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  Nooooo…couldn’t be…She closed her eyes…Outrageous dream. Maybe Raye had given her a hallucino— Raye!

  Jessica opened her eyes. Turned her head. Saw the burned-out roof of her house and let out a…yowl. She tried to clap a hand to her mouth to quell the appalling sound, but something wrenched at her fingernails. Her hand—paw—Hand was hooked to the branch.

  Dreaming! She tried to say it aloud. “Merrowrr!” Druginduced, without a doubt. Closing her eyes, she propped her chin on her forearms. Wait it out. Sleep long enough, and somebody would give her back her own body.

  Except that there was no way to go back to sleep, with her thoughts darting like panicked squirrels. At the image, her stomach rumbled, then turned. Oh, no! No way.

  That brought another issue to mind. If I were a cat—but of course I’m not—but if I were, then where would… Cattoo be?

  The sound of purring gradually filled her mind—that idling, sotto voce purr Cattoo used when she was nearly asleep, utterly at peace. As if Cattoo lay on the pillow beside her, nose pressed to Jessica’s ear, Cattoo was…here. With her. Happy, as always, just to be near.

  What a dream!

  In the dream last night, she’d told Cattoo to go live for both—No. Jessica tried to shake her head—it was an awkward, unnatural motion. Her whiskers brushed her arm, sending an electric thrill to her cheek, and the nerve endings beneath the fur on her arm.

  For a dream, it had its own kind of loopy logic. She’d taken Cattoo in, from a fearful, scrounging life. Now Cattoo had returned the favor—had taken her in when she’d had no place to go but a burning building.

  Jessica dropped her chin back on her paws. Wait. This’ll pass. The best way to deal with unreality was to refuse to deal with it.

  A car drove along the upper street, the hum of its engine punctuated by the soft thumps coming from lawns and sidewalks. Jessica didn’t bother to open her eyes. The morning paper.

  Soft whoosh of a well-insulated door opening, then a few hesitant steps. A man’s grunt—he must be stooping? Then the sound of a rubber band being rolled off a folded newspaper. Rustle of pages as he opened it.

  Tap, tap, tap came the heels of a woman down the sidewalk. They slowed, then stopped. “God!” she said fervently. “Was anybody hurt?”

  “The woman who rented the place,” said the man. “They took her off in an ambulance. Don’t know if she lived or not. Guess the Journal had already gone to press. There’s nothing here.” He rustled his paper.

  Jessica opened her eyes and stared straight ahead. A gorgeous mosaic against the blue sky beyond, the leaves •turning from green to gold. As she watched, one leaf let go its twig and spiraled down. She didn’t track its fall. So maybe I am dead, after all? But I didn’t become a soul, exactly. I moved in with a cat.

  Nooooo. Not possible. Wait till you wake up. Her stomach rumbled. Shut up! she told it fiercely, and tried not to think about bacon. Or squirrels.

  The branch lifted in the rising wind, then dipped lazily, and her stomach swooped with it. Her claws—fingernails—whatever, flexed and bit deeper into the bark. How far to the ground?

  No distance at all. I’m still in my bed. All the same, she wasn’t about to look down.

  Perhaps she’d have stayed there forever, locked in a state of fierce and categorical denial. But sometime later, her ears swiveled to the sound of a car idling down the street. It stopped before her house.

  Jessica refused to look. She’d had quite enough of this dream, thank you.

  The door of the car opened. A light scuffing sound as a pair of shoes found the ground. The car door didn’t close again. Slow steps crossed first sidewalk, then lawn.

  Jessica opened her eyes.

  Sam drifted across the grass, eyes fixed on what was left of her house. His face was the stunned face of a sleepwalker.

  Sam, oh God, am I glad to see you! Dream or no, there was no one she’d rather see.

  Sam’s eyes rose to take in the burned-out roof. They moved to the tree, skimmed over her branch, then returned to the front of her house. His hands clenched suddenly as his chin jerked up a notch.

  “Sam!” Jessica called, and didn’t give a damn that it came out a feline yell. “Sam!”

  He shook his head, but not at her. He was simply denying.

  Across the street, a door opened, then closed, and a grayhaired man started down the walk to his car. When he saw Sam, his steps slowed. But something about Sam’s stillness drew him on. He crossed the road, then stopped beside him.

  “When did this happen?” Sam murmured without turning to see whom he addressed.

  “Last night. Around midnight.” Jessica’s neighbor shifted from one foot to the other. “Did you know—”

  “Is she all right?”

  “Yes, I’m all right,” Jessica yelled. “I’m right here!”

  Neither of the men looked her way. “She…wasn’t burned.”

  Something in his voice jerked Sam around. He reached for the older man’s shirt, but his hand stopped midair. His fingers clenched, flexed wide, his arm dropped. “Then what …was she? What’s the matter?”

  “Smoke inhalation. I asked a fireman last night, then we heard the rest on the news this morning. She was a pretty little thing. Always smiled at us when we passed on the—”

  “Was? My God, are you telling me—” Sam grabbed him by the shoulder.

  “She’s in critical condition,” the man blurted. He reached up awkwardly to pat Sam’s hand. “In a coma, they say.”

  “Coma…”

  A coma, Oh, God…Except that she wasn’t. She was right here, awake, in possession of all her senses…trapped in the body of a cat.

  No, this had to be a dream.

  But if this is a dream, then please, please let me wake up! Because dream or no, she had to get to Sam, had to wipe that look from his face. “Sam!” she cried, and rose to a shaky crouch.

  Then looked down past her branch for the first time. Looked down some sixty feet—but it was more like looking over the rim of the Grand Canyon. A howl tore out of her throat.

  “Where?” Sam demanded. “Where’d they take her?”

  “Rhode Island General.” The older man patted Sam’s hand again, then lifted it from his shoulder. “I’m sure she’ll be all right.”

  “You better believe she will! Can you tell me how to get there?”

  “Sam, wait for me!” Jessica cried, but he and her neighbor were already headed for Sam’s car. “Sam!” She had to get to him, touch him. If he’d only hug her, she’d surely wake up.

  Right now she couldn’t even turn around. She faced outward, away from the tree trunk. To turn, she’d have to hang her head one way over this yawning chasm, while her tail—Her…? Slowly, filled with a dreadful surmise, Jessica looked over her shoulder.

  Given all the rest, it should’ve come as no surprise. Still, that supple black…appendage, swaying behind her like a furry cobra—her eyes went round when she caught sight of it. The tip of it…curled, as if saluting her, then the whole thing puffed up as her shock hit home. “I am a cat!”

  This wail was so wholehearted the neighbor stopped his directions and turned. “Looks like she’s stuck up there.” He nodded toward the tree.

  “Stupid cat,” agreed Sam, sliding into his car. “She’ll figure it out.” And he drove away.

  AND SO SHE DID figure it out, cursing Sam Kirby’s blindness every inch of the way. What she figured, after half an hour of near paralysis, was that it was best not to think about what she was doing. Like the Zen archer who shuts his eyes to find the bull’s-eye, she did best when she concentrated on the goal and let Cattoo’s instincts handle the enabling details.

  Or to put it another way, it was best not to sit there and agonize over how to bare your claws. Or how to sheath them, once you’d nailed yourself fast to the side of a tree. Think about it, and you tended to stick.

  Determinedly not thinking about it, she hugged her way painfully down the trunk. And that, of co
urse, was only the start of her problems.

  RI Gen lay a mere three miles away as the crow flew. But between Jessica and her goal stretched the Providence River, two eight-lane highways, all of downtown Providence. And countless dogs. The day that had started out a nightmare went downhill from there.

  SOME EIGHT HOURS LATER, Jessica crouched beneath a seat on the filthy floor of a city bus, watching a pair of white tennis shoes. The shoes were laced to the feet of a nurse, who, pray God, was headed for the medical center.

  After that last incident with the Yorkshire terrier—Jessica still seethed at the memory—she’d given up trying to walk to RI Gen. The daytime city just wasn’t meant for cats.

  Not that buses had been an improvement so far. There was no direct bus from the East Side to the hospital complex, for starters. So there wasn’t one bus she had to sneak onto, but several.

  By now she’d perfected her technique of slipping aboard by the rear door, just as the last rider got off. People might look back in amusement, but no one was going to stop the bus, tell the driver he now carried a nonpaying passenger.

  But once she was tucked safely under a seat, she faced another problem. She couldn’t see where they were going. Had no way to know which stop was her stop.

  And even if she figured that out, what was she supposed to do—jump up and yank the cord? Not that she couldn’t have done so, but she’d always been a private person. People staring, that had never bothered Sam, but as for her, that was something she avoided like the plague.

  Well, that shyness had cost her today. So far the bus had zoomed twice past the med center, once going, once returning, without stopping. She’d ridden to the end of the line, had her tail stepped on twice on the return trip. This time, if she was wrong about the nurse’s destination, Jessica was going to pull that cord and let them all stare. She had to get to Sam.

  Her stomach turned at the thought of not reaching him, then turned again from hunger. Sam, if anybody can help me, it’s you. He was the smartest person she knew, after all. She’d hated that about him once—the last thing she’d wanted in a husband was another superachiever to measure herself against and be found wanting, but now…Sam, you’ve got to be there. Wait for me. Because if she couldn’t find him at the hospital, how would she find him at all? And if she couldn’t find him—

  The nurse’s shoes shifted. She stood, then reached for the cord.

  When the bus pulled over, Jessica shot between the woman’s legs and out the back door. She hit the ground running, her ears swiveling back to note the screech of surprise. Silly woman. It’s not as if I were a rat, you know. Her ears switched forward. Where am I? Her pace quickened as she recognized the buildings in the distance. Just a hundred yards more.

  She’d figured out her strategy while riding to hell and gone. Sam would exit through the lobby of the hospital, as all visitors did. That was the only way she’d find him, since he could’ve parked in any one of several parking lots. But what if he’s left already? It was nearly dark.

  That didn’t bear thinking about, and not just because she needed him to help her snap out of this. But after all, there was no reason for Sam to hang around waiting for her to wake up. It wasn’t as if they were married. Ex’s weren’t obliged to worry and wait.

  But somehow she knew he’d be here. Somewhere. A low hedge of boxwood edged the walk that led to the main entrance of RI Gen. Jessica found a spot beneath with a clear view of the doors. She was learning that cats were safest out of sight. Come, Sam, come to me. The air was cold, the damp earth colder, and by nightfall—She shuddered. By nightfall she wanted her breakfast, and Sam’s comforting, clearheaded logic on her side. Without him, the night would be chilling in every way.

  But while she sat and worried, her front paws grew warmer. Jessica looked down to find her tail curled neatly around her toes.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  NIGHT CREPT over the city. Jessica’s stomach growled. Somewhere deep within, Cattoo seemed to stretch, then stir. What are we doing here?

  Jessica fought down the feeling of restlessness. We have to find Sam. She glared at the hospital doors, willing him to appear. Sam, come to me.

  Because of her fierce attention, she almost missed him. Across the street, the revolving door to the professional building spun. Jessica’s ears flicked, then dismissed it. People had been coming and going there for hours.

  Leather shoes on heavy feet hit the sidewalk. The door hummed and spun again, then another man, lighter on his feet, joined the first. “Thanks, Mac,” drawled a familiar voice. “There is a way you could help. I want longer visiting hours—could you fix that? Or better yet, how about a cot in her room? I’d like to be there when she wakes.”

  Sam! Jessica bolted out from under the bush and scurried up the walk, then stopped, watching from across the street. Sam, and somehow he’d connected with Mac MacKenzie, one of her partners at Diagnostics.

  “Sam—” MacKenzie jammed his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels “—you can’t sleep there. They don’t want you underfoot in the intensive-care unit, and they don’t have facilities for overnight visitors. Besides—” his gaze slipped away from the younger man to fix on the sky, the sidewalk, Jessica across the street “—besides, she might not regain consciousness…right away.”

  Or at all. Jessica had delivered too many heartbreaking prognoses herself not to recognize the signs of Mac’s discomfort, what he hated to come right out and say.

  “Or she might wake any minute. They said that, too. The neurologist told me there are no signs of brain damage.”

  “Good, good,” Mac said heartily. “That’s excellent news.”

  But you’d know that already, Jessica realized, sinking to a crouch. The word went right round the hospital whenever a doctor was admitted. Mac or another of her partners would’ve gone up to her room, read her charts. Talked with the physician in charge.

  “But all the same, you’ll have to pace yourself,” Mac continued. “You could be in for a long haul.”

  Sam shrugged. “Whatever. But can you see about extending the hours?”

  Mac nodded. “Soon as they consider her stabilized, in a day or two, I’m sure I can arrange it.”

  “Thanks.” The two men turned and paced down the walk toward the parking lots, their eyes on their shoes.

  Across the street, Jessica prowled in parallel.

  “Funny,” murmured Mac. “But we never even knew she’d been married, let alone to…” His voice trailed away.

  Go on, say it, Mac, Jessica thought bitterly. To somebody like you. It was plain for anyone to see, wasn’t it, that she’d never been a proper match for Sam. There should have been a law about truth in packaging. If she’d known what he was to become, that first day when she’d hired a bone-lazy grad student to tutor her in organic chemistry, she’d have turned around and run for her life.

  Sam shrugged. “She never talked much about herself.”

  Except to you. Jessica trod across a sheet of damp newspaper, pausing to shake a paw with each mushy step.

  “Except to me,” he added under his breath.

  “Huh?” Mac glanced at him.

  Huh? Jessica paused in the midst of a paw shake. It was almost as if Sam had heard—

  “Nothing.” Sam walked on, scowling. “Okay, here’s something maybe you could do. I hate hotels. If I’m going to be around awhile, I’ll need someplace quiet to stay where I can work when I’m not here. Know anybody who’d rent an apartment, short term? Not too far from here?”

  Yes! Jessica jumped for sheer joy—batted at a moth, which was fluttering overhead. Sam, you’re really going to stay? See me through this? If so, she had a chance. Once she’d made him see what was going on, once he’d turned his mind to the problem…

  “As a matter of fact, I might know just the place.” Mac jingled his car keys in his pocket. “The doctor whose practice Jessica took over, Harry Neuman, he and his wife lived over in the Jewelry District, in a loft. It’s somethi
ng between funky and swank, fantastic windows, a converted mill building.”

  “Sounds perfect. That’s for rent?”

  “I’m s’posed to be selling it for him. He left town in, uh, something of a hurry. But the realtor hasn’t had a nibble on the place. I think, as long as she had permission to show it if a buyer came along…”

  The two men stood arranging the details. Sam would stay in a hotel overnight. Mac would bring him the keys tomorrow. Jessica waited. Mac’s route would turn from here toward the doctors’ parking lot. Sam would have to cross the street to reach the public lots. It would be best if he was alone when she approached him. She wasn’t sure yet how she would make him see. But she would. He’d have to smuggle her into his hotel tonight, she supposed. Room service, she thought ecstatically, and her stomach rumbled agreement. Perhaps a steak, juicy and rare? Or maybe fish? Most definitely the coffee she’d never had this morning.

  “When does her family arrive?” Mac asked, interrupting her plans.

  “They’re not sure yet.” Sam’s voice was carefully neutral. “Seems her old man has operations scheduled till Christmas the year after next. And her mom’s a hotshot in corporate law. There’s some deal she’s cutting. General Motors and half the Third World might roll belly-up if she dropped the ball this week.”

  Business as usual. It was no more, really, than she would have expected. And Jessica knew it would have been far otherwise if there’d been anything useful they could do.

  “Her dad phoned Fisher, Jessica’s doctor—really put him through his paces, Fisher tells me. And then he had a pal of his, some rock-star neurosurgeon out in San Diego, call for a phone consultation. Then her brother called from Europe, put him through it one more time.”

  “Lucky Fisher,” Mac said with feeling.

  “Yeah, final-exam day. But apparently he passed. Jess’s dad tells me he’s a good man and he’s doing everything anybody could…” Sam’s voice went husky, and he swung away to glare at Jessica.