I see them in memory, just a flash through the back of my mind. Charred, their faces distorted, curled into themselves from the heat. Bodies that lay grotesquely on the pavement, jarring us into panic until we realize the truth.
Bingo.
I was here. I stood outside the rim of fire, watching the water a
rc, listening to the chaos.
Eight people died. But worse, this time the bomber hadn’t spared the nearby buildings. Whether too enthusiastic, or simply unaware, he’d created a force that leveled almost half this city block.
The reminder turns me ill and I bend over, gripping my knees, my stomach roiling. But it’s empty, save for the beer, so I gulp in breaths and clear my head before I make a fool of myself on the street.
I climb back into my car, sweaty, trembling.
This time, no one will die.
I back up, out of the light, swaddled in the darkness with a good view of the shop, lay my head back on the rest, pin my eyes on the store, and wait.
Chapter 18
It always starts the same way. I’m standing in the middle of a lake—not a big lake, more of a bay, with a wooden bridge arching over a waterway into the larger expanse.
This lake is surrounded by cattails and rushes frozen in January’s grip, some broken, turned mustard and brown in the crisp air. A thin layer of snow casts over the ice, thick and blue and rippled by the wind. People often believe ice freezes in pristine, skate-able smooth sheets when in fact it is scarred with thick runnels and often littered with the carcasses of unfortunate ducks and geese, trapped in its frozen grasp.
My breath puffs out smoky, then clears in the frigid air. I can almost feel it—the numbing grip of the below-zero temperature stinging my nose, but as dreams go, I can’t really feel anything. I can only hear. The wind, moaning through the willows and behind it a voice.
Always the voice, haunting, calling.
I turn, searching the shore. Empty. Just the skeletal arms of birch and poplar reaching to the gunmetal gray sky.
Then I hear the crack. It’s sharp, like a shotgun, fracturing the air, and although it’s expected, I flinch. Ravens startle and lift from the rushes. The wind whips the snow into a dervish at my feet and only then do I think to look down.
A vein has fissured open below my feet.
I start to run.
I’m fast. I can feel it, running with my mouth open, breathing hard. I pump my arms, careening across the ice, but my feet betray me and I slip. I fall, slam hard. My wind explodes out of me.
Another crack, and this time the report shatters my bones. Shaking, I lift myself off the glass. The ice webs under my mittened hands.
As I scramble to my feet, I’m no nearer the shore.
Now, a voice is calling.
I’m gasping, my breath labored, fatigue weighting each step.
The cycle repeats. I run, I fall hard, and it knocks my world sideways. Then the crack, the voice and in my soul, I know I’ll never reach shore.
The lake will open, and I’ll slide into the dark, murky, frigid depths. Disappear.
They’ll never find me.
Rembrandt!
I wake with a rush, as if the voice is right beside me and I’m trembling, my breathing rough. If I were at home, next to Eve, she would have her hand pressed to my chest, her voice in my ear. It’s just a dream.
I lean my head back into my headrest. I might be able to travel through time, but clearly I’ve brought my demons with me.
Sweat slicks my body and I run my hand across my mouth, find it dry.