He broke the surface, clawing for the pool's rim, kicking back to keep her away. He felt her hands on his leg again, felt the tightening loop of the scarf. He lashed out savagely, a hard thrust with his heel. It connected, with a shocking impact, with her flesh. Then he was free.
He scrabbled out of the water on his belly, suddenly aware of a raging presence around him that wanted furiously to hold him back. The rocks' sharp teeth tore at his flesh as he rolled to his feet. He crashed into the woods and ran headlong, branches and twigs underfoot stabbing and slashing him, voices howling in his head. He missed a step on the steep hillside, stumbled, missed another, and fell rolling downward, the hard earth beating the breath from his lungs and clawing more skin from his flesh. He kept himself rolling, over and over, tumbling down until he crashed against a rotted fallen log. He dragged himself over it, into its lee, and huddled there, fighting to get his breath back.
After a minute or so, he heard her.
"Carroll," she called. "What's the matter, darling? I was only playing!" Her voice was sweet, anxious, concerned.
Monks raised his face just enough to glimpse over the log. She was standing on the hilltop at the edge of the woods, a silvery magnificent vision. Her hair was loose now, a wild, wet stream down her back and shoulders, shimmering as her head turned slowly to overlook the moonlit landscape.
"Are you hurt? Tell me, I'll come help you." She took a few tentative steps forward, brush crackling under her feet. Monks tensed, ready to flee again. But she hissed in pain and bent suddenly to grip her foot, then backed away, limping a little. He closed his eyes in thanks. The same sharp branches and stones that had fought him were his protectors now.
But the sense of menace was still thick around him.
"You can't stay out till morning – you'll freeze! Come to me, love. I want you again."
Monks waited.
Suddenly, in screeching fury: "You kicked me, you bastard!"
He bowed his head again and hugged himself, shivering. He had never heard a voice like that – it was the furious presence he felt, speaking through her.
"Do I scare you because I'm not a cripple, is that it?"
He closed his eyes. She had found that in him too, not just Alison now, but Martine. Vengeance was descending for all that he had and had not done.
"I know you hear me," she called, voice low with wrath. "I can feel you. Go ahead and hide, but I've got you in me now. You're miner
He opened his eyes in time to see her stalking away, her white shape fading into darkness.
Monks lay there trembling in his cold rebirth. Around him, the night creatures moved with tiny rustlings, stealthy, timid with fear or fierce with readiness to pounce. In the distance, an owl hooted, whuh oo-ooo. The presence hovered around him, electric with menace: Hecate, queen of the night, mistress of spellcasters. They had powered their magic with effluvia from the victim's body, believed to contain the vital essence – hair, nail clippings, menstrual blood. Semen.
Monks forced himself to rise. Getting out of here was what mattered most in the world. He could see the lights of the house downhill and steered himself by them, crashing naked through the brush, barking in pain from his tormented bare feet. The invisible fury fought him like a headwind, while the voices chittered in his brain.
The parking area was deserted. He trotted in a crouch to the Bronco, pausing to peer in the windows, to make sure it was empty, then dropped to the ground and pulled himself under the rear end. His fingers found the set of spare keys he kept wired there, hidden by a carefully applied clump of mud. He got in and shuddered with relief when the big engine caught.
He found the narrow road and piloted the vehicle like a grandmother, hardly faster than a crawl, hands clenching the wheel at ten and three, staring wide-eyed through the windshield in the desperate effort to keep that winding line of pavement between the front tires. The overwhelming sense was that he and the Bronco were staying still. Everything else was moving, in a fluid shifting tapestry that obeyed no rules of physical order.
It got quickly unendurable. His panicked gaze searched for a place to hide, and spotted the moonlit tall tops of a eucalyptus grove across a field. He aimed for it, jarring his bones over ruts and hummocks, and finally pulled in behind the trees.
Little by little, the fury around him eased and the voices in his head receded. Awareness of cold seeped back in, and his body responded to meet its need, rummaging in the Bronco's rear for jeans and a sweatshirt. He went teary-eyed at their delicious warmth. He was feeling pain again now, too, from his cuts and bruises. Dark blood seeped from his flesh where the branches had slashed. But he knew that the healing had already begun – that invisible forces, like brownies in a fairy tale, were gathering to rebuild the torn tissue and replace the lost fluids. It was a marvel, this fleshly system that carried him around. As a physician, he was only a clumsy mechanic, able to guide the process a little. But the real work was taken care of on a molecular level, by some mysterious organic instinct that knew exactly what it was doing.
For a time he could not measure, he huddled in the front seat, drifting off into fantastic inner landscapes, getting hints of insights that seemed to have stupendous importance, then snapping back into watchful fear.
At last, he could feel that the drug was wearing off. The moon was near the horizon now. He guessed that four or five hours had passed since he had first arrived at the house. He got out and walked around for a minute to clear his head, then started the engine again. This time, things around him stayed put. He drove carefully, still a little shaky, but all right on the predawn back country roads.
Monks's mind was already filling with doubt. Had any of it really happened? Had she actually tried to drown him – or was that only a drug-induced fantasy, generated by a compounding of his fear, suspicions, and long-buried guilt about Alison? Had he imagined the words he thought she had screamed?
Or was he only being allowed to escape because of a deeper and far more fearsome truth?
It had not only happened, but she was right.
He was hers now.
Chapter 27
Gwen Bricknell stalked into the big house through Julia's studio, avoiding the party still going on out front, and quickly climbed the back stairs to her apartment. She had put her skirt and blouse back on, but she was wet, and pale with cold and rage. When she threw open the door, her trembling gaze landed on a vase of a dozen glorious red roses on her vanity. She had brought them up earlier, from the flowers delivered for the party, to celebrate. But now they mocked her.
She yanked off the garments and stuffed them in the trash, then grabbed a pair of scissors and hacked at the scarf, ripping it into shreds. It had failed her. She had had Monks so close. Everyone had seen him stoned. He would have been found in the spring, tomorrow morning, where he had wandered and fallen in. And that would have been the end of the prying.
Then her hands fell to her sides, dropping the scissors and scarf. The truth was, something in her had not wanted him dead. She had failed herself.
But she could not afford that weakness again.
She put on a fluffy terry robe, kept warm on an electrically heated rack, and started hot water running in the Jacuzzi. Then she laid out a long line of finely powdered cocaine on a china plate. She inhaled it sharply, standing quiet while its sweet energy mushroomed in her brain. When the tub was half full, she added a few drops of Rigaud bath oil and stepped in. She sank back, eyes closing, feeling the steaming warmth recharging her cells. There was nothing for that like hot water, but one had to be careful. Water was not friendly to the skin.