Petals on the Pillow (11 page)

“You walked,” he said simply, stretching his long legs out before him.

“I walked?” Kelly echoed, feeling ready to slap the smug expression off his face.

He nodded his head. “You walked and talked and said a lot of fairly strange things. You don’t remember any of it?” He watched her now, head tilted to the side, waiting for her reac
tion.

Kelly sighed and sank down next to him on the couch, anger draining from her and exhaustion flooding into its place. “No. I don’t remember any of that. Just what I told you about touching the light and then waking up in here. What exactly did I say?”

“Bunch of nonsense.” Harrison shook his head and stood in one fluid, powerful movement. He extended his hand to her and helped her up from the couch, his powerful hand easily encircling her wrist. “Come on. I’ll walk you back to your room.”

***

All the way up the stairs and down the twisting hallways, Harrison kept watching Kelly from underneath his lowered eyelids. He wondered what woman he would be kissing if he were to take her in his arms right now. Would the lips beneath taunt and tease him? Or would they give up their sweetness with an innocent sensuality that left him breathless? Was the whole thing an act? Or had he really just witnessed his dead wife’s spirit speaking through the young woman next to him?

It was crazy. He had to have imagined it. Maybe the light had been some strange kind of electrical phenomena brought on by the storms and the changeable summer weather. Touching it might have scrambled up Kelly’s own electrical impulses. A kind of seizure. Sure. That could be it.

But then how had she known about the furniture? His birthmark?

How had she managed to kiss him with the lips of his dead wife and why the hell had her eyes changed color?

They reached the door to Kelly’s room.

“Good night, then,” she said, the moment awkward and silent. She looked up at him, her eyes dark and shadowed pools in the dimly lit hall.

“Yes,” Harrison replied. “Good night.”

Kelly started to walk into her room. He couldn’t stop him
self. He had to know. Harrison grabbed her arm and swung her back against him. He kissed her. He moved his mouth over hers, drinking in its softness, and then his firm lips demanded more. Her lips opened under his as he knew they would. He’d known what to expect from the first second their lips touched.

But even after finding what he wanted to know, Harrison continued to explore the recesses of her mouth with a slow and deliberate boldness, savoring the taste of her, the feel of her, the trusting way she gave herself over to him. He kissed Kelly. Sweet, warm, and still very much alive, Kelly.

The heat in him grew. Would it be so wrong, he asked himself. Would it really make a difference? She was driving him wild. He wanted her so much. He was still half-aroused with desire from that earlier fiery kiss, Elizabeth’s kiss. Kelly’s kiss was pushing him right over the edge. He pressed against her, trapping her against the wall with his powerful thighs. He imagined what that release might be like inside her, the sweeping away of tension, anxiety, even rational thought. He slid kisses down the side of her neck, relishing the little gasps of pleasure she couldn’t seem to contain.

She
arched into him and bent her neck to his kisses. He moaned, encircling her in his arms, one hand pressed against the small of her back. He slid the strap of her tank top over her shoulder with his teeth. Lifting her half off her feet, Harrison nuzzled against her breast. His tongue found her nipple, already rock hard and raised, and teased it further.

She gasped, tangling her hands in his dark hair as she surged toward him. Her breath sounded harsh and ragged
.

H
e whispered, “Who are you? Tell me who you are.”

She stiffened in is arms, no longer soft and yielding. She stared up at him, confusion and hurt on her face. Then s
he pushed her hands against his chest, easing him away from her. “I’m Kelly Donovan,” she said in a small voice, still trembling. “I’m the woman you hired to paint a mural for your daughter. Just an employee. Nothing more.”

She slid away from him against the wall. “Good night, Harrison,” she added and slipped into her room, shutting the door firmly behind her
.

He stood there, dumbstruck, staring at the closed door in disbelief. What had just happened? He should be grateful, Harrison told himself, that one of them had had the sense to walk away. Whatever it was that was going on between them threatened to consume him entirely. How could he have even imagined that he could bed her without consequence? Without entanglement?

Harrison leaned his head against the rough plaster of the wall that he had moments ago pressed Kelly against, knocking his head slowly as if he could pound some sense into himself. Maybe it was the insomnia. Maybe the weeks of sleepless nights had finally added up to the point where he was no longer capable of rational thought. Maybe he’d imagined the whole thing.

Wearily, he pulled himself upright and trudged down the hall.
He’d taken only a few steps when he froze. He had heard something. He just wasn’t sure what. He leaned back over the bannister. For a second he thought he saw a shadow near the staircase, then it was gone. He rubbed his eyes. That’s how tired he was. His eyes were playing tricks on him. Shaking his head, he turned and went to his room.

Chapter Seven

The broad-brimmed straw hat shaded the man’s face as he turned up rich black dirt with a small spade. It was a rare sunny morning in the Pacific Northwest with soft hazy wisps of clouds streaked across the gray-blue sky. Kelly watched him work. The sun felt good on her bare arms. The slight dew still on the grass stained her sandals. She could smell the warm scent of freshly turned earth even a few feet away. She stepped closer.

Dora Jenkins’ husband’s gnarled hands still gripped the gar
dening tools with a great deal of strength, despite his age. The sun shone down on his faded blue work shirt and khaki pants, throwing the creases into deep shadows. A bedding flat of primroses sat by his side with a few four-boxes of lavender scattered around him. He paused to wipe the back of his neck with a red kerchief.

Kelly wondered what a painter like Courbet would have made from the scene. Probably something monumental with grace and strength. She wished she had her sketchbook with her. She’d have to start remembering to carry it with her more often. She’d been missing too many good opportunities to sketch because her book and charcoals were up in her room instead of by her side. Elizabeth had had the right idea about that. Maybe Kelly should get something smaller, more book
-sized, that she could have with her all the time.

“Good morning, miss,” Jenkins said, sitting back on his
heels. He was as lean as Dora was ample. A warm and genuine smile kept his weather-beaten face from being overly stern. It creased his face now as he greeted her. “Nice morning for a stroll.”

“Good morning, Jenkins.” Kelly sat down next to him in the thick carpet of grass, legs folded Indian style, like a blue denim pretzel. “It is a lovely morning. Your gardens are lovely, too.”

The smile stretched further. “Thank you, miss. Not too many get to see them these days, but I still love to work with them. It’s nice to be appreciated though.” He patted her hand.

“I take it you used to have more of an audience for your efforts.” Kelly plucked a blade of grass and rubbed it between her fingers. Its sharp scent floated up to her in the fresh clean air.

“Oh, my yes,” he exclaimed. While he talked, he gently removed a few wilting plants to replace them with fresh ones. “The gardens were always an important part of Mrs. St. John’s parties. She always said the backdrop was just as important as the music for creating atmosphere. We had a lot of parties here back then and she did have an amazing eye for color and flowers. Them get-togethers were quite something to look at.”

“She did some beautiful paintings of flowers, too,” Kelly said. “I saw them upstairs.”

“Yes, she did. And all of them from our gardens here, too.”

“Really,” Kelly said. “You must have quite a variety of things growing, then.”

Jenkins leaned back again, straightening inch by inch with a hand braced against the small of his back. He removed his straw hat to mop the top of his bald head with his kerchief. Setting the hat back on his head with a tug, he said, “Yes’m. We sure do.”

“Jenkins?” Kelly bit her lip, not fully sure she really wanted to ask this question. “Do you have any gardenias growing on the property?”

“No, ma’am. Not no more.” He regarded her thoughtfully from under the brim of his hat. His hands kept moving, automatically taking out dead and dying plants and plopping in new ones, but his eyes searched her face.

“You used to then?” Kelly pressed on.

Jenkins nodded. “Used to have quite a few. Mrs. St. John used to call ’em her ‘signature flower,’ whatever that meant.” He chuckled a little. “I reckon it meant they looked good on her. Sure did suit her, too, with that black hair of hers and her skin so pale. Wore ’em in her hair, on her dress. Any old way she could think of. Always knew when she’d walked by recently, too. Left a trail of scent behind her.”

“What happened to the gardenias? Why don’t you have them anymore?” Kelly asked.

He shrugged. “Didn’t make it through last winter. Mrs. St. John and I, we always babied ’em through the cold. ’Tweren’t easy, but we usually managed. Course, we were the only ones on the whole island who had any luck with ’em atall. Jenny down at the florist shop in the village couldn’t even keep ’em more’n a day or so.” Jenkins laughed a little. “Mrs. St. John always said that was proof they were her special flower. She’d say, ‘Look, Jenkins, see how they stay alive and bloom for me. It’s because they know I love them so much.’”

He paused for a moment, hands still in the dirt. A lavender plant lay in his open palm. A bee buzzed lazily around him. “I guess she was right, too. They sure gave up the ghost last win
ter. Seems like no matter what I did, they just turned brown and died.” He slipped the plant into its spot and blew his nose loudly into his kerchief. “Didn’t have the heart to re-plant ’em. I think Mr. Harrison was relieved. Hard to look at those pretty white flowers without thinkin’ about her, even for me. Must have been terrible hard for him.”

“Oh,” Kelly said, her voice small. She brought her knees up and hugged them close to her chest. She wondered how exact
ly those fresh petals were getting on her pillow night after night if no one on the island could grow the plants.

Jenkins cleared his throat. “Any particular reason you asked about gardenias?”

Kelly looked up. Jenkins watched her closely, his eyes as bright blue and perceptive as his wife’s. Kelly shook her head. “No real reason. You had so many varieties, I just wondered if you’d ever tried that one.”

Her explanation sounded lame even to her own ears. The look on Jenkins’s face clearly stated his disbelief, although he didn’t press her further. When she got up a few minutes later and headed back to the house, though, she felt his eyes on her all the way to the kitchen door.

When Kelly walked into the kitchen, Dora Jenkins turned from the sink where she washed dishes. “Morning, miss.” “Good morning, Mrs. Jenkins.” Kelly nodded. She poured herself a cup of coffee and stared down into her mug. “You really ought to send some of those scones to David,” she mused out loud.

“What was that, miss?” Dora asked.

Kelly looked up, surprised. “What?”

Dora regarded her with suspicion. “Why would you say that? About Mr. David,
I mean.”

“Did I say something?” Kelly felt an uncomfortable flush creep up her face. She seemed to remember speaking, but couldn’t quite seem to grasp what she’d said or why she’d said it. The thought had slid away from her, slippery as an eel.

“You said I should send Mr. David some scones.” Dora set down the dish she was wiping and stood with the slightly damp towel hanging limply from her hands.

“I did?” Kelly said, her mind still blank.

Dora stared back at her until the buzz of the telephone broke both women’s concentration. Dora answered the phone and then mutely held the receiver out to Kelly.

“For me?” she asked, confused.

Dora nodded.

The call was from Resting Arms Nursing Home, the home where Kelly’s mother had lived since Kelly was four years old. After a few muttered sentences from Kelly, Dora politely excused herself, but Kelly was sure the nature of the call had been completely apparent by then. She’d stretched her meager savings as far as they could go and then some. Her last check to the nursing home had bounced and, in short, if another check wasn’t forthcoming from Ms. Donovan, the little “extras” that Nancy Donovan currently enjoyed would not be continued. No more weekly set and wash at the home’s beauty salon. No more visits to the physical therapist to massage her atrophied limbs. And no more treats from the canteen. Ms. Donovan understood, didn’t she, that it simply wouldn’t be fair to give those things to Miss Nancy for free when other clients had to pay for them?

The accounts payable representative went on to assure Kelly that of course Miss Nancy would continue to receive only the very best medical care. It was just the extras that were in question.

That her mother was completely unaware of these “extras” and had been since she’d suffered a massive stroke more than 22 years ago was a point not completely lost on Kelly. But she also knew that what her mother was or was not capable of under
standing at this point had little to do with the matter. Her father had made sure Kelly’s mother had those things for years and would have expected Kelly to do the same. Too bad the insurance policy he had taken out on himself didn’t quite cover all the bills. Kelly promised a replacement check within the week and hung up the phone. She crept from the kitchen before Dora could return, seeking the solace of her work upstairs.

She found Betsy’s room empty and immediately started to work. She unrolled the drawing and set up the ladder as close to the wall as she could. She made her way up with the full-size drawing trailing behind her and a roll of masking tape clenched in her teeth. Kelly balanced on her toes on the highest rung of the ladder she could safely reach. She stretched to tape the sheet of paper in her hands to the very top most edge of the corner of the wall.

She’d hoped to block out all the little things that were bothering her by burying herself in the mural, but taping up the drawing didn’t offer enough distraction to quiet her mind. Unable to focus on specific plans for how to handle various color changes and other details in the composition, Kelly found herself musing on the strange happenings of the past few days.

First of all, someone was leaving the petals of a flower grown nowhere on this fairly isolated island on her pillow every night. If Betsy wasn’t responsible for the little nightly gifts, then who was? Somehow Kelly couldn’t imagine Kendra leaving them as a little lagniappe for her, or Dora Jenkins sprinkling flower petals after herself as she trundled around the house. And for God’s sake, why would they? So Elizabeth had loved gardenias. So she’d died young and tragically. Why on earth would that lead someone to leave those petals on Kelly’s pillow night after night? What message were they supposed to impart? What was Kelly supposed to do abo
ut it? She’d found three more lying there, deceptive with their waxy, white innocence and sweet smell, when she’d left Harrison in the hallway the night before. Who else besides Harrison had known she’d even left her room?

There was another mystery. How in the world had she ended up in the drawing room with Harrison last night? The memory of seeing the blue light on the dock and the blank space of time immediately afterward had her skin crawling. There was something there, something just on the edge of her ability to remember or perceive, but the harder she chased it, the further it receded into the mists that seemed to shroud what had happened the night before. That it was tied up with the strange dreams Kelly had been having since she’d arrived at the Manor seemed likely, but once again, why?

Perversely, what Kelly couldn’t chase from her mind was precisely what she desperately wanted to forget and hoped Harrison would forget, too. No matter how she wished she wouldn’t, her mind kept replaying scenes from their little encounter outside her bedroom the night before. Worse than her mind, however, was the betrayal of her own body. Just thinking about it made her face flush and her breath come a little faster. When she thought of the way she’d arched to him, not just allowing him to kiss and fondle her, but encouraging it, she thought she’d go wild with embarrassment if good old- fashioned lust didn’t finish her off first. Never before. Not ever had she reacted that way to a man and certainly never, ever, ever had she acted that way with an employer.

And that’s precisely what Harrison St. John was to her. An employer. He wasn’t a date, a boyfriend or even a friend. He wasn’t, as far as she was concerned, even eligible. Certainly not to her anyway. So what was she doing practically tackling him in hallways?

Kelly picked up the little container of graphite dust that she’d pounce through the holes she’d made along the contour lines of the drawing to transfer the basic shapes to the wall and climbed back up the ladder. With a light pecking motion, she gently tapped the graphite over the surface of the paper. She smiled when she thought of how pleased Betsy had been with the final cartoon. Apparently, Betsy hadn’t quite been able to imagine it life-size before she saw it all spread out. She’d laughed out loud and clapped her hands just at the sight of it.

Betsy with her freckled face and lopsided braids. What a kid. Kelly grinned. She just had that effect on her. Kelly could
n’t help it. She’d make a great illustration for a magazine, Kelly considered for a moment. I really ought to get some sketches of her before I’m through here.

The thought led her back to Elizabeth St. John’s sketch
books. Had the same person who had been leaving the petals on her pillowcase also left the sketchbook there? Why? What on earth was the photograph of Harrison, Betsy and David supposed to tell her? Besides, all the sketchbooks were safely tucked away in Betsy’s little hideout. That meant whoever left the book knew about Betsy’s private grief and was doing nothing to help her.

Kelly sighed as she finished pouncing the graphite dust through the drawing and onto the wall. With a delicate touch so as not to disturb the ghost image of the mural underneath, she carefully peeled away the drawing. Working quickly, she retraced over the line with a light soft pencil. Satisfied that the bones of the drawing were up on the wall, Kelly rummaged through her supplies looking for a kneaded eraser to remove the excess graphite without damaging the painted surface. She could have sworn she’d thrown one in the case she had with her in Betsy’s room, but after two times through everything in it, she realized she must be mistaken.