Chasing Venus (43 page)

All those days in
Glendale they had felt relatively safe?
 
Fake.
 
An illusion.

So where was he
now?
 
Watching still?

“Why does he want to
kill me?”
 
Annie shook her head, her
eyes pained.
 
“I don’t
understand.
 
I thought he just
wanted to frame me.
 
What good does
it do him to kill me?”
 
She started
to tremble.
 
Her knees buckled.

Reid lunged forward and
lifted her into his arms, her body light as a rag doll.
 
He kicked the door shut, then carried
her to the couch and laid her down.
 
He crouched beside her and saw clearly the telltale signs of her pitched
flight.
 
The bloodied scratches on
her arms, some frighteningly deep.
 
The dirt and grass smears on her jeans and tee shirt.
 
The caked mud on her sneakers.

He had had a moment or
two of doubting her when he’d first gotten back to the cabin the prior
night.
 
Now he wondered how that was
possible.

She noticed his
appraisal and chuckled weakly, a semblance of the old Annie.
 
“You should have seen how people stared
at me in the library.
 
I felt like a
freak.”

He refrained from
pointing out that she had been in danger in the library, too, danger of a
different kind.
 
Being
recognized.
 
Being arrested.
 
Yet that hadn’t happened.
 
And now here she was, with him again.

Her eyes ran down his
body, naked but for the towel.
 
She
cocked her chin at the .38.
 
“I
didn’t know you packed one of those.”

“
Crimewatch
has made me a few enemies.
 
It’s the same kind I used to carry when
I was a cop.”

“I could’ve used it
last night.”

“I wish you’d had
it.
 
Then this whole thing would be
over.”

“It’s far from
over.”
 
The pained look came back
into her eyes.
 
“I have no idea who
he is, Reid, no idea.
 
I think he’s
a middle-aged man.”

“Why do you say that?”

“He’s not that
fast.
 
He’s got a gut.”
 
She waved a hand when Reid started to
speak.
 
“That could describe a young
man, too, I know.
 
But I don’t think
so.
 
Something about the way he moves.”
 
She stopped.
 
The stillness returned, as if the memory
alone were enough to paralyze her.

“You don’t have to talk
about this now.
 
Now is the time for
you to sleep, to wash up, to eat something.
 
Let me see what we’ve got.”
 
He began to rise.

She clutched at his
arm.
 
“Don’t go.”

“I’m just going to the
kitchen.
 
I’ll be right here.
 
Don’t worry, I won’t leave you.”
 
The reassurance tripped off his lips,
sounded natural to his ears.

She studied his face as
if to analyze whether he spoke the truth, then fell back against the
cushions.
 
He went to the bedroom
first and wrenched on his jeans, inserting the .38 in his waistband, then moved
into the kitchen to forage for food.
 
They were getting low on supplies.
 
Peanut butter on crackers would have to do.
 
He carried it back to the couch, where
Annie lay with her eyes closed.

He stood over her,
wondering how something as simple as watching someone sleep could be so
fascinating.
 
Her chest rose and
fell in an even rhythm; her mouth hung slightly open.
 
Now, at rest, her brow was smooth and
unfurrowed
.
 
Her
black lashes were impossibly long; her skin as dewy as a baby’s.
 
He was surprised anew at how petite she
was, how little her hands and feet were.
 
In sleep she looked sweet, vulnerable.
 
But by now he knew that her small size
belied her strength.
 
There was a
lot of will, a lot of fight in that diminutive frame.

Somehow she’d make it
through this.
 
He didn’t know how,
didn’t know when, but he could imagine a normal life for her.
 
He could picture her as he’d seen her
that night after Simpson and crew had discovered the dead frogs in her
backyard—cross-legged on the sofa in her own home, marking manuscript
pages with a red pen, tortoiseshell glasses sliding down her nose.

He was taken aback by
the sadness that washed over him at the image.
 
Annie alone.
 
Annie going on with her life.
 
And somewhere far away, him going on
with his.
 
Alone, too, in a way he
hadn’t been before he met her.

She stirred, opened her
eyes, didn’t seem fazed to find him staring.
 
“Hi.”
 
She forced her body upright and peered
at the food in his hands.

He handed it over,
tried to shake the desolation that had overtaken him.
 
“This should make you feel better.”
 
He cleared his throat.
 
“Let me get you some water.
 
And a knife for the peanut butter.”

Those domestic chores
settled him a bit.
 
He sat on the
coffee table near the couch, this time watching her eat instead of sleep.
 
This he found just as compelling.
 
Finally he had to laugh.
 
“You don’t look so tired anymore.”

“I’m faking.”

“Did you sleep at all
last night?”

Her eyes rose to
his.
 
“A little.
 
Under a tree.
 
When I was sure I’d lost him.”

“You didn’t want to
come back here?”

“I didn’t want to risk
it.
 
This is where he found me.
 
And you were gone.”

Now he wanted to hear
the whole story.
 
She seemed to
sense it.
 
“He never got that close
to me once we were outside.
 
He ran
after me for a long time but I dropped him.
 
He just fell further and further
back.”
 
She gave a lopsided
smile.
 
“It made me very happy I’m a
runner.
 
That was one way I could
outdo him.”

Reid wasn’t
reassured.
 
Her first sentence
lodged in his mind like a splinter.
 
“You said he never got close to you once you were outside.
 
Does that mean—”

“He had me by the legs
when I jumped out the window.
 
I was
dangling there.
 
I had to kick him
off.”

Reid couldn’t keep his
eyes from trailing down her body.
 
She put down the plate of food, hiked the hem of her jeans.
 
And there, in purple and black, were the
bruises that told the tale.
 
The
handiwork of a maniac who’d murdered four people and for a terrible moment had
Annie in his grasp.

Reid understood the
desire to kill.
 
He’d felt it in his
own soul.
 
But this, this he
couldn’t grasp.
 
Where did this
man’s rage come from?
 
What had
Annie, or any of those other writers, ever done to him?

Annie spoke again, and
what she said startled him.
 
“Do you
ever pray?”

The question took him
back.
 
“I used to when I was a
kid.
 
Irish Catholic family, mass
every Sunday, the whole thing.
 
But
now?
 
Not really.”
 
He shrugged.
 
“Though I’ll tell you I’ve had my
moments.”

She nodded as if she
understood.

“In the alley …”
 
His voice trailed off.
 
Oh, he’d prayed there.
 
God hadn’t listened but Reid couldn’t
blame him.
 
No doubt He had more
sympathy for people who didn’t summon his name only in emergencies.

“I never really
prayed.
 
As you might imagine, my
parents aren’t big on organized religion.”
 
She gave a rueful laugh.
 
“But yesterday when I was running, you’d have thought I’d prayed all my
life.
 
I said one prayer after the
next, like an old pro.”

“You sound
embarrassed.
 
You shouldn’t be.”

“It makes me feel like
a hypocrite.”

“No.”
 
He rose from the coffee table, squeezed
beside her on the couch.
 
“You were
afraid you were going to die.
 
It’s
only natural at a moment like that.”

“When he was trying to
break down the bathroom door …”
 
She
shuddered and closed her eyes as if that would banish the image.
 
Reid knew she would soon learn, if she
hadn’t already, that that trick didn’t work.
 
“For a long time I couldn’t get the
window open.
 
Part of it was painted
shut.
 
My life flashed before my
eyes.
 
I didn’t think that happened
but it did.”

“You saved
yourself.
 
You should be incredibly
proud.
 
You’re the only writer who
got away from that scumbag.”

“Barely.”

“The point is, when you
had to get the job done, you did.”
 
He paused, then, “Apart from how damn relieved I am, I am also
tremendously proud of you.”

“Really?”
 
The eyes she turned on him glowed with
gratitude.
 
Then she looked
away.
 
“I was married to Philip for
years and he never once said that to me.”

Your ex is a jerk
, Reid wanted to say.
 
Forget
him
.
 
Though he would be a
hypocrite to mouth those words given how large Donna loomed in his memory.
 
Instead he whispered into her hair.
 
“I can tell you that lots of people with
experience, with training, don’t function the way you did.
 
I could tell you stories that would blow
your mind.”

“I hope you do
someday.”

There it was again, a
vision of the future.
 
This time
with Annie in it.
 
A different
picture entirely.

She rose from the
couch, brushed cracker crumbs from her jeans.
 
“I’m really not all that brave,
Reid.
 
Even after I read your
posting, I was afraid to come back here.
 
Until I saw your truck.
 
Really, until I saw you.”
 
She frowned.
 
“Are you sure you
shouldn’t be hiding the truck?”

“As far as I’m
concerned, it’s a deterrent.
 
He
waited for the truck to leave before he made his move.”

“He was watching us.”

“Yes.”

“He could be watching
us now.”

“Yes.
 
But I’m ready.”

Annie let her eyes
drift to the gun in his waistband.
 
“I want to learn how to use that thing.
 
But right now I’m desperate to take a
shower.”
 
She didn’t move toward the
bathroom, though.
 
She stood still
and glanced toward it, then back at him.
 
“Will you, you know, keep an eye out while I’m in there?”

“I can’t promise you I
won’t get distracted.”

Her eyes flared with
panic before she caught the innuendo.
 
She shook her head.
 
“You are
such a guy to be able to think about sex at a time like this.”

He rose and towered
over her.
 
Her eyes—those
delicious green eyes—never wavered from his.
 
“Maybe I’ll get real lucky and won’t
have to just think about it.”

She held his stare for
a long enough beat to give him hope.
 
Then she turned and moved toward the bathroom.

Mission
accomplished.
 
Now she was
distracted enough to forget at least some of her fear.

He cleaned up from her
paltry meal, called out once to reassure her he was nearby.
 
He heard the shower’s water pound.

She had left the
bathroom door, battered as it was, partly open.
 
He slid inside the room and watched
her.
 
Through the opaque glass he
could make out only the vaguest outline of her body, but that was enough to
tantalize.
 
“I’m here,” he said, so
she wouldn’t be frightened if she happened to look over.

“Okay.”
 
She was shampooing her hair.
 
A rosemary scent filled the air.

He eyed the dirty
clothes she’d abandoned on the linoleum floor and scooped them up.
 
“I’m putting your clothes in the
washer.”

“I won’t have anything
to wear.”

That was the whole
idea.

The water had stopped
running by the time he returned.
 
He
handed her a fresh towel and continued his perusal of her body as she rubbed
herself dry.
 
When she was done she
twisted the towel around herself and combed her fingers through her hair, whose
blond spikiness aroused him.
 
Not
that he needed any encouragement.
 
He levered himself off the door jamb, pulled her body into his arms, and
lowered his lips to her neck.