“East to Madison and then right,” she said.
“So, no, the car’s not stolen. I came here with . . . I mean, my parents left me enough money for a lousy car and a decent apartment, or a nice car and a crappy apartment.”
“And you picked the car?”
A wash of pink in Walker’s cheeks revealed a hint of embarrassment. “I’m a guy,” he said. “Of course I picked the car.”
Seeing his bravado momentarily waver softened Keira.
“I guess everyone has that one thing that they can’t resist spending money on, huh?” she said. “Susan’s always harping at me about how I could have better clothes or a decent car if I didn’t spend so much money on music.”
“Exactly.” He relaxed, looping one hand through the steering wheel. “But I don’t think you need better clothes. You’d only be torturing the male population of Sherwin.”
He wasn’t the first guy who’d told her she was hot, but he was the first one who’d ever said it in a way that made her feel beautiful. He made it sound like something obvious. The compliment warmed her more quickly than the heat streaming out of the air vents.
Walker turned onto Madison and Keira gasped.
There was a door in the middle of the road. A door, standing there all on its own, like the entrance to some sort of grand house that had moved away and left it behind. It was intricately carved, with a pattern of circles and interconnected lines. It had a worn metal handle, but with only the bleak meridian of Madison Street behind it, there didn’t seem to be any reason to open it. In front of the door, a swath of impossibly dark shadow lay like a doormat.
Or a threshold.
Walker drove straight toward the door, completely oblivious to it. Part of her wanted to scream that she was about to be in a second car wreck in as many hours, but she watched the car in front of them pass through it like a mirage.
Because I’m hallucinating. Again. It was exactly like what had happened with the fruit in the kitchen. Oh, God.
She reached up to touch the side of her head. Maybe she had smacked it when the SUV hit her car, after all. If she had a concussion, that might explain the sudden appearance of a door that no one else could see.
A shocked yelp slipped out of her mouth as the door handle whipped through the car between her and Walker, then disappeared through the backseat. Keira bit her lip.
“Uh . . . you okay?” The rumble of Walker’s voice shook her back to reality. He leaned forward in his seat, like he was on alert, as if she might throw up or freak out. It was the same way people in school looked at Kendall Philips last year, after her boyfriend dumped her and she’d lost it and smashed in his locker door with a softball bat.
She glanced in the rearview mirror. The door was gone—the only thing behind them was a rusted-out Cadillac. Keira dropped her hand from her head. Her scalp wasn’t tender at all—no lumps. No bumps. Whatever was wrong with her was obviously not from the wreck.
Obviously.
Anxious, she launched into a finger exercise, playing the notes on her lap. “I don’t know. I guess maybe I did crack my head, after all,” she said. “I’m seeing—my vision’s kind of funny.”
Walker’s next words were as careful as a Bach composition. “Funny how, exactly?”
She shook her head. She didn’t want him to think she was crazy. The thought of him shaking her off like some sort of lunatic he’d found muttering on the street corner made her ache.
The entrance to her neighborhood loomed on the right. “This is my turn.” She pointed. “Take the first two lefts and we’re the second house on the right.”
He fixed his eyes on the street in front of them and put on his turn signal. A muscle in his jaw jumped, and she noticed that his knuckles had gone white around the steering wheel. “Seriously, Keira—if something’s wrong with your head, you can tell me. You should tell me.”
His sudden intensity sent a shiver through her. He didn’t seem cocky anymore, and there was an edge in his demeanor that she hadn’t seen before. She licked her lips, weighing her response. In her bag, her phone began to ring. The ridiculous ringtone broke the tension in the car.
“I bet that’s my mom.” She bent and wrenched open the front pocket of her bag, digging frantically until she came up with her phone. Keira had never been so grateful for a distraction—even if it did mean dealing with a thousand questions from her panicked mother.
Chapter Nine
“KEIRA?! I JUST GOT your message.” Her mother sounded frantic. Keira could hear the slip-slosh noise of papers being thrown into desk drawers. “What happened? Where are you? I’m coming right now.”