Shroud of Fog: (A Cape Trouble Romantic Suspense Novel)

by Johnson, Janice Kay

  Once she’d woken her husband, they had found the sliding door unlocked. Neither of them could absolutely swear they had locked up before going to bed.

  That wasn’t good news, although Daniel was careful not to say as much. Until now, he’d worked on the assumption that the kid had sneaked out for some reason. That was still his best guess. But an unlocked slider could be eased open by a man who’d seen the cute girl earlier and noted where she and her family were staying. Everybody sound asleep, Dad maybe snoring, he could have slapped a hand over the kid’s mouth, or even knocked her out with a gas like ether, if he was a sophisticated predator, and quietly carried her out of the room.

  The rest of Daniel’s small police force began arriving and he went out to organize the search. Once they fanned out on the beach with flashlights, he woke guests in the nearest rooms. The only one who had anything useful to say was the woman in the next unit, who had fallen asleep not more than half an hour ago. No, she was quite sure she hadn’t heard any vehicles arriving or leaving. In fact, she’d been marveling at how quiet this place was at night. She thought she had heard a sliding door opening and closing, though.

  “It never occurred to me it wasn’t just someone stepping out to admire the moonlight on the ocean,” she said guiltily.

  Except there wasn’t much of a moon tonight, which was what made the search so challenging.

  What time had she heard the door?

  Oh, maybe eleven? Her uncertainty was plain.

  Daniel was getting a bad feeling, but it took him a moment, standing out in the quiet by himself, to realize the feeling didn’t have anything to do with the missing child. Or only because he was reminded how easy it was to break into someplace, unheard by sleeping residents.

  Shit, he thought, I should call Sophie. But all he’d do is wake her up with no justification beyond disquiet that had no basis in fact. He’d slept fine last night, and she’d been alone then, too.

  Even so… If he’d had a single officer who wasn’t scouring the shoreline shouting out Skyla’s name, Daniel would have sent him to do a drive-by of Sophie’s rental cottage.

  But even from here, with the night so still, he could hear the voices. “Skyla! Skyla, if you’re here, your parents are scared because they don’t know where you are.”

  Concentrate on finding this girl instead of obsessing about Sophie Thomsen, he told himself, and decided he’d give it five more minutes before he called in some more help.

  *****

  It wasn’t easy falling asleep again, once Daniel had left. Sophie’s body ached in unaccustomed places, her heart ached for a different reason altogether – or, maybe, not such a different reason – and her mind refused to shut off.

  She tossed and turned, trying every position but standing on her head. It didn’t help that she was keeping an eye on the clock. She felt sure Daniel wouldn’t come back, but would he think to call to let her know the little girl had been found?

  No, he wouldn’t want to wake her.

  She didn’t like to think about the girl, alone out in the darkness. Or…not alone.

  Alone, please. Alone had to be better, even if she was lost and scared.

  The next thing Sophie knew, she was alone in the shifting fog, which muffled and confused, making even familiar landmarks unfamiliar. Mommy liked mornings, but she shivered whenever it was foggy and started a fire instead of suggesting a walk on the beach. Why would she go out in the fog?

  Sophie jerked at a noise that didn’t sound like Mommy’s voice. Stiffening, she opened her eyes and realized she’d nodded off and been dreaming.

  The sound wasn’t part of her dream. She heard it again, the tinkle of broken glass falling. As if a hand swiped shards away away from the window frame.

  Fear suffused her, keeping her still while she thought frantically. What if she hid under the bed? Would he, whoever he was, think the cottage was empty? But what if he’d been watching it and knew better?

  Her frantic gaze found the clock. 12:43. Daniel had been gone less than an hour. If the intruder had been watching, he might have waited just long enough for her to have fallen asleep.

  Grateful she’d pulled on a T-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms after Daniel left, she slipped out of bed on the far side from the door. If only she had her phone within reach, but it had to be sitting out at the table beside her laptop where she’d left it.

  Not that she’d have dared dial anyway.

  Straining to hear any noise from the living area, she tiptoed to the window. Thank heavens it was covered by curtains instead of blinds that would have rattled.

  A soft thud came to her ears. He had stumbled, probably over one of the plastic storage totes left sitting in the middle of the floor.

  Oh my God oh my God.

  Since her arrival in Cape Trouble, she hadn’t so much as tried to open the old-fashioned sash window in the bedroom. At home she almost always had her bedroom window open a crack at night, but here…here she’d been trying to shut out the the heartbeat of the surf and the salty ocean smell, because they triggered too many memories.

  Terror running like a current of electricity under her skin, she prayed this window hadn’t been painted shut. Or the wood hadn’t warped, making it balk when she shoved upwards. She’d have only one quick chance. Push up, knock the screen out, tumble through the opening.

  Scream.

  *****

  Daniel didn’t even have to think about where he was going. No, he wouldn’t wake her up, but he needed to see for himself that the cottage was still dark and peaceful. He might even get out and walk around it, just to settle this creeping sense of disquiet that wouldn’t leave him. He didn’t want to scare her if she should be awake and hear a soft footfall along the side of the house or in the back yard, but he’d rather that than go home without being positive she was locked in, snug and safe.

  Fortunately the kid had been found quick, before he’d had to call in Search and Rescue volunteers or sheriff’s department deputies. She had just wanted to see the beach at night, she said tearfully, only somebody had walked by, scaring her, and she got turned around and there were funny noises, like this hoarse honking that he told her was probably sea lions chatting. She’d hidden behind some rocks. It was so dark she wasn’t sure she could find her way back to the hotel. And then when she saw the first men with flashlights on the beach, that scared her even worse. The breeze, they determined, had been snatching the voices that called her name and whipping them the other direction from where she was hiding.

  Her dad yelled at her and hugged her and her little brother burst into tears. Mom sobbed even harder.

  Daniel thanked his officers and drove away before any of them could so much as start toward their own vehicles. He thought about what Alex Mackay said about an itch, and knew that’s what this was. Some atavistic instinct whispered, She’s in danger, and he had to listen.

  The streetlights were at the corners, leaving the center of the block in darkness. He saw nothing to alarm him, but didn’t feel the relief he should have, either. Damn, he wouldn’t admit this weirdly paranoid episode to anyone. Even as he ridiculed himself, though, he switched off his headlights and rolled to a stop a couple of houses away.

  The sound of him opening his door was loud in the quiet night. He left it open. There was no way to shut it quietly. He told himself he just didn’t want to wake sleeping folks. Flashlight in hand, he walked toward the rental cottage.

  In the daytime, the garden was beautiful. At night, he didn’t like it, even as the scent of roses in bloom drifted to him. Overgrown lilacs and other shrubs cast shadows even in the darkness. The arbors and tangle of climbing roses and honeysuckle and who knows what else blocked a good sightline to the cottage from the street.

  He had almost reached the opening that led beneath a garden arch when he heard the rough scraping of wood and then an odd clatter. Even as he thought, what the hell? he was running.

  *****

  The window hadn’t wanted to go
all the way up, but she could squeeze through the opening. She had to. With a hard shove, Sophie ripped the screen off and was shinnying herself through the window even as she heard the loud thud of footsteps on the hardwood floor behind her. Not a word, but a rasp of breath.

  Her T-shirt seemed to catch on the window frame. Frantically, she levered herself forward and fell, twisting so that she’d land on her shoulder rather than her head.

  Branches grabbed and scratched, slowing her descent. She’d have sworn she felt a hand grab at her ankle, too, but if so it missed. Sobbing, she came down painfully. She couldn’t let herself pause even for a second. What if he came out after her?

  Scream. But she couldn’t draw enough of a breath. She scrabbled her way out from beneath whatever bush this was until she felt grass beneath her hands and knees.

  That’s where the flashlight beam found her.

  “Sophie?” And she knew the voice to be Daniel’s.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Daniel was not happy. He could have had the son-of-a-bitch.

  He should have understood instantly that someone was in her house. He shouldn’t have paused long enough to be sure Sophie was uninjured.

  Not until she had gasped, “Inside. Someone’s in there,” had he left her and raced around the corner of the cottage to the back, where he immediately saw a broken window – and the back door standing open. He swung the beam of light around the yard, but didn’t see the dark shape of a man hiding.

  For the first time in a long while, he pulled a weapon and went through a door with a rush, sliding to one side even as he used his elbow to nudge the light switch on.

  Clearing a place the size of the cottage took less than a minute. The guy was gone.

  He called for backup and got his young troops driving nearby streets in hopes one of them would spot a man on foot, but he already knew it wouldn’t happen. This guy was willing to take some major risks, but he was also smart enough to have figured out how to disappear.

  Sophie hadn’t argued when he packed up her essentials, stuffed her in the passenger side of his SUV, and took her home for the night. There, she showered and then let him doctor her scratches, wincing as he applied antibiotic ointment and covered it with gauze.

  In bed, he waited while she squirmed until she apparently got as comfortable as she could, after which he spooned himself behind her, laid his hand on her stomach and murmured, “Sleep tight.”

  As beat as he was, he expected to have trouble sleeping. He knew he wouldn’t be able to if she couldn’t, but, with astonishing speed, she dropped off, and he was able to follow.

  She was still asleep when he got up at least an hour later than his usual, but by the time he came out of the bathroom she was up and had started his coffeemaker.

  Seeing the stiff way she moved, he banished her to a chair in the dining nook and took over the minimal breakfast preparations.

  “I’ll take you over to the cottage this morning so you can get the rest of your stuff,” he told her as he waited for sliced bagels to pop out of the toaster. “You’ll be staying here.”

  “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” she said to his back.

  He swung around to frown at her. “Why not?”

  “You haven’t sounded like a man who wants a live-in girlfriend, even a temporary one.”

  “I want you here.”

  “People will talk.”

  He snorted.

  She had been sitting quietly at his table, sipping coffee and waiting for the toasted bagels he’d promised her. Now she bent her head and gazed down at her hands on her lap. “It’s…an awful lot of togetherness,” she said quietly.

  What did that mean? She thought he’d irritate her? Bore her? What?

  “If you weren’t here, I’d have been staying at the cottage,” he told her. “If you don’t want to share my bed, you don’t have to. I have a guest room.”

  The house was a rental; he hadn’t decided yet whether he wanted to stay long enough in Cape Trouble to buy. He felt at home in this house, though. It was an older place, in good repair and with a fresh coat of paint, although not fancied up like the cottage Doreen had rented for Sophie. A solid two-story with three bedrooms, it was painted a good old-fashioned pale gray with crisp black and white trim. The remnants of a garden meant a big lilac by the detached garage had bloomed this spring, and a few spindly roses had followed.

  Sophie met his eyes. “It’s not that. It’s…what you said.”

  What he’d said. Daniel puzzled over that as he understood what he was seeing in her eyes was apprehension. Then he knew.

  You scare me, Sophie. That’s what he’d said.

  You scare me, too.

  Ignoring the toast popping up, he went to her. When she tilted her head back to maintain eye contact, Daniel cupped her cheek in his hand and told her the truth.

  “Not being with you as many hours a day as I can manage would scare me a whole lot worse.”

  She searched his face, finally closing her eyes and resting her head into his hand. “Okay,” she murmured. “Until you arrest Aunt Doreen’s murderer.”

  And then she planned to move out? She’ll be going back to Portland anyway, he reminded himself, and refused to dwell on the painful cramp beneath his breastbone.

  *****

  The day was another misty, chilly one, the kind Sophie hated most. She wanted to hug herself, and it wasn’t only to hold in her body warmth.

  Hannah showed up to drop off several new donations that had just arrived in the mail. She was vibrating with excitement.

  “W Seattle Hotel in Seattle gave a two night stay. And Southwest Airlines gave tickets. Can you believe it?”

  They hugged, and then Sophie showed her where she was at. Hannah looked, approved, and departed in a whirlwind, saying she couldn’t leave the store for long.

  Now, left alone to work except for her attending police officer, Sophie closed a cardboard box, slapped a length of masking tape on it and wrote with black felt tip pen, Ceramic Wall Plate, and the donor’s name. When she rose to her feet, she groaned as muscles and joints both protested.

  Officer Slawinski jumped forward in alarm. “Ms. Thomsen, you’re not supposed to do any heavy lifting!”

  “Do you see me lifting anything?”

  “Well, no, but…” He trailed off in confusion.

  She smiled at him. “If you wouldn’t mind putting that on a shelf.” She nodded at the box at her feet.

  Once he’d leapt to do as she asked, Sophie told him she wanted to go with him to the other storage unit to evaluate what was left there. She waited while he rolled down the door of this one and locked, even though that seemed unnecessary, then walked with him around the corner to the back of the long building and number 4079, where Doreen had been killed. Sophie’s gaze went to the now-empty parking spot where her aunt’s aging Corolla had been hidden under a canvas cover. Once Daniel had had the car fingerprinted, he’d had an officer drive it to Doreen’s house, where it now sat garaged. He’d asked Sophie to hold off selling it briefly, which was fine by her.

  With an effort, she turned her gaze to the fog-shrouded woods beyond the chain link fence. The sight was no improvement, though - the woods made her shiver, and she deliberately turned her back to watch as Slawinski unlocked and pushed the metal door up with a clang.

  Someone – presumably one of Daniel’s officers – had swept up the broken glass and gray dust of fingerprint powder from the concrete floor. Even the blood had been swabbed up. The cat climber had been long since shifted to the new storage unit. The gourmet foods that had been spilled across the floor, some trampled, had been relegated to a garbage dumpster. But she couldn’t forget. She tensed every time she looked into this unit, seeing double – the increasingly bare interior overlaid by that first snapshot. Body, congealing blood soaking into a cardboard box, the cut glass vase lying on its side, boxes knocked askew and torn open.

  She blinked hard this time and mostly saw what was here now.
And yes, she decided as she surveyed the space, she was getting somewhere.

  She had most of the paintings and prints to go. They’d been stacked at the back, for the most part. Two shelving units were still loaded. There were some oddball, bulkier things, like a big, shiny red wheelbarrow loaded with tools, potting mix, a garden statue that made her think of the Easter Island faces, gloves and who knew what else. She thought it went with a gift certificate that offered a garden design, given by a prominent Oregon landscape architect who, among other things, had had a television show on some PBS channels here in the Northwest and wrote a column for the Oregonian.

  “I guess we should bring that,” she said, and Slawkinsi grabbed the handles and moved it outside, where he waited for her. Thank goodness for the free labor – she felt like an old woman today. The hot shower she’d taken at Daniel’s had loosened up her bruised body, but it had long since stiffened again.

  She chose a fairly large cardboard box that looked promising, experimentally hefted it and determined it wasn’t heavy, then carried it back around the corner. This time she stayed behind, doing a few stretches while Officer Slawinski was out of sight before she sighed and sat back down behind her card table and opened the box she’d brought.

  Like so many, it was full of other boxes as well as a few plastic grocery bags that held soft items. She opened the first of those with interest, able to see that it was a quilt.

  A beautiful one, she saw, hand-quilted with tiny, precise stitches, and old. Hand-pieced, too, she was willing to bet, because the pattern was Grandmother’s Flower Garden, a tough one to do by machine even now, given the hexagonal pieces of fabric.

  She reluctantly bundled it up again and put it on her pile to take with her tonight – she’d need to spread it out and search for damage as well as measure it, and she couldn’t do that here without taking a chance of getting it dirty.