Chapter 8
Dropping back to all fours, I fled in the opposite direction. Apparently my crashing progress through the undergrowth was convincingly bearlike. The voice behind me rose to the edge of hysteria.
“Omigod! Hurry up, shoot it, shoot it!”
Frigid mud sucked at my hands and feet while I barrelled through the icy creek, praying the duffel bag wouldn’t fall out of my parka. Redoubling my efforts as I charged into the shrubs on the other side, I prayed even more fervently.
Please, after surviving a year and a half while people intentionally tried to kill me, please, please, don’t let me get shot by some fucking moron who thinks he’s the Great White Hunter…
“Settle down, Simpkin.” A deeper, calmer voice made me suck in a breath of relief. “This is why we don’t give sidearms to rookies like you. It’s illegal to shoot it; and anyway, the poor damn thing’s more scared of you than you are of it.”
“But it’s a bear…”
“And it’s probably in the next county by now,” the second voice said in long-suffering tones. “Come on. By the time we finish this circuit it’ll be midnight and we can sign off-shift. My feet are killing me.”
“But it was a bear, it could have killed us…”
Their voices faded, and I fought the urge to collapse on the ground and quiver for a while.
Get it together.
If anything was happening to Nichele, I needed to get in there. And even if she was perfectly safe, the party might be winding down soon if everybody was planning to attend the seminars tomorrow. My chances of buttonholing Harchman were rapidly diminishing.
Suppressing a groan, I turned to splash and slither back through the creek.
The woods were a fresh misery. The inadequate moonlight only penetrated in small patches where a few deciduous trees raised their autumn-bare branches to the sky, and the rest was stygian blackness. Following the sound of distant music, I blundered uphill, making frequent and painful acquaintance with roots, rocks, and low-hanging tree branches.
By the time I reached the edge of the trees by the guesthouses, sweat was trickling down my backbone despite the chill. My jeans and parka sleeves were soaked and icy cold, and I could feel mud drying on my hands and face. I didn’t dare use my muddy hands to check, but the way my scalp was prickling I probably had twigs in my hair, too.
Dress or no dress, I couldn’t join the party looking like this.
Nerves vibrated in my belly. Running out of time.
Through a gap in the trees, the lights of the guesthouse glowed a welcome to those who weren’t mud-covered and marinated in stale sweat. A tantalizing finger of warm light reached toward me as the doorman swung the door wide, offering his usual half-bow and smile to the tux-and-gown-clad couple who strolled inside. Their well-bred laughter mocked my hopeless inability to join them.
The closing door cut off their voices and the doorman resumed his position outside.
Dammit, I needed to get into that guesthouse and get cleaned up.
Rapidly shedding the parka and stripping down to my bra, I turned the parka sleeves inside-out, hoping their wet insides would be cleaner than their mud-caked outsides. My breath plumed in the frosty air while I smeared the soggy ice-cold fabric over my arms and hands.
I finished the job by scrubbing my hands vigorously against my jeans, then transferred my gun to the mannequin’s purse along with the essentials from my waist pouch. With a few jerks of my hairbrush, I dislodged some tangles and stray twigs from my hair.
Halfway to hypothermia, I peeled off my wet, clinging jeans and shivered into the cold fabric of the dress. The icy weight of the necklace added the crowning touch to my goosebumps.
Shivering violently, I stuffed my boots and clothes into the duffel bag and slung it under the nearest large spruce tree, where it melted into the darkness. I did my best to memorize the duffel bag’s position relative to the guesthouse door, then turned back to study the doorman.
I needed a distraction.
Teeth chattering, I glared at the man, willing him to take a break. Go for a smoke or go to the bathroom or something, dammit.
He remained in place, as stiff and solemn as a Buckingham Palace guard.
Hell, he probably didn’t even pee until his shift was over.
What if I screamed, and then circled around to sneak in while he came to investigate?
No, he’d likely stay put and call security. That was the last thing I needed. A generic security guard would be bad enough, but if one of them remembered me from last year my plans could go south in a hurry.
At last common sense kicked in. I muttered, “Idiot,” and pulled out my cell phone to dial Nichele. She would let me into her room for a quick cleanup with no more than some fond eye-rolling and teasing. Thank God my weirdness was already firmly established.
The ring tone sounded again and again before finally going to voicemail. Nichele’s perky recorded voice made my throat constrict.
Oh, God. She always answered her phone. It was never outside her arm’s reach.
Something bad had happened.
I punched the disconnect button and charged out of the woods.
As I lurched onto the illuminated walking path in my ill-fitting slingbacks, a brown-haired woman let out a startled cry from a few feet away, her hand flying to her bejewelled chest. “Oh! I almost shit a brick! Where did you come from?”
Dammit, I hadn’t even seen her on the path behind that big cedar hedge. Her jewellery, dress, and shoes looked classy to me, but what the hell did I know? I couldn’t imagine a high-society matron saying something like ‘shit a brick’. Was she friend or foe?
Even more rattled than before, I mumbled, “Sorry,” torn between the burning need to charge straight up to the main house waving my gun and the urge to keep a low profile.
And double-damn, the doorman had caught sight of me now, too. He offered his usual smile, but it wavered when he took in my appearance.
The woman’s brows drew together, too, as her gaze travelled from my head to my toes.
Almost afraid to look, I glanced down at myself.
Oh, shit, it was worse than I’d thought.
The protection of my hiking boots had only served to emphasize the stark line between my clean feet and ankles and my mud-streaked calves. My hands and wrists were filthy up to the forearms, with deep black crescents of mud under my fingernails.
I didn’t even want to know how my face and hair looked.
“I… uh, I slipped and fell down by the pond,” I lied rapidly. “I was trying to sneak back into the guesthouse and get cleaned up before anybody saw me.”
“Are you all right?” the woman inquired with concern.
“Cold and grumpy, but fine.”
Humour twitched at the corner of her mouth. “Okay, I’ll pretend I didn’t see you, then. Come on; you look half-frozen.” She gestured toward the guesthouse door with a smile.
“I can’t,” I blurted, urgency hammering at me. Find Nichele…
The frown was back between her eyebrows. “I hate to point out the obvious, but you need to. My grandsons come home cleaner than that after running wild outside all day long.”
“Um, no, I meant…” An excuse popped out of my mouth as if I’d actually rehearsed it. “I’m bunking with my friend and she has the room key. I just tried to phone her but she’s not answering…”
“Well, you can’t go to find her looking like that,” the woman said firmly. “Come on, you can clean up in my room. I was just on my way to change to a more comfortable pair of shoes anyway.” She indicated her elegant pumps with a rueful grimace before extending her hand. “Lois Butler.”
“Uh…” I half-extended my filthy paw, hesitating. Give her my real name or my alias?
“Aydan Kelly,” I said in a split-second decision. “Sorry, I don’t think I’d better shake your hand.” I turned it toward her, grubby palm up, and she laughed.
“A little mud never hurt anyone.” She gave me a firm handshake. “Hurry up; you’re shaking like a leaf. Don’t you have a wrap?” She herded me down the path to the guesthouse door as she spoke.
“Nothing that’s not soaking wet and muddy,” I replied truthfully as the doorman bowed us inside, his expression professionally pleasant again.
“I have a spare sweater you can borrow,” Lois offered as we hurried down hallway.
“Oh, no, I don’t want to impose…”
She slid the cardkey into its slot. “Nonsense. I’m not using it, and you can give it back to me tomorrow.”
“Uh… I don’t know if I’ll be here tomorrow,” I muttered, and made a beeline for the bathroom before any more inconvenient questions came my way.
The sight that confronted me in the mirror was enough to make even a strong woman blanch.
I faked a jocular tone. “Omigod,” I called through the door. “You weren’t kidding. This is horrible.”
Her laughter carried back to me. “I told you so.”
Heart pounding, I surveyed the damage. What terrible things might be happening to Nichele while I stood here wasting time?
I forced myself to take a breath and marshal all my hard-earned spy skills. Rushing off without a plan could get us both killed. I needed to schmooze and fit in. No swearing or gun-waving, no matter how attractive the prospect seemed.
I yanked off the pinching shoes and began at the top, shaking a few more spruce needles out of my hair and cleaning the muddy smudges off my face. I couldn’t do anything about the angry red scratch on my cheek, but some diligent scrubbing returned my hands to more-or-less presentable condition.
Hoisting each leg in turn up to the sink to sluice off the mud, I gave thanks that there was nobody to witness my skirt riding up to my waist in the process.
My cleanup felt far too slow, but it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes later when I did a rapid clean-up of the sink and floor with wads of toilet tissue.
I pasted on a smile and emerged from the bathroom. “Thank you so much. I’ll get out of your hair now. I really appreciate you taking me in.”
Lois rose from the soft leather loveseat that graced the small grouping of furniture in front of an impressive stone fireplace. “You look at lot better. Here…” She delved into her purse and handed me a small tube. “Put some concealer on that scratch and you’ll be as good as new.”
Chafing at the delay, I followed her instructions. All part of the plan to fit in, I admonished myself. Stay calm. Stay professional.
When I returned the concealer, she held out a black sweater. “Here, put this on. You’re still shivering.”
“Oh, no, it’s okay. Thanks, though.” I held onto my smile and moved not-too-subtly toward the door. “I’ll be fine as soon as I get back to the party. You know how warm it is in a crowd like that.”
Lois nodded and slid her feet into a flat-heeled version of the pumps she’d worn earlier. “Okay, if you’re sure.” She sighed and followed me to the door. “I can hardly wait to call it a night.” She pulled the door closed behind us and added, “I hate these parties. I thought I’d be done with them when I retired, but I got roped into this by a charity I volunteer with.”
“Mm-hm,” I mumbled, my mind fully engaged in worrying about Nichele.
A moment later I repressed the urge to smack myself in the forehead when I realized Lois had given me a perfect opportunity. Instead of slinking into the party like the pariah I was, I could be Super-Spy Jane Bond, strolling in chatting with an invited guest as though I belonged.
Tuning back into the conversation, I used my best party manners to draw out Lois’s love of music, gardens, and grandchildren on the way back to the main house, thankful that her sarcastic wit made for easy banter.
When we stepped laughing into the grand ballroom, a waiter bearing a tray of wineglasses descended on us immediately. “Would you care for some Chardonnay?”
Lois gave him a smile and accepted a glass. “Thank you. My favourite!”
“Um, sure. Thanks.” I took a glass, too, pretending to sip while I studied the party with my heart pounding.
A middle-aged woman hailed Lois, who turned to engage in the conversation. As soon as her attention was elsewhere I eased out a breath.
The wineglass was trembling in my fingers, and I willed it to steady. Get with the program. Jane Bond would be coolly cataloguing the situation in a single blink of her sophisticated eyelashes; not standing here shaking in her too-small shoes and trying not to spill wine down the front of her stolen dress.
Then again, Jane Bond wouldn’t have bumbled around kidnapping dummies and impersonating bears, either. And she probably didn’t have any friends as dear as Nichele…
I pushed away the babblings of my nervous brain and squared my shoulders. Focus.
With a pleasant shock, I realized I actually had been analyzing the situation while the foolish part of my mind was occupied. Thank God. Maybe I was getting better at this spy stuff.
I already knew the physical layout of the house, and the surveillance cameras were still where I remembered them. And Nichele had been right about the security personnel.
In the ballroom alone there were six goons in dark suits, blending into the cultured crowd approximately as well as toads in a bowl of cream. I’d seen another pair patrolling the path on the way over, and there were likely more of them down by the gazebo and pond. All this in addition to Harchman’s regular uniformed security guards.
Wow. Either somebody was really paranoid, or…
An iron hand closed around my upper arm, not painful enough to make me yelp, but tight enough to mean business. My heart leaped up to vibrate in my throat as the giant owner of the hand leaned down to growl in my ear.
“Please come with me. Don’t make a scene.”