Dark Secrets 2: No Time to Die; The Deep End of Fear (19 page)

"I'm sorry. I made a mistake. But there's no reason to get dramatic about it."

"No reason! My entire life flashed before my eyes."

"Really. I hope it was interesting," I said, then checked over both cars, though clearly they had not touched. "I didn't even jostle your bonnet."

He looked at me funny, and I remembered that American cars had another name for the front of the vehicle. "I mean your cap."

He squinted at me and ran his hands through his hair, big hands through dark and wavy hair. I suddenly recognized him—the guy in the antique shop, the one who had been buying a last-minute gift.

"What I mean is that whatever that big metal thing is"—I pointed to the front of his car—"l didn't touch it."

"I remember you from the store," he said. "You're English."

"Not exactly."

"That's why you're driving on the wrong side of the road."

"It's only the wrong side in America," I pointed out.

He took a step closer, perhaps wanting another look at eyes that were like green plastic pop bottles, but I couldn't step back. The obedient little boy I had told to stay in the car was standing on my heels, peeking around me.

The guy rested his hand on the front of his car. "This is called a hood."

"I'll try to remember that," I replied crisply. "And I'll try to stay on the right side of the road." Oh, those dark, brilliant eyes! I thought. "Let's go, Patrick."

"Wait, Kate." Patrick yanked on me, wanting me to bend down so he could whisper. He spoke loud enough to be heard in the next shire. "It's Sam Koscinski, the hockey player. Don't you remember? I showed you his picture."

Hearing the awe in Patrick's voice, the guy smiled. No guy, I thought, should have both eyes and a smile that could melt steel. His ego was probably insufferable.

"I do remember. The manic-looking one."

The guy laughed. He didn't care—he knew girls found him attractive.

"Can I have your autograph?" Patrick asked.

"Sure," Sam replied in his soft American drawl. "Do you have something I could sign?"

Patrick glanced up at me.

"Get a piece of paper from your book bag.
Not
your spelling test," I added, watching him to make sure he stayed on the left side of the car, walking safely between it and the sidewalk.

"Are you his baby-sitter?" Sam asked me.

I turned back to him. "His tutor," I said, "his nanny, au pair, whatever. I live with the family."

"Oh, yeah? Where?"

"Outside of town, an estate called Mason's Choice."

"The Westbrooks' place?" Sam's smile disappeared.

"Yes."

"That kid is a Westbrook?" Sam's eyes narrowed. "How is he related?"

"He is Adrian Westbrook's son."

"Nice father," Sam remarked, his voice thick with sarcasm.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean a lot of things. For one, his father yanks people around."

"Well, his father isn't the one who wants your autograph," I reminded him.

"I tore off two pieces of paper," Patrick announced as he rejoined us. "Can you sign both? I'm going to mail one to Tim," he explained happily. "Tim's dad took us to your games."

Sam signed both of the ragged pieces quickly—carelessly, I thought. I hoped that Patrick was too enamored to notice the sudden chill in the air.

"Are you playing here this Saturday?" Patrick asked him.

"Yup. Got to go," Sam said brusquely.

"Can we go to the game, Kate? Can we, please? Please?"

"If we can't find anything better to do," I said.

Sam, who had started off, glanced back a moment.

I couldn't tell him off, not in front of Patrick. I wasn't going to tear down a child's hero, even if he was a royal jerk.

Sam waited for me to back up and drive past his car, perhaps thinking it was safest if he didn't move while I was on the road. It wasn't until we turned into the gates of Mason's Choice that I remembered what had distracted me from my driving.

At the thought of it, the skin on my arms rose in little bumps. According to Patrick, Ashley had said I could "ride" Silver Knight. The toy's name had been a secret shared by us—how did Patrick know it? Since the horse was my favorite among Ashley's toys, it was also the bribe she would use when she wanted me to play with her. I found it spooky that twelve years later, Patrick, wanting me to play, was making the same offer.

Chapter 5

"An excellent idea, Patrick," Adrian said that evening, touching his son's cheek, smiling at him. "Mrs. Hopewell, set a place at the dinner table for Kate."

Eating dinner with the family was the last thing I wanted to do. "Thank you very much, but—"

"You may place her between Trent and me," Emily interrupted.

"I've told you before, Emily," Robyn said, "you don't need to give Hoppy instructions. She is quite capable at her job. Besides, the order for seating people at the table was set long before
you
arrived here."

"By you, I suppose," Emily replied, "before I was born."

Robyn sent her a withering look.

In the last fifteen minutes, with the family gathered in the beautiful, high-ceilinged room that overlooked an expanse of darkening water and sky, the petty comments had run nonstop. Robyn, who had chosen the armchair closest to her father's, showed considerable skill in undermining Emily's authority in the household.

Emily, responding by positioning herself even closer to Adrian, perching on the ottoman that matched his chair, displayed her own talent for small put-downs, such as reminding Robyn of her age. Both women continually glanced at Adrian, like schoolgirls waiting for an adult to notice and take sides.

Across the room, next to the fireplace, Trent and Brook had their own game going.

"I don't care where anyone sits," Brook said, lounging on a striped silk sofa, his muddy feet on the upholstery, "as long as I get fed."

"Spoken like the well-bred gentleman that you are," Trent remarked. He sat on a matching sofa, but his feet were flat on the floor and his back straighter, stiffer than the furniture.

Adrian, apparently unfazed by these small exchanges, watched Patrick with obvious pleasure. Tearing through the pile of gifts his father had purchased for him in Baltimore, Patrick was acting like a spoiled brat, tossing down each box after seeing what it contained, wanting the next one.

He paused, holding a sleek red car. "I want Kate next to me."

"No," Robyn said. "The matter is settled." "But I want to sit next to Kate! I want to! I have to!" He yanked tissue from the box and threw it at Robyn.

"Patrick," I said softly, unsure whether I should correct him when his parents were present.

Robyn's tan face darkened with anger. "Children who have been raised properly do not insist on getting their way."

"He's only seven," Emily protested.

"And he has such a fine role model in your own son," Trent added from across the room. "With Brook around, whatever would give Patrick the idea that he can have everything he wants?"

Robyn glared at Trent, but Brook smiled, as if he thought his uncle's jab was a compliment.

"Daddy, really," Robyn said, "Patrick must learn his place."

"Louise," Adrian said calmly, "seat Patrick on my right and Kate next to Patrick."

Mrs. Hopewell nodded, her face expressionless as a wig stand.

Robyn blinked her eyes rapidly, as if fighting back tears, which I found a bit weird. She was too old to become unhinged at losing a battle over seats.

Emily pouted beautifully, like a model in a lipstick ad. "Darling, Patrick was with Kate all afternoon and will be with her again this evening. I want him next to me at dinner."

Adrian ignored his wife and turned his gaze on Robyn and Trent. "Inviting guests for dinner is part of Patrick's training if he is to be the next head of this household. He may invite and seat his guests as he wishes."

A sullen silence followed. Trent toyed with a paperweight on the table next to him. Robyn flipped furiously through a horse magazine, not pausing long enough to read a headline. Brook scowled at the ceiling, and Emily developed a sudden fascination with Patrick's model car. I excused myself to get ready for dinner, eager to get away from them all.

Was Adrian really planning to make Patrick the head of the household, his principal heir, I wondered; or was it simply his way of silencing the nasty group? It was certainly a good way to create antagonism toward Patrick. To Robyn and Trent, Patrick was a newcomer surpassing them in the amount of attention they received from their father, and perhaps in the amount of money.

Surely Patrick sensed the jealousy among the members of his family and felt their intense dislike for him. Most children, I thought, aware of others' hostility, either acted out or retreated. Perhaps Ashley, created out of snippets Patrick had heard from members of the household, was his retreat. In effect, he had made himself a new relative, one he could play with.

When I returned to the first floor, dinner was ready to be served. Adrian took his seat at the head of the long table, and Henry, the elderly employee, seated Emily on the left side of Adrian, across from Patrick. 1, of course, was to sit next to Patrick. Brook stood behind me as if courteously waiting to push in my chair. I felt his finger, the tip of it, making small circles on the bare skin at the back of my neck. I would have preferred being touched by a lizard. I glanced across the table at Robyn, who pulled in her own chair with a grim look.

"Now, Mother," Brook told her, "guests must be seated first. According to Patrick, Kate is a guest. And, as we all know, Patrick is the one who calls the shots around here."

Sit down, Brook," Adrian said, his voice quiet but carrying like thunder.

Brook sat next to me, with Trent across from him. A girl not much older than I assisted Henry in serving the soup. Mrs. Hopewell stood in the doorway and watched. For a few minutes all you could hear were spoons scraping against china and the wind coming off the bay. A fire had been made in the dining room hearth; it hissed and sputtered.

"You know my dump truck?" Patrick asked, breaking the silence.

"The one you unwrapped this afternoon?' Adrian replied.

Patrick nodded. "I gave Patricia a ride in it."

"Oh, Patrick," Emily said, "your hamster should stay in her cage."

"But she liked it, she really liked it—didn't she, Kate?" he said, appealing to me.

"She didn't actually say so, but yes, I believe she did."

Patricia, being old as well as plump, had showed no inclination to scurry around. I didn't see any harm in letting her out of her cage. Children need to touch animals.

"The hamster must remain in her cage, Kate," Emily said.

Yes, ma am.

"You were informed that Patrick is allergic to cats and dogs."

"Yes, ma'am. Is he also allergic to hamsters?"

Brook laughed, which made my question seem flip.

"No," Robyn answered, before Emily could. "His mother is. She has a severe reaction to anything that walks on four legs."

"So, Trent," Adrian said, I had counted on meeting with you this afternoon. I've been going over last year's earnings, and I can't say I am pleased."

Trent nodded. "I assumed you would need a day to settle in, Father, so I dropped by Crossroads. We've received another complaint from the Gleasons, the family who lives next to it."

"The shack people?" Brook interjected. "The family who doesn't know when to stop having kids? Though that's okay with me. The oldest girl is pretty hot."

"Stay away from her, Brook," his mother said. "She's not our kind of people."

"It's good of you to remind me, Brook," Adrian added dryly. "Mrs. Hopewell, with Brook home, you must remember not to set the house security system at night. We don't need the alarm going off at four in the morning."

"This time," Trent went on in his businesslike, colorless voice, "the Gleasons have contacted the county animal control people and have asked them to examine the fencing on the kennels. They believe the dogs are a danger to their children, who play next to them."

Adrian shrugged. "I believe their children are a danger to my dogs."

Robyn laughed, a bit too loudly. "The Gleasons have contacted the right person in our family," she observed. "Did you pet the dogs, Trent, to convince the family that they are friendly?"

"No, he stuck his head in one of their mouths," Brook said, making his mother laugh again and even winning a smile from Adrian.

I remembered how timid Trent had been around Ashley's collection of animals, especially the wild creatures she was always feeding—featherless birds, baby raccoons, and her favorite, a battle-scarred orange tabby.

"The point is," Trent said, "we will need to comply with suggestions by the county. If the dogs got out and something happened, we could be sued."

"The dogs know their job," Adrian replied. "They will maul anyone who enters the building after hours, just as I trained them to do. Case closed."

The soup was removed and the next course brought in, steak with vegetables. Patrick was silent, his eyes flicking from one member of the family to the next, like those of a wary animal.

"Did Louise give you a phone message, Trent?" Emily asked. "Someone from the Queen Victoria called today."

"The hotel?" Robyn cut in. "You're not still seeing that woman, Margery whatever."

"Gilbert," Trent said, pronouncing the last name distinctly.

"I would think, Trent," Robyn went on, "that somewhere in New York or Philadelphia, you could find a woman more suitable than a hotell manager who went through the Wisteria public school system."

"And I would think," Trent responded, "that if you had a worthwhile way to spend your life, you wouldn't be so concerned about mine."

"Perhaps if she had her own romance," Emily suggested slyly. "How many years has it been since you've had a man in your life, Robyn? I mean, besides your father."

Robyn's eyes bored through Emily.

A sudden gust of wind rattled the dining room's old windowpanes. The flame in the fireplace sputtered and blew out.

"Where—where did that come from?" Trent asked softly.

Everyone turned, following his eyes to a window. The sky was completely black now, but the outside floodlights had come on, lighting the window casements like small stages against the darkness. There wasn't a sound at the dinner table—not a sip from a glass or a clink of silver. In the window farthest to the right sat a battle-scarred orange tabby.

Without a word, Patrick pushed back his chair and walked toward the window. He laid his palm flat against the glass. The tabby arched its back, rubbing against the pane, as a cat rubs against the leg of someone it knows.

"Can I let him in, Daddy? Can I keep him?"

"Darling, you have an allergy," Emily said.

"But—"

"He's a feral cat," Adrian replied. "You can't own a wild animal like that. They are never happy staying inside."

"But he likes me," Patrick pleaded.

Brook glanced from the cat to his mother. She shifted uncomfortably in her chair. Trent gazed at the shabby cat, as if entranced. Orange stripes, a bitten-off tail, half of its left ear missing—it was identical to the one Ashley had loved.

Ashley's cat could still be alive, I reasoned, for cats could live twenty years or more. It seemed too much a coincidence that another animal would have the exact same coloring and scars as Ashley's and would choose the same window he had liked to occupy twelve years before. But if this was Ashley's feral cat, how much more a coincidence was it that he would show up now, now that I had returned to Mason's Choice, now that Patrick saw something in the air he called Ashley?

I was dreaming, unhappy, five-year-old dreams, having cried myself to sleep in the cottage bedroom. Ashley had taken Lilly, my golden-haired baby doll.

She had shelves full of her own dolls, but she wanted mine. When Ashley snatched Lilly, I screamed for help, but since I did a lot of shrieking while playing with her, the adults ignored me until it was too late. Now Ashley had hidden my doll where no one could find her.

I sat up suddenly, awakened from my afternoon nap by the sound of something crashing through the cottage window. Broken glass flew inward. I jumped out of bed, then saw my doll lying on the floor among the sharp pieces.

"Lilly!"

"You can have her back."

Surprised by the sound of Ashley's voice, I looked up. She was supposed to be punished, not allowed out of the house til she gave back my doll, but she sat on the limb of an old maple outside my bedroom window.

"You climbed the tree," I said in awe.

She shrugged. "We can climb anywhere." The orange cat she loved, the wild one with the torn ear, was perched two branches higher, staring in at me.

"You can have Lilly. I don't want her," Ashley said. "She's ugly now."

I looked down at my baby. Her teeth had been colored black with a marker. Jagged black scribbles had been made all over her beautiful face.

"Mommy!" I howled. "Mom-my! Mommy, I need you."

Hands tugged at me. Small hands held my face. "Kate? Kate!"

I sat up, no longer in a cottage bedroom, but in the main house at Mason's Choice. The clock read 2:05 A.M. Patrick stood next to my bed, his eyes big and frightened.

"Patrick, what is it?" I asked, struggling to free myself from the threads of my dream. "Is something wrong?"

"It's Ashley," he said. "She keeps talking."

"What?"

Patrick chewed on the sleeve of his pajamas. "I told her to be quiet, but she won't. She won't let me sleep."

I climbed out of a bed and knelt in front of him. Resting my hands on his thin shoulders, I could feel him shivering beneath his flannel top. "You were dreaming."

"No, Kate, she's there. She's in my toy closet, playing with my horses."

I glanced toward the stairway between his room and mine. What did it mean—both of us dreaming of Ashley at the same time? Nothing, I told myself.

Returning to her home, it was only natural I would dream of her. But perhaps not so naturally, Patrick did.

I slipped my arms in my dressing gown, then took a jacket from my closet and put it on Patrick. He looked small and vulnerable in it, its cuffs dangling wel below the ends of his arms.

"Let's go have a look," I told him, then headed down the steps. He trailed behind, reluctant to go back to his room, but equally reluctant to be left alone in mine. At the bottom of the turning stairs I stopped. The door of his toy closet was ajar; light emanated from within.