“It could have been dangerous,” Valeria said, her eyebrows knitted together in concern and irritation. “We should stick together when we dive.”
Don’t let her see you sweat it. It’s not for her to judge you.
I’m not sure where the voice came from exactly. But I recognized it as one that I heard sometimes when I felt put on the spot or awkward. I thought of it as some kind of “confined lady of the realm” part of my personality that popped out of her closet every once in a while when I felt cornered and defensive.
“I know. Like I said, I won’t do it again.” Somehow, I knew that edge in my voice would silence her.
And it did.
Chapter Thirteen
I felt unusually tired after we returned to Les Jumeaux and stored the dive equipment. I told Valeria I was going to take a nap. Ignoring her concerned expression, I headed up the stairs and fell into bed, where I immediately dropped into a dead sleep.
I awoke to elongated shadows in the bedroom. My cell phone was ringing. I sat up, feeling extremely disoriented. I picked up the phone and checked the caller ID.
“Hi, honey,” I said groggily.
“Hi. What’s wrong?” Evan asked me, concern in his tone. I realized my voice sounded very ragged.
“Nothing. We went diving this afternoon. I think I overdid it a little. I was wiped out when we got back. I was napping when you called.”
“Sorry for waking you. You must have been tired. You don’t take naps often.”
“I know.”
“Did you have a good time diving?”
“Yeah. Manny, Valeria’s brother, took us out on the cruiser. We dived near the shore here. It was amazing. How are your meetings going so far?”
“Fine. Nothing out of the ordinary.” There was a long pause. “Anna? Are you sure you’re all right? You sound strange.”
I laughed. “I feel a little strange, to be honest,” I confessed, rubbing my itchy eyes. I stood and headed toward the bathroom, desperate for a glass of water. I started to suspect that the stressful incident in the sauna, the discovery of the box, and my strange behavior diving today wasn’t all adding up.
I felt as if I was getting sick.
Valeria agreed with me that the experience in the sauna might have worn me down more than we’d thought. She was very sweet, insisting I take it easy and bringing me dinner in bed. I had no interest in arguing with her about it, which seemed to me further proof that I was a little under the weather. So I did a little Netflix bingeing and ate Valeria’s delicious supper of mandarin orange chicken and salad.
I was asleep by ten o’clock.
The nightmare woman came to me again that night, her presence once again turning my body into a locked prison. This time, much to my horror, I heard her gurgling voice more clearly. Not, light in the darkness, as I’d previously thought.
Light from my darkness.
And then:
Swim deep.
That’s what I heard in the ghost’s rattling throat.
The message left me highly unnerved. The most obvious reason was that I’d seen a light in the darkness when I’d swum impulsively into that cave. But something else left me uneasy about those ghostly words… something I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
I spent a good portion of the night sleepless, that disturbing, inexplicable message lying heavily on my consciousness. I didn’t fall asleep again until dawn had broken.
I awoke to sunshine streaming around the curtains. I experienced a familiar sense of urgency about my work. It wasn’t the time for me to be puzzling out the bizarre message of a nightmare. I wanted to finish my painting today, and the light appeared to be perfect for it.
While I was in the bathroom, I heard my cell phone ringing. I sprung for it when I saw it was Evan calling.
“Morning. Feeling better today?” he asked.