Virginia had rattlers, right?
Not a rattler. Rattlers rattled.
A moccasin? What deadly venomous creature might roam the dryness of a cemetery by day, and swim through the flooding of the rain by night?
She had to get out. She was too cold, trembling throughout her limbs. She was imagining too much again. Ghostly dances before her eyes. Bones reaching out from the ground. Yes, she spoke to ghosts. But none of them were speaking to her. They were just playing tricks with her mind, adding to the terror of her situation.
The water in the hole was almost to her waist.
“I’ll be able to swim out soon!” she told herself out loud.
Once again, she tried to get a grasp on one of the tree limbs. Her fingers curled around what seemed like a sturdy branch. She braced a foot against the side of the hole.
Her foot slipped on the mud and the branch snapped at the same time. She plunged all the way down, her head going beneath the surface of the rising water.
She rose, sputtering, gasping.
And then, a miracle.
“Darcy!”
Had she imagined it? Or had she really heard a voice?
“Here, here! I’m here! Help!”
Nothing then, she heard nothing at all. She hadn’t shouted loudly enough, not to combat the wind and the rain. Her voice had grown hoarse, almost nonexistent.
“Darcy!”
She wasn’t imagining it. Matt’s voice.
She jumped, throwing herself as high as she could. “Matt! Here, Matt, here, please!”
And then, at last, the limbs were ripped from the top of the grave, piece after piece. “Oh, God, yes, thank God, thank you, thank you!” she heard herself gasping.
The last of the oak was pulled away, and she was standing in the mire, looking up. The sky was dark.
She saw only his form.
Huge, hands on hips, glaring down.
And for a moment she felt a twinge of panic.
Matt. How had he known that she was here—unless he had pushed her in. Maybe he hadn’t come to save her at all. Maybe he was about to reach down and use his imposing size and strength to press her down, down into the muck and mire, where she couldn’t breathe, where she would slowly struggle and fight until she….
He hunkered down by the side of the grave.
She’d thought it before. Maybe she’d been pushed, just shoved into the grave, so that someone could come back….
And finish her off.
“Jesu, how in the hell…?” he said. “Take my hand.”
He didn’t give her a chance. He reached for hers.
Inadvertently, she pulled back.
“Are you hurt?” he asked anxiously.
“No.”
“Let me get you out of there!”
She swallowed hard, let him get a good grip on her hand.
A moment later, she heard a strange suctioning sound—she hadn’t even realized that the water had turned the earth to such a grasping muck. And still, it gave her up. He reached down to slip an arm beneath her right shoulder, pulling her out.
They both fell to the side of the grave. The rain continued to sluice down upon them. He stared at her a moment before righting himself, and reaching to help her up.
“You’re like a goddamn ice cube!” he said. “How the hell did you manage to fall into a grave? Never mind, let’s just get you back to the house.”
She was shaking, trembling. Her knees weren’t holding her. He picked her up and carried her to the car, setting her into the passenger’s side.
He found a blanket in the back and drew it around her shoulders. “How could you have missed a hole that damned big?” he asked her, turning the key in the ignition, and hitting the switch for the heater.
I didn’t fall in—I was pushed!
But she didn’t say the words. Yes, she had been pushed. But by a who or a what, she didn’t know.
Matt himself?
“The rain…I was running from the rain. I thought I could just leap over the brick wall and reach the cars faster,” she stuttered out.
“Oh, man, Darcy, look at you. Are you hurt? No broken bones? Sprained ankle?”
A crack on the temple. Maybe one that made her mind wander too fiercely.
“I’m fine.”
“Are you?” he murmured. He glanced at her, his look concerned and anxious. “This place isn’t good for you, is it?” he murmured, more to himself than to her.
“I’m all right,” she repeated. They were driving through rain, but at long last, it seemed to be slackening. “Matt?”
“Yes?”
“How did you know where to find me?”
“What do you mean?”
“How did you find me? That oak had covered the entire grave. And actually…it did take you a while.”
He scowled, cast her a glance, and looked back to the road. “We all thought you’d gone off with Max Aubry.”
“Gone off with him?”
“Clint said you were determined to talk to him, that you could handle yourself.”
“I did handle myself, very well, thank you.”
“There were so many cars, as well. I didn’t realize you were really missing until Adam said that Max Aubry approached him when he was leaving.”
“I see,” Darcy said.
He drove fast. They reached the entry to Melody House, and he swung hard into the drive, halting the car abruptly, coming around the side for her. He opened the door in haste, then paused, staring at her suspiciously.
“You’re not going to tell me that a ghost reached a bony hand out of a grave and wrenched you down into it, are you?
“Nope. Absolutely not,” she assured him.
“Come on. I’ll help you.”
“I can manage on my own, thanks.”
She slid quickly out of the car, and up onto her feet. But the world seemed to waver before her. She gritted her teeth hard, feeling the pounding at her temple where she’d struck the earth hard as she’d catapulted into the open grave.
“You’re going to slip in the mud!” Matt said impatiently. He swept her up.
Her limbs still felt frozen. She couldn’t fight. He walked up the steps to the porch, fumbled with his key, and opened the front door.
A moment later, they were on the stairway.
They passed the spot where, sometime in the past, two lovers had battled viciously, before the man had swept the woman into his arms…
And into the Lee Room.
Just as Matt now carried her.
And, just as in the past, he laid her down upon the bed, and turned away.
And once, in the past, a man had realized just what a woman knew, and what she could tell the world about him. He had turned back to her, wound his fingers around her throat, and strangled the life from her.
Matt turned back to her.
“Damn you, Darcy!” he said softly.
And came toward her.
Chapter 16
16
“T hey’re taking a really long time,” Penny said, looking at her own empty plate and the untouched hamburger she had ordered for Matt.
“Yes, well, we can order coffee,” Delilah said. “I’d really love some coffee.”
“I just wish we all knew where Darcy was,” Penny murmured.
“But, surely, nothing could have happened to her!” Delilah said.
“I’m certain that everything is all right,” Carter said firmly.
“Wonderful,” Delilah said, smiling. “We’ll all order coffee, and hopefully, they’ll arrive along with it.”
“So what’s taking so long?” Clint demanded.
“I think that I should get back to Melody House as quickly as possible,” Adam Harrison said.
They all stared at him.
Penny jumped up. “Adam! Do you have a feeling, a hunch? What’s wrong? Should we all be running out of here?”
“Penny, I’m so sorry, calm down,” Adam said. “I don’t have a feeling about anything. I just assume that, if Darcy had been caught in the rain or anything, Matt would have taken her straight back to the house.”
“Of course!” Penny said with a sigh of relief. “Mae, would you get the check for us, please? Or better yet, can you just bill the whole thing to Matt?”
“Naturally,” Mae said.
“I really think we should order coffee!” Delilah said, somewhat plaintively. “What if Matt is bringing her here? Then we’ll all be in cars going in different directions.”
“Who could drink coffee at a time like this?” Penny said, glaring at Delilah.
“Delilah has a point,” Carter said.
Adam let out something of an exasperated sigh. “I’ll head back to Melody House, and the rest of you stay here. That way, we’ll be covered.”
They all stared at him.
“Good idea, right? Miss Dey, you go right ahead and order your coffee. When I get to the house, I’ll call.”
He started toward the door. The bar phone began to ring. Sim picked it up. “Hello…yes?” He held the receiver away from his mouth. “Hey! Mr. Harrison. You don’t need to go anywhere. He’s got her. Matt’s got her. She fell into a grave, can you imagine that?”
He was answered by silence. And in the bar, one by one, they all looked at one another.
Darcy ran the water in her shower, feeling like an idiot. She’d almost cringed when he turned to her, but he hadn’t even glanced at her then. “Can’t believe this—I forgot to call and tell them that I’d found you. You’re really all right? Feels like I’m always saying that to you, Darcy. It’s why you shouldn’t be here,” he added somewhat harshly. “Grab a shower. Then, if you want, we’ll drive on over to the Wayside Inn. I’m sure the others have finished their meals by now, but I don’t know what we’ve got around here right now, and since you’re the lost lamb at the moment, the others are going to want to see you. I’ll be in my room. I think I could use a shower and change, too.”
So Matt was gone.
No violence, and no passion, either.
