twelve

JEKYLL ISLAND

Amy woke up to daylight, feeling sleepy and warm and contented.

Then she reached out for Irish. She was alone. And naked.

Panic enveloped her.

Clutching the sheet around her like a mammoth towel, she rose from the bed. No Flaherty in sight. Nor could she find Bo.

Bo! Guilt shoved aside the panic.

She went to the windows on the beach side front of the room and saw the colonel out with Bo. She watched as he slowly matched his footsteps to those of the obviously stiff terrier. The colonel had a slight limp of his own.

He was wearing jeans, and a long-sleeve blue shirt, the sleeves rolled up past the elbow. He looked solid and real and irresistibly attractive. Particularly next to Bo.

She moved into the bathroom and looked at herself. It must be twelve or thirteen hours since two men forced their way into her room. She hadn’t had time to wash, or even brush her hair. It was going in all sorts of directions, and her eyes had shadows under them.

She wasn’t very appealing.

Amy knew she never should have let last night happen. It had been fear, relief, gratitude. Certainly nothing more. There couldn’t be anything more. She barely knew the man.

She wasn’t prepared for this. For its impact on her. She had never believed in this … kind of feeling.

Because of her mother, perhaps, she had been wary of relationships. She had not wanted a series of one-night stands, nor even one-month stands. She’d had enough “uncles” come and go to doubt constancy of any kind.

She didn’t want that kind of life, but neither did she believe in true love. At least, not where she was concerned. She wasn’t the kind of woman who evoked poems and pretty words or attracted the kind of man that she suspected Irish Flaherty was.

Amy had lost her virginity at twenty-two with a fellow student in postgraduate studies. She hadn’t moved in with him, although that’s what he had wanted. She’d still believed in a ring before cohabitation; he hadn’t believed in marriage. And when she was offered a position that he wanted, he became emotionally abusive.

She’d left the relationship. She hadn’t hung around for it to evolve into something else. Her mother had done that. Not her.

Instead, she’d settled into her work. She’d been elated when she’d received an offer from Braemoor.

She’d had one more relationship, but it had not lasted. She hadn’t looked again because she didn’t think many of them really worked. None of those of her friends did. Jon was a perfect example. His wife of twenty years had been talking about seeking a divorce and threatening to take everything they had built together.

That thought brought reality back, to the nightmare her life had become. Until a few hours ago when it was miraculously transformed by a stranger. But that transformation couldn’t last. She knew that.

No matter how glorious the last few hours had been, they were over.

She slipped on the clothes she’d worn yesterday. They were all she had. The rest of her clothes were in the unit several doors down, and neither she nor Irish had been allowed inside.

Amy went and stood at the door.

Flaherty turned and saw her. He looked down at the dog, said something, and started back. Bo followed right behind, slowly.

When Irish reached the door, she opened it. He stepped inside and waited until the dog came inside.

Flustered, she leaned down and picked up Bo. He settled happily into her arms and reached up to lick her face.

“He’s better,” Flaherty said, looking her up and down. She kept trying to think of him as Flaherty. Irish was too … personal. Intimate. Even now. Or maybe especially now.

She didn’t miss the sudden fire in that gaze as it found the spot where her shirt ended.

It created a corresponding heat in her. “Thank you for taking him out,” she said. She feared it was more a mumble.

“He let me know it was necessary,” he said wryly.

She sat, and her hand rubbed Bo’s ears, his favorite place. She felt guilty that she’d not taken him out earlier. Amy could feel her face turning red at the thought of what had diverted her from giving him the attention he deserved. She sought to change the subject. “Do you think I can get some clothes?”

“Yes,” he said. “They have an officer in front and in back, but I see no reason why they won’t let you have your clothes.”

“My boxes?”

“Did you find anything in them?”

She looked into his eyes, wanting to know how much the answer to that question meant to him. “No. I went through most of them. I don’t know why anyone would be interested in them.”

“Your friend Jon had them for several weeks. Could he have removed something from them?”

A week ago she would have said that was impossible. She trusted Jon. Now she wondered whether she could trust anyone.

“I don’t know,” she said simply. “I don’t know anything any more.”

“Would you object to my going through them? I might see something you didn’t.”

She deliberated. She was getting nowhere on her own. She nodded. “Can we get them back from the police?”

“I think so. They have no reason to keep any of your possessions.”

Amy looked up at him. “When do we leave here?” Not I. She needed that “we” at the moment.

“We’ll be safe enough here for a couple of days. Police are crawling all over the place. The management said we can be their guests, though I suspect they would be happier if we leave.”

She suddenly grinned. “I bet they would.”

“On the other hand, I think the local police want us to stay. I don’t think any of them has seen a murder before.”

“It was pointed out to me that I shouldn’t leave without letting them know,” she replied.

He didn’t reply.

“Irish?” It was the first time she’d tried the name on her lips.

He raised an eyebrow in question.

“Are you here because of your grandfather? Or are you part of an official investigation?” It was a question that had been worrying her. She still didn’t totally trust him. Or his motives.

“It started because of my grandfather,” he said.

“And now?”

“Oh, I still want to know what happened all those years ago, but not at your expense, or the expense of anyone else,” he said.

“Then why did you begin probing in the first place?”

“Surely you had questions when the articles appeared?” he countered.

She remembered the moment she’d read the article. She hadn’t believed it of her grandfather then, and she didn’t now. She, too, had meant to research it.

“I had a lot of them,” she said, “but I had my tenure hearing coming up, and I thought … later.”

“Tell me about your grandfather.” His voice was low and reassuring.

She shrugged. “Not much to tell, except he was disciplined and honest and demanding. I can’t imagine him doing anything dishonorable. If anything, he expected too much of himself, and of others. Including my mother.”

“In what way?”

“He wanted my mother to be like him. His wife—my grandmother—died when my mother was eight. He was gone much of the time, and my mother had one governess after another. She never felt he loved her. Instead, he demanded perfection from her. I think she tried, then discovered she could never meet his expectations, so she stopped trying. She rebelled in every way possible.”

She was silent for a moment, then continued slowly. “She took a picture of him when she left, though, and she collected other photos over the years. Part of her never stopped wanting to be loved by him.”

“And you? What did you think of him?”

“I hated him, even though my mother said I shouldn’t. I knew he’d disapproved of her, and that was why she’d left. I didn’t like anyone who disapproved of my mother.” She looked at him. “When my mother died, I had to live with him. We went to war with each other. He wanted me to be the lady he’d tried to make my mother into. I resisted him with everything in me. I resented the fact that he was alive and my mother was dead.”

“Who won?” he asked.

“Eventually both of us,” she said. “I found him crying one day when he was looking at my mother’s photo. He was embarrassed at being seen, but for the first time I realized that he had really loved her. And that he loved me. He just never knew how to show it. Along about then, we declared a truce.” She gave him a half smile. “I think that’s when I discovered nothing was all black or all white.”

“You loved him?”

“Very much, at the end. I always regretted it took me so long to understand how very complex he was. He had come from a family that had nothing. His father died in the coal mines when he was a boy, and his mother migrated to the city, where she cleaned people’s houses. He could never understand why my mother didn’t appreciate everything she had.

“He was a mustang,” she added, “and he was proud of rising from the ranks. But he never forgot the slights he received because he wasn’t a West Pointer. He’d had to fight for everything he ever got, and he never knew how to give an inch.”

“He never gave an inch with you?”

“It took him a while. He didn’t know anything about children. He was gone so much of my mother’s childhood, and then he would come home and expect her to be like one of his privates. It wasn’t meanness; he just didn’t know any other way to do it.”

Emotion registered in his eyes. Empathy? Understanding? He always seemed so well contained. At least until last night. But last night was an emotional outlet. Nothing more. And she was talking too much. She’d never talked much about her feelings for her grandfather before. Or her mother. Those memories were too private, too intense.

She could be garrulous about her work, and about superficial things. She’d never been any good at sharing intimate feelings. In fact, she often wondered if anyone really knew who she was. She sometimes wondered if she did herself. The contrast between her mother’s carefree lifestyle and her grandfather’s structured one had often made her question that.

She wanted to change the subject, and there was nothing like turning the tables.

But then his fingers went up to her face and caressed with exploratory gentleness. She forgot about turning the tables as the heat grew between them again. The sexual awareness they had shared intensified. Knowledge was there between them now. They were no longer two strangers bumbling in a new, enforced relationship. Instead, they had shared a close brush with death, and then let their emotions explode in bed.

Not wise, she told herself. Perhaps not a bond at all, but emotional overflow. Gratitude at being alive and wanting to experience that life to the furthest extent possible. And soon he would go back to his life, and she to hers.

But that was a cop-out, and she knew it. She was afraid. Not only of people trying to kill her, but of wanting something she couldn’t have, of experiencing heaven, then losing it. This was something that couldn’t last, that—given their own lives—was destined to end.

Still, his very touch was like a live electric wire snapping against her and charging through every nerve ending.

She wrenched away and swallowed hard, looking away from him toward the gray ocean and blue sky and fiery sun. She tried to slow the rapid beating of her heart and calm the need pooling inside her.

Take what is being offered. She wanted to, but that was the reckless side of her, the side she’d inherited from her mother—and was practiced at taming. Don’t get in any deeper. You still don’t know what he’s after.

When she turned back to him, his eyes were masked and he’d moved several feet away, as if he knew she wanted—needed—distance.

“I’ll see if I can get your clothes and laptop,” he said.

“I’ll go with you,” she said.

He shook his head. “I’ll probably have more luck on my own.”

“The good old boy cop network?” She couldn’t keep a hint of resentment from her voice.

“Something like that,” he replied.

She hesitated. She wanted to demand to go with him, to make sure all her belongings were safe, even the accursed boxes. She’d noticed he had said nothing about the boxes to the police. Nor had she. She hadn’t wanted them impounded again. Darn, there had to be something in them; otherwise, why was she being pursued?

But she also knew how she looked. Her clothes were wrinkled and, like his, had some blood spots. She hadn’t taken a bath since the attack, and she felt nothing like the staid, respected, and respectable college professor she was supposed to be. She must smell like sex as well as blood.

Amy nodded. “I’ll take a shower.”

“You should be safe. The police are still going over your room, and they’re keeping an eye on this one.”

“You think someone would try again in the middle of the day?”

“Hell, I don’t know what they would try,” he said. “I do know they seemed determined for some reason.” He paused. “I’ll be right back.”

There must have been doubt in her eyes, because he approached her again, touching her chin with his right index finger and forcing her gaze to meet his. “We will find out who and what,” he said. “And there will be an end to it.”

She could be dead by then. She still wasn’t sure of his motives or his role in all this. She did know he apparently was the only protection she had. It was a galling fact. Even more galling was the fact that she seemed to be putty in his hands. He needed only to look at her. Time in a cold shower would be good.

Very good.

She didn’t say anything, but moved away again. She went into the bathroom and slipped off the shirt. Her body was unnaturally hot, and when she looked in the mirror, she saw that her face was flushed. For a moment she looked at herself in the mirror. She had bruise marks on her shoulder where one of the assailants had grabbed her, and the ugly wound from a week ago.

More painful, though, was the want that still lingered in the core of her. She wanted—craved—the feelings she’d had this morning, the wonderful warmth of his body, and the exquisite sensations that followed.

But at what cost?

With a snort of disgust, she entered the shower, first turning on the hot water to cleanse herself, then the cold to cool rampaging feelings. It didn’t seem to work. She was just as tingly as before, just as wanting.

And it wasn’t only the safety she needed.

Irish traded a few war stories with the officers as one called and asked for permission to allow him to take Dr. Mallory’s belongings.

One was particularly interested in the CID. “Nothing ever happens here,” he complained. “Until last night,” he added quickly after Irish raised an eyebrow. “Mostly just traffic accidents, a few hotel thefts, underage drinking on the beach.”

Irish told him how to apply. Many CID agents were civilians, and he seemed like a bright kid, a little intimidated by Irish but not enough to cut him any slack or allow him to do anything without obtaining permission from a superior officer. Irish liked him. He would have told him to use his name, but his name might be more a detriment than a help in the future.

He knew he should call his commanding officer, even though he was on leave. He knew there must have been any number of calls to Doug Fuller. Doug would have to catch him first.

But not if he couldn’t get in touch with Irish, and Irish could always justify not keeping in touch with the office by repeating Doug’s own words. “Get the hell out of here and don’t let me hear from you.”

At least he hadn’t said, “Don’t let me hear about you.”

It was semantics and it wouldn’t wash, and Irish knew it. But at least he didn’t have to disobey a direct command. It might not save his career, but neither would ignoring a call on his vacation be a court-martial offense.

He had absolutely no intention of leaving Amy Mallory to fend for herself. He still couldn’t avoid the very real possibility that he might well be responsible for starting the chain of events. That made it essential that he take care of it.

She had, though, done a pretty good job of taking care of herself. He hadn’t been flattering her when he said she had probably saved his life.

He couldn’t forget that, and now her life, her future, was more important than his grandfather’s reputation or the mystery surrounding the train. He knew only that their lives were now intimately linked.

Once the detective reluctantly gave his permission, Irish packed her suitcase, grabbed the food for the dog, and left. He would return for the laptop and boxes, he said. He thought about taking them with him, but he had several errands, and her possessions would undoubtedly be safer with law enforcement than in an empty motel room.

The water in the bathroom was still running when he returned. He put the clothes on one of the two double beds.

He looked at the messed bed, and remembered those few glorious moments. He couldn’t remember when he’d last felt the emotions he’d experienced then. Amy Mallory had a combination of innocence and passion that was incredibly appealing.

He felt things he hadn’t felt in a very long time. Tenderness. He had wanted to give as much as take.

Irish shook his head. He had to be careful. She was vulnerable now. Extraordinarily vulnerable. He shouldn’t have given into temptation earlier, but it had been so spontaneous, so completely natural, so irresistible.…

And unfair to her. He knew that. He would have to keep his zipper closed. Then, perhaps when they knew each other better, when danger wasn’t an aphrodisiac.…

But even then she would have to understand the ground rules. He’d decided years ago that his career and marriage would never mesh, and Amy, he sensed, was a forever kind of woman. She’d had enough pain during the past several weeks without him adding to it.

He had made an art out of noninvolvement in the past twenty years. To be good at his job, he’d had to; God knew the devastation and hatred he’d seen in Kosovo had demanded it. But it went deeper. He’d lost one father to war, another to divorce. His mother had been destroyed by the army.

Noninvolvement had centered his life. He had no intention of changing now. With this vow firmly in charge of his libido, he sought to dismiss the image of Amy in bed, her tousled hair framing her face, and the long, dark eyelashes that made those gray eyes mysterious and seductive. Even more daunting was erasing the memory of their lovemaking and turning his thoughts toward something more productive. Like how the bad guys had found her.

He ticked off one possibility after another, then decided to take a look at his rental car. Amy’s assailants didn’t seem to be after him. They had concentrated all their efforts on her. Still, he was thorough, or at least he tried to be.

He went outside, opened the trunk, and searched it carefully. Then the undercarriage of the sedan. Nothing. Next was the interior. He found the small GPS device tucked between the cushions in the backseat.

They hadn’t followed Amy. They had followed him.

To get to her? Or to get to him?

He left the device in his car. For the moment it did no harm. They knew where both he and Amy Mallory were. There would be a better time to discard it.

He wished he had a gun. His automatic had been taken by the police. He would head into Brunswick and buy a pistol. He shouldn’t have any trouble with his credentials. He would certainly pass an instant check. He wanted one for Amy, too.

When he returned, Amy had dressed in clean clothes: a short-sleeve shirt and shorts. For the first time, he noticed how long and shapely her legs were; he’d been too busy earlier studying other parts of her anatomy. Her hair was wet, and short curls framed her face. She was sitting in the large chair looking out. The dog was in her lap.

She didn’t look at him but obviously sensed his presence. “Do they know who the … dead man is?”

He shook his head. “He had no identification on him. No wallet. No credit card. No driver’s license. They’ll have to run his fingerprints through the computer.”

She shuddered. That said something to her. She watched movies, read suspense novels. “That means he was a professional.…”

“Hit man?” he said. “It looks like it.”

She was silent for a moment, obviously trying to digest the information. “Then there is more than one?”

He nodded. He noticed how valiantly she was trying to hold herself together. Her lower lip trembled. He wanted to reach out and comfort her, but something in her eyes warned him against it.

After a second, she asked, “And my laptop?”

“We can pick it and the boxes up later. I thought it and the files would be safer there for the time being.”

“Can we leave here?”

“You can. I just shot a man. I think everyone’s agreed it was self-defense, but there are some formalities.”

Fear flickered across her face. He remembered how she’d felt early this morning. Soft and passionate and ever so receptive. Because of what she had gone through. In ten days, her house had been burned, she’d been shot, then someone tried to kill her at the hospital, and now this.…

She had fallen in his arms because of her need. The fear had to go somewhere, or she would break.

Or would she?

Amy Mallory was a survivor.

He went over and put his arm loosely around her shoulder. “I think your grandfather would be proud of you,” he said.

“I don’t know what to do next,” she said slowly, pain in her eyes. “My tenure hearing is late next week. I have to be back.”

He was aware of what a tenure hearing meant. It was success or failure. Those that did not achieve tenure usually lost their positions.

He wanted to promise that she could safely return by then. But he couldn’t do that. He didn’t believe in false promises. The only thing he could do was find an answer to the puzzle. The attackers apparently believed a key lay in Amy’s boxes. But another key could be the grandchildren of the third staff officer, General Eachan. Might they have any ideas as to what happened to the missing gold and paintings?

Amy gently lowered the dog down to the floor, then stood.

“Do you think it would be safe to walk down to the beach?”

“The place is still crawling with the local gendarmes,” he said. “I think it’s the safest place you—we—can be.”

“What about the FBI? Haven’t my attackers crossed state lines?”

“We don’t know that,” he said. “And the local officials have to call them in.”

“Can’t you?”

He would have to go through Doug. Who would then order him back. There might well be a period of time where she had no protection. Maybe calling in the Bureau would be necessary, but he didn’t think they could provide protection for her. There simply wasn’t enough proof of a connection to a federal investigation. Someone had twice tried to kill a college professor. That’s really all they had.

“Let’s go for that walk,” he said, holding out his hand. “I think the bad guys are a long way from here now.”

He opened the sliding glass door. Bo stood and followed them as they went down the sidewalk toward the beach. Their particular section of the motel seemed curiously still. Irish wondered if most of the guests had left.

The beach, though, was crowded with families. And walkers. Joggers. Once more, he wished he had a gun. But on the other hand, he didn’t see anyone wearing enough clothes to hide a weapon.

Amy’s fingers tightened around his for a moment, then let go quickly, as if suddenly conscious of—and distrusting—the quiet intimacy. He could feel the tension in her body. Or had she just felt his own? He made himself relax.

The sand was hard, not sugary like so many other beaches. The water was gray rather than blue. Birds skittered over the sand while gulls competed with colorful kites as they soared in a cobalt blue sky. A breeze cooled the warm temperature. It was the kind of day made for vacations.

Not for running from murderers.

Bo stayed right with them. He walked stiffly, but his tail wagged. He stopped to sniff a piece of driftwood, then a dead sea creature. Amy’s eyes didn’t leave him.

They walked silently for a while. Gulls cried. Waves crashed. It all seemed so normal, Amy thought. It clashed against the fear she felt. She didn’t think she would ever believe in normalcy again.

Her fingers burned from Irish’s touch. She’d wanted to hold his hand, to clasp something strong and solid. But it was a lie. Oh, not that he wasn’t strong and solid. But the emotions she’d allowed to run rampant weren’t. He had been convenient. She’d been convenient. And the circumstances had created havoc.

It wasn’t real, and she wasn’t going to let it be real. She didn’t want him to think he had to stay, or that she needed him as much as she did. She didn’t want him to believe she felt she had a claim on him because of a few moments of passion.

Not just passion. Not just fear. Not just gratitude. There had been more. Much more. But it had been on her side. Men like Irish Flaherty didn’t fall for mousy historians.

She didn’t want him to feel obligated.

She tried to turn her attention to the sea. The sea she’d always loved. They could walk miles beneath those oaks, could escape the busy beach for secluded coves, but that would be dangerous. She’d never worried about danger before. She’d never not done something out of physical fear. She hated that feeling.

But the sun eased some of the tension, and the sound of the waves some of the terror. Both, however, made her even more aware of the man next to her, of the masculinity that oozed from his every pore.

They walked farther, and she noticed that he made sure there were other people around. She also noticed that the heads of females turned as they passed.

They sat on an old log and watched the shrimp boats some distance away. She still had trouble putting the two together—that peace and the violence of last night. The rhythms of life—the birds, the skittering small crabs, the children squealing as a wave washed away a sand castle—with the sound of bullets last night and the color red.

The rhythms of life this morning when they’d joined in a whirlwind of want and need. Why did she distrust it so? She shoved the thought aside.

Bo rose painfully and started exploring again. He wandered a little as enticing beach things apparently beckoned to him. Amy watched carefully as he moved a little farther down the beach.

A lone man whistled to him. Bo looked up, apparently undecided as to what to do. The man approached the dog, and suddenly Amy was up, running, calling his name in a shrill voice. Bo turned and started toward her.

The man shrugged and started walking again as she reached Bo and lifted him up. She realized she was shaking.

Flaherty reached her and put his hands on her shoulders. Safe. They were both safe.

For the moment.

Fear for the dog still washed through her like waves. The man was probably just a dog lover.

Probably.

The fast beating of her heart slowed. But fear remained.

Would she ever see a stranger again without wondering if he wanted to kill her?