Hiding in the Shadows (32 page)

“Oh? The way Dinah talked?”

“Surely you don’t think this one will be that tough? She’s no bigger than a minute, and it’s easy to see she’d jump out of her skin if anybody yelled boo.”

“She survived that car accident, didn’t she? She came out of a coma when she should have ended up a vegetable. I wouldn’t underestimate her if I were you.”

“She’ll talk,” Max repeated stubbornly. “We’ll get the box, and then we’ll be safe. If you think it’s necessary, we can plant the box so it looks like Jed had it—all that clear evidence of blackmail. He gets the blame for that, Cochrane gets the blame for killing him, and we lay low for a few months.”

“And what about Faith Parker? They’ll know
exactly
when she disappeared, Max, and you told me yourself Cochrane’s still at the police station being questioned. He has an alibi for the time she vanished.”

“You can fix it so it looks like he hired somebody,” Max said, impatient. “You’ve always been able to fix things, Connie, ever since we were kids back in Seattle. Should be easy enough.”

Conrad swore viciously. “Easy? Do you realize how many rabbits I’ve already pulled out of my hat for you? Christ, if you’d just killed her in Seattle or, better yet, hadn’t been careless enough to leave that envelope in the office where she was bound to see it—”

“How was I to know Jed had hired a secretary with too much curiosity for her own good? Once she saw the note from me to him it was only a matter of time before she figured out the insurance scam. I had to get rid of her.”

“But you didn’t get rid of her, did you? You didn’t even make sure what she looked like, killed the sister instead and the mother with her.”

“Look, never mind all that, it’s water under the bridge. I’ve got her now, and I don’t intend to stop until she’s told me where that goddamned box is.”

You hid it in the only place you felt really safe. That’s why I couldn’t tell him. He wouldn’t have been able to get into Haven House, and so he would have burned it down to destroy the evidence. They would have been killed, all of them. Karen and Eve, Andrea and little Katie. I couldn’t let that happen.…

Faith closed her eyes briefly, then opened them and tried to figure out her options. She had to get past the open door and the men inside the room … and she had to get out of this house. Unaware of where the windows and doors were, she was bound to make mistakes, especially if she was running.

But what choice did she have? She risked another
look into the room. Conrad had turned toward a desk against the far wall, and Faith could have laughed aloud when Max turned in the same direction. Both their backs were now to the door.

Now or never
.

Holding her breath, Faith slipped quickly and silently past the doorway.

“If you’re determined to be stupid, at least don’t be insane,” Conrad was saying angrily. “To bring her here! There’s no way I’ll allow you—”

“I didn’t know if you wanted another body pinned on Cochrane, so …”

Faith reached the foot of the stairs and went up them swiftly. From what had been said in that room, she gathered she was at Conrad’s lakeside vacation home somewhere outside the city. Which meant she had no idea where she was.

Away. Just get away. Worry about where you are later
.

At the top of the stairs she found herself in a small hallway, which led to a dining room and a kitchen, where there appeared to be an exterior door. At the end of the hall was a living room, with another staircase going up.

Don’t go up. The nitwits in the movies always climb the stairs, and how they expect to get off the roof when someone’s chasing them—

“I know,” Faith whispered. She continued to move carefully, desperate to make certain no squeaking floorboard betrayed her to the men below. The front door, she thought, was probably near the living room, but this door out of the kitchen was closer.

As soon as she opened it, Faith detected the unmistakable odors of a garage. A closed garage. And garage doors were very noisy when they opened.

She swore inwardly and drew back into the kitchen, just as she heard heavy, quick footsteps on the basement stairs and Max swearing grimly.

With no time to do anything else, Faith slipped through the door into the garage, closing it silently behind her.

He’s very good at playing cat and mouse. Don’t hide. Get away
.

The garage was dark; Faith had to feel her way. Moving as fast as she dared, she nearly fell over the hood of a sports car. Were the keys in it? She tried the doors but they were locked.

Growing accustomed to the darkness now, she made out the garage door, which was closed, and two windows, which were high up and also closed. Nothing to stand on.

Was there an automatic door opener? She peered up at the tracks above the car and made out the box. So there would be a remote in the car, most likely, and one by the door to the kitchen.

She felt her way back to the door, fear growing, horribly aware of the minutes ticking away. She heard the voices inside rise in a violent argument, heard them get louder as Max and Conrad came in her direction, and then a deafening gunshot.

Terrified, Faith punched the panel of the garage-door opener. Instantly, the garage was filled with bright light, and the big door began to move up laboriously and loudly.

Nearly blinded, Faith lunged for the garage door and ducked under it just as the kitchen door opened and she heard a curse behind her.

She ran.

It was dark and cold and wet; the rain must have stopped only recently, because water dripped everywhere. The drive was narrow, hardly more than two rutted tracks, and treacherous because of the mud. The woods pressed in toward her on both sides; she had no idea in which direction the lake lay.

She ran.

All she could hear was her heart thundering, her breath rasping in her throat, but Faith was certain he was behind her, gaining on her. Maybe he’d be in the car, maybe he was on foot, but he was behind her, she knew that. More than once she slipped, but miraculously kept her footing well enough to continue moving forward, away from the house.

Something loomed up out of the darkness ahead of her, reaching for her, and for an instant of sheer terror Faith thought one of them had circled around and gotten ahead of her.

“Faith. Jesus, Faith—”

She found herself caught tightly in Kane’s arms, so tightly she wasn’t sure if it was her heart or his pounding so wildly, and gasped, “Behind me. He’s behind me—”

And then everything happened very, very fast. Kane swung her around so that his large body shielded hers. She heard an engine roar, and bright lights stabbed suddenly through the darkness, pinning her and Kane in the stark glare. She heard the sounds of tires spinning wildly on slippery ground,
saw headlights coming drunkenly at them, and then the engine screaming louder, and she saw Kane’s arm stretch out, saw something gleaming in his hand.

His first shot made glass shatter, and then there were other guns, other shots, and he was moving, carrying her away from danger as the car careened off the drive and plowed into the trees with a sickening crunch of metal.

The engine screamed again, then gurgled and died.

“It has to be later than midnight,” Faith said. “It just has to be. This has been the longest day of my life.”

“I wish you’d let me call a doctor,” Kane said.

“You heard the EMS medic. I’m fine. No injuries, no shock, not even aftereffects of the chloroform.” Faith curled up in the big chair before the fire Kane had lit while she’d been in the shower, and watched him as he stood gazing at the flames.

“Still,” he said. “Like you said, it’s been a very long day.”

“And I should be exhausted. But I’m not.” She paused, aware of his silence and the tension between them. “Did you say Bishop was flying down in the morning?”

“Yeah. He would have come tonight, but we were able to find you fairly quickly. Guy already had the information on Conrad’s lake house, and I couldn’t think of any other place he’d go, so …”

“The cops were shooting too, Kane. It might not have been your bullet that killed Max Sanders.”

He turned his head and looked at her. “I hope it was mine.”

“Revenge?”

“Justice. Now he’ll be rotting in the ground.”

She drew a breath. “What about Conrad? They say he might pull through.”

“I hope he does,” Kane said calmly. “I want him in prison. I want him to spend the rest of his life in a small, bare cell.”

“He probably will. Once Richardson sorts through their blackmail box, he’s bound to find Conrad’s prints on the photographs and papers. He and Max wouldn’t have been so desperate to get the box back if they hadn’t been positive what was in it could convict them.”

Kane shook his head. “All this time, the box was hidden in Haven House.”

“The only place I felt really safe,” Faith murmured. “I’m sorry, Kane. Sorry I dragged Dinah into this, sorry I didn’t tell her that I’d found the box snooping in Conrad’s office because I’d seen Max go in there. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to remember.”

“Do you remember everything now?”

It was her turn to shake her head. “No, just bits and pieces. But it’s a beginning. I guess Dr. Burnett was right—it’ll all come back eventually.”

Kane returned his gaze to the fire and was silent.

“Now that the story has an ending of sorts,” Faith said, “I guess we won’t have to worry about reporters following us around.”

“It isn’t over yet. I still have to arrange a memorial service.”

“I … heard Richardson tell you they’d have the autopsy results in the morning. Then they’ll release her body?”

“Yes.”

Faith felt a dull ache. Well, what else had she expected? He’d said himself that no one would ever be able to take Dinah’s place. And now that it was over, now that he had his puzzle virtually put together and she had the satisfaction of knowing the murderer of her mother and sister was dead, they would go on with their lives.

Their separate lives.

Faith looked down at the floor. Why had she even gotten dressed after her shower and come in here? Why hadn’t she just gone to bed and left him alone? He obviously wanted to be alone. “I guess … now that the danger is past, I can go … home. Back to my apartment.”

“I don’t want you to go,” he said.

She felt her heart skip a beat, but kept her gaze determinedly down. “I know I just moved into your life for a week, and I want you to know I’m grateful. I would have been so frightened on my own, and probably dead by now—”

“I don’t want you to go,” he repeated slowly.

She had to look up then, and met his gaze with a sensation of being stripped naked of more than her clothing.

Even more slowly, in a tone of realization and reluctance and acceptance, he said, “I … don’t … want you to go.”

Don’t question. Not yet. Not now
.

Faith was on her feet before she realized she was going to move, and he was turning toward her, putting his hands on her shoulders.

“I didn’t plan this,” she said.

“I know. Neither did I.”

“I … I’m not … I couldn’t stay if it was only because—”

“It isn’t.”

Faith pulled breath into lungs starving for air. “Are you sure? It’s only her red polish, her earrings, but I’m not—”

Kane lowered his head and covered her mouth with his.

She heard a broken sound, and realized it came from her, from deep inside where something had let go. She felt the hardness of his body against hers, felt her fingers slide into his hair and her mouth come alive beneath his, and there was something so familiar and intimate and wildly arousing in his touch, his kiss, the strength of his arms around her, that she wanted to cling to him with all her might, all her will.

“You’ll stay,” he muttered against her lips.

“Yes.”

He raised his head and stared down at her, gray eyes molten. He framed her face with his hands, and she could feel them shaking.

Fierce, he said, “I won’t be so careful this time, do you understand? I won’t bite back what I want to say because I’m afraid it isn’t what you want to hear. I won’t stop myself from touching you because I’m not sure you want to be touched. And most of all, I won’t let you shut me out of the parts of your life that
matter
to you.”

Faith reached up to touch his face. “I love you.”

He caught his breath, then kissed her again, his mouth hard now, insistent. He lifted her, carried her from the living room to the bedroom.

She was hardly aware of being set on her feet beside the bed, of helping him pull off her sweater and slide the pants down her legs. She was unbuttoning his shirt, tugging it from his pants, and gasped when his hands pushed aside her bra and held her breasts.

Her hands fumbled, but she managed to push his shirt off his shoulders, unfasten his pants. She touched him and heard his indrawn breath, felt the wildly spiraling tension inside both of them wind even tighter. Touching him was necessary; it fed the starving need inside her.

“Ah, God,” he muttered, hoarse and desperate.

They were on the bed somehow, the covers thrown away, pillows scattered. The lamplight let them see, but their hands saw more, moving everywhere, shaping and fondling and caressing. Lips never more than a whisper apart. Bodies straining to be closer, to merge, to meld.

He felt so right to Faith. So right touching her. So right inside her, filling an emptiness she hadn’t known was there, claiming that part of her for himself.

“I love you,” she whispered, and knew she always had.

SEVENTEEN

“So I guess it’s all over now,” Dinah said
.

“I guess so.”

“Puzzle completed, treasure found. Bad guys vanquished.”

“You might have been more help,” Faith accused
.

Dinah smiled. “It had to happen the way it happened. Things do, you know. So don’t feel bad.”

“About Kane?”

“You love him. I wanted to, but … I couldn’t, not the way he deserved.”