The room was dark, but I could see a silhouette looming in front of the window. I caught my breath before I realized it was Devlin.
He stood very still, his face tilted skyward, moonlight bathing his features. The hush of the hospital heightened my senses. I could hear the murmur of voices in the hallway, even the distant ping of an elevator, but my attention remained riveted on Devlin. His presence filled the room, and I drew a long breath, drinking in that indefinable essence that belonged solely to him.
As I lay there studying his profile, a large form swooped down from the sky, casting a shadow across his face and into my room before vanishing into the night. I might have thought the fleeting image had been caused by the bump on my head except for the way Devlin took a half step back from the window.
“What was that?” I gasped.
He whirled in surprise, those gleaming eyes pinning me in the moonlight. “How long have you been awake?” He sounded taken aback, though whether from my alertness or that plunging shadow, I had no idea.
Ignoring his question, I pushed myself up on my elbows to scan the window behind him. “You must have seen it, too. It was huge.”
“Yes, I saw it,” he said with a shrug, but there was an unexpected roughness in his tone that his aristocratic drawl couldn’t disguise. “I only caught a glimpse out of the corner of my eye, but I’m sure it was an owl. Their wingspan is impressive, especially when you aren’t expecting to see one.”
“An owl? In the middle of the city?”
“It’s not unheard of,” he said. “Barn owls are fairly urbanized. They like to nest in church steeples. And we have plenty of those in Charleston.”
His tone had lightened, but neither his words nor his demeanor soothed me. I found something ominous about the way he’d been staring out into the darkness so intently. “Whatever it was flew right past the window. Close enough to cast a shadow over your face and into the room.”
Devlin said nothing, but instead moved toward the bed with his customary grace, his features an inscrutable mask. He looked perfectly poised, calm and unbent, but the rigid set of his shoulders betrayed a tightly coiled tension. Where moonlight slanted across his face, I could see a hint of trouble brewing in the furrows of his brow. I noticed the phone in his hand then. I hadn’t heard a ring or a vibration, much less a conversation, but something had obviously transpired to disturb him.
My gaze darted to the window, then back to Devlin. “Is everything okay?”
Normally, he was as adept as I at concealing his emotions, but I was picking up a weird vibe from him tonight.
“What is it?” I urged.
Another pause. “I have to go out for a while.”
“Is it a case?”
He hesitated for so long that I thought he didn’t want to answer, but then he said with a hint of dread, “It’s not a case. I’m told my grandfather has taken ill.”
I glanced at him in alarm. “I’m sorry. I hope it’s not serious.”
“He was in perfect health when we had dinner so I’m convinced he’s up to something. I just haven’t yet figured out his angle.”
“Are you so sure he has an angle? What if he really is sick?”
“That slim possibility is the only thing tearing me from this room tonight,” Devlin said. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, but in the meantime I’ll see to it that security keeps a sharp eye out for anything or anyone suspicious.”
“Don’t worry about me. Whoever broke into my house is likely long gone. I’ll be fine.”
“Amelia...”
I waited expectantly. He wanted to tell me something. I could see it in the flare of his eyes.
I put an encouraging hand on his arm. “What is it?”
He leaned over and grazed his lips across my forehead. “I wouldn’t leave you if I wasn’t certain you’d be safe here.”
“I know that.”
“Get some rest. I’ll be back before you know it.”
A moment later, he was gone.
I wanted to call out to him, to tell him to be careful out there in the dark where dangers from this world and the next lay in wait.
Instead, I got up and padded over to the window to search the night sky. I still wasn’t convinced I’d seen an owl earlier. For most people a nocturnal bird would have been a perfectly acceptable explanation for that diving shadow, but I wasn’t most people. I knew things. Saw things. Heard things.
The past twenty-four hours had been full of strange happenings. I felt very off center. It was as if banging my head on the stairs had awakened something inside me, making me more attuned than ever to the unnatural world around me. And yet I suffered no other repercussions from the blow. I didn’t feel dizzy or disoriented. I hadn’t experienced any blurred vision or memory loss and even my headache had faded. I wanted to believe the visions and voices would disappear, too, once I left the hospital.