Their value documented for tax purposes, the paintings were donated by wealthy patrons, to be resold to other wealthy patrons. The hospital fund benefited. The gallery retained a small commission and the artist’s reputation was enhanced.
Tables of food and drink were arranged in the center of the ground floor. At the back of the room a string quartet played, almost drowned out by the laughter and conversation of the guests.
In the foyer, Niko and Sam shed their topcoats, allowing another green-jacketed attendant to drape them over his arm. “May I take your coat, madam?” he asked.
Reluctantly, Karen allowed him to take the fur away. She didn’t know whether it was exposing herself to the curious eyes of the guests or the loss of its warmth that made her shiver.
“Well, let’s get to it.” Niko folded Karen’s arm over his and started toward the bar.
“Niko, you rascal,” a henna-haired matron with a southern accent called out and intercepted them. “Who is this lovely young woman, and why haven’t I seen her before?”
“Karen, this is Abigale. She operates one of the largest modeling agencies in the city.”
“Abby, meet Karen Miller. Karen has just arrived from the land of snow and ice.”
“Norway?” Abigale asked. “How interesting. Your hair and your gown are exquisite. You’re either a model or an actress.”
“Nothing so exciting,” Karen corrected her. “I’m from Minnesota. And I’m a schoolteacher, first grade.”
“What a waste,” Abby chirped, leaning down to whisper in Karen’s ear. “I’m from Alabama myself, but if you keep my secret, I’ll keep yours.”
Karen began to relax. She couldn’t hold back a smile. As if anybody on the face of the earth would ever take Abigale for anything but a Southerner. She liked Abby. Maybe the evening wouldn’t be so bad.
“And how’d a schoolteacher from Minnesota end up with Mercy General’s resident sinner?”
Karen couldn’t resist tweaking Niko a bit with her answer. “Haven’t you heard? He’s traded in his pitchfork for a white horse. Now, if the hospital could just stop his fascination with house shoes, they’d be happy.”
“House shoes?”
“It’s an inside joke,” Karen explained.
After that, Abby made it her personal commitment to introduce Karen to everybody there. By midnight Karen’s feet hurt. If Niko wasn’t holding her elbow, he was close enough for her to feel his eyes boring holes of fire straight through her dress.
But there was no sign of either Miles Lambert or the newspaper reporter.
Whatever Niko had hoped to accomplish hadn’t happened, and Karen had a splitting headache. Excusing herself, Karen slipped into the ladies’ room.
She’d done her part. Obviously she’d been wrong about Niko’s being in danger, or he’d overestimated the response to his press release. If she could get out, she’d just take a cab back to her boardinghouse. She couldn’t protect anybody anymore, not Niko and not herself.
From the ladies’ room she could see that there was no way she’d get out the front door. Niko was guarding it and the lobby. And even if she did, they were miles from her room. She didn’t have so much as a subway token. She’d need taxi fare.
She noticed Sam halfway up the platform display area. He was feigning an interest in a wrought iron creation that looked like a refugee from a junkyard. Obviously he was keeping watch from the top.
If she could just get Sam on her side, she’d—Karen waited until Niko’s attention was distracted by new guests entering the building. This was her chance.
Moments later she was making her way up the ramp. She shielded herself from Niko’s view by mingling with the other patrons, pausing when necessary to acknowledge a greeting, but using her interest in the exhibit to discourage conversation.
Just a few feet above her at the top of the ramp she saw Sam turn his head toward an open door that she hadn’t noticed before. Before she could reach him, he stepped inside, closing the door behind him.
Now what was she to do? Surely he wouldn’t be long. Stepping behind a large sculpture composed of mirrors and some kind of cracked silvery rock, she waited. The displays were less well lit up here, but this exhibit caught the light of the chandelier hanging from the ceiling and sparkled like a jewel.
In spite of her frustration, she stared at the mirrors in fascination. Then she saw the door open. Sam was standing in the shadows, watching.
Good. Karen glanced down at Niko. When a tall, heavyset woman stepped between them, Karen dashed up the remaining steps to the top. “Sam?”
Sam turned and looked over his shoulder toward her. Then he moved into the doorway. His face caught the light.
It wasn’t Sam. She’d seen this man before. He was wearing the same specter’s mask she’d seen at the haunted house. “Miles!”
Karen let out a little scream and whirled to run down the ramp. Then she remembered Sam and turned back. She could only hope that Niko was watching from below.
“What have you done with my friend?” Karen demanded, jutting out her chin and taking a step forward.
“Do you want to see?” The specter reached out and caught Karen’s wrist with fingers of steel. He jerked her inside the room and locked the door before she could pull away.
“I’ll scream!” Karen threatened, knowing that remaining calm would be a better way to handle the situation than showing her fear. “There are people down there who will hear me.”
“You promised. Why didn’t you stay away?” the whispery, muffled voice asked.
“I promised what? Why don’t you tell me what I promised?”
“You know, foolish girl. After I sent the note, you promised.”
Karen studied the darkness, trying to get her bearings, wondering what had happened to Sam. “If I promised you something, I’m sure I would have done it.”
“I promised too, but he knew I wouldn’t stay. But he wouldn’t let me go, even after I told him the truth. Because of you I had to stay in that awful place.”
Karen listened carefully. The person sounded familiar, but with no opening in the mask, it was hard to understand the muffled voice.
Before, she’d been concerned about bringing danger to Niko. Then Sam. For the first time, Karen was afraid for herself. This person was mentally unbalanced, and she knew that such a condition was often accompanied by great physical strength. Niko’s plan had worked.
Too well.
Suppose Niko hadn’t seen her. She might die without him ever knowing that she’d fallen in love with him. She tried to free her arm, but the gloved hand holding hers was too strong. Now she was being dragged through the dark room toward a second door opened to the faint glow of moonlight outside.
“Come with me, Karen. I have a little surprise for you.”
Karen’s teeth had begun to chatter. Her breath was shallow and fast. But it wasn’t from the cold. It was from the possibility of loss. She might have left Minnesota, but she wouldn’t let anybody force her to do something she knew was wrong, not ever again.
“Wait,” Karen said, “it’s freezing out there. I need my coat. Just let me get it and I’ll go wherever you want me to go.”
“You won’t need a coat. In a very few minutes you’ll have all the heat you want.”
There was a laugh, angry, guttural, demonic. “You should have listened. Now I’ll have to punish you.”
Sudden loud voices and running footsteps caused a disturbance at the party below.
“Where is she?” Niko’s voice called out. “She couldn’t have disappeared into thin air. Karen!”
Karen’s heart leapt up in her throat. She opened her mouth to scream, then held it back. She didn’t know what was about to happen, but she didn’t want Niko hurt.
This was no fantasy, no dream. This was real, and she was about to bring harm to the man she loved.
Frantically she looked around, searching for something—anything.
“Forget it, Karen,” her masked assai
lant growled. “In a very short time I’m going to make sure you never interfere with me again.”
By now Karen’s eyes had grown accustomed to the darkness. She followed the line of her assailant’s gaze and saw a large, crumpled figure on the floor by the door.
“Sam? Sam, are you okay?”
“He’s not dead, not yet. I have no quarrel with that one, but I couldn’t allow any complications, not now. It was too hard to find you.”
Her attention had been momentarily diverted. In that second she heard a click, followed by a flash of light. Miles had lit a torch.
“What are you doing?” Karen cried out.
“Making sure you understand what is happening, Karen.”
Karen thought she heard Sam beginning to stir. If she could just keep Miles’s attention a little longer. “How did you find me?”
“Oh, I had some help from that reporter back in Silver Lake. He never believed that you were dead. He came to interview me, told me what he’d learned. He thought he had it all figured out. He was a fool. Led me straight to you.”
Just like Niko said, all the little blank spots in her memory had begun to fill themselves in now that she needed to know. She hadn’t wanted to leave Minnesota, and she’d felt like the criminal for letting the arsonist go free, but she’d had no choice. She hadn’t considered that the police would think something had happened to her.
Karen forced her attention back to the present. She had to keep him talking, stall until she could think of something. Surely the police were on the way.
“The reporter?” Karen remembered. “Of course, he called me. He was coming to talk to me. He said he knew why I left. That the Lambert family promised to send you away if I disappeared.”
“They were all fools. You didn’t believe me either, so I gave you a little warning.”
“I believed you. I left.”
“Only after I set that little fire in the nursing home. I knew you wouldn’t want your mother hurt.”
“The fire was effective,” Karen admitted as it all finally came back to her. “We had a deal. As long as there were no more fires, I agreed to stay away. I couldn’t let anyone else die. But it doesn’t matter now, does it? The reporter knows the truth.”
“Yes, that’s why I had to kill him. I couldn’t push him in front of a taxi too. But a subway works just as well. I guess they haven’t found him yet.”
Karen felt colder than she ever had in her life. “You—pushed me? Of course, now I remember.” Karen could feel the jab in her back just as she stepped into the street. “I was going to the police.”
“I picked up your purse and took it back inside. Nobody ever saw me. I didn’t want anybody to think it was a mugging. No, I wanted the world to know that you had been punished. But you didn’t die, so now I’m going to set another little fire.”
Karen sucked in a deep breath and realized in horror that she’d been too alarmed before to notice the smell of gasoline.
“Why, Miles? Why would you want to hurt all those people downstairs? They haven’t done anything to you.”
“You still don’t understand, do you?”
“Karen!” Niko’s voice was just beyond the door now.
She didn’t dare answer, not with Miles between her and Niko.
“Karen! Princess, where are you? Answer me, dammit!”
The low, garbled laugh came again. “Princess?”
“You don’t want to do this,” Karen insisted. “Niko isn’t the kind of man you want to cross.”
“Niko? So that’s the boyfriend, not the one I hit over the head. Too bad. The fire will take care of him too.
“But he’s a doctor,” Karen said, trying to reach the man who had slipped over the edge of reason. “He can help you.”
Too late, Karen realized that was the wrong thing to say.
“No more doctors.” The guttural scream rose from deep inside her assailant’s throat and almost blocked the sound of pounding on the door.
Miles jerked Karen toward the outside door.
“You must not do this,” Karen begged, pulling against the tightening grip. It no longer mattered what he planned for her. She couldn’t allow anybody else to be harmed.
“You have nothing to say about it, Karen. You’re going to die.”
Karen was no match for the strength of her assailant as he dragged her toward the edge. She managed to kick off her shoes and plant her feet on the tarpapered roof.
“Look down there, little Karen. You’ll either burn alive or you’ll jump. I’ll finally be rid of you. It’s your choice.”
Karen had never had martial arts training. She’d never even been an athlete. But when her captor pitched the torch, igniting the puddle of gasoline in the little room where Sam lay, she went ballistic.
Karen swung herself around, flinging the masked man toward the edge of the roof. She could hear the sound of the blaze, and she watched in horror as it licked the trail of gas out the doorway just past her feet toward the low wooden rail around the roof. Miles had created an arrow of flames toward the edge.
Behind her she heard a crash and a shout as Niko broke into the burning room. There was a struggle as Niko helped Sam to his feet.
“He’s got Karen,” Sam yelled.
“Where?” Niko asked.
“Tell them to stay back!” Miles threatened, pulling Karen another step closer to the edge.
At that moment Niko leapt over the low flames and landed on the roof beyond. “Let her go,” he said. “You aren’t going to hurt anybody else.”
“Don’t move! All I have to do is step back, over the edge, and your princess will go with me.”
“Go away, Niko,” Karen said quietly. “Miles wants only me. I don’t want you hurt.”
Niko ignored Karen’s directions.
“Don’t, Miles,” Niko argued, taking a step to Karen’s left. “You don’t know what you’re doing. You’re ill. You can’t fight this by yourself, but I can help you.”
“Nobody can help me.”
“But I can. I know a good place. It’s called Hope House. My own father is there. It’s very nice. They’ll protect you.”
“You mean they’ll keep me locked up. Doesn’t matter. I can get out. I’m very clever.”
“I’m sure you are. You’d have to be to start all those fires. I can tell.”
“What do you know? You’re a doctor?”
“I had a sister once. She lived a very unhappy life. She sacrificed her future to save me. I almost let her death ruin my life. I know now that we have choices, but if we make the wrong one, we can ask for help.”
“I don’t want any help, doctor.”
“Neither did she. I tried very hard to help her, but she wouldn’t let me.”
Karen kept quiet. What was Niko doing? Then she understood. He was trying to distract Miles.
As he talked, Karen sensed movement on her right. The fire from behind caught the surrealistic mask in its glow while the wooden rail ignited, turning Miles into a silhouette against the flames in the night sky. Karen could hear shouting. Clouds of smoke boiled past them, making it hard to breathe.
“Stop talking. You don’t really care about me, none of you. Stay away!” The masked figure screamed, taking another step back, drawing Karen along. “I won’t go back, ever again!”
“Why?” Niko asked, keeping even with them. “Isn’t the sanitarium a nice place, Miles?”
“Don’t talk to me. You don’t know. None of you knows. Not even smart little Karen, who stopped me from getting away.”
“Why do you keep calling me ‘little’?”
Another laugh. “You really don’t know, do you? All this time you thought you did, but you didn’t. You were so blind that you never understood the lie.”
“What lie?” Karen asked, hearing the telltale sound of footsteps on either side of her.
A sudden blast from the horn of an arriving fire truck startled Miles, and he glanced behind himself for just a moment. It was now or ne
ver. Karen jerked her arm. Her captor stumbled and fell against the burning wall. For a moment he teetered wildly.
“Now!” Niko yelled. Sam grabbed Karen, yanking her back from the edge.
At the same time, Niko reached for the arsonist, who fought to right himself. There was a momentary struggle. Niko held on to Miles’s right arm and reached for the other, catching the mask instead. As he ripped it away, a scream cut through the night.
Karen finally knew and understood. The final piece of the puzzle fell into place. She knew why she hadn’t wanted to wake up.
The scream came again, not from the person wearing the mask, but from Karen.
The unmasked figure wasn’t Miles. It was a woman.
The woman cursed, turned, and plunged over the edge, pulling Niko with her.
Karen screamed again.
“Mother!”
Tuesday the 18th Mercy General Hospital
“You aren’t going to die and leave me alone now that we’ve found each other, my Gypsy lover,” Karen said. “I’m waiting right here until you wake up.”
The voice was as sexy and smooth as vintage brandy. He liked what it promised as much as he liked the feel of the fingertips working their way up the side of his leg.
“It’s my turn to be the rescuer, Niko. I guess I ought to clear the air completely. My mother set the fires. She was in a sanitarium, the same one that Miles was sent to from time to time. For a reason that I’ll never understand, they became friends. Seems Miles told her about burning down a neighbor’s toolshed to get even with the man for telling lies about him. My mother thought she had a lot of getting even to do.”
Niko was listening, though he was having trouble understanding. It was like a dream. He was there, yet he wasn’t.
“The arsonist was never Miles. The night of the haunted house fire mother found a specter’s mask at the patient’s Halloween party and managed to escape with the volunteers. She’d done it before. She probably hid in the back of one of the cars leaving the sanitarium.”
Mac's Angels : Sinner and Saint. a Loveswept Classic Romance (9780345541659) Page 15