Кей Хупер: Whisper of Evil

"Oh, no, thanks, I can manage. I do appreciate the offer, though."

He touched his hat brim again, smiling. "Okay, but don't hesitate to holler if you need anything. Anything at all."

"I won't."

The two deputies got back in their cruiser, and Nell deliberately turned to unload the Jeep rather than watch them leave. By the time she reached the front porch with an armful of groceries, she was aware that the cruiser and its deputies had reached the end of the long drive and pulled out onto the road heading back toward town.

She didn't look after them.

They had left the front door standing open, guarded only by the old screen door, and for just a moment she stood there trying to brace herself both mentally and emotionally.

Another twinge in her temple urged her into the house before she was entirely ready to go, which was probably just as well. Without some sort of spur, she wasn't at all sure she would have been able to do it.

She stepped into an open foyer that was disconcertingly familiar with its polished wooden floor and round, pedestal-leg table. There should have been flowers on the table, of course, and hadn't there been a rug underneath?

Shaking off the vague musings, Nell moved purposefully past the stairs toward the kitchen, deliberately not looking through any doorways she passed. Formal dining room on one side, living room on the other, half bath under the stairs — and no need to check out any of those rooms.

Not yet. Not yet.

She put the grocery bags on the kitchen counter and spared only one quick look around the bright yellow-and-white kitchen, then immediately headed back out to the Jeep. She needed to get everything inside, and as soon as possible; the twinges in her temple had become a painful throbbing as rhythmic and inevitable as her heartbeat.

She barely made it, dumping her luggage in the foyer and locking the front door before moving unsteadily back to the kitchen. She fumbled through the bags for the few perishables that needed to go into the refrigerator, fighting the dizziness grimly even as she told herself she should at least find a chair before —

Blackness washed over her, and Nell crumpled silently to the dusty tile floor.

It was a bit like meditation, he had decided. If he closed his eyes and concentrated, really concentrated, his body seemed to grow very light, almost weightless, and some part of him was able to float away for a while. Sometimes he just floated without direction, not really caring where he went, enjoying the sensations of drifting along without any ties of the flesh.

True freedom. He'd had no idea.

Sometimes, however, he focused all his energy and will on controlling his direction, concentrated on reaching a particular place, because there was someone special he had to find.

Like her. She was easy to find. The effortless connection established so long ago led him to her quickly.

She was moving about the kitchen, putting groceries away. Preoccupied, maybe even upset or unnerved by the storms rumbling all around on this restless spring night. She looked a little pale, he thought, and there was a square of adhesive bandage on her forehead just above her right eyebrow.

He wondered if she had fallen. Wondered what would happen if he reached out and touched her.

He nearly did reach out but stopped himself. No. Not now. Not yet.

There were things he had to do first. A job he had to finish. He wasn't the sort of man to avoid his responsibilities, after all. That was not the way he'd been raised, and not his character. A man finished what he started.

Besides, there was plenty of time for Nell. Time to find out the truth about why she'd come home. Time to find out how much she remembered.

She walked past him, intent on placing a couple of boxes into an upper cabinet, and he was almost certain he could smell her hair, a clean scent like sunshine.

He almost reached out and touched her.

Almost.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH

Nell woke so abruptly that she heard the broken-off ending of her own strange, muffled cry. She sat there in her bed, staring at the hands that were still raised and stretched out before her as though she had been reaching for something. Her hands were shaking visibly. She felt stiff, so tense her muscles protested with sharp twinges. Her fingers curled slowly, and she made herself relax her arms, lower them. Stop reaching.

The bedroom was flooded with morning light, the previous night's storms long gone, and through her slightly open window a cool, moist breeze fluttered the curtains. It smelled damp and earthy, like spring.

She didn't have to try to remember the dream. It was always the same one. Little details varied, but the basic framework of the dream had never changed. And even though it wasn't an every-night occurrence, it happened often enough to be all too familiar to Nell.

"I shouldn't have come back here," she heard herself murmur.

She had hoped that after so many years, coming back here wouldn't have made it worse. But she should have known better than that. Even driving down here she had known, had felt the wrenching sensation she had lived with for so long begin to intensify, as if a cord tied to something deep inside her were being tugged insistently.

Now the pull was steady, urgent. Impossible to ignore.

Stiffly, Nell slid from the bed and went to take a shower, allowing the hot water to beat down on her while she concentrated on shoring up her defenses. It was hard, harder than it had ever been before, but by the time she was dressed and on her way downstairs, the pull inside her was at least tolerable, pushed down and quieted so that it no longer made her feel she would be torn in half.

I shouldn't have come back here. How can I do what I have to with this inside me?

"Nell."

Halfway across the foyer, she stopped with a jerk and turned completely around, staring behind her, all around her. But there was no one there. Absolutely no one.

"I shouldn't have come back here," she murmured.

"It's a simple enough question." Ethan smiled easily as he gazed across his desk at Max Tanner. "Where were you Saturday night, Max?"

"You mean, where was I when George Caldwell was shot?" Max offered the sheriff a smile no more real than his own. "I was at home, Ethan. Alone."

"No witnesses."

"And so no alibi." Max shrugged, keeping the gesture as relaxed as he could. "Sorry, didn't know I'd need one."

"Didn't you?"

"No."

Ethan nodded, mouth pursed in what was probably supposed to be thoughtful consideration. "You and George had your differences, I believe."

He believed . He fucking well knew but had to play his little games. So Max played along.

"He wanted to buy a piece of property here in town and I didn't want to sell it. He doubled his offer, I said no sale — and that was it. Hardly anything to kill a man over."

Ethan nodded again, lips still pursed. "But there was something else, wasn't there? Something about a note on that ranch of yours?"

"He called in the loan. I paid it. End of story."

"Is it? Way I heard it, you had to sell off a third of your cattle to pay that note."

"So? It left me with two-thirds of the herd and free of any debt to the bank."

"But you lost money on the deal. Prices for beef were way down when you had to sell."

"The timing could have been better," Max admitted. "But it was business, Ethan, nothing more than that. George called in the note; I paid it. He was within his rights; I honored my obligations."

"You were pissed as hell, everybody knew that. Called poor George a bloodsucker, is what I heard."

Max thought grimly how easy it would be to become paranoid in a town where the sheriff "heard" a hell of a lot — including far too many private conversations. But all he said was, "I was pissed. I got over it. And that was two months ago."