mentioned his dead wife.
He laughed that deep rumble that brought goose bumps to my skin. “No—everything she made tasted like shit.” He lifted the bottle and took a long pull of the amber liquid. “But it was her outlet, especially when she was pissed at me. So I felt I owed it to her to eat it.”
“Well,” I said, “I don’t know that I’m much of a cook either, but I’d be willing to share my hot chocolate with you, if you’d like some.”
His mouth lifted at one corner. “Thanks, doll.”
When I set his mug in front of him, he jerked his chin at it. “So, what’s doin’ with you? You’re practically dead on your feet. Why are you awake already?”
“Nightmare,” I said with a tight smile. “How about you? Why are you awake?”
His answering chuckle was filled with bitterness. “Haven’t been to sleep yet. I have a few nightmares of my own.”
I blew over the edge of my mug and took a tentative sip, then said, “I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”
This managed to produce a true laugh, dissipating the shadow of sadness in his eyes. “Fair enough.” He jerked his head toward the kitchen door. “Come on.”
He led me into a sunken living room where a fire blazed in the massive hearth, filling the room with soothing warmth and casting it in shadow. I curled up in one corner of the leather sofa, adjusting the edges of Juliet’s robe to cover my knees.
Nicky set his hot chocolate on the coffee table, then dropped down in the opposite corner, the bottle of Scotch propped on his knee. His face wore a dark scowl made darker by the shadows cast by the fire. We sat in silence for several long moments, Nicky lost in his own brooding thoughts as I watched him out of the corner of my eye, wondering if he really had wanted to talk or just needed someone else in the room with him.
I’d polished off the last of the hot chocolate and was just rising to my feet, intent on excusing myself to leave Nicky to his thoughts, when he suddenly said, “So, what’s with all the nightmares? They because of what you saw in that spider’s head?”
I sat back down, curling into myself even more at the mention of those horrifying dreams. “Partly,” I admitted, my mouth going dry. “What I saw there . . . it traumatized me. I mean, I was just a little girl—and a very sheltered, pampered one at that. I didn’t realize any creature could even have such murderous thoughts.”
Nicky grunted, obviously not having any such delusions.
“Well, back then Tales didn’t do such a great job dealing with people suffering from trauma.” I sighed, thinking of the cases I’d worked over the years. “I don’t know that we do a whole lot better now. Anyway, my father thought the best treatment was to make me face my fears. We had a deserted little root cellar on our property—no one had used it in decades. My sister swore it was haunted, and to look at it, you’d certainly believe her. All the village children were terrified of the cellar, of what might be lurking inside, waiting to gobble us up.”
Nicky turned his head, his full attention on me now as I told my story.
“One morning, my father carried me out to the root cellar, kissed me on the cheek and gave me a big hug, then locked me inside.” I shuddered, remembering the terror that had consumed me when I realized what was happening. “It was so dark . . . so close. And crawling with thousands of spiders. I pounded on the door until my little fists bled as the spiders crawled all over me, screamed until my voice was little more than a whisper.”
“Jesus,” Nicky breathed. “How could a father do something like that to his own kid?”
“He thought he was helping me,” I told him. “It was a different time; we had no knowledge of psychology back then. He thought it was the only way to bring me back from the edge of madness, to cure me of the effects of what I’d seen.”
“How long were you in there?”
I shook my head. “I have no idea. My father stayed with me most of the time, trying to talk me through the fear, reminding me that I could control it. When he finally opened the door, it was dark. I think he mistook my silence for triumph over my fears, but I was really just too exhausted to fight it anymore.”
“God, I’m sorry,” he said softly. “What happened after that?”
I took a deep, shaky breath and let it out slowly. “I vowed I’d never go back to that dark place, not ever. No matter what, I’d control my fear. I’d never let it rule me again.”
He gazed at me for a long moment, an emotion I couldn’t quite place in his eyes. Then he nodded. “I figured you were one hell of a woman, Trish,” he said. “But I don’t think I knew the half of it.”
Feeling my cheeks go warm at his unexpected praise, I looked away, studying the room to hide my pleasure at his words. “You have a gorgeous house,” I told him, desperate to change the subject and feeling totally lame the moment I said it.
Apparently, though, he didn’t mind. A slight smile curved his lips. “This is my favorite room.”
I nodded. “I can see that. It has your personality.”
He gave me a curious look. “Yeah? And what do you think you know about my personality?”
I wrapped my arms around my legs and rested my chin on my knees. “You sometimes come off as a bit hard around the edges, but you’re actually a softy and have a way of making people feel comfortable and safe without even trying. You intentionally present the impression of ease and charm with a vibe of underlying danger,
but when I look closer, I can see there’s much more than what’s on the surface. You have a sturdiness and steadfastness of spirit that’s rare these days.”
He took another swig of his Scotch, then grunted. “And you got all that from my furniture?”
I shook my head. “No. I got that from how you’ve looked after your friends all these years, the respect and loyalty you command from the people who know you, the fear you inspire in the people who don’t. I got that from how you fought those vampires and how you didn’t even think twice about helping me when I was in danger from that ghost. How you could’ve dumped me at FMA headquarters or on any one of my colleagues, but you brought me to your home.”
He grunted again. “Well, I’m sure there are some people who’d disagree with your assessment.”
“People like Juliet?” I said, hazarding a guess. Based on the way his jaw tightened, I knew I’d hit the mark.
“She hated this house,” he said, gesturing with the bottle. “Didn’t think it was grand enough for a Capulet. She wanted something more befitting her rank among the Willies. She was a Lit after all. I was just the kid who’d fallen asleep on the job once and had turned into a petty thief when no one else would hire me. I had to fight to get where I am in the Here and Now, to make my fortune. You’d think that would’ve been enough. But she never let me forget that I was just a Rhyme and that she’d married beneath her.”
I shook my head. “But I thought . . . I mean, you loved her.”
He nodded. “Yeah. I thought she was what I needed—classy, smart, sexy as hell. She was a good dame. And I think she loved me, too. For a while anyway. Things had gone pretty cold between us there before—well, before that night.”
“Because of how you felt about Red?” I asked gently.
He shrugged. “Red and I had one helluva time once upon a time, but we were a lot better off as friends, and eventually we both realized it.”
“But Juliet worried there were still feelings between you?”
He pulled his hand down his face, scrubbing at the stubble growing in at his jaw. “She was convinced I was still sleeping with Red—which was total bullshit. That’s not my style. Anyway, things were getting better with me and Jules there at the end.”
My heart broke a little as I sat there listening to him proclaim his tentative optimism about his relationship with his wife. I’d never in my life wished more vehemently that I could unknow what I’d seen in a dying person’s thoughts than I did at that moment.
“I’m sure they were,” I managed to force out.
He cocked his head to one side. “Did you see her thoughts that night?” he asked. “Did you—what do you call it in your reports?—read her that night?”
I felt my skin prickle with panic at being put on the spot. “Of course,” I told him. “I read the dead at every
