Haunting Rachel (37 page)
Authors: Kay Hooper
Slowly, Rachel said, “I was dreaming about Tom a lot in those first years.”
Adam nodded. “But sometimes, in your dreams, he was just out of reach, wasn’t he? Not easy to see. You spoke to him, and sometimes he answered you, but sometimes he was just there, watching. Because sometimes he was me, Rachel.”
“People don’t dream the same dreams,” she protested.
“We did, the whole time I was in that prison. And we’ve been dreaming the same dreams the last couple of weeks. Do you want me to describe the house with all the rooms and hallways? The masked men? The way Tom and I kept wearing masks of each other? And that stonewalled room where they hung me up and beat me?”
Rachel was silent.
Adam went on, his voice calm again, almost detached. “The locket was a connection to you. I don’t know how I was able to keep the guards from finding it, but I did, just as Tom had. And somehow, it made all the months, and finally all the years, bearable. I just kept telling myself that
I had to survive, I had to beat the bastards and live long enough to get out, because I had to find you, just as I’d promised I would. And not only for Tom’s sake, but for mine as well.
“When that dictator was finally overthrown, and the first decent regime in decades took over, they opened the cell doors and told us we could go home. Even so, since I was an American, it took several weeks for me to get home.”
He paused. “Then, of course, I had to face reality. As badly as I wanted to go and see you, there was no way I could, not then. I was in fairly bad shape and looked like hell, aside from being dead broke. And then there was the story I had to tell you.”
Adam looked at her finally, his eyes very dark and still. “I didn’t want to. It seemed to me that it wasn’t something you needed to know. Thomas Sheridan was dead. Period. How he died didn’t really matter. I figured you’d gone on with your life, and there was no need to distress you by hearing such terrible things from a stranger.”
He shook his head. “That’s what I told myself. But I barely waited long enough to settle with the company before I started looking for you. I knew where to start, of course, and it didn’t take me long to find out you’d gone to New York. That you were okay, happy, I assumed. I could hardly approach you in any sense, I knew that. Especially since I’d found a picture of Thomas Sheridan by then, and knew just how like him I appeared. But I couldn’t quite let go either. So I came here to Richmond. Saw this house, found out all I could about your family.”
“You didn’t know Nick was Dad’s partner?”
Adam hesitated. “He wasn’t Duncan’s partner then. Rachel, it was my suggestion that Nick approach Duncan about joining the bank.”
She stared at him. “Why?”
“Several reasons. I had contacted Nick almost as soon as I got out of prison, and I knew he was looking to set up in some kind of financial business, that he wanted to settle down for a while. I knew he’d be damned good at it, and that he’d be able to lighten some of your father’s burdens.”
“I never thought of him as burdened,” Rachel murmured.
“It wasn’t more than he could handle, Rachel, I just got the feeling from what I’d found out about him that taking on a junior partner might give him more time to do some of the things he seemed interested in. And I wanted someone near your family, in a position to let me know if anything happened. If anything changed.”
“I see. Then later, when you called looking for Nick, it was a ruse?”
“That wasn’t quite the way it happened. I’m sorry, Rachel, for lying about that. But without explaining about the locket and why I was in Richmond, it was the only way I could think to account for how I happened to get that loan from your father. In reality, I approached him openly, approached the bank, I mean. I told Duncan it was because I knew Nick, and Nick was out of Richmond at the time. The rest happened just as I said. Duncan listened to me, and offered the private loan.”
“He must have been shocked that you looked so much like Tom.”
“Surprised, yes. I don’t think much shocked him, though.” Adam shrugged. “In any case, I went back to California and got to work. I came out here once or twice a year, as I told you. And kept in touch more often with Nick.”
Rachel drew a breath and kept her voice steady. “Then Mom and Dad were killed.”
He nodded. “And I found the bits of that timer, realized there was more to it than a tragic plane crash. I saw you at the funeral, but I stayed back, out of sight. I thought the way I looked might be one blow more than you could take just then. Nick and I had already decided to find out what was going on. I knew it was only a matter of time until we met. But you’d told him you were going back to New York until the estate was nearly settled, and I wasn’t about to introduce myself to you when you were burying your parents.”
Rachel said, “After I came back to Richmond, just before my car’s brakes gave way, I saw you watching me.”
“Yes. I’m sorry I frightened you.”
“Why didn’t you approach me then?”
Adam’s gaze dropped to his hands once again. “Nick had said he’d introduce us, and we’d already realized we could get access to Duncan’s private papers only through you, but I wasn’t ready to face you. By then I knew what everybody said, that you’d buried your heart with Tom, that you were still mourning him even after so many years.”
“Is that what you thought when we did finally meet? That I was still mourning him?”
“I knew how you’d looked at me in the moments after the crash, and in the hospital, when you thought I was Tom.” His gaze returned to her face, dark and grave. “Yes, I thought you were still mourning him. And I knew that my looking so much like him would only complicate that.”
“I
was
still mourning him,” Rachel said. She paused, seeing his face tighten and those eyes grow even bleaker. Then she said, “It had become almost a habit, I think. Something I hadn’t questioned until you showed up. Then
I had to face it, because you were here and I was feeling things for you. I was so confused at first.”
“I know.”
She looked at the locket still lying open in her hand, and slowly closed it. “And this … I’m glad it helped you. I’m grateful to anything that helped you survive that place. And I’m glad you told me about Tom. But he’s gone, Adam. He’s been gone a long time.”
“Is he? We both saw him yesterday, Rachel. We both saw what he did for you. And I was told that several times a man was spotted following us, watching. A big blond man, athletic, polished. He kept to the shadows, and walked as if he wouldn’t make a sound. There’s no way of knowing, of course, but it’s a possibility I can’t eliminate.”
Steadily, she said, “Nick said maybe we all have guardian angels. And maybe they look the way we expect them to look. I don’t have any other answer, Adam. All I know is that Tom is dead—and we’re alive.”
“You loved him.”
“Yes, I loved him. I was a nineteen-year-old girl with my life ahead of me, and I thought that life was with him. But ten years changes a lot of things. It changes people. It changed me. I’m not that girl anymore, Adam. Just like you’re not the young man who flew to South America to do a job. We both got through what we had to, and it changed us.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” Still holding the locket, Rachel left her chair and knelt beside his. She put the locket in his hand. “This belongs to you. It was yours much longer than it ever was Tom’s—or mine.”
He looked at the locket for a moment, then at her. “I promised—”
“You promised you’d bring it back to me. You did. And you delivered Tom’s message.”
He nodded, silent.
“I think we should change the initials on one side. I don’t think Tom would mind.” “Rachel—”
“I love you, Adam. Don’t you know that?”
He caught his breath. “I hoped.”
Rachel linked her fingers together behind his neck and smiled slowly. “In case you’re wondering, you are not a substitute for Tom. And I am not in any way confused about my feelings, not anymore. I love you with everything inside of me. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”
His arms went around her, tightly. “Rachel …”
Unnoticed by either of them, the locket slipped from his fingers.
And glinted gold in the carpet.
A year later
achel was surprised to be there.
She was at the garden gate, the one that opened onto the path that led through the woods and to the river.
The gate was open.
She passed through it and followed the path toward the woods, conscious of an odd sense within her. There was a tinge of sadness, but, more than that, there was a kind of joy.
When she entered the woods, she paused on the path, looking ahead to a very bright light.
“Hi.”
Rachel turned her head to see Adam beside her. He reached out and took her hand, and the twining of their fingers made her smile.
“Hi. Why are we here?”
He nodded toward the bright light ahead. “One last visit, I think.”
She looked ahead, and saw a man standing with the light behind him. She knew who he was, even though he wore no mask this time.
And this time, Tom didn’t speak. But he was smiling, and his face was at peace. He spread his hands wide in a gesture taking in the both of them.
Then he turned and walked away into the light.
Rachel opened her eyes slowly, and for a moment just lay there thinking about the brief dream. She raised her head and looked down at Adam, not surprised to find him awake.
And she didn’t even have to ask.
“That hasn’t happened in a while,” she said.
“No. I guess he thought we needed an ending.” Adam smiled.
Rachel smiled and reached to touch his face, the gold of her wedding band glinting in the morning light. “Or he did.”
Adam’s arms went around her. “I prefer beginnings.”
“So do I,” Rachel said. “Oh, so do I …”
KAY HOOPER
, who has more than four million copies of her books in print worldwide, has won numerous awards and high praise for her novels. Kay lives in North Carolina, where she is currently working on her next novel.
If you loved
HAUNTING RACHEL
you won’t want to miss a taste of her
heartstopping thriller,
SENSE OF EVIL
available from
BANTAM BOOKS
in hardcover
T
he voices wouldn’t leave him alone.
Neither would the nightmares.
He threw back the covers and stumbled from the bed. A full moon beamed enough light into the house for him to find his way to the sink in the bathroom.
He carefully avoided looking into the mirror, but was highly conscious of his shadowy reflection as he fumbled for a drinking cup and turned on the tap. He drank three cups of water, vaguely surprised that he was so thirsty and yet … not.
He was usually thirsty these days.
It was part of the change.
He splashed his face with the cold water again and again, not caring about the mess he was making. By the third splash, he realized he was crying.
Wimp. Spineless coward.
“I’m not,” he muttered, sending the next handful of water to wet his aching head.
You’re afraid. Pissing-in-your-pants afraid.
Half-consciously, he pressed his thighs together. “I’m not. I can do it. I told you I could do it.”
Then do it now.
He froze, bent over the sink, water dribbling from his cupped hands. “Now?”
Now.
“But … it’s not ready yet. If I do it now—”
Coward. I should have known you couldn’t go through with it. I should have known you’d fail me.
He straightened slowly, this time looking deliberately into the dim mirror. Even with the moonlight, all he could make out was the shadowy shape of his head, dark blurs of features, faint gleam of eyes. The murky outline of a stranger.
What choice did he have?
Just look at yourself. Wimp. Spineless coward. You’ll never be a real man, will you?
He could feel water dripping off his chin. Or maybe it was the last of the tears. He sucked in air, so deep his chest hurt, then let it out slowly.
Maybe you can buy a backbone—
“I’m ready,” he said.
“I’m ready to do it.”
I
don’t believe you.
He turned off the taps and walked out of the bathroom. Went back to his bedroom, where the moonlight spilled through the big window to spotlight the old steamer trunk set against the wall beneath it. He knelt down and carefully opened it.
The raised lid blocked off some of the moonlight, but he didn’t need light for this. He reached inside, let his fingers search gingerly until they felt the cold steel. He lifted the knife and held it in the light, turning it this way and that, fascinated by the gleam of the razor-sharp serrated edge.
“I’m ready,” he murmured. “I’m ready to kill her.”
* * *
The voices wouldn’t leave her alone.
Neither would the nightmares.
She had drawn the drapes before going to bed in an effort to close out the moonlight, but even though the room was dark, she was very conscious of that huge moon painting everything on the other side of her window with the stark, eerie light that made her feel so uneasy.
She hated full moons.
The clock on her nightstand told her it was nearly three in the morning. The hot, sandpapery feel of her eyelids told her she really needed to try to go back to sleep. But the whisper of the voices in her head told her that even trying would be useless, at least for a while.
She pushed back the covers and slid from her bed. She didn’t need light to show her the way to the kitchen, but once there turned on the light over the stove so she wouldn’t burn herself Hot chocolate, that was the ticket.
And if that didn’t work, there was an emergency bottle of whiskey in the back of the pantry for just such a night as this. It was probably two-thirds empty by now.
There had been a few nights like this, especially in the last year or so.
She got what she needed and heated the pan of milk slowly, stirring the liquid so it wouldn’t stick. Adding in chocolate syrup while the milk heated, because that was the way she liked to make her hot chocolate. In the silence of the house, with no other sounds to distract her, it was difficult to keep her own mind quiet. She didn’t want to listen to the whispering there, but it was like catching a word or two of an overheard conversation
and
knowing
you needed to listen more closely because they were talking about you.
But she was tired. It got harder and harder, as time went on, to bounce back. Harder for her body to recover. Harder for her mind to heal.
Given her druthers, she would put off tuning in to the voices until tomorrow. Or the next day, maybe.
The hot chocolate was ready. She turned off the burner and poured the steaming milk into a mug. She put the pan in the sink, then picked up her mug and carried it toward the little round table in the breakfast nook.
Almost there, she was stopped in her tracks by a wave of red-hot pain that washed over her body with the suddenness of a blow. Her mug crashed to the floor, landing unbroken but spattering her bare legs with hot chocolate.
She barely felt that pain.
Eyes closed, sucked into the red and screaming maelstrom of someone else’s agony, she tried to keep breathing despite the repeated blows that splintered bones and shredded lungs. She could taste blood, feel it bubbling up in her mouth. She could feel the wet heat of it soaking her blouse and running down her arms as she lifted her hands in a pitiful attempt to ward off the attack.
I know what you did. I know. I know. You bitch, I know what you did—
She jerked and cried out as a more powerful thrust than all the rest drove the serrated knife into her chest, penetrating her heart with such force, she knew the only thing that stopped it going deeper still was the hilt. Her hands fumbled, touching what felt like blood-wet gloved hands, large and strong, that retreated immediately to leave her weakly holding the
handle of the knife impaling her heart. She felt a single agonized throb of her heart that forced more blood to bubble, hot and thick, into her mouth, and then it was over.
Almost over.
She opened her eyes and found herself bending over the table, her hands flat on the pale, polished surface. Both hands were covered with blood, and between them, scrawled in her own handwriting across the table, was a single bloody word.
HASTINGS
She straightened slowly, her entire body aching, and held her hands out in front of her, watching as the blood slowly faded, until it was gone. Her hands were clean and unmarked. When she looked at the table again, there was no sign of a word written there in blood.
“Hastings,” she murmured. “Well, shit.”