The Glimpsing by James L. Black, Mary Byrnes Read Free Book Online Page A

glowed, but this time no shadows, no sounds, no movement whatsoever.   Gabrielle was no longer in the bathroom.   She really had gone home.   He and Portia were alone.
    It all came rushing in at that moment, a revelation, grand and unfathomable, but quite clearly true.   Hours ago, Portia had come to his house under the pretense of giving him a gift.   She had made advances toward him, and he, because of Gabrielle, had refused them.   But Portia hadn’t given up.   She had returned to his house, fully intending to sleep with him.   She had even managed to somehow get rid of Gabrielle.   Perhaps that, he realized, was why he had awakened to the sound of Gabrielle weeping in the bathroom.
    As for Portia’s dress, and hair, and eyes, well that was just her way of saying that she didn’t want to be Portia any longer.   She was pretending to be someone else.   Someone who was prepared to do all of the things the real Portia could not.   And what did he care, as long as she was Portia where it mattered.
    “How did you do it?” Jack asked.   “How did you get Gabrielle to leave?”
    “I didn’t,” the woman said softly.   “She left because of you.”
    Jack had no idea what that was supposed to mean, and he frankly didn’t care.   Right now, there were far more pressing matters to attend to.
    “You’re not Portia?”
    “No,” she said flatly.
    Jack smiled, then added.   “Well, we’ll see about that.”
    After a brief pause, Jack raised his hand, held it there a moment, and then placed it squarely between the woman’s breasts.   He pushed gently, and she slowly eased back to the bed.   The hand began to roam, up her neck, along her cheek.   He slipped a thumb over her lips, toying with them, and then pressed it inside, feeling the moist warmth of her tongue.
    The hand departed, moving downward, gliding over the swell of her right breast, along her waist, finally out over her hips.   His other hand joined in, both of them now slipping beneath the red dress and bunching it up, revealing the pretty triangle of red panties.   Eyeing her thighs, he took a moment to squeeze the firm flesh there and prepared to—
    The woman’s hand landed squarely on his cheek, as unnaturally hard as it was swift.   It left behind the stinging sensation of a thousand tiny pinpricks.   The blow made his head veer sharply.   For an instant, he thought she might have dislocated his jaw.
    “Still think I’m Portia?” the woman chided.
    Jack peered at her bitterly, his eyes tearing, a hand now protecting that thoroughly abused side of his face.   She seemed to be fighting back a smile.
    He stood up slowly, cautiously, and began backing away, the moment becoming strangely surreal.
    What had just occurred was an impossibility .   A woman as thin and delicate as Portia could never have delivered such a powerful blow.   He kept backing away.   And as he did so he slowly realized that the woman he had so confidently assumed was Portia, really wasn’t her at all.   Yes, she bore a strong resemblance to the woman, especially in the area of the eyes and nose, but the lips were slightly less full, and the eyebrows bore a peculiar tilt.   She looked more like Portia’s sister than Portia herself.
    “Who are you?” Jack asked , his voice hoarsened considerably because of the blow.
    The woman peered at him for a moment, then slid forward, stretching her hands in front of her until she was postured on her stomach.   She then propped herself up on her elbows, crisscrossed her arms, and lifted her feet into the air behind her.   She looked up at him with a coy smile.
    Then Jack knew.   In fact, he chided himself for not realizing it sooner.   Incredibly, unbelievably, he was staring at a perfect incarnation of the woman in the painting.
    The truth of what was happening hammered at him once again, this time with even greater certainty.   He understood it all: the reason for the woman’s appearance on his floor, that