“I tried not to wake you.”
“I was only dozing. What are you doing?”
“Keeping watch over you.”
“I don’t need watching over.”
“Yes you do, Dylan,” he said somberly. “You do.”
“I’m still not convinced that Roland poses a threat to me. But even if that is so, no one in the world could find me here.”
Back toRoland, he thought with irritation. “That’s why I brought you here. No one can find you. But say someone did, that big room out there is too much distance between us.”
She glanced at the nightstand. “Is the gun necessary?”
“I hope not. But no sudden moves, please. I chambered a bullet.”
“Why all these safety measures? What’s happened?”
“My hunch was right. Someone went to check your house.”
“How do you know?”
“I’m a cop.” Her huff of annoyance annoyed him. “Just trust me on this, all right? I’m here, and I’m staying.”
“For how long?”
“Till daylight.”
“Then what?”
“Then… I don’t know. I’m thinking. Go back to sleep.”
She lay still for a time before turning onto her side toward him. “Don’t take this as surrender. I just don’t know what choice I have.”
“None.”
“With you injured and in a weakened state, I might manage to overpower you and escape. But I doubt I’d get very far in a swamp teeming with life-threatening hazards.”
Hearing the irony in her tone, he turned his head on the pillow and pretended to consider her chances of success. “You’re fit. You might make it as far as the camo garage.”
“If by some miracle I found it, I wouldn’t know how to get into it.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Those locking mechanisms areintricate. But you’ve got a doctorate, don’t forget. You might figure them out. However,” he said, holding up his index finger, “even if you did get into the garage, I’ve hidden the keys to both vehicles.”
“And confiscated my phone.”
“There’s that,” he said. “So…”
“So I’m pretty much stuck.”
“Pretty much.”
They exchanged smiles, then he turned serious. “I’m sorry I badgered you into talking about your husband. I wanted to know why you’re inside that bell jar, why you keep a grip on self-control like you’re afraid that if you loosened it even a fraction, you would fly apart. Now I know why.” He looked at her with regret. “I hadn’t counted on it being that bad.”
Pensively, she stared at a spot beyond his shoulder before meeting his gaze again. “I think I needed to talk about it. I hadn’t really done so in years, not since I went into practice.”
“How’d that come about?”
