Cover Of Night

If anything, he looked even more puzzled. "You said it, Mommy. You said ‘Damn Pat." "

"Down, not damn!"

"Ohhh." He frowned. "Down Pat. Who’s Down Pat?"

"Never mind." Maybe it was just a coincidence; maybe he hadn’t heard the word damn at all. After all, there were only twenty-six letters in the alphabet, so how unusual was it that he would get some of them mixed up? Maybe he’d completely forget what he’d said if she just let the subject drop. Yeah, right. He’d savor it in private, then trot it out when it was certain to embarrass her the most – probably in front of her mother.

"Sit down and play while Tanner’s in the naughty chair," she instructed, patting his shoulder. "I’ll be back in ten minutes."

"Eight," said Tanner, reviving enough to give her a look of outrage.

She checked her wristwatch; damn if there weren’t eight minutes left in his sentence. He’d already been in the chair for two of his punishment minutes.

Yes, sometimes her children definitely alarmed her. They could each count to twenty, but she certainly hadn’t vet introduced them to subtraction, plus their concept of time tended to be either "right now" or "wait a long, long time.’ Somewhere along the line, while he was observing instead of talking. Tanner had picked up some math skills.

Maybe he could do her taxes next year, she thought with amusement.

As she turned away, her gaze fell on the number 3 plainly lettered on the door across the hall from the stairwell. Mr. Layton! What with the plumbing emergency, plus the twins’ disobedience, she had completely forgotten about bringing a breakfast tray up to him.

Swiftly she walked to the door; it was slightly ajar, so she knocked on the doorjamb instead. "Mr. Layton, it’s Cate Nightingale. Would you like me to bring up a breakfast tray?"

She waited, but there was no answer. Had he left the room and gone downstairs while she’d been in the twins’ room? The door had a stubborn squeak, so she thought she would have heard him if he’d opened it.

"Mr. Layton?"

Still no answer. Gingerly she pushed the door open, and the squeak came right on cue.

The bedcovers were thrown messily aside, and the closet door stood open, showing several articles of" clothing hanging from the pole. Each guest room had a small private bath and that door, too, was standing open. A small leather suitcase was on the folding Ing-gage stand, the lid open and propped against the wall. Mr. Layton, however, wasn’t there. He must have gone downstairs while she’d been talking to the boys, and she simply hadn’t heard the door squeak.

She started to back out of the room, not wanting him to return and think she was she snooping, when she noticed the window was open, and the screen looked slightly askew. Puzzled, she crossed to the window and tugged the screen back into place, latching it. How on earth had it gotten unlatched? Had the boys been playing in here, and tried to climb out the window? Her blood ran cold at the thought, and she looked out at the drop to the porch roof below. Such a fall would break their bones, possible even kill them.

She was so riveted with horror at the possibility it was a moment before she realized the parking area was empty. Mr. Layton’s rental car wasn’t there. Either he hadn’t come back upstairs at all, or – or he’d climbed out the window onto the porch roof, swung down to the ground, and driven off. The idea was ridiculous, but preferable to thinking her little boys might be climbing out on the porch roof.

She left room 3 and returned to the twins’ room. Tanner was still in the naughty chair, and still looked in danger of imminent demise. Tucker was drawing on their blackboard with a piece of colored chalk. "Boys, have either of you opened any of the windows?"

"No, Mommy," Tucker said without pausing in his art creation.

Tanner managed to lift his head and give it a ponderous shake.

They were telling the truth. When they lied, their eyes would get big and round and they’d stare at her as if she were a cobra, hypnotizing them with the sway of her head. She hoped they’d still do that when they were teenagers.

The only explanation left for the open window was that Mr. Layton had indeed climbed out it, and driven away.

Why on earth would he do such a strange thing?

And if he had happened to fall, would her insurance have covered it?

Chapter 2

Cate hurried down the stairs, hoping Sherry hadn’t been overwhelmed by an unexpected influx of customers while Gate had been upstairs dealing with the twins. As she approached the kitchen door, she heard Sherry’s voice, rich with amusement. "1 wondered how long you were going to keep your head stuck under that sink."

"I was afraid if I moved, she’d swat my ass, too."

Gate skidded to a stop, her eyes wide in astonishment. Mr. Harris had said that? Mr. Harris? And to Sherry? She could see him saying something like that to another man – maybe – but when he was talking to a woman, he could barely put two words together without blushing. And there was an ease to his tone she’d never heard before, one that made her doubt her own cars.

Mr. Harris… and Sherry? Had she missed something there? It couldn’t be; the idea of those two together was too outlandish to be real, like… like Lisa Marie and Michael Jackson.

Which told her that anything was possible.

Sherry was older than Mr. Harris, in her mid-fifties, but age didn’t matter much. She was also an attractive woman, hefty but curvy, with reddish hair and a warm, outgoing personality. Mr. Harris was – well, Cate had no idea how old he was. Somewhere between forty and fifty, she guessed. She pictured him in her mind’s eye; he looked older than he probably was, and it wasn’t because he was wrinkled or anything like that. He was just one of those people who was born old, with a seen-it-all manner. In fact, now that she really thought about it, he might not even be forty yet. His nondescript hair, somewhere between brown and dishwater blond, was always too shaggy, and she’d never seen him when he wasn’t wearing a pair of grease-stained, baggy coveralls. He was so lanky the coveralls hung on him, looser than a prostitute’s morals.