Paused.

Picked up the top sheet. Thick, slightly rough. Drawing paper. Blank on both sides. Wasteful. Perhaps it was time to have a word with . . .

Flicking on the desk lamp, he aimed the circle of light directly at the sheet of paper. Faint gray lines ghosted across the page. There. And then gone. Although under the caress of a fingertip, the imprint of a pattern remained.

Something was definitely going on.

“It’s no use.” Henry sat back in his chair, allowing Tony to look away and break the contact between them. “There’s definitely something blocking the memories.”

“Shock?”

“Perhaps. I’ve seen shock block memories in the past and for all your experience with the . . . unusual, you’ve never had the corpse of a friend drop at your feet before.”

Tony sighed. “She wasn’t exactly a friend.”

“And you feel guilty about that now she’s dead?”

“No. Maybe.” He picked at the faded patch of denim on one thigh. “I don’t know. Henry, what is it if it isn’t shock?”

“I have no idea.”

“Educated guess?”

Prince of Darkness safely tucked away, Henry smiled and stood, dragging his chair back to its usual place at the dining room table. “You must believe I had an interesting education, Tony.”

“Well, yeah. Interesting experiences anyway.”

“True enough. But, in this instance, none of them seem to apply.”

Tony didn’t entirely believe that, but since he had nothing to back up an accusation except that Henry was spending just a little too much time fiddling with the chair, he dropped his gaze to his watch before his face gave the whole thing away. The numbers took a moment to sink in, but when they did he stood. “Oh, crap. It’s almost 3:00. No wonder I’m feeling so punchy. I’ve got to get going.”

“Why not stay here?”

“Why not?”

Henry ignored him. “There’s an extra bed and a change of clothes and we’re not a lot farther from Burnaby than your apartment. What time do you have to be at work tomorrow?”

“Uh . . . unit call’s at 9:30.”

“An early enough call given that it’s nearly 3:00.”

What he could see of Henry’s expression showed nothing more than an almost neutral concern. They were long over and he’d ended it. They were friends. Friends had the keys to friends’ apartments. Friends offered crash space. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to stay.”

“Good.”

“Will you be . . .” Funny how a distance of eighteen months suddenly made what had once been a perfectly normal question sound like horror movie dialogue. “. . . going out to Hunt?”

“No.” One hand rose to tug at the edge of the cream-colored sweater. “It’s too late.”

Suddenly the earlier indecision over which shirt to wear made sense. Tony felt his cheeks flush. Knew Henry was aware of the sudden rush of blood and that only made it worse. “You were on your way out.”