by Cassie Miles
“Sometimes,” Liz repeated. If only she could be absolutely certain.
Her gaze lit upon an object placed on the windowsill between a pot of blooming daisies and a green Chia pet. It was a small plaster statue of a bluebird perched on a brown tree branch. “Sister, where did you find that statuette?”
“It always makes me happy when I look at it. Such a cheerful bird. When I used to visit Agatha in her sickroom, the little bluebird was always there on the table beside her.” Sister Muriel reached across the sink to pick up the statue. “After she died, I asked Sarah if I might have this. As a memento.”
“May I take it?” Liz asked. “It might be evidence.”
“Of course.” Sister Muriel placed the bluebird in her hand. “If this cheery fellow can help you find and convict the terrible person who murdered my friend, you are most welcome to it.”
“I’ll try to get it back,” Liz promised.
“If not, I won’t be disappointed. Every day, it seems, my memories of Agatha grow stronger. Sometimes, I believe she is here with me, still encouraging, still doing her good works.”
“Perhaps,” Liz said, “she is.”
On the porch, she held out the statue toward Dash. “Sister Muriel had this. As a memento of Agatha. Look, Dash. It’s your falcon.”
“Bluebird,” he said.
He turned the cheap plaster bird over in his hand. There was a circular hole in the bottom that had been taped over. When he shook the statue, he could hear a rattling inside. Firm evidence, he thought. Finally, he could prove that Agatha had been murdered by someone who had exchanged her high blood pressure capsules for a dose of poison. With luck, there might even be a fingerprint on the capsule.
“This is almost all we need. Gary Gregory is cooked.” He looked gratefully at the plump, pretty nun with the wire-rimmed glasses. “We have one more stop, Sister. But Liz and I will be at the church. Six o’clock.”
As they drove away, heading toward Liz’s apartment, Dash decided it was a good sign the church where the sister planned for the marriage ceremony to take place was named St. Michael’s. A good omen. Or, possibly, a very bad one.
They barely spoke on the ride to Liz’s apartment. Not only was the rush hour traffic difficult, but Dash was lost in contemplation. He truly could not imagine the consequences if he had transgressed. Angels who erred were often sent to the dread Fifth Choir, the celestial equivalent of Siberia. Avenging Angels were reassigned to less interesting positions. And, if he had blown it big-time, there was always eternal damnation.
Was it worth the risk?
He looked at Liz and knew the answer. She was his heart, she was part of the essence of him. To have her, he would risk eternal punishment.
When Liz parked behind her apartment, he hesitantly said, “About this marriage—”
“You’ve changed your mind,” she assumed. “I agree that it’s a big step—a giant leap—to be undertaken so precipitously. But I can’t lose you, Dash.”
“And I feel the same about you. I love you, Elizabeth. I want this marriage. I want it more than anything. We might be grabbing at straws, but we have to try.”
“Oh, Dash.” She wanted to kiss him, longed to draw comfort from his embrace. But it was too soon. They were not married yet.
They hurried up the stairs to her apartment, and Liz went directly to the trash container beneath the sink. She removed the magazine she’d thrown away when she thought it had been touched by an intruder. By Gary, she thought.
Beneath the magazine, there were coffee grounds, a disgusting orange peel and a few empty containers. At the very bottom, stained and crumpled, were the computer printouts she had used for her rough draft of the price comparisons.
Triumphantly, she said, “Here they are, Dash. These are originals, straight from Gary’s computer.”
He took the papers and turned toward the door. “Let’s go, sweetheart. We’ve got a date at six.”
“I want to change clothes.” Though she didn’t have a white, lacy dress, Liz did own a pale blue pantsuit with a satin collar. “I won’t be a minute.”
She went into her bedroom and stopped dead in her tracks.
“Guess again, Liz.” Gary Gregory sat on the bed. In his hand, he held a very deadly-looking revolver.
She pivoted, but he was faster. He grasped her forearm and raised his weapon. The barrel of the gun pressed against her head.
“I was afraid you might try something,” he said. “Even though I fired you, I had a feeling you’d come back to pester me. After all, you’ve seen the figures.”
“But I’m not a computer,” she said. “I couldn’t remember. And without documentation, I couldn’t prove—”
“Shut up, Liz.” He guided her into the front room, keeping the gun close to her head.
Dash stood paralyzed, unable to help.
Gary ordered her to sit on the sofa and told Dash to sit beside her. “Don’t try anything,” he warned. “This gun is cocked and ready to fire. It’s a hair trigger.”
He ordered Dash to turn over the rumpled computer pages. As soon as he had them in his hand, he smiled. “Now I’ve got everything I need.”
“Why did you kill them?” Liz asked.
“I felt really bad about Agatha, you know. She was, after all, the only person who would hire me after that embezzling charge—which I have since erased from the memory of every computer.”
“Then why?”
“The money, of course. Raising my roses is expensive, and after I had that freeze in my greenhouse that nearly destroyed years of effort, I knew that I couldn’t afford to go halfway. I needed the best that money could buy. So I started siphoning off money—small amounts at first. When the cash started getting bigger, I covered myself with key-man insurance.”
“But Agatha was beginning to catch on,” Dash said. “Is that it? She was onto you?”
“She had an inkling. I knew that as soon as she was out of the way, I could take as much as I wanted. Jack was so stupid. Even when I killed him, he didn’t know why.” Gary’s beaklike nose protruded into Liz’s line of vision. “And now I’ll have to kill the two of you. And I want to make sure it’s blamed on Hector. Better yet, on his thug son.”
“It won’t do any good to kill us,” Liz bluffed with sheer bravado. She was so terrified that it took all her effort not to faint. “We have evidence. Hard evidence. One of the capsules, disguised to look like high blood pressure medicine, that you gave to Agatha.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“It’s true,” Dash said tersely. He described the pill. “Might even have your prints on it.”
“And where is this capsule?” Gary asked.
“If I tell you,” Liz said, “will you let us go? I promise we won’t help the police at all.”
“Do you think I’m a fool?” He waved the gun in her face and pressed the barrel to her cheek. The cold metal stabbed into her skin. “You don’t have any room to bargain. Either way, you’re dead. But you do have one choice.”
“What’s that?”
“I can kill you slowly. Which is something I would rather enjoy doing.” He raised his white eyebrows and stared at her with cruel intensity. “Or you can give me this capsule, and your death will be sudden and fast.”
“You’re insane.”
“And you’re deceased.”
He cackled at what he must have perceived as humor, and she realized that he truly was crazy. Though he professed to have a logical motive for his crimes, she knew there was more. Dash would have called it evil.
Gary leered at her, enjoying the power he attained with a gun in his hand. “Now, Lizzie, what’s it going to be? Fast or slow?”
“I’ll get the pill,” she said, playing for time. If she could move out of the line of fire, Dash could easily overpower this disgusting vulture who kept beautiful roses and terrifying secrets.
“Where is it?” Gary demanded.
“In my medicine cabinet. In the bathroom. I’ll have to
find it for you.”
“Fine.” Keeping the gun close to her head, he ordered, “Dash, you go first. Then, Liz, you follow. I’ll be right behind you. Remember, Dash, if you make one false move, she’s dead.”
Dash rose slowly to his feet. Though he spoke not a word, Liz could hear him, as if he was speaking aloud. His voice instructed, “When you get into the bathroom, slam the door on him and hit the floor in case he starts firing.”
She fell into step behind him, and Gary trailed her. She could feel the gun at the back of her head. Would this work? Would she be able to move fast enough?
At the bathroom, she slammed the door and dove
Two shots crashed through the wooden door, but Dash leaped forward and locked it.
“We’re okay,” she said, somewhat amazed. “All right, Dash, do your angel thing. Whack him with a flaming sword.”
“I’d like to take him alive. I want him to stand trial and be convicted for his crimes.”
“Well, just knock him out. Don’t you have a stun gun in your repertoire?”
“And how would I explain that to a judge?”
Gary was blasting at the door lock. In minutes, he’d be through the door. She had an idea. “I’ll go through the window. There are enough ledges out there that I can climb to the roof.”
“And then?”
“I might be able to sneak inside another apartment and use their phone. Just hold him until I get outside.”
She was through the window and onto the ledge in a minute. Tiptoeing cautiously, she inched along the eaves until she came to a dormer. Carefully, Liz tried the window. Locked!
She kept going. The fancy architectural details made it simple to climb over to the other side.
Inside her apartment, she heard the bathroom door crack and slam open.
Gary’s head appeared in the window. His crest of white-blond hair bobbed furiously.
Though she tried to duck, he spotted her and let loose a volley of gunfire. Where were her neighbors? Why hadn’t anyone called the police? Where was a cop when you really needed one?
She peeked again and saw Gary shove himself onto the window ledge.
Dash’s voice in her ear advised, “Hold on tight.”
Liz braced herself.
The hot, vicious gust of wind came up suddenly, and Gary flattened himself against the eave of the house, clinging to her window frame. He tried to move, but the blast of air fought him. The gun dropped from his hand and fell three stories to the ground below.
Liz looked away from Gary to the pale blue skies and the western sunset. She couldn’t say for sure, but she thought she saw wings, pearly white and powerful, stroking a tidal wave of air that rocked the shingles on the roof.
Gary lost his grasp and his balance. With a surprised screech, he fell back in space. He crumpled on the ground and lay silent.
Immediately, Dash was beside her. “Are you all right?”
“I’ll live. How about Gary?”
“He’s unconscious. His left ankle is broken.”
“So he won’t be going anywhere,” she said.
She eased her way into her apartment and telephoned the police. But this time, Liz couldn’t wait around for their questioning. She had a ceremony to attend.
IN ST MICHAEL’S CHURCH, Dash and Liz—who had managed to change into her pale blue pantsuit and to drag a comb through her hair—stood before the priest. The only witnesses to their vows were Sister Muriel and three of the women from the shelter.
Despite his wildly beating angel heart, Dash listened to the words of the ceremony. If anything was to happen to separate them, he wanted every second branded on his memory. When Liz accepted him as her husband, saying a quiet, “I do,” his joy was unbounded. Her love was better than flight, than invisibility, than any of the miracles of his existence.
And when it came his turn, his voice was strong. “I do.”
From behind him, Dash heard the beautiful resonance of a heavenly Choir. He turned and looked up. At the rear of the church, in the choir loft, he spied Angelo, waving and cheering as if he was at a football game and not a solemn wedding ceremony. To his left was another cheerleader—Cherie in her leopard-skin robes. Behind them both, a celestial Choir was arrayed, and they celebrated the sacrament of marriage in powerful song.
“I knew you could do it,” Angelo shouted. “Follow your heart. I knew you could figure it out.”
Dash looked at the priest, who was speechless, staring at the miraculous manifestation in the choir loft.
But there was someone else at the altar. Dash’s gaze fixed on a marble statue of St. Michael with his fiery sword held aloft. And the statue moved. It breathed. The fierce saint’s eyes blazed and he offered a benediction. “I now pronounce you man and wife. Dashiell, you may kiss the bride.”
Dash needed no more encouragement. He drew Liz into his arms. For the first time, he allowed himself to taste the honey of her lips. Her body was pressed firmly against him, and he reveled in the unfamiliar sensation. His fingers tangled in the length of her hair.
She was perfect, he thought as he ended their kiss, the first of a lifetime of kisses. He stroked her arm. With his finger, he traced the line of her jaw. He held her face in his hands and studied every angle and curve. “Here’s looking at you, sweetheart.”
This, indeed, was close to heaven.
After they had retreated down the aisle and stood on the church steps, accepting congratulations from Sister Muriel and her ladies, a well-dressed man approached.
Dash introduced him. “Liz, I’d like for you to meet Mike. He’s a good friend and my boss.”
“I’ve heard so much about you.” She noticed that his necktie was exactly the same color as the maroon warrior cord that Dash had worn when he manifested as an angel. “In fact, I was thinking of asking you for a job. As an investigator.”
“We’re not quite that liberal yet,” he said. “But I expect to be doing more consulting work with you in the future.”
“Consulting work?”
“Frankly, I had hoped you and your husband might form your own private detective firm. After all, I can’t really let him return to the agency. Nor do I suppose he would want to.”
Dash nodded. He couldn’t speak. His gratitude overwhelmed him.
Mike scratched his temple and grinned. “I would suggest the name Divine Investigations.”
“Thank you, Mike,” she said. “We’ll consider it.”
He nodded. “May your union be blessed with many children.”
He walked away. He’d only gone a few paces when he vanished like a dream in the night.
She gaze at her new bridegroom. “When Mike said he wanted us to form our own agency, did that mean you’ve changed? Are you still…” She looked around to make sure no one was listening. “Are you still an angel?”
Without moving his lips, he sent a thought to her. “Yes, my darling. I am still an angel. Your angel.”
“Well, I think we should get started on that blessing from Mike.”
“Many children,” he said. He reached into his jacket pocket, removed the fancy wrapped condom and placed it in her hand. “I guess I won’t be needing this.”
A police car squealed up to the curb of the church, and a uniformed officer jumped out and charged up the wide stone stairs to St. Michael’s Church. “Dash Divine and Liz Carradine? We’ve just arrested one Gary Gregory for the murder of Jack Orben, and we have a few questions you might be able to help us with.”
Liz linked her arm through that of her new husband, appreciating the very solid feeling of his body against hers. How had she ever thought her life was dull, mundane and routine?
“Please come with me,” the cop said.
“You bet,” Dash said. “We’re there, Officer. And we got evidence that’s going to make conviction a breeze.”
So easily, he slid into his Sam Spade persona, the face he wore for the everyday world. And Liz smiled at him. She was the only mortal who knew all his secre
ts, including the very intimate detail that he wasn’t anywhere near as tough as he acted.
He leaned toward her. Almost embarrassed, he dropped a kiss on her forehead. “You don’t mind, do you, precious? We need to help the coppers whenever we can.”
“No problem,” she said sweetly. “I guess the honeymoon will have to wait.”
“I’ve already waited several lifetimes for you to come along,” he whispered. “A few hours more won’t matter.”
Without speaking, they exchanged eternal vows and pledged their love.
eISBN 978-14592-7564-5
THE IMPOSTOR
Copyright © 1996 by Kay Bergstrom
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Printed in U.S.A.
Table of Contents
Cover Page
Table of Contents
Excerpt
Dear Reader
Dedication
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
