Standing in the Shadows

by Shannon McKenna

  She slammed the phone down and curled up on her bed. She fished the matchbook that had Connor’s phone number written on it out of her pocket, and stared at it.

  Anything happens, anything at all, call me, he’d said. Promise me.

  She was so tempted to call him and sob out all her problems to him. He was so warm and strong. He beckoned like a lighthouse in a storm. She wiped tears angrily away. Not an option. Connor was the last person she should turn to for help. No matter how terrified she felt.

  Oh, Christ. There were at least a dozen big, scary-looking vitamin pills lying on the table next to a tall glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice when Connor stumbled out of the back bathroom in the morning. Davy had the imperturbable macho-zen act down to a high art, but he still insisted on treating his younger brother like a goddamned invalid.

  Davy glanced at him, jerked his head toward the vitamins, and narrowed his eyes, as if to say, Don’t even think of struggling.

  “I start with coffee, not orange juice,” Connor grumbled.

  “This is my house. I am boss in my house. If you swallow them all down without giving me any shit, I will give you some coffee,” Davy said. “And then we’ll go over the Mueller stuff.”

  That snapped his mind to instant alertness. “Find anything interesting?”

  Davy gave him an oblique look. “Want some breakfast?”

  Connor yawned. “Hell, yes.” His stomach was groaning.

  Davy blinked. “I’ll be damned. I’ll go put on some eggs and ham for you. Two eggs or three?”

  “Four,” Connor said.

  A grin split Davy’s stern face. He vanished into the kitchen.

  Connor was frowning at a weird transparent amber pill when Sean wandered out onto the porch. “What is this crap?” he asked plaintively. “It looks like a congealed glob of oil.”

  “It is a congealed glob of oil, you ignorant slob. Four hundred ECU of vitamin E in a gel capsule. Good for skin, nails, hair, and scar tissue. Take it. You need all the help you can get.” Sean placed a mug of coffee in front of him. “Davy says if the pills are gone, you can drink this.”

  Connor studied his brother’s sartorial splendor with wondering eyes. Sean always looked well-groomed, even when he just rolled out of bed. Some recessive gene that Connor had utterly failed to inherit.

  Sean was decked out in a wine-red sweater that showed off all his muscles. Tight designer jeans. Hair mussed into perfect stylish disorder. A whiff of expensive aftershave drifted over and assailed Connor’s nose.

  He closed his eyes against Sean’s blinding glory and swallowed down the gummy capsule. “What are you still doing here?”

  Sean grimaced. “Woman trouble. Julia is camping out in her car in front of my condo. I told her from the start not to get all intense on me, that I’m not looking to commit right now. Didn’t work. Never does. So I figured if I don’t come home till morning for a few nights, she’ll figure I’m boffing someone else and get a clue.”

  “You slut,” Connor said. “Someday you’ll pay up, big time.” He picked up the last vitamin, a big, yellowish brown pill. “This is the one that makes your piss turn chartreuse, right?”

  Sean glanced over at it. “That’s the one. B complex. Great stuff.”

  “It looks like a rabbit pellet,” Connor complained. “And it smells like horseshit. Why do you guys torture me with this crap?”

  “Because we love you, asshole. Shut up and eat the pill.”

  Connor froze, startled by the edge in Sean’s voice. Sean stared out at the water. A muscle twitched in his sharp, clean-shaven jaw.

  For a moment, he caught a glimpse of the depths of his brothers’ worry for him, and a hot ache swelled up in his throat. He covered by shoving the evil-smelling pill into his mouth, and choking it down with a gulp of coffee. “Jesus. I’ve got yellow skid marks on my esophagus.”

  “Suffer,” was Sean’s succinct rejoinder.

  They sipped their coffee. This tense, meaningful silence was too much for him to take first thing in the morning. He had to knock it down to the level of bullshit banter, so they could both breathe again.

  “So, uh…Julia,” he ventured. “Is she the aerobics instructor with thighs like a vise?”

  Sean seized onto the change of subject with evident relief. “Hell, no. That was Jill. You missed Kelsey, Rose and Caroline.”

  “Ah. I see,” Connor murmured. “So what’s with this Julia?”

  Sean winced. “Curly blonde hair, big blue eyes, five-inch heels. I met her at a club a few weeks ago. It was fun for a while, and then bam, out of nowhere, she mutates into this gigantic bloodsucking insect.”

  Connor winced. “Shit. I hate it when that happens.”

  “Me, too. Lurking in the dark outside my condo all night, brrr. Creeps me out. Next thing I know, she’ll be boiling my bunny.”

  Connor made sympathetic sounds. “Sounds painful.”

  The screen door flew open, kicked by Davy’s massive booted foot. He laid two plates before his brother. Thick slabs of grilled ham, a heap of scrambled eggs full of melted cheddar. Four pieces of toast, dripping with butter. A pile of fresh honeydew, cantaloupe, and pineapple chunks with a big scoop of cottage cheese perched on top.

  Connor blinked. “Whoa. So, uh…where’s my damask napkin and my lemon-scented finger bowl?”

  Davy shrugged, unembarrassed. “You need protein.”

  No arguing with that. He dove in, ignoring his rapt audience. A few minutes later, he pushed back two highly polished plates. “Let me have it,” he said. “What’s up with Claude Mueller?”

  Davy flipped open a manila folder full of computer printouts. “There’s not as much as I would’ve expected, for such a rich guy,” he said. “Born in Brussels in ’61. Mother Belgian, father Swiss, a big shot industrialist. Outrageously wealthy. Claude was sickly as a child, suffers from some weird form of hemophilia, now more or less under control. A reclusive loner type. He studied art and architecture at the Sorbonne from ’80 to ’83 and then gave it up due to ill health. In 1989, his parents were killed in a car accident. Claude was the sole heir to a fortune of around a half billion or so.”

  Connor choked on his coffee, and wiped his mouth. “Jesus,” he said. “Hard to wrap your mind around that much money.”

  Sean gave him an evil grin. “My mind is stretchier than yours.”

  “Poor Claude was traumatized by his parents’ deaths,” Davy went on. “From that point on, he secluded himself on a tiny private island off the south of France. Never married, no children. All he cares about are antiquities. He had a collection of medieval reliquaries, weapons, Viking and Saxon artifacts, and of course Celtic stuff. He’s a big presence on the ’Net. Spends lots of time in art history chat rooms and message boards. He administers the Quicksilver Fund, which he established in the early nineties. It’s a stinking pile of money that he doles out to arts organizations. All of whom suck his virtual toes.”

  “Photos?” Connor asked.

  “I couldn’t find a recent one. These are over sixteen years old.” Davy shoved a pile of color printouts across the table to him.

  Connor pushed aside his plate and leafed through them.

  Claude Mueller was thin, nondescript, neither handsome nor ugly. Bland features, olive skin, blue eyes, thinning brown hair. The clearest of the lot was a passport photo taken two decades ago. A chubbier version of the same man, with a mustache and goatee.

  Connor studied them, letting his mind float open like a net, scooping for images, connections, snags, feelings. Nothing jumped out, nothing flashed by. All he felt was a prickling, restless unease. “Novak could pass for this guy,” he mused. “Same height and build.”

  Davy and Sean’s swift glances clearly continued a conversation they must have started last night after he’d gone to bed.

  Davy shook his head. “I got into the database of the Quicksilver Fund last night. I found the transactions for the plane tickets Mueller bought for Erin in the past few months. The pre
ssing business that kept Mueller from meeting Erin in Santa Fe was ill health. I saw the medical records. Two days before she was scheduled to go to Santa Fe, Mueller was admitted to a posh private clinic in Nice for a bleeding ulcer.”

  Something tightened steadily in Connor’s stomach. Even though he knew this news should be making him feel better.

  “I hacked into the clinic’s records,” Davy continued. “He couldn’t make it to the meeting because he was vomiting blood, Con. Not because he was sitting in jail, plotting Erin’s downfall.”

  Connor set down his cup. Davy’s tone was flat, his voice unreadable. “Since when do you read French?” he demanded.

  “I hung out in northern Africa for a while after Desert Storm, remember? They speak a lot of French in Egypt and Morocco. I picked it up. It’s not hard, if you already know Spanish.”

  Connor stared into his coffee. So Davy knew French. His brother was full of surprises. “Wasn’t it a little too easy, finding all this info?”

  “Yeah, it was easy,” Davy said slowly. “It’s possible that it’s an elaborate, fiendish plot. Anything’s possible. But spending untold amounts of money to put together a cover story this complicated, all for Erin Riggs’s benefit? Come on, Con. Sure she’s a cute girl, but—”

  “I’m not suggesting that it would be all for Erin’s benefit,” Connor snarled. “It’s to Novak’s benefit to have another identity.”

  Davy looked away. “It’s like Nick said, Con. Novak’s run home to hide under Daddy’s wing. It’s the smart thing to do.”

  “But he’s insane.” Connor looked from Davy to Sean. Both his brothers avoided his gaze. “He doesn’t reason like a normal human.”

  “You have to face reality, Con.” Sean’s mouth was tight.

  Connor clenched his jaw. “And what is your version of reality?”

  Sean looked like he was bracing himself. “That you hate the idea of this girl you’ve always wanted going to meet a filthy rich guy who goes nuts for Celtic art. Nobody could blame you for hating it.”

  The food in Connor’s belly congealed to a cold lump.

  “Let her go, Con.” Davy’s voice was heavy. “Move on.”

  Connor rose to his feet and snatched the sheaf of paper from the table. “Thanks for your help. If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got stuff to do.”

  “Yo, Con,” Sean said, as Connor shoved open the door.

  Connor jerked around with a this-had-better-be-good expression.

  “The guy may have more money than God, but hey…he urps blood,” Sean pointed out. “Bleeding ulcers are not sexy. Take what comfort you can from that.”

  Connor slammed the porch door so violently that it rattled in its frame. They braced themselves. Slam went the front door, too.

  Sean dropped his head down and bonked his forehead against the table. “Shit, shit, shit. Just shoot me now. Put me out of my misery.”

  “Yeah, that was brilliant.” Davy’s voice was dour. “You always hit a nerve. Straight on, bull’s eye.”

  “It’s a family trait.” Sean raised resentful, narrowed eyes.

  “You were the one begging to be put out of his misery,” Davy observed. “Not me.”

  Sean slumped down into his chair. “I didn’t think things could suck any worse for him than they already did. I was wrong.”

  “Things can always get worse,” Davy pointed out. “Always.”

  “Aw, shut up,” Sean muttered. “Goddamn pessimist.”

  Chapter

  5

  It was sunset in the woods. She was naked beneath her gauzy dress. Her hair was loose, her breasts swayed beneath the fabric. Currents of warm air caressed her skin. Golden light slanted through the trees. They swayed and shivered in the soft, perfumed breeze.

  Connor was following her, with a patient, measured gait through eons of dream time. His eyes were full of longing, and the realization grew so gradually inside her, when she finally understood, it was as if she had always known. He would never close the distance between them as long as her back was turned to him.

  She stopped in a circle of trees, fragrant grass below and open sky above, hesitated for one last, trembling moment…and turned around.

  His face lit up with triumphant joy. The wind rose as he approached her, whipping her hair around her face. She had solved the riddle, and finally they could claim what had always been theirs.

  The air hummed like honeybees. Sweet, shimmering overtones filled the air. He placed his hands on her shoulders, pushed the dress off. It slid over her body to the fragrant grass below. There were no words. It was a ceremonial dance, a magical binding.

  Incoherent yearning fountained up inside her, and she reached for him. She offered him all her need, all her secret heat and softness. He kissed her with a rough urgency that mirrored her own, and bore her to the ground. He gave her his heat and his hunger, the sinuous power of his body, the blazing energy that illuminated the dark places inside her, burning away fear and shame as the sun burned away fog.

  Power rose through her like sap, and thousand-petaled flowers of every hue burst into bloom in her sex, her heart, her head. The grass was their soft, fragrant bed as he surged into ber, deep and desperate—

  The alarm shrilled. Erin jolted upright in bed. She slapped the alarm into submission and covered her face with shaking hands. The alarm had cut her off at the good part, and left her high and dry. What rotten, cruel timing. She could hardly breathe, she was so turned on.

  She’d been having that dream for years. Connor’s garb varied according to what she was researching at the time; sometimes he wore jeans and a T-shirt, sometimes he was a Celtic warrior, sometimes a Roman soldier. The details didn’t matter. The dream always left her writhing in bed, quivering thighs clenchd tight around a pool of liquid heat. Distracted by lust. The last thing she needed to cope with today.

  She tried to be objective, adult. Dreams were messages from the subconscious mind. This was fine and good, and she appreciated the courtesy. But what could this dream indicate, with her life the way it was? She’d never had sex with Connor. She’d barely ever managed to have sex with anybody, at least not successfully, so why should her subconscious mind use sex to make its point? To get her attention?

  She hugged her knees to her chest, still shaking. If that was the intent, it had worked. Just a dream, she repeated. Just a dream.

  She glanced at the clock. Seven o’clock. Time to make some tea and calm herself down with something busy and constructive, but horror of horrors, there was nothing left to do. The apartment was already painfully tidy. Everything that could be alphabetized was. Every surface that could be scrubbed shone. Her packing was done, her travel clothes laid out, down to the last hairpin. If this went on, she would be reduced to cleaning off the gunk that accumulated on the computer keyboard with cotton swabs and alcohol. Coping mechanisms gone wild.

  The intercom buzzed. Her first thought was that it might be Connor, and she stumbled across the room, electrified. “Who is it?”

  “It’s me, silly. Tonia. Don’t tell me Ms. Perfect is still in bed?”

  “Oh, hi, Tonia. The elevator’s still broken. Take the stairs.”

  She pulled on some sweats while she waited for Tonia’s knock. She opened the door and gave her friend a grateful hug. “You are such a sweetheart for helping me. I hate leaving Edna at the pet hotel.”

  Tonia tossed her black curls. “No big deal. Sorry I had to bug you so early. Shall I take Edna home with me, or just take your keys?”

  “Whatever’s more convenient for you,” Erin said. “And I am taking you out to dinner as soon as I get back.”

  “Oh, stop.” Tonia rolled her artfully made-up eyes. “I’ll take Edna home, then. She can chase some of the neighbor cats around. She’s such a warmongering bitch, she must feel stir-crazy in this tiny place.”

  Erin was all too aware of how the fussy Edna hated being cooped up in an efficiency apartment. But life was tough all around.

  “I’m sure it’l
l be a nice treat for her,” she said tightly.

  Tonia lifted up a Starbucks bag. “I brought us some sticky buns, plus a couple of double-shot lattes. You need a stiff dose of caffeine.”

  Erin devoured a gooey bun while Tonia pawed through Erin’s suitcase. “You can’t go meet an eligible zillionaire dressed like this,” Tonia protested. “You don’t have a single thing that shows off your chest, and you have a fine chest, girl! What am I going to do with you?”

  Erin shrugged. “I’m going for professional, not sexpot.”

  “The two are not incompatible.” Tonia wagged an admonishing finger at her. “When you come back, we are going shopping, and I will personally show you how to reconcile them.”

  “I’m broke,” Erin said. “No shopping until my ship comes in.”

  Tonia rolled her eyes. “That’s what I love about you, Erin. So naïve. Let me lay out the plan for you. Step One, borrow my clothes to make that all-important first impression. Step Two, get passionately friendly with the zillionaire. And then, then we will go shopping.”

  “Oh, stop it. This is a work thing. And besides, I…” Her voice trailed off, and she started to blush.

  Tonia blinked. “Don’t tell me you’re blowing off this opportunity because you’re hung up on that guy who ruined your life!”

  “My life is not ruined, for your information,” Erin snapped. “Connor came to see me yesterday.”

  “Here?” Tonia’s jaw dropped. “In your apartment? What did he do? Did he come on to you? I’ll shoot him if he came on to you.”

  “No! He didn’t! He came to tell me that Novak and Georg Luksch broke out of prison. He’s worried about my safety. He tried to persuade me not to go on this trip.” No need to mention that intense hug, since it had been completely platonic. At least on his part, if not hers. “Actually, I thought it was sweet of him,” she said hesitantly. “To warn me.”

  “Sweet?” Tonia snorted a derisive sound. “He wants into your pants. Sure, he saved you from the evil henchman of the big bad criminal, but you told me yourself that all that Georg did to you was flirt. And McCloud turned him into hamburger right in front of you. Maybe some girls go for that sort of thing, but you’re not one of them.”