[Oxrun Station] The Bloodwind Read Online Free PDF Page B

one of Greg's patient lectures. "I swear to   you, two drinks at dinner and no more, ever again."
    "Wow," he said softly, and shook his head slowly.   "You're all right, though?"
    "Sure." Her smile was cock-eyed. "As well as can  be expected, given the day." She pulled open the center   drawer and took out a pencil, tapped it once on her knee   and rolled it between her fingers. "I'll tell you, Greg, I  don't mind admitting this is driving me nuts. I mean, the whole tiling is making me absolutely paranoid."  She caught herself, and waved away the question that  came to Greg's expression. "I just don't understand why Constable has to wait. Why can't we have the meeting now and get it over with, huh?"
    "Because he thought you'd shove one of your kids  into one of your sculptures,  that's  why. Like Vincent  Price in  The House of Wax,  and all that."
    Her throat constricted. "You think they turned us   down?"
    He shrugged. "I don't know, Pat. I honestly don't   know."
    She chewed absently on the eraser. "I think he hates   me. Ford, that is. Constable doesn't care one way or the   other."
    "No," Greg said, stretching his legs and crossing  them at the ankles. His voice was naturally low, a   rough-edged complement to her own deep timbre. "Ac tually, if the truth be known, you scare him."
    "Me?"
    "Now, Patrice," he said, cautioning against lying to   someone who knew her better. "Come on, come on."
    "No, I can't buy it, Greg. What he's afraid of is the   expense. Setting us up in a separate department will  mean hiring at least two more full-time people, giving  you and me at least promotions, and —"
    "All right," he conceded, "that's part of it too.   But  you know damned well that isn't all of it, not by a long  shot."
    She looked at him thoughtfully. He'd joined the faculty only four years ago, a multi-degreed artist who'd   grown weary of the games he'd had to play with the larger galleries. It wasn't sour grapes because of no  talent; he just didn't have the stomach for the competi tion he had to face. At first, Pat had thought him a  quitter and had been scornful for retreating into teach ing; then she realized there was something else, some thing that had unnerved him and made him leery of going   on. She still didn't know what it was, but she knew he  would tell her sooner or later. It was in the way he  would look at her when he thought she wasn't watch ing; in the way  ...  in his way of building a friendship   between them so he could begin the unburdening.
    She was patient. She could wait.
    Meanwhile, a second look showed her hints of exhaustion tightening the folds around his eyes. When she   lifted an eyebrow in silent query, he shrugged and drained his cup. "No sleep."
    "You were drunk," she accused lightly.
    "I was passed out," he admitted with a rueful laugh.   "I don't know how the hell I got home, believe me,  and I kept waking up every hour or two. The damned   tree outside my window kept hitting the pane. I almost  went out and cut the thing down."
    "That would be just like you," she said. "Get straight   to the root of the problem."
    He glared. "That's terrible. You  oughta  be shot."  Then he blew her a halfhearted kiss and left, wasn't ten  feet down the corridor before a pair of young women  fell in beside him, laughing instantly at something he   said, gesturing as if they had a mobile canvas retreating  before them.
    Pat watched until the doorframe cut them off. And   wondered how many of those girls Greg had taken into   his bed.
    "Oh, nasty," she scolded. Her right hand brushed  over an end of the collar tie, tugged at it lightly before  she closed her eyes tightly,  snapped  them open. A  groan at feigned aches in the small of her back and she   stood, stepping around the desk to fetch her books from   their shelf.  A finger to her chin, scratching.  Thinking   about Greg, the younger women who constantly sur rounded him . . .
    . . .