Shadows 02 Celtic Shadows

by K C West

  She turned her back to me. I wasn’t the least bit interested in whatever she had to do. Her words had turned my world upside down, and I wanted her gone.

  “I’m sorry I’ve upset you,” she said, folding the now empty envelope and heading toward the door. “I just didn’t want any secrets.”

  I couldn’t look at her anymore. I stared at the floor, trying to compose myself. My hand shook as I held the knob. “Get out of my sight before I sic Pup on you.” That was an empty threat. Pup was still out with Arwel.

  Terry sighed. “I’m sorry that’s the way you feel.” With her head held high, she walked through the doorway.

  “How the hell do you think I feel?” My eyes filled with hot tears. I slammed the door shut and leaned my forehead against the cool wood, my chest heaving.

  Terry was a bold-faced liar. Kim loved me. She’d never betray me. She’d never sleep with her, even under these circumstances.

  I wanted to believe that so badly, and yet…

  *

  I moved to the bathroom as if in a trance. The bath water had cooled. I pulled the plug and watched it swirl down the drain.

  I folded my arms and dropped my head, letting my forehead press against the cold porcelain rim of the tub. Life had seemed so blissful an hour ago. Now, I had so many questions, doubts, and fears. Terry was a beautiful, experienced woman. She and Kim had been intimate for several years before I entered the picture. A lump formed in my throat. Oh, geez, did Kimmy do what Terry said she did?

  I knew how I felt in that cottage without Kim. I was so desperate one night that I took matters into my own hands, so how could I blame her for seeking physical comfort, especially from a former lover? She had no guarantee I was ever coming back alive.

  Tears dribbled down my cheeks. I sniffed and tried to swipe them away. I turned the water on full force to drown out the sound of my sobbing.

  A hot bath wouldn’t solve this problem, but I had to start somewhere. A long soak would give my mind and body time to absorb the blow, as unfair as it was, and try to decide what to do about it.

  I put a waterproof covering over my bandage, shed my robe, and lowered myself into the steaming water, tilting my head back against the tub’s cool surface.

  It took so much courage to love someone, to give your body and soul to someone, to be so vulnerable. Kim knew this. She remembered how she felt after Terry left her for someone else, and how it hurt so much to be betrayed. She’d been through it. How could she do it to me, knowing the anguish it would cause?

  I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to rid myself of the vision of Kim and Terry together.

  The more I tried, the harder it became.

  Chapter 25

  Enjoying a delicious meal with Sergeant Jones had put me in good spirits. We had shared candid thoughts on the investigation and what PJ and I needed to do to get our lives back on track. From Blodwyn’s suggestions, I gathered that life had not always been rosy for her and that some of the comments she made were from personal experience, though she didn’t go into detail.

  I took the long way back from the cafe, strolling along the cobblestone paths and enjoying the warm summer sunshine, making mental lists of future work projects and social activities.

  Now that our business here was nearly complete, I guessed we wouldn’t be seeing much more of Blodwyn. That was too bad. I’d like to count her in our circle of friends, and I’m sure that PJ would, too. Circle of friends! That was a joke. With our moving around so much, our circle was small indeed, but there was no reason it had to stay that way.

  Oh, we had our colleagues from the Superstitions, but that wasn’t the same. They were just starting out and were scattered across the globe. Our most frequent contacts with them came in the form of e-mails, postcards, and hurried phone calls. I hoped that some day we could settle at the ranch and discover the sociability there that we lacked in our present situation.

  Listen to me, talking about social interaction. Me, the consummate hermit, the loner, the lover of solitude.

  The social thing was really more important for PJ than it was for me. And Santa Fe was a lively town. PJ should thrive there. She was the extrovert in this relationship, though she had obviously brought me out of my shell - the shell that Terry clamped shut when she left so suddenly, shattering my faith in people and my ability to love. PJ, bless her heart, helped me live and love again.

  I followed the winding path along the ridge until it met the inn’s long circular drive. In a few more seconds, I was up the steps and through the heavy wooden door. The aroma of fresh baked bread welcomed me, and Arwel smiled a greeting from across the vestibule. She was busy registering a couple of guests, so I waved, crossed through the sitting room, and climbed the stairs.

  If I hadn’t been so stuffed from lunch, I might have been tempted to make a detour to the kitchen for some tea and toast. Right now, though, my interests lay with a certain blonde beauty.

  I let myself into the room quietly, thinking that PJ might be napping. I wanted so much to tell her about the meeting with the police and about my luncheon with Blodwyn, as well as a dozen other things of lesser importance. We hadn’t had much time to really catch up, and I yearned for quiet time to reconnect with my partner.

  The doctors had cautioned Frederick and me about future reactions that PJ might suffer due to the kidnapping. They suggested we find her a good therapist and attend sessions ourselves. Her father knew a specialist in trauma and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. He had already made some initial calls to set up appointments for when we returned to the Boston area. In the meantime, he and I decided to be discreet when discussing the ordeal with PJ.

  God, how I’d missed her. I needed to recharge my core and spend some overdue quality time with her. She was my tonic.

  She wasn’t in bed, so I checked the bathroom. I found her in the tub - head tilted back, eyes closed. I thought she might be asleep, so I paused for several seconds, admiring her body. She had lost some weight, and there were still ugly bruise marks along her ribs. A piece of plastic protected the bandage on her left shoulder, keeping it dry, but her breasts, only partially submerged, drew most of my attention. How I longed to put my hands on those beauties again.

  “Hi, sweet treat,” I whispered, leaning close to her head. The kiss, intended for her lips, landed off to the side when she jerked awake.

  “Jesus, you startled me,” she said when I swept some strands of damp hair from her forehead.

  “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” Her right arm moved to the wound, effectively covering her breasts. I couldn’t tell if her gesture was a response to pain or sudden shyness. “You okay? Your shoulder aching?”

  “I’m just tired, that’s all.” She sat up straighten “I’d better get out. The water has cooled.”

  She averted her eyes in what appeared to me to be a deliberate attempt to avoid mine. Something was wrong, and she wasn’t telling me what.

  I picked up her towel. “Would you like help getting dried off?”

  “I can do it myself.” She pulled the old-fashioned plug from the drain before climbing out of the tub and snatching the towel from my hands.

  “What - ” I swallowed my words, heeding the little voice that warned me that it was not a good time to confront her. “You know, I’m pretty tired myself. While you’re finishing up, I think I’ll go lie down and relax a bit.”

  “Yeah, you do that. Relax a bit,” she said, awkwardly drying herself off with one hand.

  I wanted to help, but I could tell that she would rather I didn’t. Her attitude was puzzling. It hurt me to see her acting this way, as if I were the enemy.

  I took a deep breath. Patience, I told myself. She’d been through a week of hell. It was no wonder she wasn’t herself.

  I paused in the doorway on my way to the bedroom. “You know something?”

  Her head came up and we made eye contact. “What?”

  “I love you.”

  There was a second or two of uncer
tainty in her eyes. “Yeah, that too.”

  Now, I was really concerned. Her usual response would have been that she loved me, too, or something cute and suggestive. What was going on with her?

  I was confused by her attitude and unsettled by her avoidance of the L word. PJ had never hesitated about saying she loved me, or in demonstrating how much.

  I sat on the side of the bed and removed my shoes and shirt before stretching out with my hands folded behind my head. It was just my overactive imagination. She’d be out here in a minute, ready as always for a kiss and a bit of snuggling.

  I must have fallen asleep, because when I awoke, the sunny room had turned gray. Large raindrops splattered against the glass, creating a wavy, streaming effect. PJ was sitting in the chair, in her terrycloth robe, her bare feet drawn up beneath her. She had an open book in her lap, but she didn’t appear to be reading.

  I yawned and stretched, turning onto my side with a smile. “Sweetie, come lie down beside me.”

  At first, PJ acted as though she hadn’t heard me. Then, as if in a trance, she did as I asked, stretching out on her back and staring at the ceiling.

  I put my hand on her arm, but she made no move to acknowledge me. To hell with the sensitivity stuff, I needed to get to the bottom of this.

  “I know something’s bothering you. Why don’t you want to talk about it?”

  When she turned to look at me, her eyes were red. She’d been crying.

  “Won’t you tell me, sweetheart? Is it something I’ve done?”

  “Humph!”

  “PJ, I’m worried about you.”

  “You are?”

  “Of course I am.”

  Two delicate tears trickled from the corners of her eyes. “Am I too young for you?”

  “What?”

  She sniffed. “Not experienced enough?”

  “Where the hell did that come from?” I sat up and pulled her to me. “Whatever put such a crazy idea into your head?”

  Her body stiffened, but she didn’t draw away. “You were lonely when I was gone, weren’t you?”

  “You know I was.”

  She took a long, shaky breath. “You wanted a woman to share your bed.”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “At least you’re honest enough to admit it.” PJ moved away from me, rolled off the bed, and went to the window. Even in the glass’s wavy reflection, I could see that she was trying hard not to cry.

  “Yes, I wanted a woman to share my bed.” I followed her to the window, gripped her gently by the shoulders, and turned her around. “You.”

  “Me?”

  “Of course you. Who else?”

  She paused and seemed reluctant to answer. “What about Terry?”

  “What about her? She and I were over long before I met you. You know that.”

  “That’s what you told me.” She glanced downward and took a deep breath.

  “What’s this about?” My grip on her right shoulder tightened.

  “Terry was here during this whole ordeal. I wasn’t.”

  “Yes, she was. And for the record, I didn’t call her in on the case. Your father did. She and I went to dinner together one evening after working all day to decipher your tape. I did not see her socially at any other time.”

  PJ’s sullen expression didn’t change. We stared into each other’s eyes for several long seconds.

  “You know better,” I said. “I’m surprised you’d even consider there was more to it than that.” I was angry that she would think that I had been with Terry, and especially while she was a captive and in so much danger.

  “Then why - ” She stopped and bit her lower lip.

  “Why what?”

  She tried to twist away from me. “Nothing.”

  “How can I come clean with you, if you won’t do the same?”

  “Then you admit that there is something to come clean about?” Her green eyes bored into me.

  “No, I don’t.” Where was she getting all these cockamamie ideas?

  “Come here.” I pulled her back, taking her in my arms, smelling the clean scent of her skin and kissing her tear-filled eyes. I murmured soothing words and rubbed the tip of her nose with my own until she smiled. Her body relaxed against me and her head found its familiar spot under my chin.

  I felt we were back on track, now. Whatever crisis was bothering her had passed.

  “Why don’t you get dressed?” I said softly. “And if you’re up to it, we can take a little drive. They tell me there’s a place about ten miles up the road where they have the best stewed eels.”

  “Yuck!”

  I was delighted to see a smile, however brief. “Then how about some fresh-baked trout?”

  The smile widened. “That’s more like it.”

  I gave her a final squeeze and kissed the top of her head. “Okay, you get dressed while I hop into the tub.”

  I took a quick bath, still missing the showers I was used to, and preferred. I had just wrapped myself in a towel and was coming back to the bedroom, when PJ confronted me. Her stance was belligerent, and her eyes sent spears of anger through me.

  “Only me in your bed, isn’t that what you said?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then, what the hell are these?” She threw a pair of bronze-colored briefs onto the bed.

  “They’re not mine. I don’t have any undies that color.” Come to think of it, PJ didn’t either, so who the hell did they belong to? A knot formed in my gut.

  “Pick them up. Look at them. Look at the initials.”

  What was going on here? Neither one of us had any initialed briefs.

  “What’s the matter?” PJ asked, her eyes blazing fury. “You’ve handled them before. Why would you hesitate now?”

  I reached for the briefs. On the right side of the front, in delicate gold stitching, were the initials TS. “Terry Simms.”

  “Bingo! You got it in one!”

  I turned to stare at her. “Where did you get these?”

  She tugged at the dresser drawer with her right hand. “Right here in this stupid, damn drawer.” After it failed to move more than a few inches, she slapped at it and turned back to me. “You need to smarten up and destroy the evidence before wifey finds it, don’t you think, sweetie?”

  “You think I put them there? You tell me where they came from.”

  PJ’s whole body bristled. “Don’t insult my intelligence by denying that you slept with her.”

  “But I didn’t!”

  She advanced toward me, the index finger of her right hand stabbing the air in front of my face. “You were probably so horny you had them off her before you even got to the bed. Maybe you and she were rolling around on the floor, or you were on your knees in front of her and she was up against the dresser.”

  “Shut up!” I grabbed her finger and held it still. The tone of my voice halted her tirade in mid sentence. “Terry was never in this room with me. Do you hear me? Never.” I released her finger and stood back, taking several deep breaths, my mind whirling. “Which brings me to only one conclusion.” I picked up the panties and flung them into a corner. “And that is, that you and she were here, together. That it was you and she making love. Then, too late, you found the briefs and realized they’d be a dead giveaway, so you concocted this wild story about Terry and me to cover your own guilty ass.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “What?”

  “You’ve had plenty of time alone since you were released from the hospital.”

  She was stabbing her finger at me again. “Don’t you dare turn this around on me.”

  I shook my head slowly, the knot in my gut growing tighter by the second. “It explains why you’ve been reluctant to let me touch you or make love to you. It had nothing to do with rough handling by your captors, did it? That was just an excuse. I see it all now. You were getting what you wanted from Terry.”

  “That’s the most ridiculous - ”

  “Stop it!” My head was pounding. “If you wanted o
ut of this relationship, why didn’t you just say so, instead of planning this elaborate, overly dramatic scheme?”

  “You’re crazy!” Her voice choked. She put her hand on her stomach and closed her eyes, fighting back more tears.

  I snatched a pair of cargo pants off the hanger and a Welsh, fisherman-style sweater from the drawer and dressed in a daze.

  “I’ll send for my stuff later.” I grabbed a waterproof anorak off the hook inside the door.

  “Kim, wait. I want to know why. Where are you going?”

  I slammed the door behind me, her words still echoing in my head.

  In truth, I had no idea where I was going.

  *

  I stood in the courtyard, stunned at the sudden and unexpected turn of events.

  PJ and Terry! Just the thought of them together turned my stomach. I couldn’t believe it, didn’t want to believe it, but the evidence was there - in the underwear and in her false accusations.

  It was undoubtedly Terry’s doing, but why would PJ fall for her line? I had credited her with more sense. “I guess you never know.” My words were lost in the driving rain.

  The normally picturesque village was shrouded in a gloomy pall. I walked through the pouring rain, losing track of time, oblivious to the dampness that soaked into my bones and chilled my soul. The very real possibility of hypothermia didn’t enter my mind until later. My heart was breaking; any other ailment paled in comparison.

  The huge raindrops were like tears from the sky, joining those that trailed down my cheeks.

  How could I have been so stupid… not to know, not to have guessed?

  Terry must have been with her just this morning. I was in that drawer early, when I first got up and dressed. Those briefs weren’t there then.

  I walked along the wet, deserted street, overhead lights reflecting in the slate gray pavement. With no destination in mind, I splashed through puddles I didn’t even see, my saturated clothing weighing me down.

  So, that was why she was taking such a late bath, to wash away the evidence.

  I choked on the thought. PJ and Terry.

  “No!”

  I felt sick and betrayed. The once arousing vision of PJ lying naked in the tub now disgusted me. All I could see was both of them together, all over each other, making love. The image of Terry exploring PJ’s secret places, the ones I thought she shared with me alone, left me swallowing hard, unsuccessfully fighting nausea.