by Dee Lloyd
"Don't count on it," Bart said, bending over to kiss her. "You have another relative we haven't heard from tonight."
"Oh, you don't really think Laila will be there. I got the impression from something she said that she and Raoul have been in the library these last couple of nights."
"We can hope they go there tonight."
All was silent when they entered the suite. It wasn't until they were passing by the dining room that they heard the first loud bang. Bart pushed her to the floor and threw himself on top of her as he drew his gun.
Kit began to laugh as the little explosive sounds came in rapid succession. "It's all right. It's only Raoul."
If the entertainer were not dead, Bart would cheerfully kill him for frightening him tonight. He sat up with Kit in his arms and looked at the black-clad figure with the dazzling smile who was standing on the dining room table. Even pale and semi-transparent, he could see why the Sepannen sisters had fallen for him. Dead, he exuded charisma; alive, he must have been dynamite.
"I'm sorry to startle you, Minou," the apparition said. "But I've always wanted to dance on a table and this might be my last chance."
"Feel free," Kit said. "But don't use up all your energy before you say what you want to say this time."
"Ah, but with you and your young man here together, I have all the energy in the world!" He spun into a quick few steps of a dance that sent staccato reports echoing through the room. "Ah, wonderful." He sighed and stepped down off the table with a pale hand outstretched.
"I've been aware of his presence but I have not met Bart. And I want to thank him."
Bart took his hand and from the startled expression on his face, Kit could see he had felt nothing at all from Raoul's touch.
"I used to have a pretty good handshake, Bart," Raoul said with a wry smile. "Now it's an empty gesture. The thanks, however, are sincere."
"Yes." Laila materialized at Raoul's side. "Soon our long separation will be over."
"I can't read minds," Raoul said with a smile, "but I can see that you two want to be alone. Laila and I will retire to the library. Good night but not good-bye. I suspect we will meet again. And, my sweet little Minou, be careful. Stay close to your brave man. The danger did not end with Elsa's death."
"I wish I knew how to help you, sweetie," Laila said, blowing her a kiss. "But I don't seem to have retained any practical talents." She brushed a true air kiss on Bart's cheek before she and Raoul faded from sight.
"Yes, we really are leaving." Laila's sensuous chuckle filled the air. "We'd rather play than watch. Have fun, children."
"I can't think of anything more effective to cool the libido than having the ghost of your woman's mother tell you to have fun!" Bart drawled. He swept her into his arms but his laugh was a little shaky.
"Let's see what I can do to heat it up again." Kit plunged her hands into his hair and lowered his head so that she could kiss him. His tongue tangled with hers and all of a sudden she was no longer tired. The electricity that they always generated started her blood pounding in her veins.
"Let's get out of the dining room," he mumbled against her mouth.
Without breaking the kiss, she started to lead him toward the second bedroom, her fingers swiftly working at the buttons of her silk blouse as she went. When he realized where they were headed, he stopped kissing her long enough to ask,
"Do we get to sleep in the red satin bordello? Now there's a challenge."
"I'm sure you're up to it." Kit grinned at him, whipped off her blouse and tossed it on the floor. "Race you. First one to hit the red bed naked gets to be on top."
It was close race but Bart got there first. She landed on top of him.
"Hey, Brat. No fair. I won. Get your luscious body off me, woman." He gave a low chuckle. "Did I say that?"
"Bet you can't make me," she said, nibbling and licking the sensitive spot behind his ear.
He emitted a very satisfying rumble of pleasure. This was going to be fun!
"Oh, I'll bet I can, sweetheart," he said, running his hands slowly down her back until his fingers curved around her bottom. "In a little while."
She stuck her tongue in his ear. His whole body jerked.
"Maybe I will let you play for a while," he said as if it was a big concession.
Their play was unrestrained and full of laughter. Bart's responsiveness made her even hotter for him. And when he claimed his winner's prize, their coming together couldn't have been more perfect.
"I'd say we met the challenge of the scarlet satin," Kit murmured sleepily against his chest as they lay entwined and completely relaxed.
"Ummhmm," Bart agreed and pulled the satin covered duvet over them. Then with Kit snuggled in his arms, he dropped off to sleep.
* * *
When Kit awoke the next morning the suite was empty. There was, however, hot coffee in the coffee maker and a note propped against an empty coffee mug.
I hated to leave without waking you, but I thought you'd appreciate the rest. I'm meeting Mike downstairs in Johanna's office.
See you there.
Love, Bart
P.S. I have never enjoyed a challenge more. You are unique, sweetheart.
Well, he hadn't said he'd love her forever but he had signed it "love".
When Kit looked into the office, she saw that Sergeant Jacobec had arrived and was sitting at Johanna's desk engrossed in reading Elsa's diaries. Bart met her at the door.
"I'm not needed here right now," he said, guiding her toward a sofa in the lobby. "How did you sleep?" His tender smile made her feel as if she had never left his arms.
"Do you have to ask?" She was sure her smile was truly sappy.
"Mike and I have made our statements about finding the diaries. Needless to say, I didn't mention Laila's input. We stretched the truth a bit and said Johanna suggested Elsa could have left family papers under the tiles."
"Are they going to investigate at the sawmill?"
"Grace dispatched some men with shovels as soon as she read the entries about Raoul's shooting. I suspect it won't take long to find the trunk. Elsa was pretty precise in her description of where she buried it."
"I want to check the answering machine at the cabin," Kit told him.
"Good. Let's get over there. I need to see if Bret has got back to me about a couple of things."
The interior of their cabin with its casual furniture looked comfortable and welcoming after the sensuous elegance of the tower suite.
"I'll download my email while you retrieve the phone messages, Kit." She pushed the play button and made a mental note to get a second phone line installed for as long as they were there.
Most of the messages on her machine were hangups but there was a demand from Bret to call him immediately and one from Helen Dagwood. The canned voice announced Helen's call had been made at nine o'clock last night, shortly after the phone lines had been reactivated.
"Kit, I've been so worried." Helen's usually calm voice sounded agitated. "Elizabeth called and told me your aunt had been murdered and that attempts had been made on your life. I've been calling and calling. What's going on up there?" There was a pause then she added, "We'll be at sea so I'll be out of touch most of the day tomorrow. But we'll be in port tomorrow night. I'll call again at eight P.M., Eastern Daylight time. If you get this, please be there at eight."
"Bart," Kit called, "listen to this."
Bart got up from his computer and took the receiver from her. "So Elizabeth is in the area," he said when he handed it back.
Finally, they were getting somewhere. Helen would have a location and a phone number for the mysterious Elizabeth. Kit didn't know how she was going to last until tonight for Helen's call.
"Bret wants you to call," she told him.
"I think I know what that's about. He sent me a couple of emails. He thinks he may be on to something. Tell me, what do you recall about a grant to a Dr. Gunther Roth?"
"Surely Bret doesn't think Dr. Roth is behin
d the attacks," she exclaimed. "He has to be wrong. Dr. Roth is a quiet scholarly scientist. I can't imagine him dealing with a killer."
"Tell me about the grant, Kit."
"I hated to do it but I cast the deciding vote when the funding committee decided not to renew his cancer research grant."
"You must have had a good reason."
"I didn't like the direction his genetic restructuring research was taking. He and his team were getting into a couple of series of experiments that seemed to be leading to iffy human cloning issues. He sincerely believed that what he was doing was morally acceptable. I didn't."
"That certainly could give him a motive, Kit. If you were gone, would he have another chance at the funding?"
"Possibly. He has some supporters on the committee. He would have to make some major changes in his proposal, though, to get another vote." She could see Gunther Roth's thin earnest face as he tried to convince her his research had to do with science, not morality. No. He was a coldly logical, not violent, man. "Besides, he wouldn't have the contacts to hire a killer."
"Possibly not," Bart said as he dialed his brother's number.
After he had vigorously denied avoiding all communication and explained about the storm taking out the power and phone lines, Bart didn't say much.
Kit wandered into the living room and opened the folder with the golf course sketches Joel had dropped off at the lodge yesterday. They were surprisingly professional. She wondered who else was involved in the golf course proposal. At least, if Joel was working with someone else, that meant another person who had no motive to kill her.
Thinking this way was bizarre. She was behaving like the type of apprehensive, timid woman she most disliked.
"Bret has really been digging. He discovered Gordon Timbrill's wife loves the race track. He also discovered that Gordon hasn't the slightest difficulty covering her losses. He even complimented Bret on being so thorough and showed him his yearly household budget. Can you believe he has set aside a yearly allotment for her gambling?"
"That doesn't surprise me," Kit said with a fond chuckle. "Gordon is a terrific administrator. If he finds a situation he'd rather not change, he very capably accommodates it."
"The Gunther Roth investigation is not as reassuring. It seems he made a number of vague threats of the 'I'd like to kill that woman' variety when you pulled the funding. And co-workers admit he said he wished the hit-and-run had been successful. With you gone, he thinks his life would be back on track."
"That doesn't mean he'd take action to get rid of me. I can't see him plotting to take anybody's life. Besides, Laila told us the attacks originated here."
"Laila also admitted she didn't know anything that would help you find the killer."
She had to admit he was right. "True. Relying too much on Laila's statements could be a bad idea."
The next phone call was from Johanna.
"Kit," she began with no preamble, "the only times the minister could be here for Elsa's interment are this afternoon at four or Friday morning. I told him tentatively that four o'clock today was fine. Paavo and Betsy can be there. Can you?"
"Of course we can," Kit told her. They agreed to take separate cars and meet at the cemetery.
If they did it today, possibly they would get the ceremony over with before the media circus about Laila and Raoul's murders began. She shuddered at the thought of what the tabloids would make of this. Laila had been the darling of international tabloids. She could imagine today's headlines: TRAGIC LOVE TRIANGLE #2! or LUSCIOUS LAILA MURDERED BY JEALOUS SISTER! and worst of all variations on the theme of BILLION DOLLAR KITTEN DISCOVERS MOM'S MURDER! No one around here would ever look at her the same again. The peace and quiet of Spirit Lake would be a thing of the past for her.
She needn't have worried. There was no press at the cemetery when they arrived. In fact, the only other mourners there were Betsy and Joel. And Betsy was again too tranquilized for any kind of conversation. The graveside ceremony itself was mercifully brief. Once the minister had prayed over the little urn and blessed the ground, Elsa's ashes were buried in the Seppanen family plot.
Afterward, when Kit wanted to see her mother's grave, Johanna led them to a plot in a newer part of the cemetery. Laila's grave was marked by an elaborate stone angel. She and Bart exchanged a wryly amused look. It was easily the largest headstone in the cemetery.
"I guess I didn't get the significance of Laila's grave being in another section at the time," Kit said to Johanna. "She really was ostricized by the family, wasn't she?"
"Jacob was a good man," her grandmother said with a sigh, "but a hard and stubborn one. When he disowned Laila, he took her name off the deed to the plot. Even after she came up here and bought the lodge for us, he refused to acknowledge her as his daughter. To Jacob, changing your mind was an admission of weakness."
"That can't have been easy for Laila." Or Johanna either, Kit thought. "But there's one good thing about having her own grave," Bart said thoughtfully.
Kit looked at him quizzically.
"When they bury Raoul's bones beside her, they won't be sharing a grave with Elsa."
"Wouldn't that have been ironic!" Kit smiled slowly. "But now they'll soon both be at peace."
"We sincerely hope!" Johanna said fervently.
When they arrived at the lodge, Mike was waiting outside. Bart rolled down his window.
"I talked to Grace Jacobec on the cell phone on the way over," Mike reported. "She tells me they found the trunk with Raoul's remains. Even found the diamond ring in the duffel bag."
"That's a relief. Now we can finally get the guy buried."
"Johanna was glad to get that episode resolved at last."
"Aren't we all?" Bart thanked him and slowly drove down to park behind the cabin.
"I guess that means we won't be seeing the ghosts again." Kit was surprised to find herself almost sad at the prospect.
"If they go," he said getting out of the car and looking carefully around before heading up the walk.
"You can't think they'll hang around!" Kit hurried after him. Then a thought struck her. "Actually, I'm not sure why Laila was here at all. Raoul could have told us most of what we learned from her."
He punched in the security codes and opened the door. "Maybe we shouldn't look for logic here, sweetheart."
Nevertheless, she couldn't help wondering if she'd seen the last of the lusty spirits.
Bart announced that he was going to see what he could discover about Elizabeth Anne and disappeared into the computer room. Kit read for a while, stared out the window at the lake for a bit and wished she could go for a run. She was not used to doing nothing.
It was after seven o'clock before she convinced Bart that he could break from his searches long enough to have some soup and a sandwich.
"Nothing much to report," he said, stretching and rubbing his eyes. "I hope your friend Helen has something to tell you. All I learned is Elizabeth Anne has never worked or had a driver's license in the United States. She has in Canada, but hasn't had one motor vehicle violation--not even a parking ticket that I can find. No arrests. I have to see if Mike can get me access to her tax information to see where she's employed. All I have is a mention of 'service industries' on one form."
"Come." He wriggled his fingers at her in a "gimmie, gimmie" gesture like a greedy child and flashed his devilish grin. "Give me a kiss to cheer me up."
The man was pure golden temptation. And, at least for now, he was hers. She threw herself into his arms so enthusiastically that he staggered and rocked back on his heels. "Now, that's cheerful," he said, smoothly settling himself on the nearest chair and lifting her onto his lap.
His long thorough kiss banished all dismal thoughts of cemeteries and long-dead bodies from her mind. His arms around her were strong and possessive, his thighs were hard under hers. His unique taste was exciting and addictive. She wanted to go on kissing him forever.
Eventually, the kiss ended and he held he
r tightly for a long moment.
"Umm, nice," she murmured, resting her cheek on his chest. If she could have purred, she would have.
"More than nice," he said seriously. "I needed that. Sometimes, the need to kiss you is like the need to breathe. It's just got to happen." He released her, swatted her bottom lightly and stood up. He laughed and caught her just before she landed on the floor. "But you were going to feed me, weren't you, woman?"
"Right now, I'm not sure you deserve it," she said over her shoulder as she flounced into the kitchen.
They pushed serious topics to the backs of their minds while they ate. She asked about his father and about Bret and Millie. He suggested they might possibly get a larger sailboat and motor it down the river to Lake of Bays and sail it there. She was still stunned by the thought that he even considered staying here long enough to invest in a boat when the phone rang.
Bart checked his watch. "Right on eight."
"Kit, I've been so worried. How are you?" Helen's voice was as clear as if she were in the next room. "Lizzie called and told me your aunt had been killed. She was so upset I could hardly understand her. What's happening up there?"
Kit explained as clearly as she could about the shooting attempt in Toronto and Elsa being shot. Then she asked who Lizzie was.
"Well, Elizabeth Anne, of course. Isn't she working with you?"
Kit motioned Bret to get on the bedroom extension. "You mean Betsy?" she asked.
"That's what her husband calls her. She hasn't been making a nuisance of herself, has she?"
"No," Kit said cautiously. "Why do you ask?
"She hasn't mentioned her wild idea that she's related to you?"
"Could she be?"
"I didn't think so, but it's vaguely possible. Just before she died last year, Mom confessed to Lizzie that she did know something about Lizzie's birth mother. She'd even met her once. Mom said she was beautiful, blonde and from somewhere in Muskoka. That was all she knew. Except that her first name was Laila. Lizzie was determined to find out more and when she discovered that Laila Schofield was from some place in Muskoka, she leapt to the conclusion she was Laila's daughter and that you two were related."