The Sixes

direction.

“Duncan?” she called out. Thank God, she thought.

But no one spoke back. Phoebe crept out into the hall and listened. From outside the building, probably from the path that ran in front of it, she heard the muffled sound of a guy yelling boisterously to a friend—“Max, hey,” and then, “Wait up, okay?” Inside, though, there was only silence. But then, from somewhere very close to her, Phoebe thought she heard a person sigh—a low, rough sigh like the kind a dog makes in its sleep. Her legs went limp with fear.

“Who’s there?” she said. The words caught in her throat. She turned and looked behind her, where there were several offices beyond Duncan’s, and then back into Duncan’s office. She had no idea where the sigh had come from. Darkness seemed to be throwing sounds, like a ventriloquist. Then she heard the same thing again. It was close, but she couldn’t tell if it was behind or in front of her.

Frantically, Phoebe lurched toward the reception area. Once she stepped into the main corridor and had the emergency exit signs for guidance, she flew toward the stairwell doors and then down the steps to the ground floor. After flinging open the door and bursting outside, she nearly collided with a man in the dark. It was Bruce Trudeau. The moment she recognized him, all the lights inside the building popped on.

“What’s going on?” Bruce demanded as they both looked up at the building. He was out of breath, as if he’d been running.

“I don’t know,” Phoebe said, breathless herself. “Someone . . . where’s Duncan?”

“Duncan?” Bruce asked. “I have no idea. I was on the lower campus and saw the lights go out up here. Figured I’d better investigate.”

“You weren’t with Duncan?” she asked. It was starting to feel as if she were in the tail end of a dream, when everything becomes even more absurd and horses sit down at the dinner table.

“No, why?”

She could see the curiosity in his eyes. The last thing she wanted right now was for the whole world to know she and Duncan were together.

“Um, he was going to show me the rats,” Phoebe said. “He thought I’d be interested. He had to go to another floor first—I thought to meet with you—and while I was waiting in his office, all the lights in the building went out.”

“How odd,” Bruce said. “Let me see what’s going on. Do you want to wait here or come back inside?”

“I’ll wait here,” she said, forcing a smile.

As the front door of the building closed behind Bruce, Phoebe grabbed a deep breath. If Duncan hadn’t gone to meet Bruce, where in God’s name was he? She started to dig around her purse for her phone.

But as if in answer to her question, the front door of the building swung open, and Duncan came bounding out.

“There you are,” he declared and gave her arm a squeeze when he reached her. “Bruce said you were out here.”

“Me?” she said. “What happened to you?” There was an edge to her voice, but she couldn’t help it.

“I’m sorry about that,” Duncan said. “The conversation took longer than I planned, and then just when I started to leave, the lights went out and Miles had an angina attack.”

“But you said you were meeting Bruce.”

“Did I say Bruce?” he asked, furrowing his brow. “Sorry, just a slip of the tongue.”

“Is he all right now?” Phoebe asked.

“Yes, he took a nitroglycerin tablet, but I wanted to wait and make sure it worked. Plus I think the lights going off is what triggered the attack to begin with. I would have called you, but I hadn’t brought my cell phone with me.”

“Um, don’t worry about it,” she said.

“You okay?” he asked, guessing there was something going on.

She started to tell him about the sounds by his office, but changed her mind. Maybe it was the radiator she’d heard, or else her imagination had gotten the better of her, heightened because of the darkness, and she didn’t want Duncan to think she was becoming a paranoid basket case.

“Yeah—the power failure just threw me.”

“Let’s skip the tour after all and head over to my place.”

Phoebe smiled, relieved. “Good. Right now I feel in need of a couch and a glass of wine. My shoulders are up around my ears.”

“How about a couch, a glass of wine, and a neck massage?”

“Even better.”

“Just let me grab my bag from my office. I promise not to go MIA again.”

As Duncan darted inside, Phoebe perched on the balustrade outside the building. Down the hill the rest of the campus twinkled enchantingly in the night, belying all the turmoil going on at the college—and the fact that Phoebe felt so discombobulated. I heard something, I know I did, she thought.

“I’m surprised you’re letting me drive,” Duncan said a few minutes later as he backed his car out of the science-building parking lot. “I was almost positive you’d insist on following me in your car.”

“What do you mean?” Phoebe asked, puzzled.

“I know you like to be in control,” he said. He glanced quickly over to her, smiling. “That’s not a bad thing. Just making an observation.”

“You’re saying I would have felt more in control if I’d driven my own car to your house?” Phoebe asked.

“It’s more about later. Now you’ve got to rely on me to take you home.”

Phoebe laughed. “Oh, I see,” she said. “Well, as long as you’re not planning to drive me home at eleven o’clock tonight, I’m okay.”

She surprised herself at how forthcoming she’d just been with him.

“You better be careful,” Duncan said. “I might hold you captive for the entire weekend.”

The last line caught Phoebe off guard. She’d thrown the toiletries and underwear into her purse certain that she’d be spending the night, but she hadn’t thought beyond that. The idea of staying the weekend was tantalizing and yet also mildly discomfiting. She didn’t want things getting ahead of her.

“Well, let’s see how good a cook you are,” she said, smiling, keeping it light.

They had circled around to the front of the science building on their way out of campus. To Phoebe’s surprise, she saw Glenda’s husband hurrying down the front steps.

“What’s Mark Johns doing up here?” she asked.

“Hmm, not sure,” Duncan said, glancing over. “I’d heard at one point he was thinking of teaching a class in organizational psychology as an adjunct.”

Don’t let him see me, Phoebe prayed, discreetly sinking down in her seat. She had to be the one to tell Glenda about her little fling.

A minute later they passed through the northern gate of the college. “Where do you live, by the way?” Phoebe asked.

“In Winamac Acres,” Duncan said. “It’s ten minutes from here.”

She was vaguely familiar with the area—a fairly upscale subdivision that unfolded from the town.

“It’s not ideal, but I was in a hurry to find something new after Allison died,” he added. That’s good, Phoebe thought. I won’t be forced to use the bathroom where his wife died.

The outside of the house was attractive but standard—a shingle-covered ranch with a poplar tree on each side of the entrance. The inside, though, was totally unexpected. The walls between the kitchen, dining room, and living room had been knocked down to create a loftlike great room with a big gray stone fireplace. It had been decorated in a contemporary style but with comfy pieces—including a long L-shaped couch slipcovered in white canvas. The place was totally inviting.

“Did you knock the walls down?” she said as Duncan took her coat and hung it in the closet. “It’s a terrific space.”

“Yes, it was a bit of an extravagance, seeing that I don’t plan to be in Lyle indefinitely, but after everything that had happened, I needed a place that I felt really at home in.”