Secrets of His Own

by Amanda Stevens

  The younger man had taken off his shirt in the heat, and the sheen of sweat along sinewy muscles made Cochburn uncomfortably aware of the spare tire around his middle. He hadn’t worked out in years, and in a fair fight against Draco, he’d be a dead man. In a dirty fight…he’d still be a dead man.

  Draco propped both arms against the newel posts, but the relaxed pose didn’t fool Cochburn. His muscles were bunched, as if ready to spring like a cat, and his gaze—that relentless stare—never left Cochburn’s face.

  “You didn’t answer my question,” he said softly. “Are you looking for something?”

  Cochburn cleared his throat. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I was looking for you. I wanted to ask how you’re progressing on the repairs.”

  One brow lifted. “That’s funny because I could have sworn you saw me on the roof a few minutes ago.”

  Cochburn assumed what he hoped was a look of mild surprise. “You were on the roof? Sorry I missed you. I guess I was a little preoccupied.”

  “So I noticed.”

  Cochburn smiled in a knowing way. “She’s a real looker, isn’t she?”

  Draco shrugged. “If you like blondes. Who is she?”

  “Her name is Carrie Bishop. Actually, she’s the other reason I came down here to find you. She’s a friend of one of the tenants…Tia Falcon, the brunette who lives in the pool house. I’m sure you’ve seen her around.” When Draco didn’t respond, Cochburn said hurriedly, “Anyway, she seems to think that something may have happened to her friend.”

  “Why?”

  Cochburn hesitated. “Something about a letter she received, I gather.”

  “And what does any of this have to do with me?” When Draco placed a foot on the porch, it was all Cochburn could do not to back away. Unfortunately, he had no place to retreat.

  He moistened his lips. “I wondered if you’d seen her lately…say, in the last day or two.”

  Draco gave him a quizzical look. “I thought you were paying me to fix the roof, not keep tabs on your tenants.”

  “Yes, of course. But it did occur to me that your paths might have crossed. It’s a small island. Not much in the way of distractions.”

  Draco’s gaze narrowed. “What are you getting at, Cochburn?”

  Sensing he was treading on dangerous ground, Cochburn immediately backpedaled. “Nothing. Nothing at all. I just thought I’d alert you to the fact that we have company on the island. If Carrie Bishop doesn’t find her friend, she may come down here looking for her.”

  “Then maybe you’d better pass on a friendly piece of advice.”

  The edge in Draco’s voice chilled Cochburn’s blood. “What’s that?”

  If possible, the gray eyes went even colder. “You go poking your nose in places it doesn’t belong, what you might find is trouble.”

  “TIA? ARE YOU IN HERE? It’s me…Carrie.” She paused just inside the door of the apartment to allow her eyes time to adjust to the dimness.

  Slowly the room came into focus, and Carrie glanced around with interest. To the right of the French doors was a small sitting room furnished with wicker chairs and gauzy white curtains and to the left was a kitchenette. Straight ahead an arched doorway led to a shadowy hallway and presumably a bedroom and bath.

  It was cool inside the apartment, which meant that the stucco walls were thick enough to keep out the heat. And sound, Carrie realized. Inside, she could no longer hear the generator.

  Her gaze moved back to the sitting room. A tiny niche in one wall provided just enough space for an old ebony desk. The surface had been neatly cleared, but the chair had been shoved back and left askew, as if someone had risen abruptly. Carrie frowned when she spotted it.

  The misplaced chair was the kind of detail no one else would even have noticed, but she knew her friend too well. Tia was a stickler when it came to her personal space. Everything had to be orderly. Throw rugs positioned precisely. Pillows arranged on the sofa just so. Her tidiness was the one thing she could always control, no matter what.

  So what had brought her up from the desk and driven her out of the apartment so quickly that she hadn’t taken the time to straighten the chair or lock the door?

  Carrie tried to convince herself she was making too much of that chair, but the premonition that had gripped her for days wouldn’t let go. Something was wrong. She could feel it.

  Had Tia’s nightmares come back? Had they driven her from her own wedding and brought her here, to the almost complete isolation of Cape Diablo? Had she tried to shut them out by pulling the blinds over the windows and immersing herself in another family’s tragedy?

  Or was something far more sinister at work here? Had Tia inadvertently stumbled upon the answer to a thirty-year-old mystery?

  Carrie turned to search the rest of the apartment. As she made her way down the narrow corridor, she became aware of a smell. Something faint. A lingering odor of decay that turned her stomach and made her heart pound in agitation.

  It was only a trace. She’d watched enough crime shows to know that the stench from a dead body would be overpowering so she tried not to panic.

  Tia is fine, she told herself over and over. The apartment needed airing out, was all.

  But as she stepped into the tiny bedroom, her gaze darted almost fearfully around the small space. Her first reaction to the spotless condition of the room was intense relief.

  “Thank God,” she whispered, realizing that she had been bracing for the worst ever since she’d gotten off the boat.

  Like the rest of the apartment, the room was immaculate. The bed was made and the floor free of discarded clothing. Tia’s things were stored in the closet and her suitcase shoved out of the way on the overhead shelf. Everything was in its proper place, just the way she would have left it.

  So why did she still feel that terrible sense of doom? Carrie wondered.

  Walking over to the French door, she drew back the curtain and stared out at the overgrown garden. She unlatched the door and pulled it open, allowing a fresh breeze into the room. Almost immediately the scent from the hallway faded.

  Carrie started to turn away when a movement beyond the garden stopped her. Someone was coming up a path that led back into the mangrove forest, and for a moment, she thought it was Cochburn.

  But as the man emerged from the trees, she saw that he was younger and taller than the attorney, with closely cropped hair and a lean, muscular body. He wore faded jeans and a shirt that hung open, revealing a bronzed chest and—Carrie would have sworn—the handle of a gun protruded from his low-riding waistband.

  Nearing the house, he buttoned his shirt as he glanced over his shoulder. There was something oddly covert about his movements, and Carrie remembered her conversation earlier with Cochburn about the unsavory element in the area.

  Quickly, she closed the door, then stepped back into the room before the man spotted her. He seemed to be heading directly toward her, but at the last moment, he veered off the path and disappeared back into the trees.

  Who was he? Carrie wondered with a shiver. And why did he have a gun?

  She watched for a moment longer, but when he didn’t appear again, she turned and walked over to examine a framed photograph Tia had left on the dresser.

  The picture had been taken at summer camp the year she and Tia turned twelve. They were both beaming with arms thrown over each other’s shoulders. The two of them had been inseparable back then.

  How odd that Tia had kept the photograph all these years and brought it with her to Cape Diablo. Carrie had long since put away everything that reminded her of that summer.

  The knot in her chest tightened. It still hurt to see their shining faces in that snapshot and know what the future held for them. She and Tia had been so happy that day. So eager for a summer adventure.

  But a week later, their lives had been changed forever. In the blink of an eye, the innocence had been lost, replaced by the kind of horror most people could hardly imagine.

  The da
y of the abduction had started out like so many others that summer. The sun had been out. Carrie could still see the way the light dazzled off the man’s wristwatch.

  He’d seemed cute and harmless at first. It was only later when she’d seen that terrible tattoo on his chest that she’d begun to have an inkling of just how evil he really was.

  “Don’t leave me here, Carrie. Please, please don’t leave me….”

  She squeezed her eyes closed as Tia’s desperate plea echoed through her head, followed by her own hollow promise.

  “I won’t leave you, Tia. I swear I won’t….”

  But she had left Tia. She’d left her all alone in that hellish place. Carrie had managed to get away, and the police had later told her that her escape had probably saved both their lives. But Carrie hadn’t seen it that way, and neither, she feared, had Tia.

  In spite of everything, though, the two of them had managed to resume their friendship, but nothing was ever the same after that summer.

  It had almost been a relief for Carrie when the two of them had gone off to separate colleges and eventually lost touch. Away from Tia, the nightmares and guilt had finally faded.

  Then, just a few months ago, Tia had come back into Carrie’s life. She’d called out of the blue one day, shocking Carrie from the pleasant complacency her life had become.

  “I’m getting married and I want you to be my maid of honor. There’s no one else I’d rather have with me than you, Carrie. We’ve been through so much. Please say yes.”

  Of course, Carrie had said yes, even though she’d had some trepidation about renewing the friendship. After years of struggling to ‘find herself,’ she’d finally gotten her life on track. She had the job of her dreams with a local magazine, a great apartment, a small circle of friends. So what if she hadn’t met that special someone. So what if at times loneliness threatened to engulf her. She’d finally put the past behind her and that was all that mattered.

  Or so she tried to tell herself.

  But Tia’s phone call had brought it all back. The nightmares and the guilt.

  Carrie had worked long and hard to exorcise her own demons, but they were always there lurking in the deepest recesses of her subconscious, waiting to undermine any intimate relationship she might have hoped to establish.

  The guilt was still there, too. She’d gotten away from their abductor before he’d physically harmed her, but Tia hadn’t. What must her nightmares be like?

  They’d never talked about what that monster did to her, but Carrie knew. Deep down, she knew.

  The wedding was to be Tia’s exorcism. A chance to finally put the past to rest and have the kind of fairy-tale life she’d always dreamed of.

  So what had happened? Carrie wondered. What had ended the dream and driven Tia away from the church that day? Had she simply gotten cold feet or had she discovered something about Trey Hollinger that had frightened her into running away?

  And why had she brought the photograph—such a painful reminder of the past—with her to Cape Diablo?

  A noise from the sitting room brought Carrie around with a start. Her mind flashed instantly to the man she’d seen a few minutes earlier on the path. He’d still been some distance from her so she couldn’t be sure that she’d seen a gun, but the very idea that someone might be armed and dangerous on the tiny island made her hesitate at the doorway.

  “Anyone home?” Robert Cochburn called from the sitting room.

  Recognizing his voice, Carrie let out a breath of relief as she replaced the frame on the dresser, then walked down the corridor and through the archway.

  The attorney hovered on the threshold, giving her an apologetic smile as soon as she entered the room. “Sorry to just barge in like this, but I did knock. I guess you didn’t hear me.” His gaze darted to the hallway behind her. “I trust you found your friend?”

  “Unfortunately, no.” Carrie brushed a restless hand through her hair. “I don’t know where she is.”

  Something flickered in his eyes, a shadow that made Carrie wonder. “How did you get in here?”

  “The door was unlocked.” Realizing what he might think, she said quickly, “I wasn’t snooping. I just wanted to make sure everything was okay. I thought Tia might have left the island for good.”

  “And?”

  He had the oddest expression on his face. Carrie didn’t know what to make of it. “Her clothes are still hanging in the closet so I assume she hasn’t gone far.” She glanced over her shoulder. “There’s a smell in the hallway. I think an animal might have gotten trapped in the walls and died.”

  Cochburn grimaced. “I wouldn’t be surprised. The house is old and falling apart. I’m sure there are dozens of ways for mice and rats to get in. I can have someone check it out if you want.”

  “I should probably leave that up to Tia. It’s her apartment.”

  They both walked outside then and Cochburn closed the door behind them. As they moved into the courtyard, Carrie suddenly remembered something in Tia’s letter.

  Sometimes I go down to the beach and try to imagine the two of them collecting shells, building sand castles, playing chase with the surf. Reyna, so quiet and shy, and Pilar, too adventurous for her own good. They remind me of the way you and I once were.

  Her gaze lifted to the upstairs windows at the back of the house. She almost expected to find Tia gazing down at her, but instead there was nothing but light reflecting off glass.

  She rubbed her hands up and down her arms as she continued to stare at the windows. Someone was up there. Not Tia perhaps, but someone. Carrie was sure of it. She could feel those invisible eyes on her, and the dread she’d been fighting since she’d gotten off the boat seemed to seep all the way down into her soul.

  Something bad had happened here. It was as if those lingering emotions had morphed into a physical presence, one that watched and waited and played on vulnerabilities.

  She’d only felt this sensation one other time….

  Don’t, Carrie warned herself nervously. It wouldn’t do to make comparisons.

  It was just an old house. And something bad had happened there. It was no secret. A whole family had disappeared. Little wonder the place seemed to reek of sorrow and tragedy.

  “Which bedroom belonged to the Santiago children?” she asked suddenly.

  The question seemed to catch Cochburn off guard. “I beg your pardon?”

  “I was just thinking about something Tia wrote in one of her letters. She seems so fascinated by the Santiago family, especially the little girls. I wondered if she might be up there for some reason.”

  “Oh, I doubt that.”

  Carrie turned at his adamant tone. “Why do you say that?”

  He hesitated, then shrugged. “Because if she were up there, she would have seen you by now and come down.”

  “I suppose you’re right.”

  “I really don’t think there’s cause for worry,” he insisted. “She’s probably gone back to the mainland for a few days.”

  “But if that were the case, someone in Everglades City would have seen her,” Carrie said.

  “Not necessarily. We only talked to a few people at the marina. The place is full of tourists this time of year. Faces tend to blend together.”

  “But surely Trawick would have remembered taking her back to the mainland.”

  “Trawick delivers supplies and mail to Cape Diablo, but his isn’t the only boat for hire in the area. She could have made previous arrangements with another driver. Or Carlos may have taken her back. You said she wasn’t expecting you, so it’s very possible that you’ve simply missed her.”

  Carrie hated to think that her trip to Cape Diablo had been a waste, mainly because she didn’t know where to go from there. Searching for Tia in the Ten Thousands Islands would be like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack.

  She bit her lip. “I should talk to Carlos. And what about Alma Garcia? She was standing on the balcony when we came up. Maybe she saw Tia leav
e. Do you think it would be possible for me to talk to her, as well?”

  Cochburn frowned as his gaze shot up to the third-story windows. “Alma…isn’t exactly receptive to strangers,” he said doubtfully. “Perhaps it would be better if I go up alone and have a word with her. Meanwhile, why don’t you check with the other tenant? He may know where Tia’s gone off to, and if not, we’ll go find Carlos together.”

  Carrie nodded. “What did you say his name is?”

  “Ethan Stone. He lives in the apartment above Tia’s.”

  Carrie started for the stairs, then turned back when Cochburn called out her name. “Yes?”

  He paused, as if preparing to broach a tricky subject. “I don’t want to sound overly dramatic, but I meant it earlier when I said that you shouldn’t go wandering off on your own, even here on the island. Cape Diablo is small, but it’ll be dark soon and the south end is nothing but swamp. It can be pretty treacherous if you don’t know your way around.”

  She thought again of the man she’d seen earlier and nodded. “Thanks for the warning. I’ll wait for you before I leave the courtyard.”

  “Good. I’ll meet you back here in a few minutes.”

  They separated, and as Cochburn headed for the main house, Carrie walked up the stairs to the second-floor apartment and knocked on the door. A fly buzzed past her face and she swatted it away as she knocked a second time. Finally she gave up and headed back down the stairs to the courtyard.

  In spite of Cochburn’s warning, she was tempted to strike out on her own to look for Tia. Carrie hated feeling so helpless, but she supposed the attorney was right. It would be dark soon and she didn’t know the terrain. She wouldn’t be of any use to Tia if she got herself lost or injured in the swamp.

  Standing at the edge of the pool, she stared into the murky water and wondered what she could do. Was it time to go to the police?

  And tell them what, exactly?

  It was doubtful they’d treat Tia as a missing person. She’d run away from her wedding to come here to the island of her own free will.

  The letter Carrie received had been a bit strange, but certainly nothing the police would construe as evidence. And as for the midnight phone call, Carrie wasn’t even certain it had been Tia’s voice on the other end of the line. The police would probably argue that Carrie had been too quick to jump to conclusions. And they might very well be right. What if she’d launched a wild-goose chase because of nothing more than an overwrought imagination?