The Catspaw Collection

by Anne Stuart

  If she had any sense at all she’d stay. Marco wouldn’t dare hit her again, not if he hoped to carry off the job with her assistance. Stephen McNab was too enticing, with his world-weary air and absurdly kind eyes.

  But she was ready to be enticed, ready for kindness, for anything else a couple of days in hiding with Stephen McNab might bring. “You’ll find out why,” she said. “Sooner or later. Let’s get out of here before Marco gets back.”

  “I wouldn’t mind having a few words with your friend Marco.”

  The thought of such a confrontation made Dany dizzy with horror. “Let’s get out of here before I come to my senses,” she said.

  That moved him. “All right. Maybe we’ll be lucky and run into him on our way out.”

  But they ran into no one at all on their trip through the dusk and across the trampled lawns to McNab’s beat-up Bronco. Not an acrobat, not an illusionist, not an animal trainer, not a soul saw them leave. Except Rocco. He watched them go, then headed into the mess tent, a smile wreathing his weary old face. He was a man who knew how to keep a secret—a man who would enjoy seeing Marco Porcini squirm.

  THERE WERE NO presents in Ferris’s apartment that evening. She told herself she was deeply grateful, as she fed an indignant Blackie a can of Seafood Surprise. As she soaked her weary muscles in her oversize bathtub and tried to forget the number of times Patrick had kissed her that day, she told herself she was glad he was finally leaving her alone. She told herself she could start concentrating on the rest of her life and forget about old memories and lingering desires. And pushing a disc into the DVD player, she climbed into her bed and sat back to watch To Catch a Thief.

  The first thing she did the next morning was to check her ring finger. The canary diamond hadn’t been replaced. It was still sitting where Blackheart had left it, on top of the television. She told herself she was very, very happy as she stomped into the kitchen, her lavender silk kimono trailing around her boxers and tank top. She told herself life was going to be splendid as she made herself a horrible cup of instant coffee, searched in vain for any kind of milk product that hadn’t soured, and tossed out several stale doughnuts she’d ignored in favor of cookies in the last few days. And it was only because she stubbed her toe on the step up into the dining room that she sank to the floor and began to howl like a spoiled three-year-old.

  There were no deliveries to her office at the Committee for Saving the Bay’s headquarters. No phone calls, no summons to the circus setup on Regina’s spacious grounds. Nothing.

  By three o’clock she was ready to scream. She’d been able to accomplish one thing during the day, clearing up a minor glitch involving the license for the circus performance. But for the rest of the time she’d pushed papers around on her desk and waited for someone to call.

  If she’d ever had any doubts about the worthlessness of her job, that endless day put them to rest. She wasn’t needed there, she was wasting her time and energies. At three-fifteen she wrote her letter of resignation, effective the day after the circus performance, at three forty-five she had copies in the mail to the five trustees who were nominally her employers, and at three fifty-seven she was on her way home.

  No one called her that night. She brought Blackie herring and Brie, but even he didn’t show up, clearly not trusting his distracted mistress. She unplugged the phone at nine-thirty, tired of staring at its sleek lines and begging it to ring. She’d stopped by a store and bought three movies, two comedies and a gangster film. She climbed into bed with a large snifter of brandy and watched To Catch a Thief.

  There was no canary diamond on her finger the next morning. On a Saturday there was no work, either. The rain was pouring down, sheets of water lashing against the windows, turning the middle of the day into a lightless gloom. By two o’clock Ferris knew that one more moment in her apartment and she’d start screaming. Digging out her peach silk raincoat, she pulled it on over her jeans and sweater, grabbed her purse, and headed out into the rainy afternoon with one thought in her mind. There was more than one way to skin a cat.

  DANY LIKED AMERICA, she decided as she sat curled up in the window seat of the old cabin and watched the rain. She liked the rawness, even the tackiness of the new towns that seemed to have sprung up overnight around the more elegant areas of San Francisco and Marin County. She liked the log cabin Stephen had brought her to, a place off in the woods up north of Santa Rosa in Sonoma County, with running water and electricity but not much more, not even a telephone. She liked eating hamburgers and pizza and spaghetti, the limit of Stephen’s cooking, and she liked his oddly polite way with her. In the last day and a half he hadn’t touched her. He’d taken care of her like a kindly uncle, and yet there was nothing avuncular about the way he looked at her. She’d been waiting, longing for him to make a move, a gesture, but he’d done nothing but wish her a polite good-night at her bedroom doorway before retiring into his own room. And while Dany told herself it was all for the best, she was beginning to long for those big, strong hands of his to touch her, anywhere, just touch her. She needed to remember what love felt like after all the years of abuse.

  It had been a curiously peaceful time, considering how little they’d talked. She’d responded to his gentle probing about the past with evasions and outright lies, spinning him a story about her upbringing that was culled directly from Christopher Robin and the Pooh stories. Stephen had stopped pressing her, and had responded to her own questions with equal reticence. All things considered, she knew as little about him as he knew about her. She knew he had two brothers, that he’d grown up on the east coast, and that he’d always wanted to be a cop. But she knew nothing else.

  Not that it mattered. She wouldn’t have minded if he’d had a wife and six kids stashed away in one of those towns they’d passed through; she wouldn’t even have minded if he was on the take. It would have equalized the sides a bit, making both of them cheating liars instead of just one of them. Herself.

  She leaned her forehead against the glass, staring out into the afternoon rain. They’d have to go back soon, she knew that, though he hadn’t said anything about it. He was intent on catching John Patrick Blackheart, that much she knew instinctively, and Marco was busy baiting the trap—the trap to catch her half-brother and make him the scapegoat, while they got away free and clear.

  She thought about Blackheart for a moment. He wasn’t what she’d expected, but then, twenty-one years was a long time ago. She didn’t hate him as she’d thought she would; as a matter of fact, she had to work to raise any kind of anger at his desertion. After all those years, it suddenly no longer mattered. She just wished he’d had enough family feeling to notice that she looked slightly familiar.

  She was a fool to brood. Everything was moving along at its preordained pace, and it was too late to stop what had been set in motion long ago. She’d made her choices; now she had no option but to ride along to the bitter end. She should just be glad she hadn’t ended up in bed with Stephen McNab. After more than two years of celibacy it might have proved her emotional undoing. She was far too attracted to the man as it was, attracted in a spiritual, emotional way as well as on a simple physical level.

  She could hear him splashing about in the kitchen. He’d refused to let her cook or do any housework, insisting that she needed time to relax and think. All right, she’d thought, but it had been impossible to relax with Stephen so near and yet so far. She drew back, looking at her reflection in the rain-spattered glass. The bruises were fading—a light application of makeup would cover up the worst of them without her having to skulk about in the shadows. It was time to go back, before she did something unforgivably stupid.

  She got up, stretching lazily, and put another log onto the fire. There was a slight chill in the air, but the vast fireplace proved more than adequate to the task of heating the cabin. The smell and crackle of the fire added to the coziness, and for a moment she conside
red curling up on the rug in front of it and taking a nap. That’s what a sensible person would do, she reminded herself. But when had she ever shown any sense?

  Stephen McNab had just finished shaving himself at the kitchen sink, the only sink the cabin boasted. There were a stall shower and a toilet in a small alcove off the back, but every day he’d shaved in the kitchen, and she’d studiously avoided the room while he was busy. He couldn’t have heard her approach—she had the ability to move in complete silence, and bare feet on a wooden floor didn’t make much noise, anyway. But he knew she was there, and he turned, dropping the towel he’d used to dry his face. His expression was wary.

  His shirt was lying on the wooden counter next to the sink. Dany managed a shy smile, trying to avert her eyes from his chest. “I thought I might make some coffee,” she said. “I was feeling sleepy.”

  “You should take a nap,” he said, turning to reach for his shirt.

  “Oh, Stephen,” Dany whispered in muffled horror. “What happened?”

  Stephen McNab had a beautiful torso. Lean and wiry, he made Marco’s bulging muscles look overblown in comparison. But Marco didn’t have any scars marring his artfully tanned flesh.

  Someone had done something very nasty indeed to Stephen McNab—but long enough ago that the scar had faded into a thick white line that traveled from his back, around under his arm and ended up by his right nipple.

  “Sorry,” he said, pulling on his khaki shirt and starting to button it. “I know it’s not pleasant to look at.”

  “No,” she said, crossing the kitchen before she had time to think and stopping his hands. “It’s not that. It just must have been so painful.”

  He kept his hands still beneath hers. The bright kitchen light glared behind him, and outside the rain was pouring, sending shifting blue shadows through the windows and into the corners of the small room. “It was a long time ago, Dany. It doesn’t matter.”

  “But you could have been killed.”

  “That’s what my wife thought.”

  She hadn’t really wanted to hear that, Dany reflected numbly, dropping her hands and letting him continue buttoning the shirt. “What happened?”

  He was busy tucking his shirt into his jeans, stalling for time. “I had just made detective, and I wasn’t too bright. I made the wrong enemies, pushed where I wasn’t supposed to push, and someone decided to teach me a lesson. Unfortunately I’m not a quick learner. He’s in jail, and I’m alive and well.”

  “And your wife?”

  Stephen sighed, his wintry-blue eyes almost black in the glaring kitchen light. “She said she couldn’t stand watching me take chances and eventually end up getting killed. She said I had to choose between her and being a cop.”

  “And?”

  “I’m still a cop.”

  “I’m sorry, Stephen.”

  “Don’t be. We were just kids, anyway. High school sweethearts aren’t supposed to spend the rest of their lives together. At least we didn’t have any children.”

  “Did you want them?”

  “Not then.”

  “Do you still miss her?”

  He shook his head. “I hadn’t thought of her in months. Years, maybe. Until I met you.”

  Damn, Dany thought. God’s punishing me, all right. Here I am, falling in love with a man who’s any thief’s natural enemy, and on top of that I remind him of his ex-wife. She backed away, plastering a phony smile onto her face. “You’ll have to find someone else who reminds you of her,” she said brightly.

  “Dany,” he said in a weary voice, “Lucille was a redheaded Valkyrie with a fanatical devotion to makeup and clothes and doing as little as possible. She was a prom queen who never grew up or faced the consequences of the choices she made, and when the going got rough she took off. Does that sound like you?”

  Yes, she thought miserably. I don’t want to face the consequences of the choices I’ve made. I want to live happily ever after. “Why did you say I reminded you of her?”

  “I didn’t. I said I started thinking about her when I realized I wanted someone else. More than I’d ever wanted anyone, Lucille included, in my entire life.”

  Dany shut her eyes, taking a step backward. “This won’t work. You don’t know anything about me, and if you did, you wouldn’t like it. It’s doomed before we even begin.”

  If she expected an argument, she didn’t get one. He just stood there, looking at her in the bright kitchen light. And then he reached over the sink and flicked the switch, plunging the room into a shifting, shadowy darkness. “Maybe,” he said, his rough voice curiously caressing. “We’ll never know until we find out.”

  “Stephen . . .”

  “He didn’t rape you, did he?” It wasn’t a question. It was more that he wanted to verify a suspicion.

  “Marco? No. He hasn’t touched me for over two years. Except to hit me.”

  “I thought you fell,” Stephen taunted her gently, moving toward her across the shadowy room. She held her ground, her heart pounding in anticipation—and regret. She shouldn’t do this; she knew better than he did how hopeless it was. But she couldn’t resist. His big hands caught her narrow shoulders, pulling her gently toward him. “I’ve been afraid to touch you, for fear you’d been hurt too badly to want me. But you do, don’t you, Dany?”

  “Want you?” she echoed. “I shouldn’t.”

  “But you do.” His mouth touched hers, gently, brushing against her lips, teasing them open. “You do, don’t you?”

  She slid her arms around his waist and up under his loose shirt, her hands grazing the rough texture of that terrible scar. “Yes,” she whispered against his mouth. “Yes.”

  BLACKHEART’S STREET was half-empty on that Saturday afternoon, and his battered Volvo station wagon was nowhere in sight. Ferris jiggled the set of keys that she’d tucked into her jeans pocket and hoped that Blackheart hadn’t changed his locks. He’d have no reason to. He would never suspect, after her high-and-mighty exit from his life, that she might want to break in when he wasn’t around.

  If he had changed the locks there was no way she’d get in. The one person you couldn’t steal from was another thief—Blackheart’s locks were impenetrable to any normal human being. Maybe the thief in Europe would be able to handle them, but not someone with her limited expertise.

  She didn’t know when she’d come to the conclusion that there really was a thief in Europe, and it wasn’t Blackheart still plying his trade. It might have been when he kissed her in the closet. It might have been when she followed him out over rooftops, risking life and limb to prove heaven only knew what. Sometime during the last few days she’d realized that Blackheart hadn’t reverted to his former ways.

  But he’d still been lying to her, covering up. He knew far too much about the thefts in Madrid, Paris and Lisbon, but he wasn’t about to tell her until he was good and ready. And she wasn’t about to wait any longer. She was going to go through his apartment, inch by inch, and when she finally came up with the answers she was seeking, she would curl up on his couch and wait until he came home, so that she could confront him with it.

  She had the presence of mind to call his apartment from a pay phone at the end of the block. She had absorbed certain tricks of the trade; whether it was from Blackheart himself or from the various caper movies she’d been watching was a moot point. There’d been no answer, and the way was clear. She just had to hope she had enough time to find what she was looking for before he put in a reappearance.

  She went to the kitchen first. There was just enough coffee left in the pot to make a mug—she put it into the microwave and drank it black, savoring every drop. She had to give Blackheart credit—he was neater than she was. Not by much—he went in for artless clutter and piles of books as much as she did, but he seemed to have a slightly better sense of order.


  She strolled into his living room, past the overstuffed couch where she’d spent far too much time, and headed straight for the desk. If he’d locked it, she could use her credit card, she told herself, her hand on the drawer pull, her eyes glancing at and then dismissing the old photograph of Blackheart and his father, dressed for business in tails.

  She stood there for a long moment, considering. This was her future at stake—surely unethical things were necessary, even justified when it came to her only chance of happiness.

  Maybe. Maybe not. If she opened the drawer and started pawing through it, she’d be just as untrustworthy as she’d accused Blackheart of being. Even if the end of uncertainty lay just beyond that closed door, she couldn’t do it. She dropped her hand, moved away and sank onto the sofa.

  “I’m glad you changed your mind.” Blackheart’s voice drifted to her from the bedroom door. “Why are you here? Looking for proof of my guilt?”

  “No,” she said. “I wanted to find out who you were covering up for.”

  A cynical grin twisted Blackheart’s face. “A step in the right direction, but not the confession of undying love and trust I was hoping for. Go away, Ferris, and come back when you’ve made up your mind.”

  She didn’t move. “Go away, Ferris,” he said again, moving toward her. “Or I’ll make sure you don’t want to leave.”

  Ferris ran. It wasn’t until she was halfway home that she remembered the picture on the desk and realized something she’d never noticed before. John Cyril Blackheart, alias Seymour Bunce, Blackheart’s father, looked very familiar. And it wasn’t his compelling son who resembled him. It was Danielle Porcini.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I Confess

  (Warner Brothers 1952)

  STEPHEN SLEPT heavily, his face in the pillow, one arm stretched out, holding her loosely even in sleep. Dany regretfully edged out from under its protection, climbing from the bed and tiptoeing into the deserted living room. The rain had stopped sometime during the night, and now in the chilly predawn light a faint mist was rising from the short grass around the cabin. It was going to be a long, cold walk into town.