“It was shouting.” It was the only way she knew to describe the terribly loud rumbling in her head.
“What did it shout?”
Cass shook her head, dislodging the ice pack from her nose again. She removed it as the cold on her face became more painful than the comfort of numbness. “I don’t know. I couldn’t make out the words. It was like noises strung together. It was saying something. I’m just not sure what.”
“Is that how it is…you know, when…”
She didn’t make him finish the sentence. “No. Not usually. Depending on the connection, the voices can be very clear. Considering this thing manages to get inside my head the way it does, I would have thought that anything it said would have been loud and clear. Then again it’s a beast. A monster with a speech impediment and no vocabulary.”
Cass glanced up in time to see his disbelief. In a way, she couldn’t help but admire him for making the effort. What she spoke of was so much against the grain of reality he based his life on that each word must have hit his ears like a note out of tune. Still, he was trying to understand, and that was more than so many others in her life had done.
Another long silence passed as he sat on the couch, his hip pressed against hers. When the cloth in her hand became too wet to manage without dripping all over herself, she placed it in the bowl on the floor.
“I should go,” she said, although not really sure how she was going to make that happen.
He looked down at her, his eyes studying her as if assessing each feature and its place on her face. Cass had a ridiculous impulse to ask for that mirror again just so she could see what he was seeing. Instead, she simply reached up to brush her cropped bangs over her forehead.
Malcolm reached for her hand and rested it on her stomach. Then with a finger he traced the bridge of her nose to its point, then gently circled each eye. Finally he tapped her chin and smiled.
“Definitely not broken. What size are you?”
All thought fled from her mind, making it impossible to answer. She was still thinking about the feeling of his finger trailing down her nose.
“Size?”
“I know small, but how small? Four? Two?”
“Two. Why?”
He didn’t answer directly. “Lauren’s clothes are still up in her room. The stuff she didn’t take with her when she moved out. Mostly it’s older stuff, but I should be able to find a pair of sweats and a T-shirt or something for you to sleep in.”
“I’m not staying.”
“I don’t want to argue. Tomorrow I need to go to her funeral. Her funeral is tomorrow.” It was as if he forced himself to repeat the words.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. Instinctively, she reached out to circle his wrist. A gesture of comfort she hadn’t utilized in so long. Struck by the furred hair on his forearm, its thickness and warmth, she jerked her hand back. Cass tried to make the action more subtle, but failed.
“It’s all right. I know you don’t like to touch me.”
“It’s not you. You know that. I just can’t stand the idea of being some kind of conduit.”
“But you offered to let me touch you before,” he said.
“I know.”
“You offered to do something you’re obviously uncomfortable with. Why? Were you trying to test yourself? Or maybe you were testing me?”
“I thought I owed you. I thought you would accept. People who have lost loved ones want them back. They want to connect and will take any opportunity they’ve got.” Certainly Dougie had.
Malcolm nodded slowly as he came to a conclusion. “You wanted to see if I would take that opportunity. You wanted me to use you so you could prove I was like everybody else. My guess is you’ve been used before.”
“It’s happened,” Cass said flatly.
“Not by me.”
“Not yet.”
“Not ever,” he countered.
“You sure about that? My best friend couldn’t stop himself. You asked about Dougie, if we had a lovers’ quarrel? A year ago we were both in really bad places. He’d lost his wife a few months before in a car accident. He stumbled upon me in a coffeeshop. He was a wreck. Claire, his wife, came through loud and clear. I thought I could help him. I thought I could give him some peace. We became friends. Then this one night, both of us were sick with grief and pain. We didn’t plan it.”
“It happens,” Malcolm agreed.
“Anyway, the weird connection thing happened then, too. I didn’t understand it, but he did. He felt her and he didn’t tell me. He knew she was there. Ever since then he’s been trying to talk me back into bed, and now I know why.”
“You think it’s because he wants to…”
“Be with her. Feel her through me. Yes, I do.”
Malcolm nodded slowly. “You never considered he might want you.”
“He used me,” Cass said bitterly.
“Sounds like you used him, too. To take away the grief and the pain that you were feeling. How was that different?”
Cass looked away from him then, trying to reject what was undeniably the truth. “It was different.”
Malcolm chuckled softly and Cass practically groaned at how immature her response sounded.
“Okay. But I’m not going to use you to feel Lauren. First, ew. She was my sister. Trust me when I tell you I never wanted to ‘feel’ her in life and I certainly wouldn’t want to in death. And second…”
Cass looked at him, uncertain about what point he was trying to make.
He ran a hand over the stubble that was starting to become noticeable on his chin. Then, as if coming to a decision, he leaned over her until he was so close she lost herself in the color of his dark blue eyes. His lips touched hers in the barest hint of a touch. Just so that she could register lips upon lips, a hint of breath and heat. Definitely heat.
Sitting up, he gazed down at her, seeing what she knew must be a shocked expression.
“Did you feel Lauren?”
“No!” she burst.
“Me, neither. So now you know.”
“Know what?”
“That it’s okay to touch. Because sometimes touching simply is what it is.” Abruptly, he stood. “I’m going to get you some clothes. You’ll sleep in the guest room. That way I’m close if anything happens.”
“Nothing is going to happen. You think the person in the sweatshirt is just going to show up?”
“No, but I was more concerned with your ribs. If they start to give you problems or you have trouble breathing, I’ll be close and can get you to a hospital faster than an ambulance can get here and back.”
Once again, channeling her inner child, Cass huffed petulantly. “I don’t have to take orders from you.”
“No, you don’t. But why don’t you do it just this once? You’re in pain. You don’t want to get back in my car, and I would feel better if you stayed here. If you listen to me, it will make both of our lives a little easier. For tonight, anyway. I think we could use easy for a while. I know I could.”
He was hard to argue with when he was right. “Fine,” she grumbled, rolling slowly to her side and off the couch until she was standing-hunched over, but still standing-on her own two feet. “But you’re not carrying me.”
She caught a flash of a wide smile on his face, and then it was gone. “Okay. You win.”
Cass walked one step, then two. She shuffled the third. Pressing a hand gently to her right side, she waited, but there was no sharp pain indicating a crack. It seemed that anything that hurt this badly had to be a break, but the reality was she would have been in much worse shape if the ribs were actually cracked. Still, the dull ache of bones and the muscle soreness made movement difficult.
Another shuffle. Then another.
In fact it made movement almost impossible.
“How many stairs in this place?” she asked.
