“Wow.” I frowned, trying not to let my voice tremble and give away how scared I was. “You’re really worried about this, aren’t you?”
“I’m afraid to let anyone I care about out of my sight, Rachel. We’re just going to have to make the best of it.”
Wait a minute, stop the presses. Did he just say he cared about me?
“On the upside,” he went on, “we get to spend Christmas in a beautiful cabin at an upscale resort in the mountains.”
“Being stalked by a killer and surrounded by people I barely know.” He started to talk, but I ignored him and kept going. “I know I’m being a bitch, but it’s my first Christmas with my eyesight back. This isn’t how I was hoping it would go down. As un-me-like as it sounds, I was hoping for a really spectacular holiday this year.”
“I’m sorry. I really am. I’m just trying to make sure you get plenty more of them.”
I sighed. “I know you are. And I’m grateful. Besides, it wouldn’t have been so spectacular with my sis and fam out of the country anyway. I just feel like we should be trying to catch this guy, not going on vacation.”
“We are going to catch this guy. We’re just going to work on it together from a secure location where everyone will be safe. And Chief Subrinsky is up to speed on everything else. He’s working on getting through the red tape and HIPAA laws so he can protect all the other recipients. Everything that can be done is being done.”
“Okay,” I said, knowing he was making way more sense than I was just now. And who was I kidding? I was looking forward to spending the holidays with Mason Brown. Family or not. Killer or not. Was I a basket case or what?
CHAPTER 8
Tuesday, December 19
I steered my rented SUV, a burgundy, all-wheel-drive Ford Escape, between the giant wooden signs that read Pine on the left and Haven on the right, and actually stopped and sat there staring with my mouth hanging open. The snowy, twisty drive wound uphill to what I could only describe as a log castle. The place had countless dormers, super steep peaks and green shutters with pine tree cutouts bracketing each and every window, including the twenty-foot-tall one front and center. Beyond that front window a massive Christmas tree twinkled with multicolored lights. Every peak and window and door was also lined in Christmas lights, white ones, all of them aglow. The driveway itself wound between pine trees, also all lit up in white.
“It’s like Santa’s workshop on crack,” Misty said, stroking Myrtle’s head as the bulldog snored on her lap. Her legs had to be asleep by now.
The car behind me blew its horn. One little honk, but still, it pissed me off. Mason’s mother was driving that car, a big flashy black Escalade. Marie was riding with her. The trunk and backseat were so full of gear that Josh and Jeremy had to ride with Mason. They were up ahead of us in Mason’s recently acquired manly green Jeep. Rosie and his wife, Marlayna, who I’d met when we’d all stopped for dinner at a rustic roadside diner thirty miles ago, were bringing up the rear in Rosie’s bright yellow Hummer. Marlayna seemed nice, but she was a little starstruck around me. She was my self-styled number one fan. Fortunately she didn’t seem like the type to go all stalker on my ass.
I liked her better than I liked Mason’s mother and was glad to have a female along who felt like an ally. Misty was too busy impressing Jeremy, and Marie was barely holding her pieces together. So it was Marlayna or nothing.
I got the car moving again, and resisted the urge to ooh and ahh out loud at the pristine beauty around me, glistening in the holiday lights. The place was like a Christmas card, and it was bringing my inner little kid to life. You know the one I’m talking about. The one who used to wait up for Santa Claus on Christmas Eve, struggling to stay awake to hear reindeer on the roof, and scanning the skies for a red glowing nose. I hadn’t felt that way since my eleventh Christmas, which was the last one before I’d gone blind. I hadn’t seen the lights since then, either. This was a first for me, and it was choking me up.
I do not get choked up over pretty lights.
Yeah, hardass? Then why are your eyes burning right now? That’s right, blink it away.
Fuck you, Inner Bitch.
Hey, don’t get mad at me. You wanted a spectacularly Christmassy Christmas, and it looks like that’s just what you’re getting. Wish and it is granted, remember?
Mason led the way, apparently following the signs, which blurred in my vision a little bit, to the parking lot around back. No covered garage. We’d have to make do. He got out of the Jeep and waited while I parked beside him, and he was smiling and rubbing his gloves together when I got out.
“Isn’t this amazing?” he asked.
Good God, the man was sparkling.
And looking damn good doing it. Those dimples in his cheeks are ridiculous. Possibly illegal. And is that a little bit of his inner child I see in his eyes?
“It’s amazing,” Misty said from behind me. She set Myrtle down, and Myrtle promptly peed right where she was, unashamed. “How many Christmases has it been since you’ve been able to see the lights, Aunt Rachel?” Misty asked.
I shrugged and looked away, toward the giant log cabin’s rear entrance: a row of glass doors that opened out onto a paved patio with a big stone fire pit in the center. Several people were milling around the fire in colorful hats and scarves. Some were toasting marshmallows. All were smiling.
Good God, I’d arrived in Happy-Joy Christmastown.
The driver’s side window of the Escalade rolled down. “Mason, why didn’t you pull up to the front doors so I could have had a valet unload our luggage?”
His mother. She’d pulled into a parking spot nearby.
He looked at me, a subtle exchange to tell me she was irritating but lovable. The irritating part I got, the lovable not so much. “Mother, there was no point in the rest of us pulling up in front, since we’re all staying in one of the cabins. And there’s no point in them unloading the boys’ luggage, since they’re coming with me. I’ll carry your bags inside and get you checked in, all right?”
She pouted but nodded, put her window up, shut the Caddy off and got out.
Marie got out, too. “Let’s all go in,” she said. “This place looks amazing.”
She’d done a pretty good job covering up the bruises on her face with makeup. A cute brown hat and scarf set hid the lump on her forehead. Damn, her blond curls looked great in that set. I was a little jealous, because putting me in any winter hat and scarf, no matter how cute, just looked dumb. Her eyes were still haunted, but I thought this trip might be just what she needed to help her out of her grieving.
“I want to see the water park!” Josh shouted.
He and Jeremy had got out of the Jeep and were standing behind me, bracketing Misty. Teens must have some kind of gravitational pull on each other, I thought.
“All right, we’ll check it out,” Mason promised. “But listen. It’s important that I know where you are at all times. And that goes for everyone. Adults included. Okay?”
The boys slid a look at their mother, then nodded at him. I could see the look Jeremy exchanged with Misty. The two of them clearly knew we hadn’t told them everything. They also knew that coming up here had something to do with the attack on Marie, and I think maybe Misty also suspected I hadn’t told her the truth about my “accident.”
I felt guilty for being less than honest, but it was Christmas. I wasn’t going to burden the kids with nightmare images of organs being cut out of living people, that was for sure. I mean, it wasn’t exactly the kind of sugarplum I wanted dancing in their heads.
Mason dug through the Escalade to fish out his mother’s bags, then said, “I’m locking it. Let me have the keys.”
Angela shook her head. “I never take the keys out of the ignition. That’s why I insisted on the external keypad, so I never have to worry about where I le
ft the keys.” She nodded at the row of numbered buttons underneath the front door handle. “Just punch in your father’s birthday. Twelve-eleven.”
Mason nodded and locked the oversized SUV.
Rosie and Marlayna had stopped out front and were already at the registration desk when we all trooped in. Holiday music filled the pine-scented air. I gaped like a tourist yet again, while Myrtle, insecure in a new place, pressed tight to my calf. I had a leash on her, though it wasn’t really necessary. She wouldn’t go far, especially if there were other dogs around.
The towering cathedral ceiling in the lobby was lined with gleaming logs that still had their natural shape, knots and all. White lights spiderwebbed above like stars on a clear night. The fieldstone fireplace was gargantuan. One entire section off to the right housed a bar, with more logs and shining shellac, and a smiling female bartender-slash-unemployed and underfed supermodel standing at the ready, nodding a happy hello to us. On the left was a gift shop, and then the front desk. I saw a sign beyond that, very rustic looking, pointing the way to Haven Spa and Salon and Pinewoods Bar, along with Northstar Dining Room, Polar Frolic Indoor Waterpark and Borealis Ski Shop. The place had everything.
Mason nudged me. I’d become hypnotized by the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree, the gleaming garland, the angel on top. I hadn’t even thought I’d missed these sights. Just how much I truly had was hitting me pretty hard in my emotional epicenter and sending ripples out through my entire being.
“This must be almost overwhelming for you, Rachel,” he said softly, leaning so close that his breath tickled my ear.
I sniffed and shrugged. “That sappy music they have going isn’t helping any. I mean, Ebenezer Scrooge would get choked up in this joint.”
“Yeah.” He nodded toward the bar. “Why don’t you take the kids for a hot cocoa while I get things squared away at the desk?”
I nodded. “Okay.” I was not drinking hot cocoa. Hot buttered rum, maybe. Not cocoa.
The kids, Marie, Myrtle and I weaved through the customers toward the bar. We were stopped three times by bulldog lovers who wanted to pet Myrt. She didn’t mind the attention at all, and I was relieved, yet again, that most people were too busy noticing the dog to recognize me. I’d put on a pair of fake reading glasses—if it worked for Clark Kent—and my hair was tucked under my hat. I mean, yes, I’d done the talk shows over and over again, and I do tend to get recognized around Whitney Point, but that’s only because the locals know I’m there and have seen me out and around. In reality, who remembers the face of their favorite author? How many would you recognize on sight? Go on, try picturing them in your mind. You got Stephen King, and maybe Deepak Chopra, didn’t you? But if you could pick Amy Tan out of a lineup of similar-looking women, with the addition of a hat and unnecessary prop glasses, I’d say you’re a rare individual with a photographic memory. Eventually we found a table. A waitress was with us immediately. “Welcome to Pine Haven. Is this your first visit?”
“It is,” I said.
“Where are you from?”
Oh, God, she wanted to have a conversation. “South,” I said. “The kids have been dying for a cup of your famous hot cocoa the entire trip. Can I get three, please?”
“With marshmallows,” Josh said.
“And for the adults?” She was still smiling. I was glad I’d managed to avoid exchanging pleasantries without hurting her feelings. She didn’t look any older than Misty, after all.
“Can’t I have a real drink?” Jeremy asked.
“Absolutely not, Jeremy,” Marie said.
The waitress giggled. “I couldn’t serve you anyway, without ID. And if you had ID that said you were twenty-one, I’d probably have to confinscate it.” And yes, she said, “confinscate.” And then she giggled again. Note to self, pick a table away from this section next time.
“I’ll take a rum and Coke,” I said, then looked at Marie.
She opened her mouth to speak, and Josh interrupted, in the whiniest voice I’d ever heard him use. “I just want to go to the water park! Why can’t we do that now?”
“’Cause it’s closed,” the giggly waitress said, just like that, silencing the impending and unwinnable argument. Maybe I wouldn’t have to strangle her after all. “It’s open every day, noon to eight p.m. at night, and that’s it. Sorry.”
8 p.m. at night? The brownie points she’d gained were fading fast.
Josh sighed dramatically and put his elbows on the table, head in his hands, like she’d just told him he had six months to live.
“I’ll take a hot toddy,” Marie said.
“Anything else?”
“Yeah, two more cocoas.” I looked at Marie and shrugged. “In case Mason and Angela want some.”
“Angela won’t,” Marie replied. “She’s too worried about her figure. Get her a martini, two olives.”
“Shaken, not stirred,” I threw in.
The waitress blinked like a doe in headlights, and I thought I heard crickets chirping. Josh laughed out loud, slapping a hand on the table. “Double-oh-seven!” he said. “I have that game for my Xbox.”
Marie and I chatted while we waited. Was my holiday shopping done? No. I’d bought a ton of stuff for Myrtle, but no one else. I routinely bought for only a handful of people. My sister, Sandra, her perfect hubby, Jim, the twins, my assistant, Amy, and my agent, Barracuda Woman. Marie said she’d been done for a month now. It wasn’t all that much fun anymore. Used to be all magic and mystery, but now the boys just basically placed their orders and she filled them.
The poor woman was so sad. I was going to find a gift for her this year for sure.
And there it is. The music, the pine scent, the twinkly lights, all empowered with the post-hypnotic suggestion to buy, buy, buy.
I rolled my eyes. Even I thought that was a little too bah, humbug.
“Can we at least go look at the water park, Mom?” Josh asked.
Marie sent a look at the waitress—Tammy, her nametag said. Of course it did. She’d just returned with our order. She was quick. Tammy nodded, set our drinks on the table and bent low to feed Myrtle a little doggy treat. “Sure, you can. It’s kind of dark, because most of the lights are off, but you can see well enough.”
I got a chill when she mentioned the darkness and remembered we had a killer after us. Maybe I should say something. They got up, Josh carrying his cocoa and Marie her toddy, and off they went while I debated.
“Let’s go check out the tree,” Misty said, and when I turned to reply I realized she was talking to Jeremy, not me. And then they were gone, as well, cocoa and all.
I downed my rum and Coke in about three swallows, picked up the martini and hot cocoa, and headed over to the registration desk with Myrt’s leash looped around my wrist.
Marlayna and Rosie were on their way to the elevators, behind a guy with a rack full of luggage. Angela was with them, so I skirted the desk to catch them before the elevator doors opened.
They looked at me, Marlayna and Rosie smiling widely. “This place is incredible,” Marlayna said.
“It is.” I handed the martini to Angela. “Thought you might want a nightcap.”
Her perfectly plucked—well, a little too thin, to be honest—brows rose in twin arches. “Thank you.” It almost had a question mark at the end. I could see her rethinking her initial opinion of me, which hadn’t been good, probably because I’d called her firstborn grandson an asshole during our first conversation. Don’t judge me. He was acting like one.
“De nada,” I said. “Are you guys on the same floor?”
“Yeah,” Rosie said. “Angela’s room is right next door to ours.”
“Good. That’s good.”
He nodded. I didn’t know how much his wife knew about our real reasons for being here—or Angela herself, for that matter—so I di
dn’t say more. The elevator doors opened right then, anyway, so the awkward moment ended.
I turned to look toward the giant Christmas tree. Jeremy and Misty were still in view. Then I craned my neck to see around the corner to the right, where the water park signs were pointing, but Marie and Josh were out of sight.
Damn, this was going to be harder than I had imagined.
“We’re all set,” Mason said from behind me—and way closer than I’d expected. I jumped and spun so fast I slopped cocoa on my sleeve. Fortunately it had cooled off by then.
“Great. Here. Cocoa.” I handed it to him, aware I’d suddenly turned into Cave-Rachel. “Um, Marie and Josh went to look at the water park, even though it’s closed and there’s no one down there and the lights are off.”
He frowned. “I’ll go get them. Where are Jer and Misty?”
“Tree,” I said with a nod.
“Okay, you wrangle them, I’ll get the other two. Meet you by the back doors. Don’t go anywhere else, okay? The lobby’s still crowded—you should be okay.”
I nodded once and we split up, and it hit me how much easier it was going to be keeping track of everyone with him here to help. And how much easier my presence was going to make it on him. Alone, neither of us would have stood a chance.
Besides, what were the odds the big bad organ thief had followed us up here, or even knew where we’d gone? We’d all taken separate vehicles, left at separate times from separate locations. Mason had gone all out to ensure our safety. He’d even brought a gun and was wearing it. I’d seen it under his jacket when we’d stopped for dinner.
I went into the lobby, right up to the towering Christmas tree. Silent Night was wafting from the unseen speakers now, and the scent of pine, tinged with cinnamon I noticed now, was even heavier in the air. Brightly colored prop gifts with giant bows and sparkly ribbons were stacked strategically beneath the tree. Super-sized candy canes hung from its branches, and the blonde angel on top gazed down with her arms and wings open wide, apparently pouring blessings down on us all.
Brown and de Luca Collection, Volume 1 Page 45
