Dying Forever (Waking Forever Book 3) (5 page)

“You look pale
. Are you feeling okay?” Bryce put her hand on Alison’s shoulder. “You’re shaking.” The concerned woman took Alison’s bag from her shoulder. “Come on. Where’s your car? You need to sit down.”

Alison di
dn’t feel well and as she lifted her hand to point at her car several spots over, the disorientated feeling she had swirling in her head was causing her vertigo. “Yeah. Thanks.” She took a step forward and the joints in her legs felt weak. Instinctively, she reached for Bryce and managed to grab the woman’s arm before she collapsed.

Startled by suddenly having Alison’s body pressed against hers, Bryce quickly pivoted and wrapped her arms around Alison’s waist. Their faces were only inches from one another, and Alison was feeling t
oo discombobulated to care that Bryce seemed actively put off by their proximity as she turned her head to the side.

Bryce
guided a lethargic Alison to her Honda, and her eyes averted, handed Alison the worn leather mailbag. “Can you get your keys out, please?”

Alison stared absently into space as she reached into the side pocket of the bag and pulled her car keys out. Bryce took the keys and the bag from Alison, and the chirp of the car alarm broke the silence in the garage.

Bryce opened the passenger side door, took Alison’s hand, and guided her into the vehicle. “I’m going to recline the seat a bit.”

A moment later, Alison was looking up at the black ceiling liner of her car. “I’m sorry about this. I was talking to a woman an -”

“What woman?” Bryce frowned as she crouched next to Alison, her arm resting on the open car door.

“Her - she - her name was Christine, and we were talking about my book, and -” Alison stopped
. She knew how ridiculous the next part of her statement would sound. She shifted so she was angled toward Bryce. “I know this sounds stupid, but she disappeared.”

Bryce’s brow furrowed. “You mean she left?”

Alison shook her head. “No. She was there. I turned when I heard you walking up the stairs, and when I looked back she was - just gone.”

When Bryce spoke
, her tone was gentle and reassuring. “I didn’t hear any voices when I came around the corner, and I - I assure you I would have heard something.”

Alison reached for the seat lever to her right and pulled it up, returning the seat to an upright position.
Her head was beginning to clear, and the spinning sensation in her stomach was gone. “The acoustics are odd, and the stairwell is concrete, so you probably wouldn’t.” Bryce shook her head, but didn’t say anything. Alison was confused and feeling defensive. “Look, I appreciate your help, but I know what happened.”

Not waiting for Bryce’s response, Alison swung her legs out of the car, suddenly eager to be on her way. Bryce quickly stood and slid out of the agitated woman’s way. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to upset you.”

Alison shut the car door and took her bag from Bryce’s hand. Their fingers lightly brushed, and Alison was reminded how cool Bryce’s skin was, and how much she liked it. “I’m just tired. You helped me and had the decency to at least not call me crazy to my face - so
I’m
sorry.”

Bryce looked down. “It’s no trouble.”

The two women stood in an awkward silence, Alison hoping Bryce would say something, even though she had no idea what that might be. “Goodnight.” Walking around to the driver’s door, Alison managed a smile. “I was going to have a glass of wine when I got home, but hell, if this is me sober, I better skip it.”

Bryce grinned
. “I assumed you were already drunk.”

Alison shook her head. “I wish. Take care.” She got into the car and locked the door. Pressing the button to lower the passenger side window, Alison leaned over. “Where are you parked?”

Bryce bent down, “Just over there.” She nodded towards her white Corolla four spots over.

Alison, still
shaky from earlier, chewed nervously on the inside of her lip. “I’ll wait until you get to your car.”

Bryce grinned. “Thanks.”

Waiting for Bryce to walk past the back of her car, Alison backed out of the parking space and waited until the other woman was safely inside her car. Pulling forward, Alison scanned the garage for any sign of Christine.
I’m not imagining this, and I’m not accidentally drunk.

Approaching the garage exit, Alison reached into the shallow nook in the center console of her car. Pulling her
garage key card out, she heard something rattling around the cubby. Turning the interior cabin light on, Alison’s eyes widened when she extracted a small black stone from the center console.

Chapter
4

“She was just gone?” Lydia’s eyes widened as she took a drink of her margarita, the oversized salt crystals from the chilled glass rim speckling the table in front of her.

Alison dipped a corn tortilla chip into
a shallow clay dish of red salsa and popped it in her mouth. She chewed for several seconds, letting the heat of the salsa coat her tongue. Taking a sip of her Corona beer, she shook her head. “It really creeped me out.”

Alison needed to talk to someone about what had happened in the parking garage. Nearly a week had passed, but the feelings
of dread and uneasiness the encounter had invoked lingered with Alison. She had thought to confide in her sister, or even her mother, but knew their relatively conservative way of looking at the world would leave her mother Elaine humoring her, and Jules outright mocking her.

Luckily Lydia was available, and
was also exponentially less judgmental. So the two women had agreed to meet for dinner at Tomatillos, a locally owned Tex-Mex restaurant near campus. Though the décor verged on gaudy with the oversized piñatas and brightly painted chairs and tables, the restaurant had some of the best beef fajitas in the city.

“I haven’t even told you the strangest part.” Alison had decided not to mention the stone until she could gauge Lydia’s reaction and skepticism. They were friends, but she didn’t want a co-worker thinking she was crazy.

Lydia put the oversized margarita glass down and reached for a chip. “Stranger than a woman vanishing and one of your students telling you she had never been there to begin with?”

“She’s not technically a student.”
Alison had already corrected Lydia on this point once during their conversation. Even though Bryce had proven a little odd and unreliable, Alison was still attracted to her and didn’t want to think of her in academic terms.

“Whatever gets your head on your pillow at night.” Lydia chuckled.

Taking a long drink from her beer, Alison rolled her eyes. “Wait. This does matter. She’s auditing the class, therefore I’m not evaluating her, ergo she’s not a student.”

Staring blankly at her friend, Lydia took a deep breath. “
Wow, that is some serious justification. I mean, Jesus, Ali,
ergo
?”

A rush of embarrassment spread across Alison’s face. “I was clarifying.”

“Right.” Lydia smirked.

Now desperate to get off the topic of Bryce’s enrollment status, Alison pressed on. “Do you want to hear the rest or not?”

Waving the waiter over for another margarita, Lydia smiled. “Of course. You’re the one that went all transitional words on me.”

The waiter arrived at the table before Alison could reply. She knew Lydia was right, and it was best to let it go. “Another
margarita, please.” Lydia smiled coyly at the twenty-something Latino waiter.

“Another
beer for you, ma’am?” The young man asked Alison, a smile spreading across his full lips.

“
Sure. Thanks.” Alison handed him her empty beer bottle.

The man left the table, and Alison felt Lydia shooting daggers at her. “What?”

Irritated, Lydia leaned back in her chair. “Do you even know when it happens?”

Crunching on another chip, Alison shook her head. “When what happens?” She managed through a full mouth.

“When you get hit on.” Lydia sighed.

Alison looked at her friend and then
in the direction the waiter had walked. “What? Him? Seriously?”

“I get a polite head nod when I order, but you get the Rico Suave smile.” Lydia’s tone was playful and Alison could tell she was in for some good humored ribbing.

“Clearly his charms were lost on me.” Alison grinned.

“Clearly. Finish your ghost story.” Lydia drummed her fingers on the wooden table top.

“Right, so then just before Bryce comes around the corner, the woman lifts her hand up and says she wants to give me something.” Alison paused as the waiter returned with their drinks and an even bigger grin on his face as he put Alison’s Corona down in front of her.

Avoiding eye contact with Lydia, she managed a strained grin. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure.” The man beamed as he walked away.

Squeezing a lime into her beer, Alison refused to look at Lydia. “Don’t. Just don’t.” Taking a deep breath, she continued her story. “So, anyway, she said she wanted to give me something and held out a small, black stone.”

“Random.” Lydia took a drink of her margarita, wiping her mouth with a white cloth napkin.

“It’s weird
, and I didn’t take it, but then she disappears.” Alison wasn’t comfortable telling Lydia how she felt faint, and that Bryce had to practically carry her to her car. She definitely didn’t want to tell her how embarrassed she had been by Bryce’s clear awkwardness with their closeness. Ironically, Alison could attract all the twenty-year-old Latino waiters in the world, but she only wanted the one thirty-something Irish goddess who actively avoided her
.

Shaking off the disappointment thinking about Bryce caused, Alison continued. “But when I got in my car minutes later, the stone was in the center console.”

Lydia stopped mid-drink. “Bullshit.”

Before Alison could continue, the waiter returned with a large, sizzling platter of beef fajitas
and all the trimmings. Carefully placing empty plates in front of the two women, he smiled at Alison. “Can I get you two ladies anything else?”

“No. Nothing.” Lydia interjected, clearly annoyed. The man blushed and quickly excused himself. “Jesus, give it a rest
, guy.” She reached for a flour tortilla. “So it was just lying in your car?”

Alison scooped several spoonfuls of
borracho beans onto her plate. “Yeah. When I got home, I took it inside and looked at it closely for the first time. It seemed almost warm to the touch.”

“Some precious stones are warm or even cool to the touch regardless of the room temperature, so that’
s not weird.” Lydia mumbled through a bite of taco.

Alison looked down at the table full of food, her appetite suddenly giving way to nausea. “It
feels weird when I hold it, Lydia. Hot, almost electric.”

“Then don’t hold it.” Lydia stated matter of factly. “Get rid of it.”

“Is that what you would do? I mean, given the entirety of the story.” Alison asked tentatively as she bit nervously at the inside of her lip.

Swallowing
a bite of her taco, Lydia reached for her margarita. “If I were you, I’d spend less time worrying about a rock and more time working up the nerve to ask non-student-Bryce out.”

Alison managed a faint smile as she took a drink of her beer. She was embarrassed to tell Lydia what had happened at the museum and then the downtown bar. The truth was she had
already the nerve to ask Bryce out once and was brutally rebuffed for her efforts.

Alison had said her goodbyes to Lydia and was walking to her car. It was a little after dusk and the parking lot lights hadn’t turned on yet, leaving the lot cloaked in shadows. A chill shot up Alison’s back, and she quickly looked around, the uneasiness from the parking garage creeping back over her.

Fumbling in her purse, she silently berated herself for not having the pepper spray readily available. Just as her hand closed around the thin metal and plastic bottle, Alison’s cell phone rang and began vibrating. Startled, a short yelp escaped her lips, and then she looked around to see if anyone had witnessed her overreaction.

The parking lot was empty as she pressed the accept icon on the phone’s screen. “Hello.”

“Professor Bailey. Tom Hutchinson here. I hadn’t heard back from you regarding my articles and thought I should just bite the bullet and give you a call.”
The man’s baritone voice was smooth and relaxed.

Alison
squinched her eyes shut and wished she had thought to look at the caller ID before answering. “Mr. Hutchinson, I’m sorry. With the start of term I’ve been -”

“Mr. Hutchinson? Oh no, that doesn’t sound promising. Tom
, please.” The man’s charm was effortless.

“Sorry. Tom.
" Alison liked the reporter, and though she had decided not to get involved with his project, she always felt bad when she had to let people down. "I’ve been very busy and was meaning to get back with you. Given my work load this term, I really can’t spare any time and think you would be better served -”