Born to Die - Lisa Jackson [73]
Grace approached her car as Kacey rolled down the window. “Did you see that?” she asked, and the other woman nodded. “I don’t know why he took off.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
The wolf dog growled low in his throat, eyes as pale as his master’s fixed on the surrounding forest.
“Bane, hush!” Grace commanded, and the big animal became mute.
Kacey was still talking about the other driver. “But . . . his truck might be damaged and my car—”
“Your car is fine.” Grace glanced toward the darkness into which the driver had guided his truck.
“I should speak with him.”
“No.” Grace’s gaze returned to Kacey’s. Pale green eyes were round with concern. “You should never speak to him.”
“Why? You know him?”
Grace was shaking her head and again turned to face the stretch of icy road that disappeared into darkness. “I only know that he’s evil,” she said, her breath clouding in the air. “He means you harm.”
“He took off! And I don’t think he meant to hit me.”
Grace turned back to her. “Be careful,” she warned and, whistling to the dog, walked across the road to a spot where the ditch wasn’t quite so deep and a path curved into the surrounding forest.
“Weird,” Kacey said under her breath, still shaken up, then, with some effort, turned her car around and cautiously drove the last four miles to the house she now called home. The lane was piled thick with snow, but her car, dented though it was, churned through the white powder and drove easily to its spot in the garage.
It was nearly eleven by the time she let out her breath and listened to the engine tick as it began to cool. After climbing out of the car, she flipped on the interior lights to survey the damage.
A crumpled bumper on one side, a few scratches, and a small dent were all that had happened. Easily fixed. And she was lucky to have survived. The accident could have been so much worse. Telling herself to deal with everything in the morning, she locked the garage behind her and started for the back door. The night was still, snow gently falling, the path she’d broken earlier already partially filled with new snow. Yet she had no trouble following it, her boots stepping in the large prints she’d left earlier. On the porch she paused and looked around the yard. Why, she didn’t know, just an uneasy feeling that had been with her all night. The accident hadn’t helped, nor had the other driver’s quick exit.
What had Grace said? That the driver was “evil,” that he meant Kacey harm?
That’s ridiculous. Don’t go there! He was just another driver in a hurry. And yet she felt a chill deep in her soul and remembered thinking fleetingly that she’d seen the driver somewhere before. “Now you’re imagining things.” She let herself inside and made certain the dead bolt was secure behind her.
Snapping on lights, she had the ludicrous sensation that someone had been inside. “Oh, for the love of God.” Still, she eyed each room, stepping through the archways and doors as she unwound her scarf, then hung it and her coat on the hall tree near the front door.
No knife-wielding, masked boogeyman leaped out at her.
No dark shadow crossed her path.
No pairs of eyes glowed from behind the curtains.
Muttering beneath her breath, she headed up the stairs. One step down from the landing, she paused, certain she smelled something out of the ordinary lingering in the small alcove where a portrait of her grandparents was mounted on the faded wallpaper Kacey had sworn she would take it down. She hadn’t. The pale pink rose pattern had been Grannie’s favorite, and Kacey had had neither the time nor the heart to strip it from the