A Deep and Dark December(67)

A pounding on Keith’s door. “Sheriff. Open the door!” The doorknob jiggled.

“Keith!” Erin shrieked.

“Erin! Stop it!” Graham gripped her shoulders harder, jostling her against the floor. “It’s not real. Snap out of it.”

Her head knocked against the hardwood, cracking the pain open. Suddenly she was free of the vision. Thrust back into the here and now. She closed her eyes, then opened them again.

“Graham?”

“Yes.” He released her shoulders and smoothed her hair back from her face. “I’m here, Babe.”

“I couldn’t stop it.”

“I tried to reach you.”

“I heard you calling.”

“You did?” He sagged down onto the floor next to her, laid his head against the cool wood floor. “You scared the crap out of me. What the hell happened?”

She wanted to move, but couldn’t find the strength. “I got sucked into one vision and then another. Couldn’t break free.” She pulled in a shaky breath. “It’s never been like that.” She put a hand to her head where the pain had nearly split her head in two.

He moved closer. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay.” But she wasn’t. Keith’s anguished moan as he’d leapt to his death looped through her head. She rolled onto her back slowly and stared up at the ceiling.

Something wasn’t right. She tried to reconcile the Keith in her vision with the Keith she’d known. His expressions and movements didn’t match, like a movie out of sync he’d been confusing to watch, his body moving one way while his mind seemed to move in another. What did a person think of when he took his own life? Was he scared? Happy? Relieved?

“You saw Keith in your vision,” Graham prompted.

She continued to stare at the ceiling. Graham was hard to look at, knowing how much pain he was going to cause her. But there would be joy, too, she imagined or else why would they move in together? Why would they get engaged? What would make him pull away from her eventually and whose grave would he go to when he’d leave her? This was why she tried hard not to ever look at the future. Why seeing Greg’s death had disturbed her so much. She’d not tempted fate by summoning up the future since she was a child and saw the night her mother would leave forever.

“Yes, I did. You were there.” She bolted upright, the realization striking with shocking force. “You could’ve stopped him.”

Graham sat up next to her. “Stopped him from what?”

“Oh, my God. You were there. At Keith’s house. You were knocking on the front door as he jumped off the balcony.”

“Jesus. You saw Keith’s death?”

“Didn’t you hear him?” She looked off into the distance, trying to remember the details. “You knocked. His shoe fell off and hit the lamp. It crashed to the floor. You banged on the door again and tried to open it.” She turned to him. “You might’ve saved him.”

Graham met her gaze and in his eyes she saw realization dawn. “Holy shit. I heard a noise. I just thought he was hiding to keep from answering my questions.” He pounded the floor with a fist. “Damn it. I tried to get in, but all the doors were locked. Damn it!”

“I don’t think he really wanted to kill himself.” His struggle, the jerkiness of his movement. How out of sync his actions were with who he was as a person and the emotions that had played across his face. She really didn’t think that Keith wanted to kill himself. He’d fought against it.

“What do you mean?”

“I think someone or something drove him to do it.”

“Drove him? Like a mind control kind of thing?”

“Yes. Exactly like mind control.”

*

Graham leaned back against the sofa. The fright of seeing Erin lying unconscious on the floor was just now wearing off, but his heart hadn’t gotten the memo. It still pounded out a fight-or-flight beat. He pulled in a deep breath and let it out slowly. This day had been a shit-fest from the moment he’d stepped out onto Erin’s porch that morning. And now she was trying to tell him that there might be someone in San Rey with the ability to control other people’s thoughts. Fucking hell.

“How is that possible?” he asked.

“Oh, my God!” She popped up to her feet and began to pace. “Greg.”

He followed suit, moving slower than she had. “You think someone got to Greg too?”

“I know it sounds crazy. It is crazy. Let me try and explain—” She suddenly clamped both hands to the side of her head and squeezed her eyes shut, swaying.

“Erin!” He raced to her side and put his hands over hers. “Erin. Make it stop. Come on, Babe. You can do it.”

She sucked in air and her eyes popped open. “I was just thinking about Greg and the pain hit. I started to see him and then you pulled me back. What the hell is going on?’

The fear in her voice shook him. He wouldn’t let her see how much. “Just hang on to me.” He pulled her hands down and held them in his. “I’m right here.”

“Someone is doing this. Someone with a powerful ability.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. But he knows about me, knows how to bend my ability and turn it against me.” She put a hand on his chest and gripped his shirt, bringing him closer. “He’s doing the same thing to my dad and my aunt.”