Sizzle and Burn (6 page)

“Classic serial killer victims,” Andrew mused. “The kind of people no one misses when they disappear. I wonder why Stacy Anderson was still alive when you found her.”

“She said the freak told her that she needed to be punished first by being locked up in the basement. She thinks he intended to finish the job tonight. It was just pure luck that I happened to go through the house today with the real estate agent.”

“Do they think any of the previous victims were stashed in Vella’s basement, too?”

“I don’t know what the cops will conclude,” Raine said, “but I didn’t pick up traces of any other victims. I’m almost positive that Stacy Anderson was the first one the freak stashed in Aunt Vella’s house.”

“I don’t suppose the local cops paid any attention to what you told them.”

“No. I think I made Chief Langdon nervous.”

Andrew’s chuckle was dry. “You do have that effect on cops.”

“What can I say? It’s a gift.”

“When are you coming home?”

Raine crossed one ankle over the other on the hassock. “I’ll stay overnight, as planned, because Langdon said the detectives from Portland and Seattle might want to talk to me. But I can’t do anything about putting the house on the market until the police take down the crime-scene tape so I’ll be home tomorrow.”

“I stopped by your condo this afternoon and fed Batman and Robin. Played with them for a while. They’re doing fine.”

“Thanks.”

The cats tended to get anxious if they were left alone for too long. Anxious cats could do a lot of damage in a small condo. That was especially true with Batman and Robin because Raine had refused to declaw them. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to deprive them of their only natural defense just for the sake of her very expensive woven wood window treatments. She knew all too well how important it was to have some defense mechanisms.

“I suppose Chief Langdon is going to take all the credit for the big break in the case?” Andrew asked. “The way Bradley always did?”

Andrew and Gordon had never entirely approved of her arrangement with Bradley Mitchell.

“As it happens, Langdon is very photogenic,” Raine said, amused. “He’s the rugged outdoor type. He’ll look good on the evening news.”

“Bradley always looked good standing in front of a camera, too. Going to be interesting to see how many more interviews he gives now that you’re no longer solving his cold cases for him.”

“Mmm.” She kept her tone deliberately noncommittal.

As hurt and pissed off as she was, she had not yet decided what to do about her working relationship with Bradley. Their personal relationship—what there was of it—was finished but she wasn’t sure she could bring herself to stop assisting him on certain cases. In some way that she could not explain to Andrew and Gordon or even to herself, she
needed
to use the psychic side of her nature. Denying it was like trying to deny that she could see and hear and taste and touch and smell.

“Do you want Gordon or me to drive up to Shelbyville?” Andrew asked.

“No, don’t worry, I’m not a suspect,” she said quickly. “I spent an hour answering questions for Chief Langdon and I told him to call Bradley if he wants a character reference. He seemed satisfied. Glad to get rid of me, actually.”

“You told Langdon to call the bastard?” Andrew demanded, outraged.

“Bradley’s a professional when it comes to police work. He’ll vouch for me.”

“What about the real estate agent? What was his name? Spicer? How’s he taking this?”

“He was pretty shaken. Got a hunch that after he gave his statement to Langdon, he went back to his office and had an attack of the vapors. One thing’s for sure: if Aunt Vella’s house was a tough sell before this, it’s going to be almost impossible to move now.”

“Maybe you can dump it on some unsuspecting buyer on eBay.”

“You know, that’s not a bad idea. But first I’m going to have to clean out the place. I’d forgotten how many crates of paintings are stashed in the basement. Aunt Vella always painted like mad when she was here in Shelbyville.”

“It was her own personal form of therapy,” Andrew said.

“I know.”

The room phone rang.

“Sounds like you’re getting another call,” Andrew said.

“Probably Langdon with a few more questions.”

“Better take it. We’ll see you tomorrow. Love you.”

“Love you. Bye.”

She cut the connection and reached for the room phone.

“Yes?”

“Miss Tallentyre, this is Burton down at the front desk. There’s a man here to see you. Says his name is Jones. Want me to send him up?”

The delicate cup she was holding, with its yellow-and-green floral motif, froze in midair.

“Jones?” she repeated, very carefully. There were a lot of Joneses in the world, but within her own private, tightly controlled and contained sphere the name stood out like the ominous light of an oncoming train.

“A cop?” she asked, hoping against hope that coincidences did, in fact, happen occasionally.

There was a low murmur of masculine voices. Burton came back on the line.

“Says he’s a private investigator.”

That gave her pause. Maybe the name really was a coincidence. Maybe one of the families of the Bonfire Killer’s victims had hired a PI named Jones to look into a daughter’s disappearance and somehow Mr. Jones had heard about the day’s events and managed to track her down tonight.

And maybe she could hop on a broomstick and fly.

Adrenaline splintered through her. The primitive fight-or-flight rush left her edgy and profoundly wary. Briefly she considered asking Burton to tell the mysterious Mr. Jones to leave. But she had dealt with reality often enough to know that it was a remarkably stubborn force. It didn’t go away just because one wished it away.

A thought chilled her to the bone. What if the Mr. Jones downstairs in the lobby was the same Mr. Jones who had frightened her and Aunt Vella so badly that night all those years ago? If so, he was in for a surprise. She was no longer a six-year-old kid scared out of her wits.

There was no help for it. She would have to find out why Mr. Jones had tracked her down here in Shelbyville.

“Send him up, please, Burton,” she said.

She tossed the phone into the cradle, put the cup down on the tray and rose from the sofa. It dawned on her that she was wearing only her trouser socks. Quickly she sat down again and tugged on her boots. The added couple of inches of height fortified her confidence.

She went to stand at the window, stomach clenched, all her senses revved to the max, and listened for footsteps in the hall. It was full dark now. In spite of her determination to show no fear, she felt like a gazelle at the waterhole. The realization made her mad, which proved to be a good thing. Anger gave her strength.

She heard the footsteps only faintly and only just before the crisp, authoritative knock on her door. Mr. Jones did not make a lot of noise when he walked.

She took a deep breath, steeled herself and crossed the room to open the door.

She had no preconceived notions of what Mr. Jones would look like. Her memories of the Night of Fire and Tears were not clear on that point. The events had taken place against a backdrop of shadows, shouts and chaos. She had hidden her face against Vella’s shoulder, afraid to look at the very dangerous Mr. Jones. Even at the age of six, long before the psychic side of her nature had developed, she had sensed the power in the man who stormed into her father’s lab that night.

One glance told her that this Mr. Jones was not the same one who had frightened her and Vella all those years ago. The first Mr. Jones would be in his sixties by now. This man was only a couple years older than she was. She could not take any comfort from that fact, however, because the aura of power that surrounded him was as strong or stronger than the one that had emanated from the other Jones.

The Mr. Jones standing in front of her was tall. Even with her boots on she was a couple of inches shorter than him. He was lean and virile, a man who was centered and comfortable in his body and his masculinity, a man in full control of himself. His hair was short and dark and his eyes were a shade of blue that made her think of glaciers and gun-metal. He wore a black leather jacket, black crewneck pullover, dark pants and low boots.

She knew immediately that this Jones was every bit as dangerous as the one who terrified her on that long-ago night but for some crazy reason, she wasn’t frightened. The invisible energy he generated stirred the hair on the nape of her neck but she wasn’t scared, she was curiously excited. A heightened sense of awareness fluttered through her. Mentally she groped for a one-word description of the unfamiliar feeling that was sweeping through her. Her brain supplied it immediately. She was
thrilled
.

“Raine Tallentyre.”

He said her name as a statement of fact, not a question, as if he somehow recognized her, which was impossible because she was very, very certain they had never met. She would have remembered, she thought. There was simply no way she could have forgotten him or that low, controlled, compelling voice. It was a voice that could coax a woman into bed or challenge a man to a duel at dawn. It sent another shiver of raw sensation through her. She took a step back trying to put some distance between the two of them while she pulled herself together.

“I’m Raine Tallentyre,” she said.

“Zackary Jones. Call me Zack. I’m here to make a deal with you.”

Okay, obviously she had just fallen down the rabbit hole.

“What kind of deal?” she managed.

“I need your help.” He held up a manila envelope. “In exchange, I’ll give you this.”

She glanced at the envelope. “What’s in there?”

He smiled the slow, confident smile of a man who is very sure he is holding all the high cards. “The missing pieces of your family history. Inside this envelope is your heritage, the one you were denied when your father was kicked out of the Arcane Society.”

“I don’t understand.”

“It’s simple. I’m the man with the answers to the questions you’ve been asking all these years.”

Six

H
e’d chosen his strategy the way he always did, with cold, calculating psychic intuition based on what he knew and could sense about his opponent. The path across Raine Tallentyre’s threshold had been clear to him as soon as he finished reading the files that Fallon Jones had provided. Very few people could resist the lure of learning the secrets of their past.

Figuring out a person’s weak spots and anticipating their moves was part of his talent. He wasn’t particularly proud of it but it was something he did very well. Most of the time.

What he hadn’t factored into the equation was his personal reaction to Raine. Energy flooded through him, heating his blood and triggering an unfamiliar anticipation. He couldn’t look away from her fascinating eyes, didn’t want to look away. Her voice, soft and vibrant, was a siren’s call to his senses. He could feel the power in her. It drew him as surely as her scent and the subtle challenge that she radiated.

He’d been waiting all his life to meet a woman who could do this to him. That, his level-ten mirror talent intuition warned him, made her potentially the most dangerous woman he had ever met. And the most alluring.

“You’re from the Arcane Society,” she said. It was not a question.

“I’m a member of the Society,” he agreed. “Just as your parents and your aunt were. So are you, for that matter.”

“No.”

He held up the envelope. “According to your file, your parents registered you at birth.”

“My mother is dead and the Society expelled my father.”

“True. But no one forced you or your aunt out of the community.”

Her dark brows rose above the black frames of her glasses. “That’s something of a technicality, isn’t it?”

“Sure, but it’s a big one. After your father’s death it was your aunt’s choice to keep you and herself away from the heritage that belonged to both of you.” He moved the file in his hand ever so slightly, just enough to draw her attention back to it. “Well? Do you want answers, Raine Tallentyre?”

Her fantastic eyes focused briefly on the envelope he held. “That depends on the price I’ll have to pay to get them.”

He smiled and mentally rolled the dice, enjoying the rush that came with trying to outmaneuver her.

“What the hell.” He held out the envelope. “The file is yours, whether you decide to help me or not.”

She took it, even more wary now. “What happens if I refuse to help you?”

He shrugged. “Then I lose my bet.”

She hesitated but he sensed her unwilling curiosity. He was counting on it. With her aunt gone, Raine had been deprived of the last link to the part of her family history that explained why she was different. How could she resist?

He knew, probably before she did, that he had won. His mirror talent picked up the faint tightening at the corners of her sensitive mouth and the small, almost imperceptible movement of one hand.

“You’ve got fifteen minutes,” she said, opening the door wider. “If I don’t like what I hear or if I don’t believe you or what I read in this file, you’ll leave.”

“Deal.”

He moved through the doorway before she could change her mind. She waved him to one of the chairs on either side of the table.

The room was larger than an ordinary hotel room. There was a comfortable sitting area and a gas fire that added warmth and atmosphere. He sat down but kept his jacket on. He didn’t think she was ready to see the gun.

She took the other chair, crossed her legs and rested both arms on the upholstered sides. She did not offer him tea, but then, there was only one cup on the tray.

“How much do you know about the Arcane Society?” he asked.

She raised one shoulder in a small shrug, dismissing the question as though it were of little importance to her. But his talent told him that she was faking it.

“Very little,” she said. “My aunt rarely talked about the organization. I tried to do some research online but I couldn’t find anything useful.”

“The Society is online but all of its sites are heavily encrypted.”