Drawing Blood by Mary Lou George Read Free Book Online

blue/black as he looked down at her.
    She threw her head back and panted. “Please. Take it. Do it now.” His white teeth gleamed in the dim light, his head swept down. Would she feel pleasure or pain? Holly screamed.

Chapter 4

    The sound of her own scream finally tore her from the dream. Breathless, she looked around the room…her bedroom. It seemed so real. The sheets were damp with telltale sweat and her heart pounded loudly in her ears.
    Holly’s skin burned. She threw off the covers and tore at her nightgown. Total nakedness was the only thing that offered any relief. She stood under the skylight and watched a shooting star.
    Her heartbeat eventually returned to normal as her skin chilled. Her nightgown lay in a ghostly white pool at her feet. Still damp from her perspiration, the fine cotton was cool to the touch. She tossed it in the hamper and pulled another one from the closet. Completely drained, all she wanted was sleep, but the damp sheets would provide no comfort, so she hauled them off the bed and replaced them with fresh ones. Finally, she collapsed on the mattress, pulled the sheets up and slept.
    Fatigued from the incredibly erotic dream, she hadn’t noticed how badly her arm ached or the detailed sketch that floated off the bed and landed on her slippers as she drifted off.

    * * * *

    Holly wasn’t usually a sound sleeper but when she woke the next morning to the sound of the doorbell, she knew she’d been dead to the world. Rolling out of bed, she staggered over to the window and with a scowl looked down at the person disturbing her sleep. Standing on the porch with a scowl all her own, Avery waved her arms urgently.
    Something was up. Holly glanced at the bedside clock and frowned when she saw that it was after
10:00
. She’d overslept. She hadn’t done that since moving up north. Avery hit the doorbell again with impatience. Holly waved and hurried down the stairs to the door.
      “Sorry to wake you, sleeping beauty, but you have to turn on the Moose.” She hurried to Holly’s stereo and pressed the power button. The Moose, named after the quintessential, Canadian icon, was Avery and Holly’s favorite local radio station. Music was playing and with a sound of exasperation, Avery changed the channel.
    Holly said, “Can I make you some coffee?”
    “Had some already. Stephen dropped the kids off at camp. I called you, but when your voice mail picked up, I got worried. Do you know I’ve been pounding on your door for about fifteen minutes?” She looked at Holly with concern. “I was just about to go home and get the spare key. I thought something had happened to you.” She continued to change channels until she got to the news.
    “Here,” she said, “listen to this.” She dropped her long, lean body on a stool beside Holly’s kitchen island.
    The reporter’s voice didn’t sound familiar. This wasn’t a station she usually listened to. At first, she looked at Avery with confusion then she heard what had her friend in such a state.
    In Muskoka, at a home not far away, police had found the body of an elderly woman. So far they hadn’t released the cause of death.
    Holly looked at Avery and shook her head in denial. “No…it can’t be her. She said she was leaving yesterday. Didn’t she?”
    Avery nodded. “Yes, as long as she got a few errands out of the way. I didn’t bother to ask her what those errands were. She seemed to get the urgency. I don’t know what kept her from leaving, but it sounds like it cost her her life.”
    “Wait a second.” Grasping at the proverbial straw, Holly said, “They didn’t announce the woman’s name, so we don’t know if it’s Irene O’Neill.”
    Avery treated her to a withering look that had Holly reluctantly admitting, “I know, I know. What are the chances of it being someone else? What do we do now?” Holly leaned her forearms on the kitchen island and unconsciously lifted one foot then the other, taking turns raising each and