Crazy in Chicago (17 page)

“No.” She kept on going to the sliding doors. After her inglorious fall onto the patio early this morning, she didn't want a witness to her scramble back over the hedge.

“How about I meet you tonight for a drink? At Roxy's? I've got to work late but I could meet you there about eight.”

The request sent her heart soaring. Forget her fears. Forget what she'd read about him and his playboy past. Forget that this had all happened too fast. Slowly she pivoted to face him.

The look on his face bowled her over. He smiled at her as if she were the most wonderful, beautiful, incredible woman on the face of the earth. She couldn't help smiling in return. “I'd love to.”

Her heart singing, she headed for the door. Only to be brought up short by a strong hand capturing her wrist.

Before she could react, Cody's arms wrapped around her and his mouth closed over hers in a hard, intoxicating kiss that made it clear just how much he wanted her. A kiss that made her knees weak and her head swim. A kiss that she felt all the way down to her toes.
 

As quickly as he'd grabbed her, he released her. Through a daze, Roberta saw his wink. “One for the road.”

He turned her towards the door. “Careful going over the hedge.”

No problem, thought Roberta. I'll be sure to fly.

* * *

Cody swung the suit jacket over his shoulder and leant into the buzzer. A moment later a woman's voice, sounding harried, answered. “Hello. What is it?”

“It's Cody, Allie. Can I come up for a minute? There's something I'd like to talk to you about.”

The intercom system crackled. “Oh.” A pause. “All right.” A buzz signaled the unlocking of the door. Cody grabbed for it, entered, and then made a dash for the elevator standing open in the lobby.

As the doors closed and the elevator began a slow ascent to the fifth floor, Cody shook his head. He could hardly believe he was doing this—coming to talk to Allie about what the psychic had said about him, Erik, and the strange cold place that seemed to link them.

Maybe it had something to do with making love to Roberta last night. He smiled as memories flooded over him. Roberta's unorthodox arrival. Her apology. The silkiness of her thighs and the deep longing they'd inspired. The sweetness of her sincerity, her serious face, and how it had hit him in the gut like nothing had before. He'd wanted her so badly—and the wonder of it was, she had finally wanted him back.

He shut his eyes for a moment, lost in the pleasure of the moment and the discovery that Roberta cared about him. For himself, and not for what he might mean to her career. He didn't know why it meant so much to him, but it did.

He opened his eyes as the elevator jerked to a halt. He hadn't slept much more than the scant two hours a night he'd managed through the past few weeks. But he felt so much better. With that feeling of well-being had come the determination to resolve the question of his disappearance once and for all. Even if his disappearance had nothing to do with aliens, Roberta was right. His current insomnia and nausea had to be connected with the trauma of that disappearance. Probably the blue light, too.
 

He stepped off the elevator, his trademark jauntiness back in his step. Which was why he'd decided to talk to Allie about the psychic's strange comments. No other clues, or potential leads, existed. Even the hypnosis hadn't revealed much more, except to put to rest Roberta's idea he'd been abducted by aliens. Thank God.

But now he had to either follow this up, or accept his disappearance as inexplicable once and for all. He wasn't ready for that yet. During the last two weeks he'd realized how much he wanted—how much he needed—to know what had happened to him during those six weeks. He couldn't drop it. Not yet. Even if it did mean exploring a side of him that bordered perilously close to everything he wanted to avoid, to everything that reminded him of his father.

No, he'd go for it. He smiled again as he thought of the many amazing facets of his curly-headed neighbor. Roberta. One more thing for which he had to thank her.

And he could think of a thousand ways to do it.

* * *

Allie opened the door before Cody could knock. A soft flannel receiving blanket hung over her shoulder and she held the baby in one arm.

“C'mon in.” She disappeared inside and Cody followed.

“Sit down.” She settled onto one couch and nodded at the one opposite. “I was just starting to feed the baby when you buzzed up,” she said. “So if you don't mind, I plan to continue.”

“Go ahead.” Curiosity flared in Cody. He'd never seen a mother nurse her child. And certainly not, it occurred to him, from breasts he had once caressed. He wondered, momentarily, whether it would bother Allie, and how he himself would react.

Before he had a chance to decide, Allie had slipped a breast out of her blouse, positioned Star, and covered them both with the receiving blanket. The action occurred so quickly and so discreetly that Cody didn't have time to suffer even a twinge of discomfort. Instead he remembered the woman of the night before and all that had passed between them.

After making sure the baby was properly latched, Allie looked up at Cody. She smiled without embarrassment. “Strange, huh? Anyway, we've got about twenty minutes before I have to change her to the other breast. So what did you want to talk to me about?”

Cody rested his hands on his knees. He frowned as he tried to fix on the right place to start. He looked at Allie, who gazed at him expectantly. Her open expression, combined with her lopsided pony tail and unironed blouse and shorts encouraged him. Allie, of anyone he knew, was among the most likely to give a fair hearing, no matter what.

He cleared his throat. “A few nights ago I went to see that psychic you consulted last year. I went with my neighbor, Roberta.”

“You mean Madame Carabini? You actually went to see her? Why?”
 

“To see if she could tell me anything else about my disappearance. Any clue, any hint of what really happened to me.”

“Oh.” Allie looked down at the baby. She adjusted the receiving blanket. “And could she? Tell you anything new, that is.”

Cody frowned. “A little. But not much. This time she said she could see me in a room, lying on a shelf or bunk attached to the wall. The whole room was gray and sterile, like stainless steel, she said. She couldn't tell if I slept and she could hear what she described as a human voice talking in a language she didn't recognize.”

Allie adjusted the baby's blanket again. Without looking up she asked, “Did Madame Carabini see the person talking?”

 
“No. She didn't see anyone in the room but me.”

Allie shut her eyes. When she opened them, her mouth twisted in an odd little smile. “That's not really much help to you, is it? Did she see anything else?”

“Only a blue light. An eery blue light, she said. She saw it when she sat in my car.”

“Blue? Did you say blue?” Allie straightened. A strange look came over her face. The baby started to wail.

“Oh, there, there.” Instantly Allie focused her attention on her daughter. In a moment the child had latched onto her breast again and was suckling away. When Allie addressed him again, her features appeared serene. “Madame Carabini saw a blue light?”

“Yes. The creepy thing is that I've seen a blue light several times in the last few days. Usually when I'm in the car, or about to get into it. It's usually just a flash but it's, well, unsettling to say the least. Madame Carabini said it gave her a feeling of dread.” Cody didn't mention the one other time he'd seen the blue light—the time he held Star. He'd planned to, but now, seeing Allie feeding the child, it didn't seem right to drag her into his problems.

“Dread?” Allie repeated slowly. She frowned. “Did you say the blue light gave you a feeling of dread?”

Cody looked at her sharply. Had she been this pale when he arrived? He couldn't remember.
 

“Carabini had one more thing to say,” he said, his gaze glued on Allie and the baby. “Something stranger than anything else. You remember how she told you I was in some cold, unusual place that she couldn't really describe?”

Allie nodded.

He continued. “She said that Erik—your Erik—was linked to that same, strange, cold place where I was being held.”

Allie's expression of calm interest didn't change. “Yes? What else?”

Cody squirmed. Asking people he didn't know difficult questions was part of his job. Asking a friend difficult questions about her husband was much harder. He cleared his throat. “She also said that she warned you against Erik. That he would bring some change to your life, and that it wouldn't necessarily be good.”

Allie grew still. After a moment, she looked out the window. “And what did you think of all this?”

“At first I thought it was all mumbo-jumbo. I still do. It's just, well, I keep seeing this blue light. I haven't slept well for more than two weeks. I keep getting nausea attacks. I started wondering if the insomnia and nausea had something to do with my disappearance. Or whether I was going crazy.”

He debated whether to tell her the troubling questions raised by his hypnosis yesterday. He took a deep breath and plunged ahead. “Something else. I was hypnotized yesterday. I remembered a blue light while I was driving, just before I disappeared. And later, in the room where I seem to have been kept, a man stood and watched me.”

“A man?” Allie croaked, then cleared her throat.

Cody studied her. Yes, she was pale. And she kept playing with the baby's blanket. The Allie he knew didn't have any nervous habits. “I didn't actually see him. I don't know who he was. I just knew he was there. I don't know how.”

He continued to press her. “Did you investigate Erik after Madame Carabini's warning? Investigate his background?”

Allie shut her eyes and sighed. For the first time Cody noticed the blue shadows under her eyes.

“Yes,” she said softly. “I did look into his background.” She looked down at the baby and rocked her close to her body.

“And what?” Cody leaned forward. “What did you find?”

She looked away. “Nothing. I asked . . .”

A sudden coughing and choking from the baby cut off her comment. In alarm she turned the infant on its stomach across her lap and patted its back.

The choking noise subsided, replaced by a piercing wail. Allie stood up and held Star to her shoulder. Murmuring soothing sounds and patting the baby's back, Allie swayed around the room, her attention focused on the child, who continued to scream.

To Cody's inexperienced ear, Star sounded distraught. “Why is she crying like that?”

Allie shook her head. She held the baby close and jiggled up and down. “I don't know. She's been crying a lot lately. I don't know why. Maybe it's colic.”

Cody nodded. He didn't know anything about babies. He continued to sit while Allie danced around the room with the screaming child.

Finally he stood up. “I guess I should go.”

Allie nodded but continued moving. “You're probably right. She might go on like this for quite a while.”

Cody nodded. “Well, thanks. Thanks for seeing me.”

He walked to the door and opened it. He felt a light touch on his arm.

Still holding the crying child, Allie looked at him, her green eyes troubled. “I'm sorry,” she said softly. “I'm sorry I can't be of more help.”

He smiled. “It's all right. I know you'd help me if you could.”

* * *

Fifteen minutes later Allie laid the sleeping child in her crib. Finally, after refusing milk or comfort, Star seemed to have stopped crying out of sheer exhaustion.

Allie gazed down at her tiny daughter. Tears streaked the child's red face, and her cotton sleeper was wet right through. She clenched her little fists above her head.

Allie felt her own shoulder, damp and tense from the sobbing child pressed close for so long. What had caused that crying fit? Was it something within the child, some need or urge or feeling invisible and incommunicable to her, but there all the same? Or had the child sensed her mother's tension, the nervousness and fear growing in her with each new question Cody asked?

Allie bit her lip. She didn't know. That was the trouble. She didn't know. Too many things had happened in the last few days that she didn't understand. Things that made no sense, at least not to her. And she didn't like the uncomfortable feeling that plagued her, day—
 

The doorbell chimed, startling her.

Hand to her heart and after a last look at her daughter, Allie headed to the door. She hated it when someone arrived unannounced from the lobby below. Who is it now?

She reached the door and the peephole, which she'd recently had moved to eye level from its previous ridiculous placement about three feet from the floor.