He dug into his pocket and handed her the keychain, still not meeting her eyes.
Sarah started the car, feeling hollow inside. She missed Brian with a physical ache, remembering too well how he had felt in her arms. It didn’t help much to tell herself that she had held only Pete. However it had been done, Jade had given her a fresh reminder of what she had lost, and life was newly bleak without him. The wall of guilt and unease that had sprung up between her and Pete made her feel even more alone. She thought of the hopelessness of trying to confide in Beverly, of trying to make her understand what had happened.
As if he read her thoughts, Pete said suddenly, urgently, “You won’t tell Bev?”
Sarah looked at him pityingly and shook her head.
“I don’t know how I could explain it to her,” he said miserably. “When I can’t even explain it to myself. It would only hurt her. She wouldn’t understand it.”
Sarah nodded, dismissing the matter from her mind, and backed the car into the street. Looking up at the house before driving away, Sarah felt a rush of despair that swept away her earlier worries as insignificant. They had failed. Jade held all the weapons, and she and Pete were ignorant even of the rules of battle. She had no reason to imagine that she could do any better in their next encounter. It was hopeless. She had lost.
Chapter Nine
Sarah sat at the Marchants’ table with the newspaper and a pen, going quickly and methodically through the rental listings, circling all the possibilities. They were all more expensive than her house, all smaller, and not one of them sparked any real interest in Sarah. But it had to be done. Sarah had made up her mind to get out of the house on West 35th Street as soon as possible.
She had accepted defeat. Earlier, she had been almost eager for battle, driven by a stubborn need to prove herself, against her fear. Now Sarah even mistrusted her own emotions, afraid they might be used against her. Jade didn’t fight fair; she didn’t even understand his strategy. She had brooded endlessly over what had happened at the house with Pete, the madness which had come over them both, and she wasn’t satisfied with the explanation that it had just been Jade’s way of distracting them from the spell they were trying to cast. Something more must have been intended—she was certain there was some meaning in Jade’s choice of weapons. What was it, though? What would have happened if she had given in to Jade’s illusions, if she and Pete had actually made love?
Sarah was on edge. How much of what she felt was fear, how much simply sexual frustration, she couldn’t judge. Her own emotions were suddenly as opaque to her understanding as those of the creature called Jade.
She had spent an uneasy night, full of vivid, fragmentary dreams. They were dreams full of sexual longing, but the man in her dreams was not Brian. The man was a stranger to her conscious mind, but in her dreams she knew him.
At one point, Sarah woke up to find herself out of bed, halfway across the Marchants’ guest room, hand outstretched to open the door. The one compelling thought in her mind was that she must get home to join her husband. But where that home was, or who she thought was her husband, Sarah could not remember.
She jumped at a sound behind her, and turned quickly away from the table. But it was only Beverly emerging from the bedroom.
“Peter’s still asleep,” Beverly said. “Poor thing, I guess he needs the rest.” She looked down at the page of newspaper Sarah had been marking, and nodded. “I’m sure you’re doing the right thing.”
Sarah sighed. “I’m not. Oh, yes, the right thing for me, but I’m still worried about someone else moving into that house . . . I still feel responsible in a way. But I’m going to talk to the woman who owns the house, and see if I can explain the situation. Maybe she’ll believe me, maybe she’ll understand.” An image of the old woman’s terrified face flashed into her mind. “I’m hoping she’ll agree to let the house stand empty.”
“Is she all right?” Beverly asked.
“I think so. I called the hospital, and they’re letting her receive visitors.” She sipped her coffee and found it cold. She pushed the cup away and folded the newspaper. “Do you think you’d have time to take me by the house so I can pick up my car?”
“You’re not coming to class?”
Sarah grimaced and shook her head. “I couldn’t concentrate. I’ll catch up once this stuff is out of the way.”
Beverly nodded. “We can leave now. I’m going to let Peter sleep. He looked terrible when he came in yesterday—I’d never seen him look so sick. What happened to him, Sarah?”
Sarah sighed, feeling guilty, and waited until they were out of the apartment before she answered. “He must have told you,” she said. “I don’t know how to describe it to you any better, even though it happened to me.”
