“Are you sleeping?” Linda asked.

“Hardly! I was trying to decide if I should let you sleep in your car, or if I should play the gentleman and offer you my bed—without me in it, of course,” Mac replied.

“You’ll play the gentleman,” she said, her smile disturbingly sweet. “Of course.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“I’ve got you figured out.”

“Don’t try to second-guess me, cookie. I’m not that easy to read.” He ran his fingertips over his jaw. “I’ve been going over a few things in my mind.”

She sat motionless, her clear blue eyes huge in her face.

“I’ll help you find your missing niece,” he said.

She sagged against the cushions, her relief manifest. “If you do that, there’s nothing I won’t do for you in return.”

“Be careful what you promise.”

CATHERINE SPENCER, once an English teacher, fell into writing through eavesdropping on a conversation about Harlequin® romances. Within two months she had changed careers, and sold her first book to Harlequin in 1984. She moved to Canada from England thirty years ago and lives in Vancouver. She is married to a Canadian and has two daughters and two sons—plus a dog and a cat. In her spare time she plays the piano, collects antiques and grows tropical shrubs.

Mackenzie’s Promise
Catherine Spencer

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER ONE

THE day they shipped her sister off by ambulance to the psychiatric wing of Lion’s Gate Hospital was the day Linda Carr decided to take matters into her own hands. The police had had their chance and, as far as she could tell, were getting precisely nowhere. Bad enough that the baby had been missing for seven weeks now; to stand idly by while June retired farther into the fuzzy world of tranquilizers was not to be countenanced.

Not that Linda blamed her sister. She’d known her own share of sleepless nights since the infant girl had disappeared, and she could only imagine how much worse it had been for the new mother to be told that her firstborn had been smuggled out of the hospital nursery—by the father, no less!

It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that Kirk Thayer would resort to extreme measures. From all accounts, he’d shown an astonishing lack of moderation in most things to do with June, practically from the day he’d learned she was expecting his child. It was the main reason she’d refused to marry him. But that he’d go so far as to kidnap the baby and disappear without trace…!

“I’ll bring your little daughter home,” Linda promised, when she visited June the morning after she’d been hospitalized. “You just concentrate on getting well so that you’re ready to be a mommy, and leave the rest to me.”

“And how do you propose to do that?” Linda’s friend Melissa asked that night, as the two of them dined on pasta primavera at their favorite West Vancouver restaurant. “Being a bona fide European-trained chef doesn’t exactly qualify you as a private investigator. It’s already been established that Thayer left town the same day he stole the baby and probably returned to the States. He could be anywhere by now, and given his unpredictable state of mind, I think you’re going to need an expert to track him down.”

“Uh-uh!” Linda shook her head decisively. “Not an expert, the expert—and I’ve got you to thank for finding him for me. Remember that magazine article you sent to me when I was living in Rome—the one you wrote about the maverick police officer who quit the force because he refused to be bound by all the red tape surrounding it?”

Melissa eyed her incredulously. “Please tell me you’re not referring to the reclusive Mac Sullivan, former ace detective now living in exclusive solitude on the Oregon coast.”

“The very same. Going through the conventional channels isn’t working. It’s time for a more radical approach.”

“Quite possibly it is, but Mac Sullivan’s not your man. He won’t even return your phone calls, much less agree to help you. I’d even go so far as to say that he’s the most bullheaded creature on earth, and I know whereof I speak. Researching that article was worse than pulling hen’s teeth. Setting up a private tell-all interview with the Queen of England would have been easier.”

“I don’t care. He’s the acknowledged expert when it comes to tracking down missing persons—practically clairvoyant, according to your article—and I’m prepared to camp on his doorstep so that he trips over me every time he sets foot outside his house, if necessary. It beats sitting on my hands and watching June turn into a wraith of the woman she used to be.”

“I can’t say I blame you. I barely recognized her the last time I saw her. She’s nothing but skin and bone. And those haunted eyes…!” Melissa inspected her glass of wine and let out an exaggerated sigh. “So what can I do to help—since I assume that’s why you’re bribing me with this very fine merlot?”

“I want you to check your sources and find out exactly where this Sullivan man lives. I need something a bit more specific than ‘on the Oregon coast’, which covers a lot of territory.”

“I don’t need to check any sources for that. He lives right on the beach in Trillium Cove.”

“Never heard of it.”

“Not many people have. It lies between Bandon and Coos Bay, and caters to the rich and reclusive, not tourists or newshounds. We were treated like lepers when we started nosing around town. Your best bet, if you’re determined to go this route, is to be discreet and look sophisticated, which shouldn’t be too difficult, given your worldly, cosmopolitan air. It’s a small town and none of the streets have names, so there’s no point in looking at a map. On the plus-side, though, his place lies at the end of a gravel road running directly west of the post office, so you’ll find it easily enough. But for what it’s worth, if you do find him—”

“When,” Linda corrected her. “I will find him, Melissa. I have to. June can’t go on like this and neither, come to that, can our mother. She’s been sick with worry for weeks now and the stress…well, you know how much she has to put up with already. This could be the last straw for her.”

“Then when you find him, don’t rush your fences.”

“Why not? This is an emergency and time’s of the essence. What’s wrong with being up-front about that?”

“Trillium Cove isn’t Rome or Paris—or even Vancouver. Things don’t happen at breakneck speed around there just because you want them to—and Mac Sullivan’s definitely not someone to be pushed. You can’t go hammering on his door and expect the only thing he’ll ask is ‘How high?’ just because you tell him to jump. If there was one thing which came across loud and clear during the brief interview he granted us, it’s that his priority these days is completing the book he’s writing on criminal profiles, and he resents anything which takes time away from that, although he did admit to doing a bit of police consulting on the side, once in a very rare while.”

“He’ll make an exception when I explain what happened. He has to.”

“Uh-uh!” Melissa scooped up a forkful of pasta and shook her head decisively. “He doesn’t have to do anything. This is a man who values both his privacy and his freedom to pick and choose how he spends his time.”

“He’ll choose this case when he finds out how much I’m prepared to pay.”

Again, Melissa shook her head. “He’s also filthy rich. It takes more zeroes than I earn in three months to pay the taxes on that property of his, let alone afford all the other little perks he enjoys. No, kiddo. To get him to take an interest in your case, you’re going to have to adopt a sneakier method and be very persuasive—if you get my drift!”

Linda’s stared at her, affronted. “I hope you’re not implying I come on to him?”

“I wouldn’t have put it quite like that, but since you did, then yes. In a way.”

“Fat chance! The day has yet to dawn when—”

“I’m suggesting you stroke his ego, not show up stark naked and offer to give him a full body massage, for heaven’s sake!”

“No!” Linda was adamant. She’d fended off romantic overtures from infatuated master chefs and five-star restaurateurs with equal dispatch during her years of training abroad, and wasn’t about to compromise her standards now for some small-town ex-police officer with an overblown sense of his own importance. “Apart from the principle of the thing, I can’t afford the time for those kinds of games.”

“You can’t afford not to! And if appealing to his vanity gets the results you’re after, what’s another couple of days?” Melissa’s tone softened. “Look, Linda, I know better than anyone that this isn’t how you usually operate. You’re the most straightforward person I’ve ever met—to a fault, sometimes. But there’s nothing usual about what’s happened to your family. It’s cruel and heartbreaking and scary beyond any normal person’s wildest imaginings, and if you want to put an end to the misery, the only thing you can afford to focus on is bringing your niece home safely and seeing that Kirk Thayer is brought to justice.”

Linda chewed on that for a while, then sighed deeply. “Loath though I am to admit it, I’m afraid you might be right,” she said, not much liking it but realistic enough to recognize there was no getting away from the truth of Melissa’s analysis. “If flattery will bring Mac Sullivan on board, I’ll butter him up one side and down the other so thoroughly, he’ll glow. I’ll do whatever it takes, and worry about my methods when that baby is back in her mother’s arms where she belongs.”

“And I wish you luck. Because, believe me, you’ll need lots of it.”

Even in mid-August, after weeks of hot, dry weather, the ocean was cold. Enough that Mac wore a wet suit when he rode the Windsurfer, though not enough to keep him from his early-morning swim. He needed that bracing dash into the icy waves to clear the cobwebs from his brain and prepare him for the day’s work. One thousand words minimum before four in the afternoon, fifteen hundred if he was lucky—and that didn’t count the research, or the pages of notes he compiled before he tackled the latest chapter.

The surf was wilder than usual that day, requiring he keep his attention on what he was doing, which probably explained why he wasn’t aware someone had invaded his section of beach until he practically stepped on her as he waded ashore.

Still half-blinded by the glare of sun on water, Mac detected the visitor was a woman only by her voice. Clear, bossy, cultured, it accosted him as he hoisted the Windsurfer under one arm and prepared to climb the steps to the house. “Watch what you’re doing with that thing! You just about took my head off!”

“A danger you could have avoided if you’d paid attention to your whereabouts,” he informed her murky silhouette. “You’re on private property, lady.”

“How am I supposed to know that?”

He jerked his head to indicate the signs nailed to the twisted trunks of the scrub pines edging the low-rising dune. “You could try reading—assuming you know how.”

His vision clearer by then, he watched with grim amusement as she reared back in outrage. “I’d heard you were a bit short on social graces,” she huffed, “but I’d no idea you were such a Neanderthal.”

“Well, now that you’ve been enlightened, why don’t you go back to wherever you came from and leave me to grunt in peace?”

“Because,” she said, and faltered into silence.

She had wide-spaced blue-green eyes almost the color of the sea close-in to shore. Blond hair framing a heart-shaped face in a halo of short curls. Full, stubborn mouth, dimpled chin. Slight build, shapely legs, about five-four in her bare feet, and weighing around a hundred and ten pounds. Fingers braided so tightly together it was a wonder they didn’t dislocate. Twenty-sixish, possibly a bit younger. A very uptight woman.

He noticed all that not because he gave a damn but because he’d been trained to observe. Eleven years on the police force stayed with a man, even after he turned in his badge.

“‘Because’ isn’t a reason,” he said.

She looked down at her knotted fingers. “I’m sorry if I’m trespassing. I really didn’t notice the signs.”

“I don’t see how you could miss them. They’re in plain enough sight.”

She took that under consideration for a minute, then drummed up an obsequious smile and said, “But so were you. And I was captivated watching you on the Windsurfer. You’re amazing.”

“So I’ve been told—by women a lot more subtle than you.”

She blushed, the color running up under her honey-gold skin and leaving her looking like a kid caught dipping into the cookie jar behind her mother’s back. “I’m not trying to flirt with you.”

“Sure you are,” he said. “You’re just not doing it very well. So why don’t you spit out whatever it is you’re really after, and get it over with?”

“I need your help. My sister’s baby has been stolen by the father, and she’s beside herself.”

Mac repressed a sigh and turned to stare out at the rolling ocean, preferring its eternal tumult to the unending stream of human misery which hounded him no matter how much he tried to distance himself from it. “He’s probably just taken off for the day. He’ll come home again as soon as he realizes it’s time for a diaper change.”

“No,” she said. “You don’t understand. He’s not my sister’s husband. They don’t live together. He stole the baby right out of the hospital nearly two months ago when she was only one day old, and no one’s heard from him since.”

Oh, jeez! “Then you should have called in the police long before now.”

“We did.” The bossy tone had disintegrated into something too close to despair for his peace of mind. “But it’s been seven weeks, Mr. Sullivan, and they haven’t made much progress.”

“What makes you think I can do any better?”

“Your reputation speaks for itself.”

Again he turned away, unable to confront the unwarranted hope in that wide-eyed gaze. Not many things touched him anymore, but a child gone missing, a newborn ripped from its mother’s arms, and by the estranged father no less, touched a sore spot which no amount of time seemed able to heal. Any guy who would pull a stunt like that should be strung up!

“You haven’t done your homework,” he told her, not a hint of emotion in his voice. “If you had, you’d know I retired from active duty three years ago. But there are any number of private investigators who’ll take your case and I’ll be happy to refer you.”

“I don’t want them, I want you.”

“You’re wasting your time. I can’t help you.”

“Can’t—or won’t?”

Mac spun around, the ghost of a lost child’s cry echoing through his mind. “Look, Ms…..”

“Carr,” she supplied. “Linda Carr. And my niece’s name is Angela. She weighed six pounds, eleven ounces at birth and was nineteen inches long. But all that will have changed in seven weeks. She probably looks nothing like the photo taken only hours after she was born. Her mother doesn’t know if she’s thriving, if she’s well cared for, if she’s gaining weight the way she’s supposed to. She doesn’t even know that she’s still alive.”

“If the father’s the kidnapper, the baby’s probably fine. What reason has he to harm her?”

“What reason had he to steal her?”

“Presumably because there was trouble between him and the mother.”

She nodded. “Yes. Their relationship fell apart a couple of months before Angela was born.”

“Is she your sister’s first child?”

“Yes, but Kirk’s second. He has a son from a previous marriage whom he rarely sees because the boy lives with the ex-wife who returned to Australia after the divorce.”

“That probably explains it, then. The guy probably feared he’d be denied access to this child, too.”

“I really don’t care what he feared, Mr. Sullivan,” she said, the bossiness returning full force to her tone and setting his teeth on edge. “I care about my sister who’s on the verge of complete mental collapse. And I care about a baby being left to the uncertain mercies of a man who’s clearly unbalanced. I should think, if you have a grain of compassion in your soul, that you’d care, too.”

“I can’t take on the world’s problems and make them my own, Ms. Carr,” he said wearily. “I’ve got enough to do fighting my own demons. The best I can do for you is recommend that you hire someone who specializes in locating missing persons, and if this man’s been gone nearly two months already, then the sooner you get on it, the better.”

Mac didn’t wait to hear all her reasons for ignoring his advice, nor did he tell her that with every passing day the chances of the baby being recovered grew slimmer, because he wasn’t getting any more involved. Period.

To underline the fact, he cleared the dunes and marched up the steps, surfboard and all, and left her to figure out another game plan, confident he’d closed the door on any possibility that it would include him.

Well, so much for subterfuge and sweet talk! Totally deflated, Linda stared at his departing back.

Why hadn’t Melissa warned her?

Why hadn’t she mentioned that Mac Sullivan was no ordinary man, that he had the face of a fallen angel and the body of a god? Why hadn’t she seen fit to point out that his voice flowed over a woman like molasses, dark and rich and bittersweet?

Disgusted with herself, with her inappropriate susceptibility, Linda buried her face in her hands. Melissa wasn’t to blame, she herself was, for having been fool enough to pin labels on him, sight unseen.

She’d read too many novels about hard-bitten, granite-jawed, flinty-voiced detectives, that was her trouble. Seen too many movies of officers with thick middles and double chins slurping coffee and demolishing doughnuts in between reading people their rights. Spent too many hours talking to the RCMP and local police who were hamstrung by protocol.

She’d come here believing she was prepared—and found she was prepared for nothing: not the endless drive lasting nearly two days; not the interminable congestion of the I-5, which had her clutching the steering wheel in a white-knuckled grip all the way from north of Seattle to Olympia; not the snaking coastal road crowded with tourists in Oregon. And definitely not Mac Sullivan.

Even her final destination was alien. She’d grown up in Vancouver, Canada’s third largest city. She’d apprenticed in New York and New Orleans, in Paris and Rome. And felt more at home in any one of those cities than she did on this empty stretch of beach bordered on one side by the wild ocean and the other by sand dunes rising twenty feet or more in places.

For all her world travel and supposed sophistication, she was truly a stranger in a strange land. And no closer to finding June’s baby now than she had been on her native turf.

Exhaustion swept over her, softening the edges of her disgust with the threat of tears. She’d been so sure, so determined she’d succeed where the police had failed. All during the drive south, she’d rehearsed how she’d approach Mac Sullivan, what she’d say. And been blindsided before she’d even opened her mouth. Spellbound by his commanding presence, commanding looks, commanding everything!

An image of June staring sightlessly out of her hospital room window, and another of a newborn’s sweetly sleeping face, were shamefully eclipsed by the more recent memory of a man emerging from the rolling surf and striding up the beach. Of him shaking the saltwater from his dark hair and sending the drops flying around his head in a shimmering halo. Of a pair of magnificent shoulders and long, powerful legs. Of eyes glowing smoky blue-gray in his darkly tanned face.

Oh, fatigue was making a fool of her! What other explanation could there be for the way her mind had emptied of everything that mattered and fastened instead on the physical attributes of a stranger? Why else was she slumped on a chunk of driftwood, with no place to stay that night and no clue as to what her next move should be?

Already the sun was sliding down on the horizon, allowing a hint of pre-autumn chill to permeate the air. She was hungry and travel-worn and disconcerted. She needed a comfortable hotel room, a hot bath, a good dinner, and an even better night’s sleep to fortify her for the battle ahead. But she knew from her earlier exploration that she’d find none of those things in Trillium Cove. The only inn in town had displayed a discreet No Vacancy sign and from what she’d seen, there weren’t any restaurants.

“Stop wallowing in self-pity!” she ordered herself. “It’s as unattractive as it’s unproductive. Get up off your behind and do something because you’re accomplishing nothing with this attitude!”

But her normal resilience had hit an all-time low. The accrued worry and frustration of the last few weeks had finally caught up with her and no amount of self-reproach could chase it away. Discouraged, dejected, she rested her chin on her folded arms and stared blankly at the empty horizon.

Damn her anyway! How long was she going to sit there like a lost mermaid waiting for the tide to sweep her back out to sea?

Irritated as much with himself as with her, Mac leaned back in the wicker recliner, propped his feet on the deck railing and took a healthy swig of his bourbon. Usually, topping off the day with an ounce of Jack Daniel’s and a perfect sunset was all he needed to give him a sense of well-being beyond anything money could buy.

Usually.

Usually, though, he didn’t have a desperate woman spoiling the view. He didn’t have a woman at all, except by choice, and even then only occasionally. And he made sure whoever she was didn’t come loaded down with expectations he had no intention of meeting.

Raising his glass, he squinted at the prisms of late-afternoon sunlight spearing the amber liquid. Fine stuff, Jack Daniel’s! Drink enough of it, and a guy could sink into a hazy stupor which nothing could penetrate. Trouble was, he’d learned long ago that when the effects of too much booze wore off, all he had left was a thundering headache and the same old problem he’d tried to elude to begin with. Which brought him back full circle to the woman on the—on his—beach.

Thoroughly ticked off, he slapped the glass down on the table at his side, lunged to his feet, and glared at her. She hadn’t moved a muscle in the last half hour. Head bent, shoulders bowed, she sat sunk in palpable misery. But what irked him beyond measure was that despite there being no law which said he had to make her problems his, the sight of her remained superimposed on the forefront of his mind regardless, and his thoughts kept turning to the problem she was trying to resolve.

If it had been an errant husband she was chasing after, or someone who’d taken her for a whack of money, he’d have been able to dismiss her without a second thought. But a child…a helpless baby gone missing? A man had to have traveled a long way down the road of indifference to turn his back on that.

He had the wherewithal to help her: contacts in high places, should he need them; knowledge and experience by the bushel right at his fingertips. But he’d laid down a set of rules by which he’d sworn to live. Rules which spared him having to call on any such resources.

It was fear, not rules, which held him back now, though. Fear that all he could do at this stage was discover she’d left it too late. Fear that, at the end of it all, the only thing she’d be taking back to her sister was a miniature white casket holding a baby’s remains.

He couldn’t go through that a second time.

Restlessly he paced the length of the deck and back, then turned for one last glance down at the beach. It lay deserted, not just directly below the house, but as far as the eye could see to either side. Not a living soul marred the two-mile expanse of sand he called his backyard.

She’d given up. Gone back to wherever she’d come from, or else in search of someone else’s help. He could eat dinner with a clear conscience. Praise the Lord!

His kitchen faced southeast, with a patio beyond the sliding glass door which caught the morning sun. He kept his barbecue out there, a gas-powered luxury model designed for year-round use regardless of the weather, but especially suited for an evening such as this.

He’d pulled a steak from the freezer and was in the process of searching the refrigerator for salad fixings when the bronze knocker on his front door struck the solid plank of oak. Not loudly or confidently or imperatively, the way he’d have approached it, but with a timid little pflunk!

The sixth sense which had served him so long and so well during his years on the force clicked into gear. Muttering a few choice words not fit to be heard in decent company, he strode through the living area to the hall, already resigned to what he knew he’d find waiting outside.

“Please,” was all she said when he opened the door, and he was lost. Lost in the bruised shade of her eyes, more blue than green in the descending twilight. And lost in that simple entreaty which spoke more poignantly than a flood of more urgent and articulate pleas.

“I should have realized you couldn’t disappear into thin air quite that fast,” he said, gesturing her inside.

She was shivering, pale, and just about ready to drop in her tracks. He grasped her upper arm and was shocked at how chilled her skin felt—far more than the cooling outside temperature merited. Shocked, too, by her air of frailty. “When did you last eat?” he inquired sharply.

She thought about it for a second, then said, “I stopped for coffee this morning.”

“I’m talking about a square meal.”

“I don’t know.” She lifted her shoulders indifferently. “Last night, I guess.”

Mac swore again, and propelled her to the leather couch in front of the fireplace. “Sit!” he ordered, and after she responded to the command like a well-trained member of the dog squad, he grabbed the knitted afghan his mother had sent him and flung it around her shoulders.

She curved herself into its warmth and blinked. She had the longest damned eyelashes he’d ever seen. Indulging in a few more choice obscenities—old police habits died hard—he knelt to put a match to the wood and kindling already laid in the fire grate then, while the flames took hold, returned to the kitchen and heated water to make a mug of his special hot rum toddy.

“Here,” he said, marching back to the living room some five minutes later. But she was already zonked out. Head cushioned against the arm of the couch, feet tucked under her, she slept like a baby.

Parking the rum toddy on the edge of the hearth, he piled a couple more logs on the fire, then leaned against the mantel shelf and rolled his eyes in disgust. He’d grown accustomed to his comfort zone, in which he was responsible only for himself; accountable only to himself. Still, he retained just enough humanity to be touched by her troubles.

A child had gone missing, for God’s sake, and even he—especially he!—knew the burden that cast on a person’s shoulders. And he was afraid. Afraid of his response to a woman so full of need that someone had to step in on her behalf, because she couldn’t do it alone. Afraid because, of all the people she could have turned to, she’d chosen him.

He’d looked into her eyes and remembered them not for their clarity of color or symmetry of shape, but for the faith he’d seen in them, and for the grief. And he was afraid of failing again.

“Jeez!” he growled. “Why me? Of all the people living along this stretch of coastline, why the hell did I have to open my door to this particular stray?”

She stirred. Puffed a little breath between her lips. Sighed. And settled more comfortably into the corner of the couch.

Sighing himself, he stalked back to the kitchen and yanked open the freezer in search of another steak. No point in deluding himself. She was there for the duration, whether or not he liked it.

But lest there be any doubt, he liked it not one bit and intended driving the message home to her as soon as she was alert enough to comprehend it—which, given her present comatose state, was unlikely to be anytime soon.

CHAPTER TWO

THE eerie sense that she was being watched—scrutinized with unblinking intent, in fact—penetrated the mists of sleep and lent an even greater edge of danger to the fitful dreams chasing her.

Jarring awake, she sat up too suddenly and took a moment to get her bearings. Leather warm and smooth as satin against her bare skin, a soft wool shawl caressing her shoulders, a tingling numbness creeping down her right leg. Her face touched by the heat from a fire whose flames danced in reflection on the wall of windows to her left. A framed painting above the mantelpiece, of majestic evergreens marching up a mountainside. Massive beams supporting a high ceiling. Music—a Chopin nocturne, she guessed—flowing from a sound system housed in an open cabinet made of some dark wood inlaid with ivory.

And in a tanned face of incomparable male beauty, cool watchful eyes the color of storm clouds, dissecting her, feature by feature.

He lounged in a chair on the opposite side of the granite hearth, an old-fashioned glass one-third full held negligently in one hand. He’d showered and changed since he admitted her to the house. His hair gleamed thick and black against his skull, and she detected a faint and pleasant whiff of aftershave. He wore a long-sleeved shirt almost the exact shade of his eyes, and black cargo pants.

Relaxed and casual, one might have been fooled into believing. Except there was nothing relaxed or casual in his unswerving observation, and she knew without a shadow of doubt that, had the need arisen, he’d have uncoiled out of that chair in a stunning blur of speed and power. He was part man, part machine; frighteningly intelligent, and terrifyingly detached.

“How long have I been asleep?” she asked him, her voice croaking from a throat grown dry and gritty.

“Close to an hour.”

“You should have woken me.”

“Why?”

“Because…” she said, then, unable to come up with a reason that didn’t sound either affected or downright silly, drifted into silence.

“I already told you once, ‘because’ isn’t a reason.”

She wished he’d divert that unnerving stare to some place other than her face. She felt like a butterfly pinned under a microscope. Helpless. At his complete mercy. “I guess I was tired.”

“I guess you were.” He shifted in the chair, glanced briefly at his glass, took a mouthful of whatever he was drinking, and resumed his inspection of her. “You’d like to tidy up,” he said, not in question but in command. “There’s a washroom to the right of the front door.”

Normally she’d have resented his tone but it had been hours since she’d been to the toilet and nature was calling with growing insistence. Wincing, she unfolded herself from the couch and slid to her feet, the pins and needles shooting up her right leg rendering it excruciatingly sensitive to the pressure.

“Cramps,” she offered, feeling some sort of explanation was called for as she took a lurching step forward.

“You mean you’ve got your period?” he inquired dispassionately. “Sorry, I don’t keep supplies like that on hand.”

She thought she’d die. Scarlet in the face and probably over every other inch of exposed skin as well, she groped her way to the end of the couch. “Cramps in my leg,” she stammered, beating as dignified a retreat as she could manage.

The washroom bore the same stamp of masculine opulence as the living area. Pristine white marble floor tiles, dark green porcelain fixtures, brass fittings and black hand towels. Above the sink, a large oval mirror revealed a map of creases down one side of her face and her hair mashed unflatteringly against her head from where she’d lain on it.

No wonder he’d been staring at her so fixedly. He probably hadn’t seen anything quite as unsightly since the last time he’d scraped a drunk off the sidewalk, back in the days when he cruised the streets in a patrol car.

She did the best she could with soap and water, but she’d left her bag in her car at the top of his driveway and much though she’d have loved to get her hands on her toothbrush and a comb, she wasn’t about to leave the house and risk not being allowed back in again. He’d just have to put up with her as she was.

“It took you long enough,” he informed her, when she reappeared. “Men can do what they have to do in half the time it takes a woman.”

“They also stand up to do it,” she snapped without thinking, and blushed again as he let out a rumble of laughter.

“Here,” he said, handing her a steaming mug. “Maybe this’ll warm you up and sweeten your mood.”

She sniffed the contents suspiciously. “What is it?”

“Hot rum and lemon with sugar. I just reheated it. Watch you don’t burn your mouth.”

“I don’t like rum.”

“And I don’t like strays coming down with pneumonia under my roof, so do as you’re told. You aren’t dressed for the kind of temperatures we get out here in the evening.”

“I’m not cold.”

He traced the tip of his finger over her bare arm. “Then why the goose bumps?”

Because you’re touching me, she thought, unable to control a shiver. “Reaction setting in after sleeping, I suppose. It’s not uncommon.”

“Maybe not, but I don’t want to take any chances.” He tucked the knitted shawl around her shoulders and nudged her toward the fire. “Sit on the hearth awhile and down the rum while I fix us some food. You eat red meat?”

“Would it make any difference if I said ‘no’?”

“Not a bit,” he replied cheerfully. “I’m having steak and a baked potato, with salad and mushrooms on the side. You can either join me or watch me.”

“Steak will be fine,” she told him, wondering what demon of perversity made her take issue with him when what she most wanted was to win his cooperation. “Thank you for inviting me to stay.”

He laughed again, unkindly this time. “As if I had any choice! Medium rare okay?”

“Perfect.”

The hot rum and lemon tasted remarkably pleasant and slid down her throat in a rich, syrupy stream, warming her as thoroughly within as the fire did on the outside. Beyond an open archway at the far end of the room, she could hear him moving around, clattering utensils and running water. She found the sounds oddly comforting; a refreshing return to normality, after too many weeks fraught with anxiety and fear.

The fading glow of sunset streamed across the plain white wall opposite the windows, painting it in pastel stripes of celadon and peach. Hugging the mug in both hands, she strolled to the sliding glass doors overlooking the ocean.

The view was breathtaking, stretching as far as the eye could see over ocean and sand, cliffs and stunted, weather-bent pines. A person could gaze at the sight every day for the rest of his life, and not grow tired of the spectacle. Small wonder he’d chosen this spot as his retreat.

The huge room behind her was scarcely less impressive. He’s filthy rich, Melissa had said, and it had been no exaggeration. In addition to the one she’d noticed above the fireplace, a number of other paintings hung on the whitewashed walls, some oils, some watercolors, and every one an original. There were other items, too, which told something of his taste: a jade carving of a woman rising from a pool, her arms upstretched; a crouching mountain lion fashioned from onyx; a wide, shallow bowl of beaten copper holding a selection of bleached seashells, and a tall brass samovar.

Dark Turkish rugs left splashes of color over the pale wood floors. The leather on the couches was soft and pliant as velvet. His dining table, big enough to seat twelve with ease, gleamed with the patina of age.

“Have you lived here long?” she asked, coming to lean in the archway and watch him at work.

“Going on four years.”

“It’s a very handsome house. You were lucky it came on the market just when you were ready to buy.”

“It didn’t. I found the land and had the house built to my specifications.”

“Oh.” She scanned the kitchen, noting its top-of-the-line appliances, the finely crafted cabinets, the big work island with a slotted rack holding a selection of expensive knives built into one side. “Did you design the kitchen, too?”

“Right down to the last floorboard.”

“I’m impressed.”

“Why? Because I own more than a can opener and a frying pan?”

“No. Because most men don’t have the eye for detail which you seem to possess.”

“It comes with the territory,” he said, separating the yolk from the white of an egg and whisking it into a bowl with olive oil, lemon juice, a little anchovy paste and a dash of Worcestershire sauce. “I used to make my living noticing details. They’re critical in the solving of crime. You plan on sleeping with anybody tonight?”

She blinked, taken aback by the sudden change of subject. “I beg your pardon?”

“I asked if you planned—”

“I heard!” she said. “And I’m wondering why you think it’s any of your business.”

“Well not because I’m hoping you’ll climb between the sheets with me, cookie, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

“What a relief! But that still doesn’t answer my question.”

With superb disregard for its razor-sharp edge, he juggled a chef’s knife in his right hand, and slammed the flat side of the blade on a clove of garlic, reducing it to a pulverized mound on the chopping board. “I like plenty of this in my salad dressing. If you don’t and you’ve got a hot and heavy night ahead, you might prefer—”

“I’ll be sleeping alone.”

“Oh, yeah? Where?”

“I haven’t decided.”

He stopped what he was doing and very deliberately fixed her once again in that daunting stare, except that this time, she detected an element of incredulity in its depths. As if he’d just discovered she was missing a vital part of her anatomy—like a brain. “Are you telling me you don’t have a hotel room lined up?”

“Not yet,” she admitted, trying to sound unconcerned.

“Not yet?” He raised his rather wonderful eyes heavenward as if communing with God, although he stopped short of asking, Why me, oh Lord? “What you really mean is you don’t have the first idea where you’re going to stay.”

His tone and manner suggested he thought she was too mentally defective to comprehend the situation. Retaliating, she said, “I’m well aware I won’t find a room right here in Trillium Cove, Mr. Sullivan.”

“Congratulations,” he sneered. “Are you also aware you’re not likely to find one within a fifty-mile radius, because this is high tourist season and even fleabag No-Tell Motels fill up by midafternoon?”

“Should I find that to be the case, I’ll sleep in my car,” she said rashly.

“If that’s supposed to make me feel sorry for you, you’re wasting your time. There are worse things than sleeping in a car. Ask any one of the hundreds of homeless people who consider a park bench luxury accommodation.” He scooped forks from a drawer, steak knives from the rack and sent the lot skimming over the work island toward her. “Here, make yourself useful, for a change. Set the table. You’ll find place mats and stuff inside the sideboard in the dining area.”

“Is ‘please’ a part of your vocabulary?” she snapped, catching the cutlery just before it flew off the granite surface and crashed to the floor. “Or didn’t your mother think it necessary to teach you any manners?”

He treated her to an evil and altogether beautiful grin. “I’m a Neanderthal, remember? We don’t do manners. And leave my mother out of this. She managed to raise five kids on her own without losing any of us, which is more than can be said for the family you come from.”

She supposed she deserved that, but it hurt anyway. And served to remind her why she was there to begin with. If she wanted this man’s help, she’d better fine-tune her approach. “I apologize,” she said, swallowing her aggravation. “I shouldn’t have brought your mother into this. I’m sure she’s a very fine lady.”

“Yes, she is,” he said. “And I’m a jerk to have said what I did about your family, so that makes us even. How do you feel about California shiraz?”

She found his habit of switching subjects without warning or lead-in highly disconcerting. “To drink, you mean?”

“No, cookie. To use as shoe polish.” He shook his head in mock despair. “Of course to drink—unless you don’t like it any better than the rum you were so quick to denounce but which, I notice, you managed to drain to the last drop.”

“I enjoy a good shiraz,” she said. “Also cabernet sauvignon and pinot noir. And my name is Linda. Kindly refer to me as such—or Ms. Carr, if you prefer.”

He favored her with a steely glance. “Lest we forget who’s in charge around here, let’s run over the ground rules. First, this is my house. Second, I didn’t invite you to come here. Third, I don’t take orders from anyone, particularly not a total stranger who’s looking for a favor. Remember that. Cookie.”

For the space of a second or two, she glared right back, a dozen pithy retorts buzzing through her mind and begging to be aired.

Forestalling her, he grinned again. Pleasantly this time. Disarmingly so. “Don’t do it, Linda,” he warned. “Don’t say something you’ll regret. And don’t gnash your teeth like that. It makes you look like a bad-tempered dog.”

“A rottweiler, I hope. One capable of ripping your throat out!”

He laughed. He was laughing, she decided, altogether too often and always at her expense. “Afraid not. You don’t have the hindquarters for it.”

She was wearing shorts, which fit trimly around her hips and showed plenty of leg, and the way he eyed her from the waist down left her in no doubt that he liked what he saw. Absurdly flattered, she blushed.

“Thought that’d soften you up,” he said with smug satisfaction. “Now hop to it and set the table. I’m about ready to throw these steaks on the barbecue. And one more thing: if you can do it without lopping off a finger or two, slice up that French loaf over there.”

She glared at his departing back. Much more provocation, and she’d slice him!

The steak was done to perfection, the potatoes tender and flavorful, the mushrooms, sautéed in butter and port wine, mouthwatering.

“You’re a good cook,” she said.

“I know,” he replied with disgraceful immodesty.

“Do you eat at this table when you’re alone?”

“No,” he mocked. “When there’s no one around to watch, I get down on my hands and knees, and slurp out of a bowl on the floor.”

“You don’t have to be so rude! I asked only because your dining room furniture is so big and from everything I’ve learned, you aren’t the kind of man who hosts large dinner parties.”

“You investigated me pretty thoroughly before you came calling, did you?”

“Enough to know you’re something of a recluse and don’t have many friends.”

“I have friends, Linda,” he informed her flatly. “Not many, I admit. I prefer to be selective. As for the furniture, it was my grandmother’s, and her mother’s before that. The table will seat twenty when it’s fully extended. They went in for lots of children in those days.”

She found it interesting that, for a man who shunned the company of others, he’d mentioned his family twice with obvious affection. “And you’re one of five yourself, you said?”

“My mother had five sons.”

“And brought them up by herself? My goodness, she must have had stamina!”

“She had no choice. My father died before my youngest brother was born.”

“Oh, how tragic! What happened?”

“Nosy, aren’t you?”

“I don’t mean to be insensitive. But the story is so…moving. A woman alone, with five little boys, one of them a baby who never got to meet his father…” She swallowed, the whole concept hitting a little too close to home.

“My father was a police officer killed in the line of duty.”

“Is that why you joined the force?”

“Yes,” he said brusquely. “He was my hero. I was ten when he died, and I remember him very well. He was a good man, a good father. My mother’s family were true monied blue bloods and never understood why she wanted to marry a cop when she could have had a life of ease with any number of other men. But she adored him and he her.”

“She never remarried?”

“With five boys?” he scoffed. “Even the men my grandparents tried to line her up with after she was widowed weren’t interested in taking on a gang like us, any more than she was interested in finding another husband. She’d had the best, she always said, and knew there’d never be another like him—except, possibly, for his sons who resembled him so closely that she couldn’t have forgotten him, even if she’d wanted to.”

Unexpectedly touched, Linda said, “It’s a sad but lovely story, Mr. Sullivan. It makes me doubly regret that comment I made earlier about your mother. She sounds quite remarkable.”

Actually, “superhuman” was probably closer to the mark, if her eldest son was anything to go by. He displayed a sophistication and certain male elegance strangely at odds with the tough resilience which was the legacy of his days as a police detective.

Watching him from beneath her lashes, she admired the lean, clean grace of his hands as he lifted his glass, and wondered if he handled a firearm with the same deft panache he brought to the dinner table. She suspected that he did; that even under extreme duress, he endowed his every gesture with innate style.

He might have inherited his father’s looks, but his mother’s aristocratic genes showed in his bearing, in his manner. Underneath that sometimes surly exterior lurked the heart and soul of a gentleman. She had only to look around his home to recognize his inborn good taste.

“My mother’s all that, and then some,” he said, reaching over to pour more wine into her glass. “And now let’s talk about you. Do you have any other siblings besides your sister?”

“No.”

“Which of you came first?”

“I did, by six years.”

“Making her about twenty.”

“Twenty-two.”

“In other words, plenty old enough to have developed the smarts to steer clear of a man so rotten inside that he’d steal her baby.”

Linda’s hackles, temporarily soothed by that brief glimpse of his more human side, rose again in defense. “I no more like it when you pass judgment on my sister without knowing the first thing about her, than you did when I presumed to criticize your mother.”

“But I do know something about her,” he said, unruffled. “I know she’s an unmarried mother, and her relationship with the father didn’t pan out. She was probably spoiled as a child and never got over being the baby of the family. When things went sour with the boyfriend, she probably moved back home to be looked after by good old mom and dad.”

“And how do you arrive at those conclusions?”

“When I’m faced with a situation in which the mother of a missing child isn’t the one raising hell and putting a lid on it, there are only two conclusions I’m likely to reach. Either she doesn’t care, or she’s the passive, helpless kind who leaves it to someone else to go to bat for her.” He shrugged and raised both hands, palms up. “It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out, now does it?”

Galled by his arrogance and the fact that, in June’s case at least and with very few facts to go on, he’d profiled her with uncanny accuracy, Linda said, “How fortunate you must feel, to be so blessed!”

“No. I’m smart enough to pick up the signs, that’s all. Take you, for example.”

“I’d rather you didn’t,” she said, uncomfortable at the idea of being the subject of his too-perceptive analysis.

His smile sent goose bumps racing the length of her spine. “Figuratively speaking only, cookie, so relax. You’re not my type, although—” he tilted his head to one side and surveyed her through narrowed eyes “—under different circumstances, it’s conceivable that I might find you satisfactory.”

Satisfactory? She almost choked on a mushroom!

“Would you like some water?” he inquired, starting up from his chair with phony concern. “Or is the Heimlich maneuver called for?”

“Keep your hands to yourself!” she spat, wiping her eyes with the corner of her napkin. “And just for the record, you’re not my type, either.”

“No?” He sat down again, amusement tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Time will tell. Meanwhile, getting back to our discussion, you’re the complete opposite of your sister. Proactive, stubborn, impulsive.”

“How you do you figure that?”

“You’re here, aren’t you, and going to extraordinary lengths to persuade me to help you, despite my less than encouraging response?”

“I’d say that’s pretty self-evident.”

“Yet I doubt, if it were your child that was missing, your sister would be sitting across the table from me now—mostly because you wouldn’t dream of entrusting someone else with the task, but also because she wouldn’t have the stomach for the job. She’s probably very good at weeping, wringing her hands, and drumming up sympathy, but basically useless in any sort of crisis. You, on the other hand, rush in where the proverbial angels fear to tread—without any sort of backup provision in place, should your first course of action fail.” He took a sip of wine and regarded her quizzically. “Well, how am I doing so far?”

She’d have lied if there’d been any point in it. Instead she watered down the truth. “Quite well, I suppose.”

“And that’s it?” He raised his brows in feigned surprise. “You’re not going to lambaste me for saying mean and nasty things about your poor, misunderstood sister? Have a tantrum and throw your plate across the room, maybe? What’s the matter, Linda? Didn’t your dinner agree with you?”

“I wouldn’t dream of abusing such beautiful china,” she said, striving for nonchalance. “Did you inherit it from your grandmother, as well?”

“Yes,” he said. “And stop trying to sidestep the question. How close to the mark am I with your sister?”

“Too close. Bull’s-eye close.” Defeated, she pushed aside her plate. “You’re right. June isn’t strong like me. She’s a gentle, passive soul who hates confrontations of any kind—which just goes to show how bad things must have been between her and Kirk that she’d walk out on him when she was expecting his baby.”

“What’s your impression of this Kirk?”

“Only what I’ve been told about him. She met him while I was in Europe. I’ve seen photos of him and know that he’s American, appears to have money and works in the computer field, but I’ve never actually met him or spoken to him in person.”

“You’re not going to be much help tracking him down then, are you?”

“No, Mr. Sullivan,” she said, folding her hands meekly. “That’s why I’m throwing myself on your mercy.”

“You’ll stand a better chance of getting it if you dispense with the annoying ‘Mr. Sullivan’. My name’s Mac.”

“I’ll try to remember that, just as I’m sure you’ll remember I’m Linda, the next time you get the urge to call me to heel.”

A scowl marred his handsome brow. “I bet you’re a nurse when you’re not on a mission. You look like the type who’d enjoy wreaking vengeance on a guy by stabbing a foot-long needle in his behind when he’s at your mercy.”

“Sorry to disappoint you, but this time your fabled instincts are way off target. I’m not a nurse—but I am very handy with a knife, which you might want to remember. My sister might be guilty of bad judgment, but that’s her only sin, and I won’t sit idly by while you rip her character to shreds.”

“You can’t afford to be overly protective of her, either. If I’m to be of any use at all, I need to know everything about her—the flaws and weaknesses, as well as the strengths. And I don’t mind telling you, right now I don’t see a whole lot of strengths.”

He was hard. Inflexible. She saw it in the set of his jaw, the flat, cold light in his eyes. He wouldn’t have much patience with a woman like June. “Haven’t you ever made a mistake about someone—in a personal context, I mean?”

“Sure,” he said without a flicker of regret or emotion. “I made a huge mistake thinking police work and marriage went together.”

“You’re married?” The possibility struck a blow she’d never have anticipated. He seemed so self-reliant; so…single. And yet, was it really likely a man like this wouldn’t have a wife—or at least, a woman?

“Not anymore.” His smile struck her as uncommonly fond.

“Do you still care about your ex-wife?”

“Sure I still care. Why wouldn’t I?”

“Because, as you just said, you’re divorced.”

“That doesn’t automatically make her the villain of the piece. The marriage is what didn’t work, and it wouldn’t say much for my judgment if I chose an outright bitch to be my wife.”

“Are you still in touch with each other?”

“Occasionally. We call each other on birthdays and Christmas—things like that. She checks up on me to make sure I’m not hibernating too long at a stretch. I give her the benefit of my unasked-for advice on the men in her life, take her to lunch when I find myself on her stamping ground.”

“That’s beyond my understanding,” Linda said, marveling at his sanguine outlook. “In my experience, divorce is synonymous with…all the bad things in life.”

Mac surveyed her curiously. “Exactly what is your experience in this field?”

“My parents divorced when I was in my teens. We haven’t heard from my father in years. Are you and your ex-wife still lovers?”

She couldn’t believe she’d actually come out and asked such a question, and would have given anything to withdraw it. He wasn’t impressed by it, either. “What’s it to you, cookie? I thought you came here to enlist my help, not quiz me about my sexual history. Are you done with that plate?”

“Yes, thank you,” she mumbled, still awash in embarrassment. “Dinner was delicious.”

“Nice of you to say so. Did I mention, when we went over the house rules, that the one who doesn’t cook gets to clean up once the meal’s over?”

“You seem to live by a great many rules.”

“I make them up as I go along, especially when I’m saddled with uninvited houseguests.”

“Well, it’s easy enough to be rid of me,” she said, rallying. “All you have to do is agree to help me find my niece, and I’ll leave.”

“And if I don’t?”

“I won’t budge.”

“Then it seems I’m stuck with you either way, since you don’t have any other place to stay tonight.”

Either way? A flicker of hope took hold of her. “Does that mean you’re prepared to take on the case?”

Face unreadable, he swirled the wine in his glass and took his time replying. “It means I’m prepared to consider it. Not, I hasten to add, because I find your powers of persuasion irresistible or because your sister was fool enough to get herself pregnant by a man she didn’t know well enough to trust, but because a young and helpless child is the ultimate victim.”

“Oh, thank you!” she exclaimed, relief leaving her voice shaking with emotion. “Thank you so much, Mac! You don’t know how grateful I am, or what this will mean to my family. Now, probably the best place to start—”

He cut her off with a decisive gesture, slicing his hand through the air like an ax blade and thumping it down on the table so hard that the plates rattled and the wine danced in the glasses. “Let’s get something straight right off,” he said. “If I take this on, I will be the one to decide on the best place to start. I will be the one who calls the shots. Not you, and not your family. With all due respect to your understandable concern, you are not the ones with the experience or contacts needed to bring that baby back home. But only, as I said, if I decide to pursue the case, something which is by no means certain.”

“What do I have to do to clinch things in my favor?”

He smiled. A dazzling, beautiful smile, which should have reassured her but which inspired instead the tingling sense that accepting favors from him would come with a very high price—one she might never be able to afford. “I’ll let you know when I’ve figured it out, cookie,” he said, rising from his seat and strolling languidly to the couch at the other end of the room. “Meanwhile, tackle the dishes.”

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