But she couldn’t blame her imagination again when she opened her closet and found a bright pink lacy bra wadded up on the floor. It wasn’t hers.
She picked up Mac’s business card and left a message insisting he call her as soon as possible.
If he was doing his job the way he’d said he would, she’d have some answers today.
Chapter 2
“Call your office and tell them you’ll be late.”
“Excuse me?” Dana groped for her coffee cup. She figured she didn’t have enough caffeine in her system to grapple with John McKenna first thing in the morning.
“I’ll be over there in about ten minutes to look over your house.” He hung up.
“Goodbye to you, too,” she muttered.
She watched the minute hand sweep ten times before Mac rang her doorbell. He nodded a silent greeting and walked past her toward the kitchen. He opened the back door and inspected the lock.
“A five-year-old could get in here with little effort,” Mac muttered.
“Last I heard, five-year-olds weren’t listed on America’s Most Wanted.” She sipped her coffee. The caffeine wasn’t proving to be enough to keep her alert.
Mac looked up. “You need a dead bolt on this door and your front door.” As he crossed the kitchen, he glanced at the immaculate counters. “You must use paper plates.” He thought of the dishes from a week ago that still resided in his own sink.
He took stock of his surroundings. Fancy counters that looked as if they were made out of gray granite, cooking island, bleached cabinets with etched-glass doors. Nothing out of place here. He resisted the urge to wash his hands before continuing. Instead he slipped on a pair of latex gloves. Under Dana’s watchful, and wary, eye, he went to work.
Drawers divulged little other than that he couldn’t find anything remotely resembling a junk drawer. Her personal phone book noted numbers for the usual medical needs, various repairmen, her housekeeper, and a few names and addresses he gathered belonged to friends.
He noted there were a few times when she looked as if she wanted to snatch something out of his hands, but she managed to restrain herself. She remained seated as he left the kitchen.
He bypassed the family room and living room, and headed straight for her home office.
It was just as he expected. Desk drawers were all neatly arranged, all the files in order. Even her correspondence was arranged in chronological order. No wonder she looked shell-shocked when she saw my office, he thought, glancing at the tiny boxes holding stamps, paper clips and rubber bands. He doubted she ever had to tear her desk apart to find a lousy stamp.
Dana was standing in the hallway as he headed for her bedroom.
“Do you have to go through every room?” she demanded tautly.
“Only if I want to find out who’s harassing you,” he replied. “Don’t worry. I won’t make a mess or mishandle any of your delicate lingerie.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about.”
The minute he stepped into her bedroom, he detected the same scent he remembered from his office.
If he expected to find it decorated with ruffles and lace, he was sorely disappointed. But not too much. What he found was even better.
The carpet underfoot was plush and a muted shade of spearmint green. He couldn’t imagine a dog in this room. Especially his dog. Big mistake even thinking like that. The silk bedspread was a rich cream color with an abstract swirl design of green, pale pink, peach and soft blue. Solid color throw pillows decorated the head of the king-size bed. He hated to think what Duffy would do to a bed like that. Actually, he shouldn’t even think of himself anywhere close to that bed.
He inched open the closet door and studied the variety of clothing that hung there. The contents were all well made and expensive. Work clothing and casual clothing divided. Dresser drawers disclosed lingerie that momentarily had him visualizing the silk and lace on her. He tucked that thought out of the way the minute it appeared. Not a good idea thinking of your client wearing a black lace bra, panties and garter belt. Tended to take away the professionalism. He was headed for the bathroom, when a bright color caught his eye.
“Well, well, well,” he murmured, reaching into the wastebasket and pulling out a hot-pink lace bra that screamed sex. It wasn’t remotely like the ones he’d found in her dresser drawers. The ones that were demure yet seductive. Victoria’s Secret versus Frederick’s of Hollywood. He pulled a plastic bag out of his pocket and secured it inside. He tucked it inside his jacket pocket.
The bra didn’t go with the clothing he found in the closet. He did a quick search of every closet in the house. He couldn’t find anything else that went with the underwear.
He returned to the bedroom and went on through to the bathroom. Here the colors weren’t soothing soft pastels, but colors of the ocean. Brilliant turquoise, bright lime and a smattering of deep lavender for accent.
Mac doubted a professional decorator had stepped one foot in this house. No, Dana would have done all this herself. That way she could keep her house under her control just as she kept control over her workplace.
Since she’d hired him, she obviously felt her life wasn’t behaving the way she’d planned.
There. It was so subtle, it could easily have been overlooked. Especially by a man. Even by Mac. But he’d been looking for another clue to go with the underwear and had hoped he’d find it here. He got lucky.
A former girlfriend had once set him straight about a woman’s cosmetics. There were those who were strict about what brands and colors they used. Dana was one of these. All the lipstick cases he found were black. But one silver case stood out among the others. He carefully picked it up and studied the label, then twisted the tube so the lipstick would swivel upward.
“Passion,” he murmured, checking out the color. “Interesting name.” He held the tube upward, the shimmery red shade almost blinding his eyes.
Not one of Dana Madison’s, that’s for sure.
He dropped it in a second plastic bag and stuffed it in his pocket.
A cursory search of the living and family room didn’t tell him anything other than that Dana Madison seemed to live a pretty quiet life.
Maybe the lady needed a shrink instead of a private investigator. Still, his curiosity was growing by the moment.
He returned to the kitchen, where Dana was again sitting at the table. Her delicate features were still taut and her lips were pressed together tightly. He guessed it was so they wouldn’t tremble. He wondered if she ever dared show any emotion. Maybe she did have an alter ego that could only come out at night. It might be something he’d have to discuss with her.
“Well?” She faced him with a challenging stare.
“First off, buy some timers for your lamps. Set them up in each room and program them for different hours. Make sure at least one lamp comes on just before it gets dark,” he instructed.
She nodded. “What else?”
“I’ll call you when I have my report ready,” he said, before striding out the door.
As Mac walked to his truck, he thought about what he’d seen in the house. Except for the bra and lipstick, nothing there indicated a woman who liked the nightlife.
One thing was sure. The past twenty-four hours was more than enough to tell him Ms. Dana Madison was turning out to be one hell of an interesting case.
“You’ve been very popular this morning.”
Dana paused at her assistant’s desk long enough to pick up her phone messages. She swiftly checked the name on each one but didn’t see anything that required immediate attention.
“Anything else I need to know about?” she asked.
“Scott wants to see you about the contracts for the Brand Corporation,” the silver-haired woman replied. “I told him you’d be free at three, and he could have fifteen minutes.”
Dana smiled. Marti Cameron had kept her father’s office running smoothly for more than thirty years. After his death, Dana had asked Marti to r
emain with her, since her own assistant had resigned when her husband accepted an out-of-state transfer. It was a decision Dana had never regretted.
“What will I tell him during those fifteen minutes you’ve allotted him?” she asked.
Marti arched an eyebrow. “You won’t need to tell him anything. All you’ll have to do is sit there and let him tell you why he feels the amendments to the contract are in our favor. Then you’ll explain to him they aren’t in our favor. When he asks you why you feel that, you can tell him he needs to do some more homework.”
Dana perched herself on the corner of her assistant’s desk. The smile she flashed was natural and warm. It was a smile few were allowed to see.
“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather keep this meeting for me?”
The older woman looked horrified. “As if I would presume to do such a thing.” She picked up her reading glasses with the multicolor frames and slipped them on. “Now go on and return those telephone calls. I have correspondence to finish so you can sign them before the end of the day.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Dana saluted her and slipped off the desk.
Dana couldn’t enter the office that had been her father’s without feeling as if she were entering a sacred area. At first, she feared she wouldn’t be able to run the large management leasing company as well as he had, but with Marti’s help and many hours of work, she felt more confident with each passing day.
It helped that one of her father’s last instructions was to redecorate his office the day she took it over. He’d told her to make the space her own. And she had.
The heavy mahogany furniture and hunter-green drapes were replaced with a lighter-shade wood furniture, more modern in design, and sage-green drapes. A green-and-rose tweed sofa was placed against one wall with a coffee table in front of it and a chair on either side. Her father had refused to use a computer, claiming he didn’t trust them, but now a laptop sat on Dana’s desk. Though she’d put her stamp on the space, she felt her father’s spirit still existed in the large office. That feeling helped her gain the confidence she needed to lead the company.
That confidence, so hard won, had begun to ebb when strange things started happening.
Dana sat at her desk and laid the pink message slips out like a deck of cards. She ignored them as she picked up her phone and punched out a number.
“McKenna Investigations. Leave a message.”
“As always, cryptic to the point of rude,” she murmured, waiting for the tone. “Mr. McKenna, this is Dana Madison. I’d appreciate hearing from you.”
A click sounded in her ear. “What would you appreciate hearing?”
“What happened last night.” She could be just as blunt.
“Like I told you, you’ll get a weekly report. I’d like more than twenty-four hours before giving you my observations. See you at the end of the week, Ms. Madison. Come by around five, and we’ll talk.” He hung up before she could say a word.
Dana looked at the phone receiver as if it had somehow betrayed her.
“If this is how he treats paying clients, I hate to think how he treats the world in general,” she murmured, using her fingertip to push one of the message slips away from the others.
She thought of the bra she’d found that morning. She had been instructed to contact him if she found anything. Instead, she’d thrown it away because she couldn’t stand to look at anything so disgusting. Should she call him back and tell him about it? Or just pretend it never existed?
Lately, she preferred acting as if nothing happened to her between dusk and dawn. Safer to keep it that way.
As the afternoon lengthened, the curt tones of John McKenna’s voice reverberated through her head. She didn’t know how or why, but she was positive his first night working for her had given him clues about what was going on. Clues she was not going to like hearing.
She plunged into her work. Long ago, she’d discovered it was the best way to keep her fearful thoughts at bay. Keeping her current clients confident that she could manage their buildings as well as her father had was proving to be more than a full-time job. One she was now grateful for.
By the time she felt she could take a break, her eyes were burning from staring at the computer monitor and her back ached from staying in one position too long. It was dark out, and only the lamp on her desk was lit. Deceptive shadows hung from every corner of the room.
She imagined her father lounging on the couch.
“You chose something much too soft, daughter,” he’d tell her, shifting around to find a comfortable position. “This kind of couch is only handy if you want an afternoon nap. Don’t think about making your clients too comfortable. They might think you’re as soft as your couch.”
“You’re wrong, Dad. I use it to soften them up for the kill,” she murmured, saving her work before she closed the files and shut down her computer. She stretched her arms over her head to relieve some of the ache that had settled in the small of her back, and stood up.
She walked through the dark empty offices and relocked the main door on her way out. As she descended in the elevator, she felt the silence of the entire building surround her. She felt the stark solitude as she crossed the parking garage to reach her car. The yellow lights cast a harsh glow over the area, as if she had been thrust inside something dark and evil.
Dana tried to cast off the apprehension that flowed through her mind as she grew closer to her car. But it increased as a chill skittered along her spine.
She felt a pair of eyes focused on her. She turned around in a tight circle to view everything around her. She tried to peer into every corner, but the shadows mocked her with their stillness.
“Is anyone there?” She hated it that her voice trembled. “Ed, are you out there?” She called out the name of one of the security guards who routinely patrolled the parking garage.
The answering silence was equally mocking.
Dana disarmed her car alarm and got in. She started up the car and hastily backed out of the parking stall, her tires squealing as she raced around the corner toward the exit.
She was so intent on escaping that she didn’t see a figure detach itself from behind a post and stand there watching the car’s taillights disappear.
“Run little mouse, run.” The figure laughed throatily. “But no matter how fast you run, you still won’t be able to escape me. Before you know it, the day will come when you’ll be the one in a cage, and I’ll be the one with all the cheese.”
Dana might not be able to see John McKenna, but she knew he was nearby no matter where she went.
As she left her office each evening, he was out there somewhere. He was nearby when she stopped at the dry cleaners, when she walked through the drugstore, picking up a prescription and necessary sundries, or when she made a quick stop at the gas station. It wasn’t easy to resist looking around to see if she could find him.
The feeling of John McKenna watching her was different from what she felt when someone else watched her. She didn’t sense any unease or nasty prickling of fear. She wasn’t sure what to label the feeling; it was something she hadn’t experienced before.
But no matter how comfortable she felt during those hours, she still suffered during the few minutes just before she fell asleep. She was overwhelmed by a terrifying sensation that her life was spiraling out of control. A cold feeling that warned her her slumber would steal the control she’d always held onto so tightly. And worries she’d never had before.
Of course, she’d never before had to worry about someone trying to destroy her life.
Now, Dana drove down the winding driveway. She’d always thought of the trees lining the drive as comforting. Tonight, they felt as if they were closing in on her. She breathed a sigh of relief when she reached the house. After she shut off the engine, she pulled down the visor and stared at her reflection in the lighted mirror. Lines of stress were lightly carved along her mouth and eyes. She smoothed her fingertip across them and reapplied her lipstick
, deciding the color gave her a much-needed boost.
She got out of the car, and carriage lights along the steps showed her the way to a front door she knew well. She unlocked the door and stepped inside. A woman in her sixties appeared from a side room. Her silver hair was cut short and feathered around her face. Her plump body was clothed in a floral print blouse and dark blue slacks.
“Dana.” She held out her arms for a hug. “Have you eaten, dear?”
“Even if I say yes, you’ll tell me I don’t eat enough and insist on stuffing me with food.” She welcomed the embrace that brought memories of afternoons spent in the kitchen learning to bake cookies and cakes. Over the years, the woman had gone from a trusted employee to a valued family member. Dana couldn’t imagine what it would be like if she lost her, too. “How are you, Harriet?”
“Pretending my arthritis doesn’t bother me in the mornings,” the housekeeper joked.
“Which is why I insisted someone come in to clean,” Dana told her. “You know very well you’re not expected to do all that work. You should be taking it easier now instead of trying to work harder.”
“Lord, child, I don’t have enough to do now,” she protested, laughing. “Even those nurses don’t cause that much work. Most of them seem to think a small salad is a huge meal.”
“They’re doing all right?” She knew she could get the truth from Harriet.
Harriet nodded. “They’re just fine. They seem to prefer keeping to themselves, but they always take excellent care of…your mother.” Her smile disappeared.
Dana could feel the area around her heart tighten. “She’s worse?”
“Not worse, not better,” the older woman said gently, keeping her arms around Dana. “Honey, the doctor told you there was a good chance your mother wouldn’t fully recover.”
Dana shook her head, refusing to listen. “Mom’s always come back before. She will this time. She’s had excellent care.”
Harriet’s eyes softened with the love she felt for the young woman she’d cared for since childhood. “Sweetheart, please don’t take this the wrong way, but the last time your mother was very ill, your father was here.”
Mirror, Mirror Page 3