I nearly stumbled, catching my balance before I fell. I stared at my hands, my torn wrists, hardly able to see them in the dark. Not until my eyes adjusted, anyway.
“I’m back,” I muttered. “How’d I do it? And can I go back to being – thatthing?”
I didn’t know, and now wasn’t the time to experiment. I dodged the rubble to get to the truck and yank the door open. The keys weren’t in it. “Fuck.”
They had to be in his pocket. I stepped on loose boards, tripped over bricks, and knelt beside him. Fear seized my throat as I expected him to rise up, grin, and attack me. He didn’t move. I set my hands to his shoulder and heaved, rolling him onto his back.
His glazed eyes gazed up at the stars. He was dead all right.
I searched his body for the keys and found them in his right front jeans pocket. For a moment, I considered searching further for his wallet, his ID, to put a name to his face, his evil. Deciding that wasn’t important, I recrossed the remains of the house to the truck.
It started with a roar. I popped on the headlights and put it in drive.
“I hope I can find my way home.”
Chapter Twelve
Brody
“Lindsey!”
There was no mistaking the swirl of black hair as she spun around. Her pale, round features floated ghostlike in the dimness. Her slender frame outlined against the outside lights was clearly her. She made no move to defend herself, never lifted her arms even as I raised the letter opener high.
I checked my headlong rush, dropped the silly weapon, heard it strike the floor with aping.“Lindsey, oh, God.”
She said nothing as I enfolded her into my arms. She didn’t fight me, either, but slid her arms around my neck. Slowly, as though needing to feel her way. Her face buried in my chest, I thought I heard a soft, choked off sob. I wanted to hold her all night, never let her go.
Keeping her with me, I edged toward the switch and flipped the light on. Lindsey, dirty, disheveled, nearly black circles under her eyes, peered up at me. I cupped her pale cheeks and kissed her lightly, briefly.
“Thank God you got away,” I muttered thickly, my bristled cheek against hers. “He gave me two days to find who stole his shit. Two days. I didn’t know if I could find the thief in time.”
Still, Lindsey said nothing. I caressed her hair, swiping it back from her face. Confused, worried, I stepped back and looked at her. And saw the damage done to her wrists.
“Holy God,” I whispered, lifting her hands to take a closer look at her torn and bloody wrists. Black with dried blood, her skin peeled away, I saw the rope threads buried deep in her flesh. “Oh, Lindsey.”
“He was going to rape me,” she murmured, her voice listless, devoid of all emotion.
“Where is he now?” I demanded, my anger surging. “Lindsey, where is he?”
“Dead.”
“Good. Okay, good. I think you’re in shock –”
“No.”
“No? I don’t know if you’re any judge – nor am I for that matter –”
“Did you do this to me?”
Stunned by the question, I blinked. “What?”
“Did you steal Rivers’s dope? Are you a dealer?”
“God, no.” My breath left my chest, thus forcing me to speak in a whisper. “Lindsey, I swear to you, I never stole his shit. I’d never deal in that.”
At her continually blank expression, I dropped to my knee, my hands gently holding hers. As though I proposed marriage, I gazed up at her. “Lindsey, I can’t prove it now, but I will. I didn’t steal from him. I’m not a dealer. Rivers will die for what he’s done to you. I swear it.”
“Did you murder your wife?”
