Carolina Moon

was waiting for me to make a mistake, to open the door so that he could pounce. When I did, when I told my mother she could find the canning wax up in the top of the cupboard—such a stupid mistake—he had me. He didn’t always beat me that bad, but that night… When he was finished he could be sure I wasn’t going anywhere.”
    She came back to the table. “Sherry was in the store when he came in yesterday. He asked her about her dog, and she’d just filled out an application for a job. I had the paper on the counter. Her name, her address, her phone number. He would have been certain of me, certain I’d be too afraid to tell anyone I’d seen him. He wouldn’t have expected me to go to the police. But he couldn’t have been sure of her.”
    “You believe Hannibal Bodeen killed Sherry Bellows because she’d seen him?”
    “It would have been his excuse, his justification for what he wanted to do. I only know he’s capable of it. I can’t tell you any more. I’m sorry. I’m not feeling well.”
    She walked away from the table and closed herself in the bathroom.
    She couldn’t fight off the sickness anymore and let it come. Let it empty her out. Afterward she lay on the floor, on the cool tiles, and waited for the weakness to abate. The quiet seemed to echo in her ears along with her own heartbeat.
    When she could she got to her feet, and turned the shower to blistering hot. She was chilled to the bone. It seemed nothing could warm her, but the water helped her imagine all the ugliness, the smear of it being washed off her skin if not out of her mind.
    Steadier, she wrapped herself in a towel, dosed herself with three aspirin, and stepped out, prepared to curl into bed and lose herself in sleep.
    Cade was standing by the window, looking out over the moon-washed dark. He’d left the lights off so that silvered glow silhouetted him there. She could hear the flutter of night beyond the screen, the wings and whines that were the music of the marsh.
    Her heart ached for everything she couldn’t stop herself from loving.
    “I thought you’d gone.” She walked to the closet for her robe.
    He didn’t turn. “Are you feeling any better?”
    “Yes, I’m fine.”
    “Hardly that. I just want to know if you’re any better.”
    “Yes.” Decisively, she belted the robe. “I’m better. Thank you. You’re under no obligation here, Cade. I know what to do for myself.”
    “Good.” He turned, but his face remained in shadows. She couldn’t read it, refused to try to see anything else. “Tell me what to do for you.”
    “Nothing. I’m grateful you went with me, and that you brought me home. It’s more than you had to do, more than can be expected of anyone.”
    “Now back off? Or is that just what you expect? For me to go, to leave you alone, to take myself off to a nice comfortable distance. Comfortable for whom? You or me?”
    “Both, I imagine.”
    “You don’t think any more of me than that? Any more of us?”
    “I’m awfully tired.” Her voice wavered, shaming her. “I’m sure you are, too. It couldn’t have been pleasant for you.”
    He stepped toward her then and she saw what she’d known she would see. Anger, black waves of it. So she shut her eyes.
    “For God’s sake, Tory.” His hand brushed over her cheek, back into the wet tangle of her hair. “Has everyone always let you down?”
    She didn’t speak, couldn’t. A tear slid down her cheek and lay glistening on his thumb. She went, biddable as a child, as he led her to the bed, lifted her onto his lap.
    “Just rest,” he murmured. “I’m not going anywhere.”
    She pressed her face into his shoulder. Here was comfort, and strength, and above all the solidity no one had ever offered her. He asked no questions, so neither would she. Instead she curled into him, lifted her mouth to his.
    “Touch me. Please. I need to feel.”
    Gently, so gently, he ran his hands over her. He could give her the comfort of his body, take his own in hers. Trembling she reached for him, her lips parting under his and going warm.
    Slowly, so slowly, he loosened the tie of the robe, slipped it from her. Laid his hand on her heart. It beat frantically, and her breathing still caught on sobs she fought back.
    “Think of me,” he murmured, and lay her on the bed. “Look at me.”
    He touched his lips to her throat, her shoulders, skimming his hands through her hair when she reached up to unbutton his shirt.
    “I need to feel,” she