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At her denial, his eyes narrowed. With a sweep of his gaze, he homed in on her chest.
“There is a bruise on your left hip,” he reiterated with unnerving confidence. “Two… Maybe three days old. Another fresh injury is on your chest. On your left forearm is an older mark. Your right shoulder, too. Left upper back. Left lower back. There are more, but they span weeks—”
Suddenly he surged forward, and there was nowhere to run but to press herself against the wall.
“Were these all caused by Naomi Tanner?” He raised his voice only a fraction, but she cowered as if he shouted. The muscles of his neck were corded, his face dangerously close to hers. “Answer me!”
“I-I don’t…” Panic wiped her mind blank. Had her father been right about him after all? No…
Rather than fixate on her mouth, or a part of her a pervert might be interested in, he just…
Inhaled. Over and over, his nostrils flared with increasingly rapid intakes of air. Whatever he smelled made him swallow, and a sound rumbled in his throat a heartbeat later, too deep to form audible words. No, it was something that a part of Loren hesitantly attempted to name. A growl?
“How do you know?” she asked, barely able to form the words. “How?”
“You know I can smell them—” He snapped his teeth shut, and a muscle in his jaw twitched. He seemed to realize how it sounded—he couldsmella bruise.
Loren knew she misheard him. “W-What?”
Suddenly, he was across the room, heading for the door. “Don’t worry about it. I was wrong. Have a good day, Ms. Connors. I… I think it’s a good idea if you stay away from my property from now on.”
Loren nodded, still shaken. Somehow, the loss of her haven mattered more than his strange interrogation. Did he know about her previous trips?
His face gave nothing away. With one last raking glance, he left the house entirely, slamming the door in his wake.
Creeping to the window, she noticed that he entered a green pickup truck instead of the squad car.
In a matter of minutes, he was gone.
7
The rest of the day passed in a blur. In the absence of McGoven she felt oddly calm. With every passing second, his strange behavior became a distant memory. She could barely remember exactly what he’d said—but she didn’t dare question it.
Instead, she threw herself into busywork, desperate for a distraction. As a result, she cleaned the house—twice—and watched a staticky program on the television. Afterward, she did her homework, and when five-o-clock neared, she started dinner.
The eveningcame and went, with no sign of her father. After another hour passed, Loren left his plate in the fridge and crept into bed.
I’ll just wait,she told herself. She wouldn’tfall asleep. As soon as he came home, she’d ask about the shoes.
What felt like mere seconds later, she wrenched her eyes open as a monstrous sound shattered the quiet. It was her bedroom door flying open and striking the wall.Before she could react, a brutal force seized her arm and yanked her into the hall. The stench of stale beer gave away the intruder’s identity. Her father.
He was shouting incoherently, hauling her toward the staircase. Loren reached for the banister, but a shove to her back robbed her of balance. The air rushed past in a whoosh as she struck the topmost steps. Then another. Another.
Tuck.The instinctive voice had saved her too many times to count, so she threw her hands up to guard her face as her body tumbled like a ragdoll. It felt like an eternity before her descent came to an abrupt stop. Blinking, she found herself in the living room, tasting blood on her tongue and instinctively clutching at her left side. God, she hurt.
Ignore it,that inner voice told her.You can cry later. All that matters is staying alive.
Because she was in danger. Her father stood over her, still raging. His voice echoed off the walls, but she could only hear the blood rushing through her ears. From the way his lips moved, she could piece together the gist of his tirade—care to explain...
Something.
Her mind raced, parsing through which event could have enraged him.
Naomi? School?
“Did you hear me, girl?”
She saw his leg fly out, delivering a blow to her side. The rush of pain seemed to snap the sense back into her, and she could clearly understand what he snarled next. “Care to explain why you had that asshole McGoven in my house?”
