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Rachel’s blood froze in her veins. Fool! she told herself numbly. She should have gone down to the beach and obliterated all those marks. At least the tide would have washed away any blood and other signs that had been left where he had fallen. Deliberately she wrinkled her forehead, giving herself time to think, then let her face clear. “Oh, you must mean where I collect shells and driftwood. I pile them all on a tarp and haul it up here. That way I can get it all up the slope with just one trip.”
“What do you do with them? The shells and driftwood.”
She didn’t like the way Agent Lowell was looking at her, as if he didn’t believe a word she said. “I sell them,” she said, and it was the truth. “I own two souvenir shops.”
“I see.” He smiled at her. “Well, good luck in your shell hunting.” They turned to leave again.
“Do you need a lift?” she asked, raising her voice. “You look hot now, and it’s going to get hotter.”
Both of them looked up at the blistering sun in the cloudless blue bowl of the sky; their faces were shiny with perspiration. “We came by boat,” Agent Ellis said. “We’re going to check along the beach some more. Thanks, anyway.”
“Anytime. Oh, watch out if you go north. It gets swampy.”
“Thanks again.”
She watched them disappear into the pines and down the slope, and chills prickled her skin despite the heat. Slowly she returned to the porch and sat down on the swing, automatically returning to the task of breaking the beans. Everything they had said swirled in her mind, and she tried to sort it all out, to get her thoughts in order again. FBI? It was possible, but they had flashed their badges so swiftly she hadn’t been able to examine them. They knew what he looked like, but they didn’t have any photographs of him; she thought it would be reasonable that the FBI would have some likeness, even if it was just a drawing of someone they were trying to find. And they had sidestepped the question when she asked what he had done, as if they hadn’t anticipated that and didn’t know how to answer. They had said he should be considered armed and dangerous, but instead he was naked and helpless. Didn’t they know he’d been shot? Why hadn’t they said something about that?
But what if she were harboring a criminal? That had always been one of the possibilities, though she had discounted it. Now it swarmed back into her mind, and she felt sick.
The beans were finished. She took the pan into the house and set it in the sink, then returned to gather up the paper with the strings and broken ends on it. As she carried it to the kitchen to stuff it in the trash can she cast an apprehensive look at her open bedroom door. She could just see the head of the bed and his black hair on the pillow…her pillow. When he woke up again, and she looked into those night-black eyes, would she be looking into the eyes of a criminal? A killer?
Swiftly she washed her hands and flipped through the telephone book, then punched the number. It rang only once before a harried male voice said, “Sheriff’s Department.”
“Andy Phelps, please.”
“Just a minute.”
There was another ring, but this time the answer was absentminded, as if the person had other things on his mind. “Phelps.”
“Andy, this is Rachel.”
Immediately his voice warmed. “Hi, honey. Everything okay?”
“Fine. Hot, but fine. How are Trish and the kids?”
“The kids are doing okay, but Trish is praying for school to start.”
She laughed, sympathizing with Andy’s wife. Their boys carried rowdiness to new heights. “Listen, two guys just stopped by the house. They walked up from the beach.”
His voice sharpened. “They give you any trouble?”
“No, nothing like that. They said they were FBI, but I didn’t get a good look at their badges. They’re looking for some man. Are they legitimate? Has your department been notified of anything? I may be paranoid, but I’m out here at the end of the road, and Rafferty’s miles away. After B.B….” Her voice trailed away with the sudden pain of the memory. It had been five years, but there were still times when the loss and regret seared her, when the emptiness got to her.
Like no one else on earth, Andy understood. He had worked with B.B. in the DEA. The memory roughened his tone. “I know. You can’t be too careful, honey. Look, we’ve had orders come down to cooperate with some guys who are looking for a man. It’s all hush-hush. They’re not the local FBI people. I doubt that they’re FBI at all, but orders are orders.”
Rachel’s hand tightened on the receiver. “And an agency is an agency?”
“Yeah, something like that. Keep quiet about it, but keep your eyes open. I’m not real comfortable with the feel of this.”
He wasn’t the only one. “I will. Thanks.”
“Sure thing. Listen, why don’t you come to dinner some night soon? It’s been a while since we’ve seen you.”
“Thanks, I’d love to. Have Trish call me.”
They hung up, and Rachel drew a deep breath. If Andy didn’t think the men were FBI, that was good enough for her. Going into the bedroom, she stood beside the bed and watched the man sleep, his deep chest slowly rising and falling. She had kept the blinds closed since the night she had brought him into the house, so the room was dim and cool, but a thin ray of sunlight crept between two of the slats and slanted across his stomach, making that long, thin scar glow. Whoever he was, whatever he was involved in, he wasn’t a common criminal.
They played lethal games, the men and women who peopled the shadowy world of intelligence and counterintelligence. They lived their lives balanced on the razor’s edge of death; they were hard and cold, intense but casual. They weren’t like other people, the people who worked at the same job every day and went home to their houses, to their families. Was he one of those for whom a normal life was impossible? She was almost certain of it now. But what was going on, and who could she trust? Someone had shot him. Either he had escaped, or he had been dumped in the ocean to drown. Were those two men hunting for him to protect him, or to finish off the job? Did he possess some highly sensitive information, something critical to defense?
