Page 100 of The Night Before (Savannah 1)

Oh, sure. Then why is your heart pumping in anticipation? Hmmm?

She could almost hear her twin’s accusations as she snapped on Oscar’s leash and took off jogging south, tried to run from the accusations burning through her mind. She stayed on the sidewalk, avoiding pedestrians, strollers, dogs and bicyclists. It was late afternoon, the sunlight losing ground to thick purple clouds that were rolling inland, chasing after her, just as her painful thoughts ran through her mind.

“Hey! Watch out!”

Caitlyn nearly stepped in front of a rickshaw pulled by a bicycle, but pulled back onto the curb just in time, jogging in place until there was a break in the traffic. A kaleidoscope of images spun ahead of her, graphic mental pictures of Josh at his desk, her mother lying dead in the hospital bed, Jamie gasping in her arms, the arrow in Charles’s chest, bedsprings bouncing in tempo to Copper Biscayne’s moans . . . Faster and faster she ran, trying to outrun the painful pictures, Oscar panting as he raced to keep pace with her. She didn’t know where she was going, didn’t care. Faster. Her blood thundered through her veins. Her lungs burned. Her calves ached. Still she ran, her feet slapping the pavement. But no matter how fast she ran, she couldn’t outrun the images; they caught up with her. She remembered kissing Adam, vamping with him and desperately wanting to rely on him; she recalled in vivid, nightmarish hues her bedroom on the morning after Josh had been killed and she’d woken up to all the blood.

A horn blasted and she realized she’d lost track of traffic.

“Hey, watch where you’re going!” the driver yelled from his pickup. “Next time you might not be so lucky!”

She jerked out of the way, pulling on Oscar’s leash, nearly stumbling against the curb. Her lungs were on fire and she doubled over, gasping, her hands on her knees as she dragged in long drafts of air. “I’m sorry,” she apologized to the dog and, finding a couple of crumpled bills in her pocket, tied him to a parking meter and went into a corner quick mart, where she bought a bottle of water.

What’re you running from, Caitie-Did? Is it what happened to you or is it that you can’t face who you really are, what you’ve done?

“No,” she whispered. Outside again, she opened the bottle, took a long swallow and knelt near her pet. “Here ya go,” she said, helping him drink by holding some of the water in her cupped hand. “It’s not every mutt who gets—let’s see”—she checked the label—“oh, the finest natural spring water from the mountains of France.” She laughed and Oscar wagged his tail. “Come on, let’s hike on back. No running,” she said as a breath of wind tickled the back of her neck, chilling the beads of sweat.

She looked over her shoulder, expecting to see

someone. There were other pedestrians bustling along the sidewalk, two old men in hats eyeing the sky warily as they talked, a group of people with shopping bags waiting for a bus and a woman jogging while pushing a stroller, but no sinister pair of eyes looking at her. Taking note of her surroundings, she realized she’d run much farther than she’d intended, angling through the streets without much thought. She knew where she was, but it was a long way back. “I think we’d better get going,” she said to the dog and headed toward the house. By the time she got there, maybe Kelly would have called or e-mailed back.

“Come on,” she said to Oscar and noticed how dark the sky had become. The temperature hadn’t dropped, but the air had become more dense. Traffic had picked up as commuters drove out of the city and more pedestrians filled the streets. She sensed she was being followed, but told herself that she was just being paranoid. Again. It seemed to be her new way of life . . . well, not new, but certainly more permanent. Ever since Josh’s death she’d had the skin-prickling sensation that she was being watched. Maybe even stalked.

A surreptitious glance over her shoulder and she saw no one other than bustling pedestrians heading home. No one following her. The first drops of rain fell, splashing on the pavement and sliding down her neck. The wind picked up, shimmering through the branches overhead, and pedestrians ducked inside or sprung umbrellas.

Which she didn’t have.

What she did have was nearly a mile to go. Before she got drenched. Oscar was trotting along beside her and despite her promise to him, she picked up the pace. Started jogging. The little dog was right on her heels. Faster she ran, though her legs burned. Through puddles, around curbs, the rubber soles of her running shoes slapping the pavement. She concentrated on her breathing as she ducked through alleys and under trees. As she ran by a storefront window, she thought she saw Kelly inside, but she broke stride and blinked and Kelly was gone . . . had evaporated . . . it was just her imagination. She ran on, ignoring her thundering heart and lungs that felt as if they were aflame. Sweat mingled with rainwater and ran down her face.

Through the back alleys she raced until she spied her house. Finally. She felt as if she might collapse as she rounded the corner, pushed open the gate and flew up the stairs. Picking up her wet dog, she walked inside. She found a towel in the continental bath downstairs and dried Oscar with it before giving him fresh water; then she looked in her liquor cabinet and found the makings for martinis and left them on the counter.

Dashing up the stairs, she began peeling off her clothes and headed for the shower with its still-shattered glass. She’d managed to place tape over the hole in the glass and along the cracks, but it wouldn’t last forever even though she was careful not to let the force of the spray hit it. Gratefully she stepped under the hot spray, letting the water run down her face and back. Closing her eyes, she let the hot water pulse into her muscles and refused to think how eerie it was to shower here, to sleep in her bedroom, to live in this house that had been so violated. Without the aid of sleeping pills, she doubted she would be able to rest knowing that something very, very wrong had happened here, something that she was a part of.

Somehow, some way, she had to figure out what happened. She couldn’t rely on others. Not the police. Not Kelly. Not Adam. No . . . she had to figure it out for herself. She had to unlock her memory . . . maybe hypnosis . . . Rebecca had once used hypnosis on her, and though Caitlyn hadn’t remembered what had transpired when she was under, Dr. Wade had assured her that it had been very good progress.

“I think you’ll be pleased,” Rebecca had said with a smile as Caitlyn had climbed step by step out from her hypnotic state.

“Will I?”

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

Rebecca had looked at her watch. “Let’s just say it’s a breakthrough. I’m not sure what it all means yet. Let me do some research, but rest assured, I think you’re going to feel much better.”

There had been several more sessions of hypnosis, more evasive answers, and had Caitlyn not felt so refreshed, so much better about herself, she might have been angrier about the doctor’s reticence.

“Sounds like hogwash to me,” Kelly had told her when Caitlyn confided in her sister. “What reputable shrink hypnotizes someone and then doesn’t divulge what happens while she’s out? For all you know she could have you hopping around like a chicken with your head cut off.”

“It’s not like that.”

“How do you know?”

“I know, okay? If I was doing something really weird, I’d feel it. As it is, I just feel refreshed.”

“For the record, I think it’s mumbo jumbo. Freaky stuff, Caitie-Did. Freaky stuff.”

Had it been? Now, as Caitlyn picked up a bottle of shampoo, she wondered. And why had Dr. Wade left so suddenly without a word? Yes, she’d said she was leaving for a while to organize her notes on the book she was writing, and she’d promised Caitlyn she’d return and when she did they would resume their sessions, but she needed to do some research.

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