“Why didn’t you think I’d done it?” he asked softly, his attention locked on her face to catch every flicker of expression. “I’ve been trying to get you to leave town, so logically I should have been the person you’d suspect first.”
She was shaking her head before he’d finished speaking, the movement making the sleek bell of her hair swing about her face. “You wouldn’t do something like that,” she said with absolute conviction. “Any more than you would have left me the first note.”
He paused, distracted from the pleasure of her trust in him. “Note?” Sternness laced that one word.
“Yesterday. When I went out, there was a note in the front seat of the car.”
“Did you report it?”
She shook her head again. “It wasn’t a specific threat.”
“What did it say?”
The look she gave him now was slightly uneasy, and he wondered why. “To quote: Shut up if you know what’s good for you.”
The coffee was ready. He got up and poured a cup for both of them. “How do you drink yours?” he asked absently, his thoughts still on the note and the package, which this time had been accompanied by a more specific threat. The wings of cold, black fury beat upward within him, barely controlled.
“Black.”
He gave her the cup, and sat down again in his original position, close enough to touch. She was more adept than anyone else at reading his face, and something in his expression must have alarmed her, because she launched into one of those deflecting maneuvers of hers. “I used to drink coffee with loads of sugar, but Mr. Gresham is diabetic. He said that it was easier to give up everything sweet than to fool with artificial sweeteners, so there wasn’t anything in the house to use. They would have bought it for me if I’d asked, but I didn’t want to impose—”
If she’d meant to distract him, he thought irritably, she’d succeeded. Even recognizing the maneuver didn’t blunt its effectiveness, because she used such interesting bait. “Who’s Mr. Gresham?” he asked, breaking into the flow of words. He felt the burn of jealousy, wondering if she was telling him about some guy she’d lived with before moving back to Prescott.
The slumberous green eyes blinked at him. “The Greshams were my foster parents.”
A foster home. God. A cold fist clenched his stomach. He had imagined her life as continuing in much the same vein as before. Realistically, a good foster home would have been far preferable to the way she’d been living, but it was never easy for kids to lose their families, no matter how rotten, and be deposited with strangers. Finding a good home was a crapshoot, at best. A lot of kids were abused in foster homes, and for a young girl who looked like Faith . . .
The crunch of gravel signaled Mike’s arrival. “Stay here,” Gray growled, and went out the back door. He beckoned to Mike as the other man’s lanky form unfolded from the patrol car, and walked around to the back of the house where he had left the box.
Mike joined him, his freckled face tightening with disgust as he looked down at the carcass. “I see a lot of sick things in this job,” he said conversationally, squatting by the box, “but some things still turn my stomach. Why in hell would someone do this to a helpless animal? Have you handled the box much?”
“Just to carry it out. I was careful to touch only the front left corner, and the back right. I don’t know how much Faith handled it before she opened it. I used a pen to open the flaps wider,” he added. “There’s a message on one of them.”
Mike used the same technique, taking a ballpoint from his pocket. He pursed his lips as he read the message, printed in block letters, with a felt-tip marker, on the cardboard:
GET OUT OF PRESCOTT OR YOU’LL BE JUST LIKE THE CAT
“I’ll carry it in, see if we can get any fingerprints. The plastic would be our best bet, since it hasn’t been disturbed.” He glanced toward the house. “Is she okay?”
“She was pretty shaky when I got here, but she’s settled down now.”
“Okay.” Still using the pen, Mike closed the flaps and stared down at the box for a few seconds, then grunted.
Gray looked down, too, and saw what he had missed the first time. “Shit. There’s no postage mark. It was on top of her other mail, so I thought it had been mailed, too.”
“Nope. Someone hand-delivered it. Let’s go see if she heard anything, or saw a car.”
They entered the kitchen, and Gray saw that Faith was still sitting where he had left her, sipping her coffee. She glanced up, outwardly calm now, but he suspected her control was hanging by no more than a few thin threads.
She immediately got to her feet, looking at Mike. “Ma’am.” He touched his fingers to his hat. “I’m Michael McFane, the sheriff here. Do you feel like answering a few questions?”
“Of course,” she said. “Would you like some coffee?”
“Please.”
“Sugar or cream?”
“Sugar.”
That social nicety taken care of, Faith returned to her chair. Gray stood beside her, propped against the enormous table. Mike took up his position by the sink, his feet crossed at the ankles.
“Where did you find the box?” Mike asked.
“In the mailbox.”
“There’s no postage mark on it. It wasn’t mailed, so I’m assuming someone put it in the box after your mail was delivered. No one’s supposed to use the box except the postal service, so the carrier probably would have taken it out. Did you hear the mail run, or see another car pass by?”
She shook her head. “I wasn’t here. I’d been grocery shopping. I came home, put up the groceries, then went out to get the mail.”
“Is anyone mad at you? Someone who might give you a dead cat to get even?”
Another shake of the head.
“She found a note in her car yesterday,” Gray interjected.
“What kind of note? What did it say?”
“To shut up if I knew what was good for me,” Faith replied.
“Did you keep it?”
She sighed, gave Gray a wary glance, and went to get the note. She came back holding the sheet of paper by one corner. “Put it on the counter,” Mike said. “I don’t want to handle it.”
She obeyed, and Gray moved beside Mike to read it. It was printed in the same block letters than adorned the cardboard box. Don’t ask any more questions about Guy Rouillard shut up if you know what’s good for you. Gray flashed her an irritated glance, understanding now that wary look she’d given him.
“All right,” he growled. “What have you been up to now?”
“You know as much about it as I do,” she replied, with a smoothness that he was beginning to think hid as much as it revealed.
“Well, now.” Mike scratched his jaw. “What does your daddy have to do with this, Gray?”
“Little Miss Nosy has been asking questions about him all over town.” He scowled at her.
“Why would that aggravate someone so much that they’d send her a note like this, and leave a dead cat in the mailbox?”
“It aggravated the hell out of me,” Gray said frankly. “I don’t want Monica or Mother upset by having all the old gossip stirred up again. I don’t know who it would piss off this much.”
The sheriff was silent, blue eyes hooded as he thought. “On the surface,” he finally drawled, “you’re the most likely suspect, Gray.” Faith started an immediate protest, but he waved her to silence. “Guess you knew that, too, what with the note and all,” he said to her. “So that makes me wonder why you called him, rather than the sheriff’s department.”
“I knew he didn’t leave the note, or the box.”
“It’s no secret that you weren’t happy when she moved back,” Michael said, looking at Gray.
“No, I wasn’t. I’m still not.” Gray’s hard mouth curved into a humorless smile. “But threatening notes and dead cats aren’t my style. I fight my battles out in the open.”
“Hell, I know that. I just wondered why Mrs. Hardy called you for hel
p.”
Gray snorted. “Figure it out.”
“Reckon I already have.”
“Then stop being an asshole.”
The sheriff didn’t take umbrage, just grinned. An instant later, he was all business again. “I need for both of you to come down to the courthouse so we can get your fingerprints, and check the box and note for any sets that don’t match. You’ll need to give us a statement, too, Mrs. Hardy.”
“All right. I’ll get my keys.” Faith stood, and Gray caught her arm.
“I’ll drive you.”
“There’s no need in your coming all the way back here—”
“I said I’ll drive you.” Implacably he looked down at her, forcing his will on her. She looked irritated, but made no further protest, and the sheriff grinned again.
Gray hustled her out and deposited her in the luxurious leather seat of the Jaguar. “You don’t have to drive me,” she said grumpily, as she buckled the seat belt.
“Sure I do, if I want to talk to you.”
“What’s there to say?”
He started the car and reversed out of the driveway, following Sheriff McFane’s patrol car down the road. “Obviously some nutcase has it in for you. You’ll be a lot safer somewhere away from Prescott.”
She averted her head, staring stonily out the window. “It didn’t take long for you to come up with that angle,” she retorted.
“You stubborn little witch, can’t you get it through that red head of yours that you might be in danger?”
Fifteen
Faith was boiling mad by the time she left the courthouse, though she had kept her temper mostly under control. Gray had badgered her all the way to town about moving out of Prescott, and to her fury, Sheriff McFane had agreed that she might not be entirely safe, living alone as she did, and with no close neighbors. Faith had pointed out that if she left, the harassment would stop, they’d never find who did it, and the guilty party would be pleased as punch that his tactics had worked. She wasn’t inclined to give him the satisfaction.
Sheriff McFane had allowed that her logic was impeccable, and her bravery was commendable, but her common sense was a mite off. She could get hurt.
She had agreed with him in that assessment, and stubbornly refused to budge an inch. Now that she had gotten over the shakes, she was seeing cause and effect. The dead cat meant that, somehow, she had gotten close to finding out what had really happened to Guy, and if she left now, she would never know for certain. The sheriff and Gray thought someone was harassing her; she knew that it was far more serious than that. She had to fight the temptation to tell them what she thought was behind the cat and the notes; if word got out that she was suggesting Guy had been murdered, it would warn the guilty party, making him or her even more difficult to catch. So she kept silent, and the frustration of it made her irritable.
She could ignore Sheriff McFane’s arguments that she leave; Gray’s went straight to her heart. His cajoling suggestions had long since deteriorated to forceful demands by the time they left the courthouse for the drive back to her house.
“For the last time, no!” she shouted, for at least the fifth time, as they got into the car. Heads swiveled in their direction.
“Shit,” Gray muttered. For a man who wanted to avoid gossip, he’d been pretty blatant today. His Jaguar wasn’t a car that was easily overlooked, and Faith was a woman who turned heads. A lot of people would have noted that he had driven her into town, gone with her into the courthouse, and then left with her, not to mention the fact that she was yelling at him. Well, there was nothing he could do about it now. Given the same set of circumstances he’d been faced with today, he’d do the same thing again.
Faith jammed the two ends of the seat belt buckle together. “I know you didn’t have anything to do with the cat, or either of the notes,” she said, anger seething in her voice. “But you aren’t above using it to your own advantage, are you? You’ve wanted me gone from day one, and it sticks in your craw that you can’t make me do what you want.”
He gave her a hooded, dangerous look as he negotiated the traffic in the square. “Don’t believe that for a minute,” he said quietly. “I could have you gone in half an hour if I wanted. I decided against it.”
“Really?” she drawled, infusing the word with disbelief. “Why pull your punches?”
“For two reasons. One is that you didn’t deserve what happened twelve years ago, and I wasn’t inclined to treat you that way again.” He took his gaze from the street long enough to sweep it down her body, lingering briefly on her breasts and thighs. “You know what the second reason is.”
The truth of that simmered between them, just below boiling point. He wanted her. She had known that . . . oh, almost from the first, certainly since that incendiary kiss in New Orleans. But he wanted her on his terms; he wanted to set her up in a little house somewhere away from Prescott, completely out of the parish, so his liaison with her wouldn’t upset his family. Those circumstances would be perfect for him, because he would be accomplishing both his goals with one fell swoop.
“I won’t let you hide me away as if I’m something shameful,” she said, her eyes hot and bitter as she stared fixedly out the windshield. “If you can’t associate with me out in the open, then stay the hell away from me.”
He slammed his fist against the steering wheel. “Goddamn it, Faith! That cat wasn’t from the Welcome Wagon. I’m thinking of your safety! Yes, it would please the hell out of me if you moved to another town. My mother drives me crazy, but that doesn’t mean I want to hurt her. Am I supposed to apologize for loving her, despite everything? You know how to roll with the punches, but she doesn’t. I’m a greedy bastard; I want to do what’s best for her, and have you, too. If you moved, we could have a damn satisfying relationship, and I wouldn’t have to worry that some maniac is stalking you!”
“Then don’t. Let me do the worrying.”
He made a sound of muffled anger and frustration. “You won’t budge an inch, will you?”
Again, she had to fight the urge to tell him that she had reasons for staying right where she was, reasons that went beyond their personal entanglement. The mood he was in, he wouldn’t believe her anyway.
They were out of town now, and there was very little traffic on the road. Soon he turned off on the secondary road that led to her house. She had never really noticed before how isolated her house was, at least not from the viewpoint of her own vulnerability. She had enjoyed the peace and quiet, the sense of space. Damn the unknown, unseen enemy, for destroying her pleasure in at last coming home.
She didn’t speak again until he turned in to her driveway. It was late afternoon, and the setting sun bathed the little house in a golden glow. In only a short while she had settled in here, surrounded by her own things, her own walls, covered by her own roof. Leave here? She couldn’t imagine it.
“Answer something for me,” she said, one hand on the door handle. “I don’t want to have an affair with you, no matter where I live. Does that lessen your concern for my safety?”
He stopped her, wrapping his fingers around her wrist and holding her in the car. His eyes were black with anger, but he didn’t answer the insulting question, merely replied to the statement. “I can change your mind,” he said softly. “We both know it.”
She opened the door and he let her go, content that he’d had the last word. He often did, she thought. He had a knack for pushing the conversation further than she wanted it to go, so that her only recourse was silence.
She was aware of him sitting in the driveway, watching until she was safely in the house. He was right, damn him. He could change her mind, with little or no effort. Her statement had been a bluff, but not a lie. She didn’t want to have an affair with him, but that didn’t mean she would be able to resist him. If he had insisted on coming in with her now, after one kiss she would probably let him lead her straight into the bedroom. Afterward was when the regret would begin.
• • • r />
“Gray, what in hell were you thinking of?” Alex asked irritably. “Driving around town with her, arguing with her in front of the courthouse. My God, half the town saw you, and the other half heard about it within the hour.”
Monica’s head came up, and she turned stricken eyes on Gray. He felt like throttling Alex for bringing up the subject in front of her.
“I was trying to convince her to leave,” he replied shortly, and even without looking directly at her, he could see the tension ease in Monica’s body. “Someone’s playing nasty tricks on her. Today a dead cat was left in her mailbox.”
“A dead cat?” Alex made a face. “That’s disgusting. But why was she in your car?”
“She called me when she found it—”
“Why call you?” Monica demanded resentfully.
“Because.” Gray knew his answer was blunt and uncommunicative, but he didn’t care. “I called Mike, and he came out to her house. He wanted both of us to go to the courthouse for fingerprinting—” Monica gave a sharp cry “—and Faith was still shaky, so I drove her there.”
“Why did you have to be fingerprinted?” Monica asked, incensed. “Did she accuse you of doing it?”
“No, but I handled the box. If Mike didn’t know which fingerprints were ours, he couldn’t tell if there were any belonging to the son of a bitch who left the box.”
Monica chewed on her lip. “Did he find anything?”
“I don’t know. When she was finished filing a report, I drove her home.”
“Is she going to move?” Alex asked.
“Hell, no.” Gray shoved an agitated hand through his hair. “She turned stubborn about it.” Turned stubborn, nothing. She’d been born stubborn. He pushed away from the desk and got to his feet. “I’m going out.”