“Hi,” he said, his voice still thick from sleep.
“I woke you up, didn’t I?” she asked.
“It’s okay,” he said. “You wanna come in?”
Whitney hesitated a minute, biting her bottom lip. Then she nodded. He moved away from the door and she walked in. She stood in the middle of his room, still hugging herself, looking around.
“Are you okay?” asked Tim.
Whitney laughed, but it was a wild, high laugh—embarrassed but nervous at the same time. “I had a dream,” she said. “It was really... It was a nightmare. And now—” She rolled her eyes self-consciously— “I’m really freaked out.”
Tim nodded. “I had a bad dream too.”
“You seem okay,” said Whitney.
“I don’t really remember it,” said Tim. “What was yours about?”
Whitney shook her head. “It was—I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay,” said Tim. Ever since she’d appeared in his doorway, he’d been fighting the urge to go to her and comfort her. It seemed inappropriate for him to want to gather her in his arms. He’d never noticed how small she seemed. How narrow her shoulders were. Instead, he jammed his hands into the pockets of his pajama pants, realizing that he wasn’t wearing anything else. Should he put on a shirt?
Whitney bit her lip again and began looking at different parts of the room. Looking everywhere but at Tim, it seemed.
“What can I do?” he finally asked.
Whitney shrugged, half-laughing again. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know why I even came over here. This is stupid. I should just go back to my room.”
“No,” said Tim. “You need to calm down. We can sit down and talk for a while, just until you feel better.”
“I’m embarrassed,” said Whitney.
“Let’s just sit down,” said Tim. He glanced around the room. There was one easy chair in the corner. No other seats. Except, well, the bed. Whatever. They were adults. He motioned to his bed. “Sit down,” he said.
Whitney sat down. He sat beside her. He hesitated for a minute, then he put his arm around her. He was afraid she’d stiffen or pull away, but instead she lay her head on his shoulder. He pulled her a little tighter against him. She sighed. She was small. Much smaller than he’d thought. And this was nice. He hadn’t been this close to a woman in quite a long time. He looked down at Whitney, and she moved her head so that she was looking back at him. They looked into each other’s eyes. He smiled at her. Reached out and brushed her hair away from her face.
“Kiss me,” Whitney whispered.
And he did.
The first kiss was soft and tentative. Their lips barely brushed. The next kiss was bolder. With the next kiss, they opened their mouths, exploring each other’s mouths with their tongues. Whitney put her hands on his bare chest. They twisted so that they were facing each other. Whitney wrapped her legs around his torso and then they were really kissing. He held her as close as he could, crushing their bodies against each other. Whitney tangled one of her hands in his hair. The other stroked his back.
Tim liked the kissing. It was fierce and bright and it made things stir within him that had been sleeping for far too long. It could have gone on forever, and he would have been quite happy. But Whitney seemed to have other ideas. She pushed him back on the bed and straddled him. Then she reached inside his pajamas and wrapped her hand around him, squeezing him and rocking her hand back and forth. And that...that was more than nice. That was excellent. Tim closed his eyes, but he reached for her at the same time. He slid his hand up her thigh, under her nightgown. She didn’t seem to be wearing anything underneath it. And her skin was so soft.
She leaned down to kiss him. His hands went higher beneath her gown and he discovered the soft roundness of her breasts. Whitney moaned. He kept his hands there, teasing her nipples stiff. Her hands were still inside his pants, and he could hardly think because everything felt so good.
Whitney pulled her nightgown over her head. He took a second to take her in, above him, beautiful and womanly and curvy and amazing. Then he wriggled out of his pajamas.
Whitney moved her hips against him and somehow, magically, he was inside her. He groaned. “Should we—?” he started, meaning to ask about protection, but Whitney started to grind against him, and he couldn’t think anymore. It felt so wonderful, it blotted out his brain. He was so lost in sensation, he only half-heard the words Whitney moaned as she moved against him, and he didn’t react to them. But somewhere deep in mind he registered that Whitney had just said someone’s name, and it wasn’t his. It was Shane’s.
* * *
Whitney snuggled into the crook of Tim’s shoulder, listening to his steady, sleeping breath. It was annoying that men could always go right to sleep after sex. She, however, lay awake, unable to shake the images of her nightmare from her brain. Even this close to Tim, fear licked at her spine.
She hated being afraid. Sex had blotted it out momentarily, had given her something else to concentrate on. But now it was back and strong. She shifted her position on the bed so that she was lying on her back. She hoped the feeling of the bed behind her, its weight and solidness would help her feel safer. Nothing could get to her from the bed. But she realized it was irrational. First of all, there was nothing out to get her. But if there were, oh, if there were, which she knew there weren’t, being able to see it wouldn’t stop it. Whitney couldn’t protect herself against someone if he were trying to kill her. Still, sleeping on her back sometimes helped. Made her feel safer.
Didn’t seem to be working this time. She couldn’t stop thinking about her dream. She remembered it so clearly. In her dream, she’d been having an argument with Ryan about the Shane Adams article. And Ryan had been telling her, like he always did, that writing about Shane Adams was going to get her in trouble. “Leave it alone,” he’d screamed at her. “Leave it alone, Whitney, for God’s sake! I don’t want to lose you!”
She’d run from him, drink in hand, slamming the door to her office. Inside her office, it was filled with smoke, but this didn’t seem to bother Whitney. She noticed it. It seemed normal in the dream. What also seemed normal was the huge man sitting in her office chair. He was composed entirely of dark swirling smoke, and he reached out for her when she walked into the office, engulfing her in black, sooty smoke. Whitney breathed it. It made her eyes water, but she didn’t seem to mind. The smoke man pulled her onto his lap, stroked her cheek, her breasts. He peered at her with glowing eyes. He laughed. Whitney snuggled against him in the dream, even though part of her felt utterly horrified by him. In the dream, he just seemed a normal part of her life. “Whitney, Whitney, Whitney,” he murmured, pouring smoke into her face as he spoke, stroking her. “Mine, mine, mine.”
She wasn’t sure why the dream bothered her as much as it did. It was something about the way the smoke man said mine, she thought. So possessive. So ominous. She knew there was no way to fight him. In some way, in this dream, she did belong to the dark, dark man. He had marked her. Claimed her. And part of her knew it. Knew it now, even though she was awake. She didn’t like the man. He made her feel frightened and disturbed. But he was right. She was his. She belonged to him.
Whitney touched Tim, holding onto him. Wanting to wake him up. Wanting him to anchor her to reality, to chase away these fears. Wanting him to make everything better. Tim stirred. Rolled onto his side and wrapped his arms around her.
Ryan had been right, hadn’t he? Wasn’t she unhealthily obsessed with Shane Adams? Hadn’t she destroyed anything good in her life to get close to him? Now she was here, in Shane Adams house. He was sleeping over her. And what price had she paid to get here? What price was she going to pay? She suddenly had the urge to call Ryan, to ask him what he’d meant when he’d warned her off. What had he known? What had all that business about auras and doom really meant? But her phone was in her bedroom, and she was lying naked next to Tim. And anyway, she was pretty sure Ryan didn’t want to talk to
her.
She needed to go to sleep. Why was she too afraid to sleep? She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to relax.
Something stirred between her legs. Tim? But no. Because Tim’s hands were on her torso. Both of them. But something was definitely moving the sheets between her legs, stroking the inside of her thighs.
She jumped. Ouch! Whatever it was, it burned.
Whitney thrust aside the covers, looked down her body, and screamed.
Next to her, Tim didn’t stir.
There was a black ashy hand between her legs. It had burnt a hole up through the bed. She could see the charred outline on the bottom sheet. Tendrils of smoke rose from the hand. Gently, it caressed her thigh, inches from her outer labia. It grazed her pubic hair. She heard it sizzle. The air smelled like burning hair.
Whitney tried to scramble back, away from the hand, but it grasped her thigh and held her in place. The hand burned into the soft flesh of her thigh. She screamed again. Still no response from Tim.
Another hand scalded its way through the bed’s mattress. The first hand held her fast, searing into her, down to the bone of her leg. The other hand slid one of its fingers between her labia.
Whitney writhed in agony. The air now smelled like burnt hair and burnt flesh and the finger was stroking the tender skin of her sex, sizzling away her clitoris and then plunging inside of her.
Whitney was sobbing from pain and fear. “Stop, stop, stop!” she screamed.
From beneath the bed, a deep voice whispered back, “Mine, mine, mine.”
And another finger slid inside her.
Whitney tried to struggle, tried to pull back, but every time she moved, it made the pain worse.
The fingers probed, burning away her insides, making room for themselves. They reached deeper and deeper into her, clearing her vagina, moving into her womb. She felt a burning fist and arm reaching inside her, searching, grasping.
She screamed and screamed in agony. But Tim didn’t seem to hear her. No one seemed to hear her.
* * *
Something was crawling on Tim’s chest. He blinked, stirring in bed, morning sunlight streaming between the curtains onto his body. He squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again. It was a rat. Tim sat up, throwing the rat off of him. What the hell? Shane Adams had a rodent problem? No. That was right. Shane Adams had pet rats. Dammit. How had this one gotten into his room?
Tim wasn’t a squeamish person, but he also wasn’t very fond of rats. He didn’t know what he should do. He didn’t particularly want to pick the rat up. However, he supposed it was a domesticated rat. It was used to living with people. It shouldn’t bite him or have any diseases or be dirty. He stared at the rat, which was now sitting on the edge of the bed, gazing up at him. Gingerly, he reached down and picked the rat up. The rat curled into his hand, seemingly content. Okay, then. He’d have to go take this rat to Shane. Except...he wasn’t wearing any clothes. He’d have to get dressed.
Wait. Where was Whitney? He guessed she must have gone back to her room. He set the rat back down, hurriedly threw on some clothing, picked it back up again, and went to her room. The door was open. He peered inside. Whitney wasn’t in there. So she must already be up and about. He wondered if the previous night’s activities had been a bad idea. Maybe Whitney regretted it. Why else would she have left the room? On the other hand, maybe she’d just been awake and hadn’t wanted to bother him.
He started down the hall towards the foyer. He didn’t know if he should take the rat to Shane’s bedroom. If Shane were sleeping, he probably shouldn’t disturb him. But when he arrived at the foyer, Lark, Chris, and Shane were all there, staring out the windows.
Shane looked up as he approached. Tim held out the rat. “This was in my bedroom,” he said.
“Another new rat?” Shane asked.
“New?” said Tim.
“Fuck,” said Shane. He took the rat from Tim. “Because I played last night? In my house?”
Lark glared at Shane. “How can you tell if that’s a new rat, anyway?”
“I can tell,” he said.
Why were they all looking out the window? And what did Shane mean it was a new rat? And where was Whitney?
Tim decided to look out the window himself. When he did, he saw that the lawn in front of Shane Adams’ house was filled with vans and tents and kids wearing black. They had put up signs that read things like, “Come Back, Shane!” and “Don’t Stop Playing!” He moved away from the window.
“Yeah,” said Shane. “They followed me. Like they always do. Because I’m the goddamned Pied fucking Piper.”
Interesting comparison. Tim raised his eyebrows. He didn’t want to admit that he’d had a compulsion to follow Shane himself. Had acted on it too.
“I keep saying we should just call the police,” said Chris. “This is private property. They can’t be here.”
“You can’t arrest them,” said Lark.
“Which is what she keeps saying,” said Chris.
“Well, you can’t. They just came because they want Shane to play again,” Lark said.
Shane held up the rat. “Clearly, that’s out of the question.”
What did the rat have to do with anything?
“God, Shane, one of your rats got out!” Lark said. “It’s not a new rat.”
“It’s a new rat,” said Shane. “Someone’s dead.”
“Can we stop talking about this and focus on the Entourage on your front yard?” said Chris.
“Maybe,” said Tim, “if you promised them to come back for another tour at a later date, they’d all leave.”
“That’s just it,” said Shane. “No more tours. No more music. I’m done.”
“Yeah,” said Tim, “but they don’t know that.”
“I’m not going to lie,” said Shane.
“Why aren’t you going to play anymore anyway?” Tim asked. Did it have something to do with Lark? Tim was pretty sure it did. That girl could destroy any man. She was already at work on Shane, ripping him to shreds. He glared at her. “Did you have something to do with it?”
Lark shook her head. “Why are you here, anyway? What do you want?”
Shane put his hand on Lark’s shoulder. “Do you know this guy, Lark? You’ve been acting weird since he got here,” Shane said, looking at Tim pointedly.
“It’s...” Lark sighed. “Tim is Jimmy’s brother.”
“Really?” said Shane, and he stiffened beside Lark. He looked at Tim, confusion and anger in his eyes. “What are you doing here?” he asked.
Tim wished she’d kept her mouth shut. And he was curious about Shane’s reaction. Clearly, Shane knew about Jimmy. But what did he think about Jimmy? Had Lark told Shane a pack of lies about Jimmy? What had she said? “I came because I couldn’t not come,” he said finally. “Probably the same reason those kids are here.”
“How’d they find the house anyway?” Chris said. Chris seemed anxious to get back to the topic of the Entourage.
Tim thought that was a great idea. “I don’t know. Maybe someone leaked your location to the media or something.”
“No,” said Chris, “because then the media would be here.”
“You’re Jimmy’s brother?” Shane said, bringing them back to the previous topic.
Dammit. Tim didn’t want to talk about this right now. He nodded. “Yes. I know Lark because I remember when she was dating my brother. Right before he committed suicide. But that’s not why I’m here.” Even though it was.
“It just makes me uncomfortable,” said Lark. “I don’t think you like me very much. And I don’t know why.”
This was definitely not something that Tim felt like getting into right now. He wracked his brain, trying to think of something else he could change the subject to. And then it came to him. “Where’s Whitney?” he asked.
“Probably asleep,” said Shane. “Don’t try and change the subject. I want to know why you’re here if you’re Jimmy’s brother. And—” he turned to Lark— “why
didn’t you tell me that Jimmy committed suicide? He’s dead?”
“She’s not asleep,” said Tim, determined to steer the subject back to Whitney, who he was suddenly sincerely worried about. “She’s not in her room. I checked.”
“She was probably in the bathroom or something,” said Shane. “Now back to this Jimmy business.”
Lark looked uncomfortable. “I really don’t like talking about Jimmy, and you know that.”
“But you never said he was dead,” said Shane. “Why did he kill himself?”
“That’s what I’d like to know,” said Tim, watching Lark’s face carefully.
Lark threw up her hands. “He was crazy. At the end, he was just totally crazy. Let’s go find Whitney.”
Chris didn’t look away from the window. “I think we need to call the police.”
“I used to be one of those people!” Lark protested. “We aren’t calling the police.”
“You knew who Lark was before you got here,” Shane said to Tim. “You saw her on TV. So you knew. And you’re telling me that the fact she’s your brother’s ex-girlfriend has nothing to do with why you’re here?”
“Shane, please!” said Lark. “I don’t want to talk about this.”
Which was suspicious, wasn’t it? Why wouldn’t she want to talk about Jimmy?
Shane considered. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s go find Whitney.”
Chris kept staring out the window. “I think I’ll stay here,” he said.
Shane shrugged. He started through the foyer and down the hall towards Whitney’s room. Tim and Lark followed. Shane reached the room first. The door was still open, but he knocked anyway. When there was no answer, he pushed the door open. “She’s not in here,” he said.
“I told you she wasn’t,” said Tim.
“Lark, do you mind checking the bathroom?” Shane asked.
“She’s been in the bathroom all this time?” Tim asked.
“Maybe she’s taking a shower,” said Shane.
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