"Yes, I understand that, Amabel." She wasn't about to tell Amabel that Thelma knew who she was.
"Good. You try to sleep, baby." She didn't come in to kiss her good night, for which Sally was grateful.
She lay there, waiting, waiting.
Finally, she slipped out of bed, pulled on her sneakers, picked up her duffel bag, and tiptoed to the window. It slid up easily. She poked her head out and scanned the ground as she'd done earlier. This was the way out. It wasn't far to the ground, and she knew there was no way she could get down those stairs without Amabel hearing her.
No, she'd be just fine. She climbed out the window and sat on the narrow ledge. She dropped the duffel bag and watched it bounce off the squat, thick bushes below. She drew a deep breath and jumped.
She landed on James Quinlan.
They both went down, James rolling, holding her tight against him.
When they came to a stop, Sally reared up on her hands and stared down at him. There was a half moon, more than enough light to see his face clearly.
"What are you doing here?"
"I knew you'd run after that telephone call."
She rolled off him and rose, only to collapse again. She'd sprained her damned ankle. She cursed.
He laughed. "That's not good enough for a girl who didn't go to finishing school in Switzerland. Don't you know some down and dirty street curses?"
"Go to hell. I sprained my damned ankle and it's all your fault. Why couldn't you just mind your own damned business?"
"I didn't want you out on the road hitchhiking with some lowlife who could rape you and cut your throat."
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
"I thought of that. I'd rather take that risk than stay here. He knows I'm here, James, you know that. I can't just stay here and wait for him to come and take me. That's what he said. He said soon he'd be here for me."
"I was reading a newspaper when Martha came in all worried and told Thelma about a woman calling you, a woman you said wasn't a woman but your father. She said you were really distressed. She didn't understand why you'd be so upset to hear from your father. I knew you'd probably try to run, that's why I'm here, having you crush me into the ground."
She sat there on the ground next to him, rubbing her ankle, just shaking her head. "I'm not crazy."
"I know that," he said patiently. "There's an explanation. That's why you're not going to run away. Now that's crazy."
She came up on her knees, leaning toward him, her hands grasping his jacket lapels. "Listen to me, James. It was my father. No fake, no imitation. It was my father. Amabel said it could have been a man disguising his voice
as a woman's if I hadn't been the one to answer the phone. Then she turned around and told me how much strain I'd been under. In other words, I'm crazy."
He took her hands in his, just held them, saying nothing. Then he spoke. "As I said, there's always an explanation. It probably was a man. We'll find out. If it wasn't, if it truly was a woman who asked for you, then we'll deal with that too. Trust me, Sally."
She sat back. Her ankle had stopped throbbing. Maybe it wasn't sprained after all.
"Tell me something."
"Yes?"
"Do you think someone could be trying to gaslight you?"
What did he know? She searched his face for the lie, for knowledge, but saw none of it.
"Is it possible? Could someone be trying to make you crazy? Make you doubt your sanity?"
She looked down at her clasped hands, at her fingernails. She realized that she hadn't chewed her nails since she'd been in The Cove. No, since she'd met him. They didn't look so ragged. She said finally, not looking at him, because it was awful, what she was, what she had been, perhaps what she still was today, right now. "Why?"
"I'd have to say that someone's afraid of you, afraid of what you might possibly know. This someone wants to eliminate you from the game, so to speak." He paused, looking toward the ocean, fancying he could hear the crashing waves, but he couldn't, Amabel's cottage was just a bit too far for that. "The question is why this someone would go this route. You're about the sanest person I know, Sally. Who could possibly think he could make you believe you were nuts?"
She loved him for that. Loved him without reservation, without any question. She gave him a big grin. It came from the deepest part of her, a place that had been empty for so long she'd forgotten that it was Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
possible to feel this good, this confident in herself, and in someone else.
"I was nuts," she said, still grinning, feeling the incredible relief of telling someone the truth, of telling him.
"At least that's what they wanted everyone to believe. They kept me drugged up for six months until I finally got it together enough to hide the medication under my tongue and not swallow it. The nurse always forced my mouth open and ran her fingers all inside to make sure I'd taken the pills. I don't know how I managed to keep the pill hidden, but I did. I did it for two days, until I was together enough. Then I escaped. And then I got the ring off my finger and threw it in a ditch."
He knew she'd been in a sanitarium, a very expensive posh little resort sanitarium in Maryland. All very private. But this? She'd been a prisoner? Drugged to her gills?
He looked at her for a long time. Her smile faltered. He just shook his head at her, cupped her face in his hand, and said, "How would you like to come back to Thelma's place and share my tower room with me? I'll take the sofa and you can have the bed. I won't make any moves on you, I swear. We can't just sit here for the rest of the night. It's damp and I don't want either of us to get sick."
"And then what?"
"We'll think more about that tomorrow. If it was a woman who put the call through, then we need to figure out who it could have been. And I want to know why you were in that place for six months."
She was snaking her head even as he spoke. He knew she regretted spilling it to him now. After all, she didn't know him, didn't have a clue if she could trust him or not. She said, "You know, I have another question. Why did Martha answer Amabel's phone and not Amabel?"
"That's a good one, but the answer's probably just as simple as that Martha happened to be standing next to the phone when it rang. Don't get paranoid, Sally."
He carried her duffel bag, his other hand under her arm. She was limping, but it wasn't bad, not a sprain, as she'd
feared. He didn't want to haul her over to Doc Spiver's. Only the good Lord knew what that old man might do. Probably want to give her artificial respiration.
He had a key to the front door of Thelma's Bed and Breakfast. All the lights were out. They walked to his tower room without waking Thelma or Martha. James knew there was only one other guest, who had come in just today, an older woman who'd been nice and smiling and had said that she was here to visit her daughter in the subdivision, but she'd always wanted to stay here, in one of the tower rooms. Thank God, she'd said, that there were two. Which meant she was on the other side of the huge house.
He switched the bedside lamp on low only after he closed the Venetian blinds. "There. It's charming, isn't it? There's no TV."
She wasn't looking at him or the window. She was moving as fast as a shot toward the door. She knew she didn't remotely love him anymore. She was afraid. She was in this man's room, a man she didn't know, a man who was sympathetic. She hadn't known sympathy in so long that she'd fallen for it without thought, without question. James Quinlan was quite wrong. She was as nuts as they came.
"Sally, what's wrong?"
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
She was tugging on the doorknob, trying to turn it, but the door didn't open. She realized the key was still in the lock. She felt like a fool.
He didn't make any movement of any kind. He didn't even stretch out his hand to her. He just said in his calm, deep voice, "It's all right. I know you're scared. Come now and sit over here. We'll talk. I won't hurt you. I'm on your side."