He stopped his pacing to lean against the fender of his rental car. He hadn’t had the time or the inclination to shave since he’d arrived, and now he rubbed a hand over his stubbled face wearily. He didn’t know what he believed anymore. His brain was telling him her entire story was a load of crap, but he kept catching himself thinking and reacting as if it were true.
There were so many possibilities, and combinations from those possibilities, that his head was spinning. He knew he hadn’t had enough sleep, but it was more than that. Something else, or a combination of things, was at work here, and it was draining him. It was that feeling he couldn’t shake that someone was watching. It was the mystery of the book, and how she was managing the changes in it. And it was that unsettling and peculiar feeling he got when he touched the thing, that feeling of comfort when he should have been shaken, or anxious, or scared.
Or angry.
Yes, that’s what he should be feeling. Angry at this whole thing, at whatever scheming plot was at the center of all this, because whatever it was, it was obviously aimed at him. And they thought him stupid enough to buy it. So where was the anger that had overtaken him in the library? Where was all that righteous fury?
His hand slipped up and around the back of his neck, massaging tight, knotted muscles. He let his head loll back, closed his eyes, and reluctantly admitted he was too damned tired and distracted to maintain anything as focused as anger right now.
Maybe he’d get a room here again and just sleep for a few hours. Kendall would turn up sooner or later. She had to, all her stuff was here. And if he just waited, she would come to him. He wasn’t sure how he knew that, or why he was so certain she wasn’t through with him yet. He just knew, on some instinctive level he’d learned over the years not to question, that there was no quit in this woman. She’d said she’d haunt him, and she meant it.
Too bad all that drive and energy and determination was aimed in the wrong direction, he thought, smothering a yawn. She could be hell on wheels under the right circumstances. Maybe she really had been the old man’s right hand. She sure had the nerve for it. Maybe she—
The sound of a car approaching made him open his eyes. When he saw it was a police car pulling into the parking lot, he straightened up slowly. When he saw it was headed toward him, he pushed away from his car and stood ready on the balls of his feet. It was an old reaction, one he thought he was long past, but nothing that had happened here was quite ordinary, and he was more than a little edgy.
It was only when the black and white unit drove past him and pulled to a halt on the other side of his car, in front of Kendall’s room, that he realized there was a passenger. In the front seat, not the caged rear used for prisoners.
Kendall.
He walked around the front of his car, toward the marked unit, his gaze fastened on her through the windshield. Her head was bowed, her dark hair loose now and falling forward, masking her face from him. She didn’t look up as he approached. The officer who was driving got out, gave him that curious, speculative look that cops everywhere seemed to give everyone unknown to them, glanced at Jason’s car, then walked around to the other side of the unit and opened the door. He leaned over and offered his passenger his arm.
How gallant, Jason thought dryly.
No, he thought again, it wasn’t gallant. It was necessary. Kendall was moving stiffly, gingerly, as if every motion hurt. Or as if she expected to be thrown down at any moment.
As she straightened beside the police car, the thick mass of her hair slid back from her face. Jason’s eyes narrowed as he saw the thick bandage on her forehead midway above her right eye and temple.
She is in danger.
The book’s words came back at him like a slap.
“What happened?” he asked sharply.
Kendall didn’t react, but the officer’s head snapped around. He eyed Jason warily as he crossed the four feet between them in one stride.
“Traffic accident,” the smartly uniformed young man said, then turned back to Kendall, clearly indicating that any more information was none of this apparent stranger’s business.
“Give me your room key, Kendall. Then I’ll get the things we retrieved inside for you,” the officer said with courtly politeness. “You just lie down and rest.”
“How badly is she hurt?”
The officer looked at him again, obviously reassessing his initial dismissal of Jason as merely a curious bystander. Jason returned his gaze levelly, noticing the small gold name tag above his right breast pocket. S. Browning. He looked young, Jason thought, maybe twenty-five. Or maybe that was just because he was so tired he was feeling damned old right now.
“Excuse me, sir,” the officer said, “but I’m afraid that’s really not your business.”
The politeness was still there, but there was no sign of the gentle concern that had marked his words to Kendall. Jason’s gaze flicked to her face. She was frighteningly pale, her skin almost translucent beside the darkness of her hair. There was another smaller, unbandaged cut on her cheek, and a third on her chin. As if sensing his scrutiny, she lifted her head to look back at him, then looked tiredly away, as if she didn’t have the strength to deal with him right now. And Jason knew with gut-level certainty that this was no act.
“Kendall,” he began, but she ignored him, looking down and searching in her purse with hands that were shaking. He shifted his gaze to the officer. “I’ll take care of her.”
Jason froze as he heard his own words, wondering what had possessed him to say them.
“I don’t need taking care of.”
The tremor in her voice belied her words, and Jason suppressed the urge to reach for her. That he even had to do it irritated him, and he purposely drew back, as if distance could alleviate whatever was making him react this way.
“Is this a friend of yours?” Browning asked her, his gaze flicking from Kendall to Jason suspiciously.
“No,” Kendall said, pulling out her room key at last.
“No?” Jason said, recovered enough to assume a mockingly hurt tone. “How can you say that, after the night we spent together?”
Her head came up, but she said nothing. She barely reacted at all. Jason had figured she’d come up fighting at that one, and the fact that she didn’t worried him. What the hell had happened to shake her so? She didn’t seem the type to be so upset by a simple traffic accident.
So maybe it hadn’t been a simple one.
She is in danger.
“Kendall,” he said softly, “what happened?”
She ignored him, looking at the officer. “I’d like to go inside, please. I need to sit down.”
Browning nodded, and gently took the key from her. He opened the door for her and held it while she stepped inside. Jason started to follow, but found his way blocked by the man in uniform.
“I don’t believe the lady wants company.”
“That’s for her to say, isn’t it?”
“I think she just did.”
He looked over the man’s shoulder to where Kendall was now sitting on the edge of the bed. She didn’t look up.
Browning motioned him away from the door. Jason backed up, and the officer kept an eye on him as he went back to the police car and opened the back door.
“What happened?” Jason asked again.
For a moment Browning ignored him as he leaned inside the police car and picked up a small box that appeared to contain some papers and envelopes, then straightened and gave Jason an assessing look. After a moment, as if he’d reached a decision, he said, “Some reckless driver almost ran her off Laurel Road.”
Jason drew back, tension spiking through him. “The cemetery road? The big curve?”
The officer’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know that? Do you know something about this?”
&n
bsp; God, how many times as a kid had he looked up into the face of a man wearing a badge and tried to answer that same question without seeming too scared, when inside he’d been scared to death they were going to somehow know he was a runaway. The panic response was instinctive, the knotting of his stomach, the sudden sweat, the tension of muscles getting ready to run.
If not for the shock of what the man had said, he would have laughed out loud at himself; he had four inches and ten years on this kid, yet he was reacting as if he were sixteen again, and on the run, when in reality he was farther from that scared kid than he’d ever dared hope to be.
“No,” he said, “I don’t know anything about it. Did you catch him?”
“Not yet.” Browning shifted the box he held to his left hip, not coincidentally, Jason knew, freeing his gun hand. “But we will. She gave us a good description of the car.”
“What kind of car?”
The officer shook his head. “Sorry. That would be compromising an ongoing investigation, to give that out before it was okayed for public release.”
Jason’s lips tightened. “What about the driver?”
Browning’s eyes narrowed again. “How long have you been here?”
Jason smiled slightly despite his unease. “A couple of hours. Want to check my car?”
Browning returned the slight smile. “I already did.”
“Good,” Jason said, meaning it.
Something flickered in the officer’s eyes, and Jason sensed he was once more being reassessed. “May I ask your name?”
Jason wondered if the politeness was ingrained, or if they were training them in it these days. “Jason West.”
“And your business here in Sunridge?”
Jason didn’t bother to question the man’s assumption that he was only visiting; there didn’t seem to be any point. But neither did he see any point in announcing he’d been here for Aaron Hawk’s funeral, because the old man had been his father.
“It’s personal.” He could see his answer hadn’t satisfied the man, so he added, “I used to live here, a long time ago. That’s how I know about the road.”
After a moment Browning nodded, as if in acceptance. Jason looked over his shoulder once more, to where Kendall still sat, unmoving.
“She looks pretty shaken,” he said. “She shouldn’t be alone.”
“She didn’t seem to want you around,” Browning said.
“I know. She’s . . . angry with me. Maybe with reason. But I wouldn’t . . . I’m not . . .”
He stopped and took a breath, wondering what the hell he was doing and why it was so difficult. What did he care if Kendall Chase just sat there, dazed? She’d tried to con him, for God’s sake, tried to manipulate him, and thought he was stupid enough to fail for some crazy tale about an ancient magician and a magic book. And a prediction about his future that would set her up for life.
“Never mind,” he said. “Just forget it.”
He turned on his heel, and walked back toward his car. He heard Browning, who had set the box down on the table just inside the door, ask Kendall if she needed anything more. Jason couldn’t hear her answer, but Browning came out and pulled the room door shut behind him.
“You leaving town?” he called out.
Jason’s patience snapped; he was tired, his nerves were drawn wire-tight, and he was feeling a little ragged around the edges. And right now he wanted nothing more than to do exactly that; get out of this place.
“You have a problem with that?”
The officer lifted a brow at him. “Not as long as I can find you if I need to.”
Jason grimaced. “Ask Ms. Chase. I’m sure she can tell you anything you want to know about me.”
He unlocked the car door and yanked it open. Then he slid into the driver’s seat. Browning watched him for a moment, but then walked back to his unit and got in. He picked up the radio microphone and spoke into it, listened for a moment, glanced at Jason, then spoke again before hanging the mic in its rack and driving out of the motel lot rather quickly.
Jason sat there, staring at the logo embossed in silver on the steering wheel of the rental car. He felt slightly rudderless, like a man who had spent his life heading for a certain destination only to arrive and find out it didn’t exist any longer. There was nothing left for him to do here. There was no reason for him not to do exactly what he wanted to do, just drive out of here to the airport and never look back. No reason at all.
Except for the image lingering in his mind of Kendall huddled on the edge of the bed he’d slept on last night, her hands clasped between her knees as if that was the only way she could stop them from shaking.
Some reckless driver almost ran her off Laurel Road.
She is in danger.
He shook his head vehemently and jammed the key into the ignition. He started the car, revving it unnecessarily. And still he sat there, that image of an uncharacteristically distraught Kendall haunting him.
“Damn.”
Irritation rang in the short oath. Determinedly he released the parking brake. He reached for the gearshift lever, thumbed down the button, and yanked it into reverse. He turned the wheel sharply, looking over his shoulder, ready to back out of the parking spot and head for the driveway.
He didn’t even realize he’d hit the brakes until the car halted with a little jolt. He looked back at the closed door of Kendall’s room, his jaw rigid. Uttering a string of self-condemning curses he hadn’t used in years, he slammed the gear lever back into park, stomped the parking brake pedal down once more, and shut the car off.
He shoved the car door open so hard it creaked as the hinges protested. He got out and slammed it shut just as hard. Damning himself every step of the way, he strode toward that closed door. Only the memory of how shaken she had been enabled him to knock instead of pound on the door. He ended up pounding anyway, when he stood there for several minutes and nothing happened.
Maybe he should head for the office, he thought. Make up some story about being worried about her health after the accident and get the manager to unlock the door. It wasn’t even a lie, not really. Not the accident part, anyway; he wasn’t really worried about her.
Then why are you here?
He ignored the nagging little echo in his head and pounded once more. He was about to turn and follow through on his idea when, at last, the door swung open.
She said nothing. She just stood there, staring up at him with eyes he could only describe as hollow. Although she was barefoot, she was still wearing the gray jumpsuit she’d had on this morning, but it was torn in a couple of places and stained in an oddly splattered pattern on the right shoulder.
Blood.
His gaze flicked to the heavy bandage at her temple, and he wondered how many stitches were beneath it. He opened his mouth to speak, but couldn’t think of anything to say. Instead, driven by an urge he didn’t understand, he took a step forward and gently put his arms around her.
Kendall stiffened and tried to pull free. Firmly, but also with a gentleness he didn’t quite recognize in himself, he held her fast. After a moment she seemed to give in. He moved one hand up and down her back in a soothing motion, much as his mother had soothed him as a child when he’d had a particularly ugly day. Slowly her head lowered, until she was resting it against his chest. He continued to stroke her, lightly, carefully.
“Don’t worry about it now, Kendall,” he said. “Any of it. It can all wait.”
Amazingly he found that he meant it. He, who never trusted anyone until he was certain what their angle was, couldn’t find it in him to believe that she had done this on purpose, gotten herself hurt like this, that this was part of whatever elaborate plan she and Aaron or Alice, or she alone, had concocted. Right now, he was having trouble believing anything except that this soft, tremb
ling woman was exactly what she appeared to be.
“You just need to rest,” he said, still holding her with great care.
Her head came up off his chest, and he half expected some biting comment that that was what she’d been trying to do when he’d come pounding on her door. But no words came, and she lowered her head again without even looking at him.
“Come on,” he said softly, urging her back inside. She went without protest, moving slowly, as if she was still dazed. He shut the door behind them and, without taking his eyes off her, flipped the lock. He led her over to the side of the bed. When he released her, she simply stood there, as if not certain what she was supposed to do.
“Are you sure you don’t have a concussion?” he asked, looking at her eyes. He’d had one once, when he’d fallen off that scaffold at old man McKenna’s diesel repair shop, and he’d felt exactly like she was acting. When she didn’t answer, he lifted her chin with a gentle finger. “Kendall?”
She seemed to focus then. “What? Uh . . . no. No concussion. They checked.”
“Did they give you something? Medication or something?”
“I . . . yes. I took some a little while ago.”
He saw a shiver wash through her. “You’d better sit down before you fall down.”
Her gaze shifted downward, as if she was only now realizing she was still dressed, and she lifted a hand to touch the stained shoulder of her jumpsuit with one trembling finger.
“I . . . I need to change.”
“Okay.”
She just stood there, staring at the grim pattern of drops left by the blood that had dripped from her forehead onto her shoulder. Jason smothered a harassed sounding sigh. What was he supposed to do, strip her himself? Not that the idea didn’t have great appeal, but not under the current circumstances. He’d been told he didn’t have a romantic bone in his body, and he didn’t doubt the assessment, but he wasn’t quite cold enough to take advantage of a dazed, injured woman.
“Kendall, are you going to change, or sleep in your clothes?” he asked, hoping she would move herself.
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