Long, Lean, and Lethal

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Jennifer, you’ve got to quit arguing with me all the time just for the sake of argument.”

  She was suddenly certain that she could feel the alcohol running around in her veins. It was as if she were on fire. Was it the alcohol, or was it …

  Him. She could feel it in places she didn’t even remember.

  She kept smiling.

  “Jennifer—”

  “I’m not fighting with you,” she said, trying to sound very sober.

  “But when the holiday weekend is over, you’re going to try to run off to work without me. Leave the building before me …” He looked at her more closely. “What is the matter with you?”

  “I … I really need to go to bed.”

  He stared at her a moment longer, then swept her up into his arms. She issued a short protest, then closed her eyes.

  The world was spinning.

  She opened her eyes again, realizing that she had clutched him. He smelled wonderfully of aftershave and masculinity. She closed her eyes again, letting her head fall to his chest.

  “Please, Jennifer, for real, don’t fight me on this.”

  She looked up at him, knowing that she was smiling ridiculously, but unable to stop herself. “Fight a studly hunk like you, Conar? I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  “A studly hunk?”

  “I didn’t make up the phrase. The other girls did.”

  “The other girls?”

  “Kelly, I think. Maybe Serena.”

  “At least someone appreciates me.”

  “They don’t know you.”

  “Oh? And you do?”

  “They don’t live with you.”

  “Neither do you. Not really. I mean, not enough to know if I leave the toilet seat up, run around the house scratching my groin, or insist on total possession of the remote control.”

  Her smile deepened. He was moving along up the stairs, nearing her room. Her head was spinning very badly, and she groaned. “I couldn’t fight you if I wanted to. I don’t think that I could walk up the stairs.”

  “Don’t you dare be sick on me.”

  “I’m not going to be sick.”

  “Such an exquisite beauty would never be sick.”

  “Are you making fun of me?”

  “Never. The words are Liam’s, not mine.”

  “Oh,” she murmured, silent for a minute. “Conar?”

  “What?”

  “I am going to be sick.”

  He swore and moved faster, pushing her door open with a foot, propelling her toward the bathroom. She wavered on her feet, then steadied. He meant to hold her, but that would be far too much humiliation.

  “Let me help you. You’ll crack your head wide open.”

  “No.”

  She managed to push him back out of the bathroom. Her stomach rumbled, and she made it neatly to the toilet.

  Amazingly, she felt better. Much, much better. She drenched her face in cold water again and again. Rinsed out her mouth, brushed her teeth.

  “Jennifer!”

  He was tapping on the door.

  She leaned against it. “I’m all right, Conar. I … thank you,” she said primly. “Thank you very much. I’m going to take a shower now.”

  She leaned against the door another moment, humiliated, breathing deeply. She felt better—but still horrible. Maybe a shower would help.

  She stripped down, stepped beneath the water. She needed to take something for her headache. Maybe that would help the hangover she was bound to suffer in the morning. She shook her head beneath the spray. She hadn’t done anything so wretched since she’d been eighteen.

  Finally, she turned off the water and stepped carefully from the shower stall—very precise with her every movement. Hair and body wrapped in two towels, she leaned against the door again to steady herself, then stepped out.

  She stopped short.

  Conar was standing by the window, looking out on the patio and the cliffs to the canyon below.

  “Conar, is there something …”

  “No,” he said, turning toward her.

  “Then, um, why are you still here?”

  He lowered his dark head for a moment, and she saw the small smile that curved his lips. He looked at her again. “If I heard you fall in the shower, I intended to rush in before you could drown.”

  “I’m all right.”

  He nodded, still watching her. Then he walked over to her. She was surprised by the way her heart started to thud as he did so. Blood seemed to curl and boil within her. She hated herself. She was aroused, just watching him walk, wanting to feel his hands … everywhere. She was tempted to drop the towel, curl against him. Chemistry. Too much to drink. Too much time alone, no life except the working and the worrying …

  He put his hands on her bare shoulders. Her flesh burned. Great hands. Very large. Long fingers. Her eyes dropped to them. He lifted her chin. His eyes were steady and serious. “Let me be in on this, all right? I don’t want to take anything away. I just want to help.”

  She couldn’t breathe. Her heart was pounding way too hard. Could he hear it? How embarrassing.

  “Is your head clear enough? Can you understand me?”

  “I need an aspirin.”

  He left her standing there, and walked into the bathroom. She was simply too undressed. She raced to her bed, wrenched her nightshirt from beneath the pillows. It wasn’t what she’d had in mind for such an occasion. It was soft cotton with a little Tweety Bird on the right shoulder. With the speed of light, she slipped it over her head anyway, shimmying from the towel that had been wrapped around her body. The towel fell from her hair as well. She reached for it—cracking her head on the nightstand.

  “Shit!” she swore softly.

  Conar was instantly back, helping her stand, eyes anxious. “You all right?”

  She nodded. No, she wasn’t. Now her head really hurt.

  He lifted her again anyway, set her on the bed, against the pillows she’d cast into disarray to get the nightshirt. He sat by her side on the bed. “Hang on; I dropped the aspirin.”

  “I’m all right; really.”

  “You’re getting there.”

  “Conar, this is just too … I mean, Abby is worried, the police are worried, I think Abby is … seeing things. So you become my bodyguard, work with me, follow me, haunt me, live with me, sleep with me—”

  She broke off. Where the hell had those words come from?

  “Sleep with you?” His brow arched, the curl about his lips deepened. “Was that an invitation?”

  “No … I … I …”

  He leaned forward, kissed her forehead. He seemed all chest and shoulders and masculine scent. “I never said anything about sleeping with you.”

  He straightened, laughing, and walked to the door.

  The door opened and closed.

  She felt like an idiot.

  Jennifer leapt up and raced to her door, threw it open. “It was not an invitation!”

  She heard his amused laughter echo softly from down the hall, but then he turned back to her.

  “Lock your door, Jennifer. Get in, and lock your door.”

  “Against you?”

  “Against anyone walking in the night.”

  He turned toward his own room again.

  And strangely, standing in the hall in her Tweety nightshirt, she suddenly felt a deep chill.

  As if …

  She were being watched.

  As if there were eyes in the shadows of Granger House.

  As he had suggested, she turned quickly, slipped into her room, closed the door, and locked it.

  She leaned against it. The chills faded.

  A sense of humiliation swept in again.

  She swore quietly and ran across the room, burying herself into the soft safety of her bed.

  Chapter 8

  HE HAD SEEN DEAD bodies before. In diving on search and rescue missions he had seen his share of
death.

  But he had never seen anything like the corpse of Brenda Lopez.

  Slash marks marred nearly every part of her body. Blood had pooled beneath the skin. Dirt had found its way into the cuts. And yet her face had not been touched by the knife. Being thrown down to the canyon had done some damage to her once perfect features. But the knife had never touched her face.

  She invaded his dreams. She haunted him in a nightmare realm of his sleep. He wanted to waken, but couldn’t. He just kept seeing her, picture after picture after picture.

  “Her eyes were open when she was found,” Liam had told him when he realized Conar was looking at the photos. “She fought him,” he went on. “See the slashes on the hand, on the arm? She saw him. She tried to fight him off.”

  She had seen him, her eyes had been open …

  In the night, as he slept, Conar saw it all, too. A figure of darkness stalking, approaching the plastic curtain. And Brenda, seeing her attacker.

  Yet it wasn’t Brenda.

  It was Jennifer. Reddish hair falling wet against her neck and shoulders. He could hear the almost incredible hum of water. Jennifer’s eyes were on his.

  Huge, blue …

  Conar…

  She whispered his name, pleading …

  Help me …

  He awoke with a start, shaking.

  The room was pitch dark.

  He had never been afraid of the dark, even as a child. The drapes in David Granger’s old room were thick and heavy, and they blocked out all light. He lifted his wrist to his face and stared at the dial of his luminous wristwatch.

  Five a.m. Not quite morning. Still, he rose, restless, ill at ease. He took the terry robe from the foot of his bed and slipped into it, walked over to draw back the drapes to the windows that looked out on the rear of the house, the pool and patio, and the cliff.

  The morning was still dark outside, but pink streaks were beginning to break through. Staring out the window, he experienced the strangest feeling. Hackles rising. Something teasing his spine.

  He spun around.

  Nothing. No flurry of movement, nothing.

  Just the feeling …

  He walked across the room and turned on the large overhead light. Nothing.

  It was a great room. David Granger’s vision and imagination were evident in the decor. There was a huge, carved four-poster bed with Viking motifs and symbols. A large desk with clawed feet, a bureau, and even a swivel mirror with handsome carving on the legs had the same design. Chairs and a love seat were arranged before a fireplace with a stone mantel, and there were doors to the closet and dressing room and bath.

  Feeling a bit foolish, he walked to the closet, opened it, walked in. His clothing was neatly arranged on the hangers, shoes on the floor. He closed the closet door and opened the door to the bath and dressing room. The latter was a long mirrored hallway with a chair and a stool and extra towel or clothing racks. The bathroom was elaborate, with marble and a huge whirlpool bath in the center, his-and-her johns in separate closed rooms, separate shower stalls, and a massive double sink. It was a very masculine room in all, yet one that invited feminine companionship. Granger had been married, so his wife must have been a tolerant soul.

  The bath was empty, as the closet had been.

  He turned off the lights, closed the doors, and returned to the bedroom.

  He sat at the desk, looking at the journal that was open there. He had taken to keeping a journal years ago, after he had first started diving. Marking down dive sites, times, and conditions for underwater and counting time had been a curiously rewarding activity. He had written experiences during his time in the military, and taken to jotting down thoughts or notes that might be used at a later date.

  He thumbed through the last year.

  “Abby called today. She isn’t at all well. Wants me to take a job on her daughter’s soap. Thinks there’s a plot. A plot? In a soap. Is Abby mad? She doesn’t seem to realize her daughter is a porcupine, a snotty little brat, no, an out-and-out little anorexic bitch. Too tall, too thin, too much red in her hair. And a forked tongue.”

  He flipped forward.

  “Abby sounding panicky. Is she losing her mind? I hate California, but sure do love Abby. But dragon-child is there.”

  Was Abby losing her mind? She had no real evidence for the things she said. She admitted she had delusions, but stuck to this story.

  He flipped through more pages of his journal.

  A few days later.

  “Going to California. Will get muzzle for dragon-child.”

  He flipped to that day’s date. “Okay so dragon-child is pretty good-looking. I’ve always known she was beautiful. And now that I’ve actually seen her up close and personal in a towel, she isn’t at all anorexic. Actually, it’s a hell of a shape …”

  He laid the pencil down.

  Picked it back up.

  “Testosterone raging. She is still a dragon. As prickly as a porcupine. But hell, I’d like to get past those quills …”

  Lust. What a pathetic male instinct.

  He set the pencil down again. “Ass!” he told himself out loud. “She got sick. How sexy!” Yeah, right, like that did anything to dampen the way she looked wet, and in a towel …

  He started writing again. “She’s still a dragon-child. We’re going to fight over the operation; Abby is desperate to have it. She wants quality in her life, not this nightmare of not being able to breathe, to swallow, fearing that she’ll drool in front of people, that she’ll shake in pain and humiliation forever and ever. Jennifer must see this. She does love her mother. Her eyes are very beautiful when they touch Abby. Her voice is soft and tender. She can be exquisite. And then flippant, and rude and …”

  He dropped the pencil, swore, then picked up the pencil again.

  “On other matters—Molly should be arriving any day now with Ripper. Abby says we can try keeping him in the house, I told her we didn’t have to, Ripper can just get used to the kennel the same as Lady. I don’t want Jennifer having more fuel against me. Don’t want to aggravate her when I don’t have to, though honestly, sometimes I want to knock the chip off her shoulder. Then there are those moments when I’d like to reach out and feel the lines of her face …”

  He threw the pencil down this time, as if it were suddenly in flames. He gritted his teeth. He slammed the book back into the top drawer of the desk. He rose, flicked off the overhead light, and lay back down. No good.

  He swore again, headed into the shower, and turned the spray on cold.

  The shock of it had pretty much the desired effect. He closed his eyes, stood under the spray, and let it cascade over him. At length, he turned it to warm and lifted his face.

  He turned off the water, toweled dry.

  It was still five-thirty. He was exhausted, and he was going to be a bear himself if he didn’t get some sleep. He lay down on the bed.

  There was light in the room. He had forgotten the drapes. Pink illumination seeped in.

  Close the drapes …

  He’d have to get up to do that. If he got up again, he wasn’t getting back down.

  He dozed, and had the nightmare again; he knew it, he struggled to free himself from it, knowing worse was coming.

  He awoke with a start, bolting up. He looked at his watch. After six.

  Might as well get some coffee. Hell, coffee had to be an improvement over the way he felt right now.

  Aspirin might have helped. Sure, her headache might have been worse. She could have felt as if her head were actually going to explode rather than just pound out a merciless jungle beat all day.

  Abby liked to go to church. She liked to attend the ten o’clock mass, and Jennifer always made sure that she took her. Edgar usually drove them; she usually sat in the back with Abby, watching her anxiously. Theirs was a neighborhood church where the parishioners were accustomed to the rich and famous, and the infamous, and their privacy was maintained.

  That morning Doug attende
d with them. He was cheerful, as was Abby. The two kept up a pleasant conversation. Conar drove. He was as adept and assured with Abby’s Lexus as Edgar had ever been.

  He looked exceptionally good as well. Clean, lean, sleek in black slacks, black knit shirt, and beige jacket. His dark hair was freshly washed, combed back. He had a great tan. How had he achieved that in New York?

  He was wearing dark glasses, so she couldn’t read his eyes. But looking at him, at least he didn’t seem as if he were laughing at her. Which he might have been after last night. Actually, he seemed far too grave.

  Church was uneventful. Abby seemed to be having a good day. She was shaking but almost imperceptibly. When they left, she suggested donuts. Delighted to hear her mother excited about the prospect of food, Jennifer quickly agreed.

  They talked about the party, and Doug told them earnestly, “The house is haunted. I can feel it.”

  “Doug Henson!” Abby protested. “Don’t you go spreading rumors about my beautiful house.”

  “Oh, Abby, I love your house. You know that. And I’m so grateful to be a guest in it.” Doug squeezed Abby’s hand. “And thank the good Lord for holiday weekends. I have another night in the house. That is, if you’re not shipping me out?”

  “Not if you promise not to start rumors,” Abby said.

  “I won’t start any rumors. But it creaks at night. And you can hear things …”

  “Things?” Jennifer said, a little too sharply.

  “Ghostly footsteps, moving along the hallways.” He waved a hand. “Movement in the air. I locked my door, I can tell you.”

  Conar set down his coffee, staring at Doug through the dark lenses of his glasses.

  “If ghosts are tramping the hallways, why would they pause for a locked door?”

  “I don’t know,” Doug said with a shrug. He grinned. “Hey, any little hindrance.”

  “Oh, Conar,” Abby said suddenly, “your friend Molly called this morning. She expects to be in by this afternoon. Lovely girl. We chatted, and she was vague about her plans, so I insisted she stay for the night, at the least.”

  Molly? Who the hell was Molly? Her mother’s house was becoming Grand Central Station.

  “Well, that’s great,” Conar said. He rose. “Shall we head on back?”