Текст книги "Tasting Fear"

Автор книги: Shannon McKenna

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Текущая страница: 9 (всего у книги 33 страниц)

He smiled at her and smoothed a lock of hair out of her eyes. “Strike out reasonably attractive and put in drop-dead gorgeous.”

She blew a lock of hair out of her mouth, and tried to concentrate. “So, um, anyway,” she stammered. “To get back to what I was saying—”

“Incredibly gorgeous,” he reiterated.

“Yeah, we’ve been through the beauty-of-the-flower lecture. I got it, okay? Do you want to hear the rest of this or not?” she demanded crossly.

He crossed his arms behind his head. “Hell yeah. Go for it.”

“Lucia wanted save me from myself. She hated all my fiancés.”

That got his attention. He jerked up onto his elbow. “All your fiancés? What do you mean, ‘all your fiancés’?”

She huddled deeper into her quilt. “She didn’t tell you about my train wrecks o’ love?” He shook his head, and she rolled her eyes. “I was engaged three times. All three of them dumped me. Not exactly at the altar, but close. Two of them also happened to be my clients.”

He looked incredulous. “Jesus. Why? What happened?”

She plucked the quilt, feeling stupid. “They fell in love with someone else at the last minute.”

He winced. “Oh, Christ. Ouch.”

“Yeah, it sucked. At least by the time Freedy dumped me, I knew better than to get the wedding dress made in advance. I’ve only got two wedding gowns in storage, not three. One takes comfort in little things.” She stared down, afraid to see pity in his face.

“They did you a favor,” he said. “And me, too.”

“You?” She looked up at that. “How do you figure?”

He gave her a grin. “If you were married to one of them, you wouldn’t be here with me right now, and wouldn’t that be a shame?”

A little fit of giggles shook her. “You’re right. It’s just as well. Lucia nagged and nagged about how they take advantage of me.”

He shot up. “Present tense? You’re still in contact with them?”

“Of course. I told you. Two of them are my clients. Or three, I suppose I should say, counting Enid. I manage her, too.”

His jaw dropped. “These dickheads dump you for other women, and you still work sixteen hours a day managing their careers?”

“Don’t start,” she said huffily. “I have enough to bear from my sisters. We’ve put it all behind us.”

“That guy who called at five a.m., was he one of your exes?”

She hesitated. “Uh, well, yes, as a matter of fact. That was Peter, my first fiancé. He’s married to Enid, another singer whom I manage. I introduced them, ironically enough. He’s an incredibly talented—”

“Manipulator,” he supplied. “Dishonorable, self-indulgent user.”

Nancy’s chin went up. “You don’t know him.”

“I don’t want to,” Liam said promptly. “I know enough.”

She frowned. “That’s very critical, Liam. You don’t hear me making judgments, announcing that you’ve lived your life all wrong.”

“I didn’t mean to sound critical.”

She snorted. “Sure you didn’t. And I don’t mean ‘Liam, you arrogant, know-it-all bastard’ in a rude way.”

He reached, grasping her upper arms, and dragged her down on top of him. “I’m saying the wrong things, so let’s not talk,” he said.

Her face was inches from his silvery green eyes. She was embarrassed to feel her anger fizzling away under the blunt force of his masculine allure. “You can’t win an argument by seducing me.”

He rolled on a condom she had not noticed him unwrap. “Were we arguing?” he asked innocently, pushing her legs wide. She dragged in a gasp as he thrust inside, caressing her with his hot, thick length.

“Smart-ass,” was all she could say before the power possessed them, and all they could do was cling to one another and ride it out.

The haunting sound of the Uilleann pipes woke Liam. Nancy’s light weight on his shoulder sent a rush of surprised joy through him.

He turned his head carefully and looked at the clock. 2:17 A.M.

Eoin. That sneaky, sentimental little bastard. Nancy murmured softly and raised her head. Moonlight flooded through the window, illuminating her shadowy eyes. She brushed her hair out of her face.

“How gorgeous. ‘The Soldier’s Vow.’ That’s one of my favorites.”

“Yeah, Eoin goes for the real heartbreakers,” he muttered.

She cuddled up next to him again. “It’s romantic.”

“It’s two in the morning,” he growled.

She punched him in the shoulder. “Oh, give in, Liam! There’s moonlight, there’s music, it’s romantic. Surrender, already!”

He silenced her with a kiss. “I already have.” He pulled her hand down and showed her the effect she had on his body.

She laughed. “Don’t you ever get tired?”

“Not yet. What about you? Are you sore?”

“I’m fine,” she said bashfully. “But I’d rather just talk for a while.”

“Okay,” he said, rolling onto his side. “What about?”

“Let’s take it one minute at a time,” she suggested gently. They stared at each other in the moonlight as he ran his fingers through her hair. Eoin ended “The Soldier’s Vow” and began “The Women of Ireland.”

“God, that kid is good,” she said. “So he rents your basement?”

“Not exactly. He just bunks there. It’s a space to crash.”

“You give him a job and a place to stay? That’s nice of you.”

“Not really. People helped me when I was a kid. This is the best way to pay them back. Besides, he’s family. My mom’s cousin’s boy.”

“People helped you how?” Her slender hand trailed over his shoulders, exploring his muscles. It was turning him on like crazy.

He wrangled his attention back to her question by brute force of will. “When I was Eoin’s age, I traveled the world. I worked my way across America on cattle ranches. Crewed on a yacht on the Pacific. Worked on sheep stations in Australia. I met lots of people who gave me a meal, or a job, or a place to sleep. It was a good education.”

“How did your parents take it?” she asked, fascinated.

He shrugged. “They worried. My stepfather wanted me to be a cop, like him. He was a good man. He taught me music. Carpentry, too. It was what he did for fun.” He studied the curve of her cheekbone as Eoin’s pipes began to sob out yet another haunting tune.

“Did you ever think of going to college?” she asked.

“Seemed like a waste of money,” he said. “Anything you want to learn, you can just go to the library and study up on it for free.”

She slid her slender arm around his waist. “I never thought of it that way, but I guess you’re right. What’s the story on your real dad?”

His body stiffened. “I haven’t seen him in twenty-six years.”

Her eyes were full of interest. “You don’t know where he is?”

“Maybe there was an address with the flowers he sent to Mom’s funeral,” he said curtly. “I didn’t bother to look.”

Nancy sat up slowly. “I’m sorry. I guess I hit a nerve.”

“It’s okay,” he said tightly.

She caressed his shoulder. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“I’ve put it behind me,” he snarled, and then felt like shit for using that tone with her, but his gut was clenched. Every word she said pulled them closer to that wall. They needed an emergency detour. He grabbed her arm, yanking her down. She cried out, and he froze abruptly. “Did I hurt you?” he asked.

“No, but—”

He muffled the rest of her words with a kiss, using all his skill and instinct to drag her back into the burning present moment. No future, no past. Just the melody that throbbed outside the window, the moonlight, and Nancy’s slender body moving beneath his. So generous, and soft, and strong.

He didn’t want to think about the wall they would hit. The look on his father’s face as he walked away forever. Lucia’s freshly dug grave. Masked attackers in the stairwell, the violence that lurked around every blind corner, the gun on the bedside table. The uncertainty, the danger. And this delicate thing they had. So precious, so fragile. Beset on every side.

She gripped him, crying out as her first climax jolted through her.

Yes. His. The satisfaction that burned in him felt almost like anger. He buried his face against her hair and hung on as his own dark explosion blasted him, mind and body, into blessed oblivion.

He would cheat fate for as long as he could. Fuck them all.

Chapter

9

The sky was pink outside Liam’s window when Nancy woke up. The bed beside her was empty, and a shower was running behind the door. She flopped back onto the pillow and studied the room. A photo of a younger Liam sat under the lamp. He had longer hair and a big carefree grin, his arm around the shoulder of a handsome older woman with the same eyes and smile.

She found the bathroom. Took a shower. Muscles she didn’t know she had were pleasurably sore. When she came downstairs, bacon sizzled on a skillet, a teakettle was whistling, and Liam was spooning pancake batter onto a griddle. It smelled incredibly delicious.

He looked over his shoulder and smiled. “What kind of tea would you like?” he asked. “I’ve got Darjeeling and this great Nepali stuff.”

“No coffee?” She stared at him in dismay.

“Not in this house.”

She plugged her cell phone into a countertop outlet to recharge. “There’s got to be an espresso bar somewhere in Latham.”

“I wouldn’t know,” he said, unsympathetically. “Do you like your bacon crisp or chewy?”

“Chewy, please. Could I use your telephone? I want to give my sisters your home number.”

“Be my guest,” he said.

Nancy forked some wet food into a bowl for Moxie as Vivi’s cell rang and rang. She picked up, though her voice was sleepy. “Yeah?”

“Get a pen, Viv. I have to give you a telephone number.”

“Omigod. Omigod. Is it the telephone number of that big, tall green-eyed drink of water? Hey, Nell! Wake up! Nancy got laid!”

“Get the pen, Viv,” Nancy repeated, with gritted-jaw fortitude.

Vivi hummed ebulliently as she copied down the number that Nancy dictated. “Okay, it’s on the fridge. So? Details, honey, details! Is he, well, as vigorous as he looks when you two, well, you know?”

“I absolutely will not discuss that,” Nancy said primly.

“I should think not, since he must be right there in the room with you, am I right?”

“Bingo,” she whispered.

“So go upstairs, or outside, or whatever, and I’ll call your cell,” her sister ordered. “You’ve just got to tell me everything!”

“I don’t have my cell on,” she admitted. “The battery’s dead.”

There was a dramatic silence from the other end of the line. “The battery is dead? You forgot to recharge your cell phone? Wait. Who is this, and what have you done with my sister?”

“Oh, stop it,” Nancy snapped.

“Well, tell us all about it when you get back,” Vivi burbled. “And I mean all. When are you getting back, by the way? Let’s do dinner.”

Nancy hemmed and hawed for a moment. “Um, well…I don’t exactly know when I’ll be coming back. You see, he’s asked me to—”

“Omigod! Nell!” Vivi bawled out. “Get this! Nancy’s shacked up!”

“Stop it, Vivi,” Nancy begged. “Please. Don’t jinx it for me.”

“Okay, you big scaredy-cat. Call me when you get the chance, between the bouts of hot bed-play. And say hello from the two of us!”

Vivi hung up, and Nancy clutched the receiver with a hand that shook. A high-frequency buzz, as if every cell in her body was electrified.

Liam’s hand touched her shoulder. He took the phone, hung up.

“My sisters say hello,” she offered.

“Great. Why do you look so worried about it?”

“Because now they’re having this big, happy freak-out about me being up here with you, and it’s making me nervous,” she snapped.

Liam’s mouth hardened. “Nervous? You mean you think they’ll be crushed to find out that it’s no big deal, then? Just a casual fling?”

Nancy’s throat started to burn. She winked back tears. “You’re the one who said we were going to hit the wall,” she said.

“So I did,” he said heavily.

She laid her hand upon his chest, feeling the steady throb of his heart. “It isn’t casual. It’s a very big deal.”

He covered her hand with his own. “How big?”

“Huge,” she admitted, surprising herself with her own honesty.

They came together into a tight hug. She buried her face in his chest. They clung to each other, silently agreeing to let the dangerous moment pass. An ominous scent some time later made them look up.

“Oh, God. The pancakes,” Liam said, lunging for the griddle.

They feasted on pancakes and bacon. Nancy ate twice as much as usual. They washed up and looked at each other, embarrassed.

“So, ah, what now?” she asked.

His lips twitched. “You tell me, Nancy.”

The gleam in his eye was hard to resist, but reality beckoned sternly. “I really need to get some work done,” she said.

He looked resigned. “I’ll set up an office for you,” he said. “I’d give you the spare room, but if you want a phone line, it’ll have to be in the living room. I’ll go get the stuff from your car.”

When he’d hauled in and set up all of her office equipment at the desk, he kissed her. “I’ll try to stay out of your way,” he said. “If I can.”

She tried not to smile. “Don’t freak if I turn my cell on, okay? I need to charge it up and check my messages.”

“Be my guest,” he said magnanimously. “I’ll be in my workshop.”

Her voice mail was loaded with petulant messages from Peter and Enid, so Peter was her first call.

“It’s about damn time!” Peter scolded, the second he picked up. “I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for twelve hours!”

“Horrors,” Nancy said mildly. “What’s up?”

“There’s no reason to be snotty.” Peter sounded hurt. “Enid and I did the opening act at the Bottom Line last night for Brigid McKeon and the Beltane Beldames, remember?”

“Of course. I sweated for months to get you that gig.”

“I figured you’d forgotten, since you didn’t bother to come. Well, get this. Brigid liked Enid’s voice so much, she wants her to go on tour with the Beldames!”

“Wow,” Nancy said. “That’s great. Did you tell her to call me?”

“Of course, but you’ve been unreachable, so I expect you’ve missed her call. So, what now? It’s not like Enid can say no at this point in her career to Brigid McKeon!”

“True. She shouldn’t,” Nancy said.

“But she can’t throw away her solo career to be a Beldame, either! Enid belongs in front of the band, not singing backup!”

She lost the thread when she glimpsed Liam in the doorway, listening. He moved around behind her, out of her field of vision.

“Relax, Peter,” she soothed. “I’ll talk to Brigid’s manager and get the dates, and see if I can switch Enid’s concert schedule, or maybe agree to just one tour, and use it as a selling point for her own tour.”

She squeaked, startled, as Liam’s arms slid around her, cupping her breasts. He started to kiss her neck, and she batted his head away.

“You’re up there with some guy, aren’t you?” Peter said suddenly. “The graphics are overdue for my album, it’s a week until FolkWorld Conference, it’s a critical moment in my and Enid’s careers, and all you can think of is your hormones? We’re talking serious money, here!”

“Speaking of money, remember when I advanced you the registration fees for the FolkWorld Conference?”

“But we still haven’t gotten paid for those five gigs upstate!”

She wiggled madly as his hand slid down her belly and into the waistband of her jeans. “Meanwhile, my credit cards are maxed, and you haven’t reimbursed me for the last two mailings.”

“I can’t believe you’re bugging me when we’ve got this huge decision to make. I don’t want to talk to you again until you’re ready to act professional,” he snapped, and hung up on her.

Nancy let the phone drop. “Damn. Now he’s furious.”

“Good.” Liam’s hand delved deeper. “Heard the name Peter,” he murmured. “Couldn’t help myself. Let him stew in his own juices.”

“Easy for you to say!” she snapped.

“What have you got to lose?” he demanded. “The cheap bastard doesn’t even pay you what he owes you, right?”

“Butt out of things that don’t concern you, Liam,” she said tartly. “I appreciate all your help, but please do not interrupt any more of my business calls with inappropriate sexual advances.”

“Inappropriate?” He grinned. “I’ll show you inappropriate.”

“Not today, you won’t.” She stuck out her chin.

“Later, then,” he said.

Nancy swallowed, riveted by the hot promise in his eyes. “Later.”

The day raced by. She spent most of it on the phone rearranging concert dates and dealing with Brigid McKeon’s agency. Liam was unobtrusive, but she was intensely aware of his presence, sneaking hungry glances at the unconscious grace and power of his every movement. More than once he caught her peeking, and his grin made her heart twist joyfully.

Daylight faded. She printed up labels for the next mailing of the new Mandrake promo brochure, exited out of her database, and closed the computer. She hesitated for a moment and turned off her cell. It was the professional kiss of death, but right now, she could give a flying flip. She went to the door that led to his workshop, which was dominated by a large and beautiful dining room table. He’d left the door open.

He was bending over a workbench, sanding some piece too small for her to identify. He looked up, though she was barefoot and had tried to make no sound, and put the piece down.

“You done for the night?” he asked.

She nodded. “Just shut down the computer.”

He held out his arms. “So you’re all mine?”

She wrapped her arms around him and breathed deeply of the fresh smell of wind and rain and fresh-cut wood that clung to him. “All yours,” she promised rashly. “I even turned off the phone.”

Silent laughter vibrated his big frame. “Wow. That’s huge, Nancy.”

“It is, it really is,” she agreed. “Shall we think about dinner?”

“In a bit,” he said. “First, there’s something that I want to try out with you. I’ve been thinking about it all day. And before, too.”

She kissed the triangle of skin at the V of his shirt. “What’s that?”

Without warning, her jeans slipped down around her hips and around her knees. He’d sneakily unbuttoned them. Her panties soon followed, and she stepped out of them, giggling. “Liam—”

“Let me just put you right…here,” he said, hoisting her naked bottom up onto the edge of the table he was making. The varnished surface was cool and smooth against her naked buttocks.

She smothered more giggles, gasping as he pushed her thighs apart. “Um, what exactly do you have in mind?” she asked, breathless.

He sank down onto his knees. “Let me show you.”

The week that followed was strange and wonderful, a seesaw of emotional extremes. Her days were spent in the makeshift office in Liam’s living room, working, or trying to. She vacillated from wiggling her toes with manic joy and laughing out loud for no reason to worrying obsessively about her sisters, or stressing about the stairwell thugs. And missing Lucia, so sharply she could taste it. Grief left a hard lump in her throat that only Liam’s embrace could ease.

It comforted her, somehow, that Lucia had handpicked him for her. Like a benediction from beyond. Her sisters approved of him, too. One night, Vivi and Nell had driven up in Vivi’s van from the city to have dinner. Liam had impressed the hell out of them with leg of lamb, new potatoes with herbs, and a good red wine. Gooey chocolate profiterole had clinched the deal. They were blatantly rooting for him. Which was great, but it ratcheted the pressure up even higher.

Nancy and Liam ate all their meals together, and feasting on Liam’s abundant home-cooked food was having its inevitable effect. After only a few days, her jeans were noticeably tighter, to her chagrin and Liam’s unqualified approval. She’d brought an espresso pot, a bean grinder, and a sizable stash of coffee beans to his house, and with that small but crucial detail taken care of, she was in hog heaven.

On evenings when it didn’t rain, they wrapped themselves in a fluffy afghan and sat together on the porch swing, listening to birds, crickets, frogs, wind chimes. Talking about anything and everything, or sitting in a companionable silence. A fearful little voice whispered cynically to enjoy it while it lasted. And goddammit, she would.

Liam was still carrying the gun around, but after over a week had passed with no attacks upon her person, the immediacy of the threat had eased. Nancy was almost ready to broach the subject they were so carefully avoiding. Which was, what came next.

She couldn’t stay up here cloistered in his bed forever. And in any case, the time he’d taken off to work on Lucia’s house was coming to an end. He had other jobs scheduled after it. The real world beckoned.

Her fantasy was to integrate the two realities, make him a real part of her life. Part of her was cynically sure that it was too much to hope. But oh, she liked the person who she was with him.

She would make adjustments. Be flexible. He was so worth it.

He was showing her how to make soda bread in his kitchen one evening, a pot of fragrant stew bubbling on the stove, when she broke the ice and told him she needed to drive back down to New York.

A chill settled over his face, though his expression did not change.

“What for?” His voice had a strangely distant tone.

“I have to leave Moxie with Freedy’s wife, Andrea, when I go to the FolkWorld Conference next week,” she explained.

He scowled, suspiciously. “A conference?”

“It’s important,” she said. “For me and for all my artists. Freedy and Peter and Enid and Mandrake are all performing. Eoin, too. I won’t be alone for a second. I’ll be surrounded by everyone I know, in fact.”

He let out a skeptical grunt. “Is Freedy another one of your exes?”

“Yes, but it’s amicable,” she assured him. “Freedy has a showcase Friday night at FolkWorld, but Andrea has to work, so she’s staying in the city. She promised to look after Moxie for me.”

“Why not just leave her here with me?”

She gazed at his unreadable profile and gathered her nerve.

“Thank you. But that, uh, brings me to something I wanted to ask.”

“Ask away.” He did something efficient looking with milk, mixing the batter with a few competent swipes of a wooden spoon.

She took a deep breath and blurted it out. “Want to come?”

He froze, his hands buried in dough. “To the conference?”

She hastened on. “It’s in Boston, at the Amory Lodge. I’ll get you a listener’s pass. You’d stay in my room, of course. Seeing as how it’s a weekend, and you have a job scheduled for next week, I figured, maybe you could drive up Saturday.”

“Hmph.” He looked unconvinced.

“This is the thing,” she went on. “I’ve been experiencing your life since I’ve been here, staying in your house, eating your food—”

“Sleeping in my bed.”

“Yes, sleeping in your bed, and it’s wonderful. But I have my own life. I want you to get to know it the way I’ve gotten to know yours. The conference will be crazy, and I’ll be networking with agents and presenters, and probably we won’t sleep. But you’ll hear great music and meet great people. And Eoin would be ecstatic. Mandrake’s showcase will be his first performance. It kicks off their spring tour.”

He gathered the dough into a loose ball, his face thoughtful. “What night is Eoin’s thing?”

“Saturday night. At eleven-thirty, if you can believe it.”

He laid the dough on the floury countertop, still not meeting her eyes. “I was thinking of taking a few more days off,” he admitted.

“You were?” she said hopefully.

“But I was thinking along the lines of running away with you. Someplace where I won’t have to share you with hundreds of people. I know a guy on the coast who charters a sailboat. I thought, four or five days, no worries, no looking over our shoulders. No cell coverage.”

She snorted. “You do like to push your luck, don’t you?”

“To the hilt,” he said, eyes gleaming.

Nancy watched his floury fingers patting dough onto the counter. “It sounds wonderful,” she said. “But I was hoping—” She bit her lip.

“What were you hoping?” He laid the lump of dough onto a floured baking sheet. He flicked his eyes up, frowning when she didn’t answer.

“I want this thing to be real, Liam,” she said. “Right now it’s a fairy tale, totally removed from my real life. I want to pinch myself to make sure you really exist.”

He slipped his arms around her waist, careful not to touch her with his floury hands. “Let me prove to you that I exist, sweetheart.”

She swatted him. “Stop trying to distract me. I want my friends to meet you. I want you to hear my artists. I…I want this to be real.”

“How long is this conference?” he asked cautiously.

“Four days. Thursday through Sunday.”

He tapped his fingers on the counter. “How about I come Saturday night, see Eoin’s showcase, and experience your life Sunday. Then Monday morning we take off and go sailing for a few days. Deal?”

Her heart soared. “Deal.”

“Great. I’ll call the guy, make the reservation. And now, let me put this in the oven and wash my hands, so I can grab you properly.” He scrubbed and rinsed his hands and pulled her into his arms.

“I’m so glad we’re doing this,” she said softly. “It makes me feel as if there’s hope for us. For the future, I mean.”

He stood so still, and so silently, a chill of apprehension gripped her. “Sorry,” she said, through gritted teeth. “Forget I said that.”

“It’s all right,” he said in a guarded voice. “I hope it, too.”

But he wasn’t hoping too hard, from the sound of it. She buried her face against his sweater and hung on with all her strength. As if strength had anything to do with hanging on to a man. She never had gotten the knack, what with her talent for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. Like the fairy tale about the girl who dropped toads from her mouth. But she would hang on to the bitter end, toads or no toads.

They would have to pry her away from this guy with a crowbar.

John adjusted the angle of the flexible head of the video camera he was threading between the slats of the heating vent, checking the monitor to be sure it would cover the whole miserable little apartment.

He was in a foul humor, and had been for days. Ever since that bruising encounter with that pain-in-the-ass carpenter who had taken it upon himself to be Nancy D’Onofrio’s champion. Knightly had been an unpleasant surprise. He’d caused John to lose still more face with his employer, which he could ill afford to do. And for that, Knightly would die. First he had to get this shitbag job behind him. But most definitely later. John planned to make the carpenter his own special little personal project.

He’d already dispatched the worthless turd he’d hired for local backup, but that did nothing to satisfy the bloodlust. That came squarely under the category of taking out the garbage before it began to stink. That was pure practicality. No element of pleasure or recreation.

Back to the task. He looked around Nancy D’Onofrio’s wretched apartment. It was clear that she had not located the sketches. But she would be highly motivated to do so. He would be, if he lived like this.

He’d searched her sister Antonella’s apartment in SoHo the day before. It was lined with books rather than CDs, but had more or less the same pathetic square footage. He’d searched every nook and cranny. Studied every piece of correspondence. Rigged up watching and listening devices. State-of-the-art stuff. It was nice to have a large operating budget.

The carpenter’s house was the obvious next step, but John was waiting for the perfect opportunity. Patience was key to not getting caught or killed. Hard though that was to justify to a demanding boss.

The carpenter never left her alone. No doubt fucking her for most of the day. John didn’t blame the guy. He was looking forward to taking his turn. He thought about that a lot as he sat in the woods, staring through binoculars at the carpenter’s house, massaging his crotch.

His exhaustive, systematic search of the D’Onofrio daughters’ living spaces had turned up exactly nothing so far, which meant that the time had come to start in upon the luscious physical persons of the D’Onofrio daughters themselves. A task he would relish.

He’d given a great deal of thought to where to begin. At first, he’d leaned toward the younger ones, who seemed more careless and distracted. Antonella and Vivien had not yet internalized the threat.

But his instincts prodded him in the direction of the oldest daughter. If one of them knew something, chances are she would know the most. Besides, he was salivating to interrogate her. Having her snatched from his jaws had sharpened his appetite for her to a knife’s edge. He lay in bed, sleepless, imagining it. Her, beneath him, begging and struggling. Knightly couldn’t afford to hover over her forever.

Eventually, he would falter. And John would be ready.

The phone rang, and he whipped around, irritated to have his happy reverie interrupted. The answering machine clicked on.

“Hey, Nancy?” a woman said. “This is Andrea. I’ve been calling your cell, but it’s not on, so I hope you’re checking messages. I’m just calling to tell you that I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to find some other solution for Moxie. I decided to take a personal-leave day and drive up to Boston Thursday night so I can see Freedy’s showcase. I know I promised kitty coverage, but Freedy and I get so little time together as it is, you know? Anyhow, see you at the conference. Bye!”

Boston? Conference? John went back to Nancy’s cluttered desk, and shuffled with his plastic-gloved hands in the paperwork, looking for something that had flickered at the edge of his attention. Ah, yes. There.

A conference program. The FolkWorld Conference. Thursday through Sunday, at the Amory Lodge Hotel. It would be crowded, but she would be distracted. Open to meeting new people, schmoozing.

He tucked the program into his bag. Nancy D’Onofrio was about to have the networking experience of a lifetime.