Wings of the Night 08 Blue Twilight

by Msggie Shayne

"Out here." He walked her across the parking lot, toward the place where the motel's grassy lawn met the pavement. There were a couple of picnic tables there, and he walked right up to one of them, took something out of his pocket and dropped it onto the redwood-stained surface.

  Max took a seat atop the table, picked the thing up. "What is it?"

  "It's a bug."

  Max looked up fast.

  "I found it in the phone in my room. Ten to one there's one in yours, too."

  "Jesus." She reached out for the tiny electronic button, turned it in her fingers, then shot a look at Lou. "Is it still—"

  "No. It's dead. But near as I could tell, it was working right up until I found it."

  "God, Lou, how did you even know to check?"

  He shook his head. "I couldn't stop thinking about that extra click on the phone line when Jason spoke to us from the phone in his room. It sounded more like someone on an extension but…I don't know, you get an instinct about shit like this after a while. Something told me to check, so I checked." He shrugged. "We ought to go back—check your room. Storm's and Jay's, as well."

  Sighing, she nodded. "Okay."

  "What's wrong?" he asked.

  She looked up, caught him searching her eyes. "Nothing."

  "Something is. This place is getting to you. The town. The missing girls. The goddamn eerie feeling that seems to permeate this freaking place."

  She met his eyes. "You feel it, too?"

  "Yeah. I feel it. As if I'm walking around under an anesthesia cloud or something."

  Max nodded hard. "It's like my senses are dulling by degrees. I feel slow, heavy. It seems better when we're outside of Endover, but then it comes right back as soon as we return. It's subtle."

  "Maybe we should do a little extra research. See if there's any history of chemical pollution near here. Or radon or…hell, I don't know. A natural gas leak?"

  "You'd smell natural gas, wouldn't you?"

  "I don't think so"

  "I do. And radon wouldn't have any effect for years."

  "I don't like it,” he said. "What do you say tomorrow we drive a few miles away from Endover, find ourselves another place to stay?"

  "I don't know. I feel like we need to be here, you know?"

  "Well, think it over, at least."

  "Okay." She slid off the picnic table, taking the listening device with her, and started walking back toward the parking lot and the motel.

  Lou was quick to catch up.

  "You were right before,” she said. "Something was bothering me, but it wasn't this town. It wasn't the case. It wasn't the bad air in Endover."

  She kept walking, right up to her motel room door, then stopped there to look at Lou. "I can see in your eyes that you already know what I'm going to say—and you're praying I won't say it."

  He held her eyes for a long moment. "You promised you'd knock it off with this kind of shit, Max."

  "Yeah, well, you're not making it easy. Not when you yank me into your arms the way you did tonight at the hospital, just as some kind of ruse." She probed his eyes. "You know, for one insane moment, I thought you meant it. I thought you were going to kiss me."

  He lowered his eyes, dodging the intensity in hers. Damn, he made her angry.

  "And then, when you came to my room just now—"

  "Jesus, Max, stop it already. We're working a case together. Even if something was going to—this isn't the time."

  She nodded. "I know you're right. But if you expect me to keep my end of the bargain, Lou, the least you can do is stop jerking me around like this."

  "Jerking you—"

  "I almost get the feeling you're enjoying it. Dangling the bait just to see if I'll still jump."

  Sighing, she turned from him, thrusting her key into the lock.

  Lou's hands came to her shoulders, turning her to face him. "Max, I would never—please don't think that's what I'm doing. Hell, I wouldn't even have thought…" He pushed a hand through his hair, maybe giving up on trying to express his confusion.

  "I know. You would never have thought you had it in you to hurt me. Because you've never once taken me or my feelings seriously."

  "Max, I wouldn't hurt you for the world."

  He looked as if he meant it. And maybe he did. Max turned the lock, opened the door. "But you did. And my feelings are serious. If you want me to keep them to myself, fine. I said I would do that, and I will. But you've got to do your share, too"

  He nodded. "I'm sorry. I mean it. I'm really sorry. I won't…let it happen again. I promise. No more hugs or showing up at your door in the dead of night, okay?"

  She sighed deeply. No more hugs. Hell, that was the last thing she wanted to hear from him. "Just don't hug me unless you mean it,” she said. She shrugged. "And until this case is over, I suppose you might have to show up at my door in the dead of night for reasons that have nothing to do with crawling into my bed, so we probably shouldn't rule that out. Actually, let's not rule out the alternative, either." She let him off the hook with a smile over her shoulder as she stepped into her room.

  He seemed relieved. Maybe he really hadn't been playing games with her feelings. Hell, how could he have been? He'd never believed for a minute she had any real feelings for him. He'd always chalked her behavior up to a flirtatious nature, blithely refusing to notice that she didn't flirt with any other man but him.

  He came into the room and walked past her to the bedside stand, picked up the telephone handset, removed the mouthpiece and neatly plucked another listening device from amid the tangled nest of bright-colored wires inside.

  She opened her mouth, but he held a finger up to his, then flipped the back off the tiny button-shaped bug, did something to its innards, then snapped the back on again. "Safe now. Unless there are others."

  She looked around the room, suddenly feeling exposed, watched, as if a hundred unseen eyes were looking in on her. She rubbed her arms against the chill that feeling evoked. "I'll never be able to sleep in here."

  "Yeah, you will,” Lou said. And then he began searching. He started on one wall and checked every surface, every baseboard, the curtains and the rods that held them, the window casing. He worked his way around the room, even running his hands over the carpet to check for lumps, and using a pocket knife as a screwdriver to remove the switch plates and plug covers to check behind them. He searched the closets, removed the dresser drawers, took the clock radio apart.

  He checked the bathroom, the faucets and light fixtures. He left the bed for last, stripping it bare, then lifting the mattress to check under it, before searching the area under the bed itself.

  Finally he nodded, satisfied. "It's okay. The only bug was in the phone. The room is clean."

  "Odd choice of words,” she said. She stood in the center, hands on her hips, surveying the mess he'd made.

  Lou slid the mattress back into place, then began putting on the sheets, making the bed. Max picked up the drawers and slid them back into their places.

  "So what about the other rooms?"

  "We'll check them tomorrow. No sense waking everyone"

  "How could anyone have known we were coming, Lou? Much less which rooms we'd be in?"

  He shook his head. "If Jason's phone is bugged, and he phoned us from that room, then someone—whoever is listening—might have known we were coming. But why was his phone bugged in the first place?"

  Max frowned. "Maybe every room in the motel is bugged." She lifted her head and eyebrows. "And there's no cell phone reception around here. Lou, maybe that's no coincidence. And maybe it's not us—maybe someone is keeping close tabs on all visitors to this town."

  Lou narrowed his eyes as if in thought, but then shook his head. "That wouldn't make any sense, Max"

  "None of this makes any sense, Lou" She shook her own head slowly. "I'm going to bed. Either come with me, or go back to your own room."

  He shot her a look.

  Max shrugged and sent him back a sheepish smile. "Sony. Force of h
abit."

  He sighed and turned to walk toward the door. She said, “Lou?"

  "Yeah?" His hand was on the knob.

  "What happened between you and your wife?"

  Lou went still. He lifted his head and turned back toward her very slowly. "I think I told you already, didn't I?"

  "You said you were a lousy husband. That didn't really tell me a thing"

  He sighed, lowering his head. "Hell, maybe you need to hear it. Maybe that'll—" He stopped there, lifted his head again, met her eyes, and then slowly came back across the room.

  Max thought that he was going to talk to her—really. talk to her. She hoped it, at least. She quickly climbed onto the bed he'd made so neatly, her back to the headboard, legs curled beneath her, and she patted a spot beside her.

  Lou didn't even argue. He sat, but only on the edge of the mattress, his feet remaining on the floor. "We had a kid, you know."

  Max felt her jaw drop.

  "A boy."

  "Jesus, Lou, how the hell did you manage to forget to mention that in all the time we've known each other?"

  He shrugged. His broad back was toward her. She wanted to turn him, to see his face. "It's not something I talk about. He, uh…he was only with us for three years."

  * * *

  Chapter 11

  Max's heart twisted hard and tight. She slid across the bed until she sat beside him, legs still under her, one hand on his shoulder. "He…died?"

  Lou nodded. "Leukemia."

  "Oh, my God."

  He shook his head. "I couldn't handle it. I was no good to anyone, not my wife, not myself. I threw myself into my work. She fell apart. She wanted another child. I couldn't even bear the thought of going through what we'd gone through with Jimmy again. So she found someone else. End of story."

  "End of story?" She was shaking all over. My God, she hadn't so much as had a clue, and if she found just hearing about it this devastating, how must Lou feel? "End of story, Lou? I don't think so."

  "Well, it is. There's no more to tell."

  "How long ago was this?"

  He nodded. "Jimmy would have been fifteen this year."

  She closed her eyes. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

  "I know you are, Max. It's okay. It was a long time ago."

  "It's not okay. Hell, something like that is never okay. No wonder you're…the way you are."

  He looked sideways at her. "How am I?"

  She couldn't take her eyes off his face. Everything in her wanted to hold him, comfort him, take away the old, deep shadow of pain in his eyes. But she couldn't do that, because he wouldn't let her. "You're…solitary and kind of shielded. You never go too deep, never get too close. Sometimes I get the feeling you keep the truest part of yourself locked away in a dungeon somewhere deep inside you. And now I know why."

  He pursed his lips as if considering those words, and then he dismissed them with a shake of his head. "I'm just who I am. No deep, dark psychological knots to untangle. Nothing locked away or hidden. It's more like I've been worn down until everything in me is callused and tough, like old leather." He shrugged. "It's a good way to be."

  "I'll bet. Nothing can hurt old leather."

  He smirked at her. She lifted a hand to his cheek, staring into his eyes. "I am so sorry you lost your little boy, Lou. You must have been a wonderful dad"

  He got to his feet rather abruptly. "Go to sleep, Max. Get some rest. We have a lot to do tomorrow." She nodded. "Good night, Lou."

  "'Night. Lock up behind me."

  He walked out of her room.

  Max slid out of bed to go to the door and turned the dead bolt, because she knew he would be listening for that on the other side. Then she waited, to give him time to get back to his own room. Five minutes, she figured, ought to be plenty.

  She used that time to ponder her new knowledge about Lou. No wonder he was afraid of relationships. He hadn't healed from his failed marriage, from his lost little boy. He hadn't let himself heal.

  She knew Lou. Everything he did, he either did very well or he gave up. She'd joked with him once about how he'd tried golf and was lousy at it. So he'd never played the game again.

  He was a good cop. Hell, he was a great cop. If he hadn't been, she thought, he would have quit as a rookie and looked for a different profession.

  So he'd been married. And his marriage had failed. He'd had a child and lost him. He'd made up his mind those things were things he wasn't meant to do, wasn't any good at and would never do again.

  She closed her eyes. God, it was going to be harder to get through to him than she had even imagined.

  Forcibly, she tugged her mind back to the task at hand. She glanced at the clock but wasn't sure Lou had put it back together in a way that was entirely reliable, so she counted off time in her head, even as she gathered up a credit card, notepad, pen and her trusty penlight. When enough time had passed, she unlocked the door, opened it and peered outside.

  She saw no one. Crickets chirped and sang in the distance. She smelled night air, sea-smells. They were not far from the shore. It was light outside; the light of the now-lopsided waning moon beamed brightly, bathing everything in a soft glow. It made up for the broken streetlight that stood like a crippled sentry over the parking lot.

  Slipping outside, Max walked quickly, quietly, in her bare feet to the motel office, then cupped her hands around her eyes to peer through the window.

  No lights were on. No one seemed to be around. She tried the door, but it was locked. Didn't matter. She'd scoped it out earlier. Now she headed around to the side, where there was a window. It was an old window, and she flipped the lock around easily by sliding a credit card between the panes. Then she opened it wide and climbed inside.

  The office was tiny. There was a four-foot length of counter, a small workspace behind it, and a door behind that. That door was closed now. She hadn't been able to see enough last time she'd been in here to decide whether that door led to a large office or a small apartment. If the latter, that creepy young clerk might be lurking back there even now.

  She moved silently, slipping behind the counter, sliding the penlight from her jeans pocket, glancing behind her over and over. She bent to the shelves under the counter and slid out the guest registry. Setting it on the counter, she opened it and found her own registration. Then she started copying down the names, addresses, license plate numbers and telephone numbers of the people who had been there prior to her. She decided to get as many names and addresses as time allowed.

  She stood there, flipping pages and scribbling down names—hell, there weren't very many.

  A noise—so soft it might have been her own pulse beating in her throat—made her pen go still. She looked behind her. The door was still closed.

  Carefully she tore the top page from her notepad, folded it small and slipped it into her jeans pocket. Then she bent over the registry to begin filling a second page.

  She was jotting the third entry on that page when the back of her head exploded in pain. White light flashed like lightning in her mind, and then she was pitched into darkness.

  Lou didn't go back to sleep. Of course he didn't go back to sleep.

  How the hell did Max manage to get to him the way she did? How did she get him to talk about things he had lived more than a decade without sharing with anyone else?

  Hell, how did she manage to do any of the things she did to him? Ever since he'd known her—on and off for close to ten years now—he'd taken her flirting as playful teasing and nothing more. Of course, they'd never been more than mere acquaintances—until the Frank Stiles case.

  It was only then, when they'd been thrown together on a daily basis in the height of a life-and-death situation, that he'd begun to suspect her playful flirting might be something more.

  And now he was sure of it. At least, he was sure she thought it was. And he was damned if he knew what to do about it.

  She was wrong about him. He hadn't been a wonderful father. Hadn't been muc
h of a husband, either. He'd spent far too much time working, always assuming there would be time for his family later. It was only when Jimmy was diagnosed that he'd realized there might not be a later. And sure, he'd taken time off then, tried to make up for his lack of attention. But it was too little too late. He hadn't blamed Barbara for leaving him. He'd expected it. And he'd managed to go twelve years without feeling anything more than a slight attraction toward any woman.

  He felt something for Max, though. Hell, he had a pulse. Naturally he felt something for her. Who wouldn't? The thing was, it went way beyond attraction. But dammit, he just wasn't ready—didn't think he would ever be ready—for a relationship like one with her would have to be.

  And she was too special for a fling. A fling would destroy what they had, and maybe destroy her, too. He didn't see that there were any options other than those two—a serious, passionate, long-term relationship, or a fling—except for keeping what they currently had. A growing and genuine friendship. Mutual respect. Admiration. He liked her, and she liked him.

  Yet more than ever, he feared Max wasn't going to settle for that.

  He needed to take a walk. Walk her off. Hell, being friends was great, in theory. But when she looked up at him with those big green eyes of hers, and he looked back down at her wearing a tiny T-shirt with no bra underneath, with her smooth, taut belly showing above her jeans, and her bare feet so goddamn cute he wanted to kiss them…hell.

  Yep, a walk. Clear his head.

  He opened his door, stepped outside and saw a car in front of the motel office. Taillights lit briefly. Then the trunk popped open. He glimpsed the form then, lying on the ground in front of the building.

  Max!

  He dove for his gun, lunged back outside in time to see a dark form bending over her and ran full bore. He saw something like surprise in the man's eyes—as if the woman he was about to scoop up was not the one he'd expected—but then that vanished when he swung his head toward Lou just in time to meet the butt end of Lou's handgun.

  The stranger went down hard, landing flat on his back, but he sprang up again, hissing, teeth bared.