Page 34 of In the Dead of Night

CHAPTER NINE

The mansion was perched on the cliffs like an elegant cat, Sara thought as she pulled into the driveway and killed the engine. Nick had already been gone when she’d wakened an hour earlier. There was no note telling her where to find coffee or when he would return. There was no scribbled apology for what had happened the night before.

Sara wanted to be annoyed. But she knew the kiss they’d shared was not his fault. Nick might have instigated it, but she hadn’t stopped him. In fact, she’d been as into it as he was. That made her every bit as guilty as him.

Even now the memory of the kiss made her heart quicken. She could still feel the insistent pressure of his lips against hers. The warm brush of his breath against her face. The scrape of his whiskers against her cheek. Her traitorous body responding in a way that shocked and embarrassed her.

“Enough, already,” she muttered, pulling out her key and unlocking the front door.

The smells of dust and stale air met her when she stepped inside. She tried not to think of the intruder from the night before as she walked from room to room, making sure no one had broken in during the night. She checked the garage and the patio doors and found both secure.

Nick told her not to come here alone. But Sara had never been good at taking orders. There was no way she could sit around the bungalow and do nothing until he came home from work. It was daylight, after all. The doors and windows were locked down tight. She had her cell phone handy. If someone pulled into the driveway or knocked on the door or even broke a window, she would have ample time to take evasive action.

Still, her nerves were on edge as she wandered to the kitchen and put the kettle on the flame. An ocean gale lashed at the window above the sink as she waited for the water to boil. A few minutes later, steaming coffee mug in hand, she wandered to her father’s study and looked around. Richard Douglas had spent much of his time here, sitting at his desk with the phone in the crook of his neck. A good bit of that time had been shared with Sara’s mother and Nicholas Tyson.

Setting the cup on one of the built-in bookcase shelves, Sara ran her fingers along the intricately carved wood. She told herself she wasn’t looking for a secret compartment. That would be far too…hokey. But Sara knew that when her father had designed the house, he’d made a few architectural errors and corrected them by indulging in a hiding place or two. She felt silly looking, but what would it hurt?

Two hours later she stood at the patio door and watched rain stream down the panes. All she had to show for her time so far was a caffeine buzz and dusty hands. But, for better or worse, Sara had never been easily deterred.

She was on the staircase heading toward the second level when her cell phone chirped. Her heart went into overdrive when she looked down and saw Nick’s name come up. The urge to answer was strong, but she resisted. She knew he wouldn’t be happy about her coming here alone; she didn’t feel up to defending herself. Besides, after what had happened between them last night, better to let things cool off anyway.

Methodically, Sara searched each room. Frustration lay thick in the pit of her stomach when she found nothing of interest. She was thinking about calling it a day when she found herself looking at the attic door. She didn’t want to go up those stairs, particularly after what had happened the last time. After seeing that terrible film. But even more, she didn’t want to walk away empty-handed.

“Just a quick look-see, Douglas,” she muttered as she opened the door and started up the narrow staircase.

The attic was just as she and Nick had left it. The memory of the film flashed vividly in her mind. For the life of her she couldn’t figure out why her parents had had it in their possession. A part of her hoped Nick would come back with proof that the murder depicted in the film wasn’t real. But deep inside she knew it was. Something so horrific, so ugly, would be difficult to reproduce with such awful authenticity.

She started at the shelves above the window that looked out over the rocky cliffs and churning ocean below. Leaving no place untouched, she lost herself in the search for something—anything—that would answer her questions and, she hoped, clear her father’s name.

An hour later the attic still had not given up the secrets her parents had taken with them to their graves. Facing defeat and the disappointing notion that the anonymous caller was, indeed, a crank, Sara stepped back from her work and sighed.

Hands on her hips, she stood near the window and looked around. “Damn it.”

For the first time, she seriously contemplated the reality that her trip to Cape Darkwood would net nothing. That she would not be able to clear her father’s name. That, perhaps, the events of that terrible night twenty years ago had gone down exactly as the police had surmised. There was nothing left to do but lock up the house and head back to Nick’s.

With a heavy heart, Sara left the attic and trudged down the staircase. In the hall, she passed her father’s study, but instead of going to the kitchen for her purse and keys, she found herself drawn into the room. For an instant she was seven years old again. Her mother was curled on the settee in front of the window with a martini in her hand. Her father sat at the desk, his tortoiseshell glasses pushed onto his head. Across from him, Nicholas Tyson sat in a tapestry wingback chair, smoking a fragrant cigar. Her father’s study had been a place for adult work and conversation. A place for important phone calls, computer work and, many times, laughter. It had been one of her favorite rooms in the house.

She wandered the room, feeling foolishly melancholy, touching the shelves as she passed the built-in bookcases. It was times like this when she wondered what her life would have been like if her parents hadn’t died on that terrible night. She and Sonia had been blessed with fabulous parents. Still, she couldn’t help but wonder.

At the hearth, she ran her hands along the walnut mantelpiece, admiring the workmanship. She was almost to the window when something out of place snagged her attention. Backing up a step, she squinted at the intricately carved wood, trying to figure out what wasn’t quite right about it. Her gaze landed on a side piece that connected the mantel to the wall. It was almost as if the wood had been improperly cut and didn’t fit well….

Sara reached out and tugged. The panel came easily away, revealing a small space between the wall and the stone hearth. Her pulse kicked when she spotted the tapestry journal hidden inside.

“What in the world?”

Reaching into the small space, she pulled it out. The cover had once been gold with embossed red roses, but time and dust had dulled both. She blew lightly and dust motes erupted. Her hands shook when she opened the journal to the first page. She realized immediately the strongly slanted handwriting was the same as the notes she’d found in the attic. Not her parents’. But whose?

She skimmed through several pages. Her heart beat like a jackhammer in her chest when she realized some of the passages were nearly identical to the ones she’d read in the notes that had been stolen from her the day before. Missing women. Details about their lives carefully documented.

By whom? she wondered. And why?

Realizing she needed to sit down and read the journal from cover to cover, she closed it, replaced the panel and headed for the kitchen for her purse and keys. She would do her reading at Nick’s where she was certain no one would accost her and steal what she had found.

Snagging her purse from the counter, she dropped the journal inside and headed for the door, digging for her keys as she went. She was midway there when through the sidelight, movement in the driveway caught her eye. Her first thought was that Nick had stopped by to berate her for coming here alone. But when she peered through the beveled glass, she saw a figure in a dark raincoat standing next to her car.

Sara pulled her cell phone from her purse and punched in Nick’s number. When his voice mail picked up, she left a hurried message then opened the door and stepped furtively onto the porch.

The hooded figure glanced her way and she caught a glimpse of the pale oval of a face. But in a flash he was gone, ducking around the house and disappearing into the drizzle and mist.