Anna turned and fled. Thankful that she’d always had better-than-average night vision, she managed to snag her purse and keys before she exploded out the back door and nearly dove into her Jeep. Her hands shook so bad it took her three tries to get the key in the ignition. The Jeep lurched into reverse, then she shifted gears and jammed her foot on the pedal.
The Dark Man appeared right in front of her hood. Anna screamed and veered, instinct guiding her to avoid hitting him. She clipped the corner of the building in a loud screech of metal against brick. She hit the brakes so hard she fishtailed in the gravel. Teeth chattering with adrenaline and fear, Anna looked in her rearview mirror, then over her shoulder, expecting to see a body laid out in the gravel. Nothing. She hopped out and peeked behind the Jeep, but there was nothing there. A gust of wind whipped her hair around her face.
How could there be nothing?
She jogged to the front of the Jeep and groaned. A dent and a series of deep white scratches ran for almost a foot along the side panel from the headlight, which was cracked but still lit.
Holy shit. What the hell just happened?
Anna had no clue, and she wasn’t sticking around to find out. She got back in the Jeep and got the hell out of there.
At the first subdivision, Anna pulled off the road and came to rest under a streetlamp. She needed a minute to calm down and get her wits about her.
“Okay, Anna, what just happened?” she asked, looking at herself in the rearview mirror. “Be rational.”
Right, rational. Well. She’d been painting the forest scene and been overjoyed at the idea that she’d painted something so normal. She’d hoped that meant she was done painting the Dark Man. And then she’d seen him right in front of her own eyes. Despite the fact that the air in the Jeep wasn’t that cool, she shivered. The lights had gone out and she’d seen a pair of floating glowing eyes, like something right out of a spooky movie. And then the man had somehow made it outside and she’d driven through him but then he hadn’t been there when she’d looked.
That about summed it up.
Still staring at herself, Anna yawned until her eyes watered. Her gaze dropped to the clock on the console. Nearly one in the morning.
Given the long nights painting, how drained she felt after wrenching these images out of her head and onto the canvas, and the all-nighter she’d pulled on Thursday, she was exhausted. And strung out. Plus, she really hadn’t eaten much of the chili she’d made for dinner.
Chuckles bubbled up Anna’s throat. The stupid Dark Man wasn’t in her studio or her driveway. He was in her head. And she’d just totally spooked herself when the lights went out. That’s all.
She felt ridiculous, like a young kid who’d watched a horror movie all alone and then couldn’t go anywhere in the house without turning every light on and checking every closet.
Shaking her head, Anna pulled a U-ey and came to a rest at the stop sign. A left took her back to the studio where, she realized, she’d left her phone in the stereo dock. A right took her home.
Anna looked both ways, debating. One of the reasons she hated scary movies was because some female character always went searching through a dark house investigating a weird noise while you screamed at the television for her not to be an idiot because the serial killer was hiding behind the door. Annnd that thought did it. The irrational scaredy-cat inside her gave an aw, hell no! and said she could come back for her phone in the morning. With one last glance to the left, Anna turned right and headed home. She clearly needed a very good night of sleep.
Chapter Three
Anna sat on the front porch swing, nursing a cup of coffee and listening to the sound of the rain that had been parked over Jarrettsville for the past two days. Despite getting seven hours of sleep, she didn’t feel the least bit refreshed. Instead, she’d woken up with a headache and with a fogginess in her brain she couldn’t quite make go away. Her CFS, no doubt, which the late nights of painting were clearly not helping.
The constant exhaustion had set in about six months before. She’d come back from running one morning and had suddenly felt as if someone had laid a lead blanket over her head. After a whole day in bed, she’d dragged herself to the doctor certain she’d come down with the flu. But the exhaustion, muscle and joint achiness, headaches, and feeling of fogginess never went away. After several more doctors’ visits, they’d diagnosed her with chronic fatigue syndrome. Now here she was, twenty-nine years old, solely responsible for the care of her sick father, and so tired she could let herself fall over on the swing and sleep all day.
Instead, she sipped her coffee and scanned the street, her gaze going from Mr. Hendrick’s house next door to the empty house for sale across the street to the Nolans’ house on the other side. Everything was quiet and still. Yet she had the strangest feeling she wasn’t alone.
Knock, knock. “Tessa, what are you doing out there?” came a muffled voice that startled her. Coffee almost sloshed out of her cup she’d jumped so badly. But it was just her father, Garrett, confusing her once again with her mother, who’d died eight years earlier, the year before his dementia had set in and Anna had boxed up her life in New York City to move home and take care of him.
She peered over her shoulder to the window, where her father had pulled the living room curtain aside and was staring out at her. “I’ll be right there, Dad,” she said, loud enough for him to hear through the glass.
Anna’s shoulders sagged. Alzheimer’s had stolen from her father twice over—first in making him forget what he’d lost, and second in rendering him incapable of even knowing he’d forgotten. Yet he could still recite case law and play the piano beautifully without ever needing a sheet of music. Tears pricked at the back of Anna’s eyes. Alzheimer’s didn’t only steal from its victim. As much as love and loyalty had led her to put her dreams on hold and return home to care for her dad, the pain of knowing he wasn’t really there anymore made it damn hard not to wish the disease—or something—would set them both free once and for all. She really hated herself for those thoughts. She’d lost her big brother, Michael, when she was fourteen and her mother when she was twenty-two, so her dad was all she had left.
Two more knocks sounded against the windowpane. “Tessa, I think you should come in now,” Garrett said louder, discomfort slipping into his voice and pulling her from her thoughts. In the past few months, he’d become anxious about venturing from the house. His anxiety extended to her leaving, too, so much so that she was now reduced to sneaking out of the house like a teenager.
Blinking away the tears, she got up and heaved a deep breath. Staring at her reflection in the storm door, she practiced smiling. Everything stressed her father out these days, so her illness was yet another secret she carried. Putting on a chipper face, she stepped inside, closed the door, and leaned against the arch that led into the living room, still decorated the way her mother had remodeled it years before she’d died. “I’m here, Dad.”
“What were you doing?” he asked, staring up at her from his recliner. He’d slept there last night, which meant he’d had a bad night, too. Even though he’d be sixty-eight next month, his hair remained mostly brown and he didn’t appear much older than he’d ever looked to her. For the millionth time, she wished the father she’d admired her whole life were actually here with her. Once, he’d been able to deduce whether she was happy or sad in just one glance. Now, he often didn’t know who she was.
“Just listening to the rain.”
He frowned. “What day is it?” he asked, the question part of their morning routine.
“Sunday, September fifteenth.” She glanced at the clock over the mantel. “And it’s nine o’clock,” she added. For some reason, repeating the date and time seemed to help him grapple with his increased confusion. “Are you ready for breakfast?”
His shoulders relaxed and he settled against the backrest. “What are you making?”
“Omelets?” she asked.
“No veggies. I don’t like o
melets with veggies.”
She sighed and walked toward the door to the kitchen. “Nope, no veggies. Sausage and cheese.”
Her dad’s smile was instant, like the reaction you got if you told a kid he could have a piece of candy. This man had been an intellectual giant in the field of corporate law, and now forgot to get up from his chair during the day. At all. If she asked him to do it or tried to help him do it, he’d get angry and refuse. But if she dangled a carrot in front of him—or, in this case, a sausage and cheese omelet—he’d often manage it.
Anna rounded the doorway and got to work. She’d browned and diced the sausage before her dad had awakened, so all she needed to do now was throw everything together in the skillet and make some toast. As the savory smells wafted through the kitchen, Anna nearly held her breath to see if it would be enough to tempt him out of his chair. The moment he became immobile—whether it was because his body or his mind stopped working didn’t really matter—would be when she finally had to confront the question of putting him in a home, something he’d once made her promise never to do. She busied herself with setting the table.
A creaking sound came from the living room, and Anna let out a long breath. Her dad entered the kitchen and paused at the end of the counter, watching as she slid his omelet onto a plate. “Smells good,” he said.
She smiled up at him, struck again that there was one thing dementia hadn’t managed to steal—his commanding height that had always left her feeling small and safe and protected. “Come sit down.” He took his seat at the old kitchen table as she brought their plates over and refilled their coffee.
Her dad dug in immediately, his lack of commentary expressing his approval of the food. When something displeased him these days, he let her know it. Once, Garrett Fallston had been a master storyteller, barely allowing others a word in edgewise. Not that anyone had ever minded, because her dad had always had the ability to keep a crowded table in stitches so that you hardly knew where the night had gone. Now, even if she told him about her day or asked him questions, he rarely said a word when they ate together.
She took a big forkful, and as the spice of the sausage warmed her mouth, a suffocating sadness flooded into her chest. Sometimes life took and took and took, even from good people who deserved every happiness. Anna looked across the table at the man she’d idolized her entire life, the man who’d always been her biggest source of encouragement and support, the man who’d taught her by example that following dreams and taking risks and swinging for the fence were how you got the most out of life. This man deserved happiness and dignity if anyone did. Her emotions darkened, and rage had the edge of the metal fork cutting into her fingers.
On the heels of the anger, a hazy image flashed into her mind, a variation on a stream of similar images she’d been seeing lately. The Dark Man standing in front of bars. For a moment, she clenched her eyes against the onslaught even as she felt the claws of compulsion slinking around her brain. “Want more?” Anna said, forcing herself out of her head and into the here and now.
Her father finished the last of his toast and brushed his fingers off over the plate. “Nope. You did good, Tess. Just the way I like it.”
Anna took a deep breath and faked a smile. She didn’t even look like her mother, who had had brown hair to Anna’s own pale blond. “I’m glad.”
He wiped his mouth and left the table for the living room, where he’d settle in with the Sunday newspapers and some morning talk shows. She brought him more coffee, a bottle of water, and a bowl of his favorite snack—popcorn, which she knew was all he needed to be content for the next few hours. Anna employed a home health aide during the week so she could paint and teach occasional art classes at the community center, but on the weekend, she could sneak out only after her dad had gone to bed or while he was deep in the midst of routine. Like now. The one positive consequence of her father’s forgetfulness about getting up and his anxiety about going outside was that she could often leave him long enough to run errands without his even noticing. Luckily, his Alzheimer’s hadn’t resulted in any wandering problems. So far, at least. And since they lived in such a small town, everyone he passed would know who he was and call her right away even if he did.
Her dad all squared away, Anna resolved to return to her studio in the light of day to retrieve her phone and, more importantly, prove to herself nothing was amiss. She grabbed her keys and purse, sneaked out the back door, and tiptoed down the wooden steps that led to the driveway. Her gaze landed on the dent and scratches. Man, she’d really done a number on it, hadn’t she?
In the Jeep, she met her own gaze in the rearview mirror and rolled her eyes. Good thing no one had seen how she’d behaved last night, because she felt so stupid about having freaked out and fled just because she thought she saw something.
In less than fifteen minutes she was turning into the lot that surrounded her studio. An old barn that had once served as a general store, it was red with a metal gambrel roof. A wide porch jutted off the front, and she remembered from when she was younger eating farm-fresh ice cream at the tables with umbrellas that had then filled the space. Puddles splashed and gravel crunched under her tires as she pulled around to the rear.
Anna absolutely hated that a flicker of anxiety—or maybe it was just anticipation?—ran through her belly.
She’d been to this place a thousand times to paint, always alone, and she’d never once freaked herself out as she had last night. No way she’d let getting a little spooked take away from the refuge she’d found here.
Without painting, she just might go stark raving mad.
Right. So. Anna gave the back door a hard stare and then hopped out of the Jeep and into the never-ending rain.
Frustration roared through her when she paused with her hand on the knob. Finally, she yanked open the door and stepped out of the wet morning and into the cool darkness of the main room. Except, when she secured the door behind her, she noticed that it wasn’t dark. The light in the room she used as her studio was on. The one that had been off when she’d left the night before.
“Okay, Anna, that’s easy enough to explain. The power went out and when it came back on, the light was still on from last night,” she said out loud, just to add sound to the quiet stillness surrounding her. Quiet…because her music wasn’t playing. Obviously, the battery had run out on her phone overnight. “See? Everything’s fine,” she said. “Stop being stupid.”
Anna settled her purse and keys on the counter, one of the many counters, display cases, and shelves that had been left all over the main room, and stepped to the door of her studio, which had probably been a storeroom in another lifetime.
Everything was just as she’d left it. And no one else was here. Tension melted out of her shoulders and she released a long breath. This new subject had her so out of sorts that she was seeing things.
“Damnit,” she muttered as she walked up to her worktable. Her idiocy last night prevented her from cleaning her brushes or sealing her palette. Now her brushes were stiff as a board and the paint in the tray was hard. She collected everything and went back out to the main room. Tucked against the closest wall was a counter with a sink in it, where the ice cream display had once been. She let the water run until it turned hot, pulled the plug so the sink would fill, and added a lot of dish soap. Soaking the palette and brushes would make them usable again.
Just as the brushes submerged beneath the bubbles, an image slammed into Anna’s brain.
The Dark Man standing in front of bars, this time with someone on the far side.
Not again. Not so soon.
Anna grasped the edge of the sink and bowed her head as the image continued to form and sharpen in her mind’s eye. Prison bars, and the person on the other side was a prisoner. And, oh God, he was shackled to the wall.
Compulsion roared through her like a drug.
She whimpered as the force of the feeling seized her, overtook her, possessed her.
“No. I’m no
t doing it right now,” she said, hearing the weakness in her own voice. But even as she turned and walked back to the studio, her mind was already deciding which canvas to use and seeing the colors she’d need for the painting.
She grabbed a new palette and pulled a thin sponge layer from the bottom that helped keep the quick-drying acrylic paints moist. Back out at the sink, Anna dampened and wrung out the sponge, then returned to her easel. The image growing in strength and intensity in her mind made her stomach squeeze and her heart hurt. Never in a million years would she come up with such a thing on her own.
Then where are these images coming from?
The question stopped her cold, a tube of paint in her hands. She couldn’t begin to answer that. All she knew was the need to get the image out of her head. And there was only one way to do that.
Soon, she had her paints prepared, new brushes and knives ready, and her canvas selected. As she stared at the paints, they took on their colors. But as with every other time she’d done one of these paintings, they weren’t vibrant, but dull. Not bright, but dark. Like some sort of filter had been placed between her eyes and the world.
The thought sent a shudder down her spine.
Forcing the chaos in her mind away, Anna dipped her paint into the gray and stepped to the canvas. Motion captured her attention from the corner of her eye.
The Dark Man stood in the doorway and leaned against the jamb.
Anna jumped and her pulse raced, but this time, anger flooded in instead of fear. “I will deal with you on my own damn terms,” she said, taking a perverse amount of pleasure from putting a figment of her imagination in its place. Because that’s all he was.
He didn’t move or speak. Not that he could, since, you know. Figment. Of. Imagination.
Anna rolled her eyes, done with being scared and so pissed to have to do this again that she was nearly out of her mind. “I’m doing your damn painting already. So just leave me alone.” She cut her gaze back to the expanse of white, but the desire to see if his image would still be there if she looked again drove her to distraction.