter in her ears, bathing her neck.

Laughter so familiar she choked on a sudden rush of tears. Oh, God, it still hurt so much to hear that laugh. It would be so good, so damned good if he really were Richard.

This delusion—or whatever it was—was looking better all the time. Maybe she ought to stop fighting it. God, if these arms around her could only be his. That breath in her ear…

A sob broke from her chest. She couldn’t stop it. Another followed, and then another. Tears flash-flooded her face. She cried so hard, she shook with it. Because it seemed very much as if her husband were holding her to him right now.

Gently, still protecting her bulging middle, he moved her off him. Annie covered her face with her hands, embarrassed and shaken. Terrified to look up and see Richard’s face on a stranger. Terrified that she wouldn’t.

She sat on the ground, legs folded to one side, face hidden, and fought to control her tears.

Strong hands grasped her shoulders, kneaded them. “What is it? You’re hurt after all, aren’t you?”

“No,” she managed between sobs. She knuckled the tears from her eyes and drew a shaky breath, head bowed.

He eased her to her feet, still holding her, treating her as gently as if she were made of porcelain.

“I’m all right now,” she assured him. “Really.” She told herself it was true. She was all right. She could get through this just fine.

There was no more running away. It was time to face this thing. Time to see the truth. She blinked several times and tested her vision by counting her own fingers. Then, drawing a deep breath, she lifted her head and blinked the tear haze from her eyes. She would look at him. She would see that he wasn’t Richard. She’d see the dark-haired stranger, maybe, or someone she knew, but not Richard. She turned her head and looked at him.

Her jaw fell, and she blinked faster.

“Oh my God.”
She didn’t run from him this time. She couldn’t. He was too real. And she had to be sure…

With shaking hands, she touched his face. It didn’t alter or vanish as she half expected it would. It was real.
It felt
real and familiar and wonderful. Her fingers dived into his golden hair, felt its texture. And the tears flooded her eyes, blurring her vision, and she pressed her lips to that beloved face again and again, muttering his name and a hundred other things, until the words and the kisses tangled in one another and tripped in their haste to reach him. She felt his body tremble, felt his arms close gently around her, saw his eyes flash as they met hers. And then she just nestled herself against him, let him hold her, buried her face in the fabric of his shirt. He even
swelled

like Richard. She’d be content to stay wrapped in these strong arms forever.

The way he felt when she pressed those tear-soaked, salty kisses to his face was beyond his understanding. Something rushed through him. Something more than the adrenaline surge he felt in the heat of disputes or battles, or the satisfaction he felt when a mission was complete. It was like… joy. Only stronger. Wilder. More fierce and intense and urgent than that. And his arms went around her without his consent, though if he’d given the act any thought, he wouldn’t have resisted. He
wanted
to hold the small, beautiful, tortured woman. He’d wanted to hold her for some time now. To take away her anguish. To absorb it into himself if necessary—anything to ease her pain.

As soon as he closed his arms around her, she relaxed against him and his heart leaped in reaction to the way she felt there. Boneless. Shivering. Clinging to him as if she’d sink to the ground without his support. And the thought came to him that perhaps she was hurt after all. Automatically he scooped her up, surprised again at how light she felt. And he carried her easily, even while battling the eerie sense that he’d done so before. And no, not on that rainy night when he’d first seen her, but even before then. There was something so very familiar about the way her head rested against his shoulder, the touch of her hair on his neck, and the scent of that hair. There was something familiar about wanting to protect her. To take away her pain. Her soft breaths on his skin tickled a memory to life, but it was buried too deeply to identify.

She didn’t speak to him. Just pressed her face into the crook of his neck and dampened his skin with her tears. He made his way back down the narrow road, past the school building. That was where he’d imagined she was going when he’d realized that she had left the house. And when he’d caught up to her, seen her apparent rush, he’d thought something urgent there must need her attention.

But the urgency in her step had eased at the base of this hill, and she’d gone on slowly, almost mechanically. Why had she wandered farther? What had drawn her into a brush with death?

He glanced over his shoulder at the steeply rising road behind him, but saw no one. And he dismissed his curiosity in favor of more immediate matters as he approached the wrecked car, its nose embracing a telephone pole. A woman babbled all but incoherently to the emergency people on the scene. Luckily for everyone involved, the volunteer fire department was practically within shouting distance.

The woman driver looked unharmed. Thankfully the paramedics could devote their attention to the one in his arms. The delicate beauty who called herself Annie, and who’d somehow become precious to him. At the touch of her hands, he’d been enchanted. It was like magic. Protecting her, seeing her safe at any cost, had suddenly taken as on as much importance to him as protecting the child she carried. But protecting the child was his mission. He wasn’t supposed to care for the mother.

She stirred in his arms, and as he lowered his gaze to her face, he saw her wide emerald eyes staring up at him as if she were seeing a miracle. Tears filled those huge round gems to brimming and spilled over. Slowly, like glycerin, they slid down her cheeks.

He stopped walking, shocked into immobility by the sight of those tears and the look in her eyes. They bathed him with emotions, those green eyes. They caught him and held him, and he couldn’t move in the force of their grasp. There was a power emanating from those eyes. Something stronger than Sir George’s magic, more binding than his own vows. It gripped him by the heart and held tight, shaking him right to the core.