“So you’re Jewish?”

Pierce opened his mouth. Said only, “Protestant. You?”

“Agnostic.” Griff reached over and daringly traced the black outline of feathers. “Former park ranger in Utah?”

“You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”

“I’m a reporter. I keep an open mind. It’s part of my job description.”

Pierce’s smile grew cynical. He glanced at the clock next to the bed. “I’ve got a busy day tomorrow. You mind if we sleep?”

“No.” Griff closed his eyes. “Night,” he said politely.

The light snapped out and he felt the dark drop down on them.

“Good night,” Pierce said.

Chapter Fourteen

A child was screaming.

A high, thin, terrified scream shattering the night like a fist through a mirror. And over the terrified wail a man was speaking, his voice raised in an effort to be heard, yet straining to stay calm, to reassure.

“Griff? Griffin. Can you hear me? Listen to me. You’re all right.”

Wait.What? He knew that voice. What was happening? He had been sleeping. Deeply asleep...

“Griff, it’s okay.” And now the voice sounded desperate. “You’re okay. Wake up now. You’re all right. Everything’s all right.”

Wait. Was that—?

Griff opened his eyes and the crazy, sliding kaleidoscope of dream and memory snapped back into place. He was in a strange bed in a strange room and a stranger was speaking to him over and over, the disembodied voice sounding shaken in the dark.

“I’m okay,” Griff rasped. His throat felt raw. He was winded, out of breath as if he’d been swimming miles beneath the ocean. His heart still thundered in his ears with the strain of trying to get to the surface. He was drenched. With sweat.

“Jesus.” The bedside lamp flicked on. Pierce stood beside the bed, naked and beautiful and bewildered in the muted light. Ink-black eyes, ink-black scrollwork on his chest and groin. He said roughly, “What the hell was that?”

Griff put his hand up as though to shield his eyes. Mostly he didn’t want Pierce to see whatever his face revealed. Too much, whatever it was. His voice cracked as he said, “I don’t know. I’m sorry.” But of course he knew. Night terrors. He hadn’t had one in years, but they had been a regular part of his childhood. Once upon a time he rarely made it through the night without screaming down the house.

“We’ll be lucky if the police don’t show up.” Pierce glanced at the phone as though expecting the SWAT team negotiator to ring any second. “You sounded like you were being murdered.”

Griff put his hand down. “I’m sorry. Really. I didn’t know I was doing it.”

“Believe me, that did not escape my notice.” He was still watching Griff as warily as if Griff was something dangerous. “What the hell were you dreaming?”

“I don’t...”

“You have to remember something!”

Griff winced, and Pierce made an obvious effort to modulate his voice. “You must remember something. Try to think.”

How strange. He had never been asked to remember before. In fact, he had been told to forget it, put it away, think of happy things, safe things. He stared up at Pierce. He didn’t know where to begin. How to begin.

Maybe that showed because after a moment, Pierce sat gingerly on the side of the bed. His black brows formed a single forbidding line, but he was still using that careful voice. “It was a dream. It can’t hurt you. Try to think. Is there some mental picture, some image you recall?”

Griff closed his eyes. Tried his best to remember. His stomach churned as he zoomed in on...not what had terrified him but how that terror felt...how he had felt...desperate, helpless, lost, powerless. The feelings were what lingered. The images were only a confusing blur. They didn’t make sense. They weren’t clear...

No. One image stood out. He nearly laughed because it was ridiculous. In the nightmare it hadn’t been funny.

“What?” Pierce said.

Griff turned to meet his eyes. “The mechanical bird.”

“The what?”

“There’s an old clock in the library at Winden House. It’s a mechanical bird in a cage. It sings at five o’clock.”

“I remember that clock,” Pierce said slowly.

“In my dream the bird was saying something to me, but I couldn’t understand it.”

Pierce seemed to consider this. Finally, he said, “What do you think it was saying?”

“Huh?”

“What do you think the bird was trying to say to you?”

Griff laughed shakily. “‘Cocktails, anyone?’ How the heck should I know what the bird was trying to say?”

“It’s your dream.”

Griff gave another uncertain laugh. He scrubbed his face with his hands, feeling the roughness of his beard, the moisture on his eyelashes. The hair at his temples was wet too. Jeez. He shook his head.

“Take your time,” Pierce said.

The only thing weirder than the fact that he was sitting in Pierce Mather’s bedroom talking about his nightmares was the fact that Pierce apparently wanted to analyze his nightmares. There was a lawyer’s mind for you.

“I don’t know.”

“Were you afraid because of what you thought the bird was trying to say or because you couldn’t understand what the bird was trying to say?”

“I’m not sure.” He grinned crookedly. “It’s a great question though.”

Pierce was still frowning.

Griff made himself ask, “Do you want me to go?” He truly hoped Pierce would say no because he dreaded the idea of being alone. Not to mention he felt more tired now than when he’d first fallen asleep. But he wouldn’t blame Pierce for wanting an undisturbed rest of his night.

“Do you think it’s going to happen again?” Pierce questioned.

“I don’t think so. I honestly don’t know. It hasn’t happened in years. Not since I was a kid.”

“You used to get these dreams when you were a kid?”

Griff nodded.

“A lot?”

“I guess.”

“Didn’t your mother take you to a doctor or a—a—”

“Shrink?”

“Hell yeah, a shrink. I’d think a shrink was in order if it was my kid going through that every night.”

“She didn’t believe in doctors.”

Pierce’s brows shot up and then returned to that now familiar unibrow. “No doctors?”

Griff shrugged. He knew by now how odd his childhood sounded to other people, but growing up it had seemed normal enough. “I didn’t get sick. I mean, I got the usual things. The measles and mumps. I never broke a bone or anything like that.”

Pierce continued to scrutinize him like it was Mather v. Hadley, with a landmark decision at stake. At last he shook his head. “No. You don’t need to go. It’s almost dawn anyway.” He climbed back between the sheets, stretched out with a sigh. He glanced at Griff and raised the blankets in invitation.

Griff cautiously edged back over. He was surprised and even a little grateful when Pierce wrapped an arm around him, pulling him closer.

“Comfortable?” Pierce’s breath was warm.

Griff nodded, shifted, rested his head in the surprisingly accommodating curve of Pierce’s neck. He sighed.

“You’re sure you’re twenty-seven?” Pierce sounded faintly amused.

“Twenty-seven and a half,” Griff replied drowsily.

“When’s your birthday?”

“June twenty-six.”

Pierce said nothing. Or Griff didn’t hear it because he was already asleep.

* * *

When he woke again it was to the sound of Pierce’s alarm clock. Nature sounds. The rhythmic sweep of the ocean. Pierce was warmly spooned against his back, and Griff came back to awareness feeling warm and irrationally happy.

He was still absorbing the surprise of that as he felt Pierce waking, blinking back to alertness. He recognized the exact moment Pierce remembered who he was with, and the withdrawal was immediate. Pierce used a gigantic yawn and stretch to move away and put some distance between them.