Night Mist

Rachel told herself that maybe it was time to slow down on the amateur sleuthing. What had she been thinking to challenge him this way when she was physically and psychologically in a vulnerable position?

As for Jay Barnes, all expression vanished from his face. “I don’t believe I know what you mean.”

“A twin,” she said, her boldness waning. “Do you have one?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I’m not sure.” She’d noticed that as she grew more uneasy, a deadly calmness had entered his voice. “I suppose it’s because I keep getting this feeling we’ve met before. Do you? Have a twin, I mean?”

“No.”

He spun around and walked away. She couldn’t say she was disappointed; she simply didn’t breathe until she heard the sound of his door shutting. Only then did she expel the breath she’d been holding, shut her eyes and let her clamoring nerves charge through her body like a pinball machine gone haywire.

As soon as she could be sure her legs wouldn’t buckle beneath her, she hugged her bag to her chest like a shield and hurried to her room, where she shut the door and bolted it. Only then did she allow herself a shaky sigh of relief.

Things were getting far too complicated. What had she been thinking of to ask him that? She’d as good as told him she was onto him—pure foolishness since she didn’t have a clue as to what she was stirring up.

“Well, you’re up to your neck in it now,” she murmured to herself. The gauntlet had been thrown, leaving her little choice but to figure out what could follow.

Wishing for once that she hadn’t been born with a natural curious streak, Rachel placed her bag onto the cane chair beside the door and considered the state of her dubious sanctuary.

When she’d first taken the room, she hadn’t minded that its spareness paralleled that of a convent cell, unlike the more ornate ones below. She’d explained to Adorabella that she would be working so much she only needed a place to collapse and sleep off the inevitable fatigue that would be status quo until she fulfilled her contract. Maybe she’d been too hasty.

What was it she’d once heard or read about the simplest room containing any number of weapons? Right—the floral wallpaper could bore Jay Barnes, or whoever he was, to death if she could get him to stand around and stare at it long enough. The lamp on the single, scarred bedside table might be good for one throw. The equally abused dresser held her few toiletries, but most were contained in paper or plastic. She couldn’t even count on using the twin-size bed as a hiding place. Strange how until this moment she hadn’t noticed its smallness, when even as a child in her family’s summer home she’d had a full-size mattress. It showed how tired she really had to be.

Strange, too, that she’d originally taken this room because she’d liked the idea of having a man across the hall—even an unsociable one. Big houses were creaky, and this one wasn’t any exception; the sounds of aging often resembled footsteps on the stairs and outside her door.

Adorabella claimed they were the spirits of previous owners. Rachel had smiled politely at that, but had decided she would stick with more logical rationale, like settling boards or the weather. At any rate, she’d claimed Jay Barnes as her invisible, but de facto guardian, and let the knowledge of his presence insulate her confidence in her security.

But now that confidence was shattered. Who was going to protect her from him if she had made an exceedingly poor judgment call?

She glanced at the cane chair and, before she could talk herself out of it, moved it under the doorknob. The jiggling and scraping sounds made her wince, but once done she felt slightly better. Confident enough to slip out of her jacket and conscientiously hang it in the starkly bare closet. Then she crossed back to the bed, sprawled onto it and slipped off her shoes.

The cross-stitched bedspread was one Adorabella Levieux had made herself, and it carried the wonderful smell of a fresh laundering. The clean scent also reminded her of the condition of her work clothes. Worried that she might have a drop of blood or street dirt on them, and not wanting to stain the painstakingly made cover, she pushed herself back off the bed. After turning off the light, Rachel stripped off her jeans, blouse and T-shirt in the privacy of near darkness. Then, relying on the faint glow from the security lamps outside, she laid her clothes over the chair and slipped into an oversize shirt.

What now? she thought, facing the shadow-filled room. No way could she go to sleep after the last hour’s upheaval. Her nerves were stretched tighter than piano wire and her mind was racing. In fact, she doubted there would be peace for her before dawn came, and maybe not even then.

Because it took her farthest from the door, she padded across the deliciously cool hardwood floor to the window and curled up on the low, wide ledge. Through the screen and beyond the gnarled fingers of the sentinel oaks, night lingered deathly still, as it had since the mist descended Sunday on Nooton.

From this perspective the bridge took on a surreal quality. It almost resembled some phantom beast out of mythical lore—colossal, yet skillfully cloaked by a vaporous veil of gray. Only a leg showing here, an ear there, a hint of spine and ominous jaw.

Rachel shivered. Strange visions to conjure—considering she’d never been a fanciful person. And, as one who had until recently felt well-acquainted, comfortable, with the night, the changes were as depressing as they were unwelcome.

What a mess she’d gotten herself into this time. She could imagine what her parents would say: “It’s no less than we expected, Rachel. Only you would give up all we’ve provided for you to live in some backwoods swamp town where the roaches are as big as domestic animals. Far be it for us to interfere with your right to live below the poverty line, but did it ever occur to you to once consider how embarrassing these selfish gestures are for your family?”

And yet, if she would ask, they wouldn’t hesitate to do everything in their power to get her on a plane back to the east coast. Even if it meant calling in favors from among their Washington, D.C., contacts, including borrowing a private corporate jet. Nothing would be too good for Phyllis and Earl Gentry’s only daughter and youngest child, because Gentrys, they liked to point out, stuck together.

Especially if there was good press involved, Rachel reflected bitterly.

But she also knew any favor extended to her would come with a price tag. One she wouldn’t pay, regardless of her anxiety over what she might have gotten herself into. She’d worked too hard for her independence to hand it back to them, even if it looked slightly stress-fractured at the moment. Eleven years’ hard, she thought, remembering Roddie. An old, familiar pain gripped her heart. There was another reason to stand firm: if she surrendered and ran home, it would be turning her back on what her brother had died for.

Gestures, indeed. No, she would have to see this situation through on her own. But never had she felt more unsure of herself or about what to do.

Trying to think back to the beginning, she rested her forehead on her updrawn knees. Think about Joe…. Joe warning you about…who? Jay Barnes, who looked like him, but couldn’t be him? It didn’t make any sense! Jay Barnes was no more Joe Becket than she was Princess Whatshername. His unignorable physique versus her sexually deprived status aside, there had been no real chemistry between them.

Except for that one moment when…

None, she argued with herself, repressing her mutinous thoughts. While on the other hand, Joe, with a few simple words, a look and a caress had made her feel…special…needed…wanted.

Bright Eyes. Like a whisper carried on the night’s steady wing, the memory of his voice, as well as his words, floated to her. No one had ever called her that before. Being a woman who’d gone through college, graduate school, medical training and hell’s internship in her own noncomformist way, she was too experienced to fall for negligent flattery. Two affairs had also left her dubious as to whether she was capable of opening her heart again. But how often did a woman have a ghost tell her he needed to touch her more than he wanted his dubious contact with the world?

“Only you don’t believe in the supernatural,” she whispered.

Torn, Rachel leaped to her feet and combed both hands through her hair.

So what was going on? Maybe she needed to focus on things from a different angle…specifically, on someone who didn’t vanish the moment she touched him…which brought her back to Jay Barnes.

She pressed her lips together. Not for a moment did she believe that man. She also didn’t think his reticence had anything to do with a penchant for privacy. He was hiding from something, or someone, she knew it.

How strange his expression had been when she’d asked about a twin. She’d only posed the question because she couldn’t think of any other way to explain his uncanny similarity to Joe. Obviously, she’d touched a tender nerve. All she had to do was figure out what it was.

From the moment he’d first seen her, he’d known she would be trouble for him. It gave him no pleasure to have her prove him right.

As he lay on his bed with sleep farther away than ever, he linked his hands behind his head and swore at the stabbing pain. That damned hand would be his downfall yet!

Shifting to avoid putting any further weight on it, he again berated himself for being a clumsy fool. He’d injured himself trying to keep Mudcat’s building from falling around him, holding up sheet metal paneling as he’d reached for the drill. There was, however, no such thing as a successful shortcut—at least, not for him. He’d discovered that as a kid when he’d written a book report based on the cover jacket and received a failing mark; he’d had the lesson drilled into him every time impatience or pride had lured him into beating around the bush instead of doing something the right way. Now his throbbing hand reiterated the old lesson.

At least the derisive and damnably desirable doctor had been right about the ointment. The burning had about stopped. But the thing was still stinging like a nest of vengeful scorpions.

Dr. Rachel Gentry…what was he going to do about her? He’d never doubted the legitimacy of her credentials; however, just as there were cops who were crooked and politicians who were worse, he figured it was entirely feasible for a doctor—especially one who was so easy on the eyes—to be not quite on the up-and-up. What else explained what a woman with her understated class was doing in a moldy sinkhole like Nooton?

He’d known her name almost from the moment she’d moved in. The Duchess had told him when he’d gone downstairs to pay for another month’s rent. He’d let the drifty old landlady lure him into her parlor—crammed with everything except spiderwebs—and prattle to her heart’s content. It had been a sacrifice considering the god-awful cologne she doused herself with. The mere thought of how the artificial sweetness had conflicted with the strange smells drifting out from the kitchen made him shudder. But he’d sat and listened, her voice reminding him of a scratched-up vinyl record.

“…Dr. Rachel Gentry of the Washington Gentrys. I’m sure you’ve heard of them.” He hadn’t. “Oh, my dear, impeccable lineage. They’re connected to the Georgia Gentrys, you know. Rachel—she insists I call her Rachel, isn’t that sweet?—well, Rachel inherited that delightful complexion that’s become world renown. But I digress…”

She’d about digressed him into a coma. These days he couldn’t afford to give a damn about the hide on peaches, women or anything else; he had been pleased that he’d come away with enough information to justify his uneasiness about his new neighbor.

Rachel Gentry, he’d concluded, might be a legitimate physician, but she was no more a good Samaritan doing her bit for the underprivileged in this parish than he was the pope’s son. He would have to stay alert until she made her move.

Pity she was such a looker, though, and sharp. That had probably been the idea—send in the primo bait to sniff him out. He’d never made it a secret that he had an appreciation for independent women who had as much brainpower as beauty. Someone must have tipped them off and they’d decided to test the theory, since nothing else seemed to be working in their attempt to locate and flush him out.

Well, let them try. He enjoyed a game of cat and mouse as much as anyone, and he’d been getting more than a little restless, anyway. How the devil did Garth stand it around here? he wondered, then reminded himself that the snake lived on an estate surrounded with all the toys other people’s money could buy.

Feeling a new surge of bitterness, he jackknifed off the bed and paced the confines of his room. Room—ha! he thought with a new surge of sarcasm. The price of obtaining privacy had meant taking this man-size version of a toaster oven. Fog or no fog, the temperature remained lethal up here regardless of the hour, and the closest thing to air-conditioning crazy Adorabella provided was the oscillating fan on the dresser. Most of the time he refused to run it, because the ancient thing had almost no safety guard left and sounded as though it was still busy grinding up fingers of previous tenants.

He stopped before it, tempted to turn it on despite all the reasons he shouldn’t. He was drenched with sweat, and the hot, humid breeze would have to feel better than this. Of course, best of all would be a beer.

If he had to stay here much longer, he was going to have to look into getting one of those small refrigerators and a quiet fan…and then he could wile away the hours by wondering if he would live long enough to get his money’s worth out of them.

He reached for his cigarettes and lighter, reminding himself for the umpteenth time that life was easier without complications. Maybe somebody should have told bright-eyed Dr. Gentry that. Hell, she seemed too young to have her license, let alone be involved in this kind of filth.

His cigarettes and lighter lay beside the man-eating fan. Pulling one from the pack, he stopped it inches away from his mouth, then slammed it back onto the dresser. Down to almost three a day and she’d nearly ruined it for him.

He ran his good hand over his hair. Like the rest of him, it was soaking wet, another warning that he was edging toward an explosion.

What the hell, he thought, thinking about the beer again. Hadn’t he already reserved himself a first-class ticket to hell? He might as well make it a worthwhile trip.

He headed for the door.

CHAPTER FIVE

He thought his door might well be the only one in the house that didn’t squeak when opened. Humidity served as the culprit. With all the windows lifted to invite reluctant breezes, it had its run of the place. But he’d offset its effect on the hinges by keeping them oiled. As a result, when he eased out of his room and paused in the hall, he did so in near silence.

As was the case in his own room, the only light came from the blue-gray glow seeping through the window at the end of the hall. Because he lived in the darkness as much as he could in order to develop his night vision, he didn’t mind.

He took a moment to listen at Rachel Gentry’s door. There was a brief rustling and a squeak—as she turned in her bed?—followed by stillness. Without consciously intending to, he found himself picturing her as she slept, or rather the way he preferred to imagine her…wearing only the night’s wet kiss, her slim body graceful in a half twist like a ballerina in midleap, her hands lost in the dark silk of her hair. Just as unintentionally came the stirrings of arousal heating his body.

Like he needed this, he thought, berating himself for his weakness. He couldn’t afford to keep letting his thoughts drift to her, regardless of whether it made the hours of isolation pass more quickly or not. She already had too much of an effect on him, and that could prove problematic if things started coming apart.

Thirstier than ever, he made his way down the hall, treating the carpet runner like a serpent to be avoided. He’d learned that if he stayed on either the left or right side of it, he could usually reach the stairs without making a sound. It had become another game to him—a potentially lifesaving one. He’d taught himself the tone of each creak, too. Now when he heard someone coming, he knew exactly where they were positioned and who they were by their weight displacement on the hardwood floor.

But because of the relentless effects of the dampness combined with the age of the house, it was impossible even for him to get through without at least one squeak, and he found it, a new one, three feet in front of the landing. Silently cursing, he made a mental note of the spot.

The stairs were supposed to be easier because he’d learned to balance the bulk of his weight by resting his right hand on the railing, his left against the wall, and using a variation of a sailor’s method of descent in a ship. Under the circumstances, however, that maneuver was impossible, and the childlike tactic of sliding down on the railing wasn’t going to work, either, if he couldn’t easily stop himself. Deciding he needed the discipline, he started down the hard way.

Once he reached the second floor, he knew he could move more swiftly without having to worry about noise. The codger on this level snored loud enough to block out any noise he made, and no doubt the divorcee had yet to return from her nightly manhunt. But at the first level, he stopped.

There was something about this part of the house that bothered him. Something odd. If he put any merit in his landlady’s prattling, he would blame it on the spooks she claimed roamed around here. On the other hand, he’d met the voodoo queen, her housekeeper, and he figured she was the one who left him feeling he had a bull’s-eye painted at the base of his neck.

Even so, he enjoyed his periodic raids down here to swipe something from Jewel’s refrigerator. He never touched the food, though, no matter how hungry he was. Most of it looked strange enough to persuade him to turn down the Duchess’s frequent invitations to “family” dinners. The voodoo queen did, however, share his appreciation for beer, even if hers was a cheap local brand.

That’s what he’d come down for, and upon reaching the refrigerator, conspicuous by its modernness in a kitchen that was otherwise a throwback to forty, maybe fifty years ago, he carefully opened the right-hand door. The room filled with light and, uncomfortable, he quickly reached for a can on the bottom shelf. That’s when he felt it.

It had happened before, although never this powerfully. The only way to describe the intense awareness was that it felt like being in the cross hairs of the scope of a powerful rifle zeroing in on his skull. Without so much as drawing a breath, he dove beside the refrigerator, letting the door continue swinging open. It swept the huge kitchen with a yellow light, and he saw…

Nothing. Nothing at all. Except that the curtains, hung in lieu of a pantry door, were shifting. From the breeze of the swinging refrigerator door, he told himself.

Maybe.

He shifted to a crouch, then rose to his feet. He took a step forward, a knot of tension hardening in his gut, and then took another. With every expectation of a barrel appearing and discharging into his midsection, he grabbed both sides of the curtain and yanked it open.

“Jeez.” He backed away in shock and disgust.

Rachel jerked upright in bed, an unpleasant feeling, at once frightening and disorienting. But knowing the sensations passed more quickly when she didn’t fight them, she leaned back against the headboard and waited, completely still and silent, until the jumpiness and nausea passed. And to gain some insight into why she’d been jarred to consciousness this time.

Her mouth felt as though someone had stuffed it with the down from her pillows. Her shirt clung to her perspiration-dampened body like an unwelcome hand. Convinced that nothing more than the oppressive weather had intruded on her sleep again, she leaned over and checked the time.

Dismayed to see she hadn’t been asleep for even an hour yet, she kicked off the sheet tangled around her legs. At this rate she would be a basket case within the next week, she moaned silently, brushing hair out of her face and climbing out of bed. She went to the window to see if anything had changed—if there was a chance of a shower or a breeze. Something had to give, even if neither of those possibilities looked likely.

What unholy weather. That wasn’t only her opinion—everyone was saying so. Normally, a number of natives had explained to her, something would give one way or another. The logical ones blamed the persistent fog on global warming. A few strange characters pointed to UFO interference, the coming of the Age of Aquarius or Armageddon. Rachel saw logic in the theory about the troubled environment, but her instincts were edging toward a conclusion even stranger than the UFO idea.

“No more,” she moaned, massaging her temples with her fingertips. “Not tonight.”

Maybe a cup of water and two aspirin would relax her enough to get back to sleep. Shifting to massage her neck, she headed for the door. If she didn’t get some rest, Sammy was going to give her heck when she went in to relieve him in the afternoon. That kind of trouble she didn’t need. Up to this point in her career, she’d managed to show all her supervisors that she could handle her share of job stress; she wasn’t about to prove otherwise.

After moving the chair, she was about to free the secondary lock on her door, when she froze. What was that? A footstep?

She pressed her ear closer to the door and listened. For a moment everything remained silent, and then…it wasn’t exactly a step she heard, but a slight shifting of the floorboards, as though someone was trying to hide their movements.

Could it be Jay Barnes? What was he doing up?

The question was, how could anyone sleep in this sauna?

Rachel shut her eyes and tried to think. Maybe his hand hurt him worse than he’d admitted.

No doubt he’s been lying about a number of things, but if you open that door you may find out more than is healthy to know.

It was a risk she felt she needed to take. She’d had enough of trying to answer her own questions. Too many of them were being left unexplained. But that didn’t mean she wouldn’t be careful.

Ever so cautiously, she slid back the lock. Seeing how her hands were shaking, she quickly released the other lock and swung the door open.

A dark figure sprang toward her, had probably begun to do so the instant he’d heard the door opening. He moved with a speed and agility that Rachel found terrifying. She gasped and fell back against her opened door. With nowhere to go, she waited for the inevitable.

But rather than attack, he rested a hand on the right side of her head and growled, “What do you think you’re doing?”

Fair question—if she’d been in the mood to be fair. “Me? What are you doing? Have you any idea what a fright—You could’ve hurt me!”

“If I’d meant to, you wouldn’t be standing.”

His cold confidence made her stare in mute disbelief. She forgot how hot she was and how brave she’d always believed she could be in the face of adversity. All she knew was that she’d made a ridiculously big mistake by opening the door. “You’re a very strange man, Mr. Barnes,” she replied, deciding to salvage what was left of her common sense and retreat. Fast. “If you’ll excuse me…”

With a mere shifting of his weight, he blocked her with his left shoulder. “Not so fast.”

The maneuver brought him so close she could feel the heat of his half-naked body merging with her own. It created a near-electric aura between them. Barely able to move her lips, Rachel whispered, “Please get out of my way.”

“After you answer some questions.”

“If anyone should be answering questions, it’s you. I’m not the one creeping around out there.”