Smoke in Mirrors(37)
Author: Jayne Ann Krentz

“I wasn’t faking anything, either,” he said softly.

She thought about the feel of his heavily aroused body between her thighs.

“I noticed,” she said.

By the time they sat down to eat at the table near the window, the atmosphere in the kitchen had subtly altered. The charged sensuality still shimmered in the invisible currents of air that swirled around her, but there was something else, too. She was aware of a cozy, comfortable, intimate warmth. It felt good to have Thomas sitting here across from her.

She suddenly regretted that she had fed him leftovers.

The fog lifted while they did the dishes. Thomas got his coat from the closet. She followed him outside, hugging herself against the chill of the clear, starry night.

He paused and looked past her into the hall of the small house. “I’ve got a lot of work to do in there. I’m going to replace the windows and redo the bathroom from the plumbing out. The flooring is good, though. Solid oak. Just needs to be refinished.”

She followed his gaze. “Do you plan to stay on here in Wing Cove after this is all over?”

“Depends. I came here after Bethany died because I could see that Deke was in trouble. Figured I’d stick around until he came out of his depression. But I’m not tied to Wing Cove. I can do my work anywhere. Wrench isn’t fussy, either. What about you? You tied to that job down in California?”

“Not anymore. I can go back if I want, but I’ll see how I feel about it when the time comes.” Hard to explain, even to herself, but this journey to Wing Cove felt like a turning point in her life. She couldn’t make out the shape of the changes that were coming but she knew things would be different after this venture. “The only thing I’m tied to is a person. My grandmother. If I move, she’ll move.”

“Sure.”

Thomas took a step closer and kissed her. He did not put his hands on her. She could have pulled back. But she didn’t.

He ended the kiss.

“Didn’t think it was just the adrenaline,” he said, looking satisfied.

He went down the steps, got into the SUV and drove away into the night.

She went to bed and lay awake in the darkness for a long time, thinking about how it had been to have Thomas there that evening. This situation was already complicated enough as it was. It would be extremely reckless to add a torrid affair to the volatile brew.

She forced herself to refocus on the business that had brought her to Wing Cove. When that got her nowhere, she spent some time mulling over what she and Thomas had seen in Alex’s cabin.

Eventually she slipped into a restless sleep.

. . . And plunged straight into a dark dream.

She walked down a long, shadowed hall lined with old, dark mirrors. Somewhere in this corridor the truth was trapped inside a looking glass. All she had to do was look into the right mirror and she would get the answers she had come here to find.

She stopped in front of an ornate, Rococo-style English looking glass and saw Meredith inside, looking out at her.

You can’t sleep yet, Meredith said silently.

She whirled around and found Alex Rhodes watching her from inside the depths of a garish fun-house mirror. He gave her his sexy smile, inviting her to join him in some private joke. But the smile was all wrong. As she watched his features became twisted and distorted. His yellow eyes glowed.

She turned away and continued down the endless hall of mirrors, searching for the truth.

Chapter Eleven

They sat in the dark room with the glowing monitor and looked at the little plastic bags on Deke’s desk. Wrench was flopped on his back on the floor, legs in the air. Thomas draped his arm over the edge of the chair and absently rubbed the dog’s stomach.

“I can’t get past a vision of the two of you breaking into Rhodes’s house.” Deke shook his head, looking amazed and maybe even a little amused. “I’d like to have been there to see you both hustling your rears out the back as he was coming in the front door.”

“Trust me, you didn’t miss anything.”

“Black velvet and a weird mirror, huh? Guess it goes with those phony yellow eyes of his. Interesting.”

“I don’t know what he’s up to, but he’s in this thing deep,” Thomas said. “He made the move on Leonora. Mentioned Meredith’s name to her. Probably trying to see how she’d react. The only thing I can figure is that he knows about the million and a half bucks.”

“That money is safely back in the endowment account, thanks to Leonora.”

“Yeah, but Rhodes wouldn’t have any way of knowing that, would he?”

Deke’s amusement faded. “He was in town at the time Bethany died.”

“I know. But I can’t see any connection. Except the drug rumors.”

Deke picked up one of the bags and looked closely at the blue-green powder in the corner. “If this stuff is some kind of illegal shit we probably should be careful about how we deal with it. Don’t want to give Ed Stovall an excuse for arresting us.”

“Can you get it tested quietly?”

“Sure. I know someone in the chemistry department. A grad student. He’ll do it, for a price.”

“We need to check out Rhodes, too.”

“That,” Deke said, “I will handle personally. I just hope I have more luck than I did with my other research.”

“You didn’t find anything new on the Eubanks murder?”

“Nothing more than what was reported in those clippings. Sebastian Eubanks, widely held to be a couple of bricks shy of a full load, was presumed to have been shot by a burglar he surprised in the mansion one night. No one was ever arrested. End of story.”

Thomas gripped the arms of the chair. “Leonora is talking about playing lady spy. Mentioned signing up for some stress counseling from Rhodes. Said it would be a good way to get close to him. Maybe pick up more information.”

Deke studied the bags. “Might work.”

“I don’t give a damn if it would work or not. She’s not going to do it. Not if I have anything to say about it.”

“The thing is, you don’t have anything to say about it,” Deke pointed out.

Thomas looked at him.

Deke held up a hand. “Remember what that therapist you dated for a while told you. You’ve got control issues.”

“This isn’t a control thing. It’s common sense.” Thomas shoved himself up out of the chair and walked to the nearest window. He yanked the curtains open. “I don’t want her alone with that son of a bitch for five minutes. Rhodes is up to something. I can feel it. He may be dangerous.”