Waking Nightmare

by Kylie Brant

  And she wished, quite desperately, that this man wasn’t the first one to elicit this sharp-edged longing in her.

  There wasn’t enough hot water to erase the darkness of Abbie’s mood, but it helped, as it always did, to concentrate on the case. She was anxious to learn what she could about Karen Larsen. She wasn’t particularly eager to spend the day with Ryne, but the sooner they got their relationship back to a professional footing, the better.

  Shutting off the water, she grabbed a towel and briskly dried her hair before wrapping it around herself. Immersing themselves in a new aspect of the case would ease the awkwardness between them. Logically, she knew that. Now if she could just put logic ahead of emotion, she’d be ready to face him again.

  She finished her morning rituals with lightning speed, then headed to the bedroom, mind still lingering on the morning ahead of her. She reached for the light switch and flipped it on, then froze.

  Ryne should have been gone. Certainly she’d given him every opportunity to take the easy way out. Every man she knew would have accepted the chance to make his escape.

  But then, she’d never met a man like Ryne Robel.

  He was fully dressed, sitting on the corner of the bed, hands clasped between his open legs, his gaze on her. And his voice, when he spoke, was husky, but determined. “You and I have a few things to get straight before we . . .”

  He stopped, and she realized in an instant what had distracted him. She snatched her hand away from the light switch but he was already on his feet, striding toward her. He caught her by the shoulders when she would have turned away, took one of her arms in his hand and turned it upward. Her gaze followed the direction of his, toward the crisscrossing of old scars lining her inner arm from above the elbow to the wrist. Scars that had been hidden from him last night by her shirt. By the dark.

  Most of them were white now. Those that still remained pink and puckered had been deeper than the rest, and would never truly fade. The observation was detached, as though it had originated from someone else.

  Ryne let her arm drop, repeated his examination of the other. And when he looked at her again, it was with that same impassive mask she remembered from the first time they’d met. The same little smile that had nothing to do with humor. “You a cutter, Abbie?”

  She flinched, pulled away from him, and this time he let her go. Feeling strangely ancient, she moved toward her closet, although she wasn’t about to dress in front of him. Regardless, it was imperative that she establish distance, physically at least. “What are you still doing here?”

  “You’re changing the subject.”

  “It’s the only subject I’m interested in discussing.”

  “Those scars are too straight, too even, not to have come from razor blades. Either you did it yourself, or . . .” His voice broke off, and then he was by her side in two long strides. “Did someone abuse you? Was it your sister?”

  Callie. Her stomach turned over. Oh, God, she did not want to get into this. Not now. Not with him. “Callie never hurt me.” Not really. Just the opposite. And that was the source of all her sister’s problems, wasn’t it? Prolonging her own pain to save Abbie. She released a long shuddering breath. “It was a long time ago, Ryne. And it’s absolutely none of your business.”

  He cupped her shoulders with his hands, gave her a little shake. “That’s bullshit. Last night made it my business.”

  “Last night?” She tried for an incredulous laugh, failed miserably. “So we bare our souls because of one night of sex, is that it? In that case, you go first. Why don’t you tell me the whole story about what happened in Boston? The real reason behind your move to Savannah?”

  She saw his expression go blank, and allowed herself a bitter little smile. “So last night gave you rights to pry into my life, but none for me, is that it? Are personal disclosures linked to number of orgasms? Because if so, I’m pretty sure we’re close to even on that score.”

  His eyes burned into hers, angry in a way she couldn’t quite fathom. “You’re right, it isn’t fair. You don’t owe me any explanations, but you’re going to give them to me anyway. You know why? Because seeing those scars planted an image in my head. Of you, in the past, hurt and bleeding. And I don’t want that picture there. You have no idea how much I don’t want it. So either you tell me or I’ll get the answers another way.” At her silence, he gave her a nod, released her to step away. “All right then. I’ll have Callie picked up and ask her. Somehow I think she’ll be more forthcoming.”

  Panic sprinted up her spine. Callie had seemed close to the edge last night already. The last thing she needed was to be pressed about their past. It was, after all, the cause of all her sister’s problems. She grabbed Ryne’s sleeve as he would have turned away. “Leave my sister out of this. You’re not going to manipulate me again into revealing something that’s none of your business. I’m not a suspect you’re interrogating. Stop treating me like one.”

  Temper ignited, he gritted out, “No, you’re not a suspect, you’re a woman I . . .” He stopped, as if shocked by the incomplete thought. Voice raw, he continued, “You matter, okay? To me. You probably shouldn’t, but there it is. And whatever happened to you . . . it matters, too. And believe me, that scares me more than it does you.”

  His words acted as a fast right jab to the solar plexus. Inwardly reeling, she stared at him, grappling with his revelation. She’d have suspected him of using words to get his way if he didn’t look so miserable at having uttered them.

  Shaken, she turned away. She couldn’t think, couldn’t reason, while looking at the concern etched on his face.

  But her thought processes scattered even further when he crowded close to her, drawing her back to lean against him, skating his hands down her arms and up again. “I’m the last person to judge, you need to know that. And if you really can’t tell me . . .” He hesitated, long enough for her to realize how hard the words were for him to say. “I’ll try to leave it alone.”

  His last statement abruptly deflated her, had all the fight streaming away on a shuddering sigh. His thumbs brushed against the skin on her inner arms. She wondered what he’d say if she told him that sometimes the scars still throbbed with a phantom pain that owed nothing to the physical. Or how long it had taken her to break herself of the habit of rubbing those scars whenever she felt threatened.

  Such futile battles, really, in the scheme of things. Just as holding out against his concern was. After all these years, no one could be hurt by the truth anymore. The damage had been done long ago.

  “Callie is four years older than me. She was ten when my father started raping her.” She felt him jerk against her, was glad she couldn’t see his face. It was easier, far easier, to pretend she was talking to herself.

  “I don’t know how old I was when I realized what was going on. Not completely, of course.” Children couldn’t really fathom that kind of horror until they were thrust in the midst of it. “But I knew he was hurting her. Going to her room in the middle of the night and doing ‘bad things.’ Things that made her cry and bleed. Things little girls don’t know how to describe to someone else.”

  His voice was raw in her ear. “Your mother?”

  “Died of pneumonia when I was only a couple years old. We moved around a lot. He worked for a big construction company. We went where their projects were.” The years were a blur of new neighborhoods, new schools. She could see now how their lifestyle worked to keep them isolated. Kept them from establishing any relationships that could lead to them entrusting someone with their secret. She’d always wonder if that had been part of her father’s plan.

  “I was eight the first time he came to my room.” She was barely aware of Ryne behind her. Unaware of his stillness. His held breath. The past had sucked her in, sucked her down. And the memories still burned. “He didn’t get in. As soon as we’d moved to that house, Callie put a lock on the inside of my room. I have no idea where she got it. How she knew to install it. But she did
and made me swear I’d use it every night.” So he’d stay outside the door and whisper to her, his voice coaxing and threatening by turns. While she shook and prayed in the darkness to be delivered from something she couldn’t even fully understand.

  “And how long did the lock keep him away?”

  She knew what he was asking, but she shook her head. “Callie made sure he never came in. She would . . . distract him.” Offer herself as sacrifice to keep him from brutalizing Abbie. How did someone repay a debt so steep? Especially knowing it had most likely cost her sister her mental health?

  Ryne’s body was strong and steady behind hers. It was tempting, so tempting, to lean against his strength for just a moment. She refused to allow herself even that small indulgence. If there was one thing her past had taught her, it was the danger of relying on anyone but herself.

  “One night I was so scared he was going to get inside that I tried to get out the window. Ended up breaking it and cutting my arm on the broken glass.” She stopped, her throat closing at the memory. There was no way to describe that slash of pain, starkly pure and somehow beautiful. No way to explain what had made her reach for a shard again once she heard the footsteps, still clad in work boots, move heavily past her room and down the hall in response to her sister’s call. And every time she’d hear Callie cry out, she’d bring that shard of glass across her arm again. As if the infliction of pain could absolve her of responsibility for the agony her sister was experiencing, on her behalf.

  “I graduated to blades later.” Her voice was flat. She knew better than to tell him that Callie had bought them for her. He would never understand how the two of them had bonded over shared suffering. Only through her training, and the distance of adulthood, did she understand how dark and twisted that reasoning had been. But at the time it had made perfect sense.

  His voice was tight. “Is he alive?”

  She warmed at the grim intent in his voice. She could have told him that no one could right old wrongs. There was nothing to do but find a way to live with them. But it touched something inside her that he felt the need to do so.

  “He died when I was ten. We were in foster homes after that.” And once the truth had been shared with a caseworker, there had been long-term therapy, for both her and Callie. It had probably saved her life. It had been less effective for her sister.

  He didn’t utter any meaningless platitudes, for which she was grateful. There was nothing to say, and they both knew it. Abbie dreaded turning around, seeing for the first time the difference in his expression. If he looked at her with unease or—worse yet—pity, their working relationship would be strained unbearably. Their personal relationship would be irreparable.

  But there was no opportunity to turn around, not then. Instead, his arms tightened around her, and his chin rested lightly against her hair. And as he held her, the silent understanding he offered was in many ways more healing than time, more therapeutic than all the years spent in a therapist’s office.

  Slowly, as if operating absent of conscious thought, her hands came up to cover his. And for an instant, she allowed herself to let go and enjoy his warmth. His embrace. And the steady solid feel of his strength as she leaned her weight against him.

  Just for a moment.

  The beer can hurtled through the air, crashing into the television set controls, abruptly silencing the pious news anchor. The fucking talking heads on the local news kept going on about Ashley Hornby’s suicide. And every time the news story ran, that familiar rage boiled up all over again, spilled over.

  The cowardly cunt had ruined everything. Everything. All the thought and planning that had gone into arranging her experience, and she hadn’t even had the courage to accept her destiny. Instead she’d taken the easy way out and ruined the whole thing.

  With the sweep of an arm, the contents of the table were sent flying to the floor. She’d been flawed. Weak. And—the fact couldn’t be escaped—she’d been a mistake. The whore hadn’t had the strength to face her fate.

  Fists clenched. Temper hazed vision. It was getting harder and harder to keep that old rage leashed, channeled into the one thing that gave it purpose. Errors couldn’t be tolerated. There was too much at stake to waste it all on an undeserving bitch like Hornby.

  A deep breath. Then another. Slowly, tension eased out of a body stiff as a board. The next one would be better. Perfect. Laura Bradford would be a masterpiece. And nothing would be allowed to go wrong. The rest of her life would be a horror, and she’d live through every second of it, as she was meant to.

  And that horror was going to begin even sooner than originally planned.

  Chapter 14

  “You’re sure she’s home?”

  Abbie shrugged at Ryne’s question and rang the doorbell again. “She said she’d be here until she leaves for her eleven o’clock shift. It’s only ten.” Her phone conversation with Karen Larsen had been brief, but the woman had sounded open to speaking with them. Of course, when she’d immediately assumed Abbie was calling about the investigation into her house fire, Abbie had done little to make her think otherwise. They knew the woman was skittish about the details of the case. She and Ryne had formed a game plan for this interview prior to making the contact.

  A voice sounded from inside the house. “Just a minute.”

  Abbie glanced at Ryne. His burgundy shirt was the only splash of color against his black suit and tie. Dark sunglasses hid his eyes.

  Despite her trepidation after their conversation this morning, it had been amazingly easy to face him again at headquarters, and she knew she had Ryne to thank for that. When she’d entered, she’d found him at his desk, poring over Larsen’s arson investigation report. Other than an initial searching glance, he’d been all business as he’d given her a run down of what he’d learned so far. It had been simple to follow his lead.

  She could almost forget that the revelation she’d shared with him hadn’t been entrusted to anyone else in years. Not since her third interview with Raiker, prior to being hired. And that had been unavoidable. Adam Raiker didn’t tolerate secrets.

  And now, apparently, she’d met another man who demanded the same level of candor. She was less sure how she felt about that.

  The door opened as far as the security chain would allow. “Yes?”

  “Ms. Larsen?” Abbie recognized the woman from a photo that had been included in the arson case file. She shifted to position herself in the woman’s view. “I’m Abbie Phillips. We spoke on the phone earlier. With me is Detective Robel.”

  “I’m going to need to see some ID.”

  Ryne held his shield up where she could see it, and the door closed. The rattle of a chain sounded and then the door opened to reveal a woman wearing what Abbie thought of as the new medical uniform: patterned smock, white pants, and pink rubber crocs.

  “Sorry. I’m still a little nervous after all that’s happened.” Larsen stepped back and waved them inside.

  “Perfectly understandable.” Abbie gave her an encouraging smile and glanced quickly around the small living area. The house was slightly bigger than the one she was staying in, and sparsely furnished. But there were fresh flowers in a vase on the TV. Some framed prints on the wall. Brightly colored throw pillows were placed on the couch. The room was as tidy in appearance as was the woman herself.

  Larsen’s dark blond curls fell to her shoulders, framing a narrow face, carefully made up. Her lipstick was the exact shade of the polish on her neatly manicured nails, and the small hoop earrings she wore. “This is about the fire, right? Because I’d really like to get things settled with my insurance company. I lost all my things and I can’t afford to buy much until I know what the settlement is going to be.”

  “We’d like to talk to you about the fire, if you have a few moments.” Ryne took his glasses off and indicated for the woman to sit. She looked from him to Abbie and back again before sinking slowly onto the couch.

  “Where’s Officer O’Hare? He’s the one I’
ve always dealt with before.”

  “He’s still active on your investigation,” Ryne replied. “We’re here because there’s a possibility that your case is related to one we’re working on.”

  The woman looked puzzled. “I don’t understand. The fire was started by a candle I left burning that caught my bedroom drapes on fire. Stupidly careless on my part, I admitted that. But how could my case be connected to any others?”

  Ryne sat on the opposite end of the couch, facing her. “Some details in the fire investigator’s report caught my attention. For instance, there was some burned cable near your bed that has been identified as electrical cord.” He waited a beat. “Since most people don’t keep it lying around, it raises some questions.”

  Larsen sent a quick glance toward Abbie, as if looking for help, found none forthcoming. “Exactly what kind of case are you two working on?”

  “The cord?” Abbie pressed.

  Larsen lifted a shoulder jerkily. “I had some leftover TV cable in a closet from when I had cable installed. But it wasn’t connected to anything. I’m not sure what that could have to do with the fire.”

  Cable wiring and electrical cord were two very different things, but Ryne let it pass. His interest in the woman, however, deepened. He pretended to consult his notebook . “You told the investigator that you’d been out earlier that evening at some nightclubs.”

  Larsen flushed, and her gaze dropped to her hands, linked in her lap. “I’d had a bad day. I decided to go out for a few drinks, something I never do. I mean, hardly ever. And yeah, I was pretty wasted when I got home, which is the only reason I would have been so careless with the candle.”

  “And the locks on your doors.”

  She looked up sharply at Abbie’s words. “What do you mean?”