West

Dimming the lantern, I closed my eyes, comforted by his homey scent. The discussion with him replayed through my thoughts, and I listened for a long moment to see if his possessions would speak to me the way my surroundings sometimes did.

There were no empathic memories here at all, as if he didn't exist or leave traces of himself the way others did. I relaxed and rested my head on his pillow, wriggling beneath the blanket to grab my cell. I typed a message to Carter then replaced the phone in the pocket of my borrowed trousers. Either the chip was faulty or there was something unusual about Taylor.

I didn't realize how busy my mind had become with the empathic memories until it was silent for the first time in several days. Instead of comforting me, all I could think about was the skeletons at the bottom of John's well.

Sleep didn't come, and every time I closed my eyes, I saw them and experienced a flare of new fear. After an hour or so struggling to block the thoughts and fall asleep, I sat up restlessly. It was too dark for me to fumble with the lantern.

Wrapping the blanket around me, I left the bedroom, relaxing once I entered the warmth and light of the main room. The sheriff was stretched out next to the fire on his stomach, still wearing his shirt, as if he feared me walking in on me.

"Can't sleep?" he asked, hearing the creak of the floorboards beneath my feet.

"No." I crossed to the fire and lay down beside him.

He sat, his dark hair tousled. "I'll go to the barn."

I laughed. "Are you afraid I'll bite you?"

"No, Josie. An un-chaperoned, unmarried woman -"

"Lay down and shut up, Sheriff," I ordered lightly. "I found three bodies today. You can protect me from anyone who wants to make it a fourth."

He hesitated, studying me briefly before he returned to his belly. I rolled onto my side, back to him, and gazed at the dancing shadows thrown off by the hearth.

"You don't scare easily," he observed.

"Not usually, no. I don't feel like being alone tonight," I replied. "Sometimes I think your brother is lucky in his cave. He knows there are shadows and darkness around him, inside him. I stumble upon them and see secrets no one should ever know. I want to believe good trumps evil but have started to doubt something I viewed as irrefutable before."

"Good and evil are relative."

"Like hanging men every Saturday?"

"To keep a peace that doesn't want to be kept. There are times when it takes evil to keep evil in check."