Haunting Rachel

by Kay Hooper

  She looked down at his hand and, almost absently, said, “It’s taken months to sort out Dad’s business affairs at the bank. Sorting out his personal affairs could take just as long.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “You know, you don’t have to feel obligated to do this. To watch over me. No matter what Dad did for you, he wouldn’t expect—”

  “Rachel.”

  She looked up and met his gaze. That was very different from Thomas, that gaze. The color of his eyes, their intensity. There was something in them that made her breath catch in the back of her throat.

  His fingers tightened around hers. “Tell me not to say it. Tell me you’re not ready to hear it.”

  Nobody had ever looked at her like that before. Not even Thomas. For just an instant, she hesitated, almost not breathing. But then she leaned back in her chair and very gently pulled her hand from his grasp. Her heart was pounding, and she didn’t know if it was excitement or terror. “I’m not ready. Adam, we barely know each other—”

  “I know all I need to know.” But he was smiling faintly, that naked look in his eyes gone now. Or hidden. “But I also know you need time.”

  “Yes. It’s an understatement to say there’s a lot going on in my life right now. The timing is—”

  “Lousy. Yeah, I know. Rachel, listen to me. I won’t push. I learned a long time ago how to be patient. And I am not going to let anything happen to you. All right?”

  She nodded slowly, conscious that her heart was still thudding against her ribs, that it was still difficult to catch her breath. “All right.”

  “Good. Now—why don’t I get out of here and leave you alone. We need to start asking those questions.”

  “Right,” she murmured. “Questions.”

  “Did I tell anyone about your plans to open a boutique?” Graham raised a surprised brow. “Until I heard about the explosion, I hadn’t even been aware that you were serious enough about the idea to be looking at property. Why would I have told anyone?”

  “It was just a question, Graham.” She kept her voice casual, but gazed steadily across the desk at him. For this, she had wanted to be face-to-face, and so had driven into town after Adam had left. Graham was always in his office on Saturday afternoons. “Somebody called the real estate office just after I left there yesterday morning, looking for me. Somebody who knew I was thinking of opening a boutique. So I just wondered if you’d told anyone.”

  “No.”

  “And you weren’t looking for me yourself?” She knew he hadn’t been but asked anyway.

  “No. I think I would have mentioned it when we talked after the explosion. Of course, since you hung up on me—”

  “I didn’t do that.”

  “As good as. I tried to call you around lunchtime. Fiona said you were shut up in Duncan’s library with Adam Delafield.”

  Rachel had let the housekeeper take that call when the phone had rung partway through their meal. She had still been too upset to talk to anyone, and knew Fiona would have told her if the call had been important. Unfortunately, Fiona had always had a soft spot for Graham and was, Rachel sometimes thought, a tad too willing to tell him everything that went on in the Grant household.

  “We had lunch.”

  “It obviously wouldn’t do me any good to ask you again to stay away from him until I get the background information on him.”

  “That wasn’t a question. But the answer is no.”

  Graham scowled. “I don’t trust him, Rachel.”

  “You’ve said that before. But, so far, you haven’t shown me any reason not to trust him.” She kept her voice quiet and even, knowing that Graham’s concern was sincere. “Graham, he probably saved my life. Dad trusted him enough to lend him three million dollars on a handshake—”

  “Or so he says.”

  “And I like him,” she finished defiantly.

  Graham’s face closed down into its lawyerly expression of detachment. “Which, of course, has nothing to do with the fact that he could be Thomas Sheridan’s twin.”

  That wasn’t something Rachel wanted to hear, but she managed to meet his eyes steadily. “I don’t know if it does or not. But I’d like the chance to find out.”

  “And the fact that during the week after he appeared in your life you had two rather violent close calls doesn’t bother you?”

  “Of course it bothers me.” Rachel kept her voice matter-of-fact, reluctant to encourage Graham in any way to overreact. “In fact, it should relieve you to know that Adam is just as concerned. He thinks Dad may have made an enemy who has some reason to want me out of the way.”

  Clearly hesitant to agree with Adam, Graham said, “Rich men do make enemies. But even if that were true, I can’t imagine why it would carry over to you.”

  “I can’t either.” Rachel frowned. “Unless it has something to do with the bank. I haven’t decided what to do about my shares yet. Maybe somebody’s trying to … encourage me to sell out.”

  “You suspect Nick Ross?”

  Rachel barely hesitated before shaking her head. “Not really. He has enough control at the bank to do virtually whatever he wants, with or without my shares. I’ve told him I won’t interfere, and I meant it. I think he knows that. As a matter of fact, he told me that if I intended to keep my shares, he’d advise me to hire Mercy to manage them for me.”

  “I don’t see who else would benefit if you gave up your shares.”

  “Graham, it’s just a possibility. That’s all I have right now, possibilities. I can’t be sure of anything. I don’t know, for a fact, that either of those two … violent close calls were specifically intended to injure me. The brake line could have failed by accident, and the arson of that building could have been completely random. I just don’t know.”

  “You know enough to be careful.”

  “That’s more or less what Adam said.”

  Again Graham didn’t appear thrilled to be in agreement with Adam. “It’s common sense, Rachel. You shouldn’t even have driven into town alone today. And where’s your car parked? In the secure lot, or—”

  “Out front,” she murmured.

  Graham picked up his phone and called a cab. “Leave the keys to the lease here. I’ll get another car sent out to you. And when I do, promise me you won’t leave it in any unsecured area.”

  Rachel pushed the car keys across the desk to him. “All right.”

  “Will you also promise me you’ll try to stick close to home for a while? Until we know more?”

  She avoided the promise by saying, “What do you expect to know? More about Adam’s background?”

  “Among other things.”

  “What other things?”

  “I intend to go through my copies of Duncan’s business papers. Contracts and the like.”

  “You’ve been all through those to settle the estate.”

  “Yes, but I wasn’t looking for any reason someone might want you out of the way. This time I will.”

  Rachel nodded and stood up. “Okay. You do that. I’m due to sign a lease on the store on Queen Street Monday.”

  “Bring it to me before you sign.”

  She grimaced slightly, but nodded again. “In the meantime, I’m going to start going through Dad’s personal papers. Maybe I’ll turn up something.”

  “Just be careful, Rachel, all right?”

  “You bet.”

  When he was alone again, Graham sat for a long time in his silent office, gazing at nothing. Then he reached for his phone.

  When the car pulled over to the curb, Adam moved out of the shadows and got into the passenger side.

  “Did we have to meet so late?” the driver complained. “I should be at home in bed. And why this shitty neighborhood? Jesus, I don’t dare turn off the engine or I’ll find my tires slashed. Or missing.”

  “Will you stop bitching, Mike, and show me what you’ve got?”

  Mike reached inside his dark raincoat and pulled out a small plasti
c bag. “Here. And if they find it missing from the evidence locker before I can get it back, my job is history. When you call in a favor, you don’t mess around, do you?”

  Adam ignored the question. “This is what the fire marshal found?”

  “That’s it. Arson for damn sure.”

  Instead of turning on the dome light, Adam removed a penlight from inside his jacket and used that to slowly examine the charred bits of metal and melted plastic inside the bag.

  “Any suspects?”

  Mike shook his head. “Nah. The other arsons in the area were started with plain old gasoline and a match. What’s left of this thing shows a lot more imagination, according to the experts. And a lot more expertise. State-of-the-art sparking mechanism, says our guy. And probably on some kind of timer. But those bits and pieces don’t match up with any unsolved explosions or arsons in the computer.”

  Adam grunted.

  “You see something different? I mean, I know you’re some kind of electrical wizard and all.”

  “No,” Adam said. “I don’t see anything different.” He turned off the penlight. “Guess there’s no chance of me keeping this for a while.”

  “Hey, pal, I don’t owe you that big.”

  Adam returned the bag to him. “No problem. But I would … appreciate a copy of the fire marshal’s report.”

  Mike groaned. “Christ, you’re gonna get me fired.”

  “Just a copy. You can get it.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Thanks, Mike.”

  Mike peered through the gloom at Adam. “You want to tell me what all this is about?”

  “I’m just keeping an eye on a friend, that’s all.”

  “Rachel Grant? That’s some friend, pal. Most any man in Richmond would just love to be keeping an eye on her.”

  Adam shifted slightly in his seat, but all he said was “Anybody suspicious of this on her account?”

  “You mean does anybody think your girl was meant to end up on a slab?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Not that I’ve heard. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, is the thinking. Why? You know something we don’t?”

  “No. Just wondering.”

  Mike grunted. “If it comes to that, I would have thought you were a more likely target for an accidental death than Rachel Grant. You’ve made more than your fair share of enemies.”

  “Yeah. But not in Richmond.”

  “Oh, I think you might have one or two even here.” Adam turned his head to stare at him. “Oh?”

  “Yeah. Saw an old … friend of yours the other day.”

  “Who?”

  “Max Galloway.”

  “Son of a bitch.”

  “He’s all of that. And a loose cannon into the bargain. I don’t pretend to know what he’s doing in Richmond, but you can bet your last dollar it’s nothing good.”

  “Can you find out?”

  “Only if he breaks the law, draws attention to himself. He isn’t likely to do that. The Richmond cops don’t know him. Except for me, of course, because I used to work in California.”

  “Maybe you’d better warn them.”

  “Yeah. Maybe I will. And you watch your back, Adam. Galloway never made it a secret that he hated your guts. Maybe he followed you here to finally do something about it.”

  Adam didn’t say anything to that, and when he opened the car door, the dome light showed no change in his calm expression. “Thanks for giving me a look at the evidence, Mike. I’ll wait for your call about the fire marshal’s report.”

  “Give me a few days.”

  “Right.” Adam got out of the car and shut the door. Mike didn’t waste any time in leaving the neighborhood.

  Adam turned up the collar of his jacket, conscious of the chilly mist that was drifting in, and began walking slowly along the littered sidewalk. Blocks away from The Tavern, the area was desolate, mostly deserted. The only sounds were the rustle of trash skittering over the pavement and his own quiet footsteps.

  Max Galloway.

  Patterns of fate? Threads of destiny? How else to explain it?

  And how long had that violent enemy been in Richmond? Maybe waiting. Maybe watching.

  Maybe acting.

  Rachel.

  Automatically, his hand lifted to touch the slight bulge of the locket beneath his shirt. Its presence did nothing to reassure him.

  Max Galloway.

  Rachel.

  Jesus.

  Adam quickened his pace.

  • • •

  Rachel came out of her bathroom on Sunday morning and stopped dead in her bedroom. For just a moment she could have sworn she had once again caught the elusive scent of the cologne Thomas had always worn. But even as she sniffed, it was gone.

  Oh, of course it was gone. Because it hadn’t been there at all.

  Just my imagination.

  She sat down at her dressing table and began brushing her hair, an unseeing gaze fixed on the mirror. With that imagined scent had come a rush of memories, and she had no choice but to endure them. Thomas, teasing her because it turned out the men’s cologne she had fallen in love with was what the TV commercials insisted women dreamed of their men wearing when they came home from the sea. It was not something he would have chosen to wear, but he had worn it for her. He had always worn it.

  Thomas hiding little notes and presents for her, here in the house and out in the garden, laughing at her when she couldn’t find one. His voice whispering words of love. His promises …

  He wasn’t very good at keeping his promises.

  When that thought occurred, it felt so much a betrayal that Rachel was jerked from the daydreaming. She focused on her face in the mirror, saw her cheeks were wet. Slowly, she wiped the tears away.

  He hadn’t been very good at keeping his promises. And not only the last one. Thomas had more than once made a careless promise, only to find himself unable to keep it later. He had always been sincerely apologetic—she thought—but it occurred to her for the first time that the character trait might well have made him a less than perfect husband.

  The realization unnerved Rachel. She got up from her vanity table and went to dress, and it wasn’t until she was ready to leave the room that she saw the rose. It lay on her pillow, a single yellow rose so fresh there was still a drop of dew on a satiny petal.

  Rachel’s first reaction as she picked up the flower was simply one of pleasure. She loved flowers, especially yellow roses. But then she realized that there was something very strange about this. Where had it come from? The flower hadn’t been there when she had gone to shower half an hour before. So who could have come in and placed it on the pillow? It was still early; Cam was a late sleeper, and Fiona was far too brusque for something like this— even if there had been a yellow rose in the garden to pick. There wasn’t.

  She stood there, staring at the rose, baffled and uneasy.

  It was after noon on Sunday before Rachel could finally bring herself to sit down at her father’s desk one more time. She would have preferred to do something else. Almost anything else. But suspecting that somebody was trying to frighten—or kill—her was even more painful than facing her father’s memory.

  At least, she hoped that was true.

  For the first hour or so, she occupied herself by sorting through what she found in the two top drawers and placing them in reasonably neat piles atop the desk. Her father’s day planner was put to one side so she could go through it at her leisure; what looked like personal correspondence was stacked together; pens, paper clips, and other standard supplies; endless scraps of paper with sometimes cryptic notes in her father’s hand; quite a bit of business correspondence unrelated to the bank; stacks of business cards.

  And two small notebooks detailing deposits and withdrawals.

  To and from a bank in Geneva, Switzerland.

  Rachel placed one of the notebooks on the blotter and began slowly to thumb through
the other. Her hands were shaking.

  The deposits and withdrawals went back more than twenty years. Some were fairly small. Most were large, into six and even seven figures.

  Millions. Millions had gone through the accounts.

  After the first shock had passed, Rachel found a legal pad and a sharpened pencil and began doing some figuring. It took some time, but she gradually realized that there was a pattern to the deposits and withdrawals.

  Over the first five years there had been only deposits made, until the total reached just over ten million dollars. After that, each year there was never more than a single withdrawal, though there was sometimes more than one deposit. A million in, two hundred thousand out. Five hundred thousand in, two million out. Two hundred thousand in, a million out.

  Slowly, Rachel found the matches. Each withdrawal was matched to the penny by a deposit at a later date. The account never held more than fifteen million dollars, and never held less than five.

  When she looked more closely, Rachel saw that the note of each withdrawal contained a series of numbers and letters—always ending in two letters. Initials, she realized. And each set of initials for a withdrawal was matched by a set for a later deposit.

  “Loans,” she whispered as realization dawned.

  The two notebooks contained a history of loans—or, as her father had undoubtedly called them, “investments”— made and repaid. Over the space of twenty years. With no paperwork except these simple figures kept in two little black leather notebooks.

  “Rachel, that’s not the way Duncan did business.”

  Graham had said that. And he was right. It hadn’t been the way her father had done business, not for the bank. But for himself, it seemed, a handshake and these little notebooks had been enough.

  And there it was—five years before, a three-million-dollar withdrawal. And the series of identifying numbers and letters ended with AD. It was a series not yet repeated in the notebook, because the loan had not yet been repaid.

  Adam had told her the truth.

  If he was who and what he claimed to be.