Always in My Dreams (8 page)

"I want you to send for the police," Moira said, looking at the clock. "Liam O'Shea will be another forty minutes making his rounds. I don't want to wait that long for help. Someone should search the grounds now."

"I'll dress and go out, Mama, if it will make you feel better, but I think the intruder's long gone." Skye spoke to her father then. "It's still a good idea to get the police. Your offices at Northeast may be in danger of being ransacked. He wanted to know where you had a safe."

"You told him?"

She shook her head. "I couldn't talk. He gagged me." She saw her mother's horrified look and went on quickly.

"He didn't really expect me to know. He thought I was a servant."

Jay Mac patted Moira's hand. "I'll send Mr. Cavanaugh to find O'Shea. Skye, you're not to go outside again, dressed or not." He stood. "Do you have a description of the man?"

"No. I was blindfolded." She heard the catch of her mother's breath and rushed to reassure her. "I'm
fine.
Really, I'm fine."

Moira remained skeptical, studying Skye carefully. She pointed to Skye's wrist. "Sure, and I don't remember seeing that bruise before."

Skye followed her mother's eyes to her wrist. There was indeed a bruise forming. "I had a knife. He forced me to drop it."

Now Moira sat back on the sofa. She crossed herself and whispered, "Mother of God."

"I'm getting Mr. Cavanaugh," said Jay Mac. "Skye, don't say another word to your mother. Better yet, make
her
some tea." He hurried out of the room.

Skye sat forward. "Mama? Would you like some tea?"

"A little whiskey wouldn't be amiss."

She smiled. "All right. I think I could use the same. I believe I'm actually trembling." She held out her hand and watched it quaver. "What a night this has been." Skye got up and went to the dining room. She returned with two tumblers splashed with whiskey and handed one to her mother. "Did Jay Mac tell you what happened at the skating pond tonight? About me being pregnant?"

"I thought your father told you not to say another word," Moira said drily. "I'm sure I don't want to hear any more."

Skye smiled. Obviously her mother knew the story. "Well, then, I finished my letter of introduction to Mr. Parnell." Moira's look was blank. "The inventor."

Moira nodded. "I see. You're going to go through with it. I wasn't certain if you would."

"It will be fun," she said. "If only to foil Jay Mac's plan."

"You know he has a plan?"

"He always does. I can't imagine this would be different." Skye curled her legs under her and pulled the blanket around her shoulders. She sipped her drink. "Is it the inventor? Does Jay Mac think he would make a good husband?"

Moira found a reason to smile. "That would be like him, wouldn't it?"

"He hasn't told you?"

"He never confides those kinds of plans. I didn't know about Rennie and Jarret or about that awful mess with Maggie and Connor until it was much too late. He knows I don't approve of that sort of interference."

Jay Mac returned. He was holding the butcher knife in one hand. "Mr. Cavanaugh's gone for the police. I've looked in the study. It appears nothing was taken." He held up the knife. "Oh, and I found this on the floor. What were you thinking, Skye?"

"I suppose I wasn't," she admitted. "At least, not clearly."

Jay Mac could only shake his head. "I need a drink." He disappeared into the hallway, taking the knife with him.

The beat cop arrived ten minutes later. He was followed in short order by two more policemen from the station. Mr. Cavanaugh waited on the outskirts of the gathering until Jay Mac assured him he wouldn't be needed again.

Skye made her statement still wrapped in the throw blanket, then Moira hustled her off to bed. Jay Mac went with one of the policemen to the Worth Building, while another stayed on the premises to guard against the intruder's return. Liam O'Shea went back to his beat, alert now to danger in the neighborhood.

Skye rubbed her feet against the cool sheets as her mother tucked her in. She didn't protest Moira's fussing. The act was reassuring for both mother and daughter.

Moira sat on the edge of the bed and touched Skye's forehead with the back of her hand. "You're still chilled," she said, her brow furrowing. "I hope you're not coming down with the ague. Sure, and you were outside in your bare feet without much more than a stitch of clothing on."

Taking her mother's hand, Skye held it firmly between both of hers. "I'll be fine, Mama. It's been an adventurous night, is all."

Moira's reply was a noncommittal grunt at the back of her throat.

Skye smiled. "Good night."

For a moment Moira didn't move. She studied her daughter's flushed face, the cheeks that looked as if excitement had burned color into them, the contented shape of her full mouth, the brightness of eyes that were so brilliantly green they'd shame a shamrock. Moira did not think blood ties were prejudicing her when she thought her daughter, in the space of a few hours, had transcended mere prettiness, even beauty, and become simply radiant.

Moira felt the ache of tears pressing at the backs of her eyes. She blinked to hold them back. "Oh, child," she said softly, leaning forward to kiss Skye's cheek. "You're a piece of work."

Skye started to ask her mother what she meant, but Moira was already removing herself from the bed and turning back the lamps. Rolling on her side, Skye stared at the crack of light beneath the closed door until it, too, was extinguished. She heard her mother's light footsteps recede in the hallway.

Skye was almost asleep when she realized she hadn't told anyone about the encounter in the park, yet in retrospect, she knew the oversight had somehow been intentional.

It was the secret knowledge of this stranger, a man whose face she had not seen, whose voice she had barely heard, that she hugged to herself as she drifted slowly to sleep. It was the stranger who became the unifying thread in the fabric of all her dreams.

* * *

Jonathan Parnell was an attractive man. His appeal for some rested partially on his very aloof, almost forbidding posture. While not precisely cold, he was nevertheless only marginally interested in what others were doing or saying. Not only could he be alone in a crowd, he cultivated a serious, reserved air that shielded him from incidental or frivolous conversation.

His hair was a pale yellow color that camouflaged premature threads of platinum and gray. In the sunshine it could still have the brilliance of youth. His blue eyes had dark indigo centers that lent his expression a certain opaque flatness that could be remote or merely mysterious. His features were sharply chiseled, with fine aristocratic lines defining his jaw and chin.

Parnell's mouth bore a distinctive stamp of disapproval as he entered his suite at the St. Mark Hotel. Walker Caide was sitting on a wide overstuffed armchair facing the door. The perfect stillness of his face, the hard look of slightly narrowed eyes, was the only indication of anger that Parnell could observe. In their brief association he had learned Walker's fury was more like lightning than thunder.

Walker Caide didn't move. He watched Parnell remove his hat and coat and hang them on the rack just inside the room. "A woman?" he asked.

Two fingers were raised. "Plural."

The shape of Walker's solemnly set mouth didn't change. He said evenly, "This isn't going to work, Mr. Parnell. I can't protect you if you won't follow my instructions." He stood, coming to his feet in a single easy movement. Reaching in his pocket, he withdrew a roll of bills. "This month's wage. I haven't earned it." He held out his hand.

Parnell didn't make any attempt to take the offering. He studied Walker Caide with dispassionate interest. "You can't quit," he said finally. "There is the matter of my life."

Walker shrugged. Jonathan Parnell was his senior by fifteen years but tonight he had acted with the sense of a fifteen-year-old. "This trip to the city was made against my advice, but you did agree to certain rules."

"This trip was a necessity," Parnell said. "I needed supplies for my work... things I couldn't have ordered." He made a brusque, impatient gesture with his hand and brushed past Walker in order to get to the sideboard. "I've already explained that. I hate to repeat myself."

Walker remained unmoved by his employer's irritation. He thrust the roll of money back in his pocket and turned to watch Parnell pour himself a drink. Walker shook his head when he was offered the same. "Where did you go?" he asked.

"The Seven Sisters. It's a—"

"Brothel."

One pale golden brow was raised and Parnell studied Walker again, this time assimilating different information. "I see," he said slowly. "You're familiar with it." He wondered how Walker satisfied his own needs. He couldn't recall seeing Walker demonstrate any interest in the female staff, but he was aware there was interest in the other direction. He supposed that some women found Walker's slightly crooked nose an intriguing flaw.

His stare became vague again, introspective. He would never understand women.

"Not intimately."

"Hmm?" he asked. "What was that?"

Walker repeated himself calmly giving no outward sign that he was annoyed by his employer's inattention. "I'm not personally familiar with the brothel."

"Oh." He wondered if Walker Caide ever paid for his pleasure.

Walker wondered why Parnell paid for his. Yesterday's simple walk through the lobby of the St. Mark should have been enough to show Parnell that he was interesting to the opposite sex. Or had he really not noticed? "You should have remained here while I was out. I wasn't gone long."

"Did you get the things I asked for?"

"Some of them. A few shops were closed. Someone else wanted exact specifications that I couldn't give."

Parnell sighed. "I told you."

"I know. I'll escort you around tomorrow."

Parnell knocked back half his drink. "Tomorrow, eh?" he asked, one corner of his mouth lifting in a sardonic smile. "I suppose that means you're not quitting."

"I suppose it does," he said without inflection.

Nodding, Jonathan Parnell rolled the tumbler between his hands. "You'll be as happy to return to the valley as I."

"You're safer there. We both know that."

"I was thinking of my work. I'm anxious to get back to it."

Walker was silent, waiting. Parnell rarely talked about his project and his work area was off limits to Walker. Details about the project were rare. After a few moments Walker realized Parnell wasn't going to say anything about it now. "I want to get the rest of your supplies in the morning and get out of the city by noon. It's better if we travel during the day."

Parnell nodded. "That's fine. I'm not anxious to tempt fate again."

Walker was alert to the phrasing. He hadn't missed the reddened mark on Parnell's cheek, either. It made him want to touch the side of his own face. "Again? Was there an incident this evening?"

Finishing his drink, Parnell cleared his throat before he answered. "No. Tonight was... uneventful. I was referring to previous threats on my life."

"Then you were lucky. The people who want your invention wouldn't hesitate to put a whore in the Seven Sisters if they thought you might go there again."

Parnell considered that. "Intriguing thought. You think I was followed?"

"I know I was." He watched his employer's eyes cloud over, then become distant. "Don't worry. I lost them. No one saw me purchase any of the things on your list."

There was a hint of relief. "Secrecy is everything."

"So you've said."

Putting down his drink, Parnell raked his hair with his fingers. "I know. That's why you're going to be surprised at something I've done."

Walker doubted anything Parnell did could really take him off guard. He had planned too carefully for that. He hadn't yet reached his thirtieth year, but he wasn't inexperienced at his work. "What's that?" he asked politely.

"Before we left the valley I placed an ad with the
Chronicle
for a housekeeper. It was in this morning's paper."

Walker realized he'd been wrong. He
was
surprised. One of his tawny brows rose and his head cocked to the side as he simply stared at his employer. "Jesus," was all he said.

Chapter 3