Page 14 of Safe in Shadow (Pine Ridge Universe #22)

S he slept.

He paced the perimeter of the land surrounding the house.

Yes, if he truly wanted to exert himself, he knew he could make it to the very edge of Pine Ridge for a few minutes at the most—and after speaking to Grace, he now realized both why it was possible and why it was always so difficult.

All those miles—all those acres used to be theirs. His and James.

Farms. Their land was going to be farms—but that had changed, and the land wasn’t his now, even though the house still seemed to be.

The grounds around the house seemed to remain under his control—or his care—or perhaps they were his cell.

With that morose thought accompanied by memories trying to assert their control, Nyx walked into the treeline.

Certain patches appeared darker to his eye, even in the shadows cast by the trees in the moonlight.

Places where innocent blood cries out.

Grace is in no danger from me.

She will surely be in no danger from The Stranger.

He turned and looked at the house. It looked as though someone lived in it now. The roof was repaired. The windows and shutters were new and fresh. The paint was pristine. Nothing sagged or hung askew.

No one would dare come here now. And Grace’s car is here.

One day—one day soon, I will tell her about The Stranger.

What if it scares her away?

He shook his head, a human gesture that came so easily tonight.

She makes me more human, and I don’t despise it. I don’t even feel the sick envy I used to, watching even the sickest of men talking and moving, souls covered in flesh.

Nyx didn’t like that something in him had changed so quickly, although he supposed his lust and curiosity had been paving the way for weeks.

He slipped farther into the forest, head turning away from the darkness that seemed to strangle certain trees, places where the earth had been disturbed in frantic digging.

Stay on the path, he reminded himself, only for the thought to bring him to a complete halt.

What path? There was no path here, not even grass, only years and years’ worth of natural mulch. Piles of last fall’s leaves, blackened by heavy snows all winter, lay in a carpet under peeling birches.

But there used to be a path. A bridle path, and it cut through...

Nyx moved faster now, memories trying vainly to surface.

There was a bridle path that cut all the way through to Miller’s field! I cannot cross the edge of the woods, for that was never mine!

Horse’s hooves suddenly sounded in his ears and made him start.

Not now, over a hundred years ago.

Rushing. Away from him.

No, toward him.

Because he could move faster than the horse.

Because he could move faster than the girl.

Nyx stopped suddenly, phantom lungs bursting for breaths that he would never take again.

What was now a sloping hill with fallen trees and hollow logs blanketing it had once been a far steeper ravine, leading down to a fast-moving stream.

In the moonlight, the stream still ran, a silver ribbon instead of a bubbling current.

The horse reared—right here.

The peace that Grace had bestowed upon him earlier evaporated, and hatred and horror returned.

Cynthia was here. On the horse.

Then there, down on the ground at the bottom of the ravine, bucked off from a full gallop as she was rushing to the Miller’s.

He’d loved Cynthia once.

And in a flash, it had turned to sickening rage. Murderous rage.

That’s why he’d killed her.

He looked at his hands, gray and almost solid. They looked quite eerily ashen in the moonlight.

I wanted clean hands. Clean heart.

Because I’m a killer. Just like The Stranger.

Cynthia’s was the first pile of bloody rags left in these woods.