He pushed the thoughts aside and opened the door, flicking on the light as he stepped into the room.
A suitcase lay on the floor, clothes dumped beside it. The mattress had been tossed from the bed, sheets and pillows thrown into a pile. Balmy air billowed in from the open sliding glass door, dark shadows undulating on the balcony behind it.
An escape route for the intruder? Or a hiding place?
He wasn’t going to investigate. Not with Natalie stepping into the room behind him.
“What—” she started, but he grabbed her arm, tugging her back over the threshold and into the hall. The room was silent and still—no sign of an intruder lying in wait. He eyed the closed closet door and the one that opened into the bathroom, then fixed his attention back on the balcony. The perp had entered that way. Or he’d entered through the door and left that way. If he’d left. Luke reached into the room and flicked off the light, watching the shadows play on the balcony curtains.
“Do you—”
“Shhhhh,” he whispered in Natalie’s ear.
She stilled, and he knew she was watching the curtains, knew she was seeing what he did—a subtle shift in the shadows that seemed out of sync with the fluttering fabric.
A person? Or just the exterior lights playing tricks on his eyes? There. Gone. There again. He thought he heard a soft thud, a quiet rustle of fabric. Then the wind shifted, the curtains fell back into place and the balcony went still and silent once again.
Copyright © 2019 by Sara K. Parker
ISBN-13: 9781488040313
Innocent Target
Copyright © 2019 by Elisabeth Rees
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