by Andrea Drew
My fingers grazed his smooth-shaven cheek as his soft lips met mine. The kiss was initially slow and gentle. Then his mouth parted and a spark ignited as his tongue touched mine. I sighed and relaxed, my body melding with his.
The hairs on my arms and neck lifted and warmth spread throughout my body. Connor pulled me closer and he moved away briefly. His eyes, heavy with desire, raked across me greedily. I also craved his touch, needing more of him. My breath quickened and I arched back my head, letting out a sigh as his lips burned across my neck.
“Connor,” I whispered, as he kissed a trail up my neck to just behind my ear. I moved my hands from his arms to his muscular back. Connor seemed chilled out, forgetting about work for a change. I ran my hands across his muscular shoulders.
I drank in the sight of Connor as he pulled his lips away to gaze at me, his swollen wet lips and hooded eyes telling me all I needed to know. He took my hand and gently led me toward the staircase.
As he stepped onto the bottom stair, the phone in his pocket rang loudly. A frown crossed his face.
“Ignore it,” I whispered.
But Connor paused mid stride, hand to his pocket. With a sigh, he retrieved the phone to look at the screen. “Damn. It’s the station. I have to get this, I’m sorry.”
As I watched, he brought the phone to his ear. I couldn’t believe it. I continued up the stairs and flung myself on the bed. Of all the rotten timing.
Connor remained on the stairs, where I could hear the deep rumble of his voice. The stair treads creaked beneath his weight before he appeared leaning against the doorway, face flushed. “I’m sorry.”
“Me, too.” I couldn’t keep the longing out of my voice.
“If I wasn’t in the middle of this damn case, I wouldn’t worry, but…” Connor came to the bed and wrapped his arms around me. He kissed me on the lips— quickly, but still enough to make my pulse race.
“You better get out of here,” I said and turned away.
“I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you, promise.”
I didn’t reply. I heard his footsteps on the stairs and the door closed behind him.
If I thought I had problems getting to sleep before, I didn’t have a hope in hell now.
Chapter Two
Saturday 19th January, 6.21am
You have to stop him, Gypsy.
Net curtains billowed from the open window, the summer night beyond still and silent. Moonlight reflected off the lightly polished floors. The fragrance of lavender wafted in and I took a small step forward.
The bone-colored walls were empty except for a full-length mirror to my left. The room faded as my attention shifted to a wooden cradle in the middle of the floor, which creaked as it rocked, gently at first then building up to a rhythmic sweep.
Yet suddenly there was an unseen presence, unannounced but palpable. The sweet voice of a young girl spoke, echoing inside my head.
−You have to stop him.
This wasn’t making any sense.
−I have to stop who? Who are you? What is this? I have no idea about any of it…
−I’m Isabella. It’s Christie, she’s in danger. He’ll try to kill her.
−What? Who will? What are you talking about?
−She trusts him. She won’t believe he’d ever do it, but he will.
My eyes snapped open. The light streaking through the edge of the blinds, by which I could see the stain in the corner of the ceiling, announced the beginning of another day. With the dream just behind my eyelids, I pushed myself up from the bed and thought about the voice of Isabella.
−That was weird.
So why this dream?
As an occasional telepath, I can tune into other people—usually the dead—pretty well, but never in dreams. Usually it happened as mind flashes or pictures while I was awake. This was a first. I’d always thought psychic mediums that received messages via dreams were just plain weird. Kind of strange coming from a telepath, I know, but there it was.
The last time I’d used my abilities had been a while ago, nearly a year in fact, other than occasional interchanges with Renee when we didn’t want to share our conversation.
After Aaron, Connor’s nephew, had not only tried to kill me in a hit and run but had also broken into my townhouse with the intention of torturing me as part of his screwed up payback plan, he ended up in a Melbourne prison and wouldn’t be getting out for at least ten years. The justice system didn’t take too kindly to cop killings, even if said cop was corrupt, as Connor’s former partner Ian Robson most certainly was. I wondered if Christie visited her brother in jail, which might explain why we weren’t the best of friends.
Connor and I had been together since our blind date. The strong connection we’d made on the fateful evening we met had been forged into something practically unbreakable, reinforced by his rescue of me when I’d needed him most. I loved our uniqueness. A psychic telepath with attitude, a detective with sentinel gifts who denied them, and regular dealings with death, either investigating murders or passing on messages from those that had passed on, meant our relationship was far from ordinary.
I heard the spray surging in the bathroom as Connor started a shower. I sank back into the warmth and security of my bed.
I closed my eyes for what felt like a moment or two but more likely minutes had passed. I sensed movement to my right, a faint rustle. Connor stood beside the bed dressed in a crisp white shirt, his chin up and hands fiddling underneath it as he finished tying a Windsor knot on a dark blue tie.
“Morning, gorgeous,” said Connor, his voice a quiet rumble. A waft of spicy aftershave lingered.
I shuffled onto my right side to face him with a sleepy smile. “Hey, you. Big day, then?” The mattress gave way and crackled as he sat beside me.
“Another murder, possibly drugs related plus the intense Mr. Stinky case.” Connor sighed and tugged at his earlobe. “I have to go, but I wanted to let you know: I invited Christie and Ryan over for dinner tonight.” His gaze, like searchlights, almost burned my face as he gauged my reaction.
“Oh shit!” I bolted upright in bed and flung the covers off. “For god’s sake, Connor, the place is a pigsty and I’ve got a full day of work today.” I stood, running my hands through the bird’s nest that served for bed hair.
“They’re not coming to look at the place. They’re coming for a reading for Christie.” Connor stood at the door; his tight shoulders rose and fell. His edginess didn’t surprise me. Whenever Christie and I were in a room together, the air could be cut with a knife. I needed to get to the bathroom and get rid of the stale taste in my mouth and he was standing in my way.
“A reading? Geez, Connor, I don’t do readings. You know that!” I stomped toward him with the intention of reaching the bathroom. Connor grabbed my wrist lightly.
“Hang on lovely, hear me out.”
I jerked my arm away and he released me.
“Connor, you know what I can do, but I don’t do readings. What, does she think, I just turn on a psychic tap or something? Do you? Why the hell would Christie want a reading from me?” I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, glaring at Connor. Mornings were not the time for bad news.
He ruffled his damp blond hair. “I’ve talked to Ryan about it. We know they’re both skeptics, but Christie is so desperate for comfort, for something, that she’s agreed to see you, and Ryan has finally seen sense, if it will help her. She needs help and has finally agreed to it, sounds like. She wants to get in touch with Rae’s dad…”
As I stomped toward the bathroom door, I snapped over my shoulder. “Great, thanks, Connor. A day of housework, work, and then tonight I get to prepare dinner for your desperate niece and her cynical boyfriend, both of whom are convinced I am a total fruit loop that has bedazzled you with my power. Fan-bloody-tastic.” I slammed the door and turned the shower on. The hot water gushed and steam billowed up, a curtain of mist.
“I’ll cook, promise,” said Connor, his voice muffled through the bat
hroom door.
“Yeah, yeah, okay,” I said, resentment pooling into a reservoir within my chest. Sprucing the house up for unexpected guests, especially Christie, who had tried her best but wasn’t fully successful in containing her resentment, was not my idea of the perfect weekend.
As I soaped my wet hair, I tilted my head back and the smell of jasmine wound its way to my nose. I guess I understood Christie’s resentment to some degree, but it didn’t lessen the sting in its tail. She’d lost both biological parents at the age of twelve, first her father Dan, a cop killed in a courthouse explosion, and then her mother Rae had turned to the bottle for comfort and the house had burned to the ground the night she fell asleep smoking. Her aunt and uncle took Christie and her brother in as young teenagers, and then a couple of years ago Jill and Connor had split. So of course when I came along a year ago she was, well, I suppose ‘reserved’ was the best way of putting it. Then of course, her brother had turned out to be a psychopathic drug-addled stalker with a murderous bent and would spend the next decade in jail. Not much else in her life could go wrong. Overall, she had recovered remarkably well from the cruelty fate had dealt her.
Remorse stung. I realized I was probably too hard on Connor. I loved him intensely, but of course, when my grumpiness reared its irritated head, he was the closest and therefore most logical target. Maybe if I could be there for his niece and help her out, Christie and I could forge something closer, a real connection. I’d asked Connor if he and Christie had ever had the conversation he didn’t want to face, the unspoken, festering secret. He hadn’t told her he suspected he was her father, not her uncle. To be fair, how would anyone bring up something like that? It was simply too much, an ugly box of secrets that once opened could never be closed. Connor had been only eighteen when he’d attempted to console Rae, who was lonely because of her husband’s long hours at work, and it had turned to a fit of passion. Christie was born nine months later. It wasn’t my place to spill the beans, but the secret swelled within me occasionally, desperate to be revealed.
I stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel, rubbing myself dry as quickly as possible. I needed to get dressed, eat, check emails, wrap up any work I had in record time and get stuck into sprucing up the damn living areas for tonight’s farce.
Saturday 19th January, 10.14am
Christie relaxed her head back and gasped as the warm water ran down her body. For just a few minutes, she might be able to switch off the swirling ever-present thoughts. Switch off the pain, the torment, the tears, the constant searching and questioning. Why her grandfather, and why did the good people get taken? He’d been her rock in a sea of confusion. She’d been close to him and although her stepmother Jill had told her that he had terminal cancer nearly eighteen months ago, Christie had always assumed he’d pull through, tough old bugger that he was.
She remembered his strong arms, and how although he was in his seventies he still towered over her, and how a hug always made her feel safe, secure, buffeted for just a moment from the struggles of life.
After his death four months ago, she’d been numb. Somehow, she hadn’t connected her grandpa with death. It hadn’t clicked for her that he was gone. The unstoppable grief arrived in a flood about six weeks later.
When Christie had arrived at the church for his funeral, shuffling in with tentative steps, the hushed sanctity of the church and the sight of friends and family at the front pew had cracked open the dam of grief surging behind dullness. She’d told Connor that she’d like to view her grandfather’s body, to say goodbye with happy memories instead of remembering him hooked up to machines in hospital. However, when the coffin was wheeled toward the altar, she’d splintered and broke, running from the church, face in her hands. It had taken every bit of self-control she had to return and sit calmly in one of the pews, tears streaming down her face.
At times, it didn’t seem so bad; she got through the whole day without cracking up. Others, she was a mess, struggling to keep it together at work. She wondered if the grief would ever dissolve completely. Christie reached up for the conditioner bottle, squeezing and smoothing it across her wet hair. She arched her head back, eyes closed, suds flowing down her head and neck.
An unnatural weight amongst the water cascaded down the back of her head. She snatched at it and brought her hand forward, lifting a clump of gnarled matted hair to eye level. Her eyes rounded and her forehead hit the shower wall.
“No, no,” whispered Christie, her stomach a mesh of nerves and terror as she struggled to stay upright. The wooly snarling wreckage, the gnarled knot of hair, signaled the end. She would end up like Grandpa, hair falling out as he lost his fight with cancer.
She gasped and headed out of the shower, grasping onto the towel rail before her legs buckled beneath her. She slid down the wall, her backside thumping onto the bathroom floor. Christie fell back. The ringing in her ears was so loud, so damn loud. Burying her face in the towel, she fought to get it together. Her pulse was beating hard and fast, and her chest hurt, tight and burning. She had cancer, she knew it. Ray’s hair had fallen out then, why else would hers be falling out now? Oh, god. She took a slow, deep breath and blew it out slowly, willing her heart rate to slow down. Levering herself up along the wall, she snatched the towel and wrapped it back around her body, flicking the clump of hair onto the floor, eyes screwed shut and mouth set in a grimace.
Damn it. The dam broke and warm tears coursed down her face.
Christie yanked open one of the wardrobe doors, crying and swearing quietly. If Ryan were here, he’d help her get herself together. He’d been called in to work again. But maybe that was the problem—she was relying far too much on him. If she didn’t get her shit together, he might start looking elsewhere. Wouldn’t he?
He’d been her rock after her grandfather’s death, his grumpiness giving way to support and caring, but the last few weeks he’d changed. The grumpiness intensified, had a sharper edge. He’d mentioned a serial assault case, Mr. Stinky due to victims reporting the attacker’s vile stench, but she couldn’t be sure if his change in demeanor was due to the ongoing case or a change of heart relationship-wise. She knew she didn’t have her guard up at present, and doubted herself and the loyalty of those she loved more than usual.
She sighed and tugged at a couple of outfits in her wardrobe. She selected a few and threw them onto the bed, then rubbed the towel across her body so hard it hurt.
“Ouch!” she cried out, surprising herself, but the friction provided enough of a jolt to get her arse into gear. She stomped over to the drawers to rip out a set of underwear, sending the contents across the carpet.
She had to calm herself. Then she should ring up to book a doctor’s appointment. She didn’t know what she’d say, or if she could take more bad news. Maybe the day would get better.
Saturday 19th January, 6.29pm
Ryan had thought this would be a good idea, but driving to Connor’s place he revised that decision. Deep in the thick of the so far unsolvable case, he wondered if his reserves of kindness were depleted. Battling traffic to visit a supposed psychic seemed like the last thing either of them needed.
As Ryan drove, Christie looked across at him, searching for a signal, a sign of what he might be feeling. Nothing. Her stomach was empty and her mouth dry. A horn honked behind them, and she gasped with a sharp uptake of the shoulders. Good grief, she was a nervous wreck. It wasn’t just her though; surely Ryan’s hand shook slightly as he unlocked the car door?
She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t told Ryan her hair was falling out. If she said it aloud, he’d think she was, well, flakey, nutty, completely losing the plot. Plus, now wasn’t the right time. Things were too rushed. He arrived home an hour after she did and they had less than half an hour to get themselves changed and back in the car for the short drive to Gypsy’s place.
“I’m nervous as hell.” Christie kept her eyes on Ryan’s profile and saw his cheek muscle tense.
He didn’t take hi
s eyes off the windscreen. “We don’t have to do this, you know. We can change our minds. We have that right, Christie. Let’s just have dinner and leave.”
“No, I want to…well, I want to at least try. I might get to talk to Grandpa again one last time.” Christie twisted her fingers before she looked back up through the windscreen. She’d been surprised when Ryan casually mentioned a possible reading from Gypsy; he was a complete skeptic and had been as long as she remembered. Whenever Gypsy’s name was mentioned, he merely grunted. Hell, Christie wasn’t sure about the woman or her abilities either, but if there was a chance, just a glimmer of hope she could talk to Grandpa even for a few seconds, it could change things for her. She knew it. It just might give her the closure she so desperately sought.
“Okay.” Ryan blew out a long, thin stream of breath as the car stopped. He locked eyes on her. “You ready for this?”
His green eyes were as brilliant as ever. Christie wondered if there would come a time when they would be tired of each other, bored by each other. They’d been together for almost a year now and she loved him as much as she always did, if not more.
“Yeah, I think so.” She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.
The car had pulled up in front of Gypsy’s small apartment in Carlton. Getting out, Christie breathed in the combined smells of summer, a gardenia bush and light rain on warm concrete. Dinner would probably help loosen her up. She closed the car door, making eye contact with Ryan across its roof.
They linked hands and headed up the steps. At Gypsy’s front door, they stood side by side, barely moving.
“Here we go,” said Ryan. The door opened within seconds of the doorbell being rung.
“Christie, Ryan, come in.” Connor’s hair was slightly tousled and freshly dried and his shirt looked like he’d just thrown it on. Obviously, a big night, but then again, to Christie her uncle looked permanently disheveled, constantly rushing from one crisis to another.