How to find a person in the dark, in an empty void? Shout for all you’re worth.
“Darin!”
After a quick break for air, Barbie tried again. “Hey! Darin! You here?”
Startled crickets hushed for several seconds, then recommenced, rubbing their anorexic legs together in an encore chorus of what ever they had been playing. Sounded like Dvorák.
“Hey! Darin!” Barbie called. “You left something in my apartment.” Me.
A snapped twig brought Barbie around in a frazzle of nerves. Another snap, and she whirled again. Never particularly good at directions, she lost all sense of where the parking lot was.
“Great.”
She had been stupid to think this might work. She’d deserve Angie’s wrath if she ever made it back to the streetlamp alive. Of course, Angie would have cookies and eventually maybe a modicum of sympathy. That was some small solace.
And, wow! There was a light up ahead! She grinned. “Gotcha, you ego buster. You. . .you. . .”
She trotted briskly toward the pinpoint of light, not giving a thought to stray heads or body parts, until something caused a hitch in her gait. A noise. Something digging in soft dirt? An animal? Coyotes? Wolves? Big dogs gone astray? Think Hound of the Baskervilles. There were also movies about grave robbers after gold fillings and wedding rings, not to mention certain human organs.
Barbie’s feet stopped of their own accord. The puffs of her breath filled the night, joining the sounds of the crickets. The light seemed no closer. The parking lot, hidden out there somewhere, might as well have been on Mars. She was totally screwed! Her parents had once warned her about her temper, and they’d been right. Why hadn’t they gotten her some help?
“Darin!” Her shout was fainter this time, less demanding. Sensing possible disaster, mind looping half with fear, half with adrenaline, Barbie wondered if Angie had gotten her message, if her pal was already out the door in what was going to turn out to be a true rescue mission.
“Loss of will is not acceptable,” she muttered to the dark. “Not for a Bradley. Besides Dad’s being a judge, my big brothers are defense attorneys. I might have an ancestor or two buried close to where I’m standing. What would they think of a chicken in the family? A big chicken who’s afraid of the dark?” She wasn’t going to wait around to find out.
Encouraging her feet forward, Barbie scrambled through the brush, heading in the direction of the light. A flashlight would have been handy, she realized, wishing she’d learned her lesson from her last trip to the cemetery. A semiautomatic weapon wouldn’t have hurt, either.
Stumbling through a thick, scratchy patch of greenery, she came up on a building so fast that she almost smacked her head on it. Backpedaling, catching herself in time to avoid a fall, she faced the building, pulse pounding.
The building wasn’t wide enough or tall enough to be a caretaker’s cottage, but was much larger than an out house. It stood smack-dab in the center, maybe, of the cemetery. Which meant it was a. . .crypt?
Geez. Yes. A crypt. She was so out of there.
Spinning on her heels, digging in with all the rubber left on her running shoes, she made a dash in the opposite direction . . .and belly-flopped over a gravestone.
More noise came from the bushes. Barbie wasn’t sure if it was to her right or left as she scrambled onto all fours and then to her feet. There was another near miss, this time involving her left knee and a concrete urn. More cusses. Very unpious.
Bush-rustling sounds came, closer this time. Barbie’s heart leapt out of her chest, beating so rapidly that her neck actually thumped. Someone was there, in the greenery. Someone or something.
Her voice was strangled as she spoke. “Hello? Darin? You there?”
That’s all she got out.
Chapter Twenty
Barbie was broadsided by a hurtling ball of energy that first knocked her to the ground, then socked the air out of her.
“Help!” she shouted when she could breathe. “Help!”
Footsteps sounded, then, “Barbie? What the. . .? Dog, off! Come!”
The weight on Barbie’s chest remained, growing heavier by the second and emitting a ferociously guttural growl.
“Dog! Off!”
The weight lifted. Barbie struggled to her feet, shaking so hard she had quite a time remaining upright.
“Barbie? What are you doing here?”
Darin’s voice. Bingo. Thank God. Heaps of relief flooded Barbie, though Darin remained hidden beneath the shelter of some drippy old trees. Swaying slightly, she heard another low growl and turned her head. A blob of darkness crept into the moonlight, an obscenely huge dog. The beast Darin had called off of her. The beast that had likely ripped his Porsche’s seats.
She pointed at it. “Does that thing eat people or what?”
“Dog is a Rottweiler,” Darin replied. “A guard animal. He’s menacing in the dark to strangers, but nice enough when you get to know him.”
“You sure?” Barbie’s heart continued to pound.
“Reasonably. What are you doing here, Barbie? Are you all right? I left you safe in your apartment.”
Dang. Darin’s voice registered concern. Barbie suffered a pang of guilt, considering his warnings of the previous night, but she recovered quickly. Why had she come all the way out here? So what if he happened to be the first guy she had been interested in for a long while? So what if his proximity made her all rubbery inside? The truth was, he had exited early, shaking her up, thus making this unexpected visit a necessity, because she hadn’t gotten the precise time and place of her next date.
Good grief, that excuse was lame, and the only one she had.
Dog, if that’s what the thing really was, being hip high and as wide as a compact truck, fussed near her feet. Uncomfortable with this, Barbie took some time to get herself in order.
“You tucked me into bed,” she said scornfully. “But you forgot something.”
Trying desperately to rekindle the anger she’d felt at being dumped in such a way, Barbie sensed some of that emotion reawaken, albeit in the form of a much smaller flame. An almost non ex is tent flame, to be precise.
Darin stood beneath the overhang of a giant tree, branches draped around him. She could see his outline, though little else. It seemed to her that Darin might be keeping about as far from her as he could get.
“You forgot good-byes and good nights,” Barbie explained, hands on hips, feet apart. “Perhaps you aren’t brushed up on manners, communing out here with all the dead people.”
Darin’s voice now rang with relief. Maybe disbelief, too. “You came all the way out here for a good-bye?”
“My parents made sure I had social skills.”
Darin took a baby step forward. “I mentioned there would be many more opportunities to get to know each other. I left you safe and sound at home.”
“Ah-ha!” Barbie snapped. “How do you know I was. . .sound?”
The moon ducked behind a cloud. Barbie blinked, once again thrown into complete darkness. This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, she told herself, since she had chosen to act like an imbecile and probably looked like one, too. Did she really want to see Darin’s expression? No. Did she want him to look carefully at her, dressed in sweats and sweating? Not to mention the fact that if Darin were to come closer, she’d likely make herself an even bigger fool by throwing herself at him.
Then there was Dog.
Hearing a really fierce growl, fearing to move in case the beast had ideas of his own, Barbie fumbled mentally and tried not to whine. “You were there one minute and gone the next. I didn’t know what to make of it.”
“It was getting late, and harder to leave. You were so very inviting,” Darin explained.
Flattery, dammit. Nice flattery. So, maybe she wasn’t immune. He’d said she’d been inviting, right? Perhaps Darin’s frustrating disappearance had been indeed due to a fear of diminishing self-restraint, and not because of anything she might have said or done. H
is vanishing act had perhaps been necessary to cover up his own needs, and not due entirely to absentee manners.
In light of these possibilities, Barbie felt truly pathetic.
“You mentioned opportunities to get to know each other,” she recalled, figuring it really was too late to worry about appearing more foolish. “You didn’t say when.” This last bit was barely audible. The anger fled Barbie with a hiss.
“Now who’s being per sis tent?” Darin asked, and Barbie couldn’t tell what kind of emotion backed the question. His voice was again gruff, raw, and raspy. Much like Dog’s growl, which was truly menacing and overrode the seconds of silence soon after.
“Nice doggie.” Barbie remained as motionless as she could, frozen with her hands on her hips while the dog circled. “It’s not what you think, Darin. Not Fatal Attraction or anything.”
“You came out here only to confirm our next date, at some possible peril to yourself.”
“Yes, actually. That, and I was worried about you.” Barbie shrugged and offered Darin a weak smile, though he couldn’t possibly see it. Don’t give in, no matter how asinine it gets, was her new credo. Stand your ground. Keep what’s left of your dignity, even if it’s nearly undetectable.
And please, God, let this man stay interested.
“So,” Darin began thoughtfully, though to Barbie he sounded a trifle ill at ease. “How’s two weeks from to night for the next date?”
Relief was swift but short-lived. Barbie first bit her lower lip to keep from cheering, then backtracked. Two weeks? Not tomorrow night? Not Wednesday or Saturday? Didn’t he want to see her right away? How could he wait all that time?
With a second bite of her lower lip, Barbie told herself not to fret, that this would be all right. If Darin could play hardball, she could too. If Darin could play hard to get, she could do it better.
“That sounds fine,” she said, evidently forgetting the pact with herself she had just made in favor of game playing. She slapped her head with the palm of one hand. What about hard to get? What about hardball? He was postponing her, for Pete’s sake! Maybe even humoring her!
“Of course,” she immediately amended, “I’ll have to check my schedule.”
Okay. All those stories about folks and animals digging in graveyards aside, the hole she was digging for herself was now about ten feet deep. She didn’t even keep a written schedule. Other than school and Angie, her social life was a wasteland.
“What time?” she heard herself ask. What time? Had she really said that? “If I can make it, that is.”
“Nine?” Darin suggested, ignoring all her absurdity, at least to her face. He would no doubt later reevaluate this incident, Barbie knew. He might not show up in two weeks or any other time, after this. Fact was, she had come all the way out here at freaking midnight. It was Fatal Attraction! She had become Glenn Close.
“How about seven?” Barbie countered. “If I can make it.”
“Any special reason for the time change?”
“Nope, just being contrary.” Don’t want to appear too easy.
“Split the difference?” Darin said. “Make it eight?”
“Done. That is, if I—”
“Right. If you can make it.” Darin coughed and cleared his throat. “I hope you can make it, Barbie. I do want to see you again. I’d like us to start over. I suppose we have to see a movie?”
“Unless you have something better in mind?”
“I’d like to think I do.”
Pitter-pat, there beneath Barbie’s rib cage. She fought it by suggesting, “If it involves feeling and any sort of tucking, I think a movie would be the way to go.”
Darin’s laugh rang out, boomeranging hollowly back around through the cemetery’s close buildings. Close buildings made of marble. With bodies inside.
The moon stayed hidden, as did Darin, though he had moved. Barbie saw him as a dark outline against the light-colored marble crypt wall. By the sound of things, Darin’s dog was still nosing around the brush next to her. She hoped there wouldn’t be any sudden lunges.
“Look. Maybe we can talk about details later,” Darin said. “It’s very late. I’ll walk you back to your car.”
This, to Barbie, sounded quite gentlemanly in the face of her rather presumptuous escapade. Yet Darin’s tone belied enthusiasm. It sounded as if he really didn’t want to walk her anywhere, and might feel obligated.
“I need a minute,” he said, keeping back beneath the trees and as much out of sight as was possible, it still seemed to Barbie. “Then I’ll say good-bye twice to make up for the one I forgot.”
All right, maybe Darin was being a nice guy, Barbie reasoned ashamedly. Maybe she should accept some of this blame and tuck her tail between her legs.
“Don’t rub it in,” she said earnestly. “I can’t believe I did this either. Please do walk me back to the parking lot. Angie should be there by now.”
“Angie’s in the parking lot?” Darin said with audible interest.
“Hopefully. I sent up an SOS.”
“Alone? She’s alone?”
“Except for me, in a minute.”
Darin sounded nervous. “Barbie, can you wait here, for only a moment, without moving? I need to get something.”
“You’re sure you can find me again?” she asked.
“Positive. I’ll leave you Dog for company.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Count to sixty, and I’ll be back.”
“One, two, three, four. . .” Barbie turned around several times in the dark, staring down at the dog. On her third rotation, a hand closed over hers. She nearly collapsed. Dog let out a bellowing bark of recognition, and in a scene reminiscent of the night before, Darin started off at a jog with Barbie in tow.
Over the dewy grass they went, then through some bushes and past gravestones, cutting through the night as though Darin knew every inch of the place, keeping beneath the dark alley of trees lining the fence. Darin Russell, keeper of the grounds, graveyard shift.
Finally, breath sounding irregular as he released Barbie’s hand, Darin stopped beside the big cemetery sign, also partially tree covered. Barbie, for the first time, got a load of Dog, sitting in a pool of moonlight.
She let out a cry of dismay. Dog had to be truly the largest four-legged animal she had ever seen. Thick chested, wide backed, black on top, rust colored underneath, he had a nubby tail, short downward-pointing ears, and very big teeth—all of them bared. This was not a dog. This was a nightmare.
“I can’t go any farther,” Darin announced suddenly, surprising Barbie. “I’m sorry. There’s something I was doing. Something I have to attend to. Will you be okay now? Is that Angie’s car?”
Angie’s car was indeed there, its candy apple–red vintage form parked right beneath the lamppost. Barbie could see that the driver side door was open. It didn’t take a telescope to see that Angie wasn’t inside.
“She must have gotten tired of waiting for me.”
Her statement brought a drawn-out growl from Dog, which sounded like ghosts shouting from one of those crypts.
“I told her to wait in the car,” Barbie explained, both to Darin and his dog. “Now I’ll have to go and look for her.”
“No,” Darin said. “It’s too late for that.”
He whistled, and Dog ran to him. With what looked like a tight hold on the beast’s massive studded collar, Darin glanced at the empty Fiat, to Barbie, then up at the sky with such concentrated attention that Barbie followed his lead and looked up. The clouds were parting overhead. A big moon appeared, fat and silver and dripping light. The crickets again went silent. The clouds flooded back together.
“Spooky,” Barbie said. “What’s with the crickets?”
“They go quiet to protect themselves,” Darin said, “from things that go bump in the night.”
Barbie shivered.
“Sort of like you, tripping over that urn,” Darin added, chuckling.
Barbie smiled and pressed the
hair back from her face. He was teasing her. Surely this was a good sign?
“I’ll find Angie,” Darin told her. “I’d prefer it if you’d wait in the car. That way I don’t have to worry about rounding up both of you.”
“Yeah, and you’d give Angie a heart attack for sure. You do know that Dog here doesn’t look much like a dog, Darin. And you’ll be a complete surprise.”
Silence. . .then Darin said, “Would Angie have left the keys?”
“Maybe,” Barbie answered. “If she were inviting every thief in the area to come and take the car off her hands.”
Darin wasn’t amused. “It really would be a good idea for you to wait in the car. Dog doesn’t like company, I’m afraid.”
“I’d rather go with you,” she replied. “Heck with Dog.”
“Please, Barbie. The car. If the keys are there, start the engine and wait.”
Moonlight lit the cemetery sign and highlighted a circular pattern on the ground beneath the tree where Darin stood. Barbie watched him step backward, able to see him now. Gone was the dapper suit and white shirt. Darin now wore a long coat of black fabric that fell to his ankles and hung loosely around him. His feet were encased in a pair of boots. His hair was tousled. His hands were in his pockets. His smile looked wan.
“Keep your cell phone handy in case you’re disturbed by anything. You do have your cell phone?” Darin asked.
“No. Yes. Maybe—”
“Do not under any circumstances get out of the car. Do you understand, Barbie? No circumstances. No matter what you see or hear, you are to remain inside the car.”
“I—”
“Go. Now. Good night, Barbie.” Darin held up a single finger. Then he held up two. “Good night.”
Barbie stepped off the curb. Feeling a little silly, she ran as she’d been told. She jumped into Angie’s car, reached for the keys. . .and found them missing. Crap.
Through the small windshield she could see that no one now stood on the curb beneath the graveyard sign; Darin and his hound had gone in after Angie, losing no time. Funny, he hadn’t suggested calling Angie on her cell phone. Barbie reached into her pocket for her—
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