Out of Mind

The weight left. He stood beside the bed, bending over her, drawing on her mouth and nose while the world began to turn black for Caroline.

Helpless, paralyzed, she could do nothing to stop this man from inhaling her life. And while he pulled on her insides with the massive drag of his sucking, Caroline got smaller.

She did get smaller, and smaller. She shrank until his mouth drew in her whole head.

A plop and he spat out her head again. She flipped over and landed in something transparent. A loud, loud bang sounded before it got darker. Wherever she was, the way in or out had been closed.

Peering as best she could, her whole vision was filled with a large, almost black eye looking back at her.

Then she knew where she was. Naked, curled in a ball, Caroline lay in the bottom of her own empty champagne glass.

Chapter 10

“You aren’t my father, Ben,” Willow said, frustrated that he refused to let her go to see Nat Archer on her own.

Ben watched her face for an uncomfortably long moment. “Glad you noticed.”

The precinct house was also on Royal Street and only blocks from the Millet antiques shop.

They had almost reached the black railings around the forecourt that led to Nat’s office. Willow stopped walking. She faced Ben with the little red dog she already loved under her arm. “I don’t know how you found out when I’d be coming down here. You just showed up when I was leaving my flat. You keep on just showing up. Have you been messing around in my head again? There are basic courtesies to follow—for all the families like us. You know the rules about that.”

“I do, but I’m surprised you mention them.”

Lightning showers didn’t usually start in the morning, but today was an exception. White streaks cracked the heavy gray sky and big raindrops began to fall. The street smelled of damp grit and a suggestion of spilled beer from the night before.

Ben pulled her closer to the coffee shop next to the precinct house. “Why do you have to try to be such a loner?” he said through his teeth. “You pretend you don’t need anyone. Not you, not Miss Independence. Crap. We all need other people.”

He didn’t get mad easily. Everyone said Ben had a long fuse, and he had almost never gotten angry with Willow. She looked from her white tennis shoes with lime-green flashes and laces, to the open door of the coffee shop. It wasn’t much after seven, but a stream of people on their way to work filed in and out. They dragged in. They came out with coffee steam rising past their noses and faint sparks of new hope in their eyes.

“Want some?” Ben angled his head toward the shop.

“I want you to go away and leave me to be an adult. I’ve got trouble—we both know that—but I’m the only one who can deal with it. And I’m not guilty of anything, so I’m not worried.” Not true.

“You’re right, it isn’t true,” Ben said. “You’re worried out of your mind and I don’t blame you.”

She frowned at him. “Stay out of my head!”

“I wasn’t in there. You were in mine.”

Had she been? The thought unnerved her. If she was starting to voluntarily enter his mind, or anyone else’s, she was losing her grip on being normal. She was normal, dammit. Being around all these so-called paranormal people was getting to her—rubbing off in some irritating ways and all of them imaginary. She would be okay as long as she remembered she only imagined she was psychic sometimes because she was afraid of being so.

“Thinking about it, are you?” Ben said.

If she didn’t turn a bit wobbly just looking at him, this wouldn’t be so hard. When his blue eyes looked straight into hers and she could see how intensely concerned he was for her, staying mad took a lot of willpower.

Yesterday’s kisses still left their imprints on her. She looked at the palm of her hand and sighed. Yes, she really could still feel the imprint of his mouth there. Just giving in and sliding into his arms again would be heaven. It would also be unfair—to him, and to her in the end.

“Thanks for caring about me,” she said, softening her voice without meaning to.

“Can’t help myself,” he told her without a hint of amusement. “For the record. I couldn’t sleep last night so I gave up early. I’d already been out for a run and I was back in Sykes’s place when I heard your door open. Of course I was going to see what was going on and if I could do anything.”

She had noticed the tight black jogging pants—how could she not?—and the lightweight black cotton jacket over a T-shirt. He also wore running shoes.

“You can’t do anything, Ben. But thanks. It means a lot that you’d want to help.” And it did. What she couldn’t afford was to dwell on the sense of loss that only grew worse the longer he was around her. Wanting him but knowing she should not have him was a cruel thing.

He took her by the hand, firmly enough to make sure she couldn’t pull away.

Willow caught her breath and stared at him. “Worse,” she said, referring to the electric field that formed between their palms and fingers. “I mean, it’s even stronger than yesterday.”

“Did you think it would go away because I did? You wanted me to leave, Willow, so I did—and I hoped you’d ask me to come back. But no, nothing.” His dark blue eyes didn’t look at all sleepy in the muzzy morning light.

With the Millets, these hyperreactions between a man and a woman happened only when they were destined to be joined for life, or Bonded as it was known. Willow saw him through tears. She blinked and swallowed and tried to look away. She couldn’t.

“Things haven’t changed between us,” Ben said. “You can’t change that and neither can I.”

“Of course we can.” She made a useless attempt to drag her hand away. “It’s all imaginary.”

“Didn’t you ever love me, Willow?”

This was a nightmare, a nightmare and a dream all mixed up together. “Stop it,” she said.

They stood, holding hands, for what felt like minutes before Ben all but pulled her off her feet and into the shop. “Is it still americano with room for cream?” he asked flatly.

Willow nodded. “And yours is americano with no room for cream.” Pain had gone from their grip on each other, replaced by tingling warmth.

He grinned slightly. “I take it like a man,” he said, and she figured he wasn’t only talking about the coffee. “Any luck finding who that dog belongs to?”

“I’m going to call the shelter,” she said, her stomach knotting. “And I’ve put a sign in the shop window. I haven’t had a chance to see if I can find any ads looking for a dog. I think he was abandoned. He just showed up in my apartment.” She kissed wiry fur on the dog’s head.

When Ben didn’t answer, she looked up at him, expecting disapproval, but he smiled at her and scratched the dog under the chin. “Don’t forget there’s plenty of time for someone to come looking for him, but he couldn’t have a better home than with you. I’m hoping you get to keep him.”

She believed him. “Why do you make it so hard to stay angry with you?” she said and covered her mouth, amazed by what she’d said.

Ben gave a short laugh. “So what’s his name?”

“Mario,” she said, avoiding meeting his gaze.

“You liked my suggestion,” he said, sounding absurdly pleased. “Great.”

“Winnie begged her way in around four this morning and decided Mario is her pup. Can you imagine that? I thought she’d hate him on sight.”

“Winnie’s a one-of-a-kind dog. Does Mario mind being pushed around?”

“She gathered him up and curled herself around him,” Willow said. “I think she’d like to have taken him home to Marley and Gray.” She laughed. “Poor Marley.”

The barista pushed their paper cups across the counter and called Ben’s name. Finally their hands parted.