by Kay Hooper
“No.”
“Well, it’s creepy, let me tell you.” Caitlin shivered unconsciously, then frowned. “What about what she said? The warning to Samantha?”
“I’ll certainly pass it on. My partner is with her now, so she should be safe enough.” It was Jaylene’s turn to frown. “ ‘He knows.’ Knows about what?”
“Beats me. But it must be important, or Lindsay wouldn’t have worked so hard to get through to me.” She eyed the unplugged TV uneasily. “At least, I think that was her, scanning through the channels. It didn’t hit me at the time, but when we were kids she used to drive me crazy turning the channels constantly. So do you think that was her?”
“Probably. Televisions seem more easily affected by spiritual energy, or so I’m told. Something about the literal transmission of energy through the air around us.”
Caitlin was more interested in results than in methods, at least at the moment. “Do you think . . . she’ll try to get in touch again?”
“I honestly don’t know, Caitlin. If it’s important enough to her, then maybe. Try, at least. Though it may take a while to refocus her energy.” Jaylene studied her for a moment, adding, “If you’d rather not be alone, then I’m sure we can arrange something.”
“No. No, that’s okay. If Lindsay wants to communicate, I want to hear what she has to say. I didn’t listen enough when she was alive, so I’m damned well going to listen now.”
“She wouldn’t want to scare you, Caitlin.”
“She would if that’s what it took to get my attention. She was very single-minded, my sister.”
“In that case, you may be hearing from her again.”
Dryly, Caitlin said, “Anything you want me to ask her?”
“Well, I would suggest you ask if she knows who killed her, but we’ve tried before and that question never seems to get us anywhere.”
Briefly distracted, Caitlin said, “I wonder why?”
“Our boss says it’s the universe reminding us that nothing is ever as simple as we think it should be. He’s probably right. He usually is.”
“Mmm. Do you think I will be able to communicate with her? Or just . . . receive?”
“No idea.”
“Will I mess up anything by trying?”
Jaylene smiled and shrugged. “There aren’t any rules, Caitlin. Or not many, at any rate. Do whatever feels best to you at the time.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“Unfortunately, it is.” Jaylene got to her feet, still smiling. “I’ll call Luke and let him and Sam know about the warning. In the meantime, the two deputies will be outside keeping an eye on this place. If you need anything, or you feel too uneasy to be alone, let them know.”
“I will. Thanks, Jaylene.” Caitlin sat there for a long time after the other woman had gone, until it occurred to her that she was waiting—and that this room was going to get very quiet and very boring if she just sat here for hours.
What she needed to do, she decided, was what she would usually do this time of the evening. Call the nearest Chinese take-out place and order her dinner to be delivered and settle in for the night.
Reaching for the phone book in the nightstand drawer, she murmured, “I’m ready when you are, Lindsay.”
And she could have sworn the lamp beside her flickered. Just a bit.
Samantha unlocked her motel-room door and came in, saying, “There are two deputies out there keeping an eye on this place; why do you have to be here too?”
“Because they aren’t watching you, they’re watching Caitlin.”
“And because they wouldn’t get out of their car to help me if I was on fire?” Samantha waved away his response before he could offer it, adding, “Never mind.” She was almost too tired to care. About anything.
“Sam, you heard what that kid told you.”
“I heard a lot of things tonight, most of them inside my own head. I’m tired of listening.”
“Sam—”
“I’m going to take a long, hot shower. Do us both a favor and don’t be here when I get out.”
His jaw firmed. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Samantha heard a little laugh escape her. “Fine. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She got a nightgown from one of the dresser drawers and went into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. All her toiletries were there, as well as her robe, and she lost no time in stripping off and stepping behind the shower curtain into the tub.
It was after eleven, the usual time she tended to return from the carnival when she was working. And usually, after the hot shower, she ended up lying in bed staring at the TV or reading far into the night. She was a voracious reader, partly due to a stubborn determination to be well-educated despite her lack of formal schooling, and partly out of simple interest.
Letting the hot water stream over her chilled skin, Samantha tried her best to get warm even though she knew the cold came from inside, where no amount of hot water could touch it. It came from that limbo where the visions took her, where even the wispiest bit of precognitive or clairvoyant knowledge came from, a place she had tapped into far too many times today.
She hadn’t been lying to Luke. She had heard too much today, and it had left her feeling raw and, for one of the few times in her life, unsure of herself.
So the kidnapper was watching her.
She had expected that, sooner or later, but still . . .
What was her next move?
She stood under the hot water for a long, long time before finally, reluctantly, getting out and drying off. She towel-dried her hair but didn’t do anything more than finger-comb it, put on her nightgown and wrapped herself in the thick terry robe.
As promised, Luke was there when she came out. He was sitting in the so-called reading chair, his feet propped up on the bed, the television tuned, low, to the news.
His holstered gun was on the table near his hand.
That indication of her own vulnerability made Samantha feel even more raw, and she heard herself say tensely, “Don’t you have someplace else to be? I mean, isn’t there an investigation in full swing right now?”
“It’s been a long day for everyone,” he reminded her, oddly quiet. “We’ll start fresh in the morning.”
A little voice in her head warned her that it had been a long day and that decisions made when she was this tired had always, always backfired on her, but Samantha ignored it. No more voices. Not tonight.
“I hated you for a long time,” she told Lucas.
He got to his feet slowly. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh, don’t be sorry. Hating you was better than hurting. I wasn’t going to let you hurt me, no matter what. That’s why I laughed when you said you hadn’t meant to hurt me. You didn’t. I didn’t let you.”
He took a step toward her. “Sam—”
“Don’t you dare tell me you’re sorry again. Don’t you dare.”
He took another step toward her, then swore under his breath and yanked her into his arms.
When she could, Samantha murmured, “Took you long enough. Here we are, right back where we left off. In a cheap motel room.”
“It wasn’t cheap,” Lucas said, and pulled her with him down onto the bed.
Samantha had believed she’d forgotten how it felt, his body against hers, his mouth seducing her. That she had forgotten how well they fit together, how his skin burned beneath her touch, how her own body responded to his with a fierce pleasure she had never known before or since.
She had believed she had forgotten.
She hadn’t.
Part of her wanted to hold back, to save something of herself, but she had never been able to do that with Luke. And he was just as unrestrained, his mouth eager on hers, hungry on her body, his hands shaking as they touched her. Even his voice, when he murmured her name, sounded rough, urgent, as potent to her senses as any caress.
Two wary, prickly, guarded people forged a connection in the only way they would allow themselves, flesh to flesh and soul
to soul. And even as she lost herself in the pleasure of it, Samantha was conscious of an almost wordless hope.
That, this time, it would be enough.
11
Tuesday, October 2
It was probably around two in the morning when a quiet storm began to rumble outside. Lucas lay in the lamplit room and listened to it, just as he had listened earlier to Samantha’s soft breathing.
She slept with the boneless tranquillity of an exhausted child, held close to his side, her dark head pillowed on his shoulder. She fit him perfectly and always had, something that had once made him feel a wordless unease.
He wondered now why he had felt that way. And why he no longer did. Had he changed so much in three years? Or had it been then, as Samantha had said herself, simply a case of lousy timing?
Not that the timing now could possibly be better.
No one had to tell Lucas that he was not the easiest of personalities, or that he tended to keep others at a distance at the best of times, a trait that was magnified many times over when he was in the middle of an investigation. He was driven, obsessive, often single-minded to the point that he unintentionally shut out those around him. But that was the work, not his personal life.
Is there a difference?
Of course there was. He could separate the two.
Can you?
What had Sam said to him? That he had taken the easy way out, letting Bishop clean up behind him as he moved on and told himself it was for the best? Was that what he’d done?
Could he have been that arrogant? That cruel?
“You should sleep,” she murmured.
She had always had that facility, he remembered, able to shift in an instant from deep sleep to full wakefulness. Like a cat, she was more likely to nap for short periods than to sleep heavily through the night, no matter how tired she was.
“I will,” he said.
Samantha pushed herself up on an elbow to look at him, solemn. “Your gun’s under the pillow, and you have one hand on it. Not exactly relaxed enough for sleep.”
After a moment, he slid his hand out from under the pillow and lifted it to cup her cheek. As quiet as she had been, he said, “Christ, Sam, can’t you see that you’re in danger? The bastard is watching you.”
“He’s been watching you for months. And don’t say you can take care of yourself. We both know I can take care of myself too.”
“It isn’t a matter of being able to take care of yourself. Lindsay could take care of herself, and she’s dead.”
“Okay, granted. But there’s a patrol car with two deputies in it parked out front. The door’s locked, and you’ve wedged a chair under the handle. And besides all that, if he was watching earlier, and he knows anything at all about you, about us, then he knows you’re here with me, he knows you’re armed, and he knows you’re ready for him.”
“Tonight.”
“Yes, and after that little message of his, he isn’t really likely to make another move tonight, is he? One of the objects of the game appears to be catching us off guard, so warning us ahead of time wouldn’t be terribly smart.”
“Yeah, I know,” he admitted reluctantly.
Half consciously, she rubbed her cheek against his hand. “Then I think we’re safe enough for tonight.”
Lucas felt his mouth twist. “From him, I guess.”
“But not from each other?”
He had to laugh, albeit wryly. “You have a unique way of cutting through all the bullshit, Sam.”
“Life’s too short for bullshit.” Her smile was also a little wry. “Especially with a killer running around playing dangerous games. Luke . . . you don’t have to tell me that neither one of us thought this through.”
“Just like last time.”
“Not quite.”
“What’s different, Sam? We’re in the middle of an investigation, there’s a deadly criminal on the loose, the media are swarming all over you and the carnival—”
“The difference,” Samantha said, “is all a matter of expectation. I don’t expect happy endings anymore, Luke. So you don’t have to worry about that.”
“Don’t I?”
“No. When the investigation is over, you’ll move on to your next case and I’ll move on with the carnival. We’ll continue with our separate jobs and our separate lives. Which is as it should be.”
Her calm fatalism bothered Lucas, and he didn’t stop to wonder why. “Says who?”
She smiled, dark eyes very steady. “Says me. I see what will be, remember? The future. And my future doesn’t have you in it.”
“You’re sure of that.”
“Positive.”
“So I should just relax and enjoy the present, huh?”
“Well, this present. Tonight. Maybe a few more nights, if we can steal them.” Her shoulders moved in a slight shrug. “That won’t be so hard, will it? We were good together in bed. That hasn’t changed.”
“It wasn’t all we were, Sam.”
“It’s enough for now.”
Lucas might have argued, but her lips were on his, warm and hungry, and his body remembered hers too well and too eagerly to allow for clear thought. Or any thought at all.
She was right. They were good in bed. Very good.
The inn where Jaylene and Lucas were staying was across town from the motel nearer the fairgrounds and, unlike the motel, didn’t have a manager who rented at least a few of his rooms by the hour. So it was a quieter place, back off the highway and far enough away from the nearest Wal-Mart to be out of the heavier traffic patterns.
Though they had been here only a week, Jaylene was as comfortable in her room as she was in her own home. One of her most useful traits, Bishop had noted: she was a nester. So she was completely unpacked, her laptop set up on the small desk near her bed, and she had even stopped by a local florist to get a small vase of flowers to make the generic room-without-a-view brighter.
If she had to live much of her life on the road, Jaylene intended to be comfortable.
It was late, so she was already wearing her flannel kitty pajamas, but Jaylene was also a night owl and still up working on her laptop when the storm began—and her cell phone rang.
She checked the caller I.D. and then answered, “You’re up late. Or are you still in another time zone?”
“No, we finished up in Santa Fe,” Bishop said. He paused, then added, “I tried Luke earlier but got his voice mail.”
“He was in Samantha’s booth most of the evening. Probably turned his phone off or set it on vibrate after I interrupted a reading with a call.”
“I just got the earlier report. Was there any luck in getting an I.D. of the man who passed on his little message through the teenager?”
“No. She didn’t get a good look at him and, besides, isn’t what you’d call a dependable witness. I think her comment was that he was ‘old . . . like about thirty.’ ”
“Ouch.”
“Uh-huh. Anyway, there was no way to contain that crowd soon enough, not out there. Luke called in some deputies to question all the ticket-sellers and people running the other booths before the carnival closed up shop for the night, but they were busy as hell for a Monday, and nobody remembered seeing anything useful.”
“And Caitlin Graham?”
“Just what I reported. Possibly a message from Lindsay warning Sam to be careful because he knows. He is, presumably, the kidnapper. What he knows is still a mystery, at least to me. And all this is assuming the message is genuine, of course.”
“You have your doubts?”
“About Caitlin’s honesty, no. She definitely experienced something paranormal. I could still feel the energy in the room when I got there. But she also admitted that the phone connection—my second bad pun of the day—was iffy and she may have misheard. No way to know for sure, unless Lindsay gets back in touch.” She paused, adding, “We could use a medium.”
“Don’t really have one available.”
“Hollis?”
> “No. Tied up on another case.” He paused, then asked, “How is Luke holding up?”
“You know Luke. The longer this goes on, the more tightly wound he’ll get. Finding out he’s a personal target of a serial killer’s twisted games didn’t exactly make his day. Losing Lindsay was horrible, and he felt that on every level.”
“And Samantha?”
“How is she, or how is Luke handling her presence here?”
“Both.”
“She’s quieter, more guarded. Maybe even secretive. Really pushing herself physically and emotionally to read every night, I think because of something she hasn’t told us about so far. And she’s had at least two nosebleeds that I know of, both after touching something or someone and getting a vision.”
“Was there violence in the visions?”
“The first one, yeah, violent terror, according to what she told us. Second one, not so much. There was a suicide, but I don’t think she actually saw that.”
“Is she having headaches? Sensitivity to light and sound?”
“Dunno for sure. Sam’s not one to give away much.”
“Opinion?”
Jaylene considered briefly. “If I had to guess, I’d say she was having headaches. I know damned well she’s tired as hell and not planning on taking a vacation anytime soon. Luke’s worried about her, that’s plain enough.”
“How are they getting along?”
“Been able to work together, more or less. He’s defended her to the sheriff. More or less. He believes what she’s told us but also believes she’s holding something back, and that hint of mistrust has been fairly obvious. If I see it, she sees it. They’ve been prickly as hell with each other, at least until tonight. I don’t know, maybe they’ll settle some things now that they have a little time alone together.”
Bishop was silent for a long moment, then said, “You’re all convinced this killer is still in Golden?”
She noted that he didn’t even pay lip service to the “kidnapper” definition; to Bishop, a killer was a killer, period.
“We have no way of knowing for certain if the message Sam was given by the teenager was from the kidnapper or just some journalist yanking her chain. Could have been the latter; they want a story and she hasn’t been real forthcoming from their point of view. She didn’t get anything from the ticket he sent or the twenty he gave the girl, and neither did I. Only the girl’s prints, naturally.”
