Dead By Dusk

by Heather Graham

Page 26

 

  "Lock those windows again!" he called back up.

  A few minutes later, he returned. He looked baffled, but not at all apologetic.

  "Grant, what are you doing?" Stephanie demanded.

  "I saw it come here. "

  "You saw what come here?" She crossed her arms over her chest.

  "A… shadow. "

  He was still frowning and looking around the room. Despite herself, his words created a chill in her.

  A shadow. She could only dimly remember now, but there had been a shadow…

  In the room. There, at the foot of the bed. Where he had been. Except that he hadn't really been there.

  "Let me get this straight. You saw a shadow. At night, in the moonlight. Imagine. And so you raced up my back steps, pounded on the glass as if you needed to wake the dead, and burst in here—to catch the shadow?" she said.

  "There was… someone," he said.

  "Grant, what are you doing?" she whispered, a little desperately. "There's no one in here—as you've seen. "

  "No," he agreed, looking at her. He still seemed so troubled that she couldn't just scream and order him out "There's no one in here. "

  "Okay… is the shadow in here?"

  "Stephanie, I haven't lost my mind. "

  "Right. But the next thing I know, you'll be telling me to wear a cross and buy a gun and fill it with silver bullets, or the like," she said dryly.

  He didn't laugh, or crack so much as a rueful grin.

  "Maybe that wouldn't be such a bad idea," he told her.

  "Oh, Grant, please. I'd be understanding if it were just—finding that girl must have been horrible for you.

  But you started this very strange behavior in Chicago. That's why we split up, remember?"

  "Stephanie, please. I keep telling you that there is something very wrong here. "

  She walked across the room, coming to him. "You saw a shadow. Maybe someone was walking to get to their own place, and walked by mine to get to it. Grant, I'm alone here, and there's nothing wrong. "

  She set a hand on his chest, looking up into his eyes, trying to get him to pay deep and serious attention to her.

  He met her gaze, then shook his head, distracted. He seemed to be listening to something in the night.

  There was nothing to hear.

  He looked back at her again. She saw the vein thundering at his throat. He was as electric and keyed as he had been in her dream. Vital. Heat seemed to emanate from him. She stepped back slightly.

  "Grant, you've got to go. "

  He shook his head.

  "Stephanie, I have to stay. "

  "Grant! We split up because we really needed to. It's not because I hate you—you know I don't. It's not that we weren't good together—we were. But we're what's wrong. Please, Grant, you don't know how hard it was for me… I came here to make it on my own, to get myself together. Then you were here!

  You can't stay. "

  He shook his head impatiently. "Stephanie. " He gripped both her hands, holding them between his. "I don't mean here, right here. I don't mean to crawl in with you to sleep. I don't mean to coerce or trick you back into bed. I just need to stay here. At your doorway. Make sure all the doors are locked, and then just throw me a pillow. "

  She backed away from him.

  "You're crazy. "

  "But I'm not leaving. Scream or call the cops if you feel you really have to. I am not leaving. " He released her, walked by her, and grabbed a pillow off the bed. She watched as he assured himself that the sliding doors had been relocked.

  "This is getting ridiculous. Beyond what I owe you in respect to the past, or out of friendship," she said, walking to her bedside phone. "I am calling the cops," she told him.

  She damned the fact that he knew she wouldn't. With the pillow he had taken from the bed, he walked to the doorway, and just outside. Plumping the pillow behind him, he leaned against the wall.

  She set the phone down and walked to where he stood. "Grant, I am really, really worried about you. "

  "Go to sleep, Steph," he said wearily. He sounded drained. There was no emotion in his voice.

  "Grant! You're going to stay all night, leaned against a wall?"

  "Yes. "

  "Aren't you supposed to be at the dig tomorrow?"

  "Yes. "

  "And then there's the last rehearsal, and a show tomorrow night. "

  "Yes. "

  "But you're going to stay up against a wall all night?"

  "I'll doze off, I'm certain. But at least, I'll be here. "

  She threw up her hands, exasperated. "Fine. Stay there, then. I'm going back to bed. " So, determined, she walked back to the bed, and crawled into it, drawing the covers to her chin. She listened, and waited.

  Grant didn't move.

  And she realized that he really intended to spend the night sitting up against the wall.

  She lay in bed, listening again. The voice of the BBC journalists went on and on.

  Shadows…

  Dreams that were so vivid they seemed real.

  Yes, maybe she should buy a cross.

  Time passed. Grant didn't come near her, but neither did she rest. How could she? He was with her. It wasn't a dream, a sexual fantasy caused by their sudden parting, and her self-enforced deprivation.

  She was certain that he was worried. But… he was crazy worried. In Chicago, he had been distracted.

  He had called out another woman's name.

  That still hurt. Maybe it was the real crux of the matter. Then, tonight, he had said that Lena had come on to him. Lena said she hadn't even seen him.

  She'd be an idiot to get up and go to him. He was with her, he was quiet, he was on guard against whatever danger threatened in his own mind. Leave it lie, leave it lie…

  But thirty minutes later, she was still wide awake.

  She rose, and walked to the hall.

  His eyes were closed, his head against the pillow pressed to the wall. His handsome features were so stressed and riddled with tension that she felt her heart flip.

  "Grant. " She whispered his name.

  His eyes flew open and he jerked bolt upright.

  "I'm sorry!" she murmured, coming down to sit cross-legged before him.

  He exhaled with relief.

  "Do you want some tea… a drink, or something?" she asked softly.

  "Just go to sleep, Stephanie," he said.

  She rose. "I think I'll have a Tia Maria with milk. That could help. "

  He groaned. "All right. I'll have a Tia Maria with you. "

  She went on down the steps. He followed. In the kitchen, she found glasses, milk, and the Tia Maria stuffed into one of the cabinets.

  "I'll take it neat," he told her.

  She nodded, and added milk only to her glass of liqueur.

  She handed him his glass.

  "Grant, I admit that what has happened has been really terrible. You spend your days working on bones.

  Then, today, you found the dead girl. But you have to understand. Something very sad happened—it doesn't mean that we're all in danger. The girl was attacked by animals. "

  The look he gave her was filled with disbelief. "You cannot tell me that you believe that!" he exclaimed.

  "Grant! Doctors did an autopsy," she argued.

  "They're lying," he said simply.

  "Why would they lie?"

  "A cover-up—I don't know. "

  "You said yourself that the body was… ravaged. "

  "She wasn't killed by an animal," he said flatly. "Not by a wolf, not as we know wolves," he muttered.

  "All right—maybe the boyfriend did it. The fiancé. And the community is covering up. That still wouldn't put any of us into a high-risk zone. "

  "Stephanie, if you tell me you haven't felt anything strange since you've been here, I will call you an out-and
-out liar. "

  She hesitated. "We're in a foreign country. We all had some jet lag. The night sky is different, the language on the streets is different… everything is different. "

  Again, he gave her that look. "You know what I'm talking about. "

  "Oh, Grant," she murmured.

  "Stephanie, I'm not asking anything of you," he reminded her.

  She sighed. "Fine. Be crazy. I'm going back to bed. "

  She rinsed her glass and set it in the sink and started back upstairs. She heard him follow, heard him take up his position again.

  And then she couldn't stand it again. She kept seeing flashes of the image she had seen in her dream. It had once seemed so wrong to be together when it seemed that it wasn't what she really wanted, or the way she craved to be needed and loved as well. Tonight…

  He was here.

  He was Grant.

  And if it was only for the night…

  She walked out to the hallway. He was awake this time, and he looked up at her, a brow rising sardonically.

  "Stephanie, you're supposed to feel safe and secure with me out here, and therefore, you should be able to sleep. "

  She didn't answer. She offered him her hand. He took it, eyes narrowing somewhat warily. He rose, towering over her.

  "I can't sleep with you out here," she said.

  "I'm not leaving. "

  "I know. "

  Their eyes met.

  A slow, rueful smile touched his lips. "Stephanie, if you think I can lie on one side of the bed and keep my distance, I'm not sure I can make that kind of a promise. "

  She angled her head to study him, and slowly smiled as well. "I think I might actually be rather insulted if you could make such a promise. "

  She felt his thumb fall against her cheekbone, the pad of it callused, but almost excruciatingly gentle.

  Then she caught his hand.

  "I'm not saying that anything has changed," she told him roughly.

  His hand fell. "Well, then, I'll try not to be too tender. "