Eyes of Fire (12 page)

The hell with them both, she decided.

She told Jacques good-night, determined to reach her own cottage and lock herself in.

She departed by way of the porch once again, cutting across the lawn to her cottage.

The key was in the pocket of her jeans. She reached for it as she neared her door.

Judy Walker had watched the news, and she'd assured Sam that it was going to be a bright, hot day tomorrow. It was hard to believe right now, when clouds were obscuring the moon. Despite the lights on the island, it was a dark, misty night. She hadn't gone far from the main house before it was nearly swallowed up in the mist.

Damn! she told herself. But she was nearly at her own cottage. Too close to it to run back to the main house. Why was she suddenly frightened? She'd never been afraid on the island before.

But then, she'd never been attacked in her own bathroom before, either.

Well, this is it, stupid, she warned herself. Hadn't she been thinking about old horror movies earlier? Wasn't it true that only really stupid heroines managed to find themselves alone with the murderer?

And not just alone. Alone in the mist. In the darkness.

Oh, great.

And all because she was irritated by Adam. Because he was as appealing as he had ever been. As aggressive. As dominating. Never mind that his decision that she shouldn't be left alone was for her own good.

She'd just been so damned hurt. Because she'd been so infatuated. Young, and so in love.

And now…

Now the night seemed alive. Everywhere she looked, the mist-enshrouded tropical beauty of the island seemed to harbor danger.

She quickened her pace and reached her door. Nervously, she tried to slip her key into the lock.

The bushes rustled behind her, startling her into dropping the key. It fell to the concrete with a sharp ping. As she reached for it, a shadow fell over her. Huge, dark, looming over her like wings of death in the night.

Then hands came down on her, biting into her shoulders.

And she started to scream.

S
ue Emerson stared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror and smiled. Her hair was brushed to a high gloss. God, she had good teeth. And good skin. She frowned slightly, then rubbed a little more lotion into her cheeks and under her eyes. No premature aging for her. The sun could be vicious. She didn't intend to allow it. One day, she meant to be very rich.

She didn't want to decay before that day came.

She stepped back to give herself a fuller view of her body. Her outfit was sexy. In fact, it was downright decadent. A black creation that covered her whole body while leaving strategic locations covered in nothing but gauze. She smiled again. She should grace the pages of a men's magazine, she thought. She pouted, practicing for an imaginary camera.

Lucky, lucky Joey.

She stepped out of the bathroom.

The lighting was low. A fire burned in the hearth. Joey had opened a bottle of wine and poured them each a glass. He sipped burgundy from his, sitting in his briefs on the edge of the bed, the telephone receiver in his hand.

Sue picked up her wine, smiling.

He waved a hand at her to wait a minute.

Wait, hell.

She struck a pose by the bathroom door, sipping the wine artfully. Running the tip of her tongue over her lips. Wiggling it in his direction.

He should be drooling by now. Instead he just stared at her.

“Hey, stud!” she whispered, running a hand down the length of her body.

“Yeah,” he said to whoever was on the telephone. “I can hold a second.”

Joey was young and very good-looking, with a strong body, blond hair and good features. Not bad at all.

If only he would learn to listen to her a little more.

She left the doorway and walked over to him. Lowered herself to her knees between his thighs. Ran her hands along them. “Ooh,” she murmured. “Want to fool around, lover?”

He covered the receiver with his hand. “Will you cut out the honeymoon crap for a while?” he demanded irritably. “Can't you see I'm busy?”

Sue rose, her jaw locked in anger as she stared at him. “Fuck you, asshole,” she said sweetly, then turned and strode out of the bedroom.

Joey looked after her broodingly. Women. Now he would be apologizing for the better half of the night.

Didn't matter. Maybe he wouldn't bother. Maybe she would just have to come back on her own. He smiled slightly. She was enough of a nympho that she would be back. She had no right to be acting like such a bitch.

After all, she was the one who liked money so much, he reminded himself angrily.

Then he heard a voice talking to him on the phone, and he gave his mind over to the business at hand.

 

“It's me! Will you please shut up!”

Sam gasped, aware even as she was spun around that Adam was the hulking shadow behind her.

“You scared me to death.”

“Well, what the hell was the matter with you, walking out like that?”

“I was ready to go.”

“Are you anxious to meet that guy again? Hoping he'll be in your bathroom again?”

“Oh, will you go to hell!”

“Then what were you doing?”

“You two were still busy, so—”

“Get inside. I'm not going to argue out here.”

She had little choice. Adam had the key and turned it in the lock. He propelled her inside.

She kept moving, heading for the side of the room opposite him.

“Damn you, Sam, it should be obvious to you that you're not safe.”

“All right! I'm sorry.”

“You damned well should be. You—”

The door was shaken by a hard knock. Sam jumped. Adam instantly flung it open. She started to cry out in protest, then saw that it was Jem on the other side.

“Great, I'm in danger, and you just fling the door open,” she said.

“I knew he was right behind me.”

“I, uh, don't mean to be interrupting anything here,” Jem began.

“You're not!” they both swore in vehement unison.

Adam lowered his head slightly, lifting his hands. “You're here, Jem, so I'm out of here. See you both in the morning.” He stared at Sam. “Bright and early. We're diving the Steps.”

“Good night to you both!” Sam snapped, heading for her bedroom. It seemed important for some reason to make her exit before Adam made his.

But once she was gone, he didn't rush to go. Jem looked at him. “Sofa is yours tonight,” he said.

“You don't need to—”

“Fair is fair,” Jem said.

Adam shrugged. “Okay. I've got to get a few things. I'll be back in about thirty minutes. I'll knock twice.”

“Gotcha.”

 

The baby started crying in the middle of the night. Yancy bolted up, hurried to the crib and looked at the infant. She had to smile as she reached for him. What a temper! His little fists were balled and waving, his mouth opened wide to give his angry screams full volume.

“You know, young man, you're supposed to start sleeping through the night one of these days,” she said, picking him up and patting his back as she held him comfortingly against her shoulder. His screams turned to sniffles. “That's what the baby books say, anyway. But you're hungry, and if you're hungry…”

She walked to the dressing table and cracked the cap on a sealed, disposable bottle of formula, balancing the baby on her shoulder as she screwed on a sterilized disposable nipple. All the prepared stuff was expensive, but worth it in the middle of the night. She adored the baby. There was absolutely nothing about him, nothing he could do, that would be too much trouble for her, but still, she was certain that even the very best parent in the entire world had to stumble around a bit in the middle of the night.

“Don't be a little piglet. You'll wind up with a stomachache,” she warned him, settling in the rocker to feed the baby.

Oh, God, yes, she adored him. He looked so much like his father. Thank God for Sam's belief that human life was precious, no matter what! Thank God the baby existed. He was hers now, no matter what the situation that had brought him into the world. He was precious. Those blue eyes, that soft, soft, light brown hair.

Those eyes on her. So trustingly.

He suddenly smiled around the nipple in his mouth. Reached out little fingers toward her.

That smile, so much like his father's…

She rocked, thinking, reminiscing. Wondering.

She realized that the baby had closed his eyes. She took the bottle from his mouth, set him over her shoulder and burped him. Then she rose and began to walk idly around the room.

She paused, certain that she had heard a sound from downstairs.

She stood dead still.

Yes…

Someone was downstairs. Someone moving around in what had been Justin Carlyle's office.

She hesitated, feeling the thunder of her heart. It was just Jacques, she told herself.

Never, he had no interest in the office.

Should she go down?

No, definitely not! Sam would send her right off the island with the baby if she thought that Yancy had risked him in any way.

It was just Adam, she told herself. Adam had spent the entire day in the office, going through books, charts and papers. They'd all been with him. No secrecy there.

She'd heard Adam leave in a hurry earlier. She'd heard Jem follow him out. But he might have come back.

But if it wasn't Adam…

What should she do?

Her agony of indecision was short-lived, at least. She heard a click and realized that someone had exited by the bar door onto the porch.

She pulled out the little lamb night-light that had softly illuminated her room, casting it into total darkness, then flattened herself against the wall, staring over the lawn area that led down to the docks.

She saw…nothing.

No, a figure.

But just as she caught sight of the figure on the lawn, a cloud covered the moon completely.

The figure stood just between the pools of illumination cast by the island's night-lights. In darkness.

She could see very little. The figure was tall…. Dark…. Nothing more.

Shaking, she set the sleeping baby into his crib. Then she checked her door. Locked. Securely locked.

She set a chair in front of it anyway.

Whoever she'd seen, they weren't coming back tonight, she assured herself as she lay down. But she didn't sleep.

She was suddenly certain that neither Justin Carlyle nor Hank Jennings had died by any trick of nature or by accident. Both men had been murdered.

And now the murderer had come to the island to strike again.

 

There was a very strange place between sleeping and waking, a place where memories came to haunt her sweetly in a pleasant mist.

The day was perfect. The sun was high, strong, the air touched by the perfect breeze, keeping the summer's heat palatable. They'd spent the day on the
Sloop Bee,
her father on deck, reading another of his “sources.” She'd been diving, buddied up with Adam, since it had been just the three of them out for the afternoon. They'd come across the huge manta ray that afternoon. Adam had pointed out the creature to her. She'd been determined to befriend it, to take a ride on its mighty wings. The manta had been obliging, allowing her to close her fingers over its wings, to feel its power as it whipped through the water. Soon after, Adam had joined her, laughing behind his mask. It had been the perfect dive. They'd been near the Steps, and the sea had come alive for them. Barracuda had skulked about, offering up their wicked-looking grins but keeping their distance. Brilliant yellow tangs had darted about the reefs to the southwest of the Steps, along with clowns and angelfish. The colors had been so vibrant and magnificent, the sea so excitingly alive….

She had seen everything by his side. Shared the visions, loved the underwater world with someone who loved it equally well. Back aboard the
Sloop Bee,
she'd described it all for her father, who had laughed, bright-eyed himself, because he understood their feelings so well. Justin had tried to tell her then what he had been working on, but she hadn't really been listening that day.

She'd just watched him with Adam. Seen Adam's interest. His enthusiasm. Seen Adam smile. Seen his dimple. Seen him move. Her heart had thudded with exquisite pleasure to see the two men in her life find such a satisfying friendship. One of them, however, hadn't realized that he was one of the men in her life….

Until later.

Running down the beach on Drop Island. The white sand beneath her feet, the setting sun crashing down around them in shades of bloodred crimson. She'd doused him in cold water when he hadn't listened quickly enough to what she'd been saying. Running had seemed the most prudent action.

Until he caught her. Until they tripped in the sand. Until she looked into his eyes while feeling the sun-fevered smoothness of his flesh, the power of his muscles pressed against her.

Tasted his lips, the salt, the sea…

Every young girl dreamed about her first time making love. Planned it, perhaps. Yet nothing in Sam's imagination had been so sweet, so smooth, so perfect. Words had failed her, but actions hadn't. He was so experienced; she was simply so in love. The crimson-streaked sky was the perfect canopy, the sun-baked sand the perfect bed. God! Even now, she could almost
feel
his lips against her flesh, tantalizing her, the way he could move his mouth against her, circling, barely touching, making her want to scream to feel his caress just where it wasn't, scream again when it came against her flesh just where she had yearned for it to be. He seduced, awakened, evoked. By the time he actually entered her, she was half-crazed with wanting him. If there was pain, it was fleeting. It was the wonder that remained with her, the warmth, the feeling of intimacy, the awe….

The silver touch of his eyes….

She shifted, smiling slightly, remembering. He was older, mature, responsible. Magnetic. Experienced, aware, fascinating.

She was…distracted.

The morning light was coming into her bedroom. She blinked against it, groggy as she awoke. Blinked again.

Those eyes. Silver eyes, watching her still.

Sam bolted up in bed, dragging her covers with her as she stared at the man seated in the Victorian rocker at her bedside, a big mug of coffee in his hands as he stared at her. She clenched her teeth, hoping to hell that she had been sleeping soundly and that nothing had escaped her lips while she drifted in her semiwaking state.

“Damn it, what the hell are you doing in my bedroom?”

He shrugged, leaning forward, offering her the coffee. She ignored the mug and continued to stare at him, outraged.