Page 92 of The Diamond in the Rough

The guilt was particularly strong at the moment.

18

He washot and sweaty and absolutely filthy, and had decided to stay in his dog form rather than shift back. It would be easier to just have Val spray him off in the back yard first.

Val had rolled his eyes when he’d just looked up at the car seat, wagging his tail, then went into the trunk and got out the big blanket that was back there for things like this and laid it out on the passenger seat so that he could jump in without destroying Val’s precious car seats.

I pulledmy hand back from the faint smudge on the door, frowning at the impulse that had made me run a fingertip over it. I should have known that it would contain some sort of memory. This one had obviously been Taavi’s, presumably after a hike or something similar. I’d already known not to get mud or food on Hart’s car seats, but it was good to know that he was serious enough about it that even Taavi wasn’t allowed to mess up the car.

I was tempted to touch some other part of the car,because that would be more pleasant than thinking about where we were going—which was back to Tranquil Brook.

Even though Hart had told me last week that I wouldn’t have to go back, that they could do the search of the property without me, apparently they’d changed their minds.

Hart had picked me up at my apartment at seven in the morning, and I was working myself into an anxious mess. He’d called me just after six, so at least knowing that I was going to have to go back to Tranquil Brook hadn’t kept me up all night. It wasn’t how I wanted to wake up in the morning, either, but an hour of mild panic before being bundled into Hart’s maroon Charger was probably going to be long-term better for my health and exhaustion levels than if he’d actually told me the night before.

But being back at Tranquil Brook wasn’t the only thing that had my stomach tying itself in knots.

Raj was going to be there.

I’d have to face him for the first time since he’d found out that I’d been invading his subconscious, sleeping mind.

And I had no idea what he was going to have to say about that.

Maybe he’d refuse to talk to me.

Maybe he’d pretend that nothing had ever happened between us in his head and mine.

Maybe I’d disappear into the ground and never have to deal with any of it.

I didn’t think he’d say much of anything in front of anyone else—Hart, maybe—but I also knew that if he did have something he wanted to say to me, he was likely to find some sort of excuse or reason to get me on my own.

I couldn’t decide if I was happy that the humiliation of having to grovel in front of Raj Parikh was being combined with the horror of having to go back to Tranquil Brook justto get it all over with at once, or whether it was just going to make everything that much more awful.

“I’m sorry about this,” Hart said for about the third time that day.

I nodded.

“It’s just that… we’re not getting what we need. Not sure what’s useful and what isn’t.”

I wasn’t entirely certain how I was going to be at all helpful with any of that, but I was fairly certain I was going to find out, probably the hard way.

As long as nobody made me go into the bathing room, I’d probably manage not to completely break down into a hysterical mess.

No, I was going to do that, regardless. But maybe I could avoid a full meltdown panic-attack.

Small goals.

The lookon Raj’s face when I climbed out of Hart’s car was enough to tell me that he hadn’t known and definitely hadn’t approved of my presence at Tranquil Brook.

I couldn’t say that I disagreed with him.

I didn’t want to be here any more than he wanted me here, although I had the feeling it was for very different reasons.

My hands shook and there was a constant feeling of low-grade nausea roiling in my stomach. For the moment, I had it under control, but I was fairly certain that if I stayed, I’d end up throwing up at least once before the end of the day.

I was completely terrified of whatever I would experience—or re-experience—if Hart won the argument and handed me things to touch. I would do it anyway, because ifI could be helpful, if what I found might reveal something more about the killer or his employer, or motive… I had to do it. For my own sense of self-worth, if nothing else.

Raj had gripped Hart’s elbow and dragged him away from me, hissing something in a low tone of voice that I couldn’t make out, although the increasingly bright pink of Hart’s pointed ears suggested that he wasn’t happy about whatever it was.