Silent Fall (20 page)

"Yes, a dark place," she agreed. "Some people are sick, evil."

He had a feeling she wasn't talking about his father anymore. "You can't get Erica's killer out of your mind, can you?"

"I'm trying."

He knew she didn't want to go back to the moment when she'd glimpsed the killer's thoughts, but he felt compelled to take her there. "When you were in the killer's head, did you think you were tapping into the actual shooter, or the person who ordered the hit? Because I think we're dealing with two people."

"The shooter—I was in his head," Catherine answered with certainty. "I saw what he saw. I felt his satisfaction."

"And did you get the sense that he was working for someone else?"

"No, not from anything he thought, but I agree with you that there have to be two people. I just think that at the moment he kills he enjoys it. He's good at it. It's what he does. It's his life."

Catherine's words drew a chill across his body. Dylan glanced over at her profile, seeing the renewed tension in her face. He was sorry he'd brought up the subject. "Don't think about it anymore."

"It's difficult not to. I feel as if there's some clue right in front of me that I'm missing. If I am connected to the shooter, why don't I know who he's working for?"

"Because he didn't give you a clue in his thoughts." Dylan paused, then said, "I'm surprised you didn't sense him tonight, didn't pick up on any vibes that he was watching the house."

She stiffened in her seat. "I did feel uneasy. I thought it was just because it was getting dark. I shrugged it off."

"You shrugged it off," he echoed in surprise. "You can do that? I thought the visions overtook you."

"It was more a feeling than a vision, and I was distracted because I was eager to read the last two journals. I turned on the lamp, thinking I would banish the shadows, and then the window shattered. The shooter must have seen me in the upstairs bedroom. Perhaps he was waiting for the lights to come on, so he could figure out where we were."

"Probably," he said, his mind latching onto an earlier part of her statement. "What journals were you reading?"

"Oh, these," she said, pulling the two books out of her purse. "They're your grandmother's diaries. I had them in my hand when the shooting started. I never put them down."

"What's in them?"

"Actually, I haven't read these books yet, but your grandmother kept journals her entire life. I spent the afternoon reading about her childhood, her family, first love, that sort of thing. I was just getting to the part where you were born when I found these last two books, but I couldn't get them open, and then the window blew, and you know the rest."

Dylan swallowed back a sudden knot of discomfort in his throat. He didn't want to know what his grandmother had written.

"Maybe the journals will give us some insight into your father," Catherine added. "You might find out what your grandmother really thought about your father."

"That he was a prince, no doubt," Dylan said cynically. "She didn't see him as an abusive bully, that's for sure."

"But she did see him as spoiled. She wrote at great length about how saddened she was by the miscarriages she suffered between her daughter Eleanor's birth and your father's birth, and how much she wanted a son. She said that when Richard was born, she couldn't stop herself from spoiling him rotten. She knew it was wrong, but she wanted to give him the world. The older he got, the more he took. She worried when your parents married. She wasn't sure if your mother would be strong enough to handle him." Catherine drew in a breath. "After reading it all, I wonder why your father picked your mother. They were so different. He was an ambitious businessman eager to rise to the top. She was a kindergarten teacher with ordinary parents. What made them want each other?"

"Hell if I know." Dylan put up a hand as Catherine opened her mouth again. He felt a desperate need to stop her from saying another word. "I don't want to hear any more, Catherine."

"Dylan, I know you don't think the past is important, but—"

"But nothing," he said, cutting her off. "It's my past, and I get to decide what I want to know. Just let me drive. I can't do this right now." He wasn't sure he could ever do it, but he certainly needed to be in a place where he could get away if he had to. Odd that he should think of it that way, as if the past could still hurt him. It was over and done. Wasn't it?

He didn't pretend to have Catherine's psychic abilities, but his own instincts were telling him that he couldn't ignore the fact that Catherine kept bringing his parents back into the present. It had to be because of his father's association with Erica. Dylan just couldn't figure out how his mother entered into it. Maybe it was that Catherine's senses enveloped everything and didn't filter out what wasn't necessary.

He rolled his neck around on his shoulders, hearing the crack of each joint. Everything in his life was a big question mark. Two days ago he would have said he had all the answers. Now he had none. But he did know one thing for sure.

"They made a mistake tonight," he said. "If they wanted us dead they should have done it, because I won't give anyone another chance to kill you or me."

Catherine didn't reply. He didn't know if she believed him or not. And despite his confident words, he had no idea how he was going to back them up.

* * *

Catherine's face was as cold as ice. Her teeth had started to chatter with the ever-present wind blasting through the broken window next to her. She pulled her sweater up over her mouth, but she could still feel the sting of the night air against her cheeks. Her eyes were watering, so she closed them, trying to relax, to find some peaceful place to escape to in her mind, not that her mind had ever given her much peace.

She should be feeling more relaxed by now. They were a hundred miles away from the city, deep into wine country. The police wouldn't be able to find them; nor would the man who was after them. He had to have given up by now. It was only logical to think they were safe for the moment. Unfortunately her instincts always beat down logic, and she couldn't shake the feeling that trouble wasn't far behind.

She wanted to believe that Dylan would protect her. She knew he would try. If it came down to it he'd put himself before her. He was that kind of man: unselfish, courageous. She'd never met anyone like him. She just wished Dylan could see himself for what he was now. In his head he still saw the cowardly child who couldn't escape the bully, the one who did everything wrong and nothing right, the one who felt isolated, lost, and helpless. All the bad things he'd ever heard about himself probably played over and over in his head every night before he went to bed. It was always easier to believe the bad stuff people thought about you than the good. She knew that firsthand.

She wanted to break through his emotional walls, but they were built strong and sturdy, made to last. Once in a while she slipped through a small break, but then he threw up the barricades and pushed her out.

Dylan was afraid of her, made uncomfortable by what she saw in him. He wasn't the first man she'd terrified with her visions, and she doubted he would be the last, but he was the only one she really wanted to stay. But he would go—eventually. She knew that as surely as she knew anything. Dylan didn't want to be with a woman who could see into his head, who knew where he came from, who had heard all his secrets. She didn't think he'd shared his past with any one of the women he'd dated. He blamed himself for not standing up to his father, for not fighting back, for not being able to win. So he kept that loser hidden behind his big, strong walls.

The man he was today always won, always succeeded. Dylan would someday find a woman who'd add credence to his reputation, someone beautiful and educated and not at all crazy, not at all quirky—not at all like her. He wanted perfection in every part of his life. She didn't blame him for that. She'd yearned for the perfect life, too. But lately she'd begun to realize that she didn't want perfect anymore. She just wanted love, real love, the kind that blossomed with the years, grew stronger with the trials of life, a love that didn't waver in the face of doubt, a love that probably didn't exist in the real world. She'd certainly never seen it. But still she believed in it. What a romantic fool she was.

Letting out a sigh, she tried to redirect her thoughts, think of something else, find some image that wasn't Dylan or his father or his mother or Erica. She wanted to slip into one of her peaceful paintings—the pretty meadow, the quiet pool, the beach where her dogs liked to run. But those images couldn't take shape in her mind. They were being pushed away by a dark shadow that spread and enveloped everything in its way.

His motel room faced the highway. The cars whirred by, a relentless roar of engines. The orange light from a fast-food restaurant sign blazed through the sagging curtains at the window. The place was a rat hole. He would be able to afford the Ritz after he finished this job, and he was itching to do just that. But not just yet, because the fucking asshole he was working for wanted to play games.

The voice rang through his head again, the cryptic instructions, the odd requests. What the hell was going on? He was a killer, not a game player. When he shot, he shot to kill, not to scare, not to make someone run. But he'd had his orders. And he'd completed his task. Soon he would get to finish the job. The time couldn't come quickly enough for him.

He picked up the phone, punching in the familiar number. "There's two of them, you know. That's double the price if you want them both dead." He listened, his heart soaring at the response. This was going to be sweet. He would trap her. She would know there was no way out, and then she would take her last breath at his command. He couldn't wait. "I understand," he said. "The woman dies first. No problem. No problem at all."

Catherine started, blinking open her eyes, desperate to escape the darkness in her head. She'd seen him again, and he wasn't just after Dylan now. Her heart thudded against her chest. She was next.
The woman

dies first.
He'd been talking about her.

"Oh, God," she breathed.

Dylan glanced over at her, his gaze narrowing in alarm. "What's wrong now?"

"He's going to kill me first."

"Who?"

She knew Dylan wanted her to identify the man, but she hadn't seen him. She'd been him. She'd felt his delight at the prospect of watching her die. He wanted her cornered, isolated, alone.

Her breath caught in her chest as her mind shot down another haunted corridor in her head, a place she never went, except perhaps in her nightmares, but never when she was awake. She fought to stay in the light, but the shadows sucked her in.

Someone called to her, a voice from a long time ago, his words silky and smooth with evil intent. She clapped her hands over her ears. "No," she said loudly. "Don't. Go away. Stop!"

"Catherine."

She heard Dylan calling to her, but his voice wasn't as strong as the other man's.

"Where are you, little girl? Where are you hiding, sweet pea?"

She held her breath, shrinking into as tight and small a ball as possible. He couldn't find her. He couldn't. She chanted the words over and over again, her gaze catching on the drops of blood staining her toes. She buried her face in her cotton nightgown, smelling her own fear, tasting her own vomit, hearing the screams in her head. If he found her he would kill her, too.

She felt the car swerve, then come to a jolting stop. The seat belt snapped her back into place. Her eyes flew open as Dylan grabbed her hands, pulling them away from her ears so she could hear him.

"Dammit, Catherine," he said forcefully. "Talk to me. Look at me."

Dylan's commands drove the other man back into the recesses of her mind.

She stared at him, her chest heaving as she tried to breathe. Dimly she realized he'd pulled over to the side of the highway.

"What the hell is going on, Catherine? Are you having another vision? Are you connecting with the guy who's trying to kill us?"

She wanted to answer him, but the words wouldn't come. Her present and her past were blurring together. She wanted to escape, but there was no way to leave the terrors of her own mind. She felt very close to the edge of a perilous cliff. All her life she'd wondered if one day she would snap, one day she would break in two, one day she would go to sleep and never wake up. A person could only take so much. And tonight's attack on her life had reminded her of the last time she'd dodged death.

Blinking rapidly, she tried to focus on something real, something right in front of her. She feared she was losing it big-time, and she couldn't help wondering how many more chances she would get before someone succeeded in killing her.

"Catherine, pay attention to me."

Dylan's words made her turn her head. His hands reached again for hers, his warmth cutting through the cold chill.

"You're freezing," he said, rubbing her fingers hard. "I should have stopped before this."

"I'm . . . I'm okay," she said finally. One day she would have to face what was in her head, but not today, not now. She wasn't ready. She had too many battles to fight, too many killers to face. She couldn't beat them all at once.

"Can you tell me what you saw?" Dylan asked.

"He's going to kill me first. Then you."

Dylan's eyes widened. "Where? When?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. But he's somewhere out there, and he doesn't seem worried about finding us. How can he know where we're going to be when we don't know?"

"He doesn't know where we are right now. He can't," Dylan told her. "He's not that powerful."

"I think he is—or someone is," she amended. "Someone who's telling him what to do. And that person wants you to watch me die."

He cupped her face with his hands. "That's not going to happen. I swear to God I won't let that happen."

"I know you'll try—" she began.

He cut her off with a shake of his head. "No, I won't just try. I'll succeed. You have to believe in me, Catherine, the way I believe in you."