Cold Fire

him.
    She was afraid of him.
    She couldn't do anything about the love; that was just part of her now, like blood or bone or sinew. But almost any fear could be overcome by confronting the cause of it.
    Wondering at her own courage, she drove back along the graveled path to the foot of the windmill. She pumped three long blasts from the horn, then three more, waited a few seconds and hit it again, again.
    Jim appeared in the doorway. He came out into the gray morning light, squinting at her.
    Holly opened her door and stepped out of the car. “You awake?”
    “Do I look like I'm sleepwalking?” he asked as he approached her. “What's going on?”
    “I want to be damn sure you're awake, fully awake.”
    He stopped a few feet away. “Why don't we open the hood, I'll put my head under it, then you can let out maybe a two-minute blast, just to be sure. Holly, what's going on?”
    “We have to talk. Get in.”
    Frowning, he went around to the passenger's side and got into the Ford with her.
    When he settled into the passenger's seat, he said, “This isn't going to be pleasant, is it?”
    “No. Not especially.”
    In front of them, the sails of the windmill stuttered. They began to turn slowly, with much clattering and creaking, shedding chunks and splinters of rotten vanes.
    “Stop it,” she said to Jim, afraid that the turning sails were only a prelude to a manifestation of The Enemy. “I know you don't want to hear what I have to say, but don't try to distract me, don't try to stop me.”
    He did not respond. He stared with fascination at the mill, as if he had not heard her.
    The speed of the sails increased.
    “Jim, damn it!”
    At last he looked at her, genuinely baffled by the anger underlying her fear. “What?”
    Around, around, around-around-around, around-aroundaround. It turned like a haunted Ferris wheel in a carnival of the damned.
    “Shit!” she said, her fear accelerating with the pace of the windmill sails. She put the car in reverse, looked over her shoulder, and backed at high speed around the pond.
    “Where are we going?” he asked.
    “Not far.”
    Since the windmill lay at the center of Jim's delusion, Holly thought it was a good idea to put it out of sight while they talked. She swung the car around, drove to the end of the driveway, and parked facing out toward the county road.
    She cranked down her window, and he followed suit.
    Switching off the engine, she turned more directly toward him. In spite of everything she now knew—or suspected—about him, she wanted to touch his face, smooth his hair, hold him. He elicited a mothering urge from her of which she hadn't even known she'd been capable—just as he engendered in her an erotic response and passion that were beyond anything she had experienced before.
    Yeah, she thought, and evidently he engenders in you a suicidal tendency. Jesus, Thorne, the guy as much as said he'll kill you!
    But he also had said he loved her.
    Why wasn't anything easy?
    She said, “Before I get into it… I want you to understand that I love you, Jim.” It was the dumbest line in the world. It sounded so insincere. Words were inadequate to describe the real thing, partly because the feeling ran deeper than she had ever imagined it would, and partly because it was not a single emotion but was mixed up with other things like anxiety and hope. She said it again anyway: “I really do love you.”
    He reached for her hand, smiling at her with obvious pleasure. “You're wonderful, Holly.”
    Which was not exactly I-love-you-too-Holly, but that was okay. She didn't harbor romance-novel expectations. It was not going to be that simple. Being in love with Jim Ironheart was like being in love simultaneously with the tortured Max de Winter from Rebecca, Superman, and Jack Nicholson in any role he'd ever played. Though it wasn't easy, it wasn't dull either.
    “The thing is, when I was paying my motel bill yesterday morning and you were sitting in the car watching me, I realized you hadn't said you loved me. I was going off with you, putting myself in your hands, and you hadn't said the words. But then I realized I hadn't said them either, I was playing it just as cool, holding back and protecting myself. Well, I'm not holding back any more, I'm walking out on that highwire with no net below—and largely because you told me you loved me last night. So you better have meant it.”
    A quizzical expression overtook him.
    She said, “I know you don't remember