Forbidden Ground (Cold Creek #2)(44)

“You okay?” Grant whispered. “Didn’t mean to push things—us. I don’t mean to take advantage of your being a guest here.”

“Or of trying to distract me?” she managed to answer. “But you do.”

“If we get together—I mean, not only like this—I don’t want it to be because you want to convince me you should explore the mound.”

That was the splash of cold water she needed. She struggled to sit up, and he helped her. They sat, still facing each other. “Nor do I want you to think my response is any sort of bribery,” she told him.

They were so close she could see her reflection in the dark depths of his eyes, flickering firelight, too, as if flames danced within. Could it be she’d known this man for less than a week? In a way he was her enemy, but she felt so close to him. She was suddenly afraid of him and herself. He’d come closer to convincing her to want him, even to love him, and wouldn’t that mean putting what he wanted above her own needs?

*

That night, Kate couldn’t sleep. Her mind raced over things Grant had said and done—Carson’s words, too. For a while she studied the photo of his grandmother Ada. She looked so unique, as if she knew things she couldn’t quite say or was a deep thinker. For some reason, Kate related to her, instinctively liked her. She turned out her lights, then stood at her bedroom window, staring out toward the mound. The slash of moon seemed like a tilted grin, like the one the Beastmaster wore. And she kept thinking of Carson’s silly story about the walking dead coming to get her to make her visit their graves in the mound.

Paul Kettering’s funeral was tomorrow. He’d be laid to rest not far from here, according to current customs, embalmed, put in a coffin, then a concrete burial vault six feet under, his grave marked with a stone. The Adena had buried their beloved, too, but according to their ways, under a mound. It was still a mystery how Paul’s skull had been smashed. It was a mystery how the Adena of Mason’s Mound had died, and she yearned to—

She heard a fierce, single, distant shout. Surely, that hadn’t come from outside—from the mound! No, it was muffled, but definitely Grant, unless Brad had come back, but she hadn’t heard him.

Could Grant be sick? Calling for her? If Brad was back, was it an argument? An intruder like at Paul and Nadine’s?

Not waiting to grab her robe or stuff her feet in her slippers, she grabbed a brass bookend from the dresser for a weapon and ran from the guest bedroom into the dark house.





14

Kate rushed headlong across the living room with fire embers still glowing in the grate. She had not even been down the hall to Grant’s bedroom. Several doors stood open like dark, yawning mouths, but two of them were closed.

“Grant? Grant, are you all right?” she called out.

Wearing only black boxer shorts, he opened his door and leaned against the frame. He looked frazzled and disheveled. She wanted to comfort him. Though his bedroom was dark and the hall was dim, she could feel his eyes on her body. She crossed her arms over her breasts, surprised she still held the heavy bookend in one hand.

“Sorry,” he said, shaking his head as if to clear it. “Nightmare. So real. I must have yelled. You got me thinking too much about what could be inside the mound—ghosts or something.”

“You don’t have to apologize for that. Welcome to my world,” she said to try to lighten the mood, but she could tell he was embarrassed.

“Ever see one of those old mummy movies—Boris Karloff, I think?” he asked. “It’s your fault, sweetheart, for hauling out that picture.”

Sweetheart?

“Grant, I’m sorry. How about we form a team with Carson Cantrell and his staff and excavate the mound, even if it’s just to prove there’s nothing of interest or value there? You know—debunk any strange thoughts we might have about it. Since many of the mounds were entered and pillaged by pioneers years ago, maybe there is nothing left, but don’t you feel curious?”

“Isn’t curiosity what killed the cat? But yeah, I’m curious about you, at least.”

Despite priding herself on being rational and careful, she walked closer. Talk about that mound being a magnet—this man enticed her as much...more.

A voice cut in so close she jumped. “Din’t mean to ter’rupt your foreplay or afterglow,” Brad said. “Or,” he said, staring at the brass bookend she held, “a lover’s quarrel. I’m goin’ to the room you two ’signed to me. ’Scuse me, please.”

Now Kate felt really undressed. “Grant had a bad dream and called out,” she said as Brad propped himself against the wall, not moving despite what he’d said.

“No need to ’xplain. I swear you two are fated to be mated, so full steam ahead.”

“You weren’t driving in that condition, I hope,” Grant said, putting Kate gently behind him. “I thought we were agreed on that.”

“Nope. Had a lady friend. Don’t we all? She dropped me off—not dropped me.” He snickered at his own stupid joke.

“Lacey?” Grant demanded.

Behind him, Kate grimaced and shook her head. Brad might guess she’d spied on him now.

“Word sure travels fast in these parts,” Brad said. “Yeah, Lacey, just for old times’ sake, man. Sometimes I think ‘Bad Brad’ was better for her’n you were.”