“I couldn’t … face anything else until she was gone.”
“I know.”
Still grave, she asked, “Do you know that I love you?”
He smiled slowly. “I was sort of hoping you did. You made me wait long enough to hear it, though.”
“I had to get Caroline out of my head,” she explained.
“And make sure she wasn’t in mine?”
“Something like that.”
He bent his head and kissed her slowly. “She was never in my head,” he said huskily against her lips. “But you are. God, you are. In my head and my heart and under my skin … inside me so deeply you feel like a part of me. Like you’ve always belonged there. I love you, Joanna.”
She made a little sound of contentment. “I love you too.”
He lifted his head so that he could look at her, and stroked her cheek gently with the tips of his fingers. “We should go in. You’re cold.”
Her smile was so lovely it nearly stopped his heart. “I wanted to see the dawn. It looks so different when you don’t wake up scared to death. Just look at it, Griffin—isn’t it beautiful?”
It was difficult for him to look at anything but her, but he turned his gaze obediently to the horizon, where black was shading to deep purple, only to become dark blue overhead and then lighten gradually toward the east behind them where the sun would soon rise. It was high tide, so the ocean was roaring and booming as it battered against the cliffs, the morning air laden with salty dampness.
He drew a deep breath. “I fell in love with this place the first time I saw it,” he said.
“So did I.” She smiled at him again. “I didn’t realize it because I seemed to see shadows and tension everywhere I looked, but despite all that, I felt deep inside that this was a beautiful place.”
“Then stay here—with me. Marry me.” He hadn’t intended to ask her, not so soon, but it felt right to him to say it now. “I know you’d be giving up a lot, Joanna, but—”
Her fingers touched his lips lightly to stop him. “What would I be giving up? The city? I don’t need it. Family? Aunt Sarah was the last. Friends? I’ll make new ones.”
“Sweetheart…”
“I love you, Griffin,” she said softly. “There’s nothing in the world I want more than to stay here with you.”
He drew a deep breath that did nothing to ease the sweet ache in his chest, and pulled her into his arms. “You won’t regret it, Joanna, I promise.”
“I know that.” Her fingers threaded into his hair, and her smile glowed with more promise than the morning. “I knew that the first time I saw you, even if I couldn’t admit it to myself. I looked at you, at the suspicion on your face, and I knew I wouldn’t be going back to Atlanta—except to pack.”
“I think you’re three parts witch,” he said huskily.
“And I think I’m just very, very lucky.”
Griffin thought he’d been the lucky one, but he didn’t argue with her as he lifted her and carried her back to their warm bed.
IT WAS EXACTLY TWO WEEKS to the day after Joanna had arrived in Cliffside, and a sunny Tuesday in mid-October, when Griffin walked beside Joanna to the peaceful old church at the northern end of town. He walked with her as far as the lovely wrought-iron gate at the side of the church and opened it for her. “You’re sure you don’t want me to go along?”
Joanna smiled up at him. “I’m sure. This is something I need to do alone.”
“Okay.” He bent his head and kissed her lightly, understanding without the need for explanations. “I’ll wait here for you. Just remember our appointment. Fifteen minutes.”
“It shouldn’t take me that long.”
She walked into the town’s oldest cemetery, following one of the neat graveled paths toward a spot she needed no directions to find. Like most everything in Cliffside, the grounds here were well kept, mostly sunny but shaded in several places by huge old oak trees. The ocean could barely be heard from here, yet it could be felt, almost like a pulse in the ground. It was an oddly alive place where the dead had been laid to rest.
It was a place Joanna had avoided until now. She had avoided even thinking about it, because she’d been afraid that the fragile tie between her and Caroline would be severed by the stark reality of a grave and a headstone.
But the connection Joanna had known for so long was gone now, the feeling of it no more than a wisp of memory, and it was time for her to say good-bye to Caroline.
Her grave was as meticulously neat as all the others here, the grass clipped short and still green in October, the marble headstone gleaming. Her name was carved deeply into the stone. Caroline Douglas McKenna. The dates of her birth and her death were carved deeply as well. She had not lived thirty years, and she had made his life hell for more than ten of them, yet Scott had had carved Beloved Wife and Mother as well—and Joanna doubted he had done it because of convention.
Poor Caroline. She had lived and died with no idea of what she had missed.
On either side of her headstone were affixed permanent flowerpots, and in each one a bunch of her own roses glowed with beautiful color. They wouldn’t last long this time of the year, Joanna knew, but there were more grown and tended in the greenhouse to replace these when needed. For Caroline, indeed. Somehow, Joanna didn’t doubt that Caroline’s roses would bloom at her grave for a long, long time.
“You’ll probably hate these,” Joanna said conversationally as she bent to lay a bouquet of mixed flowers on the neat grave, speaking aloud because it felt right to. “But I’ll let the men in your life bring you roses, Caroline.”
She looked at the headstone, her gaze tracing the letters spelling out the name of a complex woman who had, Joanna believed, reached out from death to save her daughter. “You knew Regan was in danger, didn’t you? Maybe it was just something you realized in that final moment, that she must have found the box with the disk in it. Or maybe … maybe there’s a time beyond death when we know what happens to those we left behind.
“Either way, I believe you knew. You knew she’d need help, knew she’d be in danger if Dylan discovered she’d found the disk. And maybe you wanted something else fixed as well. Did you, Caroline? Did you, finally, regret what you’d done to Scott? Did you realize that Regan needed her father back?”
There was no answer, of course, but it didn’t stop Joanna from musing aloud, from trying to find a kind of closure in this, the most elusive and intangible part of the whole thing.
“I’d like to think you did regret a few things, Caroline. That you sent me here not only to protect Regan but to at least attempt to heal a few of the wounds you caused. Scott knows the truth about Regan now. Adam had a chance to … oh, confess, I guess. And even Griffin doesn’t feel so guilty about your death now.
“Even the town is sort of healed, with the truth known. I think your death and Butler’s shook up everybody more than they wanted to admit, and then when I came along, looking so much like you and asking questions, it just added tension. Griffin felt it, too, the uneasiness of the town. Maybe a lot of people sensed there was something wrong, I don’t know. In any case, things are much better now. Why I came here will probably always be a mystery to some people, but even the ones who seemed so wary of me are smiling and friendly now. This is a nice little town, Caroline. I think I’m going to love it here.”
She stood with her hands folded, and smiled somewhat ruefully as she looked at the headstone. “I don’t think we would have liked each other much, you and I. I can’t say that I liked many of the things I found out about you since I got here. But I don’t hate you. You probably couldn’t help being the way you were, so what’s the use of hating you for it? But I do think your life gave you no pleasure, and that’s a real shame. You’d hate pity, so I won’t offer you that, but I wish…”
What did she wish? Joanna sighed. “I’m glad you asked me to come, Caroline. I’m glad I was able to help—even if the whole thing drove me crazy and scared me more than once. The
only thing I regret is Amber. Griffin says it isn’t my fault, that Dylan is wholly to blame, but I can’t help feeling responsible for what happened to her. I’ll have to learn to live with that; the price I paid for coming here, I suppose.
“Regan is fine. She and Scott have a long way to go yet, but the beginning has been promising. She even rode into town yesterday in his car, the first time she’s been able to do that. Everybody was glad to see her. And though you probably won’t like hearing it, I think Scott will probably end up with Lyssa. She seems to be helping him through all this. You ought to be glad for him, Caroline. He loved you, you know. No matter what you did, he loved you.”
Joanna frowned slightly. “I guess that’s what I wish, that you hadn’t missed out on what he could have given you. I don’t know what went wrong first, whether your nature made him go cold, or you got restless because it wasn’t easy for him to show his feelings and you … needed devotion.
“All I do know is that you missed the most wonderful feeling life has to offer, Caroline. And I do feel sorry for you for that.”
She fell silent for a few moments, than smiled wryly. “I know, you don’t want my pity. I just hope you’re at peace now. I’ll keep an eye on Regan, I promise. Good-bye, Caroline.”
Joanna turned away and walked back down the path to the church. She felt satisfied, felt a sense of closure. And when she saw the man she loved waiting for her at the curch gate, his eyes lighting at the sight of her, her step quickened eagerly and she thought she would burst with happiness. She didn’t look back, not once, because the past was finished.
Only the present mattered. And the future.
KAY HOOPER, who has more than six million copies of her books in print worldwide, has won numerous awards and high praise for her novels. Kay lives in North Carolina, where she is currently working on her next novel.
FBI Agent Noah Bishop has a rare gift for seeing what others do not, a gift that helps solve the most puzzling cases.
Read his electrifying adventures in three stand-alone novels of psychic suspense from New York Times bestseller Kay Hooper, all available now.
STEALING SHADOWS
HIDING IN THE SHADOWS
OUT OF THE SHADOWS
Turn the page for a sneak preview of
STEALING SHADOWS,
the chilling story of a woman who steals inside the shadows of a killer’s mind—at the risk of losing her own life.
“Talk to me, Cassie.”
She was all but motionless in the straight-backed chair, head bowed so that her hair hid her face. Only her hands stirred, thin fingers lightly tracing and shaping the red tissue petals of the exquisitely handmade paper rose in her lap.
“I think … he’s moving,” she whispered.
“Where is he moving? What can you see, Cassie?” Detective Logan’s voice was even and infinitely patient, betraying none of the anxiety and urgency that beaded his face with sweat and haunted his eyes.
“I … I’m not sure.”
From his position a few feet away, Logan’s partner spoke in a low voice. “Why’s she so tentative with this one?”
“Because he scares the shit out of her,” Logan responded, equally quietly. “Hell, he scares the shit out of me.” He raised his voice. “Cassie? Concentrate, honey. What does he see?”
“Dark. It’s just … it’s dark.”
“All right What is he thinking?”
She drew a shaky little breath, and those thin fingers trembled as they held and traced the paper rose. “I—I don’t want to … It’s so cold in his mind. And there are so many … shadows. So many twisted shadows. Please don’t make me go any deeper. Don’t make me touch them.”
Logan’s already grim face grew bleaker at the fear and revulsion in her voice, and it was his turn to draw a steadying breath. When he spoke, his voice was cool and certain. “Cassie, listen to me. You have to go deeper. For the sake of that little girl, you have to. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she replied forlornly, “I understand.” There was a moment of silence so absolute, they could hear the soft crackle of the tissue paper she touched.
“Where is he, Cassie? What is he thinking?”
“He’s safe. He knows he’s safe.” Her head tilted to one side, as though she were listening to a distant voice. “The cops will never find him now. Bastards. Stupid bastards. He left them all those clues and they never saw them.”
Logan didn’t allow himself to be distracted by the disturbing information. “Stop listening to him, Cassie. Look at what he’s doing, where he’s going.”
“He’s going … to get the girl. To take her to his secret place. He’s ready for her now. He’s ready to—”
“Where is it? What’s around him, Cassie?”
“It’s … dark She’s … he’s got her tied up. He’s got her tied up … in the backseat of a car. It’s in a garage. He’s getting into the car, starting the engine. Backing out of the garage. Oh! I can hear her crying…”
“Don’t listen,” Logan insisted. “Stay with him, Cassie. Tell me where he’s going.”
“I don’t know.” Her voice was desolate. “It’s so dark. I can’t see beyond the headlights.”
“Watch, Cassie. Look for landmarks. What kind of road is he on?”
“It’s … a blacktop. Two lanes. There are mailboxes, we’re driving past mailboxes.”
“Good, Cassie, that’s good.” He glanced aside at his partner, who grimaced helplessly, then returned his attention to that dark, bent head. “Keep looking. Keep watching. You have to tell us where he’s going.”
For a few moments there was nothing but the sound of her breathing, quick and shallow. And then, abruptly she said, “He’s turning. The street sign says … Andover.”
Logan’s partner moved a few steps away and began talking softly into a cell phone.
“Keep watching, Cassie. What do you see? Talk to me.”
“It’s so dark.”
“I know. But keep watching.”
“He’s thinking … horrible things.”
“Don’t listen. Don’t go too deep, Cassie.”
She lifted her head for the first time since they had begun, and Logan flinched. Her eyes were closed. He’d never seen such pallor in a human face before. Not a living face. And that pale, pale skin was stretched tautly over her bones.
“Cassie? Cassie, where are you?”
“Deep.” Her voice sounded different, distant and almost hollow, as though it came from a bottomless well.
“Cassie, listen to me. You have to back off. Just see what he sees.”
“It’s like worms,” she whispered, “feeding on rotting flesh. On a rotting soul…”
“Cassie, back off. Back off now. Do you hear me?”
After several moments she said, “Yes. All right.” She was trembling visibly now, and he knew if he touched her, he would find her skin cold.
“What do you see? What does he see?”
“The road. No mailboxes now. Just winding road. He’s getting tense. He’s almost at his secret place.”
“Watch, Cassie. Keep watching.”
Several minutes passed, and then a frown tugged at her brows.
“Cassie?”
She shook her head.
Logan stepped aside quickly and spoke in a low voice to his partner. “Any luck with Andover, Paul?”
“There are five variations on the street name Andover within two hundred miles. Bob, we can’t even get to them all, much less cover them effectively. She has to give us something else.”
“I don’t know if she can.”
“She has to try.”
Logan returned to Cassie. “What do you see, Cassie? Talk to me.”
In a tone that was almost dreamy now, she said, “There’s a lake. I’ve seen the lights shining on the water. He’s … his secret place is near the lake. He thinks he’ll dump her body there when he’s done. Maybe.”
Logan looked swiftly at this partner, but Paul was already
on the cell phone.
“What else, Cassie? What else can you tell me?”
“It’s getting harder.” Her voice became uncertain, shaky once more. “Harder to stay inside him. I’m so tired.”
“I know, Cassie. But you have to keep trying. You have to keep us with him.”
As always, she responded to his voice and his insistence, drawing on her pitifully meager reserves of strength to maintain a contact that revolted and terrified her. “I hear her. The little girl. She’s crying. She’s so afraid.”
“Don’t listen to her, Cassie. Just him.”
“All right.” She paused. “He’s turning. It’s a winding road now. A dirt road. I can see the lake sometimes through the trees.”
“Do you see a house?”
“We’re passing … driveways, I think. There are houses all around. Houses on the lake.”
Logan stepped aside as Paul gestured. “What?”
“There’s only one Andover Street close to a lake. It’s Lake Temple. Bob, it’s only fifteen miles away.”
“No wonder she’s picking him up so well,” Logan muttered. “She’s never been this deep before, not inside this bastard. The teams moving?”
“I’ve got everybody en route. And we’re chasing down a list of all the property owners on the lake. Pm told this is one of those places where the people name their houses, give them signs and everything. If we get really lucky…”
“Keep me advised,” Logan said, and returned to Cassie.
“Lake Temple,” she said, dreamy again. “He likes that name. He thinks it’s appropriate.”
“Don’t listen to what he thinks, Cassie. Just watch. Tell me what he’s doing, where he’s going.”
Five minutes of silence lasted seemingly forever, and then she spoke suddenly.
“We’re turning. Into a driveway, I think.”
“Do you see any mailboxes?”
“No. No. I’m sorry.”
“Keep watching.”
“It’s a steep driveway. Long. Winding down toward the lake. I see … I think there’s a house ahead. Sometimes the headlights touch it ….”