The Vanishing

by Jayne Ann Krentz

  “That’s it?” Catalina said. “That’s all good old Uncle Victor is going to do? Question the damned clone?”

  “Trust me, Victor is taking this case very seriously.”

  “How do we know that?” Catalina asked.

  “He is sending the team to Seattle on the Foundation’s private jet.”

  “So?”

  “He sent me commercial,” Slater said.

  “You mean he went cheap where you were concerned?”

  “He would have had me booked economy class, but luckily Uncle Lucas intervened and told the travel department I had to fly first class.”

  “Yeah?” Catalina glanced at him. “Because you’re special?”

  “No, because I have a little problem with claustrophobia.”

  Catalina stared straight ahead at the road. “You’re not the only one.”

  “The night in the cave incident?”

  “Uh-huh. You?”

  “The month I spent locked up in the attic.”

  Catalina went quiet for a while.

  “You’ll be okay,” she said finally.

  “What?”

  “You’re worried that maybe you really have become what Deke called you,” she said. “An icer.”

  “Did you see that in a vision?”

  “I didn’t need a vision to figure out what you were thinking,” she said.

  “How can you be sure of that?”

  “Mostly because you haven’t brought up the subject.”

  “Let me get this straight. The fact that I haven’t talked about it made you realize I was thinking about it?”

  “Naturally.”

  He closed his eyes for a few seconds and then forced himself to open them again. Sleep summoned him with a Siren’s call but he did not dare give in to the lure. He might wake up in a room full of hallucinations.

  “Icers are supposed to be the stuff of paranormal legend,” he said quietly.

  Catalina smiled. “Like Vortex?”

  “I could have iced Deke’s aura.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “I could have killed him.”

  “You had a gun. You could have used that to kill him, too. But you didn’t. You’re not a blank, and you’re not one of the crazies. I’m assuming from the way you’re dealing with this issue that until now you didn’t know you could use your talent to cool someone’s aura?”

  “I knew that I was . . . changing. I just didn’t know how.”

  “Now you know.”

  “I’m an icer. One of the monsters.”

  “No, you are not one of the monsters.” Catalina’s voice sharpened. “Monsters do evil things because they can. You’ve got a new talent, but you are the same man you have been all along.”

  “You’ve only known me since this morning.”

  “Your aura is strong, but it’s stable, and you are in full control.”

  “You can really see all that?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I can also see that you are in desperate need of sleep. You burned a lot of energy today, and from what you told me earlier you didn’t get any sleep last night. You need to rest.”

  “It might not be a good idea for me to sleep.”

  “Are you afraid you’ll wake up in the attic?”

  “I’m serious, damn it.”

  “Go to sleep, partner,” Catalina said. “I’ll wake you when we get to Fogg Lake.”

  “You’ve still got that auto-injector?”

  “Yes, but I won’t need it.”

  “Keep it handy.”

  “Okay.”

  He gave up trying to fight the exhaustion. He bunched up his jacket, wedged it into the corner created by the door and the headrest of the seat, and closed his eyes.

  He was out between one breath and the next.

  He fell straight into the locked-up-in-the-attic dream.

  “What did you put in the food this time?” he asks.

  “Just a little something to ease the visions,” Uncle Victor says.

  “How long are you going to keep me locked up?”

  “Until you have recovered,” Uncle Lucas says. “Eat the soup. You’ll feel better afterward.”

  “I don’t want any more drugs. They might make me sleep, but the nightmares are worse than the hallucinations.”

  “You need to sleep,” Uncle Lucas says. “Eat the soup. If you don’t you’re going to end up in Halcyon Manor.”

  He picks up a spoon and starts to eat the sedative-laden soup . . .

  “Wake up, Slater,” Catalina said. “We’re almost there. Just in time, too. It’s getting dark. Night comes early in these mountains. Another half hour and we wouldn’t have been able to make it into town.”

  He opened his eyes, braced for four walls and a room full of nightmares. But all he saw were tendrils of fog creeping out of the heavy woods that bordered the narrow road.

  A battered sign came up in the headlights of the SUV.

  WELCOME TO FOGG LAKE.

  NOTHING TO SEE HERE.

  CHAPTER 21

  The sharp raps on the front door sounded just as Catalina was studying the limited selection of canned goods in the kitchen cupboard and trying to decide whether to heat up beans or chicken soup for breakfast.

  “It’s Bev Atkins, Catalina, dear. Heard you arrived in town late last night. Figured you might need some basics for breakfast. I’ve got eggs and a fresh loaf of bread for you.”

  Catalina closed the cupboard. She walked quickly out of the old kitchen and across the small, cozy living room. She opened the door and smiled at the cheerful middle-aged woman on the front step.

  “Good morning, Ms. Atkins,” she said.

  “It’s Bev, dear. You’re not a little girl anymore. No need to be so polite.” Bev held out a picnic hamper. “Here you go. Everything you need for breakfast. Enough for two people. I heard you had a friend with you.”

  By now it was a good bet that everyone in Fogg Lake knew she had brought a friend with her. It would be interesting to see if the welcome baskets continued to arrive after word went out that the friend was an Arganbright and that he was from the Foundation.

  Catalina took the basket. “Thank you so much. I really appreciate this. I didn’t think to do some grocery shopping before leaving Seattle. Mom keeps some canned goods on hand, but it would have been beans and chicken soup for breakfast if you hadn’t dropped by.”

  “Euclid will have the general store open later this morning, so you’ll be able to stock up.” Bev peered past Catalina’s shoulder. “Is your friend up and about yet?”

  Slater spoke before Catalina could say anything.

  “I am up and hungry,” he said. He crossed the room and came to a halt just behind Catalina. “Slater Arganbright.” He glanced at the contents of the picnic hamper. “That looks great.”

  Bev’s eyes widened. “Arganbright?”

  “Yes, ma’am. One of Victor Arganbright’s nephews. I don’t think I caught your name.”

  Catalina decided she was under no obligation to explain or defend Slater’s presence. He was an Arganbright. He could fend for himself. She gave him a bland smile.

  “This is Beverly Atkins,” she said. “She lives just down the road.”

  Slater ducked his head in polite acknowledgment of the introduction. “Ms. Atkins.”

  “We don’t get a lot of visitors from the Foundation,” Bev said, her tone turning sharp. “Generally speaking, we don’t have the sort of problems that tend to attract the attention of that bunch in Las Vegas, thank goodness.”

  “I know,” Slater said. “Nice, quiet little town you’ve got here. But sometimes stuff happens, even in places like Fogg Lake.”

  Bev ignored him to focus on Catalina. “What brings you and your friend to Fogg Lake?”
<
br />   There was no point in trying to conceal the reasons she and Slater were in town, Catalina thought. There were few, if any, secrets in the small, closely knit community.

  “Something has happened to Olivia LeClair,” she said.

  “What?” Bev looked appropriately shocked. “Is she ill? Hurt?”

  “We have reason to believe that she’s been kidnapped,” Catalina said. “I’ve asked Slater to help me investigate.”

  “This is horrible news,” Bev said. She darted a quick glance at Slater. “I suppose that does explain why you’re here.”

  Slater slanted a veiled glance at Catalina. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Bev turned back to Catalina. “Olivia doesn’t have any family left here in town. She’s not rich. Why on earth would someone kidnap her?”

  Slater rested one hand on Catalina’s shoulder. “This looks like it goes back to that murder Olivia and Catalina witnessed in the caves.”

  Bev stared at him. “But that makes no sense. There was no murder. Everyone agreed that the girls experienced some sort of hallucination. All that old energy in the caves, you know. People who spend a lot of time in there often see and experience strange things.”

  “We are going to try to verify whether or not someone died in the cave fifteen years ago,” Slater said. “If we can come up with a lead, it may help us find Olivia.”

  “This is just so awful,” Bev said, stricken. “We never have any crime here in Fogg Lake. Are you absolutely certain Olivia was kidnapped?”

  “Yes,” Catalina said.

  “Has there been a ransom demand?” Bev asked.

  “No,” Slater said.

  “Then how can you be sure?” Bev shot back.

  “We’re sure,” Slater said. “Now, if you don’t mind, Catalina and I need to get to work. Time is critical in a kidnapping case.”

  “Yes, I understand,” Bev said. “Will you be going into the caves?”

  “That’s one of the reasons we’re here,” Catalina said.

  Bev started to retreat back down the front steps. She paused, glancing from Catalina to Slater and back again.

  “Then the two of you are not . . . a couple?” she asked.

  It was clear she was trying to be diplomatic, but a blunt question was a blunt question.

  “We are a couple,” Catalina said. She did not have to be psychic to know that Slater had gone very still. She smiled at Bev. “A couple of investigators working a case together.”

  “A couple of investigators?” Bev nodded quickly. “I see. Well, then, I’d better let you two get to work.”

  Bev hurried down the steps and walked briskly toward the center of town, a few short blocks away.

  Slater closed the door and looked at Catalina.

  “A couple of investigators?” he said.

  “It was the best I could come up with on the spur of the moment. It has the benefit of being true, not that it matters.”

  “It doesn’t?”

  “Nope.”

  “You don’t think they’ll believe we’re just colleagues working a case?”

  “Oh, I’m sure they’ll believe that part.” Catalina hefted the picnic hamper and turned to go back to the kitchen. “But they’ll leap to other conclusions about our relationship.”

  Slater followed her into the kitchen. “What kind of conclusions?”

  “In small towns, two people sharing space in the same house equals a couple.”

  “Is that a problem for you?”

  “No. What happens in Fogg Lake stays in Fogg Lake. Unlike, say, Las Vegas.”

  “About yesterday.”

  She froze for a split second and then very deliberately took an egg out of the hamper and cracked it into a bowl.

  “Nothing happened yesterday,” she said. “Aside from the fact that someone tried to kill you and kidnap me, that is.”

  “Something very important did happen for me,” he said evenly. “I’ve spent the past several months wondering what that radiation had done to me. Yesterday in Royston’s safe house I got the answer.”

  She picked up another egg. “This is about the icer thing?”

  Slater crossed the small space to stand directly in front of her. “A lot of people who understand just what that means would panic if they knew exactly what I have become.”

  She cracked the egg into the bowl. “Maybe later. I’m a little busy at the moment.”

  Energy whispered in the atmosphere.

  “I’m trying to thank you for taking my new talent in stride,” he said. “For acting as if I’m normal, or as close to normal as people like us get. You are making this a lot harder than it should be.”

  She turned to face him. “Neither one of us qualifies as normal, but neither one of us is crazy. Neither one of us is a blank. Neither one of us is a monster. What’s more, we are both in control of our talents. There is no need to thank me for affirming that state of affairs. I’m sure that in time you would have figured it out on your own.”

  Slater was starting to look wary. “This was supposed to be a simple case of me thanking you. But I get the feeling I’m missing something here.”

  “All right, fine, I’ll spell it out. I do not want you to kiss me because you’re grateful to me.”

  “Huh?”

  “Did I misread the situation?”

  Slater narrowed his eyes a little. The heat in the atmosphere got more intense.

  “Yeah,” he said. “You did misread it. I do want to kiss you, but not because I’m grateful.”

  “Why, then?”

  He caged her, his hands gripping the edge of the counter on either side of her. He leaned in close but he did not touch her.

  “I would like very much to kiss you because I think you are so damn hot that you could single-handedly set this house on fire, to say nothing of setting me on fire. I’ve been burning since I ran into you on the street in Seattle yesterday morning.”

  The shock of his words hit first. Men did not generally talk to her like that. Actually, they never talked to her like that. Previous conversations with men about sex tended to fall into one of three distinct categories. The first group of males said things like I need discipline. Those in the second group told her she was a control freak. Last but certainly not least were the guys who advised her to talk to a sex therapist about her inability to have an orgasm.

  Slater wanted her; really wanted her. He wanted her the way a man was supposed to want a woman. But the real shock was the realization that she wanted him.

  She put the egg down on the counter with exquisite care, because the shivery thrills snapping through her made her feel a little unsteady. She finally understood the true nature of the strange tension—the bone-deep sense of awareness—that she had been experiencing ever since she and Slater had collided on the street.

  So this is it. This is what passion feels like. You’ve been waiting for a man who would climb the tower wall to get to you. Now here you are about to jump straight into his arms.

  Wrong time. Wrong place. Wrong man.

  Maybe not the wrong man. Maybe this is the only man you’ll ever meet who can make you feel like this.

  She put her hands on his shoulders to anchor herself, because she knew that whatever happened next, it would shatter the walls of her fortress.

  “Do it, then,” she said. “Kiss me.”

  The sensual heat in his eyes went up a couple of degrees.

  “Sure,” he said. “But here’s the deal. You have to kiss me, too.”

  She was breathless now. “You’ve got a deal.”

  She kissed him, hard and fast and with a sense of desperation. He wrapped his arms around her and took her mouth with a fierce intensity that was unlike anything she had ever experienced. But it was her own response that truly blindsided her.

  It thrilled
her to know he was rock-hard because of her. His scent compelled her. He was strong enough to handle her if she lost control. She would not frighten him or damage his ego or make him wonder about her sanity. In his arms there was no need to hold back.

  She could have sworn she felt a storm of energy swirling in the kitchen. She would not have been surprised if they did start a fire.

  When she finally surfaced for air, the compelling heat in the atmosphere threatened to draw her back down into the depths. For a few beats she stood there in his arms, struggling to steady her senses. The fire in his eyes made it clear that he was fighting his own inner battle.

  “Wrong time,” he finally said.

  “Right.” She got her breathing under control and turned around to pick up the egg that she had set down on the counter. “Wrong time.”

  “But there will come a right time,” Slater said.

  It was a vow.

  CHAPTER 22

  If you go inside you will go mad. You will throw yourself into the lake and drown.

  Catalina stopped in front of the deceptively narrow entrance to the cave complex. She could do this. She had to do this. For Olivia’s sake.

  Slater studied the opening in the rocks.

  They were both wearing day packs filled with the usual things sensible people took on a hike—spare flashlights, bottles of water, first aid kits and some energy bars. Slater had added a couple of additional items to his pack—the vintage telephone and the card file that he had taken from Royston’s vault.

  She had been offended when she saw him stuff the phone and the file into the pack.

  “You don’t trust my neighbors?” she had said. “You think they’re going to rifle through your things while we’re gone?”

  “When I’m working a case involving hot artifacts, I don’t trust anyone,” he had said.

  She had not made any more comments about trust or the lack thereof. She had other things to worry about, things like incipient panic.

  “That’s it,” she said. “That’s the entrance to the cavern. Once you get inside there’s a short tunnel that leads to the big chamber where the murder went down.”