Field of Graves(81)

Taylor and Baldwin made their way back to the car. Taylor lit a cigarette, a grimace on her face.

“Smarmy old dope. He gave me the creeps.”

Baldwin started laughing. “Gave you the creeps, huh? He wasn’t the friendliest person I’ve ever met.”

“Ick. Didn’t you love his quick CYA? Always gotta cover your ass.” She picked up her phone and called in to the office. “Hey, it’s me. Is Lincoln there?” She waited a moment. “Linc, I need you to do your magic. Get a number and address on Gabriel Lucas...Right...Cool. Let me talk to Marcus...Hey, puppy, how ya holdin’ up?...Oh, you poor baby. Do me a favor. Get on the phone with a doctor named Steven Hoyt. He’ll be with the oncology unit at Vanderbilt. We need all the records he has regarding treatment of Gabriel Lucas. Brain cancer. See if he has anything we can use for DNA. Yeah, we have a live one. Thanks.” She hung up and lit another cigarette.

“Lincoln will get the records a sight faster than Miss Mouse back there. Hopefully Marcus can find this Dr. Hoyt. Let’s get back over there and see what we can find out.” She realized she was walking alone. Baldwin was standing stock-still ten feet behind her.

“Baldwin? What’s wrong?”

He gave her a look, his eyes shining. “I think I know what’s going on.”





68



“Wake up, love. That’s right. Sit up a little now. You need to drink this.”

The cool water slid down the back of her throat. Jill realized she was awake, and felt Gabriel’s arm around her shoulders. She tried to gulp. She was thirsty, so thirsty, and choked on the water. Sputtering, she opened her eyes.

Gabriel was sitting next to her. She saw he had brought some food, and realized she was starving. She reached out for the tray, but he grabbed her hand gently and set it back in her lap.

“No, my darling, let me.” He reached for the plate, broke off a piece of bread and gave it to her. She took it and started chewing.

“Gabriel, what is going on?” she mumbled through the bread in her mouth.

He just looked at her, got off the bed, and picked up a sheet of paper. Clearing his throat like an actor on the stage preparing for a great soliloquy, he began reading aloud. “‘A Call to Arms’ by Jill Gates.”

Thoughts thrash and tumble

like lions crashing

through the cresting waves.

No movement, no action

lost in the abyss they call my mind,

fleeing like sandpipers

chasing ghost crabs

on the milky white powder expanse.

A calm breeze blows harmless

smiles and stabbing glares

wash away the tumult.

And I lie

in dreamless death,

suspended in my cage.

He finished with a flourish, bowing to his audience. Jill put the bread back on the plate, staring at him. He was absolutely crazy. She could see it in his eyes. And he looked even sicker than earlier, pale and drawn. She had a vague memory, some rumor about him leaving school because he was ill. But that couldn’t be. He was writing a book. He would have told her if there was something wrong.

She tried to access the memory, but her mind was so muddled from all the drugs, and she just couldn’t grasp the memory. And now he was reading her old poetry?

“What, you don’t remember this glorious ode? You wrote it for me. For me. When I read it, I knew. I knew you would be the one. You would never betray me, Jilly. I knew it in my heart that we would be together forever. ‘And I lie in dreamless death, suspended in my cage’? When I read this, I wept. I knew I had found you, the one who could help me become immortal. I knew you would bear a child, a son, who will live on forever. A son who will be strong enough to lead all of us into the afterlife, who will bless us and make us pure.”

Jill was crawling backward on the bed. This man in front of her was not Gabriel. This was not the wonderful, seductive professor she had found so incredibly attractive. This man was a raving lunatic. She hadn’t written the poem for him; it was an assignment from another teacher in another class. She couldn’t even remember showing it to him, which meant he must have gone through all of her old things. But how...oh, that was it. She remembered asking him if she could store some old boxes of work in his attic months ago, after their affair began.

“Oh God, what have I done?” she groaned aloud. It had seemed so simple, so fun. An older professor, so smart and sexy. He had shown so much interest in her from the minute she met him, always wanted to hear her thoughts and opinions. Remarks she made to the boys her age in class were often met by blank stares or derisive giggles. They weren’t interested in talking about philosophy and religion. They just wanted to get in her pants.

But Gabriel, oh, he was so different. He encouraged her crazy questions, made her feel so intelligent. He’d treated her like an equal from the day she met him, pushed her to think about the world in ways she’d never dreamed possible. And when they’d finally consummated their intellectual courtship, she’d never felt anything had been so right in the world. She didn’t think for a minute that she was the only woman he was sleeping with, but it didn’t matter to her. He was sharing his life with her, and when she became pregnant he was overwhelmed with joy, promised to take care of her and the baby forever. No, this wild-eyed thing before her was not the man she’d known. The man she knew.