Books by Nora Roberts

by Roberts, Nora

  She stopped, laughed now as she put her glasses on. “What the hell, I’m having a glass of wine. Want one?”

  “No thanks. I’ve got driving to do.”

  “You’re a real straight arrow, aren’t you, Mac?” She headed off to the kitchen, shouting back. “I never was much to look at, and after camping a couple weeks, I’d’ve been a little ripe. Had long hair then, wore it in braids. What was I thinking? The woman, she was old to me, but she was a looker. Dark red hair all done up, lady suit on like she’d just come from teatime. She had dark, dark eyes, and when they latched on to mine, I swear I heard waves crashing on rock, storms, I felt the wind blow over me though the day was hot and still. I heard a baby crying.”

  Wineglass in hand, Lulu clumped back in, dropped back on the colorful, well-sprung sofa. “She told me to get in, just like that. And I did, just like that. Never thought about it twice. Mrs. Devlin, she had power, just like her granddaughter does. I didn’t know what it was then, I just knew it was. She took me to the house on the cliffs.

  “I loved her.” Lulu allowed sentiment to fill her throat along with the wine. “I respected her, and I admired her. She was more family to me than my own blood. They’d never given much of a damn about me, and I’d gotten used to that. But she taught me. Passed on her love of reading, trusted me. Made me work for my keep—goddamn, she expected you to pull weight! I cleaned that big-ass house so many times I could’ve done it in my sleep.”

  “You didn’t know she was a witch?”

  Lulu considered. It wasn’t something she had given a great deal of thought to. “It was kind of gradual. I think she saw to that so it’d be a natural thing for me to accept. Maybe it was easier seeing as how I was into all that hippie-metaphysical-nature-is-our-mother business.”

  “When did you learn about the legend?”

  “That was a gradual thing, too. It’s part of the Sisters, so you hear this, read that. Working for Mrs. Devlin, I became part of the island before I realized it.”

  “Then by the time Mia came along, it was natural for you to accept power in her.”

  “If I had to analyze it, I’d say Mrs. Devlin saw to that, too. She knew the way things would be before they were. When Mia was born, her son and his wife moved into the house. I figured out pretty soon they’d done it so they’d have themselves a couple of live-in sitters. Selfish twits.”

  She paused, took a deep gulp of wine. “The night they brought her, they went down to the hotel to have dinner, and Mrs. Devlin took me into the nursery. Mia was a beautiful baby—red-headed, bright-eyed. Long arms and legs. Mrs. Devlin, she picked her up out of the crib, cuddled her for a minute, then she held her out to me. Scared me boneless. It wasn’t just that I’d never held a baby before, or that this one looked like something made of precious glass. It was that I knew. I knew she was giving her to me, and nothing would ever be the same for me again. You ever want something so bad you could taste it, but the idea of taking that first sip makes your belly jump?”

  “Yeah.” He set his notebook aside now and just listened. “Yeah, I have.”

  “It was just like that. We stood there, her holding Mia out, me with my arms crossed over my chest with my heart beating like a hammer inside it. And a storm came up out of nowhere, just like in my dreams. Wind whipping the windows, lightning flashing. It was the first and last time I saw her cry.

  “ ‘Take her,’ she said to me. ‘She needs love and care, and a firm hand. They won’t give it to her, they can’t. And when I’m gone, she’ll only have you.’ I told her I didn’t know how to take care of a baby, and she smiled at me, and just kept holding Mia out. Mia started to squirm and fuss, shake her fists, and before I knew it, I was taking her. Mrs. Devlin stepped back. ‘She’s yours now.’ I’ll never forget that. ‘She’s yours now, and you’re hers.’ And she left me to rock Mia to sleep.” Lulu sniffled. “Wine’s making me sloppy.”

  Touched, Mac leaned over, closed a hand over hers. “Me, too.”

  Sheriff Zachariah Todd emptied the dishwasher—one of the few tasks he was allowed to attempt in his own kitchen. “Okay, let me see if I got this straight. Mia told Sam what happened out on the coast road this morning. Ripley, who didn’t know what happened, found Sam up at Mia’s house and he told her, Ripley—but she promised she wouldn’t tell Mia he’d been there, so she told Mia—when Mia was going to tell her—Jesus—about what happened; that she, and that would be Ripley, ran into Sam on the road when he was cleansing the area.”

  “You’re doing great,” Nell encouraged as Zack took a breath and she checked on the progress of her lasagna.

  “Don’t throw me off the track. Then Mac told Sam what Ripley had told Mia while Mia was telling you what happened this morning. Then Ripley told you the rest of it, which you told me. For reasons that escape me.”

  “Because I love you, Zack.”

  “Right.” He pressed a fingertip dead center of his forehead. “I think I’ll just keep my mouth shut altogether. No way to wedge my foot in there that way.”

  “Never a bad choice.” She heard Lucy’s sudden and joyful barking. “Someone’s here. You go, take the tray on the third shelf. I’m experimenting with canapés for the Rodgers’s wedding I’m catering next month. Put them up where Lucy can’t get them,” she called as he started out, then glanced down at Diego. “Men and dogs,” she said, and clucked her tongue. “You have to watch them every minute.”

  And because she did, Nell took the time to shift all the utensils Zack had put away into their proper slots before she grabbed a bottle of wine and went out to greet her guests.

  Mac and Ripley had brought the puppy along, which sent Lucy into spasms of delight and terror, and had a miffed Diego stalking upstairs to sulk.

  Mia arrived with a bouquet of freshly clipped daffodils, and helped herself relax by sitting on the floor playing tug-the-rope with Mulder.

  “I think of getting a dog now and then.” She laughed as Mulder lost his toothy grip on the rope and went tumbling ears over tail. “Then I think about my gardens.” She snatched the puppy up, holding him high. “You’d just love digging up all my flowers, wouldn’t you?”

  “Not to mention chewing on your shoes,” Ripley said sourly. “Of course, you’ve got a hundred pair to spare.”

  “Shoes are a form of self-expression.”

  “Shoes are to walk in.”

  Mia drew the puppy down, rubbed noses. “What does she know?”

  That’s how Sam saw her when he came to the door, sitting on the floor, laughing while a fat yellow puppy licked her cheeks. His gut clenched, and his throat snapped shut.

  She looked so carelessly happy with her skirts spread out on the rug, her hair tumbling down her back, and her eyes bright with pleasure.

  There, in that outrageously beautiful woman, was the shimmer of the girl he’d left behind.

  Then Lucy barked, Mulder leaped, and Mia stopped laughing as her gaze snapped to the doorway.

  “Lucy!” Zack called to the dog, then grabbed her collar as he opened the screen door for Sam. “No jumping,” he ordered as Lucy’s muscles bunched for a joyful leap. “Either of you.” He said it under his breath. A blind man could have seen that hungry look on Sam’s face.

  “She’s all right.” Sam skimmed a hand over Lucy’s head and she collapsed onto her back. He passed the wine he’d brought to Zack before crouching down to rub her exposed belly. The puppy gamboled over, wanting his share.

  “What are you doing here?” Mia demanded.

  Sam lifted his eyebrows at her tone, but before he could respond, Mac stepped in. “I asked him to come.” Mac nearly flinched at Mia’s quick, accusing stare. “We’re all part of this, and everyone here has something to contribute. We need to cooperate with each other, Mia.”

  “You’re right, of course.” The carefree woman was gone. In her place was one with a cool voice and a polished smile. “So rude of me, Sam. I apologize. This has been our little club for some time now, and I wasn’t expectin
g a new member.”

  “No problem.” He picked up the rope Mulder dropped hopefully at his feet.

  “Dinner will just be a few more minutes.” Smoothly Nell moved into the tense air. “Can I get you a glass of wine, Sam?”

  “Love one, thanks. Does your little club have any initiation rite I should know about?”

  “Just the little business where we shave all the hair off your head and body.” Mia sipped her own wine. “But that can wait until after dinner. I think I’ll wash up.”

  Before she could get to her feet, Sam was on his, a hand held down to her.

  Whether it was a test or a peace offering, Mia blocked herself so that when she took his hand it was nothing more than palm meeting palm. “Thanks.”

  She knew the house as well as she knew her own, but headed up the stairs rather than using the more convenient powder room on the first floor.

  More distance, she thought. More solitude.

  She slipped inside, shut the door. Leaned back against it. It was ridiculous. Absurd for the man to affect her the way he did. It was all right, or nearly so, when she was prepared, but when she saw him at those odd moments—those moments when too much of her was already open—he just filled her up.

  She wanted to blame him for it, but it was foolish, and foolhardy, to keep picking at an old wound. What was done was done.

  She stepped to the sink, studied her face in the mirror. She looked tired, a little pale and drawn. Well, it had been a difficult day. And the shell, at least, was simple to mend.

  She washed her hands, then ran water in the sink. Bending, she scooped it, cool and fresh, onto her face. In the normal scheme of things, she enjoyed using cosmetics. The pencils and tubes and brushes were amusing, and there was something reassuringly female about using them.

  But for now, this was simpler, and certainly quicker.

  She dabbed her face dry, weaving the glamour spell. Then she looked critically in the mirror again. Much better, she decided. She looked rested, with the subtle bloom of healthy color in her cheeks. More color, not quite so subtle, slicked her mouth.

  Then with a sigh for her own vanity, she traced a fingertip over the curve of her eyelid, as a woman might use eyeshadow and a brush to define them. The contour deepened.

  Satisfied, she gave herself another moment to smooth out her emotions. And went back down to join the others.

  A close-knit group, Sam thought as he ate Nell Todd’s truly amazing lasagna. The body language, the looks, the half-finished thoughts one would complete for another all told him these were five people who’d bonded like glue.

  By his time line, Nell had been on the island slightly less than a year, and Mac only since the past winter. Yet they’d been absorbed in a way that made them all very much a single unit.

  A common enemy was part of the answer. But he saw more here than what he perceived as a kind of wartime intimacy.

  There was something in the way Mia warmed when she spoke to or listened to Mac, the amused affection on her face. It was love he saw there, not the sort that sprang from passion, but something deep and true.

  He saw byplay like that all around the table.

  Nell scooped up a second helping for Mac before he’d asked for one. Zack tore off a hunk of bread and passed it to Mia while he continued to hold a heated debate with his sister on the pitching depth of the Red Sox. Nell and Mia exchanged looks in an unspoken joke that had them both chuckling.

  And all of it, all the ease, made it clear to Sam that building a bridge over his years away would take more than time and proximity.

  “I think my father and yours played in the same foursome for some charity golf tournament,” Mac commented. “Just last month, in Palm Springs, or Palm Beach. Or something with a Palm in it.”

  “Really?” Sam had never been interested in his father’s pseudo charity events. And it had been years since he’d had to bow to the pressure of participating in any of them. “I met your parents at various functions in New York.”

  “Yeah, same circles.”

  “More or less,” Sam agreed. “I don’t recall meeting you at any of those various functions.”

  Mac only grinned. “Well, there you are. So . . . do you play golf?”

  Now, Sam smiled. “No. Do you?”

  “Mac’s pretty much a spaz,” Ripley put in. “If he tried to tee off, he’d probably slice his big toe into the woods.”

  “Sad, but true,” Mac agreed.

  “Last week he tripped going down the deck steps. Six stitches.”

  “The dog tripped me,” Mac said in his own defense. “And it was only four stitches.”

  “Which you could’ve avoided if you’d come to me instead of going to the clinic.”

  “She rags on me every time I get a bump or a bruise.”

  “Which is daily. On our honeymoon—”

  “We’re not getting into that.” The flush started creeping up Mac’s neck.

  “When we were using taking a shower as an excuse to have some hot, steamy sex—”

  “Cut it out.” Mac spread his hand over Ripley’s face and gave it a nudge. “And that towel bar was not properly installed.”

  “He ripped it right out of the wall in the throes.” She batted her lashes at him. “My hero.”

  “Anyway,” Mac said on a long breath. “Seeing as you’re in the hotel business, Sam, you might want to make sure your towel bars are secure.”

  “I’ll make a note, particularly if the two of you decide to take a weekend at the Magick Inn.”

  “Well, if Nell and Zack make a reservation,” Ripley continued, “you’d better check the stability of the bathroom sinks. They knocked the one upstairs out of alignment when—”

  “Ripley!” Nell hissed it, horrified.

  “Do you have to tell her everything?” Zack demanded.

  “Not anymore.” Ignoring Ripley’s laughter, Nell pushed to her feet. “I’ll get dessert.”

  “I had no idea bathrooms had become such erogenous zones,” Mia commented as she rose to clear her plate.

  “I’ll be happy to show you mine,” Sam said, and was given a shrug as she strolled into the kitchen.

  “She didn’t eat. She only pretended to.” Sam kept his voice low.

  “She’s tense,” Mac added.

  “There’s no point in my being here if it closes her off.”

  “The world doesn’t revolve around you.” Ripley snagged her glass and drank.

  “Rip.” Zack’s voice was a quiet warning. “Let’s just see how it goes from here.”

  With a nod, Sam picked up his own plate. “She trusts you,” he said to Mac.

  “Yes, she does.”

  “Maybe that balances things out.”

  Sam had nerves of his own when they settled back in the living room. What he was had never been an issue for him. It simply was. But neither was his gift something he discussed. He joined no coven. And though only four out of the six there were hereditary witches, it was very much a kind of coven.

  “We all know the legend,” Mac began.

  The historian, Sam thought. The scientist. The detail man with the facile mind.

  “During the Salem witch trials, the three who were known as Fire, Earth, and Air conjured what became Three Sisters Island as a haven against persecution.”

  “While innocents were hunted and murdered,” Ripley added.

  The soldier. Sam idly stroked the cat, who had deigned to join him on the sofa. A woman with grit. The earth.

  “They couldn’t have stopped it, or if they’d tried,” Zack said, “others might have died.”

  And here, Sam decided, was reason and authority.

  “Change one angle of destiny, change all.” Mac nodded, continued. “The one called Air fell in love, married a merchant who took her back to the mainland. Bore his children, kept his home. But he could never accept what she was. He abused her, and ultimately killed her.”

  “She blamed herself, I think, for not being what he wan
ted. For not staying true to herself, and choosing poorly.”

  Nell, the nurturer, Sam thought when she spoke. The cat stretched under his hand, as if agreeing. She was the air.

  “She saved her children, sent them back to her sisters. But the circle was diminished. Weakened. And the horror of it, the fury of it,” Mac went on, “festered in the one known as Earth until she surrendered to the anger, the rage, and the need for revenge.”

  “She was wrong,” Ripley said now. “I understand what she felt, why she felt it, but she was wrong. And she paid. Using her power to kill the one who’d killed her sister destroyed her, and came back threefold. She lost her husband, a man she loved; was never able to see her children again; and shattered what was left of the circle.”

  “There was one left.” Mia’s voice was clear, her gaze level. “One left to hold it.”

  Intellect, pride, and passion. Was it any wonder that she stirred him? Sam thought. She was the fire.

  “Despair can crush even the strongest.” Nell laid a hand on Mia’s. “But even alone, even heartbroken, she wove a web of protection. Three hundred years strong.”

  “She made certain her children were taken care of.” Mac thought of Lulu. “Which brings us to now.” He frowned into his coffee. “A still unbroken circle.”

  “You’re worried I’ll fail when my time comes. Nell faced her demons, and Ripley hers.” In what seemed an idle gesture, Mia stroked Mulder with the side of her foot. “Of the three of us, my knowledge and practice of the Craft is the most extensive.”

  “Agreed. But—”

  She lifted a brow at Mac. “But?”

  “I wonder if, on the other side of the scale, what you’ll have to deal with is more, well, insidious. Nell had Evan Remington, a man.”

  “He was a piece of shit,” Ripley corrected.

  “Be that as it may, he was human. She had to find the courage to face him, to defeat him and embrace her gift. I’m not saying any of that was a walk on the beach, but it was pretty tangible. If you’re following me.”

  “A man with a knife.” Sam spoke for the first time since Mac had begun, and drew everyone’s attention. “A sociopath, psychopath, whatever the term might be for that kind of evil, in the woods, in the dark of the moon. No, not a walk on the beach. It took great courage, deep faith, and a formidable power to do what Nell did. But it was an evil whose face she knew.”