by Anna Durand
Grace glanced back at the creep. Her heart thudded.
Him. The shadow man.
No, it couldn't be.
She checked again. Him. Definitely.
"Don't look at me," he said.
His voice was deep, soft, and … familiar. Ridiculous. This entire situation was ridiculous. Men could not appear out of and disappear into thin air. Either she was insane or at this moment she was lying in a coma at a hospital somewhere, suffering bizarre and disturbing dreams.
"Why are you acting this way?" he demanded, though his tone stayed calm.
Her instincts urged silence. Never knew what might set off a stalker. "Hello" might be the word that triggered a killing spree that started with her. She had no desire to get her throat slashed today. Tomorrow, maybe.
He let out a sharp sigh. "I know you can see me."
Of course she could see him. Everyone could.
Right?
"Say something, dammit," he hissed, the nonchalance vaporizing.
Now her hallucinations cursed at her. Jeez, her mental state must've deteriorated at lightning speed for her mind to create visions that swore at her. Or perhaps this was her mind's way of dealing with anger at herself. She could take a little verbal abuse from her own psyche. Except this didn't feel like a hallucination.
Well, did hallucinations ever feel like hallucinations?
She fixed her gaze on the bottom of the escalator. Almost there.
"Fine, don't talk," the man said. He leaned over her shoulder to murmur in her ear. "Just listen. You have to be careful. They're after you."
"Leave me alone or I'll scream," she said in an equally soft voice, and instantly regretted speaking.
But she couldn't help it. The guy was ticking her off. Hallucination or not, he needed a serious dressing-down.
"Someone has to warn you," he said.
"That's novel. A stalker warning his victim."
Each time he spoke, with his lips so close to her ear, his breath whispered across her skin and sent a shiver rippling down her spine — an oddly stimulating shiver that didn't feel like fear.
She ought to move down another step. Her muscles refused to obey.
He sighed. The warmth of his exhalation set off a flurry of goose bumps.
"I'm not a stalker," he said.
She laughed. The tone echoed hollow and stark in her ears.
"They're coming for you," he said. "Be careful."
She twisted her torso to face him. "If I hear the word 'them' one more time — "
"Sh." He tilted his head, apparently concentrating on a sound only he heard. "I have to go."
"Wait."
He vanished.
A blast of air tossed her hair into her face. She brushed the locks aside. He had disappeared, like a light winking off, gone faster than the speed of a spinning atom.
During the course of their conversation, something inside her had changed inexplicably. The notion of a shadow man no longer bothered her, she realized. He disappeared at will. Couldn't everybody? Maybe not everybody vanished, but in a bizarre way she accepted that this man, whoever he was, possessed that ability. It seemed perfectly natural.
Shit.
The notion did make sense if he was, after all, nothing but a hallucination. A part of her believed that, but another part believed he existed as a real person, made of flesh and blood and bone. The split in her psyche gave her a stomachache.
And the start of another migraine.
She stepped off the escalator. People meandered through the concourse, chatting back and forth, window-shopping, oblivious of the supernatural happenings around them. No one had seen the man on the escalator. No one else could see him. Her mystery man acted unsurprised that she could see him even when no one else could. She avoided wondering why.
But she'd felt his breath on her. Warm. Tantalizing.
If no one else could see him, how in blazes could she feel him?
The concourse split around a fountain, dividing into three walkways. Grace chose one at random and picked up her pace. She wanted to hide, anywhere, get out of sight where no one would find her. When she was little, she used to hide up in the branches of an old oak tree in the backyard of her family's home. She found safety in that tree. Camouflaged by the leaves, alone with her thoughts, she sat cocooned in a blanket of greenery. The perfume of the flowering bushes below calmed her nerves.
In a mall, she was hardly likely to find an oak tree.
Ahead, a department store entrance gaped wide as a dragon's mouth. She hurried through the entrance, past rows of sofas and dining room sets, through the electronics department, up the escalator to the second floor. She pushed through aisles of clothing. A saleswoman thrust a bottle of makeup in her face while blathering on about its benefits for her skin. Shaking her head, Grace rushed past the woman.
A row of fitting rooms lined the far wall. A retail version of caves. Better than a tree. She veered toward the fitting rooms.
A cashier observed her. The girl canted her head in a cat-like expression of curiosity.
Grace halted. She couldn't jump into a fitting room to hide. The cashier would get suspicious, and probably assume Grace was shoplifting. She needed an excuse.
Her hands trembled. Her face tingled. Calm down, she admonished herself. Squeezing her hands into fists, she took a deep breath.
The cashier stared at her. The curious expression tightened into concern.
Grace relaxed her hands. With as much composure as she could muster, she strolled between two racks of blouses. She pretended to examine the seam on one blouse. Glancing sideways, she watched the cashier turn away to pick up a stack of jeans. The girl carried the garments to a group of display shelves, where she began to refold and stack the garments.
Grace snatched two blouses off the rack. She took them into the first fitting room. After pulling the curtain closed, she hung the blouses on the provided hooks and collapsed onto the bench. She drew her knees up, wrapping her arms around them.
Her life had flipped upside-down and rolled sideways. She might believe she'd lost her mind, except for a few pieces of evidence to the contrary. First, there was the sincerity of Brian Kellogg. He said someone murdered her grandfather and swore that he had proof, which he would give her when she contacted him at his motel. Her main reason for thinking she might've cracked up was the shadow man. Yet a real, physical force warped her bedroom door. She didn't imagine that event. The cut on her hand had been real too, as evidenced by the blood on the bandage.
Something was happening. She must find out what.
She ought to see Brian Kellogg. Find out what he knew. If the whole thing was a trick to lure her into his motel room for a Rohypnol cocktail, she'd castrate him. She'd had enough lies and evasion.
As she rested her forehead on her knees, the smell of clean denim filled her nostrils. She would interrogate Kellogg tomorrow. Right now, she needed a rest. Oh lord. She really, really needed a rest.
Her eyelids fluttered shut. One by one, her muscles slackened. The murmur of the ventilation system lulled her into a kind of trance, where all thoughts and worries slipped from her mind. A glorious peace settled over her.
The curtain fluttered.
She raised her head.
He stood before her, inside the tiny booth, his body inches from hers.
She sprang to her feet.
The toes of her shoes bumped into the toes of his. Her bosom grazed his chest. She found herself literally face to face with the man, though she was several inches shorter than he was. Her nose brushed across his chin as she wobbled on her feet. He bent his head to look down at her. She tilted her head back to meet his gaze.
He looked like an angel. A tall, muscular angel.
She couldn't move. His eyes, with those dark pupils ringed in shimmering sapphire, mesmer
ized her. The irises glowed like nothing she'd ever seen before. Without meaning to, but unable to stop herself, she leaned against him. The heat of his body radiated into her. His gaze held hers as he lifted his arms to cradle her in them. Everything inside her tensed. The sensation was not entirely unpleasant, but tinged with a need she didn't understand. A desire to stay close to him. To take comfort from his presence.
He spoke softly. "I'm not leaving until you hear me out."
"I'm listening," she said, unsure of how she managed to speak.
"You're in danger. Very nasty people want something they think you have."
"I have nothing. Unless they want my bad credit."
"They want a flash drive."
She furrowed her brow. "What?"
"A flash drive, a kind of external memory card that plugs into a computer. Edward left it for you."
Brian Kellogg had mentioned an unspecified thing that her grandfather supposedly left for her. Now this man, whoever he was, mentioned a flash drive.
She pushed away from him. The spell had broken. That delicious tension evaporated the instant she severed their physical contact. She felt a pang of disappointment, as if she'd just given up something that she wanted very badly. But what?
He reached for her, trying to wrap her in his arms once again. The tension rose inside her.
Oh hell no. She did not want this. Whatever this was.
She slapped both hands on his chest and shoved him backward. He stumbled, bumped into the wall, and then righted himself. His mouth quirked with what looked like annoyance.
He was annoyed? Screw that.
She folded her arms over her chest. "I know what a flash drive is, but I don't have one. My grandfather left me nothing."
Except a cryptic phone message that sounded like a warning. Of what, she didn't know. Maybe he knew this man would come for her.
"He must've hidden it," her stalker said. "Someplace where only you would find it. Whatever you do, don't give it to anyone. Destroy it."
"Yes, sir. Any other orders, commander?"
The hint of a smile flickered on his face. He raised a hand to touch her cheek with one finger.
She jerked backward. Her legs hit the bench, buckling her knees. She threw her arms back to catch herself but her hands slipped.
He grasped her arms, steadying her. "Careful."
His hands felt warm, the skin surprisingly soft. He was too close again. Much too close. She felt the heat of him on her skin, smelled his masculine scent —
She shook off his hands. "Who are you?"
"Listen to me," he said, pulling her closer. "Don't trust anyone. You have no idea how badly these people want that flash drive."
Her heart pounded. Indefinable feelings coursed through her body like electrical currents.
"Destroy the flash drive," he said. "It's the only way."
He held still for a moment. His fingers encircled her arms in a firm-yet-gentle grasp. His eyes locked on hers. She sensed a familiarity in his gaze, akin to a half-remembered dream. Her lips parted as her brain fumbled for words.
Without a word, he released her.
And then he vanished.
The old Pontiac got her home, that much Grace knew, though the details of the drive blurred into one big slab of missing time. They called it highway hypnosis. She remembered reading the term in a magazine or newspaper. Her mind shifted into automatic pilot, operating her muscles without her awareness of the actions. That was how she arrived home with no memory of the trip.
It was creepy.
She wanted to hide. She needed answers. No one vanished at will. No one vanished, period. She took physics in college and understood the laws of nature. A mass didn't go poof without releasing some kind of energy.
The gusts of wind.
Was a gust of wind enough to account for the energy of a vanishing human being? Damned if she knew. And she'd bet even the top scientists in the world would be damned if they knew.
They'd call her nuts anyway.
Slamming the car door behind her, she scuffled across the driveway and down the concrete path to the front door. As she slipped inside the house, easing the door shut after her, the old weariness seeped into her body once more. She wanted to sleep until everyone and everything she knew crumbled into dust and a fresh, sane world sprouted from the remains.
A new world without inexplicable phenomena. A place where she might actually feel normal and competent, both in mind and in real life. As she turned the corner into the hallway, she avoided glancing into the kitchen. If the shadow man awaited her there, she did not want to know about it. Her brain needed rest, not vague warnings of impending peril delivered to her by an anonymous stranger.
An attractive anonymous stranger.
The memory of his scent filled her nostrils. Her skin tingled as if his warmth still kissed her flesh. From deep inside her soul arose a sense of familiarity, of memories long forgotten, of things she ought to recall but that stayed buried inside her. Each time she saw the shadow man, she experienced this sensation of knowing but not remembering. She knew him. Yet he was a stranger.
She did not know him. Her life was an open book, of the boring variety that no one wanted to read unless they were stuck in a dentist's office and her life was the only reading material available in the waiting room. The tale of her life, at least thus far, excluded all adventure and risk-taking — and certainly all romance. She never met a man like her possibly hallucinatory stalker.
Except she might have. Her Swiss-cheese brain left big enough holes to fit even a tall, muscular man.
Down the hallway she trotted, ducking through the open bedroom door. Without thinking about it, she kicked the door shut behind her. The latch refused to engage, thanks to its warped center, the aftereffect of the inexplicable change in air pressure last night. The door creaked inward.
Grace grabbed the chair that sat by the window and dragged it toward the door. She jammed the chair under the knob to brace the door shut. No barricade would keep out the shadow man. She knew that. He appeared anytime he liked, wherever he liked, regardless of privacy or courtesy. Perhaps the barricade might keep out "them," whoever they might be, or at least slow them down to give her time for a prayer before they sliced-and-diced her.
Tired. She was so tired.
Crawling into bed, she settled onto her side with her knees drawn up close to her belly. Within minutes, sleep overwhelmed her. She dreamed of the faceless man. In a voice both inhuman and intimate, he urged her to stop fighting, to give in, to let him have what he wanted. She had no clue what that thing was, but she knew he wanted it. His need infected her, hot and dark and cloying.
Give in, give up.
More than anything, she wanted to obey the command. She wanted to give herself over to him, because that would be so much easier. So much simpler. Sink into the depths of his need, and lose herself in the scalding darkness.
Give in.
Grace twitched awake. Her heart hammered against her rib cage. She glanced around the room, certain she was not alone. Yet she was. It had been a dream, nothing more. Dreams could seem so real, but they weren't. She couldn't keep fighting the shadows in her dreams. She lacked both the time and the energy for it. She needed all her strength to battle the real shadows that lurked outside. She must insulate herself from them.
She sat up. Them. Who? Her head ached from thinking about it.
The bedside clock gave the time as four in the morning. She flopped back onto the bed.
For the next three hours, she slept in fits and starts. The dream returned each time she dozed, the same as before, like a movie played over and over and over. The man's voice echoed through her mind, low and distant.
Give up. You want to.
Like hell.
If they wanted her to give up and give in, they'd get a serious shock.
She would not abandon herself to insanity or collapse on the floor in a shivering, weeping lump. She would fight — until the invisible forces were defeated.
Or until she was defeated.
One way or another, this craziness would end.
Chapter Eight
Her boots made a soft clopping sound on the pavement as Grace marched down the sidewalk. Yesterday, she'd walked with slumped shoulders and bowed head. Today, she held herself straight and tall, or at least as tall as she could get, being of average height. Something inside her had shifted. Doubts still niggled at her, but much less insistently than before.
At four o'clock this morning, she experienced a revelation. She was not insane.
Despite sleeping less than well, she felt energized. She had a mission. Find Brian Kellogg, see the evidence he claimed to have, and evaluate his claims about her grandfather's death. If the claim proved credible, she'd follow wherever the evidence led her.
Okay, so she had a mission but no plan. A mission was a starting point.
Which was far more than she had yesterday.
As for the shadow man who cornered her in a fitting room yesterday … well, she'd sort that out later. At least today she had a destination.
The Bed & Bath Inn.
It was the cheapest motel in the vicinity of Lassiter Falls, situated along the interstate to take advantage of exhausted motorists. Though Grace had never patronized the establishment, from the outside it looked like a dingy, beat-up building divided into tiny rooms.
A chill shimmied down her spine.
Grace stopped. The sensation of being watched lingered, though the chill had dissipated. She twisted her head around to glance over her shoulder.
No one there.
She had wanted to drive to the motel. Then she realized she'd forgotten to gas up the car yesterday and it probably didn't have the juice to make it the ten miles or so to the interstate. The migraine had impaired her thinking, or maybe her encounter with the shadow man left her dazed. She intended to stop at a gas station on the way home. She forgot.
So this morning she found herself walking to the nearest bus stop.