“For the most part. But sometimes I still wake up thinking I’m going to get trapped in that other world.”
“Other world?”
“That’s what dreaming is like for me. When I sleep, I enter another dimension or world.” She sighed. “I should have known better than to try to explain.”
Sam’s brows rose. “Why did you?”
“Call it a calculated risk. I agree you need all the information you can get in order to make progress on my case.”
“What was the risk?”
“Giving you the information you wanted means you might conclude I’m unbalanced. You could drop my case. I don’t want to have to find another private detective, but quitting is the worst thing you could do to me.”
He put his glass down on the table with just enough cool precision to signal his anger. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“You don’t have the power to have me committed to an asylum,” she said. She swallowed the last of her brandy and set down the glass. “It’s not as if you’re my husband.”
Sam went very still. Understanding heated his eyes. “Your dreams are the reason you’re not married, aren’t they?”
She was shocked speechless for a few seconds. And then she found her voice. “You are a very astute detective, Mr. Sage.”
His mouth twisted in a wry smile. “Thanks, but there was no Sherlock Holmes work involved in that deduction.”
“I disagree. I can count the number of people who have arrived at that conclusion on one hand, and I wouldn’t need all five fingers. No one in my family has figured it out. Neither have the various dream analysts and therapists I’ve seen over the years.”
“Haven’t they been curious about your aversion to marriage?”
“Sure. But when I refuse to give them a straight answer, they come to their own conclusions.”
“And you don’t bother to correct them,” he said.
“Nope.”
“Just how close did you come to getting married?”
“Too close.” She shuddered. “I still have nightmares about that, as well.”
“What happened?”
“It’s a long and rather harrowing tale that ends with me terminating the engagement in a somewhat abrupt fashion.”
Sam smiled a little. “You went for a dramatic touch.”
“I would just like to point out that I ended the engagementseventeen daysbefore the ceremony. Contrary to the gossip, I did not abandon my fiancé at the altar.”
“Got it.”
“Also, the rumors about the fire in his office were greatly exaggerated.”
Sam looked interested. “There was a fire?”
“Forget it.”
“All right. I’ll put it aside for now. I would like an answer to my question, though.”
“What?”
“You never explained exactly why Lillian Dewhurst took off on that long voyage,” Sam said.
