by Anne Stuart
ENDLESS HOURS LATER, SHE was beyond stress, beyond worry, beyond regret. The late flight out of Chicago had been full of turbulence and grumpy flight attendants. She had had to change planes twice, each one getting a little smaller and a little choppier. By the time she arrived at a small municipal airport outside of Bennington, Tennessee, she was feeling jarred, achy and angry. And depressed, knowing she had a five-hour drive ahead of her.
Oak Grove was a tiny, faceless town that nestled somewhere between Kentucky, Arkansas and Missouri. None of the states wanted to claim it, and it had the odd distinction of having belonged to all three in the last one hundred years. Currently, it belonged to Arkansas, but that probably wouldn’t last too long.
The only rental car was an aging Ford with no springs whatsoever. As Megan drove through the long, empty hours of early morning, she told herself things would look better when the sun rose. If it ever bothered to. There was a gloomy mist falling, and the late-spring weather seemed bleak, timeless. Somewhere beyond the side of the road, dogwoods must be blooming, azaleas and forsythia and tulips and daffodils. All she could see was gray.
THE ROAD NARROWED as it climbed through twisty, dark hills. She was still more than fifty miles away when the road turned to gravel and the rain turned that gravel to mud. She was forced to slow down to something slightly faster than a crawl, and for a moment, she considered pulling off to the side of the road and trying to catch a little bit of sleep. She hadn’t seen another car in three hours—no one would be likely to be traveling this god-forsaken road and find her sleeping.
But she couldn’t do it. She wanted to get to Oak Grove with a need that bordered on desperation. The sooner she faced Ethan Winslowe, whatever there was of him to face, the sooner she could get away, back to that horrible little airport with its horrible little plane. Her flight to Europe left New York in less than seventy-two hours—she was already cutting it close.
Besides, when it came right down to it, she was afraid. Afraid of facing Ethan Winslowe, afraid of what she’d find. Afraid that all her pleas, all her reasonable explanations were going to fall on deaf ears, either literally or figuratively. Afraid this midnight trip from hell was going to be a miserable, agonizing waste of time.
She almost missed the town of Oak Grove when she came to it. The gray mist had lessened somewhat, the sun was making a vain effort to poke through the thick clouds, and it was just past eleven in the morning. The gas gauge on the Ford was heading toward empty when she passed a cluster of buildings that suggested civilization was near at hand. She drove straight through, looking, but things rapidly became uninhabited again. There’d been a rusty gas pump near what seemed to be an abandoned store five miles back. She had no choice but to turn around.
This time, she saw the sign. Covered by weeds, rusted so that it was almost unreadable, the once-white sign said Oak Grove, Founded 1835. Underneath, someone had scratched something with a knife. Slowing the car, she peered at it. Lost, 1902, it said.
A tiny shiver of fear ran across her backbone as she pulled up next to the gas pump. She didn’t recognize the brand, and she could only hope there was even a trace of fuel in the old-fashioned pump. She sat there in her car, staring at the deserted street, and her hands came up to rub her chilled arms.
There was a church. Every speck of paint had peeled off, the front was a mass of weeds, but the windows were intact, and a sign listed services for almost every day of the week. Next to the church was a store with dingy, fly-specked windows full of old canned food and faded clothing. Oak Grove looked like a ghost town, she thought. The houses were dark and empty looking, the town deserted, eerie, a place no one in their right mind would want to live….
“Fill ’er up?”
She screamed, thoroughly spooked. “Yes, please,” she said, pressing a hand to her racing heart. “I’m sorry, you startled me.”
“Yeah,” said the man. “I have a habit of doing that.”
A fitting resident of a ghost town, Megan thought. He was ageless, the man who’d materialized beside her window, moving with a slow gait that seemed more sullen than elderly. She glanced back at the town and for the first time, realized that some of the blinds were being pulled back from the curtained windows. People were watching her covertly.
“No credit cards,” the man said when he finished, appearing beside her just as abruptly. He watched with interest as she shuffled through her meager supply of cash. “You just passing through? We don’t get people in these parts very often.”
This sudden curiosity would have been disarming if Megan had been able to rid herself of the notion that he clearly wanted her gone. She handed him a twenty-dollar bill, waited while he laboriously counted the change, and then she flashed him her friendliest smile, the one guaranteed to melt Chicago bus drivers and postal workers everywhere. “As a matter of fact, I’m looking for someone.”
He remained unmoved. “That so?”
She didn’t let her smile falter. “A man by the name of Ethan Winslowe. He lives around here, doesn’t he?”
If the man had seemed distant and unfriendly before, he now seemed positively icy. “Winslowe don’t cotton much to visitors. You’d best keep on your way.”
“I’ve come to see him,” she said firmly. “I have an appointment.”
The old man narrowed his eyes. “He’s not going to want to see you. That man doesn’t see nobody, and nobody wants to see him. They say the last person who looked him in the eyes turned stone blind.”
Megan’s mouth dropped open. “I beg your pardon?”
“And then there’s old Mrs. MacInerny. She saw him one day when she was out walking and ain’t been right in the head since. He’s a son of the devil, he is, girly. No one’s rightly sure whether he’s real or not, whether he’s dead or alive. Some say he’s a phantom, haunting that crazy old place, but truth of the matter is no one wants to find out. You’d better get away from here before you run into anymore trouble.”
“I’m not going anywhere but to Winslowe’s house. I don’t believe in such malarkey.”
“Your funeral,” the old man announced with an air of gloomy satisfaction. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“You warned me, all right. You still haven’t told me how I can find him.”
“First left. Just keep driving—you’ll come to the old Meredith place sooner than you’ll ever want to.”
It was lack of sleep, Megan decided there and then. It was sheer exhaustion, not to mention tension, that was making this odd old man sound so sinister. “Meredith place?”
“His granddaddy’s. No one in their right mind would ever want to come back there to live, but then, Winslowe ain’t in his right mind. Everyone around here knows it.” And then the man disappeared back into the deserted-looking building, slamming the door shut behind him.
Just as well, she thought, starting up her car again. She might have been crazy enough to ask him another question. Considering the strange answers he’d already given her, she’d be better off waiting to see what she found at the end of her journey.
It took her half an hour to drive what couldn’t have been more than five miles. The road turned into a rutted swamp, one the old Ford could barely negotiate. She was so busy dealing with the driving conditions that she didn’t have any time to look ahead. When the road finally ended, she pulled to a stop, sitting there staring up in mingled awe and horror.
Chapter Two
The town should have prepared her for what she’d find when she reached the old Meredith place. Ethan Winslowe’s designs should have prepared her. Meg had seen almost every one of the buildings he’d planned, those that had actually been built and those that were nothing more than prototypes, some so exotic, no one would ever live in them.
But the old Meredith place was beyond her wildest dreams—or nightmares. The facade was ordinary enough, a big Victorian mansion dating from just before the turn of the century, complete with gingerbread trim and wide porches. But spreading out on both s
ides was the strangest conglomeration of additions: wings, gables, gambrels and jutting peaks from every possible design period, from Greco-Roman to Country French to Bauhaus to modern. It looked like an architect gone totally mad, turning his own house into a crazy quilt of building styles, and for a moment, Meg panicked, looking for a place to turn the lumbering sedan around so she could get away from there.
The car was stuck, thoroughly and deeply embedded in the mud. The more she tried, the more the wheels spun. The house in front of her was still and silent; whatever gremlins lived there were paying no attention to a lady in distress.
She had no choice finally but to climb out into the mud, cursing herself for wearing high heels, cursing the rain that was now soaking down, cursing the puddles beneath her. It was just before noon on Saturday. Reese’s ultimatum was by five o’clock that day, and yet, no one seemed to be expected.
She trudged through the rain, up the front staircase to the door. There were lace curtains in the front windows facing the wide porch, politely in keeping with that style of the house. They also shielded whatever occupants lurked inside, peering out at her.
Meg gave herself a sensible little shake. She’d let the old man in the village spook her. There was nothing sinister around her, just a brilliant recluse who had business with her father. Business she planned to take care of quickly and efficiently, and then head back to light and civilization.
She heard the echo of the old-fashioned doorbell inside the house. It was late April, but the rain was cold and bone chilling up there in the mountains, and Megan shivered. If she had any choice at all, she’d turn and leave, she thought. But even her momentary cowardice had been defeated by the ruts in the driveway. She glanced back at her mired-in car. She wasn’t going anywhere until someone was willing to get her out.
She was just about to ring the bell again when the door was jerked open. “Who are you and what do you want?” a man demanded abruptly, glowering at her, his huge bulk filling the doorway and blocking any view of the hallway.
She had no choice but to look at him. This wasn’t Ethan Winslowe, of that one fact she was certain. He was a huge hulking giant of a man, well over six feet, with massive shoulders and forearms, grizzled gray hair and eyebrows and a sullen, swarthy face. She guessed he was somewhere in his late fifties or early sixties and just as friendly as the old codger in town.
It took all her self-control not to take a nervous step backward. “I’m looking for Ethan Winslowe.”
“So’s everybody else. Mr. Winslowe doesn’t see visitors. Go away.”
“I believe he’ll see me. I’m Meg Carey. Reese Carey’s daughter.”
The man hesitated in the act of slamming the door. “Where’s the old man?” he demanded, and it took a moment for her to realize he meant her father.
“In Chicago.”
“Go back and tell him his time’s up.”
“I’d like Mr. Winslowe to tell me that. I’ve come a long way to see him—”
“You weren’t invited. Go away.” Once more, he tried to slam the door, but she had the presence of mind to put her foot in the way.
“Ask Mr. Winslowe if he’ll see me,” she said again with pleasant firmness.
The man in the doorway cackled then, an unpleasant sound that increased the chill sweeping through her body. “I’ll ask him,” he said finally. “For your sake, you better hope he says no.” And to her surprise, he opened the door wider.
She wasn’t quite sure what she was expecting. Something out of The Addams Family, perhaps, but the front hallway and living room were neat, pristine, almost period pieces of Victoriana. The man nodded in the direction of a stiff-looking sofa. “Stash yourself there. I’ll see what he says. Just don’t get too comfortable.”
Not likely, Megan thought, watching him disappear. The room was dark, gloomy on such a rainy day, and her unwilling host hadn’t bothered to turn on any lights. She glanced around her, looking for a lamp or a switch, anything to chase away some of the eerie shadows. There was none.
Disbelieving, she got up and began stalking around the room, looking behind the draped Victorian furniture for something as mundane as an electrical outlet. There weren’t any.
“Looking for something?” That same rough voice interrupted her.
She straightened up, knowing her pale cheeks were stained with color. “An electrical outlet.”
“Ain’t any. Leastways, not in this part of the house. Which is where you’ll be staying.”
“Staying?” Megan echoed uncertainly.
“Yup. Ethan’s said since your daddy’s too big a coward to show up here, then you’ll have to do. I’ll show you to your room.”
“I don’t want to stay,” she said, trying to push back the panic that was like a raven’s wings beating behind her eyes. “I simply want to talk to Mr. Winslowe and then leave. Surely that can be arranged.”
“Surely that can’t,” the older man mocked her. “For one thing, lady, your car is so far stuck that it’ll take a backhoe to get it out, and there’s no one here to drive one. Won’t be till the workmen come back on Monday morning. For another, Ethan sees people on his own terms. After dark. So you just follow me and make yourself comfortable because you aren’t going anywhere until he says you are.”
A sense of utter disbelief washed over her. “I can’t….”
“You will,” the man said, his rough voice implacable. “And don’t think you can try to find your way out of here without your car. There’s no one within fifty miles who’d help you. And I’d make sure you wouldn’t get even a tenth of that distance. Ethan says he’ll see you, and see you he will. It’s my job to take care of everything Ethan requires, and he’s decided he requires you. So why don’t you stop making such a fuss and I’ll show you to your room? It’s another five hours till dark, and even then, Ethan might not be ready. You look like you could do with a rest.”
For a moment, she didn’t say anything. Things were rapidly taking on a sense of unreality. Eighteen hours ago, she’d been enjoying her farewell party. Now she was trapped in a bizarre, unelectrified house in the middle of nowhere with a car mired in the mud and a bruiser determined to keep her there.
She considered running for it, but the man had already informed her it would be a waste of time. She believed him when he said no one in the town of Oak Grove would help her. She considered flinging herself on the turkey-red Oriental carpet and having a temper tantrum the likes of which she hadn’t indulged in since she was five and a half years old. That wouldn’t do her any good, either.
She took a deep breath, drawing herself up as tall as her five foot two inches plus high heels would let her. “That sounds like a good idea,” she said. “I don’t suppose this place comes equipped with running water so that I could wash up?”
“You’ll have your own bathroom. Plumbing works fine, and there’s more than enough hot water for the three of us. You got any bags in that car of yours?”
“No. I wasn’t planning on staying,” she said absently. “Three of us?”
“You. Ethan. And me, I’m Salvatore. I take care of things around here.”
“That’s all? What about a…nurse?”
Salvatore simply stared at her for a moment. “Who needs a nurse? I can do everything for Ethan that needs doing. For that matter, I’m a damned good cook. You got a problem with that?”
“Of course not.”
“Then follow me. And watch your step. This place gets a little tricky in spots.”
That was an understatement. As long as she followed his hulking form through the Victorian hallways, things were fine. It was when they started into the new sections that things got difficult. The gloomy day let little light into the twists and turns of the passageways. They went at right angles, left angles, up flights of stairs, down flights of stairs. Some of the hallways had electric light, most of them didn’t, and within five minutes of this endless journey, Megan gave up trying to memorize her way. She didn’t know whether Salvatore
was deliberately leading her on a roundabout passageway to confuse her or whether the house was really such a maze. Remembering the strange patchwork exterior, she expected it was probably the latter.
Salvatore stopped suddenly in a narrow hallway that was made of stone. One narrow slit in the wall let in a mere thread of rainwashed light, and the heavy wooden door creaked as he opened it. “This was where your father was going to stay,” he announced. “It’s the only room in the house that’s habitable.”
That was a debatable point. While the design of that section of the rambling house resembled a medieval castle, the room he’d shown her to was closer to a dungeon. The mattress on the floor probably wasn’t made of straw, but it wasn’t a Posturepedic, either. There was a brown wool blanket folded up at one end, and judging by the icy temperature of the room, that wouldn’t be enough. The one pillow was small and lumpy looking and covered with something that looked like burlap, there were no chairs, no tables, nothing but a bucket in the corner of the room.
She walked over to it, her high heels clacking noisily on the stone floor. “Is that my modern plumbing?” she asked in a deceptively calm voice.
Salvatore shrugged, then moved over to another door set deep in one of the walls. He withdrew a ring of keys worthy of a medieval chatelain, fitted one into the lock and opened the door. “Ethan said you could use the bathroom.”
Meg didn’t move. She could see beyond Salvatore’s bulk to an impressive-looking bathroom—a huge marble tub and gleaming wall sconce set with unlit candles. “You were going to make my father use the bucket?”
“This wasn’t a social visit, Miss Carey,” Salvatore said. “You hungry? You need anything?”
I need to get out of here, she thought, but she kept it to herself, knowing it wouldn’t do her any good. She wasn’t leaving until Ethan Winslowe gave the word. “Nothing,” she said, ignoring the emptiness in her stomach. She wasn’t going to accept anything from this place; nothing but her freedom. “Unless you want to tell Mr. Winslowe I’d appreciate seeing him as soon as possible. I want to get away from here….”
