by Karen Harper
Getz was sitting near other sweating, exhausted racers who had just finished their brutal uphill then downhill, but it seemed each rider was pretty much keeping to himself.
“Beamer, stay,” Nick told the dog as they started over to confront the man.
“Claire, stay,” Tara said with a tight little smile as she dropped a kiss on the girl’s head. “See, we’re only going over there.”
Taking the piece of plaster with them again, they hurried to where Getz was sitting beside his bike. His helmet and body armor lay nearby in a pile. He was like a knight of old after a joust on his steed, Tara thought. With a backward glance to be sure Claire was all right—she had her arms around Beamer’s neck—she stepped up to Getz first, as they had planned.
She evidently caught his eye immediately, though he seemed not to recognize her. He rose, planted his legs far apart and crossed his arms over his chest. Though she couldn’t see Nick, Tara sensed that he had stiffened his stance.
“Hey, babe, you like X-treme ridin’?” Getz asked, flashing her a smile. Though he’d lived in the States for over twenty years, his German accent was distinct. He whipped off his wraparound aviator sunglasses, which reflected her distorted image. His eyes, pale gray, went thoroughly over her.
She pulled off her sunglasses and her cap, spilling her hair down to her shoulders. “What I like is for X-treme riders to stay way clear of my property.”
He frowned. “You live around here? What’s your problem?”
He actually seemed confused. If he’d been spying on her, surely he would recognize her instantly. Or was he that good an actor?
“Our problem, Whacker,” Nick put in, aligning himself shoulder to shoulder with her, though he’d said he’d give her more time, “is that an X-treme biker’s been spying on Ms. Kinsale here, whom I think you know from your checkered past. And the bike treads, which we’ve made a cast of for the police, suggest that the trespasser might have been you—someone who obviously has a beef against her.”
Nick thrust out the six-inch piece of plaster, then pulled it back, holding it, one-handed, at his side. “And next time you leave one of these with your fingerprints on it,” he added, pulling out the Cacao Reserve candy bar from his shirt pocket in pure bluff, “we’re not even going for a restraining order, but straight to the police.”
“I don’t know what in hell you two are talking about,” Getz blustered, shoving his glasses back on, but he was starting to show less bravado. “Okay, I get it now, who you are, lady. But I got rights, too. I don’t care what you and that bitch of an ex-wife or her mother say! Rights to my kid, rights not to be dissed by some chick and her boyfriend when I’m minding my own business, miles away from your property.”
“So you do know where her property is?”
“I don’t need this. Get the hell out of my face.”
“We’re doing you a big favor, Getz,” Nick insisted, leaning toward him and punching a finger in the middle of his chest. “We’re warning you to keep clear and keep clean, because I’m sure there are no X-treme races in prison.”
“You’re both nuts. Besides, there’s nothing says a biker can’t ride mountain paths anywhere. Any biker, anywhere!” he insisted, thrusting Nick’s hand away, though Nick quickly caught the man’s wrist. Tara noticed that several other bikers were looking their way. A couple of them stood and started shuffling over.
Nick swiveled his head. He saw them, too, but he went on, his voice low and menacing. “Tell you what, Whacker. We wish you good luck on the race here, but we’re the ones who are going to win if you ever set foot anywhere near where we are. Got that?”
“I’m going to call the police over.”
“Do that,” Nick countered, loosening his grip. “We’ll fill them in on everything. Tara, could you go get one of the officers we passed coming in?”
“Forget it, man! Just back off and leave me alone.”
“Deal,” Nick said, his face inches from Getz’s. “That’s the deal. You leave us alone, too.”
Tara started away, thinking Nick would follow, but the two men stood frozen, glaring at each other. She was afraid Nick might ignore the threat of the other bikers and have it out with him, or all of them, but he spun on his heel, took her arm and they walked back to Claire and Beamer.
Later, Tara, Claire and Nick applauded when the winner’s name was announced, because it wasn’t Dietmar “Whacker” Getz.
Tara’s spirits lifted even more when they got home. On the side deck lay a box of crimson roses with a flamboyant yellow bow and a card.
“Oh, look,” she cried, stooping to lift the box in her arms and smell the roses. “One of my former clients, who’s now a lawyer in Seattle, sends me flowers once in a while, but the delivery man never leaves them here.”
When she opened the card, it was signed by Marv Seymour, the creepy, online information broker who had been trying to interest her in a date. The note read, “I see you everywhere…I’ll be seeing you.”
9
That night, over their second glass of red wine, Tara and Nick sat a few feet apart on the leather couch before the gas log fire in the living room. Claire had been exhausted from their day’s excursion and had fallen sound asleep after dinner, so Nick had carried her to bed. The drumming of the rain on the roof should have lulled everyone, Tara thought, but she and Nick were both on edge. Before it had gotten dark and the storm had started, a huge cloud seemed to have slid down Shadow Mountain to press itself against the windows, sealing them in together.
“When it rains, it pours,” she said, “in more ways than one.”
“Yeah. Maybe I’m bad luck. I show up, and you’ve got a whole list of idiots who could be spying on you, or worse.”
“Worse? What could be worse?”
“Someone out to harm you as well as scare you.”
“Like someone trying to roll a rock on my head?”
He sighed, put his stockinged feet up on the wood-and-glass coffee table and leaned back into the soft leather cushions. Beamer lifted his golden head, then put it down on his paws again.
“Here’s a wild thought for you,” Nick said, rubbing his eyes with a thumb and index finger. “Maybe whoever’s been watching this place from the trees above the house is after me, and the Red Rocks incident was just an accident.”
“Oh, right, someone after you. Maybe some of the Taliban followed you here from—”
“Never mind. You’re right, it doesn’t make sense. Despite the roses, I think it was Getz. Hopefully, he’ll steer clear of you now. Unless Clay swore his brother to some sort of vendetta, Rick’s got other things to keep him occupied, namely a woman who’s a handful and a decent job, evidently with good perks. But it’s obvious this information broker you’ve dealt with is off the wall.”
“I’ve never met him, but the weird vibes come right through the laptop. My life and face have been pretty public during the last few years, so he clearly thought he knew me even before I started using him. He’s one of the best IBs I’ve ever worked with, so it’s too bad I have to cut ties. Too bad about those beautiful roses, too.”
Thank God, she thought, Nick had been here to help her during all of this. After making sure the roses weren’t bugged, he had taken them up to the old hunting cabin. He’d laid the box, note and all, on the moss bed while Tara tried to answer Claire’s questions about why they weren’t keeping the flowers. Tara had e-mailed Seymour that she would not consider “seeing him” or accept any gifts. She also made it clear that she wouldn’t use him for locates anymore.
“Let’s do something nice and calm tomorrow,” Nick said. “I’d like to thank the pastor who did Alex’s funeral service. We could go to church, then visit her grave. You said you and Claire had done that without Claire having bad dreams. That is, if you don’t mind hanging out with the two of us again tomorrow.”
“I’m grateful you’re still including me. I know the two of you might not be in my life much longer.”
“Don’t say
it like that,” he said, sitting up and putting his wine goblet on the table. He turned toward her, bending one leg up onto the couch. “This is a good transition period for me and her—and I hope for you, too. I know she’ll do what she has to when the time comes, but it really helps me to see how you handle her. I guess I have some things to learn.”
“It’s not quite like being a dog handler, Nick—sit, heel, stay.”
“Yeah, I hear you. I’d forgotten how women think,” he said with a low, raspy laugh that sent shivers up her spine. He stretched his arm out on the back of the couch and tugged at her hair. It was a light moment, yet tension hung heavy between them. “I’d forgotten,” he went on, speaking slowly, his deep voice rougher than usual, “how a woman feels in my arms, until you let me hold you yesterday.”
Their gazes met. She nodded, and that seemed to unlock something in both of them. He moved first—or else she did. Arms around each other, hips touching, sliding together, they leaned in unison back on the deep, soft couch. And then the kiss.
It had been years for Tara but it felt like eons, and she wanted it to go on forever. His mouth was taut and firm at first, but it softened, coaxing her to relax. Yet every nerve in her body went on alert; she could feel the kiss and caress down into the pit of her belly. It made her curl her toes until her calves almost cramped. They bumped noses as they tilted their heads to deepen the kiss. His arm moved lower to clasp her waist and lift her slightly toward him while she hung on to stop the tilting of the couch, the room, the entire mountain.
Maybe the coma had made her forget how this could feel. Laird must have been a great kisser, because he’d absolutely seduced her, but she couldn’t recall that, and she didn’t want to. This was the first time anything had been this magical and powerful, at least where the power was hers, as well. It was hard to believe that this was only Nick’s third night here, yet this emotional whirlwind with him made everything else seem so muted and distant.
And from somewhere—damn—in some other galaxy, a phone was ringing, ringing.
When Nick pulled slightly away, she realized they had been breathing in unison through their open mouths.
“Won’t that wake Claire up?” he asked.
Tara didn’t care if it woke the dead. “No, once she’s asleep—except for the bad dreams—she’s out. That better not be Marv Seymour,” she added, her voice shaky. “It might be a desperate client or Veronica.”
Reluctantly, she took the cell from Nick when he picked it up from the end table. With one hand in the small of her back, he steadied her as she sat up. It wasn’t unusual for the mother of a snatched child desperate for news or a new client still in shock at her loss to phone at odd hours. Sometimes Tara still used her social work counseling skills and was glad to do it. Now, she tried to clear her mind, so she could make sense.
She cleared her throat. “Tara Kinsale here.”
“Ms. Kinsale? Formerly Mrs. Lohan, right?” A young woman’s voice, slightly nervous.
“Yes, formerly Mrs. Kinsale-Lohan. May I help you?”
“This is Elin Johansen from the Mountain Manor Clinic. I’m the music therapist there. I don’t suppose you know me.”
“No, but Veronica Lohan has spoken fondly of you.”
“Oh, that’s just it. Do you know she was readmitted yesterday?”
“But—I just talked to her yesterday morning, and she seemed fine.”
Nick ran his fingers through his hair and took the empty wineglasses into the kitchen to give her some privacy. Or maybe he was just relieved that it wasn’t Marv Seymour.
“You mean she had a relapse?” Tara asked. “I appreciate your calling me, Elin.” Especially, Tara thought, since Jordan Lohan had obviously stonewalled her. What Jordan Lohan wanted around the clinic, he got, despite the fact he was a financier and not a medical mind. “Have you seen her?”
“Briefly. I wasn’t really supposed to, but she asked me to tell you something, not that it made sense. She’s heavily medicated right now.”
Tara kept nodding. Yes, she knew how that felt. Even when she was finally being weaned from the coma, she was sometimes sedated. “What did she say?” she prompted the woman.
“Okay, here it is, word for word. She said, ‘Tell Tara Kinsale, Jim’s not lost, Angel.’ She nicknamed me Angel, you know, because she said I looked like an angel painted on some Baroque organ she’d seen in Belgium.”
“So her message to me was ‘Jim’s not lost’? That’s what she wanted you to tell me?”
“I said she wasn’t making much sense, but I would have felt terrible if I hadn’t told you. I’m sure the powers-that-be around here would think I’m meddling, but Veronica is a musical genius, and I think the world of her.”
“You know, Elin, despite all I’ve been through with the Lohans, I do, too, and I thank you for telling me where she is and what she said. Do you think she’s referring to Jim Manning, the clinic groundskeeper? He’s the only Jim I can think of that both of us know.”
“She could have meant him, I guess. He’s always joking that he’ll get lost on that huge acreage he tends. You know,” she went on, lowering her voice as if someone could be listening, “I heard Mr. Lohan has him working on their land in Kerr Gulch off and on, too. Veronica always appreciated Jim’s sense of humor. She told me once no one else but him around the clinic had any.”
“He was kind to me, too, brought me wildflowers more than once when I was in rehab….” Tara’s voice faded. How different she’d felt about receiving scarlet mallow from that kind man compared to those stunning roses from Marv Seymour.
“So, are you feeling all right these days, Ms. Kinsale?”
“Better and better, physically. For the rest of me, I’m a work in progress. And please, call me Tara.”
“We’re all always a work in progress, Tara.”
“Thanks again.”
“Sure. I—I don’t know if they’ll let me work with Mrs. Lohan again, but if they do, I’ll let you know how she is. With the wonderful music she made on the pipe organ in the chapel, especially my favorites from Phantom of the Opera, she was as much help to me as I was to her.”
When they said goodbye, Tara’s heart was thudding, harder than the rain that pounded on the windows as if some monstrous mountain beast wanted in. Staring at her knees, she sat still a moment, feeling so sad for Veronica and puzzling over the strange message. Well, Veronica was doped up, so her mind might have been wandering. Yet, even if she were out of it, could the message have meant more than it said on the surface?
But besides all that, Tara was desperately trying to recall how she knew Veronica had played on the chapel pipe organ late at night—even that very Phantom of the Opera music—when Veronica had left the clinic months before Tara came out of her coma.
Tara was walking through the thick, dark fog in her heart and head. It crept down from Shadow Mountain and coiled around the house, crawled into her bed and her brain. Was she still hidden away in a coma? Voices, bright lights! Someone shone a bright light in each eye. “Is she alive?” someone shouted.
Was Alex dead? Where was Claire?
Though the air was thick with grief, she slogged on. Her feet were cold, so cold. The rain made the tree limbs slump and brush together, washing her with icy water. But she had to know. She had to find Alex and Claire, find Veronica, too. Mostly, she had to find herself, find what it was she had lost. Finders keepers, losers weepers.
“Jim is not lost,” someone whispered.
But she was lost, not sure which way to turn in the trees. In this darkness, she might slide off the edge of the cliff, and then the pain would break her in two, into two Taras, two people…She wanted to hide from the pain.
The sound of sharp barking. She was lost, but Beamer would find her. Barking, barking…deep barking, like thunder…
Tara sat straight up in bed. Oh—she’d been dreaming, but Beamer’s barking was real. A storm with lightning and thunder! The alarm clock read 5:04 a.m. She and Nick had t
alked more after Tara’s phone call last night, then gone to their beds about midnight.
Tara jumped up and pulled on a robe as she ran down the hall. Claire’s door was still closed; when she slept, she slept, but Tara peeked in to be sure she was all right. Yes, sprawled across her bed, breathing deeply. When she heard Nick’s voice, telling Beamer to be quiet and to sit, Tara closed the door and went to the top of the stairs.
“What is it?” she asked. “Is it the storm?”
“He never used to bark at storms,” he said, his voice low. “It’s still thick as pea soup out there. But I think I heard footsteps on the deck and Beamer sure heard or smelled something.”
“Maybe a big, human rat,” she said. “Hit the outside lights.”
She ran down the stairs as the exterior lights came on. She supposed they should leave them on all the time now, but what good did it do in rain and fog? There had never been a need to have lights on all night anywhere near Conifer.
Nick, in sweatpants and a T-shirt, was barefoot. He pulled the curtain open farther and they peered out. The lights only pierced about three feet into the gray, swirling mist. But that was enough for them to see a dozen roses had been beheaded and their bloodred petals strewn across the deck. Twelve stems had been stuck upright between the deck boards as if to make a thorny barrier for anyone who stepped outside.
“He must have just been here,” Nick muttered, and unlocked the sliding glass door as thunder echoed from the mountains. “Seymour, Getz, the boogeyman or whoever. I’m going out after him.”
“No,” Tara cried, and grabbed his arm. “Whoever it is, he could have more than a trap of thorns waiting, maybe even a gun. Nick, I’m so sorry about all this. Please, don’t go out there.”
