Chapter 12
Grace reached her house at the same time the police arrived.
The young, heavy-set officer cast a suspicious glare at Julian. "Who's he?"
"A friend," she said.
The officer held his hand out to her. "All right, give me the keys, and let me search the place. Officer Reynolds will stay out here with you until I finish."
Grace dutifully handed over her house keys.
She chewed her thumbnail as she watched him enter. Please let Rodney be in there.
He wasn't. The police officer came out-a short time later, shaking his head.
"Damn," she breathed.
Officer Reynolds walked her to her house with Julian one step behind. "We need you to come in, and take a look around, see if anything's missing."
"Did he make a mess?" Grace asked.
"Only in the bedrooms."
Heartsick, Grace walked into the house and up the stairs to her room.
Julian trailed behind, and watched the way she held herself rigidly cool. Her face was so pale that it made her freckles all the more apparent. He could kill the man responsible for this. No woman should ever be this afraid, especially not in her own home.
When they reached the top of the stairs, he saw the door at the end of the hallway ajar. Grace ran to it.
"No!" she gasped.
Julian rushed in behind her.
The grief on her face made him see red. He felt her pain in his heart as if it were his own.
Tears streamed down her face as her gaze darted over the shambles. The bed had been torn apart and drawers overturned as if Zephyros had come through on a tirade.
Julian put his hand on her shoulder to comfort her.
"How could he do this to their room?" she asked.
"Whose room?" Officer Reynolds asked. "I thought you lived alone."
"I do. This was my parents' room before they died." Grace looked around in disbelief. It was one thing to go after her, but why would he have done this?
She looked about at the scattered clothes, clothes that reminded her of so many wonderful moments. Her father's shirts that he'd worn every day to work. Her mother's favorite sweater that Grace used to beg to borrow. The earrings her father had given her mother the anniversary before they died. All of it was now tossed about as if it were worthless.
But it wasn't worthless to her. It was all she had left of them. The hurt stabbed deeply into her heart.
"How could he do this?" she asked as rage tore through her.
Julian pulled her into his arms and held her tight. "It's okay, Grace," he breathed against her hair.
But it wasn't okay. Grace doubted if it would ever be okay again. She couldn't stand the thought of that animal running his hands through her mother's clothes. Of him stripping the sheets off their bed. How dare he!
Julian looked at the police officer.
"Don't worry," the man said, "we'll find the guy."
"And then what?" Julian asked.
"That's for the courts to decide."
Julian raked him with a disgusted sneer. Courts. He had no use for modern courts that could turn such an animal loose.
"I know this is hard," the officer said. "But we really need you to keep looking around, Dr. Alexander, to see if he took anything."
She nodded.
Her courage amazed Julian as she withdrew from his embrace, and brushed the tears from her cheeks. She started looking through the debris. Julian knelt by her side, wanting to be close should she need him again.
After a thorough search, Grace crossed her arms over her chest and looked at the officer. "Nothing's missing," she said, then went to her own bedroom.
Grace stepped tentatively inside. A quick perusal showed the same kind of damage in here. Both her and Julian's clothes had been thoroughly searched. Underwear was scattered all about, and her bed had been stripped and the mattress was askew.
How she wished the beast had found Julian's sword beneath the bed and made the mistake of touching it. Now that would truly have been justice.
But Rodney hadn't found it. In fact, Julian's shield was still where he'd left it, propped against the wall beside the bed.
Looking around at her scattered clothing, Grace felt so violated, as if Rodney's creepy hands had touched her body.
Grace saw the door to her book closet slightly ajar. Her heart stopped beating as she walked to it, and opened the door wider. In that moment, she truly felt as if Rodney had ripped her heart out and stomped on it.
"My books," she whispered.
Julian crossed the room to see what she was looking at. His breath caught in his throat as he stood behind her.
Every single book she owned had been torn to pieces.
"Not my books," she said, falling to her knees.
Grace's hand shook as she touched the pages of the books her father had written. They were irreplaceable. Never again would she be able to open them up and hear his voice speaking to her from the past. Nor would she be able to open up Black Beauty and hear the faint memory of her mother reading it to her.
It was all gone.
In one move, Rodney Carmichael had killed her parents all over again.
And then her gaze fell to the shredded pieces of The Iliad. Tears filled her eyes as she remembered the way Julian had looked when he'd seen it. The hours they had spent with each other as she read.
Those hours had been so special. So magical as they lay in front of the couch lost in the words of the story. It was their own little realm. Their own special heaven.
"He decimated all of them," she whispered. "Oh, God, he must have been here for hours."
"Ma'am, they're just-"
Julian grabbed Officer Reynolds by the arm, and pulled him back into the bedroom. "They're not just books to her," he said between clenched teeth. "Don't mock her pain."
"Oh," he said sheepishly. "Sorry."
Julian returned to Grace inside the closet.
She was sobbing uncontrollably as she ran her hand over the shredded pages. "Why would he do this?"
Julian picked her up and carried her out of the closet, then laid her on the bed. She held on to him so tightly that he could barely breathe, and she sobbed as if her heart were splintering.
In that moment, Julian wanted to kill the man who'd done this to her.
The phone rang.
Grace screamed and struggled to get up.
"Sh," Julian said, wiping her tears with his hand while holding her steady. "It's all right. I'm here. I've got you."
Officer Reynolds handed her the phone. "Answer it in case it's him."
Julian glared at the man. How could he be so insensitive as to ask her to talk to that rabid mongrel?
"Hi, Selena," Grace said, then she burst into tears again as she told Selena what had happened.
Julian's thoughts whirled as he considered the man who had invaded her home and wounded her so deeply. What concerned him most was the fact that the man knew what to go after. He knew Grace. Knew what was important to her.
And that made him far more dangerous than the police realized.
Grace hung up the phone. "I'm sorry for the outburst," she said, wiping her tears away. "It's been a long day."
"Yes, ma'am, we understand."
Julian watched as she pulled herself together with a strength of will he had known few men to possess.
She led the police through the rest of her house.
"He must not have seen this book," one of the officers said as he handed Julian's book to her.
Julian took it from Grace's hands. Unlike the officer, he wasn't so sure. If the bastard had tried to tear it up, then he had been in for one nasty surprise.
The book could never be destroyed. Over the centuries, he had tried to do it himself, countless times. Not even fire could mar it. But the book served to remind him of just how true Grace's earlier words were.
In a few days, he would be gone and she would have no one to protect her.
That thought made him ill.
The police were finally leaving as Selena pulled into the driveway. She got out of her Jeep with a tall, dark-haired man who had his arm bound in a cast, and came running to the door.
"Are you okay?" she asked Grace as she hugged her.