Recalled (30 page)

I left the clipboard on the bed and went across the hall to Piper’s room. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, partially dressed in jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, and socks. She had an oxygen mask up against her mouth and nose. I pushed down the funny feeling I got in my stomach as I shut the door behind me.

“Are you having trouble breathing?” I asked.

She pulled the mask down and shook her head. “I was when they brought me in. My lungs were too cold to breathe right. This is just warm, humidified oxygen they’ve been giving me to help bring up my body temperature. The doctor wanted me to take a few more breaths before releasing me, just to be on the safe side.”

“How are you?” I asked, coming to stand beside her.

“I’m fine,” she said, hooking the mask near the machine. “That was pretty scary.”

Her voice dropped on the last part and something inside me squeezed. “Yeah. I didn’t realize we were on a lake. There was no sign.”

She nodded. “The patrolman said it got pushed over by the snow and then buried.”

“The patrolman?”

She nodded again. “He came to visit me earlier this morning, to see if I was okay.”

He hadn’t come to my room, which told me he wasn’t just worried about her health; he wanted to see her. Maybe cash in on the fact he saved her life…

She was watching me so I nodded and stepped toward the chair on the other side of the room. I didn’t have any reason to feel jealous. If I wasn’t trying to kill her, I wouldn’t be spending this much time with her anyway. Besides, she wasn’t my type.

And she’s too good for you,
something whispered in the back of my mind.

It was true. Even if I wasn’t trying to kill her, I still wouldn’t be good enough.

“So, they said we could go. You feeling up to leaving?” I asked.

“Yes, please. I go on vacation to get away from work and I end up in a clinic just like the one I was trying to get away from.” She shook her head and smiled.

“Why aren’t you mad at me?” I blurted out.

She stopped in the middle of pulling on her sweatshirt and looked at me. “Why would I be mad at you?”

Because I stood there and debated if I should let you drown. Because the only reason I pulled you out was because I figured you would die on the way down the mountain.

I didn’t say those thoughts out loud, though. Instead, I replied, “Because I was driving recklessly.”

She finished pulling on her sweatshirt and pushed her feet into a pair of boots.

“If it wasn’t for you, I probably would’ve died. You saved my life.”

I held back a wince. Thank God Charming and G.R. weren’t around to hear that. I’d probably be recalled on the spot. “I don’t think it was me. It was the patrolman.”

“He did warm me and give me CPR,” she began.

No, he just wanted to cop a feel
. I thought bitterly as she continued.

“But the doctor said the only reason we’re alive is because you pulled us out of the water so fast.”

“I got lucky,” I mumbled, hoping she’d been so out of it she hadn’t seen who really pulled us out.

“You can call it luck,” she said, “but I’m going to say it was your quick thinking.”

I didn’t argue. If she wanted to believe I was the hero I wasn’t going to stop her. It only added to the trust between us so the next time I tried to kill her it would work.

I was running out of chances.

I was running out of time.

“The cabin isn’t far from here. The nurse called someone from the rental place to give us a ride back there,” Piper said, not picking up my preoccupation.

I nodded. “You need to drive home. I lost my glasses.”

“We can stop and get some new ones,” she offered.

“I have an extra pair at home.”

“Oh. Good. Well, then, let’s get out of here,”

Suddenly I wasn’t in a hurry to get home. Charming would be waiting and Grim would be wondering why he never got a call to come see the body.

I had a very bad feeling it was going to be a very long day.

Chapter Forty-Two

“Suspicious -
openly distrustful and unwilling to confide.”

Piper

Dex was being very quiet. Since we got in the car and headed back toward Fairbanks, he’d barely spoken two words. When I tried to talk he would just nod his head or turn up the radio. It’s like he couldn’t even look at me.

Normally his silence wouldn’t bother me. Dex wasn’t really a talkative kind of guy. He didn’t talk just to talk, but this time his silence was different. It was sort of charged and uncomfortable.

“Almost drowning was pretty scary, huh?” I said, not looking at him, keeping my eyes on the road. The way he acted earlier at the hospital, thinking I would be mad at him and mumbling his responses when I spoke, he probably thought I blamed him. What a horrible experience it was, and I think I got lucky. Lucky because I passed out; I couldn’t remember everything. But him… He was awake the whole time. He lived the entire horror of it.

“It wasn’t fun,” he said, his voice low.

I was shocked he actually replied at all so I wanted to keep the conversation going.

“I told you I don’t blame you. You believe me, right?”

“Yeah,” he said, his voice almost sad. “Yeah, I believe you.” He still didn’t look at me when he spoke.

I drove on in silence, not sure what else to say. If he knew I didn’t blame him and he knew that we were both okay, then why was he still acting so broody?

My thoughts were swirling so much I almost didn’t hear what he said next. “Maybe you should.”

I looked over at him. “What?”

“Forget it.” He shook his head and stared out his window.

“I won’t forget it. Why would you think I should blame you for something you had no control over?”

“Because you almost died!” he yelled, his voice echoing through the quiet car.

My hands tightened on the steering wheel. Was that what this was about? Was he this upset that I almost died?

“But I didn’t,” I said quietly.

“I thought you had. When we were on the mountain, I thought…”

I felt a rush of emotion. I don’t know if it was from him or from me or a combination of us both, but it was intense and it filled the tiny space of the car and pressed in on me. Impulsively, I pulled the car over to the side of the highway, putting it in park but leaving the engine on.

He didn’t react to the fact we were sitting along the road; he didn’t even look at me.

I took a chance, turning toward him and reaching out, laying my hand on his arm. “Dex?” I whispered.

He flinched.

I pulled my hand away.

“I didn’t die,” I said again. “I’m still here.”

And then he was turning, his arms reaching, and I was pulled against him. He tucked my cheek in the crook of his neck and one arm wound around my back while the other pressed my head into his shoulder. I could hear the thundering of his heart; it sounded like a herd of wild horses running through an open field.

“When the doctor said… when he said you were across the hall… I realized you weren’t dead and I… God help me, I was so relieved.”

His chest rose and fell with his breath and with his emotion. He almost sounded ashamed that he felt relief.

“It’s okay,” I told him, my voice muffled against his neck.

“No,” he said. “It’s not.” Then he pulled me back, took my face in both hands, and penetrated me with his green stare. “I don’t know what to do.”

His voice carried so much I didn’t understand. “Do about what?”

“You.”

I felt like we weren’t talking about almost drowning anymore. The conversation took a turn, but I had no idea where. I covered his hand with one of mine and whispered, “You don’t have to do anything about me.”

His thumb stroked over my cheek and then slowly he pulled his hands away. My fingers curled around his and our hands rested on the center console between us.

“We should probably get going,” he said.

I could feel him withdrawing again.

“Why are you acting this way?” I asked, desperately wanting to know, to pull him back.

“You said it yourself,” he answered, untangling our fingers. “I’m like two different people sometimes. Maybe this is just a side you haven’t seen before.”

I shook my head and looked at him for long moments, frustrated. Those few moments when I felt the wall between us slip away were gone; his guard was back up and he wasn’t going to let me in. I sighed and turned back to sit straight in the driver’s seat. After checking the mirrors for traffic I pulled back out onto the road. We didn’t speak any more, but this time I barely noticed the silence. I was too busy thinking.

There was something going on that I didn’t know about.

But what?

I thought back to the man standing in the window at his townhouse and the feeling Dex was running away from something. Maybe now that we were going home, he was worried about whatever was waiting for him.

But that still didn’t explain what just happened between us. He implied that whatever was going on had to do with me. He said he didn’t know what to do about me. He acted as if he were caught. Caught between something or someone and he didn’t know a way out.

I glanced away from the road once more. He was staring out his window, watching the scenery pass. Both his hands were in his lap and his jaw was set.

I wouldn’t get any more answers. Not today.

But I would get them.

He might not want to admit it, but there were feelings between us. Strong ones. But there was also more going on here. Something other than just feelings, and the farther I drove, the more suspicious I became.

Chapter Forty-Three

“Rule - An authoritative, prescribed direction for conduct, especially one of the regulations governing procedure in a legislative body or a regulation observed by the players in a game, sport, or contest.
”

Dex

I knew Hobbs wouldn’t be home when I got there. As I pulled into the garage, I hoped Charming wouldn’t be either. I didn’t know what kind of car he drove, but there wasn’t one in the driveway so I took that as a good sign. He didn’t know when I was coming home so maybe he wouldn’t be here and maybe I’d get lucky and could avoid him the rest of the day. I knew eventually I would see him, and since I didn’t kill Piper, I knew there was probably going to be a fight between us.

The first thing I did when I entered the townhouse was go upstairs and put on my spare pair of glasses. I breathed a sigh of relief when my vision cleared. Thankfully, the trip between my house and Piper’s hadn’t been too long and since I knew the roads, I didn’t have any problems.

I had a headache, probably from my eyes, so I dug out a bottle of pain reliever and swallowed a couple tablets with tap water. Then I changed into a pair of Nike sweatpants and a long-sleeved T-shirt. I really wanted some coffee so I went down to the kitchen to see if I could figure out the coffee maker. It couldn’t be that hard.