Beneath THE BLEEDING SKY

Episode 6 - silo

Elizabeth cried out as darkness enveloped her like a shroud thrown over her head. Her heart hammered loudly in her ears. She fought against the sensation of being sucked into the swirling nothingness. She couldn't see him. She couldn't see anything. The crashing yowl of the storm filled the darkness, rising in tempo and pitch. A hysterical sob broke from her lips. She pushed against the arms holding her. "Let me go."

For a moment, he tightened his grip on her. Then he set her back on her feet.

"I can't see... I can't see." The monstrous storm was like a swarm of demented creatures trying to get to her. She couldn't see them but they were there. She flayed her arms trying to defend herself.

"Easy, love," he soothed. "The darkness won't hurt you." He caught her hands and held them tightly.

She gasped for breath that seemed to evade her. Her eyes rounded and very faintly she was able to see his shape in the fractured light coming through minute cracks in the shutters. Her ragged breathing became less shallow and some of the stiffness went out of her body. She let herself lean against him, an anchor in her sudden blindness.

He swore softly. "We left the flashlight behind. We weren't thinking ahead, were we? Are there any in the lounge?"

"I don't know."

He started to pull away from her but she tightened her grip on his arm. The terror of being alone was too great. She couldn't control an unreasonable fear that the darkness would swallow him up if he moved away from her.

"No use for both of us to stumble around," he reasoned quietly, gently loosening her grip.

She swallowed back a plea for him not to leave her.

Get ahold of yourself. They were in no more danger in the dark than they had been when the lights were on. It was just her imagination that had brought a rise of hysteria. A childhood fear of the dark had overtaken her.

"I thought I saw a cigarette lighter on the table," he said. His deep resonant voice steadied her.

Elizabeth forced some moisture into her mouth.

"One of the nurses is a closet smoker," she answered, trying to match his tone. "She's always leaving a Bic lying around." She drew in a steadying breath. "Let me get it. I know the room better than you do."

He hesitated a moment. "All right. I'll wait here."

Her mouth was dry as she stepped away from him but anything was better than standing still, frozen with fear. She felt her way along the counter until she reached the end of it. Slowly she walked ahead with arms outstretched, fighting the terror of falling into a dark abyss with each step.

Where was the sofa? She stopped after a few steps, searching the wavering black shadows. I must have walked past it. Suddenly she was completely disoriented. She'd lost all points of reference. The fiendish storm battered her ears with crazed howling. The darkness was alive with demons and shapeless ogres. She wanted to cry out to him to come and rescue her.

"Don't be afraid," his voice cautioned.

A stubborn pride kept the plea lodged in her throat. Slowly she turned around, holding out her arms. Her breath caught in relief when her fingers touched the back of the sofa. The rough texture of the floral slip-cover was reassuring. Sliding her hands along the cushions, she circled the couch.

"What's happening?"

"I'm circling the couch." A moment later her knees touched the low coffee table. She let out a breath of relief and bent over. "Now I'm looking for the lighter."

She blindly explored the top of the low coffee table. Her fingers brushed over a couple of magazines and then inadvertently knocked over a small vase of flowers, spilling water all over the tabletop. "I can't find it."

"Maybe I was mistaken," he replied evenly.

"No, here it is," she called triumphantly.

"Good girl." His voice was closer than she had expected. In the next instant he was beside her.

She clicked the lighter. Brief specks showered away from the flint. She clicked it. Again. And again. "Damn, it's out of fluid." The nurse probably tossed it on the table instead of in the trash.

"Here, let me try." He took the lighter from her hand.

"I don't think" Her next word was cut off as a red spark exploded in a flash. She threw up her hands in front of her face as the bright light blinded her. As suddenly as it had been pitched into darkness, the room was flooded with electric light.

She lowered her hands and stared at him in disbelief. He stood before her, a black figure in his damp open-neck shirt and narrow trousers. Tufts of dark hair on his chest matched the flowing ebony strands around his bronze face. Nothing about him was ordinary. Not his stature, his mesmerizing blue eyes, nor the powerful magnetism radiating from him. There was an arrogant lift to his handsome head. As if the electricity were under his command.

A cold chill brought a prickling to her skin. Who was he? She had surrendered to his kisses and caresses with an urgency that dismayed her. She had wanted him beyond reason.

He reached out for her but she stopped him. "No. don't touch me."

She was afraid of him. He had drawn her into a frightening intimacy that was beyond rationality. She'd been unable to deny a startling s****l awareness his touch had created even before she'd glimpsed his blue eyes and handsome face. Even now, she wanted to shut out everything but the surge of desire that flared between them. "What's the matter? Didn't you want the lights back on?" he asked with an arched eyebrow.

"Yes, but-"

"A backup generator must have kicked in.

She stared at him. Was it just a coincidence that the backup power kicked in when he had the lighter? "Is that what happened?"

"What else?" He lightly stroked her arm. "I guess the clinic had a backup after all."

Common sense told her that the electricity could have come on a moment earlier when she was clicking the lighter. But it hadn't. The timing had been exact! To the same second! A sixth sense quivered. Nothing about him was commonplace. Not the dark intensity of eyes, nor a hint of fierce nature beneath the carefully controlled exterior. He was like someone fighting an inner demon.

Stop it! she told herself. It was the storm. How could anyone think rationally in the horrible cracking, booming, snapping barrage of rain and wind? Her de-sire for this man was edged with insanity. She knew nothing about him. And yet she wanted him with a hunger that mocked every romantic liaison she had ever had.

"Don't be afraid of me," he said with a gentle sadness in his eyes. He reached out and pulled her against him.

She wanted to bury her head against his firm chest and at the same time she wanted to get away from him. "We have to get back to the others," she protested. She was filled with an irrational fear she didn't understand. It had nothing to do with the hurricane. The danger lay within herself. "Please let me go."

He held her firmly for a long moment and then he released her. He murmured under his breath, "Yes, I'll let you go when the time comes. I promise."

He wanted to say more but the time wasn't right. He handed her the packages of cookies and candy, then picked up the can of coffee and the coffeemaker.

"We'd better get back before..."

The lights flickered in warning.

When he opened the door, he looked in both directions before he let her step out. The inner hall seemed to be intact but there was a strong draft whipping around the corner that led to the front entrance. Above the howling wind and rain, he could hear a shattering of glass.

The front windows had blown out, he thought. That meant that destruction of the front lobby had begun. Both of the side wings had already been damaged. They couldn't return to the children's wing now even if they wanted to. The main section of the building was divided by several halls and the adult recreation room was the most protected because the corridor that ran past it was at the center of the main building. They had moved the children just in time. The wrathful storm would eat away at the building, biting away each wall and room until the structure was leveled.

"What's happening?" Elizabeth's voice was tight.

"I don't know," he lied.

They couldn't see the damage taking place at the front of building and he was grateful for that. No use building any more anxiety than was already filling her eyes with fear. "This part of the building is holding.

Let's get back to the rec room."

He slipped a free arm around her waist. She stiffened for a brief moment and then seemed to give in to the protective strength of his arm. She looked up at him, her eyes asking him desperate questions that he could only ignore. He knew she was fighting to understand what was taking place between them. He had no answers. None that he could tell her.

The compulsion that had driven him to come to the clinic that morning was beyond any simple explanation. He only knew that she was in peril and he had to be with her. The first time he had seen her moving across the clinic grounds she had been wearing a yellow dress. The soft fabric had gracefully swung around her legs, and her corn-silk hair had bobbed gently on her shoulders. When she disappeared into the clinic, he had felt a deep sense of loss.

Unseen he lingered close to her. Watched her arrive in the mornings and leave late in the evenings. He had been nearby when she and the little boy sat in the shade of the old oak trees. He had listened to her sweet voice singing to the child, and something sharp like a grappling hook had sunk into him.

It was the same every time he saw her. When she was in the company of a tall professional-looking man, he especially had to hold back, resisting a mounting need to take her for his own. And when she began to come and go by herself again, he experienced a deep sense of relief. He never understood his compulsion but waited for the right moment to make himself known to her.

Now he was here with her and the children. His torment was easing. He was almost at peace.