Brown and de Luca Collection, Volume 1

by Maggie Shayne

  Yeah, sap. This place was brimming with it. And not just from all the pine trees.

  When I rounded the tree, Jeremy and Misty jumped apart almost guiltily, and I wondered if they’d been holding hands just before they’d heard my approach. Or just standing close, like shoulder to shoulder or something.

  Interesting.

  * * *

  “They always have lifeguards on duty,” said a male voice, and it echoed in the giant room that housed the indoor water park. “And the kids get unlimited juice and healthy snacks while they play. All included in the park pass.”

  Mason tensed as he stepped into the dimly lit room, scanning the perimeter. There were three full-sized pools, two of which had water slides emptying into them, and five additional towering slides of various shapes, heights and bright colors. One was an open spiral, one an enclosed tube, one dropped straight down from a dizzying height, another two were obviously designed for younger riders. The water was turned off, none of them running, but the pools glistened and gleamed from interior lighting. Floating alarms bobbed in each pool, ready to scream if the water was disturbed during off hours.

  And then he spotted Marie, Josh and a strange man standing at the far end of the park, where another set of glass doors faced a snowy wonderland outside.

  “It’s going to be so much fun for you, isn’t it, Josh?” Marie asked.

  “Yeah, if I ever get a chance to do it. Why can’t we stay here in the lodge, instead of out in some stupid cabin?”

  “I promise, you’ll get plenty of time in the water park, Josh.”

  “The cabins aren’t far. Which one are you in?” the man asked.

  Marie looked up at him. “I don’t actually know yet.”

  Mason cleared his throat, and Marie jumped and turned. “Oh, God, Mason, you scared the hell out of me.”

  “Sorry, Marie.” He faced the stranger. Tall, very lean, fit the body type of Marie’s attacker perfectly. Rachel hadn’t been able to guess at his size, though, since they’d both been sitting in her car.

  Mason thrust out a hand. “Mason Brown. And you are?”

  The man blinked, as if he was wondering about the slightly challenging tone. “Scott Douglas,” he said. His grip was strong. A little too strong, like he had something to prove.

  “Scott’s another guest here, Mason. He was just telling us about the water park.”

  “Really? How long have you been here, Scott?”

  “Arrived earlier today.”

  Interesting.

  “Mason is my brother-in-law,” Marie said, as if she felt a need to explain his presence. Then she hurried on. “Thanks so much for the information…Scott. It was nice meeting you.”

  “You, too, Marie. Um, maybe I’ll see you around the lodge.”

  “I hope so.”

  She turned and headed back toward the lobby, snagging Josh’s hand on the way and tugging him along beside her.

  Mason caught up with her in the main hall. “Marie, we agreed to stick together.” He looked behind them to be sure the attentive Scott hadn’t followed.

  “I was just showing Josh the water park.”

  “Yeah, after hours, alone, in the dark.”

  She snapped her head toward him, a hint of anger in her eyes, but then she seemed to bank it. “I know. I…I forgot.”

  “I don’t know how you can forget what happened to you yesterday, Marie.”

  “I know. It’s—”

  “And striking up conversations with strange men isn’t exactly part of the game plan, either.”

  This time she let her anger flash at him. “I’m a big girl, Mason. And he was just being nice.”

  “Yeah, and did you ask yourself why?”

  “Duh, Uncle Mason,” Josh said.

  He looked down at Josh, having forgotten he was there, and could have kicked himself. The kid just rolled his eyes and ran ahead.

  Marie said, “Yeah, duh, Uncle Mason. Do you really think the only reason a good-looking single man would strike up a conversation with me is because he wants to kill me?”

  “Of course I don’t think that. You’re a beautiful woman, Marie. I just—”

  “Don’t worry. I haven’t forgotten your brother. I might never get over him, if that’s what you’re thinking about.”

  “It’s not.” Hell, his brother had been a freaking psychopath who’d left his widow and two sons because he’d been twisted and sick. He didn’t deserve Marie’s mourning, much less her loyalty.

  “It’s not,” he repeated. “I actually think it would be good for you to…you know, start dating or…whatever, when you’re ready.”

  “Right. Sure you do.”

  They picked up the pace to keep up with Josh, who was already rounding the corner up ahead and racing into the lobby.

  “He was the right height, the right build, and he’s only been here since today. We can’t be too careful. Okay?”

  She nodded. “I appreciate you being so protective of us, Mason. I do. I’m sorry I snapped at you, I’m just…not used to having to answer to anyone. It’s been months now. And even then, Eric never…he wasn’t…jealous. You know?”

  “I know.” His brother had had his own obsession going on. He’d been way too busy sating his sick appetite for murder to worry much about what his wife was doing.

  “I’m not complaining,” she added quickly. “I’ve always liked…my space.”

  “I’ll try not to act too much like an overprotective big brother, then.”

  “I’d appreciate that.”

  * * *

  Our “cabin” was a chalet with two stories, eight bedrooms, a huge living room with a cathedral ceiling, four bathrooms and a kitchen equipped to feed a small army. Beyond our initial unpacking, our curious exploring and the choosing up of the bedrooms, I hadn’t heard or seen a soul since we’d come in.

  I had taken a huge bedroom in a corner of the second floor. It had its own bathroom and a balcony—not that I’d be likely to spend too much time out there, being that it was twenty degrees outside. But the view was beautiful. Way more snow up here than at home, and pine trees and mountains everywhere.

  The bedrooms were arranged around a square balcony open down to the great room and protected by what amounted to a split rail fence. Misty had the room around the corner to the right, and Mason’s was to the left. His bedroom put him right between me and Marie, who had the other corner. Joshua had the room to the left of hers, but Jeremy had taken the middle bedroom on the fourth side, across from Mason’s room and with no one to his left or right. The kid liked his privacy. The other two second-floor bathrooms were strategically placed, one at each end.

  I loved the place, in spite of my initial misgivings. It was absolutely perfect. I’d expected it to be rustic to the point of primitive, but it wasn’t at all. Even the roomy kitchen was fully stocked. They would just tally up what we used at the end and add it to the bill.

  I was unpacking my new coat and pants, and remembering the needle that I’d yanked out of my shoulder and dropped into the shopping bag with them what seemed like a lifetime ago, when Mason tapped on my door. Yes, I knew it was Mason. No, I don’t know how I knew. My sightless senses had sharpened to where I could identify most people by smell, by the sound of their movements, by their energy, but usually not from beyond a closed door. “It’s open,” I called.

  He came in with a sheaf of papers in one hand and two steaming mugs in the other. “Coffee?”

  I grinned in delight and took one of the mugs from him. “Thanks. You’re a mind reader.”

  “I owed you for the cocoa.”

  “Yeah, and speaking of owing…”

  He held up a hand. “We’ve already had this discussion, Rachel.”

  Yes, we had. I had told him that I had ple
nty of money, that the bullshit I wrote had been good to me and that paying the entire shot for the whole crew would be absolutely no problem for me. But he insisted on paying his own way along with Marie’s and the boys’. How he planned to do that on a cop’s salary was beyond me. We were splitting the full tab for Rosie and Marlayna, though I’d had to twist his arm to get him to agree to even that much. Angela thought of herself as wealthy and was insisting on paying her own way at the lodge, which was fine with me.

  “So what have you got there?” I asked, nodding at the stack of papers while taking a nice big sip of the coffee, which was perfect. More than perfect. What kind did they have in that kitchen, anyway? I was going to have to find out.

  “Guest registry,” he said, and I almost choked.

  “You’re shitting me.”

  “I shit you not,” he said, making me grin again. “I had a private talk with the head of security while I was killing time at the front desk. You’re gonna love this guy, Rache. Retired cop, so Irish he still has a brogue. Finnegan Smart.”

  “I love him already,” I said, trying to picture the man in my mind. Was it bigoted of me to imagine him slugging a pint of Guinness and smoking a pipe? Probably.

  “I showed him my ID, told him there was a very slim chance that a suspect I’ve been looking for is up here, and that I needed the guest list. He said he’d email it, and he was as good as his word.”

  “This place has a printer?”

  “Yeah, there’s an office downstairs.”

  He shuffled papers around, separating the freshly printed stack from an older one. “I also brought our lists of which organs went to which hospitals and who the recipients were, at least as many as I was able to piece together before it became unnecessary.”

  “We thought.”

  “Yeah. I figured we could compare our list to the guest list. Chief Sub’s gotta wait for a warrant to get the list of recipients the regular way. We’ve got a head start.”

  “You don’t waste any time, do you?”

  He walked to my nightstand, set the papers down and turned. “Actually, I think I’m about to waste a little. Everyone’s clamoring for a snack. Marie found brownie mixes in the kitchen and they’ll be done in five. I said I’d see if I could coax you down for some brownies and coffee by the fire.”

  My thought bubble had Mason and me curled up on a bearskin rug in front of the fireplace—there was no bearskin rug except in my mind, just so you know—pigging out on brownies. It sounded like heaven, until Misty, Jeremy, Josh and Marie all arrived in my bubble, crowding it until it popped. But I decided to play nice and gave him what I hoped was a convincing smile. “I thought I was catching whiffs of pure temptation while I was unpacking.”

  He looked past me at the bed, the shopping bags, the snow pants. “They got the analysis back on that syringe,” he said.

  “Don’t tell me. Sucks-in-Aberdeen, right?”

  “Succinylcholine.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “It’s used in surgery to—”

  “Paralyze the muscles. I know. And your lungs get paralyzed, too, and you suffocate if you’re not on a ventilator, and it’s hard to trace because it breaks down and the stuff that remains is also found in most corpses due to decomposition.”

  He stared at me and blinked. “How is it you’re so far ahead of me on this?”

  “It was my body that had a syringe full of that shit sticking into it. One push of the plunger and we’d be having this conversation over an Ouija board.”

  He lowered his head. “You’ve barely had time to process what happened, have you?”

  “I don’t want to process it.” Then I shrugged. “Besides, I’m feeling much better now. We’re up here in the middle of nowhere. No one knows where we went, and I have to believe we’re safe while we work all this out.”

  He nodded slowly. “Yeah, I hope you’re right.”

  “I know I am.” It was a lie. I was pulling a page from my own books and thinking positively. Fake it till you make it and all that bull. Hell, you never know, it could work just this once, right?

  I heard voices…singing, and I frowned, cocking my head to one side. “Is that…?”

  “Carolers?” Mason asked.

  “Good God, they just beat you over the head with holiday cheer up here, don’t they?” And yet I moved past him into the hall, deliberately brushing against him, then hurried down the stairs to see for myself.

  Yes, there were carolers. Marie had opened the door and was standing there smiling at one of them, a tall, dark-haired guy who was damn good-looking. Not as good-looking as Mason, of course. But then, who was? He was smiling back at her, too, a twinkle in his eyes.

  They know each other. And that means she broke our number one rule. She told someone we were coming up here.

  Maybe not. There could be another explanation. But there is something going on in the air between his eyes and hers. I don’t miss shit like that.

  Rosie was among the singers, his Santa-sized belly making him easy to spot, and Marlayna was tucked in the crook of his arm, smiling ear to ear and singing off-key to “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.”

  Mason and I joined the others, crowded together at the open door as the carol unfolded. A couple in the back added harmony, and the snowy night vista behind them made it picture-perfect, too. It was wonderful, and we all clapped like giddy cheerleaders when they finished.

  “You have to invite us in for a drink now,” Rosie said. “That’s how this works.”

  “No, Mr. Jones, not at all,” said a pale, bespectacled man I guessed was either a pastor or an accountant.

  “Yes, Mr. Beckwith, yes, it does. For me, anyway.” Holding Marlayna to him, Rosie pushed through the crowd and came inside. “Go on, have fun now. These are friends of mine,” he added, because Mr. Beckwith looked worried.

  He smiled in relief then, and waved. “Good night, Mr. Jones, Mrs. Jones.”

  “Merry Christmas!” called several of the group.

  They trooped away singing “Jingle Bells” as Mason started to close the door. Then he stopped halfway as a car pulled up out front. Angela.

  Great. Now the evening was complete.

  Marlayna sniffed the air. “Now I know why you wanted to come in. I smell something good.”

  “Aw, hon, don’t be like that,” Rosie said. Then, to Mason, “It’s brownies, isn’t it?”

  “Oh, no, my brownies!” Marie ran to the kitchen.

  I ran to help her, hoping she’d made a jumbo-sized batch. And hoping even harder that this evening with the gang would pass quickly, so I could get back to that homework, alone in my room, with Mason.

  Because…what? You want to bang him?

  Yes, Inner Bitch. That’s exactly what I want. Maybe.

  I felt my alter ego snort in derision. You want more than that, and you damn well know it.

  Whoa. Where had that notion come from?

  It didn’t matter, I told myself. Another one-night stand with Mason was exactly what I wanted. Right now. I was drunk on holiday cheer and twinkling lights and anticipated chocolaty deliciousness, and I wanted another night in his arms to go with all the other sensory delights. And if there was anything more than that in the offing, I was just going to think about that later.

  Marie brought in a platter of brownies, and I saw there were at least three different varieties. Some had lighter brown swirls of what I hoped to God was peanut butter. Some had walnuts and chocolate chips, and the third batch was actually blondies, with butterscotch chips, be still, my waistline.

  She set the platter on the coffee table, a giant oak slab of a thing facing the fireplace, which was burning happily, and Josh grabbed a handful before anyone else could get close.

  “One,” Marie said. “You take one brownie at a
time, Joshua.”

  So he let them go. A pile of slightly mashed brownies freshly contaminated with whatever his unwashed boy-hands had on them.

  “Honestly, Marie,” Angela snapped, “do you really think anyone wants to eat any of them now? Joshua, take the brownies you touched off that pile. Those will be all you get.”

  Mason beat him to it, taking the most mashed brownie of all and popping it whole into his mouth. Then he chewed and grinned at the same time, clearly disgusting his mother. Joshua, who’d looked wounded a second ago, burst into giggle fits.

  Angela rolled her eyes. “That’s good, Mason. Encourage him to be rude.”

  “He wasn’t being rude,” I said. “He was just being a kid.”

  Mason’s mother glared at me, and I knew I wasn’t scoring any brownie points. Okay, bad pun. Shoot me. The woman’s personality matched her hair. White steel. And I’d been as disgusted by Josh’s brownie grab as she had. I just automatically rose to Mason’s defense. Which was stupid, because he certainly didn’t need it.

  Misty came trundling in from the kitchen with a big tray full of coffee mugs, two steaming pots and various other implements of indulgence. Cream, sugar, cocoa packets, so I presumed one pot held coffee and the other, hot water.

  Jeremy jumped up from his chair to take the tray from her, and the smile she sent him was gooier than the still warm chocolate chips in the brownie I’d just picked up. Angela looked pleased and Marie looked worried. Hell, I wasn’t. Misty had a good head on her shoulders.

  So we sat around eating. Marie was mostly quiet. Rosie and Marlayna carried on most of the conversation. And eventually it turned to my work, as I had feared it would. It was always awkward when someone brought their adoring fandom to a family function. It clashed, you know?

  Anyway, it was of course Marlayna who said, “You know, Rachel, your books really changed my life.”

  “Really? Well, isn’t that interesting?” Angela set her cup delicately down and leaned forward. “Do tell us how, Marlayna. I never thought you were the type to go in for that sort of thing.”