Her chin lifted indignantly. "Are you nuts?" She glared at him as if he"d just sprouted a second head. "I"m not taking off my blouse for you."
His body reacted instantly to the glimmer of desire he saw flash in those baby-blues. Good, he didn"t want to be the only one affected here. "Yes, you are. You grew up in a home filled with males, you"re not shy, I"m certain. Now stop wasting both our time and take it off."
A flush crept up her throat and spread across her cheeks. "I can"t."
When he"d touched her skin, checking for more marks, he hadn"t missed the thrust of her nipples jutting beneath the thin cotton T-shirt. She wasn"t wearing a bra...that was the problem. But, he doubted even that would stand in her way if he presented the challenge just the right way.
"This is all in the line of duty, Blue," he suggested trying not to sound overconfident. "If you were just one of the guys, as you prefer to think, you"d have already peeled off that blouse as well as the T-shirt."
Her gaze narrowed. "I know what you"re doing, Noah," she sa.s.sed, calling him by his given name for the first time. "Don"t think I"m so naive I can"t figure you out in a heartbeat."
The smile he"d hoped to keep concealed made an appearance. "I"m sure I don"t know what you mean. I have your welfare in mind, nothing more."
"Yeah, right," she muttered. "You just want to see my-"
"Is there some reason I shouldn"t?" He shrugged nonchalantly. "Some malformation that you"re ashamed of?"
Fury bloomed in her expression, but she did just as he"d known she would. She jerked off the blouse, allowing it to drift to the floor around her feet. She pulled the new chain holding a light stick over her head and dropped it next to the blouse. That, he decided, was her one weakness. Blue Callahan was afraid of the dark.
Before he could revel in his discovery, she did the unexpected, she turned her back and peeled off the T-shirt.
Touche, he mused, exhaling on a chuckle.
"Just do it and get it over with," she snapped. She didn"t have to turn around for him to know that she"d crossed her arms over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s.
Oh, she was tough all right. Tough as nails, but soft and sweet deep down inside. And that"s where he wanted to be. He wanted to see if all that toughness would translate into wild hot s.e.x. He was as certain that it would as he"d ever been of anything in his life.
Slowly, thoroughly, one line at a time, he applied a thin coating of the cream. Just enough to speed healing and to prevent infection. He touched her tenderly, lingering as long as he dared each time. She tensed with each new touch, sucked in an abrupt breath as if each time was the first.
"You"ll need to turn around now," he said trying his best to keep the huskiness from his voice, but he failed miserably. His heart thundered mercilessly in his chest...his whole body was hard and aching. But he wanted more of this sweet torture...to touch her again...over and over.
At first he was nearly certain she intended to refuse, then, finally, moving one unhurried increment at a time, she faced him, her arms still shielding her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Her eyes were huge, liquid with the same desire ravaging his body and soul. He wanted more than he"d ever wanted anything in his life to kiss her...to carry her to his room and make love to her. The resulting mental images evaporated the air in his lungs.
With monumental effort he forced himself to apply the cream to each line that marred the beauty of her delicate skin. He carefully painted all those on her chest, then moved to her abdomen. Her breath caught sharply when his fingers grazed the line of her waistband.
"Nothing lower?" he asked, his gaze colliding with hers.
She shook her head, her nostrils flaring with every rapid, shallow breath she took.
There was nothing more he could do with- Before he could finish the thought, she slowly moved her arms away, her fingers remaining, concealing only her nipples, allowing him access to the soft mounds and valleys of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. His hand shook as he touched first one and then the other, tracing the tiny red lines there.
When he"d finished they looked at each other for a long tension-filled moment. He wanted to kiss her again. She wanted it too...but he couldn"t bring himself to do it. He"d goaded her into this and now he felt guilty...because he was as bad as the sc.u.m who"d torn her blouse only hours ago. He"d taken advantage of the situation.
He bent down and picked up her blouse, then gently draped it over her chest. "Good night, Maggie Callahan."
He was a better man than this.
Somehow during the past five years he"d forgotten who he was. But he knew that this was not who he had once been.
Maybe the man he used to be was gone...but he had no intention of becoming what he"d glimpsed just now.
Not even to have this woman.
Chapter Eight.
Blue considered the two packages of soap lying on the kitchen table. She and Lowell had gone through everything in the house that wasn"t nailed down. Food supplies, linens, paper items, cleaning products... everything. The only suspicious item was the package of soap. A three-pack, the ends of the paper wrappings had been opened, the bars tampered with, replaced inside the packaging and the ends glued shut once more so that no one would notice.
The soap had been purchased on the mainland in last week"s order. As usual, Chester had picked up and delivered the list of supplies personally. There was always the off chance that the tampering had been done by someone totally unrelated to Drake, but that was a stretch.
Chances were, the tampering had taken place sometime after Chester had arrived back on the island with the goods. Lowell had called Chester"s home repeatedly without reaching him, so he"d opted to take a ride around the island to find him. Lowell kept a ten-speed bicycle in the garage. He rarely used it, but had insisted on finding Chester ASAP. Like her, Blue saw, Lowell wanted to get to the bottom of this mystery as quickly as possible. His continued insistence that she should call her superior, Lucas Camp, grated on her nerves, but she tried to be patient. Something about Lowell didn"t sit right with her. She frowned. It would come to her eventually.
Moving to the entry hall to await Lucas"s arrival, Blue considered why she had waited until after Lowell had left to put in a call to him. It was always preferable to keep the profile of one"s backup, or guardian angel, as low as possible. The fewer people who knew Lucas was on the island the better. That effort included Lowell and Drake, though she was certain both would be perturbed by her omission. Besides, she didn"t want Lowell around making a bigger deal of this than it already was.
She"d tried hard all day not to think about Drake...but she"d failed miserably. The rush of forbidden emotions that surged through her each time she recalled his touch...his kiss, made her feel weak in the knees. She hugged her arms around herself and paced the long entry hall. Unless Lucas had discovered something new, she had gained no ground whatsoever in this case. She had succeeded, by the skin of her teeth, in persuading Drake into allowing her to stay. But that was about the extent of her accomplishments. There was nothing to learn from the notes he"d received. Rothman"s personal forensics team had a.n.a.lyzed each and every one of them, to no avail.
Neither General Bonner nor any of his men, to their knowledge, had made a move to infiltrate St. Gabriel. There was nothing. And, yet, she"d been shot at, wrestled with, and ambushed with a bar of soap. Talk about a bad day...
And all that didn"t even take into consideration that she"d fallen into l.u.s.t with the man she was supposed to protect-who"d spent more time protecting her than vice versa! Her reputation was going to h.e.l.l in a hand-basket here.
A tap at the door yanked her from her troubling thoughts. She checked the viewfinder and smiled when she saw Lucas on the other side. He was always a welcome sight.
She unlocked the door and drew it open wide. "Mr. Camp," she said by way of greeting.
"Callahan." He nodded and then stepped over the threshold, his cane supporting his weight on the right side.
Blue had heard rumors that he"d lost his right leg, from about midthigh down, while a prisoner of war. She"d also heard that there was a secret love in his life that somehow related to that past. A great deal of speculation was made by all the Specialists as to the kind of woman who could own the heart of a man like Lucas Camp. To say that he was somewhat extraordinary would be a vast understatement. Lucas Camp knew more about the spy business than anyone on earth. He probably knew more ways to kill the enemy than anyone else as well.
Yet, his compa.s.sion ran as deeply as his pa.s.sion. If he showed half the pa.s.sion in his personal life that he allowed in his professional one, whoever the lady was...she was one lucky woman.
Blue locked the door and showed Lucas to the kitchen. While he was here she would also turn over the latest note for forensics evaluation, for all the good it would do. Whoever was sending the notes, he was too smart to leave prints. But then again, even the smart guys screwed up at times. Drake would want it returned, like the others, but Lucas knew that.
As she gestured to the soap on the kitchen table, she noticed that Lucas"s attention was focused fully on her. "Who gave you the shiner?"
The bruise on her cheek pretty much extended up to her left eye. And then there was the healing tear in her lower lip. Funny she"d forgotten all about her busted lip when kissing Drake. Oh, and she couldn"t forget the couple of dozen shallow slices in her skin, though most of those weren"t visible. "One of the guys the sheriff picked up this morning."
Lucas nodded. He"d already been brought up to speed on that. "I take it the soap is responsible for the slice-and-dice routine," he suggested.
She self-consciously tugged at the lapels of her blouse, trying to hide the marks at her throat and above the scooped neck of her T-shirt. "Unfortunately."
It would have been impossible to miss the flicker of fury in those wise gray eyes. "Let"s see what you"ve got."
Gingerly, she picked up first one and then the other bar of soap, showed him the imbedded slivers of gla.s.s and bagged each for taking to the lab. The one she"d used was already bagged and ready to go with the others. She then explained her theory about the wrappers with their reglued ends.
Lucas picked up one of the wrappers and studied it more closely. With no way to know just how many hands had likely touched it, obscuring prints was not a major concern. After he"d a.n.a.lyzed the exterior, he carefully opened it until it was a flat square of coated paper.
Blue hissed a curse as her senses rushed to another level of alert.
Cut-and-pasted letters, just like the ones on Drake"s numerous threatening notes, spelled out the word GOTCHA! The second wrapper revealed the same, as did the one she"d retrieved from the wastepaper basket in her en suite bathroom. At least now they knew the threat was real. Whoever was sending the notes was serious.
"Okay." Lucas folded each wrapper and placed them inside another plastic bag. He focused his attention on Blue then. "Whoever is doing this is close. He, or she, is aware of your moves. Probably the two men you ran into last night were hired to spook you, though, as you say the sheriff suggested, they could have been simply local lowlife."
"But the soap, Mr. Camp. It seems illogical...a taunt versus real harm. I"ve checked everything else in the house. Every can, every package, every little thing. Only the soap was tampered with. Why not just make a real move on Drake?"
"The intended target was Drake, I"m certain," Lucas concluded. "It would tie into his condition."
A frown pinched its way across her forehead. She didn"t like not knowing about his condition. "Why is that?"
Lucas averted his gaze briefly. "That"s a question you"ll have to ask Drake. I can"t give you that information without breaching protocol." He searched her eyes for a time, trying to read more than she wanted him to. "Unless your reason is personal, there are really no grounds for you to know. That detail has no bearing on your ability to perform your duty. You know all you need to."
Blue was the one who looked away then. "You"re right, of course. I"m just curious."
Lucas wasn"t buying that for a second. He didn"t have to say so, she read it in his posture and his expression.
A heavy sigh disrupted the silence that followed. "There"s something wrong here, Callahan, and I can"t put my finger on it. I don"t like it. Not only is it not the general"s style, it"s too disorganized for anyone who"d plotted revenge for five long years. Tampering with soap that might or might not end up in Drake"s shower. Sending the notes for weeks on end. It"s as if rather than warning us, our player is baiting us, trying to reel us in to some sort of trap." His gaze narrowed as he mulled over his conclusions. "I can"t shake the feeling that we"re missing something right under our noses."
Blue had to agree. It did look that way...felt that way too. "Chester checks out," she reminded him, knowing where his thoughts had likely gone.
"So did Mr. Companion, Lowell, but that doesn"t mean that one of them isn"t hiding something. It only means that we haven"t discovered it yet."
She shook her head in denial. "Not Lowell, Chester maybe. He thinks Drake is some sort of weirdo, even called him a vampire. Though he seems harmless, if I had to bet on one of them, it would be him. Lowell"s been here for a year. He could have hurt Drake long ago." Or the old woman who"d issued her that warning, she didn"t add. That little incident was still a little too creepy for her to bring up. She"d planned to broach the subject with Lowell, but things kept getting in her way...like kissing Drake or showering with broken gla.s.s.
"From now on you and Drake are only to eat what you have personally prepared. Don"t swallow anything you haven"t checked at least twice. Keep your head low, Callahan," Lucas warned as he gathered the soap and notes. "Don"t trust anyone." He eyed her speculatively. "Not even Drake. He may have crossed a line, mentally speaking, that we"re unaware of. That may be what we"re missing."
As far as Blue could tell, the only person around here who"d crossed a line for a certainty was her, but she had no intention of saying so to the boss. Instead, she nodded. "Will do, sir."
She walked Lucas out. The dark sedan that had brought him waited in the drive. She arched an eyebrow in surprise. "Wow. How"d you rate such a cool ride?" Compared to Chester"s truck, the sedan was a limo.
Lucas winked at her. "I have my sources, Callahan. When you"ve been in this business as long as I have, you know how to pull the proverbial rabbit out of a hat." He turned to leave, but glanced back before doing so. "Remember, I"m just a 9-1-1 away," he reminded, referring to his panic pager and their special code for help.
"Yes, sir."
Blue watched him go. For a man who walked with a prosthesis and a cane, his progress was efficient and fairly smooth, like that of all cunning predators. Anyone who thought Lucas innocuous because he had a handicap and had seen the better half of a century, should be warned. Lucas Camp was one-hundred-percent lethal when necessary. And all charm and grace the rest of the time.
He gave her one last nod before settling into the back seat of the car. He even had his own driver, but the tinted windows prevented her from seeing who was behind the wheel. Lucas was too cool. Here she was struggling with the whole Gilligan"s Island atmosphere and Lucas had a car and driver. She imagined he"d earned the right though...or simply taken it.
The car hesitated before moving down the long drive. Two seconds later Lowell pedaled his bicycle around the vehicle and into the yard. The sedan pulled away, disappearing into the camouflaging depths of the overgrown drive.
"Who was that?" Lowell swung his leg over the bike, removed his wide-brimmed hat and stared after the car, a frown muddling his expression. He lifted a bag from the basket, which Blue a.s.sumed held new and personally inspected soap. She"d sure be inspecting the bar she used from now on.
"That was my boss."
Lowell swiveled toward her, his eyes rounded in astonishment. "What?"
Incredulous was not an apt description of his reaction. Shocked was the better word. Confusion added to the mix of worrisome thoughts already troubling her.
She nodded. "He picked up the soap and the latest letter Drake received."
"Lucas Camp is on the island?" Lowell moved toward her, his startled expression gaining momentum rather than calming. "Already...I mean...now?" he stuttered. "I didn"t know you called him."
She hadn"t wanted to divulge Lucas"s presence, but since Lowell had practically run headlong into him there wasn"t really any way around it. He knew everyone on the island. Explaining away that car would have been impossible. Since Lowell knew Lucas"s name, she had to a.s.sume Rothman had pa.s.sed on that information.
"Is something wrong?" she queried. There had to be a reasonable explanation for Lowell"s odd behavior. What did he care if Lucas was here? He didn"t even know the man.
Composure fell too quickly into place and he smiled, the surface convention strained to say the least. "It"s nothing and everything, I suppose."
Lowell gave a dramatic wave of his arms as if his burden was too immense to handle. "The whole thing is spiraling into the bizarre. Chester insists that no one but him had access to last week"s order. He didn"t stop anywhere or talk to anyone after picking up the items at the store. The boxes were never out of his sight." Lowell climbed the steps and stood next to her, peering out over the yard with a defeated sigh. "That leaves only you and me." He turned to her, his expression grave now. "I didn"t do this terrible thing, Blue. I would never."
She dredged up a smile in spite of her uneasiness about his behavior. He was just as confused as she was. Upset too. "Somehow someone had to have gotten access before the goods arrived at the house." She chewed her lower lip and contemplated her next question. The last thing she wanted to do was unsettle him further. "Is Chester a drinker?"
Lowell shrugged. "He"s been known to on occasion. But he has always been extremely reliable." He shook his head. "I"m sorry, but I"m inclined to believe what he says. Chester wouldn"t hurt a fly. If he"d been drinking and perhaps allowed such a lapse in judgment by letting our supplies out of his sight, I believe he would simply say so."
He certainly knew Chester better than she did. Maybe he was right. But, as Lucas said, something wasn"t right here. The answer could be right under their noses. She thought of the old woman again. It was now or never. She had to ask Lowell about her. She looked toward the forest on the north side of the house, the area where she and Drake had run into trouble last night. "I ran into someone else in the woods last night," Blue began, hoping like h.e.l.l this wasn"t going to sound as crazy to him as it did to her.
"Oh?" His questioning gaze connected with hers when she faced him once more. "Besides the riffraff?"
She nodded. "An old woman. She warned me that something bad was coming and that I should be very careful. She even called me by name."
Lowell looked skeptical. "What did this woman look like?"
Blue thought about that for a moment. It had been awfully dark. "Her skin was mahogany almost, maybe she was African-American, I can"t say for sure. She wore a lot of jewelry and-" she gestured to her head "-something tied around her hair, like a bandanna maybe. The most distinguishing feature was a scar-" she traced a line across her cheek "-from the corner of her eye to the edge of her mouth. It looked pale against her skin, you couldn"t miss it even in the dark."
Lowell went ashen. "The old voodoo woman?" The words were barely audible.
Blue shrugged and made a sound of uncertainty. "I don"t know who she was. Just an old woman who, oddly enough, knew my name. I guess she kind of looked like someone who dabbled in voodoo."
Lowell was shaking his head now. "That"s not possible. The woman you"re describing is dead. She died about thirty years ago and is buried behind the old chapel. I"ve heard the tall tales about her. She"s definitely dead."
Drake"s words about the old voodoo witch rang out in her head. She laughed, the sound tight, maybe even a little nervous. But she didn"t believe in that stuff. "Look, I know what I saw and this old woman was definitely alive."
Lowell reached for the door to the house. "Maybe the darkness or the moonlight played a trick on you. With the fog we had last night, sometimes your imagination runs away with you." He frowned when he noticed the door wasn"t locked.
"I just came out to see Lucas off," she explained as she followed him inside. He didn"t respond, just locked up as usual. No matter what Lowell thought was possible or impossible, she knew what she"d seen, fog or no fog. The old woman had been real...and very much alive.
NOAH STOOD on the widow"s walk, camouflaged in the darkness. He"d risen more than an hour ago, but he"d chosen to stay in his rooms rather than join the others downstairs. He wasn"t ready to face her again so soon. He wasn"t sure he ever would be. So he"d worked.
He"d hardly slept at all this day. His own actions where Maggie Callahan was concerned troubled him greatly. He"d kept his distance for all these years...been strong and now that strength seemed to diminish with each breath he took, with every moment she stayed.
His thoughts were consumed by her. He wanted to be with her more than he wanted anything else. It was absurd. He barely knew her...certainly couldn"t feel anything beyond physical attraction for her. Yet it felt like so much more. His traitorous emotions scarcely considered the reasons she had come, his complete attention perpetually fixated on her alone. The threat of death be d.a.m.ned.
How foolhardy was that?
Then, it wouldn"t be the first time he"d been a fool. He"d spent what const.i.tuted the best part of his lifetime putting his career before all else, focusing solely on the job. What made him think he would show better judgment now, in exile? All that had saved him these past five years was total segregation.