Amanda

by Kay Hooper

  “I’d rather tell him myself,” she said. “Explain about the fake background, I mean. But … I’d rather wait awhile.”

  “Until you remember?” He smiled again when she gave him a startled look. “Yes, I know you don’t buy my nice, logical theories about what may have happened twenty years ago. Well … I’m not so sure I do, either. In any case, giving you time to try to remember makes sense.”

  “And in the meantime?”

  “In the meantime, we have this comfortable, private office all to ourselves. You may have noticed I gave my secretary the afternoon off, and forwarded all calls to my answering machine at home.”

  “I wondered why the phone hadn’t rung,” she murmured.

  “That’s why. Because I’m a man who plans ahead.”

  Amanda eyed him consideringly. “If you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking—how could you possibly know our little confrontation today would end on a positive note? I was going to leave, you know. I was going to walk out of here.”

  “No, you weren’t.”

  “I wasn’t?”

  “No.” His free hand began toying with the buttons on her blouse.

  “you’re very sure of yourself,” she noted somewhat resentfully.

  He leaned over and kissed her, taking his time about it, then smiled at her. “What I’m sure of is a whisper I heard in the night.”

  Amanda would have liked to have been able to stare him defiantly in the eye and ask what the hell he was talking about. Unfortunately, she knew her voice would betray her, just as her body was betraying her. She watched his nimble fingers cope with buttons, and caught her breath when they slid inside her blouse to touch her sensitive skin.

  His green eyes were gleaming at her. Probably with male triumph.

  “I did hear that whisper, didn’t I, Amanda?” His lips feathered kisses over her cheek and down her throat.

  “I don’t remember any whisper,” she managed.

  “Don’t you?” He unfastened the front clasp of her bra and pressed his lips to her breastbone.

  “Well … maybe I do.” She conjured a glare when he raised his head. “Are you going to seduce me right here under your father’s picture?”

  “I thought I would.”

  She blinked and lost the glare. “Oh.”

  “Tell me you love me, Amanda.”

  “you’re not being fair.”

  “I know.” He lowered his head again, and pushed aside the lacy cup of her bra so that his mouth could brush the straining tip of her breast. “But tell me anyway.”

  Amanda slid her fingers into his hair. “Bastard. I love you.”

  She caught the flash of a green glance and thought dazedly that there was definite male triumph there. So at least it mattered to him. …

  It was nearly suppertime when Walker finally took her back to Glory, so of course he stayed for the meal. He might have stayed all night, except that Amanda gathered the scraps of her dignity about her and refused to ask him.

  It rained all night.

  It also rained all day Tuesday, and the weather forecasts were filled with warnings of the flash flooding possible in mountain streams. Walker called that evening to tell Amanda that the stream beside their gazebo was so swollen it was threatening to wash away the footbridge and that the path would be ankle-deep in mud for days if this kept up. He could always drive over, though, he said, if she felt like having company.

  Still annoyed with him, Amanda retorted that it was a lousy night to go anywhere and she thought she’d curl up with a good book.

  It rained all night.

  Though Reece could get away to his office and Sully went to the stables rain or shine, Jesse, Amanda, Kate, and Maggie had more or less been stuck in the house, and all had been showing signs of cabin fever. By the time the sun made a tentative appearance on Wednesday morning, everyone was so delighted that they practically tumbled out of the house like children freed from the prison of school.

  Kate bolted for the stables and Ben; Maggie coaxed Jesse out to walk in the garden; and Amanda briefly tried the path to King High before being forced to admit that Walker had been right—it was ankle-deep in mud. And he wasn’t home anyway. So she contented herself with walking around the vast yard, breathing in the rain-washed air and stretching her legs.

  The day teased them, sunlight disappearing from time to time behind angry clouds, and two brief showers driving them back inside the house, but by afternoon it seemed the worst was over.

  “Afraid not,” Kate said when Amanda offered that hopeful statement. “I just heard the weather forecast; we’re expecting a hell of a storm late tonight.”

  Amanda groaned. “Whatever happened to the sunny South? Much more of this and We’ll have to build an ark.”

  “No kidding. And Sully says at least two of the streams nearby have changed course, so We’ve already got flooding problems on some of the trails. It’s a mess.”

  It was indeed.

  Amanda wandered the house restlessly during the second of the two brief showers, then finally broke down and called Walker about midafternoon. And at least he didn’t crow—though he did chuckle—when he said he could cut his workday short around four and come over if she liked.

  With time to kill and fair weather threatened, she decided to go for a walk, this time in the garden. Everyone seemed to have vanished from the house, but she found Jesse just coming out of his study when she passed by.

  “Walker’s coming over later,” she told him.

  “Is he?” Jesse looked at her oddly, then surprised her by lifting a big, weathered hand to touch her cheek very lightly. “I’m very glad you’re here, honey. You know that, don’t you?”

  She nodded. “You’ve … made me feel very welcome here.” It was a lie, but Amanda told it without flinching.

  A smile softened his harsh face. “Good. That’s good.”

  There was something almost fierce in his tarnished-silver eyes, and he made her a little uncomfortable because she didn’t understand it. As smoothly as possible, she eased away from him and continued down the hallway, saying over her shoulder, “I want to catch some of this sunshine before it goes away again.”

  “Good idea,” he called after her.

  Amanda walked in the garden lazily, following the gravelled paths that were still neat despite pouring rain. Some of the June flowers were rather beaten down, their petals scattered over the grass, but all in all it seemed the garden was surviving nature’s onslaught courageously.

  She hadn’t intended to go anywhere else, but Amanda could have sworn she heard a dog barking, and that drew her out one of the side paths to stand at the northwest corner of the garden. She stood listening intently, silently cursing a bird chirping merrily in a nearby tree. Had she been mistaken? Yes—

  No. She heard it again, faint and distant but quite definitely a dog barking. Without even thinking about it, Amanda set off, hurrying across the lawn toward the northwest mountain.

  If she had stopped and thought about it, Amanda probably would have waited for Walker; paranoid or not, she had stuck close to the house when she was alone—and she had caught herself being ridiculously careful on the stairs as well. But she didn’t think about anything except the possibility of finding the dogs after all this time.

  Amanda went some distance before pausing to get another navigational fix; she shouted the dogs’ names, and listened until she heard the barks, still faint. She changed course slightly and went over a rise to find a creek where one hadn’t been only days before. She picked her way across and climbed again, heading away from the noise of the water.

  At the top of another rise, she shouted their names again, and this time frowned when she realized the responding sounds were still distant. Surely she’d closed at least some of the distance by now? But the barks were … oddly unexpressive, now that she thought about it. Flat, mechanical—not at all like two eager dogs hearing a human voice they were rather fond of. Not that she’d ever heard the Dober
mans bark, but still …

  A chill feathered up her spine, and Amanda looked around to realize she had gotten a long way from any recognizable path. Don’t panic! Turn around and retrace your footsteps—with all this mud you must be able to see them. …

  She found her footprints easily enough, but relief vanished when she became convinced someone was following her. She stopped twice, staring around her, but the trees in this part of the forest grew densely and little sunlight could penetrate even on bright days. Everything was dark and dripping, curiously alien, and Amanda thought she could hear her own heart pounding.

  Beginning to panic, she slipped and slid down a slope, grabbing at saplings to keep her balance, and making so much noise that anyone following her must have known she was aware and trying to get away. The ground was impossibly muddy underfoot, slippery one minute and clinging thickly to her shoes the next, and Amanda was sure her breathing sounded as loud as the wind.

  She might not have looked back that last time, except that her foot slipped and she was neatly spun around when she grabbed a supple little oak for balance. That was when she saw him. He was coming toward her, face grim … and he had a rifle in his hands.

  It happened so fast that it was like a blur. Amanda heard a strangled sound that seemed to come from her own tight throat, and she tried desperately to use the sapling to propel herself forward, away from Sully. But she lost her balance and fell, slithering over last year’s slimy leaves into some kind of a ditch that smelled foul.

  A drainage ditch, she thought dimly, or what had been a creek. Then she looked down at the hard ring of rock surrounding her fingers—and screamed.

  Half buried in oozing mud, a human skull grinned up at her.

  “I’LL SAY IT ONE MORE TIME.” SULLY’S voice was bleak. “I went into the woods because I thought I heard a dog barking, and I had my rifle because I’d planned to set up some targets out by the garden. I saw Amanda tearing through the woods like a bat out of hell, and I went after her. I didn’t mean to scare her. Yes, I should have called out something, but I didn’t think.” His frown deepened. “You want to take a poke at me, Walker—go ahead. Take your best shot.”

  “Don’t tempt me,” Walker snapped.

  “Who found the bones?” Sheriff Hamilton wanted to know, making notes.

  “She did.” Sully laughed shortly. “The hard way. That’s why she fainted. Bit of a shock, I’d say, finding your fingers in what used to be somebody’s mouth.”

  As if the remark triggered something, the sheriff licked the end of his pencil. “And you carried her into the house, Sully?”

  “Yeah. She’s upstairs with Kate now, getting cleaned up. That skeleton was stuck in about six inches of mud, and she had it all over her.” He looked down at himself. “Which is why it’s now all over me.”

  “Suits you,” a new voice remarked.

  All three men turned their heads to see a slender redhead watching them from a distance of about four feet. Hands in the back pockets of her jeans, she stood negligently and wore a little smile.

  “In fact,” she said to Sully, “you should always wear mud.”

  Nobody had the nerve to ask what she meant by that.

  “What are you doing up here?” Sully asked instead.

  Amused, Leslie Kidd said, “If you’d care to beat the bushes, you’ll find most of the riders scattered about. It’s not every day somebody finds a human skeleton in the woods; we’re curious. I’m more curious than most, which is why I’m braver.”

  “Braver?” the sheriff asked confusedly.

  “Standing out in the open rather than hiding in bushes,” she explained solemnly. “Sticking out my neck and risking getting my head lopped off. Sully does that, you know. He’s worse than the Red Queen.”

  Sheriff Hamilton did not appear to find this explanation at all helpful, and eyed her uneasily.

  With a grunt that might have been a sound of amusement, Sully introduced her to the sheriff and Walker, neither of whom had met her formally. Then, barely giving them time to make polite noises, he said, “Who’s riding?”

  “Nobody.” Her melting brown eyes widened at him in an exaggerated expression of awe. “My idea. Aren’t I brave?”

  “You told the others they could quit for the day?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  Sully, who had been known to raise hell and rain brimstone on anyone who usurped his authority in even a trivial way, said mildly, “You should have asked me first, Leslie.”

  She nodded gravely. “Next time, I will.”

  Before anything else could be said, Helen came out of the woods and crossed the lawn to where they were standing near one of the big magnolia trees that flanked the house. She wore thick rubber boots caked with mud and carried rubber gloves in one hand, and she looked a bit tired.

  “Where’s Jesse?” she asked.

  “Inside,” the sheriff told her. “But report to me first, if you don’t mind, Doc.”

  “I was going to. You’ve got a skeleton uncovered by a flash flood, J.T.,” Helen reported flatly. “There isn’t much I can tell you as long as the bones are in the ground like that. When can I have them?”

  Hamilton shook his head doubtfully. “I called up to Asheville and asked for a forensics team to be sent down, Doc; they don’t want anything moved till they get here—probably tomorrow.”

  “Why the hell did you do that?” Sully demanded.

  Aggrieved, the sheriff said, “Because I’m supposed to when unidentified bodies are found, dammit. With all these serial killers and whatnot around, you never know when some bone a dog dug up’ll turn out to be Charlie Manson’s third-grade teacher or Ted Bundy’s left toe!”

  Sully scowled at him for a moment, but then caught the glinting amusement in Leslie’s eyes and found himself trying not to laugh. “All right, I just asked,” he muttered.

  Sheriff Hamilton straightened his fedora and settled his shoulders. “You were saying, Doc?”

  Helen, who had waited patiently through this, said, “All I can tell you is that We’ve got the bones of a man, probably in his twenties or thirties when he died, and that it could have happened ten years ago—or forty. Your forensics specialists will be able to tell you a lot more.”

  “Was he murdered?” Walker asked abruptly.

  Helen pursed her lips. “If I had to guess … I’d say he could have been. Lot of bones broken at the time of death, especially in the upper body, and I found a depression in the skull I doubt was postmortem.”

  “He could have fallen,” the sheriff objected in the tone of a man cherishing hopes.

  “Of course he could have. Could have buried himself, too. You’ll have the paperwork from my so-called examination tomorrow, J.T.” Helen nodded at them briskly, then headed off toward the house, presumably to report to Jesse.

  “She doesn’t think he fell,” Hamilton said, more or less to himself. He sighed. “Well, I’d better go make sure my boys have that tarp rigged over the bones. Sully, I’m going to post a man up in the woods to watch it till that forensics team gets here. Tell Jesse, will you?”

  “Yeah.”

  When the sheriff had trudged off, Walker said, “You heard a dog barking?”

  “Thought I did.” Sully met Walker’s gaze.

  “But you didn’t see a dog?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe you should look up there again, Sully.”

  “Maybe you should—” Sully began in a grim voice, only to be interrupted by Leslie’s gentle one.

  “Maybe a bunch of us should. I’ll volunteer, Sully. We can form search teams again, this time concentrating on the area where you heard the barking.”

  For a moment, it seemed that Sully preferred to remain there and come to blows with Walker. He looked like a man who would have found a good fight to be a handy release valve. But, finally, he turned away from the lawyer and started toward the edge of the yard, slowing his customary headlong rush because Leslie Kidd habitually strolled.

&nbs
p; Watching the turbulent Sully match his pace to hers as if by instinct, Walker had a sudden realization.

  “I’ll be damned,” he muttered.

  “I’m all right,” Amanda said.

  She wasn’t, Walker thought, but she was better than she had been. Shock lingered in her haunting eyes, but her face was no longer colorless and her voice was steady.

  Jesse said, “I know it was an awful thing for you to find, honey, but try to forget about it.”

  “I will.”

  She wouldn’t, Walker knew, but before he could comment, Kate was asking a bewildered question.

  “A body buried on Glory? Who could it be?”

  “In the past forty years,” Walker said, “how many people have passed through here? How many workers have quit or been fired, or just failed to show up one day? It must be hundreds.”

  “Any hope of identifying the body—I mean, the bones?” Reece asked of the room at large.

  Walker shrugged. “Forensic science is incredibly sophisticated, but it all depends on whether there was a missing-persons report filed. If not, if he was somebody who just wasn’t missed, then there probably won’t be medical or dental records on file anywhere for comparison.”

  “we’re upsetting Amanda,” Jesse said.

  “No,” she said, “I’m fine.”

  She was sitting at one end of one of the sofas, looking curiously isolated even though Kate was sitting beside her. The mud of her fall had been showered away hours ago; as usual, she looked cool and neat, dressed now in white jeans and a pale blue polo shirt.

  It was almost nine o’clock and not quite dark outside. A lone deputy sat miserably up in the woods by a tarp-covered patch of muddy ground, everyone else having been chased away by a brief thundershower an hour or so ago. The search teams had mostly given up and gone home, though Sully had not yet come in.

  The other Daultons—plus Walker and Ben—were in the front parlor, where everyone had gravitated after a rather grim evening meal no one had done justice to. And though it was obvious curiosity about the skeleton was strong, it was also clear that everyone was choosing their words with care.

  Amanda had been very quiet.