Jake walked toward him. “I’m Jake Truett.”
“Just got a long distance-call from someone named Luther Pell in Burning Cove. He said you might be in real trouble here at the sanitarium. Something about a dangerous man named Calvin Paxton having pulled a fast one. Evidently this Paxton fellow managed to sneak out of Burning Cove without anyone noticing until about half an hour ago. Pell seemed to think this Paxton guy might be on his way here and that he was after you and a lady.”
“Paxton won’t be a problem for anyone now,” Jake said.
Chapter 49
“It’s a version of a throwing weapon called a shuriken,” Jake said. He looked down at the lapis blue fountain pen in his hand. “A few years ago a man I did business with in the Far East taught me how to use one. They come in a variety of shapes and are meant to be easily concealed. This one was designed to my specifications. Here in the States no one thinks twice about a man carrying a fountain pen.”
“It’s so small,” Adelaide said. “I’m amazed it made such an impact on Paxton.”
It was early evening. She was exhausted but her nerves were still on edge. She wished she had some of the tisane that she used for the bad nights. She had been obliged to make do with regular tea.
She and Jake were sitting in a cabin in an auto court halfway between Rushbrook and Burning Cove. Shortly after they had finished with the police and started the long drive back, the fog rolled in over the coastal highway. Driving had become hazardous. As Jake had pointed out, they had taken enough risks for one day.
They had pulled off the road to spend the night at the first establishment that appeared clean and comfortable.
There was a fire going on the hearth. The hatbox was on the floor beside Jake’s chair. The briefcase containing the files they had taken from Ormsby’s office sat next to it.
“A shuriken is not designed to kill,” Jake said, “although it can be used that way at close range. It is, after all, a very sharp blade. But it’s primarily a weapon of distraction. You use it to startle and, with luck, frighten your opponent. The idea is to gain a little time to move in on him.”
“Which is exactly how it worked,” Adelaide said. “Something to be said for all that traveling you did while you were in the import-export business. But I’m glad you’re out of that line of work.”
“It was time. I’m not much use to our government now, anyway. Thanks to that spy in the agency I mentioned, too many people abroad know who I am. I no longer have a useful cover.”
“What about Luther Pell? You said the two of you were introduced by a mutual acquaintance. Was it the same man who recruited you as a spy?”
“Yes. Luther occasionally does favors for the FBI now. The Bureau finds his underworld connections useful from time to time.”
“That’s how you got the fake Bureau ID?”
“Uh-huh.”
Adelaide watched the flames in silence for a time.
“You’ll need to find another job,” she said finally.
“You are certainly anxious to see me employed.” Jake smiled. “I promise you, I won’t starve. I made a lot of money in the import-export business.”
“I don’t doubt that, but you still need gainful work.”
“Something will come along. But first things first.”
Jake leaned down and removed the top of the hatbox. They both contemplated the wealth of materials stuffed inside the box. There was a small, leather-bound appointment journal on top.
Jake took out the journal, opened it, and turned a few pages. “Looks like Zolanda kept detailed records of her victims and their secrets. She used initials for names but there are also dates. Beside each entry there’s a number.”
Adelaide picked up one of the sealed envelopes. “There’s a number on each packet, too.”
“Each one probably corresponds to an entry in the journal.”
“It will take hours to sort through all those papers and photos and journals,” Adelaide warned.
“Thanks to Elizabeth’s father, I know exactly what I’m looking for and I also know the approximate dates when Elizabeth consulted with Zolanda.”
It didn’t take long to find Elizabeth’s diary. It was very close to the top.
“Elizabeth was one of Zolanda’s most recent victims, wasn’t she?” Adelaide said.
“Looks like it,” Jake said.
He paged through the diary, pausing here and there to read a passage more closely. “It’s all here. The things Garrick demanded that she do in exchange for his promise to marry her. He used her, or tried to use her.” Jake turned another couple of pages. “In the end it looks like he got angry because she never gave him any substantial information about me. He told her that he would never see her again. She threatened to tell me about him.”
“That’s why he murdered her, isn’t it?”
Jake turned another page and stopped. “Looks like he had a change of heart. Declared that he could not live without her. He told her that they would run off together. Told her that she should pack a bag. He said he would come by the house to pick her up and that they would go to Reno so that she could get a divorce. He told her that she must make certain no one saw them. She writes that she will give the housekeeper the day off.”
“That’s the day Garrick went to your house and murdered Elizabeth, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” Jake closed the diary. “I knew something was wrong, right from the start. But it never dawned on me that Elizabeth was being manipulated by a spymaster until after I found her in the basement.”
“I told you once before, you couldn’t save her because she did not want to be saved. But you can save her family. You can destroy the diary.”
“Yes, I can do that.” Jake opened the diary again. One by one he fed the pages to the flames. When he was done, he sat back in his chair. “I’ll telephone Elizabeth’s father tomorrow and tell him that the diary no longer exists and that the blackmailer is dead.”
“We should burn the rest of these secrets,” Adelaide said.
“Not tonight. I need to go through them first to make certain there is nothing in the box that might affect national security. That will take time. We’ll take the rest of the items back to Burning Cove with us and deal with them there.”
“It’s over,” Adelaide said quietly.
“Not yet.” Jake looked at her. “There’s one more thing you should know before we close the door on my past. It’s about the manner in which Garrick died.”
“Are you going to tell me that it wasn’t an accident?”
Jake exhaled slowly. “He followed me out to the Mermaid that night. I was sure that he would. He came at me with a knife. But I was expecting him to do just that.”
“Believe it or not, I had already figured out that Garrick’s convenient drowning was not an amazing coincidence.”
Jake watched her for a time. “I just wanted you to know.”
“I understand. What happens now?” she said. “Will you contact someone in the FBI? After all, we just uncovered a drug ring. But if we try to explain things to the authorities, they’ll want to know all about Daydream. They’ll demand that we turn over the formula. And then they’ll question me and they’ll find out about the experiments and they’ll think that maybe I really am crazy—”
Jake leaned forward and put his fingers on her lips, silencing her. “No one is going to question you. The drug ring no longer exists. There is nothing in this case that the police in Rushbrook and Burning Cove can’t handle. No need for the Bureau to get involved.” He took his hand away from her mouth. “Trust me.”
Adelaide breathed a sigh of relief and then tensed. “What about Conrad Massey?”
“Massey knows he’s lucky to be alive. He’ll keep his mouth shut because he’s aware that he’ll go to jail for kidnapping, fraud, and attempted murder, among other things, if
he tells his story to the police—assuming he survived long enough to stand trial.”
Adelaide shot him a severe look. “You don’t really mean that.”
Jake looked at her. He did not say a word.
“All right, you do mean it.”
“Oh, yeah,” Jake said. “But you can relax. Massey isn’t in a position to make trouble for us. He’s going to have his hands full dealing with the financial disaster that is about to overtake him. That will be followed by a social disaster. For all intents and purposes, he is a ruined man.”
“One of the first things he’ll do is stop paying for the Duchess’s care at Rushbrook.”
“With Gill out of the way, perhaps a new, modern-thinking doctor will take over the asylum,” Jake said. “Or maybe it will be closed.”
“Regardless, I will keep an eye on things and make certain that the Duchess is settled someplace where she’ll be comfortable.”
Jake smiled. “We will both keep an eye on her.” He looked at the briefcase. “I want to go through the files on Daydream before we destroy them. I need to find out if there was any connection to foreign agents or someone in our own government. But we can burn your patient file tonight. It’s up to you.”
She contemplated the briefcase for a moment.
“No,” she said at last. “I think I want to read that file. I need to know exactly what they did to me. And then I’ll destroy it.”
“And afterward?” Jake said. “What do you want to do when you’re finally free of the past?”
“Florence says my teas have been great for business. I like blending them for people so I’ll keep doing that. But I would also like to use my mother’s collection of old herbals as a foundation for a new botanical research library in Burning Cove.”
“That,” Jake said, “is an excellent plan.”
Adelaide braced herself. It was time to face the future. “What about you? You’ve accomplished your objective. You recovered the diary. Now you’re free, too.”
He rose, reached down, and tugged her to her feet. He cupped her face in his hands. There was a lot of heat in his eyes.
“I’m thinking of moving to Burning Cove,” he said. “Life by the seaside has done wonders for my nerves.”
Her laughter bubbled up out of nowhere. She put her arms around his waist.
“Mine have certainly improved since I took up residence there,” she said.
“How do you feel about taking in a permanent boarder?”
“I like the idea,” she said. “I like it a lot. I could put you to work in my library, although probably not at the reference desk. I don’t think you would be good at dealing with the public.”
A rare flash of warm laughter lightened Jake’s avenging-angel eyes. “Living with you and having a steady job sounds like the perfect future,” he said.
“Yes, it does,” she said. “And just think, you will have a convenient supply of your favorite green tea.”
“I hoped that would be part of the deal.” His amusement faded. He tightened his grip on her face. “I know it’s too soon to say this, but I love you, Adelaide. You should know that sooner or later I will ask you to marry me. In fact, I will beg you to marry me.”
“In that case, I would suggest that you ask me sooner rather than later. One thing I have learned recently is that life can be unpredictable. One should not put off until tomorrow what one wants very much to do today.”
“You can say yes today?”
She smiled. “Yes.”
There was a new emotion in his eyes now. She could have sworn that she caught the glint of tears. But that was impossible, she told herself. A man like Jake would not cry.
Concerned, she raised her fingertips and touched the corner of his eye.
“Jake?” she said.
He did not answer. Instead, he kissed her with an aching tenderness that let her know the tears were real. It was a kiss that promised a soul-stirring love.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and gave herself up to the embrace.
“Adelaide,” Jake said against her mouth. “Adelaide.”
The kiss became more intense. The thrill of shared desire consumed them. Jake started to undress her but soon they were fighting each other for the embrace.
They made it to one of the two narrow beds, leaving a trail of discarded clothing behind. Jake yanked the quilt aside and stretched out on his back. He pulled her down so that she sprawled on top of him. They were still very new at the business of making love together, Adelaide thought. There was so much to learn about each other.
She could have sworn his hand shook a little when he touched her breasts, as if he could not quite believe that she was real.
She trailed her fingertips down the length of him, from his sleek, strong shoulders to his thighs. She explored his lean, muscled body with a sense of wonder and satisfaction. He was her lover and she was his.
When she reached the hard, rigid evidence of his desire, he exhaled on a harsh groan and fitted his hands to her waist. He positioned her so that she straddled him, and drove himself slowly, relentlessly into her welcoming body.
“I need you,” he rasped. “I need you so much. Come for me, sweetheart. I want to feel you come while I’m in you.”
She loved knowing that he wanted her so desperately, loved knowing that she could thrill him, loved knowing that he thrilled her.
He reached between her legs and found the exquisitely sensitive spot. She caught her breath.
Moments later her climax struck in cascading waves, carrying her away.
“Jake.”
“Yes,” Jake said. “Yes.”
He watched her with half-closed eyes, enthralled. She sensed that he was trying to hold back but his formidable willpower failed him. The storm of his own release crashed through him.
When it was over, she collapsed on top of him. He held her very close and very tight.
* * *
• • •
She felt him stir a long time later.
“There’s something you should know about me before we get married,” he said.
“Something else besides the fact that once upon a time you were a secret agent?”
She was lying on top of him, her head pillowed on his chest. The cabin was getting cold but Jake’s body was warm enough to melt a glacier. She did not want to move.
“I do have a job,” he said.
“What?” She raised her head so that she could look down at him. “Why didn’t you tell me?
“Because it’s not a very secure job. I could be fired at any time. The pay is erratic and uncertain. The hours are sometimes very odd. But on the positive side, I can do my work in Burning Cove just as easily as in Los Angeles.”
“I don’t understand. Do you sell real estate or stocks?”
“No.” Jake threaded his fingers through her hair. “I write the Cooper Boone spy novels under the name Simon Winslow.”
“You’re joking.”
He shook his head.
She eyed him warily. “You’re not joking.”
“No. I haven’t been writing for long, just a couple of years. I’ve only had two books in the series published. I can’t assure you that I’m going to be a success in that line of work.”
She thought about the yellow legal pad and the sharpened pencils that he kept in his briefcase. She wrinkled her nose.
“Does Luther Pell know about your writing career?” she asked.
“He’s one of the very few people who does know.”
She groaned. “You must have been very amused by my efforts to get you to concentrate on finding a new job.”
“No,” he said. He twisted a lock of her hair around his fingers and tugged her gently down on his chest. “I was touched that you cared enough to be concerned. I can’t remember the last time s
omeone worried about me.”
She glared at him. And then she started to laugh. He watched her, bemused for a moment, and then he grinned.
“You’re not mad?” he said.
“No. Why should I be mad? I’m going to marry the author of the Cooper Boone novels. I won’t have to wait for the next one to be released. I’ll get to read it before anyone else.”
“Yes,” he said. “You will.”
She widened her eyes. “Gosh, could I have your autograph?”
It was his turn to laugh.
“How about something a little more useful?” he said.
“Such as?”
“Such as this.”
He released his grip on her hair, cupped his hand around the back of her head, and drew her down so that he could kiss her.
“This is all right,” she said against his mouth. “But I still want you to sign my copy of your latest book.”
“Fine. I’ll sign anything if you’ll promise to stop talking and kiss me.”
“I can do that.”
Chapter 50
The following morning Raina opened the drawer of her desk and took out the slender file folder that contained the flawlessly typed report she had prepared. She put the folder on the desk but she did not open it. Instead she folded her hands on top, anchoring it securely in place.
“I have the names of your liquor thieves, Mr. Pell,” she said. “But we need to discuss this situation before I give you the report.”
Luther lounged back in the client chair and eyed the folder. When he looked at her again, his expression was perfectly neutral. He gave nothing away.
“What is there to discuss?” he asked. “I hired you to find out who was stealing liquor from my club. You say you were successful. Now you are going to give me the names of the thieves and I will pay you for your time. That does not sound complicated.”
“Actually, it is somewhat complicated. You see, there are nuances.”
“Nuances.” He made it sound as if it were an unfamiliar word.