Past Tense (6 page)

She was far better off than her simple clothing suggested. The flat was the first indication. It was an expensive piece of real estate, and even if she were subletting, the rent would have been beyond what a free-lance translator could afford.

In her bathroom he had seen the most conclusive evidence of wealth. Growing up with three sisters had given him a solid working knowledge of female paraphernalia. The cosmetics, some of which were barely used and obviously recent purchases, were of the highest quality, the most expensive brands. Crystal bottles contained French perfume.

And the underwear drying on a little rack over the bathtub—pure silk and lace. Only her outer garments were plain and utilitarian. He would have given anything for a look in her closet, but hadn’t wanted to risk her catching him snooping. It had been rude enough of him to go through her bathroom cabinets.

The morning after he’d left her apartment, he’d woken with a start from the fitful sleep he’d fallen into after nearly a whole night of puzzling over the problem.

His photo in the newspaper. Had she hatched the idea of meeting him that morning when she’d seen the paper? The story had indicated he was from Montréal. What better cover than to strike up an acquaintance with him—expatriate Canadians meeting in London.

Yet that didn’t add up, either. Her faint had been real. He would have sworn to it. And she hadn’t encouraged him. On the contrary, she’d had done everything she could to keep him at arm’s length.

He couldn’t figure her out. Even if she knew nothing about the trade conference, there was still a mystery to her.

He mulled it over all day Friday and most of Saturday as he completed mountains of paperwork in preparation for the conference. He called room service for a sandwich at ten, laughing ruefully as he thought how odd his friends would have found it to see him in the office on a Saturday evening. He’d declined an invitation to a party at a duchess’s mansion, and several offers of a more personal nature from women he knew. He’d been glad of the excuse of work.

Samantha’s image floated into his consciousness as he took a break. She wouldn’t leave him alone. He frowned heavily. There was only one way to get rid of her once and for all.

He had to see her again, satisfy his curiosity, and then she would stop haunting him.

Making up his mind, he turned back to his desk, and dialed the number he’d memorized off her utility bill.

His heart jumped when he heard her low voice. “Samantha, this is Tony,” he said. “How would you like to go for a drive with me tomorrow?”

* * * *

Damn, it
would
rain, Samantha thought as she got up on Sunday morning. The sun had held up for the entire week, only to disappear at the weekend.

She let Bagheera in and gave him his food. While he ate, she showered and dressed in jeans and a sweater, her movements abstracted. Had she made a mistake in accepting Tony’s invitation, after all her earlier resolutions to keep him out of her life? But when he’d called last night, the warmth and charm in his voice had moved her to accept. A drive seemed innocuous enough, and a welcome break.

Her biggest danger of exposure lay in his curiosity. If she could disarm him with simple friendship, she was safer.

She’d called Amelia in Nice late the night before, but the artist had assured her that no one had contacted her about Samantha. In fact, Amelia, working to complete a series for an exhibit, hadn’t seen anyone at all in two weeks except for a lost tourist who’d stopped by her isolated villa to ask directions.

The incident at the supermarket bothered Samantha. In itself it might have been nothing but a weird coincidence. But combined with the threat she’d received, it took on sinister significance. The woman who’d almost been kidnapped had looked like Sam, at least superficially, and she’d been in the supermarket at the time Sam habitually shopped there.
Sam couldn’t ignore it. On the other hand, hiding in her flat wouldn’t keep her safe for long, if someone was determined to find her.

Changing some of her habits might throw them off the track for a while. In the meantime, going out with Tony just this once would take her mind off her problems—give her the illusion of normalcy.

She glanced at her watch—9:25. He said he’d be by at half past. Bagheera had settled himself in the living room chair to sleep off his nightly carousing. He opened one eye and blinked as she patted his head, then tucked his nose between his folded paws. Satisfied, she left him, knowing he’d be fine until she returned.

* * * *

“Good morning.”

Startled, Sam looked around as she descended the last flight of stairs. “Oh, good morning.”

The man was about her height and age, with curly brown hair and a friendly, engaging smile.

“I’m new here, haven’t met many of the other residents.” With a backward toss of his head, he indicated the floor above them. “My name’s Jason Wheeler. I’m on the second floor. You are—?”

He was handsome in a boyish way. Harmless. She opened her mouth to answer. “I’m—excuse me. I’ve got to go. See you later.”

Quickly she ran down the rest of the stairs, stopping to catch her breath when she reached the street door. It was probably her own paranoia, brought on by months of considering herself a fugitive. He looked innocent enough, but when he’d asked her name, she had noticed his eyes. They were brown, but not warm like Tony’s. There had been something hard and calculating, in their scrutiny of her.

No, she had misjudged badly in the case of Bennett with his charming mouth but barracuda instincts. She had no intention of falling for the wrong man again.

Tony? Well, she would suspend judgment for the moment. She was only planning to spend a couple of hours with him. What harm would it do as long as she reminded herself that there was no room in her disjointed life for a relationship.

Tony stood outside, next to a small white car. He was smiling, his eyes on the glass-paneled door through which she would come. She pushed it open. It was too late to back out now.

Tony felt his heart lurch as she skipped lightly down the shallow step. He loved the way she walked, so quick and free. “Hi. You’re late.” Inane. He hadn’t been this awkward on his first date at fifteen.

“Only a minute or two.” Her laughter had a musical lilt that made the gray day light up.

“Cute car,” she added, still a little off-balance from the encounter with her new neighbor. “I thought all big shots drove a Rolls or a Daimler.” As soon as the words were out, she could have cursed her errant tongue. Another slip.

Big shot? The phrase jangled in Tony’s brain. Did the British use “big shot”? He bent to open the passenger door, hiding his reaction as he made up his mind to listen closely, and question her again if he found an opportunity to do so without arousing her suspicions.

“I like this car,” he said. “And it’s mine. There’s a Jag that comes with the job, but I only use it for what you might call state occasions.”

Sam exhaled gustily as he closed the door with a solid thump. He hadn’t noticed, but she’d have to be more careful.

“Where are we going?” she asked as he threaded the Peugeot onto one of the main arteries that carried commuters in and out of the city.

The wipers swished monotonously, clearing the glass as the rain fell more heavily. “First to a small town in Surrey. I have to look at a hotel that just came on the market. It might be suitable for our chain.”

He smiled at her, his face unclouded, honest, making Sam feel guilty at the duplicity of her own circumstances. “After that I’ll be free, at your disposal.”

“It’s too bad about the rain,” Sam murmured. “A picnic would have been nice.”

“Just like Vancouver where I lived for five years before coming here, good weather all week and then rain on the weekend.”

The hotel was a disappointment, a shabby little hole-in-the-wall with a gloomy pub that smelled of centuries of stale beer and old smoke.

The owners must have been desperate for a sale. The estate agent representing the property practically twisted Tony’s arm as they were leaving. “But the location, Mr. Theopoulos,” he said. “You won’t find another like it.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony said, the courteous regret in his tone making him rise another notch in Sam’s estimation. “It’s not what I’m looking for.”

He shook his head as they drove away, leaving the agent gazing after them from under a dripping black umbrella. “The owners are old. They want to retire to the coast, or to Spain if they make enough on the sale. But it’s too small and out of the way, even if the condition of the building were better. I can’t use it.”

Rolling hills stretched around them, the expanse of green dotted with grazing sheep and the occasional stone cottage. Their car’s headlights tracked a glistening path on the wet asphalt road.

“Is he right about the location being a good one?” Sam asked.

Tony shrugged, slowing as they entered another village, a single street lined with thatched stone houses. “It’s picturesque, but probably a little too far off the beaten track. It looks as if the owner didn’t have much money for improvements the past few years.” He downshifted as he pulled into the narrow parking lot of a pub. “This should do for lunch. Are you hungry?”

She’d skipped breakfast that morning, her stomach tied in nervous knots as she debated the wisdom of seeing Tony. Now it growled inelegantly. She laughed. “I might as well admit it. I’m starved.”

Tony frowned at the blue Mini parked on the street just beyond the pub. “I’m sure I saw that car in Swivington, by the hotel.”

The familiar uneasy fluttering began in Samantha’s chest. “The estate agent’s perhaps?”

“No, I don’t think so. It was gone when we came out. Well, no matter. It’s probably somebody like us who didn’t fancy the looks of that bar and decided to go to the next place up the road for lunch.”

Still, Samantha entered the door in a state of prickly alertness. But the few patrons of the pub were strangers. None of them resembled anyone she’d encountered in the past week, when the routine of her life had been disturbed.

The interior of the pub was shadowy except for the warm cheer of a fire blazing in a cavernous fireplace. Old, stained-glass windows filtered the day’s fitful light through a veil of rain.

Tony placed their orders at the bar, then led Sam to a table in the corner near the fire.

She sat staring at the flames, wondering what to talk about. When a person hid significant events in her past, it was difficult to think of a subject that didn’t reflect back to it.

Tony, too, was silent, his fingertips drumming lightly on the scarred wooden table. Samantha sighed, and he stirred. “Samantha, what are you thinking?’

She shook her head. “Nothing.” She threw him a quick smile that had a quality of sadness in it. “I’m sorry I’m such poor company.”

“It’s the weather. It’s easy to feel down on a day like this.”

The barman brought their food, hot vegetable soup and thick cheese sandwiches made with homemade bread. They ate quickly, as if they both thought this outing was a mistake and wanted to end it as soon as possible.

A fresh gust of rain came in as the door opened, sending the flames in the fireplace crackling and snapping up the chimney. A burly truck driver, his felt cap angled over one ear, staggered in, burdened by a large carton that showed dark water stains at the corners.

He set the box at the end of the bar, pulling an invoice from the inside pocket of a suede jacket that showed little of its original nap. The barman scrawled a signature, then reached under the bar and handed the trucker a white envelope, which he tucked into his pocket.

He touched the brim of his cap. “Cheerio, mate.”

With an unhurried rolling gait he walked out the door. A moment later the roar of a diesel engine announced his departure.

The rain was falling with relentless persistence from a leaden sky when Tony and Sam returned to the car. The street lay deserted, its cobblestones shining darkly in the dull light.

The blue Mini was gone. “Guess he wasn’t in the pub after all,” Tony remarked. “I didn’t see anyone leave.”

More coincidence? They’d seen the Mini twice in a space of hours. She’d seen a black Jaguar a number of times over the past week, although she still hadn’t managed to get a license number. Was somebody shadowing her? Or was it really just one of those happenstances that occur every so often?

“Maybe they had business elsewhere,” she said.

“Probably.” He started the car. “Do you want the motorway, or shall we take the scenic route?”

As a date, it had been a dud. Not sure whether to cut it short, or to hope that something could still be salvaged, she hesitated.

“The scenic route, I think,” Tony decided for her.

The road, bordered by hedges on one side, was narrow and twisting. Tony drove with skill and confidence on what still felt like the wrong side of the road to Samantha. When he asked her if she’d like to try the car, she barely restrained herself from reacting with horror.

“No, you drive. I’m enjoying the ride.” Her lips felt stiff and she wondered if he noticed.

“You have a license, don’t you?” he asked.

“Of course I have.” A Canadian one. “But since I don’t have a car at the moment, I’m out of practice,” she lied.

“Out of practice, or just not used to these roads?” he asked, more curtly than he’d intended. Frustration welled up in him. He’d learned nothing. All his questions and gentle probes had been met with silence or evasions.

She’d taken the risk. She would bluff again and hope to get away with it. But after today she would make sure she didn’t see him again. Lifting her chin, she cast him an imperious look before returning to her contemplation of the rain-streaked windshield. “I’ll have you know I’ve been driving since—Tony, look out!”

From a narrow driveway, a truck, gray as the weather, lurched toward them. Tony swung the steering wheel in a frantic half circle. The tires skidded on the rain-slicked asphalt, sending the car toward a ditch on the opposite side of the road. At the last second Tony regained control, swerving the car inches from the truck’s heavy steel bumper.