Into the Fire

  “You were listening to Nirvana?”

  “Hardly. U2.”

  At least he still knew that much about her. His mind was still reeling with what she’d said before. “Then someone was trying to kill you.”

  “Yes,” she said, her face pressed against his plain white T-shirt and his pounding heart beneath it. “Was it you?”

  So much for her astonishing declaration of love. “I wasn’t here, remember? And if I were trying to kill you I wouldn’t have saved you, would I? It wouldn’t make much sense.”

  “Nothing makes sense,” she said wearily. “I don’t suppose we can go back inside? My butt is soaking wet.”

  “The hospital—”

  “No. Just fix my goddamned tire and I’ll get out of here. Never darken your door again,” she said in a defeated little voice.

  He wanted her to tell him she loved him again. With some kind of shock he realized that no one had ever said that to him when he wasn’t making them come. Anyone could think they were in love when they were climaxing. But Jamie Kincaid was sitting with her butt in the snow, her lungs just beginning to clear from poisoned air, her stomach hurting from throwing up, and she could say she loved him. Even if she thought he was trying to kill her.

  It was too strange for him to even begin to take in. Instead he stood, scooping her up with him, and she made an expected sound of pain.

  “Are you all right?” He sounded anxious, and he didn’t like it. He couldn’t help it.

  “Fine. I could probably walk….”

  “I’ll carry you.” To be honest, he wanted an excuse to hold her tight against him. That excuse would leave when she did, as soon as he fixed her tire, but for now he was going to indulge himself.

  The kitchen was cold now. The open doors that had let out the gas had brought in the icy night air. He kicked the door shut, then closed the door to the garage as well. “It’ll warm up in a minute….” he began, but she started struggling.

  Instinctively he tightened his hold, until she managed to mutter “bathroom” and he had no choice but to release her. She disappeared into the lavatory beneath the stairs, and a moment later he heard her puking again.

  She didn’t really have much left to throw up. She’d locked the door, and while locked doors didn’t usually stop him, he decided to leave her in privacy, at least for a while. He wasn’t squeamish, but she was, and he could do that much for her.

  The garage was icy cold, too, but most of the smell had vanished. He closed the sliding door again, leaving it open just a narrow crack to let the last of the poison escape, and then turned to look at her Volvo.

  She hadn’t lied—the front right tire had been slashed. Beyond repair, as a matter of fact, though he had any number of tires hanging around that he could substitute. But if he hadn’t slashed her tire, then that left only Jamie herself. Maybe looking for an excuse to stay?

  Wishful thinking. She’d managed to figure out his air compressor enough to fill the other three tires, which certainly suggested she wanted to leave. But who could have slashed the tire?

  The logical culprit was Mouser. Loyal, interfering Mouser, who thought he knew what was best for Dillon no matter what Dillon said. And he had the stupid, romantic idea that Jamie was the perfect woman for him.

  But Mouser had disappeared, without a word, when he seldom traveled out of their abandoned neighborhood. And Mouser wasn’t the type to destroy, even in the name of true love.

  He’d get Jamie settled, then come back and fix the tire. If he couldn’t talk her into going to the hospital, couldn’t club her over the head like a caveman and drag her there, then he’d get her tucked up in bed and then get to work. The question of the hour was, which bed?

  It wasn’t a question at all, really. She wouldn’t want to sleep where a dead rat had rested—she’d rather sleep with a live one. And he wasn’t going to be there—he’d keep himself busy in the garage, getting her car in working order, rewiring the cars that had been jump-started, trying to figure out what the hell happened.

  She’d emerged from the bathroom and joined him in the garage, looking even paler. As if she’d seen a ghost. “Go on up to bed,” he said. “I’ll get your car running again and you can leave first thing in the morning.”

  “And I’m supposed to trust you because…?”

  “Because you don’t have any other choice.” At least it was an honest answer, though he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear it.

  “The rat bled all over my mattress.”

  He cocked his head, looking at her. “You know the answer to that one. You can even lock the door. I’ll sleep down here on the sofa.”

  She couldn’t help it—she glanced at the sofa in the corner, and a wash of color flooded her pale face. It fascinated him. How could she still blush after everything he’d talked her into doing?

  “All right,” she said. And before he could reply she whirled around and disappeared up the narrow stairs, with more energy than he would have thought possible.

  He wanted to follow her, so damned badly. He didn’t want to screw her—he just wanted to lie in bed with his arms around her, just for a short while before she left.

  But he wasn’t going to touch her again. He was going to keep his promise, the one he made to himself, not her. The one where he decided she was more trouble than she was worth, that she did him more harm than good. The one where he decided to let her go so he could finally get over her. The one where he decided to let her go because that was the best thing he could do for her.

  The garage was cold from having the doors open to the night air, and he was damned tired. It wouldn’t take him long to fix Jamie’s tire, and the other cars could wait until after she left. In the meantime he was going to do what he’d told her. He was going to stretch out on the battered old sofa and sleep for a few hours before he dropped with exhaustion. Nothing was making any sense, and nothing would until he got a little sleep.

  The tattered green sofa was faded and lumpy. And the last time he’d stretched on there Jamie had been beneath him, clutching him, terrified and unwillingly aroused.

  She wasn’t there now, he reminded himself. And he couldn’t very well avoid every place in the building where she’d been—he’d have to burn the place down and move out.

  No, he could lie on the sofa and not think about her. As soon as he fell asleep.

  And only if he were that lucky.

  17

  Jamie didn’t even glance into her abandoned bedroom. She knew where she was sleeping that night, and it didn’t matter whether or not she had any choice. It was just one more night, and it wasn’t going to make any difference. It wouldn’t change her, and it wouldn’t change Dillon. He could do anything he wanted to her and it wouldn’t make any difference. Make it any easier or harder to leave, when she knew that was her only choice.

  It was cold up there, but she opened the window, anyway, to dispel any lingering carbon monoxide. She’d somehow managed to cheat death once already that night—she’d be an idiot to risk her life all over again. Though maybe she was, simply by staying there.

  She was too tired to do more than strip off her snow-damp jeans and crawl into his bed, pulling the covers up around her. Her chest ached, throat hurt, and she was so damned cold. She reached inside her T-shirt to unfasten her bra, only to find that it was already free. Dillon must have unhooked it to give her room to breathe, though it wasn’t as if the bra was that tight to begin with. And for some reason the back clasp was still fastened—it was open at the front.

  Her T-shirt was damp as well, and her chest felt as if it were covered in icy fire. She pulled the covers up over her shoulders and turned off the light, closing her eyes. Willing sleep to come.

  There was a lot to be said for having an iron will, but forty-five minutes later Jamie accepted the fact that you couldn’t force sleep, no matter how determined you are. She should have remembered that. She lay there in the dark, listening to the sounds of the building as it settled into the cold n
ight. Waiting for the sound of Dillon’s footsteps on the creaking wooden stairs.

  But he didn’t come. And she told herself that was relief she was feeling, and she should go to sleep now, and first thing in the morning she’d get out of there. And she stared into the darkened bedroom and waited for him. Until she realized he wasn’t coming—he really was going to spend the night down there on that lumpy old sofa, in the remnants of the carbon monoxide.

  She sat up in the darkness, clutching the covers around her. The entire evening had become hazy—she remembered trying to fill the tires with air, listening to U2 in the background. She remembered feeling dizzy, and then that damned song came on. And then she didn’t really remember anything more, just odd dreams, with a ghostly Nate watching her as she crawled toward him, reaching for help.

  There must have been other dreams, visions as well, but she couldn’t remember them. Someone had turned those car engines on, the noise covered by the blasting of the stereo. Someone had tried to kill her.

  As a murder attempt it was kind of half-assed. Anyone could have come by and found her. As Dillon had done, the perfect hero. But Dillon was no hero.

  There were two possibilities. He’d done it, either to rescue her and fool her into thinking he was a good guy, or maybe he’d wanted to get rid of her and then thought better of it.

  The other choice, the unthinkable choice, was that someone else was there. Someone who really wanted to kill her. Someone who wouldn’t stop. Someone who’d either come up here and finish the job, or who’d kill Dillon as he slept in the garage. Helpless, except that she could never imagine Dillon as helpless.

  So that left her with two choices herself. She could crawl out of bed and lock the door, push the furniture against it and wait for morning. No one would be able to get in and finish what they started.

  That was the smart thing to do. If it really had been Dillon it would keep him at bay, as well as anyone else who wanted to hurt her.

  But she wasn’t going to do that. Her jeans were almost dry when she pulled them back on, and they were toasty warm from the heating duct where she’d placed them. She picked up the comforter and wrapped it around her shoulders, dragging it behind her as she walked down the darkened hallway.

  She could still imagine those eyes watching her, and she realized that she’d always had the sense that someone was there. She’d like to think that it was Nate’s ghost, looking out for her, but she wasn’t quite that naive. Whoever was watching her was no benevolent spirit.

  The kitchen was cold. There was a single light over the sink, and the window was open a crack, letting a blast of icy air inside. The door to the garage was open, as well, and while she could hear the furnace working overtime, it was making little progress against the night air that flooded the building.

  She stopped in the open doorway to the garage. The smell of exhaust had disappeared, and there were no engines running, no poison gas filling the room. The garage was dark—only a small desk lamp provided some illumination. Dillon lay stretched out on the sagging green sofa, sound asleep, a thin blanket covering him.

  Not enough warmth in a cold space like this, she thought, shivering. At least Dillon didn’t seem to be troubled with sleeplessness, or a guilty conscience, or worried about someone trying to kill him. Maybe he’d been out getting drunk—she hadn’t been in any condition to notice whether he’d been using or not.

  But then, she hadn’t seem him drunk since she got there. Hadn’t even seem him take a drink—the one time she thought he had it had only been iced tea. If she didn’t know better she’d think that Dillon didn’t use alcohol anymore.

  She shivered, standing there, her bare feet icy on the cement floor. She glanced at the shadowy frame of her car—he hadn’t done anything about it yet, and she had no guarantee that he would.

  There was nothing to stop her from leaving this place, right now. Walking to the nearest pay phone, calling a taxi and making it to the airport, where she could either spend a fortune on a flight or a smaller fortune on a rental car. Either way, the price would be cheap compared to her life. And her soul.

  Her chest hurt, her feet hurt, her heart hurt. While he slept the sleep of the innocent on that huge old sofa, she was standing there freezing to death, awash in misery.

  She walked across the garage, the covers trailing behind her, until she stood over him. He looked almost innocent in sleep, but Dillon Gaynor had never been innocent in his life.

  She was about to turn and leave him, when his voice broke the silence.

  “I’ll share my covers if you’ll share yours.”

  His eyes were open, and he was watching her, lying on his side, up against the back of the sofa. A million arguments cropped up in her mind, and then they all vanished. Just for tonight she didn’t want to fight.

  And he knew it. He lifted the threadbare blanket and she climbed onto the sofa beside him, pulling her covers around them both. It was a big sofa, but still only a sofa, and she had to move close to him so as not to fall off.

  He didn’t say a word. Simply tucked her against him, her head on his shoulder, his arms around her, holding her loosely, protectively. He reached up and brushed the hair away from her face with a gentle hand, and unconsciously she rubbed her face against his hand, almost purring like a kitten.

  And then she sighed, letting out the tension and fear and distrust. Letting go of everything. And just before she fell asleep she felt his lips against her forehead, and she wanted to cry.

  He could see them in the darkness. Ghosts had better vision, and shadows didn’t stop him. They were asleep on the sofa, wrapped up close together, and the slow rage that fueled him was cold as ice. But then, he was always cold. That’s what happened when you were dead—all the heat left your body. Haunting the icy upper floors of Dillon’s garage was only fitting.

  He’d watched them. He’d watched his sweet little cousin go down on Dillon on the floor of the garage. He’d watched them in the bedroom, heard the sounds she made when she came. But mostly he’d watched Dillon, his hips thrusting, his mouth kissing her, his hands holding her, touching her, loving her.

  But this was worse. This was tenderness, and unbearable. Dillon didn’t know about tenderness, any more than Nate did. He knew about sex—Nate had never had any doubts about that. But this was something else, something unacceptable.

  He should have killed her twelve years ago, when he’d planned to. It had just been bad luck that the police had stopped them, but he could have followed through later. He thought the danger was over—she would never see Dillon again. And Dillon would get over his fucked-up obsession for an innocent teenager.

  But it hadn’t happened that way. And he was the one who died, thanks to Dillon.

  He should have cut deeper with the knife, let her bleed to death on the cement floor of Dillon’s garage. He’d thought the carbon monoxide would have done it, but Dillon had come back sooner than he’d expected.

  But this time he wouldn’t let go of it. This time he’d planned backup—he was older now, and he didn’t make mistakes that couldn’t be corrected. Jamie would be dead in the next few days.

  And Dillon would have no one left to love. No one but him.

  It was strange, Jamie thought. How could she feel so warm, so safe, so peaceful, when things were so wrong? She didn’t want to wake up—it felt too good to lie where she was, pressed up against Dillon’s warm body, his arms holding her.

  But she couldn’t stay there—they both knew it. It was almost dawn—the garage was filled with a murky light, and she turned her head to look at him. His eyes were open, dark, lost eyes, and he was watching her.

  He moved his head, and she knew he was going to kiss her, and then she’d kiss him back, and then she’d be lost, and at the last minute she put her hands against his chest, pushing away from him.

  There was blood on her hands. Blood on his plain white T-shirt. Blood everywhere, and she let out a wordless cry of horror. She scrambled away from him, landing
on the hard floor of the cement, shivering.

  “Blood…” she said finally. “You’re covered with blood.”

  He sat up, pushing the covers aside, and looked down at his shirt. And then he looked at her.

  He got up and walked to one of the workbenches. When he turned around he was holding a knife.

  She didn’t make a sound as he approached her. She tried to move backward, away from him, but the sofa blocked her, and she could do nothing but huddle there in terror and wait for him to kill her.

  He could read the panic in her face. He grabbed her arm, hard, and pulled her into a sitting position, then pushed her against the sofa. She held up her arms, instinctively to block the knife.

  “Jesus Christ,” Dillon muttered, grabbing her wrists in one strong hand and holding them out of his way. And then he took the knife and cut her T-shirt down the center, so that it fell apart.

  “Jesus Christ,” he said again in a softer voice, releasing her wrists, dropping the knife. “What the fuck happened to you?”

  She reached down to pull her T-shirt back around herself, and then stopped. If his shirt had been streaked with blood, it was nothing compared to what she was wearing. Her once-white T-shirt looked like red tie-dye. It didn’t even seem to matter that she was half naked in front of him. She just looked down at the shallow tracings on her chest with numb horror.

  “Lie down,” he said. She didn’t move, so he pushed her back onto the sofa, too shocked to argue. She wanted to cover herself up, at least cover her breasts, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She simply lay back and closed her eyes, and waited.

  A minute later Dillon was sitting on the sofa beside her, laying a warm wet towel over her chest. He pushed her torn T-shirt and bra straps off her shoulders and down her arms, tossing the ruined clothing onto the floor.

  “You’re pretty damned trusting for someone who thought I was about to cut your throat.” There was no bitterness in his voice, in his face, when she opened her eyes to look at him. No emotion whatsoever—he’d closed himself off from her. As always.