Shadow's Lady (A Pajaro Bay Cozy Mystery + Sweet Romance)

by Lee, Barbara Cool

  "Ophie?" the man whispered.

  "Her name's Ophelia. And like her namesake, she's gone insane."

  Lori, halfway to the kitchen sink, could have sworn the man muttered something like "How long hath she been thus?" But that was highly unlikely, since dumb jocks didn't generally quote Hamlet from memory.

  It was done. He was inside, out of the drenching, chilling storm, and he was safe. Her whole body was shaking, she was soaked with as much sweat as rain, and her head throbbed like a really lousy dancer was auditioning on her cerebral cortex. But her anonymous pirate was alive. She splashed cold water on her face and hair, then toweled off with one of Aunt Zee's vintage royal family tea towels, leaving a swipe of mud across Queen Elizabeth's face.

  The man hadn't moved.

  "We'll have the Coast Guard here in a few minutes," she said reassuringly.

  She started to walk past where he lay on the floor, but he grabbed her leg with that iron grip of his. "Blanket?" he asked.

  "In a minute," she answered gently. "I'm going to call the Coast Guard. It might take them some time to get here in this weather."

  He wouldn't let go of her leg. That grip of his was awful. She couldn't move. "You have to let go," she said as patiently as she could. She bent down to try to pry off his fingers, but she couldn't. He stared up at her.

  "Blanket, please."

  "Fine," she said. "I'll get you a blanket first."

  He let go of her arm and she went to her bedroom to fetch the blanket.

  •••

  He had to get up. He grabbed the chrome handle on the front of the Aga and used it to haul himself to a standing position.

  Move. Fast. Now.

  Shadowfax got up to follow him and he gave the hand signal for down and stay. The dog lay back down with a grumble.

  It was agony to leave that warm stove, but he had no time to think about it. Move, DiPietro. Move or die.

  He remembered from an elementary school tour that the lighthouse tower was down the left hallway. Hopping as quickly and as quietly as he could, he made his way there. The girl had gone farther down the hall, to the bedrooms. He hoped it took her some time to get back, because he had to race her up the lighthouse tower, and he wasn't sure he had it in him to do it.

  He stood on the slate floor at the base of the stairs, trying to convince his left leg to cooperate. The low-wattage lights spaced every twenty feet or so up the thick stone tower made it difficult to see how far it was to the top. But he knew how far. Every school kid in Pajaro Bay knew. 136 steps. 115 feet tall.

  136 black iron steps, spaced just far enough apart to make hopping up them difficult. And about halfway up the tower was the little communications room. That was where the marine radio would be, their only remaining lifeline to the outside world.

  He hopped onto the bottom step. It made a rattle that echoed in the tower. "One," he whispered.

  His jaw ached from from what must have been hours of tooth-chattering cold. And the tower seemed even colder than outside, its stone walls serving as a perfect funnel for the wind to whistle in from some gap far above.

  Every time the lightning flashed through the windows—and it seemed to be flashing every few seconds now—the glossy black gleam of the iron railing stood out in the semi-darkness above him, its spiral winding upward out of sight.

  He took the next step. "Two."

  Only about 65 more to go. Piece of cake.

  •••

  He had disappeared. The mean-looking dog was still there, lying on the floor by the Aga and looking up at her reproachfully. But the man had disappeared. Now there was only a puddle where he had lain on the kitchen floor.

  It made no sense. He had been almost unconscious, yet in two minutes he'd somehow managed to disappear to... where?

  She dropped the blanket she was carrying and ran down the hall to the pantry. She threw open the outside door. A flash met her, followed almost instantly by a crack of thunder that made her ears ring.

  She slammed the door shut. He couldn't have gone back out there. Where was he?

  "Hello?" she called tentatively. Then tried again, loud enough to be heard over the roaring outside. No response. Had he passed out somewhere? But where?

  She made her way through the pantry, down the hall, past the lighthouse tower to the sleeping quarters. Both bedrooms were empty, her bedroom with its big brass bed that kept calling to her aching body to lie down, and the other, empty and cold with nothing in it but some packing crates.

  The door to the hall bathroom was shut. She knocked, then opened it. Empty. She called out again, louder this time, but heard nothing in response except a whine from the dog in the kitchen.

  She went back there. "So where did he go?" she asked the dog.

  He just looked at her.

  "Well, do something, dog. Go find him or something."

  The dog just lay there and looked at her.

  "You're no Lassie," she said. "She wouldn't just lie there like a lump. Get up!" She motioned at the dog to move and it immediately bounded to his feet.

  She waved her arm in an arc. "Where is he?" she asked, and the dog ran purposefully past her. "That's more like it."

  She followed.

  The dog headed down the hall and turned left without hesitation.

  He couldn't have gone back outside. He couldn't be that crazy. She skirted the tower stairs and made for the storm porch, but the dog didn't go that way. He went to the base of the tower stairs and barked.

  The dog bounded up the stairs two at a time, quickly disappearing from view. "Stop it!" she said with as much authority as she could. "Find your master, you dumb dog."

  But the dog ignored her.

  Then she heard it. A soft clunk on the iron stairs that didn't sound like the dog. A grunt of effort, far above. It had to be him. But what was he doing all the way up there by himself?

  She tried to follow at the dog's pace, but the exhaustion was beginning to wear her down, and she could feel the heaviness in her thighs and calves as she struggled up the circular staircase.

  She started to get dizzy as the stairs wound around and around, and she had to stop. She rested her head against the outer stone wall of the tower for a minute. "Are you up there?" she called, to him, to the dog, to anybody. There was no answer. But it had to be him up there. So once she caught her breath she kept going.

  Finally she got to the communication room. It wasn't really a room, just a wide spot, a landing really, where the original scarred oak desk still stood on the wooden floor, with nothing on it but the brand-new marine radio Aunt Zee had purchased in time for her arrival on the island.

  Except the radio wasn't there.

  A tangle of broken wires was all that remained on the desk.

  Around the far bend of the landing, the man stood in the dark, swaying slightly. The dog sat at his feet, whining.

  The radio was in the man's hands, and his hands were high over his head as he leaned over the railing and looked down into the stairwell.

  She ran to him.

  "Stop!" she shouted, and reached out.

  He let go, and her final sight of the radio was it passing inches from her open palms, falling straight down the shaft, its wires streaming out behind it, almost as if they were trying to keep from falling too.

  Then a second later, she heard the sickening smash of electronics against the slate floor.

  She turned around and slugged him in the stomach as hard as she could.

  He collapsed in a heap at her feet. The dog whined and licked his face.

  She got down on her knees in front of him and shook his shoulders. It was like shaking granite. "Why?"

  chapter five

  She was asleep. Matt watched her for a while, watched the steady, relaxed breathing as she sat upright against the lighthouse tower's outer wall, her head resting forward on her chest. If she had started the day wearing makeup it had long since washed away, and her face looked eerily pale in the dimness. Oddly enough, his
dog had abandoned him and was now curled up next to her. Ungrateful beast.

  He leaned back against the iron railing and tried to gather his strength. It was still dark, but that meant nothing. The storm still raged outside, so it was impossible to tell if it was day or night. He could have been unconscious for a minute, or for hours. He rubbed his stiff neck. More likely hours.

  Every once in a while the lightning flashed through the windows at the top of the tower. When it did, the little space where they sat was suddenly bright, and he saw the wooden floor of the landing gleaming in its old varnish, the heavy whitewashed block walls around them looming, massive enough to keep out the worst the storm could throw at the island.

  And then his eyes would go back, inevitably, to the girl. Every time the lightning flashed, she was lit up again, like he'd first imagined her in his confused brain, a magical being, not of this world. Her shoulder-length blonde hair shimmered in the brief flares like waves of gold, a stream of radiant metal flowing around her face. Unforgettable, new, and yet somehow known to him. But now he realized why she seemed so familiar.

  She looked exactly like Ms. Zelda. Not the elderly town matron who unofficially ruled Pajaro Bay through a combination of razor wit and sheer willpower. But the Zelda Potter immortalized on the silver screen many decades ago. The infamous and impossibly charismatic femme fatale who had strutted through detective flicks and epic romances and historical sagas, yet always seemed to be playing herself. The scene-stealing, smart-talking, tough-as-nails heroine with the blonde hair and the slinky figure. Lori looked eerily like her. And the similarity was apparently not just skin deep.

  She was too much like Ms. Zelda, from the little he'd seen. Zelda Potter was stubborn, smart, and always got the last word. All the reports he'd read on Lorelei York said she was sheltered, innocent, and meek.

  Meek. Hah. Apparently those doing the reporting had never been on the receiving end of her right hook. The girl could pack a punch. He was the first to admit he'd deserved it.

  But she didn't deserve him. The last thing he remembered hearing before he passed out had been her anguished cry asking him why he'd done it.

  It still seemed to echo in the empty shaft. Far below them the marine radio lay shattered and useless. Now she was trapped here with a monster, alone and helpless.

  He put one hand on his stomach, still sore from where she'd slugged him. Not so helpless. But still, she was unarmed and completely unaware of how much danger she was in.

  Why couldn't she have the radio? Because he couldn't let her call. He couldn't let her tell her story of finding a wounded man on the island. Not over an open radio channel, where anyone could hear. Where whomever had shot him might hear.

  Even without the radio, there was still danger. Logically, the shooter would search for him. And logically, the lighthouse island would be the place to look. There was nowhere else to search. If he hadn't made it to shore, he would be on the island, or dead somewhere out in the open sea. The killer would realize that, and would come here, as soon as the storm let up enough for a boat to get here. The storm might hold them at bay for a while, but it would pass eventually, and the danger would come, and they'd be helpless against it.

  He had to get himself and the girl off the island before that happened.

  He tried to stand up, then bit back the groan as the pain shot from his ankle to his hip. He sat back down and stretched the leg out gingerly, trying to keep the raw wound from touching the floor. Somewhere along the way he'd lost the improvised bandage Lori had made. And now he finally had a chance to get a look at the leg. In the semi-darkness he could make out the gouge the bullet had carved in his flesh as it had passed from his ankle up to his knee. Missed the knee completely. Just grazed through flesh without hitting any bones at all, from the feel of it. He had been incredibly lucky. And it had probably done it good to soak it in salt water for a while. Looked pretty clean, considering everything. He'd have a scar, but he could just add it to his collection.

  He wished he knew who had shot him. He tried to remember the sounds, the sights, anything that had happened before the bullet had come at him out of the darkness. But there was nothing. It had been cloudy. The moon had still been out but was almost completely obscured by the approaching storm.

  He leaned his head back against the railing. Nothing. Shadowfax had been sitting in his usual spot in the front seat of the kayak, and he'd been in back paddling. The dog had been relaxed. There couldn't have been a boat nearby. Even if he hadn't noticed anything, Shadowfax would have barked or growled, or at least reacted in some way to an approaching boat. This bore all the signs of a high-powered rifle shot from some distance, probably with a thermal scope. Which made it a planned attack. By an expert. Not just anyone could have hit him in a bobbing kayak through the fog from possibly a hundred yards away.

  It wasn't like he was surprised to have people gunning for him. He'd made plenty of enemies. But he hadn't expected to be shot here, in Pajaro Bay. Not now. Not when he was supposedly out of reach of his enemies in the Mexican cartel. Being shot didn't fit with the carefully conceived plan they'd concocted.

  Something had gone terribly wrong. And now he was out of touch with his colleagues at the Project. By now they'd be looking for him. But they couldn't tip their hand, since they had no idea who could be trusted. So they couldn't send the Coast Guard for him. Calling out the troops would imply that they had connections in the government, and that was the last thing they wanted. Matteo DiPietro was the leader of a band of criminals the government was trying to catch. That myth had to be maintained at all costs. At the cost of his life, if necessary. That was the whole point of this exercise. Find out who in the U.S. was working with Moreno. Someone had to be feeding him info on their movements. They needed to lure Moreno out of hiding, and they also needed to catch the accomplice who lurked somewhere close enough to follow their movements—possibly within the Project itself.

  And Matteo DiPietro, the "Shadow," the evil gangster who had worked with Moreno and then deliberately and very publicly betrayed him, was the bait at the center of this high-stakes game of hide and seek.

  If all had gone according to plan, Matt would have come out to the lighthouse, met Lori, and convinced her to come back to shore with him—either by befriending her, or, failing that, by pulling his evil gangster act and scaring her into leaving.

  Getting shot had ruined the whole plan.

  If he knew where they'd gone wrong, he'd know from which direction the danger came. As it was, he couldn't trust anyone, and couldn't let her trust anyone. Not until he could contact his people. Not until he could figure out a way out of this.

  •••

  "Why'd you do it?"

  He was still sitting where he'd landed when she punched him. But he was awake, his eyes glittering at her in the semi-darkness.

  She made a fist and got a handful of fur. She looked down to see the giant black dog curled up next to her, his big, bony head resting against her thigh.

  She pulled her hand away. "Get off me!"

  The dog looked at her mournfully and sighed.

  "He's not dangerous. He's a very nice old dog," the man said.

  "Sure. Okay." She sidled away from it, then wrapped her arms around her knees in a protective gesture. "So why did you wreck the radio?"

  He took a deep breath. "Did I?" he asked innocently. "What radio?"

  She frowned, trying to figure out whether he was lying or not. "You must remember...?"

  He looked around. "This is the lighthouse, right?"

  She nodded. The dog leaned over to put his head on her again. "Stop!" she said with as much authority as she could muster. The dog ignored her.

  "He understands hand signals," the man said gently. "Look." He raised his hand, palm up, and the dog sat up straight.

  "Okay, what's the hand signal for get away from me?"

  The man gestured toward himself and the dog got up and went over to sit down next to him. The dog punctuated thi
s with another big sigh.

  "Does he always make so much noise?"

  "He's probably tired. He had to swim here." He paused. "Didn't he?"

  "I guess so." She looked at the man across the landing from her in the darkness. Another streak of lightning lit the room, and she could see how pale he was, and how his hands shook when he petted the dog. He was still wearing the ripped wetsuit, which was probably pretty uncomfortable. Overall, he looked lousy. Handsome, but lousy. It was probably mean of her to doubt his honesty after all he'd been through.

  He gazed back at her, as if a bit lost. "You're the girl with the chocolate cookies?" It was a question. Gee, she had really made an impression on him.

  She nodded. "So you went surfing and got thrown into the water?"

  He nodded sort-of tentatively. "Kayaking. We had gone for our pre-dawn run across the bay, and then...?" He trailed off. "I... remember being in the water, without him." One hand petted the dog. "I'm not sure."

  The constant patter of the rain against the windows above them continued. The thunder boomed an echo each time the light flashed. The storm was not moving away, but apparently had parked itself right over their heads. Sitting in a lighthouse tower during a thunderstorm—the highest point for many miles around—probably wasn't a great idea. Yet here she was, doing all kinds of stupid things she couldn't have imagined just a month ago.

  And if this man was a crazy person and she died out here because of his idiocy? How long would it take for someone to come look for her?

  Her thoughts must have shown on her face.

  "I'm not going to hurt you."

  She rubbed her leg where he'd last gripped her with that killer hand of his. "You already did."

  "I did?" He looked really stricken. "Why did I do that?"

  "I have no idea why you do anything. Why'd you come out right before a bad storm? Why'd you destroy the radio?"