Tormented by Robert J. Crane Read Free Book Online Page A

tightly and nodded her head. “Don’t forget, Jake’s waiting in ambush. Don’t show weakness.”
    I cocked an eyebrow at her. “What happens if I show weakness?”
    “He’ll tour you around the whole island, regaling you with history you probably don’t give a damn about,” she said, dropping the bloody gauze in the waste basket. I watched it fall, the crimson catching my eye. “It’ll get in the way of your hunt for inner peace. Take care.” She made a motion toward the door. “I’d hate to see you have to come back here on your vacation.” She said it in an ambiguous enough way that she could have meant she didn’t want to see me because she didn’t like me or because she didn’t want to see me injured. I wondered if the people around me spent as much time decoding my sarcasm as I was spending on hers and decided that no, I was much more straightforward when people annoyed me. Wasn’t I?
    I walked out of the exam room and passed through the lobby, exiting onto the sidewalk to find the sky covered in clouds. It wasn’t dim grey or anything; more like bright white, the sun making its presence known with a healthy glow from behind one patch. Still, it wasn’t exactly blue skies.
    “Hey,” Jake said, right on command. He was standing to the side, against the wall, arms folded. “Sarah take care of you?”
    “Yes,” I said, taking a couple steps toward him. “Though I can’t decide if she was happier to see me or to be rid of me.”
    Jake shrugged. “That’s Sarah. She’s … prickly.”
    “But warms up once you get to know her?”
    He grinned. “Not really, no. But I love her anyway.” He came off the wall. “Need a tour of the town?”
    I regarded him with amusement. “How long will it take?”
    “About two seconds,” he said, and with one sweeping gesture encompassed the main street. “Here’s the town … and this concludes our tour.”
    “Wow,” I said, “that was really thorough.”
    “Sadly, it was,” he said. “There’s not much to it. If you want, though, I can give you my contact information so that in case you have any questions, or need help with anything, or just want to get together to have a drink or dinner with Sarah and myself, you can. Wouldn’t want you to feel completely isolated while you’re here—unless that’s what you want.” He held up his hands and smiled. “No pressure. Whatever you want.”
    “Uh, sure,” I said, not really sure how to turn him down. I pulled out my phone and unlocked it. “What’s your number?”
    He sidled over beside me and blinked when he saw my contact list. “You, uh … only have like five people in there. And one of them is your carrier’s customer service number.”
    I jerked my phone away, like I could make him unsee what he’d just commented on. “It’s new,” I said, covering quickly. And so it was … two years ago.
    “Right,” he said and gently took the phone out of my hands. I watched him nimbly program in his contact info. He was done in a fraction of the time it would have taken me. “Like I said, up to you. If you enjoy the peace and quiet and I don’t ever hear from you, I will not take any offense to it. But if you get lonely, call me up, and Sarah and I can have dinner with you. You know, if you want to hear another human voice.”
    “Thanks for the offer,” I said. “I’ll let you know.”
    “Then this is where I leave you,” he said, bowing slightly. His smile just seemed so … genuine. “I hope you have a wonderful day, Sienna.”
    “I hope so, too,” I said as he walked away. I turned and started to head for my car, but a peal of thunder far above stopped me. I looked up; the sky had grown a deeper grey, the cloud covering the sun suddenly dark. I felt a droplet splash on my forehead, then another. Little taps from cold fingers as the sky started to drizzle.
    “Well, damn,” I said as the cool autumn rain started to fall. For a brief moment, I stood there, hoping this wasn’t a