True Grey Read Free Page B

‘Truth is, if I had my way, I could murder her.’

FOUR
    â€˜M aybe you really should talk to her?’ Chris sounded so tentative that Dulcie was seized by guilt. ‘You know, a little scholar-to-scholar confab?’
    â€˜Have I sounded that fierce?’ Dulcie looked up at her boyfriend. They had left the pub early, Dulcie’s mood not getting any better in the crowded bar. Now they sat on his old sofa, Dulcie holding Esmé, their cat, in her lap. She’d been focusing on Esmé, letting the young feline bat at her outstretched finger with one white mitten. Now she studied Chris’s pale, thin face and wondered out loud. ‘Have I become an ogre?’
    To his credit, the slim computer geek smiled at the idea. ‘Hardly.’ As he pushed his bangs back, though, he revealed worried eyes. ‘But I’ve never seen you so angry, Dulce. You can be a little scary when you get that worked up.’
    Dulcie felt herself flush. She was taller than Thomas Griddlehaus, but in the grand scheme of things, she’d be considered petite. A little round, perhaps, but hardly threatening.
    Just then, Esmé pounced, biting the finger she held between her paws. ‘Ow, Esmé!’ Dulcie pulled back, and caught the sharp look the green feline eyes gave her. Size, they said, had nothing to do with ferocity. ‘Sorry,’ she said, leaning over to rest her head on her boyfriend’s chest.
    â€˜I don’t blame you.’ He wrapped his arms around her, drawing her closer. The movement should have disturbed the cat, but the little animal only readjusted. ‘I mean, you have reason.’
    â€˜Tell me about it.’ She sniffed, the tears that had been threatening since that afternoon coming dangerously close to the surface. ‘I just felt so . . . blindsided.’
    â€˜And you had no idea?’ he’d asked – they all had. It was inconceivable. ‘Martin Thorpe really owes you one,’ he said.
    She shook her head. Her thesis adviser wasn’t omniscient. ‘He reads the same journals I do,’ she said sadly. ‘He gets the same notices of publications and of meetings. It’s just—’
    â€˜Inconceivable.’ Chris finished her sentence.
    Dulcie felt her eyes closing. It had been an exhausting day, and she’d been so upset she had drunk more than she’d intended. She didn’t even like beer, really. The pub was simply social, the grad students’ ‘other place’ away from home or work. And on their budgets, anything beside the on-tap special was prohibitively expensive. She was going to have a headache in the morning, she realized, starting to drift off. As long as she didn’t have the dream again: all that blood darkening the red hair. Or was it black? Somehow she couldn’t be sure . . .
    Teeth woke her. Esmé’s teeth, sharp and quick. ‘What the . . .?’
    â€˜What happened?’ Chris, she realized, had fallen asleep on the couch beside her.
    â€˜This cat. She keeps biting me.’ Dulcie looked down. Esmé stared back, unblinking. ‘What is it, Esmé?’
    â€˜You think she’s trying to tell you something?’ Chris yawned and would have stood, only the little cat reached out one white paw. ‘Oh, she’s so cute.’
    â€˜Cute for a tyrant,’ Dulcie muttered. ‘She’s got you wrapped around her paw. What is it, Esmé? You know you could tell me directly, if you wanted.’
    She could have, Dulcie knew. Although she and Chris barely discussed it, they both had heard the voice of the young cat, speaking in quite articulate English. Usually, however, that feline voice wasn’t directed to them, but to Mr Grey – Dulcie’s late great cat whose presence lingered in spectral form, as a kind of feline guardian over all their lives.
    â€˜Maybe she just doesn’t want us to go to bed.’ Dulcie sighed. ‘You know, cats