Page 7 of Ember and Ash

“Sir,” the EMT says to Oliver from behind me. “I really must insist Ms. Thorne sit down. She hit her head.”

Oliver curses under his breath. “Sorry,” he mumbles and sets me down on the ledge of the truck, his hands sliding down my hair, his winter green eyes inspecting my injury. “Your head. Ouch. Sorry.”

“I’m fine.”

As if he doesn’t believe me, he glances at the EMT. “How bad is it?”

“It’s not,” I insist before the EMT says otherwise, and I expected she would. I focus on Oliver and what’s important right now, which is not my busted-up skull. “I have to find Jeremy.” I try to get up, and Oliver catches my waist, halting my progress.

“Jeremy’s fine,” he insists. “The shooter’s in custody, and he wasn’t after Jeremy anyway. That lunatic was all about killing you. And you can bet your pretty little backside I won’t be letting him out on bail. You have nothing to worry about.”

My brow furrows. “Me?” I ask, recalling the EMT’s similar statement with an icy chill of dread that paralyzes my breathing for a sliver of a moment and makes speaking difficult. “He…he was trying to shoot me?” I swallow hard with the realization that I was indeed being followed this morning before adding flatly, “Because I’m Jeremy’s attorney. Because the shooter thinks that I’m to blame for setting him free.”

“Because the guy’s a nutjob,” he grinds out. “He was screaming about you being a monster or a demon of some sort. You know the type. Like that damn fortune teller. Completely out of touch with reality.”

I think of the shooter, of the hatred in the vicious glare he’d aimed at Jeremy. Only he’d not been looking at Jeremy at all. I am the shooter’s “monster.” It feels far too accurate an assessment right about now.

The next morning, I wake to cool sheets and the realization that it isn’t morning at all. If I’m to believe my clock, which has never lied to me before now, paired with the bright light, it’s two in the afternoon. Obviously emotional exhaustion has taken a toll. Images flash in my mind of all the women Jeremy murdered, and I can’t go there or I’m going to lose my mind. I throw away the blanket and press my hand to my face. I don’t know what is happening to me, but I feel off, different. It’s like that moment when Jeremy showed his true self changed me in some profound way I can’t explain.

I need to do something, change something, and I force myself to breathe deeply and bring myself back into focus. In the process, my nostrils flare with the warm, earthy scent of Oliver’s cologne, its presence a reminder that I am not alone, and I certainly was not last night. He was right by my side for literally hours at the hospital while I was poked and prodded, mostly at Oliver’s insistence. He’d transported me home and slept on my couch. There’s a shadowy memory of him telling me goodbye this morning before he’d headed to work. I’m pretty sure he called to check on me too, and I’d answered the phone. I reach for my cellphone now, where it sits charging on the nightstand, but abandon it when I spy a container of Excedrin with a bottle of water next to it. Oliver has left me a note: I know how you get headaches when you sleep too long. Yes, I do, I think, and quickly pop the pills and down several large gulps of water. My head might not hurt now, but I don’t have any desire to allow it to get ahead of me. I snatch my phone up and tap Oliver’s name on my contact list.

“You’re awake,” he says, answering on the second ring.

“About time, right? Any luck reaching Jeremy?”

“No. He’s not answering my calls, and I’m sure he’s hiding from the media. Who could blame the guy?” He is silent for a few beats. “Why does it feel like there’s something you aren’t telling me?”

“You asked me that very same question about a half-dozen times last night, and my answer is the same today as it was then. I have a hunch that something’s wrong.” The lie pinches at my emotions, guilt blossoming, but how do I tell him I was in Jeremy’s head? How is it even possible?

“You spent the entire time we were at the hospital on the phone trying to find that man when you should have been resting,” he reminds me.

“Why? I don’t have a concussion, and that’s per the doctors.”

“No, but they said you were likely in shock and needed to sleep it off. And considering you slept until two in the afternoon, it’s safe to assume they’re right.” He doesn’t give me a chance to counter, shifting back to, “What don’t I know? Are you in trouble or danger of some sort?”

“I thought you were making sure the shooter didn’t get out of jail?” I counter.

“I am.”

“Then no,” I say. “I’m not in trouble or in danger.” A shiver of unease slides over me with what feels like another lie. Am I in danger? Will Jeremy decide to make me his next victim? Has he already?

“Ember,” he starts and hesitates.

“Choke it out, Oliver.”

“Is there something between you and Jeremy I don’t know about?”

“Is there something between you and Jeremy? Because that’s more likely, Oliver. I don’t get involved with clients, and if you think I would do that—”

“Stop. You’re right. I’m sorry, but there’s something going on with you.”

“Someone tried to shoot me. Is that not enough?”

His voice softens. “Talk to me, Ember.”

My teeth scrape a near fretful hole in my dry lip, and I consider telling him everything, truly I do, but I don’t want to sound crazy. I know what happened. I know what I saw and felt in that vision or whatever it was, but it won’t feel real to him the way it did for me. “It’s really nothing.”

“What’s nothing?”