by Anna Durand
She continued down the trail. Not like she had a choice. Stand still and die of heat stroke, or follow the directions given by a shadow man and possibly die anyway. At least moving gave her a chance of finding civilization again.
Her stomach growled. Her throat went dry again. A stabbing pain behind her eyes exploded into a headache. The sun dipped behind the trees, shining between the branches, scorching her eyes. The temperature dropped a little, though not enough to make a difference.
The birds silenced. Crickets chirped in the underbrush.
She held the gun in one hand. The feel of metal against her skin did little to calm the creepy feeling building inside her. She disliked the idea of wandering through the woods, alone, after dark. She had no choice. The sun was setting, and she still had no clue where she was.
The sun slid below the horizon. Soon its glow would abandon the earth as well.
The ground collapsed.
Her right leg twisted sideways, wrenching her knee. She threw her hands out for balance and the gun flew from her grasp. She hit the dirt face-first.
Her knee throbbed, a charming accompaniment to her growing migraine. She rolled onto her back. Pain radiated out from her knee. She winced and gasped. In the twilight, she spotted the obstacle that had thwarted her — a pothole.
The air seared her right arm. She touched the skin above the elbow. It was raw and damp with blood. She had a feeling these injuries wouldn't heal themselves overnight. This was no dream, unfortunately.
She had no time for injuries. She was lost in the forest, something she thought only happened in Grimm Brothers stories. She'd explored the woods countless times as a teenager, without getting lost. Back then, she stayed in the areas she knew. She should never have sauntered off into unknown territory. How could she have been so stupid?
Bracing herself against a tree, she tried to stand. Pain ricocheted up her leg. Her knee buckled. Her buttocks hit the ground hard as the back of her head smacked into the tree.
She shouted a curse.
Night settled over the woods like a blanket.
She struggled onto her knees. All the muscles in her leg cramped at once. Her arm scraped against the tree. Pain screamed through her body. Tears welled in her eyes. She blinked them back. No, she would not cry. She would crawl if she must, but she would never concede to the pain.
Of course, now that she really needed a hand, her shadow man had vanished. Typical.
She avoided thinking about the insanity of using the word typical in reference to a man who appeared and disappeared at will, poof, like magic.
A breeze wafted over her. Goose bumps raised on her arms and neck.
She stood, gritting her teeth against the pain. She retrieved her key chain flashlight from her purse and flicked the power switch. A cone of wan yellow light illuminated the trail. The light glinted off the barrel of her gun. When she bent down to pick it up, pain jabbed her knee as if a thousand needles pierced her sinews. She bit back a yelp.
Gun in hand, she straightened. Her hand shook. She couldn't carry the gun. Holstering it inside her purse, she flung the bag over her neck and shoulder. The purse strap cut a diagonal across her torso.
She trudged along the trail, inch by inch, her knee screaming at every movement. The breeze irritated the abrasion on her arm.
The flashlight flickered.
She tapped it. The beam died. She smacked the thing against a tree. The light flashed once and died. Tossing the flashlight into her purse, she trudged onward, testing the ground ahead with her toes, feeling for obstacles with her hands.
After an eternity, she stumbled out of the woods onto a paved road. A double yellow line traced the road's center. It was a highway.
She shuffled to a halt on the shoulder.
Headlights popped into view in the distance as a vehicle topped a hill. As the lights drew near, she heard the grumble of an engine. Though she dreaded hitching a ride, she couldn't walk all the way to town.
The vehicle neared. She waved her arms.
The vehicle, a late-model BMW, pulled up beside her. The driver rolled down the window.
A man, his face obscured by shadows, said, "Need some help?"
The voice. She knew him. She bent over to peer inside the car. Pains shot through her leg in a web of agony. Through gritted teeth, she said, "Henry Winston."
"Imagine running into you out here." He clicked a switch and the door locks popped up with a thunk. "Hop in. I was on my way to your house."
She stepped back. Henry Winston happened to drive down this highway. On this night.
"I live down the road," he said. As his gaze traveled over her bloody sleeve, his expression darkened. "We'd better get you to a hospital."
He ignored the obvious questions — How did you get out here? Why are you standing alongside the road in the dark? Why are you bleeding? — that any normal person would've asked. He'd met her once. He should treat her with suspicion. Yet he studied her with a thoughtful expression that lacked any hint of skepticism, concern for her condition, or even curiosity about her situation.
Winston leaned across the passenger seat to push the door open. "Come on."
"I'm fine. Just getting some exercise."
He scrutinized her through half-closed eyes. "Get in, Grace."
His voice, deeper and calmer than the waters of the Atlantic Ocean, elicited shivers in her belly. She stumbled backward. Her heel caught on the edge of the pavement. She sailed down the slope of the shoulder, landed on her butt, and tumbled backward until her head hit the ground. Her feet flipped up, almost went over her head, but then flopped down again. Her knee screamed. Her head throbbed. Tears trickled from her eyes as she clamped her jaw tight against the pain.
Staring up the slope at the car, she watched Winston slide onto the passenger seat. He swung one leg, then the other, out the open door.
The gun. She reached for her purse. It was wedged under her hip. She pushed up onto her elbows. White-hot pain scorched the raw flesh on her arm. Biting back a cry, she fumbled for the purse's zipper. Her fingers felt big and clumsy. The zipper slipped out of her grasp.
Winston's shoes clapped on the pavement. "Come on, Grace. You need medical attention. Let me help you."
"You killed Edward McLean."
The thought had burst into her mind and so she spoke it. Before now, she'd overlooked Winston as a suspect. As she uttered the words, though, they made a kind of sense.
In one step, he reached her.
She scuttled crab-like away from him, ignoring the pain that ricocheted through her body. The purse. She had to get the purse open. Seizing the bag, she clawed at the zipper. The indirect glow of the headlights stung her eyes. Squinting, she spotted the zipper pull, took it between her thumb and forefinger, and yanked. The zipper opened with a zzzt sound.
Above her at the slope's pinnacle, Winston stood eerily still, backlit by the headlights. The faintly blue glow lent his eyes the luster of faceted onyx.
He thrust a hand toward her. "I won't hurt you."
Yeah right, she thought, and plunged her hand into the purse. Her fingers touched metal. She found the gun's grip, closing her fingers around it.
Winston's hand hovered two feet above and six inches in front of her head. He wiggled his fingers. Even in the moonlight, he was a shadow. A dark wraith. His eyes gleamed, though his face was obscured by the darkness that enveloped him from this side. The light that wreathed him from behind petered out before revealing his front.
A shiver as cold as liquid nitrogen raced through her body. She sat there, tears dribbling down her cheeks. Tears of pain, not defeat. She gripped the gun, keeping it inside her purse for now. He looked unarmed — except for that suggestive bulge under his suit jacket. Even in these lighting conditions, she made out the unnatural shape that snuggled in the hollow of his left shoulder.
&
nbsp; Winston growled.
No, she must've imagined the sound. Probably the wind.
He yanked his hand back. "The hard way then."
He slipped a hand inside his jacket.
Gritting her teeth, Grace pulled out her gun and sprang to her feet. Her knee gave out. She crumpled to the ground, lost her balance, and tumbled sideways down the slope. Winston shouted at her. When she hit the base of the slope, she shoved herself up onto all fours. By some miracle, she still held the gun tight in her fist.
Winston loped down the hill after her with an oblong object clasped in one hand. He stumbled, cursed, and trotted toward her as fast as he could. In a minute, he'd be on her.
She leaped to her feet. Pain tore through the muscles from her knee straight up to her hip. White lights danced in her vision. Her ears rang. Breathe, dammit. She sucked in a breath and, teeth clamped over her bottom lip, she limped along the hill's base.
Winston bounded off the slope. He spun in her direction, breaking into a fast jog.
Thirty feet separated them. Not enough.
Her knee slowed her progress. She pushed harder, grimacing and panting from the pain as much as the exertion. Faster, faster, she must move faster. The road followed the curve of the hill, and she traced the hill's contour, pushing harder. A wave of dizziness crashed over her.
She listed right, then left. The night tilted around her. Nausea swelled inside her as she tripped and stopped.
Behind her, shoes clomped through the sandy loam. Breaths grunted. Clothes rustled.
The world spun.
No, no, no.
"Ack!"
Her limbs morphed into stone. Her heart switched rhythms with a skip and a hop. The strangled cry had come from over her shoulder.
She wanted to turn to look, but the spinning forced her to stay rooted in place. The sound of footfalls had ceased. She took slow, deliberate breaths, focusing on a single star in the sky. It gave her a center of focus, something for her massively screwed-up sense of balance to home in on. And then she waited.
Silence.
The spinning diminished into rocking.
Crickets chirped.
At last, the dizziness subsided. She turned in a half circle.
Henry Winston lay sprawled on the ground. One knee was bent, his arms askew, the oblong object still clutched in his hand. Just beyond Winston's head, a figure loomed in the moonlight. His pale hair glistened in the silvery glow. Her shadow man.
He must've attacked Winston. Knocked him out. Or killed him.
Her knees shuddered. Her tongue had turned to sandpaper. Her throat burned. The embers in her stomach ignited into a conflagration.
Her hero stepped over Winston and advanced on her. Just as Winston's eyes had glowed darkly in the moonlight, his shimmered with the blue of a Caribbean inlet. When he halted several paces from her, the weakness in her legs spread through her hips into her belly, up through her chest and into her heart. Stepping closer, he reached for her face. She flinched, but did not move away. He gently ran his thumb across her cheek to wipe away the tear stains. His skin warmed hers.
A vehicle passed by on the road above. In the flare of the headlights, she saw his face was ashen, his eyes bloodshot.
"You need a doctor," he said.
"No," she said, though her voice wavered. "I'm fine."
Her knee buckled. She dropped onto the dirt. A tear trickled down her cheek onto her lip, seeping into her mouth.
No. Enough crying.
Her ears rang. The twilight world dipped and twirled around her once again. She lay down on the earth, which felt cool against her back, and let her eyelids flutter shut. A pair of arms slipped under her, hoisting her body off the ground. She opened her eyes just enough to see, through the darkness encroaching on her vision, the unearthly blue fire in his irises.
He carried her past Winston. Her head flopped sideways. The object Winston had held in his hand, she spotted it now. It was a cell phone.
She passed out.
Chapter Ten
The light blinded her. She squinted. Voices whispered around her. Machines beeped and clicked.
While her eyes adjusted to the light, the scene shifted into focus. A young man in a green outfit — the kind worn by doctors and nurses — bent over her leg, scrutinizing her knee with his lips pressed together and his eyes half closed. Red hair spilled over his forehead in stringy locks. His skin was pale. His hands were thin and long with pronounced knuckles. He didn't notice her watching him, or didn't show his awareness if he did notice.
Hovering his hands just above her leg, he swirled his palms over the contours of her knee. A warmth spread through the joint. Not painful warmth. The soothing kind.
The young man jerked his hands away and looked at her. He was a kid, no more than seventeen by her estimation. But then, some people retained their youthful features even into middle age. In the movies and television, some actors who played teenagers were actually in their late twenties. This kid might be older than he looked, and more threatening too.
"Are you a doctor?" Grace asked.
He flattened his palm against her forehead. His skin felt warm. He closed his eyes as he inhaled long breaths and let each out slowly.
Opening his eyes, he withdrew his hand. "It's done."
Weariness descended on her. Her eyelids lowered partway without her permission. She did not want to sleep. Well, okay, she wanted to sleep. But she refused to give in to the urge.
The boy backed away from her, retreating behind the curtain that surrounded her bed. To her left, on the other side of the curtain, someone coughed. She must be in the emergency room.
She tried to speak in forceful tone, but her voice emerged as a slur. "Wait."
"Sleep," he said.
Her eyelids shut. She couldn't sleep, not now, not yet. She sensed something important had just happened and she must investigate, not take a nap. The pain was gone — the pain everywhere, she realized, even the migraine — and she had too much to do, too many questions that needed answering. She could not laze around in bed.
Can't sleep …
Something touched her wrist. With great effort, she parted her eyelids just enough to peek through her lashes.
A nurse stood beside her, taking her pulse. The woman released her wrist and scribbled on a clipboard.
Grace cleared her throat. "Don't you have machines for that?"
The nurse smiled and drawled, "I was double-checkin' the machine. Never hurts, ya know?"
Grace blinked several times, trying to clear her mind. It still felt enmeshed in cobwebs.
The nurse patted her arm. "Welcome back, hon. I was wondering when you'd rise and shine."
She didn't feel shiny. The nurse looked it, however, with her bright smile and rosy cheeks. Dark blonde hair, cut short, curled in ringlets around her face. She was probably a few years older than Grace.
"Where am I?" Grace asked, raising onto her elbows. "Who are you?"
"I'm Hannah Martin," the woman drawled, "but you can just call me Hannah. You're in Lassiter Falls Community Hospital. You had a little whoopsy."
"A what?"
Hannah giggled. "An accident, hon. You remember what happened?"
In her memory, the incident had taken on the haze of a dream. "Vaguely. I feel okay."
Hannah glanced at Grace's leg, looked away, and then glanced back. Her expression went blank. Moving only her eyes, she turned her gaze on Grace.
"Something wrong?" Grace asked.
Hannah tapped Grace's knee. "The wound. It's gone."
Grace leaned forward to touch her leg. Her knee no longer ached. The leg of her jeans had ripped and frayed around the knee, yet despite the flesh showing through the holes, she saw no wound. No blood. Not even a scratch. She flexed her leg. No shooting pains. No stiffness. She could've
executed a cartwheel off the bed if she wanted.
"How long was I asleep?" she asked.
"Couple hours."
From the grit in her eyes, the taste of sleep in her mouth, and the mud coating her brain, she would've guessed her slumber lasted days. No injuries healed themselves in two hours. She felt fine, though, like nothing had happened. Even the paranoia and anxiety that overtook her earlier had dissipated. Though deep down she knew the ordeal had happened hours ago, she could almost believe days or even weeks had elapsed.
What the hell had come over her?
"Tell me what happened, hon," Hannah said.
Winston coming at her, gun in hand. Certainty flushing through her in the form of one thought — he killed Grandpa. Then running. Winston on the ground, cell phone in hand. Phone? It had to be a gun. Hands lifting her. Darkness.
"How did I get here?" she asked.
"A nice young man brought you in," Hannah said. "Wouldn't give his name. Said he found you alongside the highway."
Her stomach fluttered. "What did he look like?"
"Blonde hair. Beautiful blue eyes. Cute as a button, but real serious."
Grace stared at the curtain. Blonde hair. Blue eyes. He saved her life. Events appeared to support that notion, yet she couldn't believe appearances anymore. Brian Kellogg appeared to have been strangled. Her leg appeared to have healed. Her shadow man must've killed Brian Kellogg and now he wanted her dead.
Then why did he carry her to the hospital?
He might need her alive, until she gave him the flash drive or he figured out where Grandpa had hidden it. But his concern for her seemed genuine and, in the darkest corners of her mind, she recognized that he meant no harm. He could help her. She should trust him. She knew him.
Ridiculous.
If he didn't kill Kellogg, then she had another invisible man to deal with, and no clue how to do that.
She flopped back onto the bed, nestling her head on the pillow. The bed was raised so that it held her in a semi-upright position.