The Seductive Impostor (5 page)

“What are you doing in my house?” he whispered, slowly winding the end of her braid around his hand. He tugged, just slightly, just enough to threaten without actually hurting her. “Who are you?”

Rachel couldn't have spoken if she'd wanted to.

His hand on her braid tightened. “What are you doing here?” he repeated, using her hair to tilt her head back.

The only light in the room came from the crack under the door she was pinned against, and Rachel had a moment's thanks that it wasn't enough to see his expression, for surely she would have really fainted then. As it was, his low and threatening voice, the smell of his pure male strength, and the heat of his tensed muscles radiating toward her were enough to make her question what she was about to do.

“Who are you?” he repeated.

Rachel slowly shifted her weight to her weak right leg and sturdy cane. “I am really sorry,” she whispered.

And having given that sincere apology, Rachel drove her left knee into his groin with all the force of her weight behind it.

Keenan Oakes dropped like a stone. He fell to his knees with a groan of agony, his hand in her hair going limp and releasing her braid as he moved to cup himself.

The clasp on her barrette popped open and followed him to the floor, Keenan Oakes landing with a heavy thud and the barrette tumbling to the floor with a loud, resounding clank.

Rachel didn't wait to see if he stayed down. She whirled, opened the door, and ran for her life—aware that she'd just enraged a predator who would not suffer this second assault on his manhood quite so nobly.

Her right knee giving her hell for further abusing it, Rachel ran down the wide hall and turned the corner toward the grand staircase that led down to the first floor. She didn't take the stairs, but opened the secret panel at the top of them instead. She stepped into the blackness with all the confidence of someone who knew the passage well and quietly closed the panel behind her.

She took her first relieved breath in nearly an hour, placing her hand over her heart to keep it from jumping out of her chest. She was safe now. No one knew about these tunnels. Their secret had died with Thaddeus Lakeman three years ago and with the architect two weeks later.

Only the architect's daughters knew they existed.

The library had a secret passageway in it, but Rachel had opted to use this one above the stairwell instead. It was a much more direct route for leaving the mansion, much quicker to the outside entrance just above the Gulf of Maine.

Even though she had been caught sneaking around, she was glad she hadn't used the one in the library to escape. Keenan Oakes would have discovered the tunnels then, and Rachel still needed them to be secret.

She had to find Thadd's secret room and her father's blueprints for the boats. And there was still the matter of the fake emeralds in her pocket. Damn. She should have just left them in the vault.

Satisfied that her heart had settled into a steadier beat, Rachel turned her flashlight back on and carefully started down the steps that wound into the blackness beyond the beam of her light. Using her cane for support, she turned left, then right, walking along a narrow corridor that led to more steps. The smell of the ocean slowly grew stronger, and Rachel's spirits lifted.

She had escaped. And though she lived right next door, she doubted Keenan Oakes would recognize her if they did happen to meet in town. He couldn't have seen past the beam of her flashlight, its glare protecting her identity.

She finally reached the entrance to the cave and immediately shut off her flashlight. She worked the hidden latch from memory, opening the iron bars that protected the tunnels from unwanted intruders, both two-and four-legged. She slid through the bushes hiding the gate, careful not to disturb any branches, hearing the well-crafted lock clink softly behind her.

Rachel sat down on an outcrop of granite and slowly massaged her knee. It was throbbing like the devil now. She glared at the cane leaning against the rock beside her. The damn thing was going to be with her another week now, after tonight's little fiasco.

She turned and looked up, trying to see the mansion through the fog, and breathed in the chilly air and let it out with a softly spoken curse. She was going to have to visit Sub Rosa again. Soon. Before Keenan Oakes took inventory of all his newly inherited possessions.

 

Crouched on his hands and knees on the dusty carpet of the library, Kee took careful shallow breaths, waiting for the pain to ease enough so he could move.

The little witch had kneed him. She had come sneaking out of the closet, apologized, and then smartly taken him down.

Who the hell was she? And what was she doing in Sub Rosa?

One minute he'd been leaning against the desk in the dark, contemplating the fact that he'd just managed to lose another girlfriend, and the next thing he knew, he was watching a small black figure follow the beam of a flashlight across the library floor. Until she had turned around and faced him, he had thought his intruder was a kid—a teenage delinquent intent on pilfering from his new home.

But she was no kid. Not with that head of hair and those big—and scared—eyes. And on her limping escape down the hall, Kee had noticed quite clearly her unmistakably feminine, heart-shaped butt.

He reached over and picked up the cap on the floor beside his hand. The smell of roses drifted upward, and he lifted the black knit cap to his face.

Roses. He'd noticed the same smell earlier, when he had walked from the car into the house. Had his thief hidden in the bushes?

Impossible. Kee knew security systems, and Sub Rosa's system was state of the art. Until he had turned it off at the gate, nothing larger than a mouse could have gotten onto the property.

So where had she come from? And what had she wanted?

“Kee? Where's Joan go—Hey, man. What happened to you?”

Kee looked up to find Jason standing in the doorway with a surprised look on his face. “Did you catch her?” Kee asked.

Jason frowned at him. “Joan?” His eyes widened, and he grinned as he shook his head. “She did this to you?”

Kee finally stood up, the knit cap still in his hand. He held it up for Jason to see. “No, not Joan. The other woman.”

“What other woman, boss?” Jason asked, suddenly serious.

Kee stiffly walked into the hall and looked toward the stairs. “Did you come up the front way?”

“Yes.”

He turned back to Jason. “Then you must have seen her.” He held the hat up again, at shoulder height this time. “A short woman, dressed in black, limping and using a cane. She headed for the stairs.”

Jason shook his head.

“Well, dammit, find her! Before she leaves the grounds. I want to know what she was after.”

Kee didn't have to ask twice. Jason all but ran in the same direction the intruder had taken.

“And find Duncan!” Kee shouted after him. “And tell him what happened.”

That last order given, Kee hit the wall switch, flooding the library with light. He walked to the closet and looked inside, and immediately spotted the crumpled backpack sitting against the far wall. He picked it up and opened it, and pulled out an equally crumpled towel. Other than that, it was empty. He turned and looked around the library.

What had she been after?

Kee shook his head, disgusted with himself. If nothing else, his thief had certainly gotten an earful. She had been sitting in the closet the whole time Joan had methodically listed off each and every one of his impressive flaws.

Which was probably why the lady had been daring enough to take such a dangerous shot at him.

Kee slowly walked back to the library door and looked down the hall in the direction she had run. Where had she disappeared to that Jason hadn't seen her when he came up the stairs? Could she still be in the house?

Kee stepped into the hall, intending to find out, when his foot sent something skidding across the marble floor. He walked across the hall and picked up the object, turning it over in his hand to examine it.

It was a hair clip. Heavy, metal, in the shape of a lobster boat. The light glinted off the colorful enamel.

It wasn't a cheap hair clip, but a finely crafted piece of jewelry. The boat was white and red, with a delicate gold chain wrapped around the miniature pulley that hoisted the lobster traps onto the boat. Several tiny traps sat on the stern, and orange and green buoys littered the open deck just behind the tiny wheelhouse.

Delicate. Precise. Handcrafted.

Kee remembered then the sound of something hitting the floor at about the same time he had.

The hair clip belonged to his intruder.

Well, hell. What sort of thief wore expensive jewelry to a break-in? For that matter, what idiot broke into a house when she needed a cane just to get around?

Kee closed his fist over the clip and adjusted the front of his pants. He was going to ache like the devil for at least a week. His intruder, who'd barely come up to his chin, was suicidal. If she'd missed by even an inch, he might have instinctively retaliated and done her serious harm.

He adjusted his pants again, deciding he still might.

Just as soon as he discovered who she was.

Which he would. She was a local, considering her taste in hair clips. And the reckless lady didn't know it, but she had just crossed the path of a professional hunter.

R
achel stopped rubbing her sore
knee and straightened, tucking her now loose and tangled hair behind her ears so she could hear better. The wail of a siren sounded in the distance, a faint echo trying to pierce the thickening fog rolling in off the ocean.

She captured her breath and held it, and waited, straining to pinpoint the direction. The wail rose in volume, moving closer, traveling at an alarming speed toward her.

“You jerk! You called the police,” she growled at the dark mansion above her, scrambling to her feet, groping for her cane. She had to get out of there, back to her house before they searched the grounds. She stumbled away from the hidden entrance of the tunnel, afraid to use her flashlight, even more afraid to get caught. She didn't want to find herself calling Maine's newest assistant attorney general to bail her out of jail. Nor was she eager to find herself facing Keenan Oakes again anytime soon.

And she wasn't sure which possibility scared her more.

The siren's shrill was louder now, pushing Rachel's nerves into a frenzy, quickening her flight. More sirens sounded in the distance, faint but growing stronger, also traveling from the center of town.

Well, shoot. The whole damn police force was coming to the jerk's rescue.

Her dragging right foot caught on a root just then, and Rachel stumbled, falling through nothing but air before painfully landing on the sharp granite rocks and prickly shrubs. She skidded and tumbled several feet before she was able to grab a fistful of rosebush and stop herself from sliding over the edge of the cliff. The tide calmly ebbed thirty feet beneath her, almost silent but for a rain of pebbles cascading into the water.

She couldn't move. Heck, she didn't dare breathe. That had been much too close for comfort.

The mounting cacophony of sirens reached a deafening pitch high on the bluff behind her. Rachel closed her eyes, wanting to weep with frustration.

She didn't deserve this. She was not a bad person. Granted, she had trespassed tonight, broken into Thadd's vault, and assaulted Keenan Oakes in his home, but she didn't need to live through the indignity of being hunted down like a criminal or the humiliation of being carted off to jail in handcuffs.

And she didn't need to fall off this damn cliff.

She was trying to make things right, dammit.

Rachel waited, fighting her panic until she could get her trembling under control. She didn't dare try her breathing exercise again; being dizzy while jutting over the edge of a cliff would not be wise. So she slowly began to count backward from one hundred instead. She was all the way down to fifty-eight before she realized that the sirens were growing weaker, moving away.

They hadn't stopped at Sub Rosa.

She lifted her head and pushed her hair behind her ears, then carefully wiggled backward, away from the edge of the cliff. The sirens had wound down, and the vehicles had stopped at Fisherman's Reach, the next cove over.

Rachel sidled back until she could safely sit up.

The smell of smoke drifted in on the fog, tickling her nose and settling the taste of acrid fumes on the back of her throat. She groped for her cane and found it several feet away, then used it to poke at the ground to find her flashlight. Wood clunked against metal, and she pulled the flashlight closer and picked it up, snapping it on and shining its beam at her feet.

Holy Mother Mary. Her toes still dangled over the edge of the cliff. Yes, that had definitely been too close.

Using her cane again, she hooked the handle around the trunk of a small pine tree and pulled herself farther up the sloping granite until she could grab the tree and work herself up to a standing position. Only then did she take inventory of her aches.

She was a battered mess. Her knee throbbed, her good ankle hurt, and the palms of her hands burned. She stuck her flashlight between her teeth and pulled on the sleeve of her right arm. The beam of light fell just above her wrist, revealing torn cloth and a thin bloody scrape.

It was time to face the ugly truth. As a criminal she was simply inept. Heck, she was self-destructing before her own eyes. There had to be a better way of making her father's sin disappear. His suggestion that she just toss everything into the ocean was beginning to have merit.

But Rachel knew she couldn't do it. Not to a collection of such beautiful works of art. Maybe she could pack it all up—once she found it—and drive the three hundred miles to Portland and anonymously leave it on the steps of the police station. That might be a solution.

But the way her luck was running, she'd probably get in an accident and be found with a small fortune in stolen art in her truck. That would certainly help Willow's career.

Rachel brushed a tangle of hair out of her face with a slightly less trembling hand and blew out a sigh heavy with self-pity. She was stuck with the option of returning to Sub Rosa and quietly finding Thadd's secret room, and filling it with the rest of her dad's stolen possessions.

But first she had to make good her escape tonight.

The scent of smoke was growing stronger, swirling in on the quickening breeze. It stung her eyes and smelled of diesel fumes. An explosion suddenly rocked the air, and Rachel instinctively flinched, only to gasp at the sight of the fireball that rose on the coastline to the east. The fog crackled and brightened with churning, angry orange light.

Rachel stumbled up the shrub-clogged bluff, every ache in her body forgotten as adrenaline shot through her veins again. She reached the bulging headland that guarded Sub Rosa from the sea and watched in horror as the remains of a fishing boat burned on its mooring.

The blue and red strobes of rescue lights added to the laser display coming from the cove. The fog flashed, absorbed, and reflected a scene of chaos.

A faint noise caught Rachel's attention then, high on the cliff at the base of Sub Rosa. She whirled, suddenly remembering her own little problem and urgent need to get home.

Rachel turned her flashlight back on and more carefully made her way back along the cliff path and through the woods in the direction of her house. It was less than a quarter of a mile, but it was treacherous going, the thickly filtered moonlight offering little help.

Despite being careful and trying not to let panic rush her, she still slipped several times, and fell yet again, landing on her good knee with enough force to start it aching as well. She eventually made it to level ground and the woods that separated her home from Sub Rosa.

She was just within sight of the yellow glow of her porch light when she heard men's voices softly traveling through the swirling fog, making it impossible to tell their direction.

Rachel recklessly quickened her pace. She ran and stumbled along, shutting off her flashlight so she wouldn't give her location away.

The sudden snarl of a dog behind her scared Rachel so badly she went crashing to the ground with a violent jolt, her wrist hitting a tree stump and ripping a cry of agony from her throat.

The next snarl sounded right beside her ear. Rachel twisted and flailed, trying to wiggle away from the beast.

“Back off, Mickey!” a man shouted from beside her. The night fog suddenly glowed with arcing beams of light.

Rachel turned onto her stomach, cradled her bruised wrist in her hand, and buried her face in her arms. “Go away. Leave me alone,” she told the men, not looking at them. “Go away.”

“Lady? Are you okay?” one of them asked, hunching down beside her.

Hell no, she wasn't okay. Her right knee felt as if it were on fire and was now so intensely painful that she was having to grit her teeth not to scream.

“Go away!” she hissed again, pulling herself into a tighter ball when the man touched her shoulder.

“Jesus, lady. We can't just leave you here,” he insisted, again ignoring her plea by trying to turn her over.

Rachel came up fighting. She swung her cane and connected with something solid. The guy leaning over her grunted in surprise, but that was about all the reaction she got. Three flashlight beams glared at her, and she blinked at their brightness, raising her good hand to see, still holding her cane like a weapon.

“Who are ya?” another man asked, hunching down beside her and speaking with a brogue that was almost charming.

Still, she wasn't foolish enough to let down her guard.

“My name is Rachel Foster. I live over there,” she told him, using her raised hand to point at her distant porch light.

“This is Sub Rosa land,” he said.

Rachel glared at him. “I know that.”

“You're trespassing,” another man said from somewhere behind his flashlight.

All she could see were his feet, but Rachel turned her glare in his direction. “I am well aware of my property lines.”

“Then what are ya doing here?” the man with the brogue asked, reaching for her cradled arm. Rachel turned slightly and tucked it tighter against her body.

“I'm searching for my cat,” she told him, staring him right in the eye as she lied.

Not that she knew where she got the nerve. The man looked as if he ate kittens for breakfast. He was positively huge and had a face that belonged on a wanted poster.

“Did Mickey bite ya?” he asked, taking her arm and pushing up her sleeve. “There's blood.”

Rachel tugged her arm back again and rubbed her wrist. “No, he didn't bite me. That's a cut from when I fell. Now go away and leave me alone.”

Not one of them budged.

“You are the trespassers, gentlemen,” she told them, using the term grudgingly. “No one lives at Sub Rosa. And the sheriff keeps close watch on the place, so you'd better get moving.”

The two men next to her grinned.

“Well, Keenan Oakes moved in tonight,” the second man said as he snatched her cane out of her hand and held it up to the light. “What's this?”

“That's mine,” Rachel said, grabbing it back. “Now that we've established ourselves as neighbors, would you kindly leave me alone. I want to go home.”

“What about your cat?” one of the men behind the flashlights asked.

“He can just spend the night outside,” she told him, scowling into the woods for effect. “It will serve him right.”

“We'll help ya home then,” the brogue guy offered, reaching out as if to pick her up.

Rachel rapped his hand with her cane. “No. I don't want any help. I just want to be left alone. Go away!” she repeated through gritted teeth.

Both men grinned again. The second man grabbed her cane, and the first man grabbed her under the arms and had her standing before she could stifle a scream.

“Ya're hurt,” he said, still holding her up.

Rachel rolled her eyes. These guys were denser than dirt. “Of course I'm hurt. That vicious dog nearly tackled me. And if you don't leave me alone, I'm going to sue Keenan Oakes for every cent he's got.”

He let her go with a chuckle. Rachel barely caught herself from falling, grabbing his arm for balance, and felt solid muscle beneath her hand. She lifted her chin. By God, she would not let these giants intimidate her.

She held out her hand for her cane. The other man handed it to her, also smiling. He nodded as he relinquished it. “We're very sorry about that, Miss Foster. Or is it Mrs.? Is there someone at home who can help you?”

Rachel didn't answer him. Using all of her concentration not to cry out in agony, she carefully turned toward home.

“Wait. Here. Take this flashlight at least,” the first guy offered, holding out his hand.

She stopped and turned. “Thank you,” she said, taking it from him. If it would get rid of these guys, she'd gladly take all their flashlights.

She briefly shone it back at the group. The dog beside them was huge, dusty gray in color, and nearly invisible in the fog. He was staring at her, his head cocked to the side, watching her with eyes that glowed like pins of starlight. Rachel shuddered and turned her beam on the men.

They were all brutes. And in the shadows of the night, they were every woman's worst nightmare. She forced herself to smile at the lot of them.

“Tell Mr. Oakes welcome to the neighborhood,” she said, just before she turned around, gritted her teeth, and started for home again.

 

Kee stood in the shadow of the woods as he surveyed Rachel Foster's house with a discerning eye. “It looks quiet. She must have gone to bed already,” he said to Duncan, inching his way up to the edge of the lawn.

It was a good-looking house, well maintained and sturdily built, sitting on a shallow bluff overlooking the ocean. There was a large barn near the woods in the back, with a motor home parked off to the side. The truck parked in the driveway was a late-model sport-utility vehicle. There was a sea kayak tied to the top of it.

Kee let his gaze roam the grounds, searching for anything that would give him a clue to who else lived here, just in case his background check on Rachel Foster had somehow overlooked a live-in boyfriend. He didn't want or need any more surprises tonight.