Rendezvous at Midnight

by Lynne Connolly

  “Only if you have to. We want him alive for questioning.”

  Michael grinned. “I’m not even going to ask who ‘we’ are. I don’t want to know. But it would be my privilege to help. I’m qualified. As a sensitive, I mean.”

  Gareth looked away. “I hate the thought of torturing anyone.”

  “Hey, man, you know we don’t do that. We extract what information we need pretty carefully, and then we blank them.”

  “Now that’s scary. You people can kill with a thought.”

  Across the room, Lisa jerked away from Brant and Michael got to his feet. Quietly, Gareth murmured, “It could be her. It could be any of them and unless you want to destroy their minds one by one getting to the truth, you’ll have to be wary of them all. Don’t be too hasty.”

  His mind rebelled against the thought. There was no way he could ever suspect Lisa of that. He couldn’t possibly feel such a strong attraction to her if she was a member of the murderous organization calling itself the Anti-Sensitives.

  Could he?

  Chapter Two

  As she walked toward the two men so absorbed in their conversation, the contrast between them struck Lisa like a hammer blow. Michael, with his dark hair and glittering black eyes, slanted cheekbones revealing his Eastern European heritage, and Gareth Fuller, the beautiful blond soccer star, tanned golden from his recent visit to Miami and from a life spent mainly in the open air.

  They had at least one thing in common. In their own way, they were both beautiful. Neither dressed to attract, but Gareth’s tight Levi’s and Michael’s wool slacks emphasized the ripple of thigh muscles underneath. She’d never seen Gareth play, but she’d make the effort to catch a game. It should be entertaining.

  Not that her interests went much further than Michael Scott at the moment. He was the offspring of a Texas rancher and a Hungarian mother: exotic looks. He had slightly tilted dark eyes and the high cheekbones of the Slav, but he spoke like a true-blue American, his Texan accent blunted by years in college and travel, with an incredible gift for speaking with ghosts. Michael looked up and smiled, and she smiled back. The awareness of the kiss they’d shared in the elevator shimmered between them. It would always be there now, the kiss, the knowledge. She hadn’t expected passion and intensity in a glass elevator at ten in the morning. Had he? They stood as she approached them, a quaint, old-fashioned gesture that seemed oddly right. Lisa couldn’t remember the last time that had happened, a spontaneous, natural-seeming motion and despite her strong conviction of equality, it heated her. Not that she was about to let them know it. She smiled as though men stood for her every day.

  “They’ve given us cabins in one corridor close to the staterooms, so we’re all close together. The cleaners will work around us until after the weekend.” Then, they’d flood the whole place with chemicals designed to fumigate and detox the ship. The place would be completely empty by then. Except for the ghosts.

  A small whirlwind erupted from the elevator, heading straight for Gareth. His unguarded expression was worth watching. At first alarmed, and then warmth for this woman, openly showing love few men had the courage to express in public. He held out his hands in a placating gesture. “I thought you’d just lean on the horn.”

  “I got tired of waiting. I wanted to see what was keeping you.”

  This must be Gareth’s girlfriend, a mixed race woman of incredibly delicate features, but with a toughness about her that warned it wouldn’t be a good idea to cross her. It was obvious she could twist Gareth around her delicate pinkie if she wanted to. But her expression softened, too, and Lisa couldn’t decide which of them reached out for the other first. They laced their fingers together before Gareth turned to Michael and Lisa.

  “Julie, this is Lisa Perez and Michael Scott. He hates Mike, so never call him that.” Some kind of understanding flashed between them and with his free hand, Gareth clapped Michael on the shoulder. “We really have to go, but we won’t be too far. Call on me if you need me.” He paused. “A few of our other friends are nearby.”

  “Thanks, I’ll give them a call.”

  Was she missing something here? It must be something to do with the intense conversation she’d interrupted. Gareth and Julie turned away and Michael turned to her. “Do we need to help with the equipment?”

  “No, they’ve got it covered.” She glanced away. His deep gaze could be too intense sometimes. “We just have to settle in.”

  “Then what? It’s hours to sundown.”

  “The passengers should be out of here after lunchtime. So we’re having lunch and then a tour of the rooms.”

  “With cameras.”

  “Never doubt it.”

  They would shoot almost everything they did this weekend and edit it later. Completely different from the way it used to be, when film stock was precious and hard to edit. “I guess we’ll be using those damned night vision cameras again,” he growled. “There’s no need. The spirits don’t much care how they’re lit.”

  “It looks good,” she said patiently, although this particular point was one Michael brought up at every production meeting. The eerie green tones in the video, and especially the way their eyes seemed to be illuminated from within, like beams of sunshine, added to the creepiness of the finished footage, so even when the phenomena were scarce, which was most of the time, they could make the best of it.

  He stopped by the corridor leading to the suites and touched her arm. “Will you be okay this weekend? If it gets too much for you, just let me know.”

  “Sure, I’ll be fine. I hardly remember her, you know?” But she was nervous. Who wouldn’t be when one of the ghosts could be your own mother?

  Not that she remembered her. Her mother was on the final voyage of the ship, her last job, but she’d never come home. Lisa didn’t even remember the journalistic circus that surrounded her mother’s death. Her mother’s murder. A baby of barely eighteen months rarely has any memories.

  But she couldn’t deny a lifelong fascination with the case. Who wouldn’t?

  ***

  Their suites were on the first class deck, close to the suites they had decided to concentrate on for shooting. They were comfortable, decorated in a deliberately old-fashioned style designed to add to the “liner experience.” Guests could treat this place as an ordinary hotel, except for several events every year, when they acted as if the ship were in its 1950s heyday, sailing majestically across the ocean, elegantly plying the passage between Southampton and New York—costumes provided.

  As they were provided now. Lisa opened the wardrobe in her bedroom to find a selection of gowns and outfits suitable for a lady of the 1950s, from smart suits to lush evening gowns. She sighed. They were beautiful, but they didn’t look very comfortable. Neither did the underwear provided. She pulled a long, tight garment out the drawers next to the hanging shelves. It looked more like an instrument of torture.

  “Can I see you in that?”

  She didn’t need to turn around to know who was standing in the open door of her room. “No way in hell am I wearing that thing.” She pulled at one of the garters dangling from the garment. It twanged back as strong as a catapult. “I’d never get out of it.”

  “Oh, you would, if I saw you in it.”

  She chuckled and stuffed the thing back in the drawer before he could get any more ideas. “Let me touch up my makeup and I’ll be with you.”

  Michael raised a brow. “I didn’t realize you were wearing any.”

  She smiled. “A touch. You’d run screaming if you saw me without my face on.”

  “Now that I doubt.” He gazed at her before stepping back. “Okay, call me when you’re ready. They want us to start ASAP.”

  “Sure.”

  She was out of her room in five minutes, after layering on the heavier makeup she needed for the cameras. Her plain white shirt and black pants were perfect for the first shoot, which she’d kept in mind when she’d dressed that morning. She wondered if Brant would shoot her
as lovingly as he used to, but found she didn’t care too much. She didn’t kid herself. Attractive, not stunning, a good figure, and the camera loved her. God knew why. So Brant would have to work hard to ruin her appearance.

  Besides, he’d finished with her. Said he wanted more than she was giving him, but it had been the kind of finish where he’d given her an ultimatum—either she moved in with him, or he didn’t want to know her any more. She’d called his bluff, and he’d didn’t back down.

  He still wanted her. The way he looked at her creeped her out sometimes, as though he was just waiting for his chance, so since the break last month she’d been careful not to find herself anywhere alone with him. But he’d wanted everything from her, and she didn’t feel right giving it.

  As promised, Michael waited for her outside. He’d applied no makeup and he looked fabulous. Life wasn’t fair sometimes. His smile seemed warm and genuine and melted her through to her bones. Something Brant’s had never done, now that she thought of it.

  Their kiss made her wonder if it wasn’t worth accelerating this affair. He was interested, that was for sure, and now, so was she. She liked him and their two previous dates had shown he was more than a pretty face. And day-um it was a pretty face!

  “You still look pretty,” he said, as though he could read her thoughts.

  “What do you mean, still?” she demanded, laughing a little.

  “With all that stuff on your face. I know you need it for the cameras, but I like….” He paused, reddening.

  She knew he was thinking of something more intimate than cleanser. “I won’t make you tell me—yet.”

  They were both smiling when they entered the first stateroom at the end of the long hallway.

  The luxury suites led off a smallish lobby, very gracefully set at the head of a curving staircase that went down to one of the first class lounges. Gilded balcony rails, slightly the worse for wear from a hard year’s activity, gleamed in the light from the overhead skylight and carefully placed accent lights.

  Brant McManus and the soundman, Theo Constantine, were waiting for them. “We’re ready if you are,” Brant murmured. “Do you want to do the intro?”

  “Sure.” She stepped forward as if she’d been expecting to walk straight into a set. Good thing she’d done her homework. If Brant had hoped to get her off balance, he’d be disappointed.

  She positioned herself at the right distance from the camera and began.

  “Welcome to one of the most haunted sites in the United States. It’s not a great house, it’s not a public building, it’s not even on land. Welcome to the Gem of the Sea, supposedly the most haunted ocean liner in the world.”

  She moved a little toward the staterooms, but Brant shook his head, so she carried on speaking. “This is a Ghosts At Home special, a three-day investigation into the mysteries of this beautiful ship. I’m standing outside stateroom number one, where several sightings have reported a lovely woman in a swimsuit. For once, the sighting might have a personal connection—to me.” She paused, gazing into the camera like it was a friend she was confiding her deepest personal secrets to. “The ghost could well be my mother.”

  She turned away and headed for the main stateroom. Brant cut the video just as she closed the door quietly behind her.

  She leaned against the door and took a deep breath.

  “Trouble, honey?” Ayesha’s soft, husky tones curled around her like a touch from a favorite aunt.

  Lisa sighed and opened her eyes. “Not really. You know the story, don’t you?”

  “Sure I do.” Ayesha got off the stepladder and tilted her head to one side, studying her handiwork. “That should do. Remotes here, here, and here.” She indicated, with a wave of her hand, the other night vision cameras she’d adjusted. As the second resident medium for Ghosts At Home, she liked to position the cameras herself, facing the places where she sensed the most activity. Ayesha and Michael worked out the schedule between them beforehand. Most of the work was done before the vigils began.

  “Beautiful room.” Lisa stepped away from the door as the others came in.

  “Beautiful suite.”

  Lisa wandered through the spacious sitting room and took a look in the bedroom, giving a low whistle. “Wow, they knew how to live, didn’t they?”

  “There are three hundred and forty cabins on this ship,” Ayesha said, “and only five luxury suites.”

  “Hollywood lives,” said Michael, from behind her.

  “Yeah.”

  The suite was decorated in white and gold, almost exclusively. The four-poster bed was fastened to the ceiling at its topmost points and gilded all the way up. Swags of white satin, tied with tasseled cords, decorated the outer part of the bed and a deep, quilted comforter lay in ordered precision on the bed. The vanity, the wardrobe, and the other furnishings were in some pale wood, gilded as brightly as anything Marie Antoinette might have owned.

  Lisa couldn’t see the luxurious extravagance. She could see only the woman, sprawled in an ungainly pose on the bed, her bright scarlet blood pumping out of the hole in her head to pool on the pristine satin coverlet.

  ***

  When she swayed, Michael rushed forward and supported her, swinging her off her feet. “I’m taking her back to her room,” he said firmly.

  Ayesha stood at his elbow, staring up at him, her velvety eyes wide. “Oh yes, I saw it too,” he told her softly. “The trouble is, I think Lisa saw it as well.”

  “Poor baby.” Ayesha touched Lisa softly on her upper arm, lifting it to fold across her body. “Not a good vision for your first spirit experience. I’ll take over here. You look after Lisa.”

  He carried her off, cursing himself for not noticing the presence sooner.

  Reaching Lisa’s suite, he glanced around to see if anyone was nearby and finding no one, he used telekinesis to open the door instead of fumbling around for the key. These doors opened with old-fashioned keys, in keeping with the period atmosphere, but to find it and then juggle Lisa and the lock would have taken too much time and might have made Lisa uncomfortable. She was coming around already. He took her through to the bedroom and laid her down on the mercifully rich cream-colored bedspread. This suite, although simpler, was far more to his taste. All that white and gold made him feel swamped in luxury.

  She blinked, and he made sure the first thing she saw was him, smiling reassuringly. “Hush,” he said. “You’re back in your suite. Don’t try to move for a couple of minutes. You’ll still be dizzy.”

  “I didn’t faint. I never faint.”

  “No, I know.” He lifted her hand and held it warmly between his own. “I saw it, too.”

  She swallowed. “That…thing on the bed?”

  He nodded, keeping her attention fixed on him. “Yeah.”

  “Do you see those kinds of things all the time?”

  “They’re not usually so gruesome, but yes, I do. Luckily, the real force of my psychic talent didn’t appear until puberty, otherwise I’d have been locked up for sure.”

  He felt her hand tremble. “How do you stand it?”

  “I’ve never seen a relative.”

  She closed her eyes for a second, and when she opened them again, they were suspiciously bright. “It was her, wasn’t it? My mother?”

  “Without a doubt. There was a resemblance in the face. Ayesha saw it, too.” He rubbed her hand gently. “It wasn’t a real ghost, Lisa. It was a vision, an image, that’s all. Some places retain the ability to show images, kind of like photographs. The bed must be one of them. I didn’t feel a presence, I just saw the image. It wasn’t her, just a picture of her.”

  “Lying on the bed in a pool of blood.” She breathed deeply, once, then twice. “I’m okay now. I want to sit up.”

  “Would you like some water?” At her nod, he reached for the unopened bottle of mineral water on the nightstand. He uncapped it and handed it to her, watching the slight tremor when she lifted it to her lips. “Wanna tell me about it? The real story
? I’ve done some research, so I know something is wrong.”

  She lowered the bottle, gripping it harder than necessary. “Yes, I’d like to tell you. And if you get in contact with her, you’ll know anyway, won’t you?”

  He gave a wry grin. “Not necessarily. We only know what they tell us. They might not be who they seem to be, or they might deliberately lie.” Did she want him to get in touch with her mother? He put the thought aside for further consideration later.

  “Well, I want to tell you anyway.” She lifted her knees and reached for her shoes, but he forestalled her, drawing off her mules and dropping them to the floor by the side of the bed. The warmth of her foot, with its sexy, high arch, beguiled him. He wanted to touch some more. So he took one foot into his lap and used his thumbs to massage it.

  “Mmm.” Her low moan made him want more, but he concentrated on her feet. “Keep doing that and I’ll tell you anything you want to hear.”

  “Anything? I might hold you to it. In the meantime, tell me about your mother. The reports say she was separated from your father and taking her last voyage on the ship as a masseuse. She was supposed to be marrying the occupant of suite number one, a rich politician and businessman running for mayor of New York. He found her in the suite. She’d come in from the pool and crossed the room to the shower, but she slipped and fell, hitting her head on a piece of furniture. She bled out and by the time Selhurst found her, she was dead.”

  “Very concise.”

  She sighed a little puff of air he wanted for himself. But he forced himself to relax, willing his erection to subside. If she moved her left foot over a little, she’d find out what this was doing to him. And he really wanted to hear her story. The real story. Several things about the case made him wonder, and the reports of ghostly activity suggested unfinished business to him. Someone hadn’t completed their journey.