by Nora Roberts
“I saw a flashlight, the beam. I think. It was late, maybe I—”
“No freaking way!” He slammed a hand to Ford’s arm hard enough to make Ford stumble back. “I told her I heard something, but she’s all shut up and go to sleep. What time was this?”
“I don’t know. Ah . . . little after two.”
“That’s it. Going for the barn? We gotta go check this out.”
“Crap.” Ford downed more coffee. “I guess we do. I need to get a shirt, shoes.”
“Can I come up? I’m digging on the house.”
“Whatever.” It was annoying to feel himself tugged into friendship with the guy who was having sex with the woman he wanted to have sex with. But there didn’t seem to be a way to dig in his heels and hold it off. “So . . . you didn’t bring your own sleeping bag, I guess.”
“Shit, man, I stay in hotels. Room service, bars, pillow-top mattresses. Cill’s the one for roughing it. You don’t have a spare, do you?”
“Actually—”
“Whoa! Holy shit! That’s Cilla.”
Before Ford could respond, Steve strode into his office and to the sketches pinned and hanging.
“Super Cilla. Dude.” Steve tapped a finger to a corner of a sketch. “These are awesome. You’re a genius. This isn’t Seeker stuff.”
“No. New character, new series. I’m just getting started.”
“With Cill as the . . . what, like, model? Does she know?”
“Yeah. We worked it out.”
Nodding, Steve continued to grin at the sketches. “I got the vibe when you came over there yesterday. But seeing this? I totally get why she turned down the on-site booty call last night.”
“She—” Mentally, Ford pumped his fist. “So . . . the two of you aren’t . . .”
“Road’s clear there, man. I’m going to say, straight out, doing her’s one thing—if she’s down with that. Messing with her? That’s another. Do that, I’ll rip your still-beating heart out. Otherwise? We’re cool.”
Ford studied Steve’s face and decided every word spoken was the silver truth. “Got it. I’m going to get my shoes.”
Steve poked his head in the bathroom, then into Ford’s bedroom. “You’ve got good light in here. How come you’re not tapping that yet?”
“What? Tapping the light?”
“Come on.” Steve shook his head as Ford pulled on a T-shirt. “Cilla. How come you’re not tapping that yet? I’d know if you were. And she’s been over there about a month now.”
“Listen, I don’t see how that’s your business. No offense.”
“None taken. Except I see how it is, because there’s nobody who matters more to me. I don’t want to say she’s like my sister, because that would just be sick, considering.”
Ford sat on the side of the bed to pull on his shoes. “The lady seems to want to take it slow. So I’m taking it slow. That’s it.”
“That’s solid. I like you, so I’m going to give you a tip. She’s tough, and what you’d call resilient. She handles herself and what comes at her. But she’s got depths, and in some of those deep places she hurts. So you’ve got to be careful there.”
“She wouldn’t be doing what she’s doing over there if she didn’t have depths, and if some of them didn’t hurt.”
“Okay. Let’s go be men and check out the barn.”
IN WHAT WOULD be her laundry/mudroom, Cilla straightened to stretch out her back. As she’d suspected, the old and yellowing linoleum covered a scarred but salvageable hardwood floor. She’d rather be upstairs having fun with power tools, but it made more sense for her to focus her sweat equity into ripping up the linoleum. Her carpenter didn’t need her up there, especially with Steve on site, so . . .
Through the window she spotted Steve, who obviously wasn’t upstairs, walking toward her barn with Ford. Setting aside her tools, she headed out to find out why Steve was out for a morning stroll instead of supervising the master suite rebuild.
The barn door stood open, and the two men were inside by the time she got there. They appeared to be debating which one of them should climb the ladder into the hayloft.
“What the hell are you doing?” she demanded.
“Checking it out,” Steve told her. “Can you tell if anything’s missing?”
“No, and why should it be?”
“Ford saw somebody skulking around out here last night.”
“I didn’t say ‘skulking.’ I said I saw someone out here with a flashlight last night.”
“You’re out on somebody else’s property in the middle of the night, with a flashlight, that’s skulking.” Steve pointed at Cilla. “I told you I heard something.”
Cilla shook her head at Steve, turned to Ford. “From all the way across the road, in the dead of night, you saw someone skulking around my barn?”
“While I have to agree with the definition of ‘skulking,’ what I said was I saw a light, the beam of it. The beam of a flashlight, moving toward the barn.”
“It was probably a reflection. Moonlight or something.”
“I know what a flashlight beam looks like.”
“Plus,” Steve interrupted, “when we opened the door, it groaned. That’s the sound I heard last night. Somebody came in here. You’ve got a lot of shit in here, Cill.”
“And it’s pretty clear the lot of shit is still here.”
“Maybe something, or some things, aren’t,” Ford pointed out. “There’s a lot of inventory here, and I’d say a valiant attempt to organize it, but I doubt you know everything that’s here, or exactly where you put it the last time you worked in here.”
“Okay, no, I don’t.” She set her hands on her hips to study the piles and stacks, the arrangement. Had she stacked those boxes that way? Had she turned that broken rocker to the left?
How the hell did she know?
“I’ve got a lot to go through, but I haven’t found anything especially valuable yet. And okay,” she continued before Steve could speak, “a teaspoon Janet Hardy dipped into a sugar bowl would be worth a spot of breaking and entering for a lot of people.”
“Who knows you’ve got stuff in here?”
“Everyone.” Ford answered Steve’s question. “There’s a bunch of people working in the house, and that bunch of people saw Cilla hauling this stuff out here—even helped. So anyone any of them talked to knows, and anyone the anyones talked to and so on.”
“I’ll get a padlock.”
“Good idea. How about the letters?”
“What letters?” Steve wanted to know.
“Did you tell anyone besides me about the letters you found in the attic?”
“My father, but I hardly think—”
“You found letters in the attic?” Steve interrupted. “Like secret letters? Man, this is like one of those BBC mystery shows.”
“You never watch BBC mysteries.”
“I do if they have hot Brit chicks in them. What letters?”
“Letters written to my grandmother by the man she had an affair with in the year before she died. And yeah, secret letters. She had them hidden. I’ve only told Ford and my father—who probably told my stepmother. But it wouldn’t go further than that.” She hoped. “Except . . .” She blew out a breath. “I realized when I was telling my father we were standing right beside an open window so I pulled him away to finish. But if one of the men was anywhere near the window, they would have heard enough.”
She rubbed her eyes. “Stupid. Plus, I pushed my mother yesterday morning about whether Janet had a lover—and one from out here—before she died. She’d blab, if the mood struck. Added to that, she’s pissed at me.”
Reaching over, Steve patted her shoulder. “Nothing new there, doll.”
“I know. But in her current mood, she might have sent someone out here to poke around, looking for something of value.”
“Give me the letters, and anything else you’re worried about. No one’s going to look at my place for them,” Ford added when she frowned
at him.
“Maybe. Let me think about it.”
“Anyway,” Steve said, “we can cross off the wild-eyed mountain man with a meat cleaver. Right? Or we can as soon as Ford climbs up there and makes sure there aren’t any dead bodies or severed body parts.”
“Oh, for Christ sake.” Cilla turned toward the ladder.
Ford blocked her, nudged her back. “I’ll do it.”
He tested his weight on each rung on the climb, as he pictured himself crashing through and breaking any variety of bones on the concrete floor. As he reached the top, he cursed roundly.
“What is it?” Cilla called up.
“Nothing. Splinter. There’s nothing up here. Not even the lonely severed head of an itinerant fieldworker.”
When he’d climbed down again, Cilla took his hand, winced at the chunk of ladder in the meat of his palm. “That’s in there. Come on inside and I’ll dig it out for you.”
“I can just—”
“While you guys play doctor, I’ll go strap on my tool belt and do a man’s work.”
Cilla glanced back at Steve. “About damn time.”
“Had to make the doughnut run. Later,” he said to Ford and strolled out.
“Did he bring you doughnuts?” Cilla asked.
“Yeah. A bribe for use of the gym.”
“Mmm. Come on in, and bring the chunk of my ladder. I assume he also woke you up.”
“You assume correctly.” Ford shoved the barn door closed behind them. “And from a very interesting dream involving you, a red room and a brass headboard. But the jelly doughnuts almost made up for it.”
“Steve believes in the power of the doughnut. So, just what was I doing in a red room with a brass headboard?”
“Hard to describe. But I think I could demonstrate.”
She looked into his eyes, bold green against gold rims. “I don’t have a red room. Neither do you.”
“I’ll go buy the paint.”
Laughing, she reached for the mudroom door, and quickly found herself with her back to the wall of the house. It came as a constant surprise just how potent, how dangerous that mouth could be. The same mouth, she thought dimly as it assaulted hers, that smiled so charmingly, that spoke in such an easy drawl about everyday things. Then it closed over hers and spiked through her system like a fever.
He gave her bottom lip a light nip before he stepped back. “I thought it was Steve headed to the barn last night. To bunk down.”
“Why would Steve sleep in the barn?” It took another minute for her brain to fire on all circuits again. “Oh. We’re all grown-ups, Ford. I’m not asking Steve to sleep in the barn.”
“Yeah, I got that. But he’s going to borrow my old sleeping bag. I haven’t used it for about fifteen years, or since sleeping in a bag on the ground lost its thrill for me. He’ll like it. It’s Spider-Man.”
“You have a Spider-Man sleeping bag?”
“I got it for my eighth birthday. It was a highlight, and has never lost its luster.” He leaned down, brushed her lips with his and opened the door behind her. “I’m more than happy to get it out of storage so Steve can use it while he’s here.”
“Neighborly of you.”
“Not especially.”
She opened the first aid kit, checked the contents. “I’ve got what I need here. Let’s do this outside. In the light.” When they stepped out onto the veranda, she gestured for him to sit. She doused a cotton ball with peroxide and cleaned the wound.
“It’s not neighborly,” Ford continued, “because the motives are entirely self-serving. I don’t want him sleeping with you.”
She shifted her gaze up to his even as she began to clean a needle and tweezers with alcohol. “Is that so?”
“If you wanted to sleep with him, then I’d be out of luck.”
“How do you know I don’t? That I didn’t?”
“Because you want to sleep with me. Ow!” He looked down at his hand and the hole she’d made at the top of the splinter with the needle. “Jesus.”
“It’s too deep to milk out, and needs a route. Suck it up. If I want to sleep with you, why haven’t I?”
He eyed the needle in her hand warily. “Because you’re not ready. I can wait until you are. But—and don’t jab me with that again—I’m goddamned if I want you sleeping with someone else, old time’s sake or not, while I’m waiting. I want my hands on you, all over you. And I want you thinking about that.”
“So you’ll lend Steve your treasured Spider-Man sleeping bag so I can think about it without caving in to my needs and sleeping with him because he’s handy.”
“Close enough.”
“Look at that.”
He turned his head to look in the direction she indicated. The sharp, quick sting had him jolting. When he cursed, Cilla held the hefty splinter in the teeth of her tweezers. “Souvenir?”
“No, thanks.”
“You’re done.” She packed up the kit, then grabbed him by the hair, crushed her mouth greedily to his. Just as quickly, she broke the kiss, rose. “And you can think about that while you’re waiting.”
With a cool smile, she walked back into the house, let the screen door slap shut behind her.
NINE
Cilla grew so accustomed to the cars that slowed or stopped at the end of her driveway she barely registered them. The lookie-loos, gawkers, even the ones she imagined took photos, didn’t have to be a problem. Sooner or later, she thought, they’d grow accustomed to her, so the best solution to her way of thinking was to ignore them, or to toss out the occasional and casual wave.
To become part of the community, she determined, she had to demonstrate her intent and desire. So she shopped at the local supermarket, hired local labor, bought the majority of her materials from local sources. And chatted up the sales-clerks, the subcontractors, and signed autographs for those who still thought of her as TV Katie.
She considered it symbolic, a statement of that intent, when she took Ford’s advice and followed her first instincts and had the gates removed. To follow up, she planted weeping cherry trees to flank the drive. A statement, Cilla thought, as she stood on the shoulder of the road and studied the results. New life. And next spring, when they burst into bloom again, she’d be here to see it. From her vantage point, she looked down at the house. There would be gardens and young trees as well as the grand old magnolia. Her grand old magnolia, she thought, with its waxy white blooms sweetening the air. The paint on the house would be fresh and clean instead of dingy and peeling. Chairs on the veranda, and pots of mixed flowers. And when she could squeeze a little more out of the budget, pavers in earthy tones on the drive cutting through lush green lawns.
Eventually, when people slowed down to look, it would be because they admired a pretty house in a pretty setting, and not because they wondered what the hell the Hollywood woman was doing with the house where Janet Hardy had swallowed too many pills and chased them with vodka.
She stepped back toward the wall at the sound of an approaching car, then turned at the quick beep-beep as the little red Honda pulled to the shoulder.
It took her a moment—and brought on a twist of guilt—to recognize the pretty blonde in cropped pants and a crocheted cami who hopped out of the car.
“Hi!” On a bubble of laughter, Angela McGowan, Cilla’s half sister, rushed forward to catch Cilla in a squeeze.
“Angie.” The fresh, sassy scent enveloped her as completely as the arms. “You cut your hair. Let me look at you. No! Don’t hug me again. I’m filthy.”
“You really are.” On another bubble of laughter, Angie pulled back, met Cilla’s eyes with her own enormous hazel ones. Their father’s eyes, Cilla thought. Their father’s daughter. “And you smell a little, too.” Beaming, just beaming, Angie gripped Cilla’s hands. “You shouldn’t still be so beautiful, considering.”
“You look amazing.” Cilla brushed her fingertips over the very abbreviated ends of Angie’s hair. “It’s so short.”
�
��Takes two seconds to deal with in the morning.” Angie gave her head a quick shake so the sunny cap lifted, ruffled, settled. “I had to practically have a blindfold and a cigarette to get it done.”
“It’s fabulous. What are you doing here? I thought you were at college?”
“Semester’s done for me, so I’m home for a while. I can’t believe you’re here. And this.” She gestured toward the house. “You’re actually living here, and fixing it up and . . . all.”
“There’s a lot of All.”
“These are so pretty. So much prettier than that old gate.” Angie touched one of the curved branches with its blossoms of soft, spring pink. “Everyone’s talking about what’s going on here. I’ve only been home for a day, and already I’ve had my ears burned by all the talk.”
“Good talk or bad talk?”
“Why wouldn’t it be good?” Angie cocked her head. “This place was an eyesore. So yeah, it’s not so pretty right now, either, but you’re doing something. Nobody else has. Is it hard? I don’t mean the work, because obviously . . . I mean is it hard being here, living here?”
“No.” But Angie would ask, Cilla knew. Angie would care. “In fact, it’s easy. It feels right, more than anything or anywhere else. It’s strange.”
“I don’t think so. I think everyone’s supposed to be somewhere, and the lucky ones find out where it is. So you’re lucky.”
“I guess I am.” The bright side of optimism, Cilla remembered, was where Angie lived. Her father’s daughter. Their father’s daughter, Cilla corrected. “Do you want to come in, take a look? It’s in serious flux right now, but we’re making progress.”
“I would, and I will another time. I’m on my way to meet some friends, but I detoured, hoping to see you for a minute. Didn’t expect to see you on the side of the road, so I guess I’m lucky, too. So if . . . uh-oh.”
Cilla followed the direction of Angie’s glance, noted the white van that slowed and pulled to the shoulder across the road.
“Do you know who that is?” Cilla asked. “I’ve seen that van pull up out here before, several times before.”
“Yeah, that’s Mr. Hennessy’s van. His son was—”