Inconnu(e)

by Vicki Hinze

  A worried frown creased the skin between his brows. “What is it?”

  She had no choice: “Not saying you will, but if you should happen to fall, there’s no way I can drag you over that wall. In case you haven’t noticed, you’re a lot bigger than I am.”

  “Oh, I noticed.” His gaze heated. “How about we move down there?” He pointed north of the gazebo, at the end of the wall.

  “Better.” She looked down at the leaf-strewn ground. “I hope you don’t think—”

  “I don’t.” He hiked a shoulder. “You dressed up. That told me you weren’t planning on me failing. And I really do appreciate you considering all possibilities.”

  They walked on over, and it hit Maggie that MacGregor’s hands were empty. “You forgot the painting.”

  He rubbed at his neck and looked away. “No, I didn’t.”

  She opened her mouth to ask why he’d not brought it, but then realized she already knew why. If this new location failed to work alone, then he still had something left to try.

  Poor Tyler. Reduced to pinning his hopes on variations of variations. Her heart aching for him, she gave him a nod to go on.

  He dragged the tip of his boot in the sandy soil, then looked at her as if silently pleading for encouragement. “Believe you can do it, Tyler. Believe it like when you paint.” She cupped her fingers and pressed them to her chest. “Feel it in here.”

  He dipped his chin, then turned his back to her. Her heart felt lodged in her throat. Her blood pounded in her temples, and she curled her hands into fists at her sides.

  The tension grew unbearable. Maggie squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t trust him but, oh God, how she prayed this would work for him. She didn’t see how it could work and, in her heart, she knew he didn’t see how it could work either. Still, she prayed for a miracle.

  This situation had to be psychological. It was the only thing that made sense. He’d felt guilty about his folks and couldn’t paint. He’d come here, healed, then gone home.

  Then he’d fallen in love with Carolyn. She’d gone gaga over his painting, gotten herself killed—with, or without intentional help—and again he’d felt guilty and couldn’t paint. So he’d come back here. Only this time, things were different. He hadn’t healed. Something inside him wouldn’t let him heal.

  What?

  It had to be psychological. Had to be. What else could it be?

  The temperature plummeted.

  Maggie shivered, surprised. It’d been such a mild and warm afternoon. Maine weather notoriously changed quickly, but there’d been no clouds in the sky. There’d have to be clouds...

  She tried and failed to open her eyes.

  Tried to move, but stood statue still, as trapped as MacGregor.

  A veil of mist curled around her feet. In her mind, she saw it swirl and swirl, steadily rising until it covered her toe to head and clung to her skin.

  What in the world was happening?

  Something cold slapped against her shoulder and snagged. As if someone held an ice cube pressed hard against her flesh. Instinctively, she tried to reach up to swat it away, but she still couldn’t move.

  The temperature.

  The mist.

  The icy fingers...

  Oh God, it was happening to her! It was happening to her just as MacGregor had described it happening to him!

  MacGregor screamed, “Nooo!”

  Maggie snapped her eyes open. Saw him hit the ground.

  “Ahhhhh!” A woman’s high-pitched screech rent the air.

  Maggie spun toward the sound, saw the birdlike Beaulah running back toward her house and tried to yell out to her for help. Her throat muscles locked and all that escaped her throat was a tiny mewl.

  Crying, only one thought raced through her mind, repeating over and again as if she stood tapping rewind then replay on the VCR.

  It isn’t psychological.

  Chapter 6

  “Maggie?” T.J. shook her shoulders. Her black jacket scrunched up in his hands. “Maggie?”

  Her skin had turned the color of melted wax and her lips were as blue as those of the kids who’d swam in the ocean last summer, swearing the water wasn’t too cold. “Maggie, answer me.”

  No response. Her eyes focused on something he couldn’t see, something inside her mind. Panicking, he shouted. “Maggie, damn it, answer me!”

  She let out a growl that rumbled through her throat, swung her fist at him as if he’d attacked her. A burning fear took root in his stomach. “Maggie, no. Maggie, it’s me. It’s MacGregor. Look at me, Maggie!”

  She darted her gaze at him. Blinked, then blinked again. Midswing, she stilled. “MacGregor?”

  The wild look in her eyes slowly faded and she groaned, threw herself at him, slamming hard against his chest. Her fingers dug into his skin at his sides and she pressed harder to him, as if she couldn’t get close enough, as if she were doing her damnedest to crawl inside him.

  He circled her with his arms. “It’s all right now, Maggie. It’s all right.”

  Her knees collapsed. Taking her weight, he lifted her to him, buried her face at his chest, his chin at the crook of her shoulder. “Shhh,” he whispered, stroking her hair with long tender sweeps. “Shhh, it’s okay.”

  She burrowed deeper, shaking so hard he nearly lost his grip on her. What the hell had happened to her? Maggie just didn’t rattle easily.

  “You didn’t pass out.” His bunched shirt muffled her words.

  “No, I didn’t. We’re both okay,” he reassured her, rubbing tiny circles on her back. Why he hadn’t was as strange as everything else going on around here. But that would have to wait until she was calmer so it could be discussed.

  He carried her back to the garden, back to the little white bench nestled under the firs and secluded by giant evergreens. “I’m going to put you down on the bench, Maggie.”

  “No!” She tightened her hold on him, then said more calmly, “No, not yet.”

  Whatever had happened to her had rattled her to the core. “Not yet,” he promised. Telling her what he was about to do, hoping not to startle her, he sat down, moved her leg over his so she half-sat, half-lay in his lap, her head nestled to his shoulder. “Okay?”

  She nodded, rubbing her cheek against his shoulder, her nose against his neck, her forehead bumping his chin.

  “Okay. We’ll just sit here for awhile. That’s all we’ll do. Just sit here and listen to the crickets and the frogs down at the pond and enjoy the breeze. It’s so gentle it feels almost like summer, doesn’t it, Maggie?”

  No answer.

  “You don’t have to talk. We’ll just sit here and not worry about a thing. We’ll think only happy thoughts and just sit here and soak up some serenity like you did when you walked down to the village. We’ll be calm and peaceful and if we listen real close, we’ll be able to hear the waves. And then we can watch the sky for awhile. The clouds are pretty tonight. Soft and billowy, and the moon’s full. It’s a pretty moon, Maggie. And in between the clouds we can watch the stars. Maybe if we watch long enough we’ll see a shooting star. I used to pretend to ride them when I was little. Did you ever pretend to ride a shooting star?”

  Still no answer, but he kept talking, rambling on about everything and nothing. It was working. She wasn’t shaking nearly so hard now. He dropped his voice lower, made it even more gentle, just above a whisper. A soothing tone, his mother used to call it. He hoped it was. Because until he got Maggie soothed enough to talk to him, he wouldn’t know what had happened to her. That gave his imagination a free rein to play out scenarios that had him sick inside.

  How long they sat there, him talking, her shaking less and less, he didn’t know. It could have been minutes or hours. Some time ago, her shudders had weakened to tremors and, for the last few minutes, her breaths had leveled out, slow and even, and she’d been so still he thought she might have dropped off to sleep.

  “MacGregor?”

  Her voice startled him. “You okay?�
��

  She tilted her head and looked up at him. “It’s not psychological.”

  His heart thudded a slow, hard beat that thumped in his temples.

  “Did you hear me?”

  He nodded, afraid to think, to know she’d—

  “I felt it, Tyler. All of it.” She dragged in a breath. “It isn’t in your mind.”

  He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. To feel relieved or terrified or outraged. It was real. He wasn’t crazy. She’d felt it.

  Oh God... He pulled her closer, tightening his arms around her like a shield. She’d felt it.

  “It’s dark.”

  “Twilight,” he lied. It had been dark for hours. The hard bench cut into T.J.’s back. His legs long since had gone numb. They should go back to the house, and they would, when he just could make himself let go of her.

  She pulled back her shoulders and sat up on his knees. “Tyler, I really am okay. I freaked out on you, and I’m sorry. What happened... rattled me, but I’ve got a handle on it now.”

  Her collar was rumpled. He reached up and rubbed it straight, the backs of his fingers brushing against her warm neck. “You went through the same thing I go through? The temperature drop, the mist, the fingers of cold?”

  She nodded. “All of it.”

  He rubbed her arm, a knot of regret in his throat. Why had he let her get involved in this? “What do you think it is?”

  “The truth?”

  She tensed slightly, and uncertain if he’d felt or sensed it, he didn’t mention it to her. A cloud scudded across the sky, blocking the moonlight, and her shadowy face grew blanketed by darkness.

  “Yes, the truth.” She’d lied to him before and he hoped to encourage her that this wasn’t the time to do it again. “Whether or not we want it, there’s a bond between us, Maggie, or this wouldn’t be happening to us. I feel it, and I think you do, too. And I think we owe each other the truth, don’t you?”

  “I think it’s something... mystical.”

  He’d thought it a hundred million times. But to hear it out loud, to actually hear the words spoken by someone who also had experienced it...

  He swallowed hard. “Me, too.” His voice had cracked, and being a woman with heart, Maggie pretended not to notice. He thought he might just love her for that kindness. “The question is what mystical is it?” He rolled his gaze skyward. “You know what I mean.”

  “That I don’t know.” She fingered the placket of his shirt, running her fingertips over the fabric between the third and fourth buttons. “But I don’t think it means to harm either of us, sans scaring a decade or two off our lives.”

  “Why would you think it doesn’t mean us harm? Maggie, it knocks me out.”

  “I know.”

  She kept rubbing his placket, her knuckles scraping against his chest. The friction felt good.

  “But think about it, MacGregor. If it—whatever it is—can knock you out so easily, then couldn’t it just as easily kill you? Or both of us?”

  T.J. paused to mull that over. It made sense. She’d made an insightful observation that hadn’t occurred to him. He was totally helpless against this mystical entity. He couldn’t defend himself in any way. So if the entity’s objective had been to harm, T.J. would have been dead months ago.

  “There’s another reason I don’t think it means to hurt you.” Her voice suffered a catch and she wrapped her arms around his neck and rubbed her nose against his neck.

  Whatever this reason was, it worried her and she wanted warmth and reassurance before disclosing it. He understood that. Spoken, the words were heard. They were acknowledged real by the speaker. Thoughts could be fanciful, but words were meant or they went unsaid. “Why?”

  She swallowed, grabbed a steadying breath and blew it out against his skin. “Because it talked to me, Tyler. I heard it. Whether from inside my head or with my ears, I don’t know. But...”

  He frowned into the darkness. It was pitch black. He couldn’t even make out her silhouette. “But what?”

  “It knew my name. And it talked to me in a man’s voice.”

  A shiver streaked up his backbone. The mystical entity was a he? When T.J. had heard it, it’d had his voice. It had been it, hadn’t it? And not T.J.’s conscience. He just couldn’t be certain. “What did it—he—tell you?”

  “Help him.”

  “Help him? Help him how? Help him do what?”

  “He didn’t mean to help him—if it was a him. It could be anything.”

  The entity wasn’t a he, then? “Who did he—it—mean for you to help?”

  She hugged T.J. tighter, and her voice shook. “You.”

  “No.” T.J. clenched his jaw until it felt ready to crack.

  “But—” Maggie interrupted.

  “No!” He sighed. “I’m sorry I shouted, but, no. No.” It was the fear. The worry and the hate for whatever was doing this. Why did it have to extend this hell to Maggie? Wasn’t T.J.’s enduring it enough?

  T.J. grimaced. Why didn’t he have enough sense to see the mistake he was making with her in handling this? Maggie was stubborn. If he put his foot down, she’d just stomp it and do as she damn well pleased. He had to appeal to her softer side, to use logic and tenderness and compassion, to get her to stay out of this.

  “Maggie, look.” He lifted her hand and held it in both of his. Tiny and fragile and yet strong and capable. She’d dragged him. A knot of tenderness lodged in his throat. “I don’t want you to get caught up in this. You see what it’s done to me.”

  She expelled a frustrated sigh and looked away.

  “It’s just too... bizarre. It’s my problem.” He gave her hand a gentle squeeze, rubbed the back of it, knuckles to wrist, with his thumb.

  She wasn’t backing off so much as an iota. He had to keep trying. “What are we talking about here? Mystical. Some entity with a man’s voice—or one capable of adopting a man’s voice.” What did that mean—specifically?

  “I agree we don’t know what it is, MacGregor, but that doesn’t change the fact that it is. And it doesn’t—”

  “Listen. Shhh, Maggie, listen to me. This isn’t your problem, honey. It’s mine. And I want you out of it. If you go now, maybe—just maybe—it’ll turn you loose.” His muscles coiled into tight knots, and regret seeped through him like a spill soaks through carpet. Hatred spread with it. And guilt. Always guilt. “Don’t you see?”

  “I see plenty.”

  “Oh, Maggie, you don’t.” He hugged her tightly and propped his chin on the crown of her head. “I didn’t want to care about you. I tried not to care about you. But—”

  “No, Tyler. Don’t.” She leaned back, pressed her palms flat against his chest. “Don’t—”

  “How do I stop? I’m flesh and blood, not stone. I needed you and you were there for me.”

  She scooted off his lap, stood before him, her hands fisted at her sides. “Don’t do it. It’ll only end up hurting us both.”

  Slowly, he stood up and looked down at her. “I care, Maggie. What you did got to me. You’ve gotten to me. I didn’t want you to. God knows, I’d never want to risk hurting another woman. But you’ve crawled down deep inside me, anyway, and I won’t pretend you didn’t because you don’t want to be there. And I won’t lie to you because the truth makes us both uncomfortable as hell.”

  “It isn’t that.”

  “It is that.” He huffed a sigh of sheer frustration. “I can’t let you just stroll into the middle of this as if it’s no big deal. You could be hurt. True, I agree, if this entity wanted us dead, we would be. But I think the thing is playing with us, Maggie. To it, it’s play. To us—to me—it’s torture. I’ve been at this for nine months. I know what I’m saying here.”

  “MacGregor, let me—”

  “Damn it, I can’t!”

  She grabbed his arms and squeezed. “Will you shut up and let me say what I have to say?”

  He stilled. The leaves on the fir above their heads rustled in the breeze and t
he moonlight dappled her skin with light and shadows.

  “I know what you’re feeling, Tyler, and it’s got a lot more to do with having lost your parents and Carolyn and a fear of losing me than is healthy for either of us—even though you don’t love me and all you’re really feeling is a good dose of lust and a little gratitude.” She gentled her voice, lifted her hand from his arm to his face and stroked his jaw. “I do see.”

  His beard’s light stubble being grazed by her hand created friction that heated his skin. He let her see the truth in his eyes, his pain and his fear. “I’ve loved and lost too many people already, Maggie. I can’t say I love you. I don’t. But I owe you, and I care about you. I can’t be the reason I lose you, too.”

  She sighed. “What I’m trying to tell you is that I don’t think we have a choice.”

  He clamped his jaw shut. “Oh, yes. We do,” he gritted out from between his teeth. “There’s always a choice, and I’ve made this one.”

  He turned away from her and strode toward the gazebo. He’d killed Carolyn because he’d ignored the signs and let things go too far. He’d done what was most comfortable for him, so he wouldn’t upset her. But, by God, he would not stand by, feed his own needs and desires, and kill Maggie, too. He wouldn’t do it. He couldn’t, not and survive.

  Maggie gave him a good half-hour to come to terms with their situation. Denial, much as she would love it, wasn’t an option.

  She leaned back on the bench and looked up through the brittle, twisted leaves at the sky. Clouds drifted, moving ever on, uninterrupted, unencumbered and, lord, but did she envy them. It was quiet, dark and cold, and why, with all this weirdness surrounding her she wasn’t scared stiff, beating a hasty retreat, and exiting Seascape, she couldn’t imagine. But the truth was she felt at peace here. It’d been a long, long time since she’d felt at peace, and she’d put up with a lot to keep it. But that she’d put up with a mystical entity struck her as nothing short of baffling. How could she explain it to MacGregor when she didn’t understand it herself?

  MacGregor. She sighed.

  She’d lied to him, not told him her relationship to Carolyn, and now she couldn’t tell him the truth. He’d throw up a defense blockade that guided missiles couldn’t break through. And he’d admitted he cared about her. That made her feel guiltier still—toward him, and toward Carolyn. Well, more toward her mother than Carolyn really. It was her mother’s promise and family duty that had gotten Maggie into this, not Carolyn herself. Maggie had tried and tried to be a good pseudo-sister to Carolyn, but she’d failed a long time ago, and Carolyn had given her no alternative but to accept it.