on her side, staring blankly at the window, where she could feel the sun warming the spread, splashing her face.
She was supposed to be Cecilia Webster now, a twenty-six-year-old blind woman from Cleveland, Ohio.
It was an identity provided for her protection, but she hadn’t felt safe one moment in the past four weeks.
A couple more weeks. That’s what Keller had promised her. In a couple more weeks the investigation should be over and the killers would be behind bars. Then she could return to her life…at least the shattered pieces that were left.
She closed her eyes, hoping, praying for the sweet release that sleep could bring, hoping, praying that the nightmares that so often plagued her sleep remained at bay.
Jesse looked at his watch for the third time in twenty minutes. His houseguest had been in the bedroom for nearly three hours and he hadn’t heard a peep.
While she’d slept, he’d made dinner, deciding on hamburgers and chips. Not exactly a gourmet welcome meal, but simple and easy to eat.
He checked his watch yet again. After six. He wondered if perhaps he should wake her, but was reluctant to intrude on her sleep if that’s what she needed. He supposed she’d get up when she was hungry, and in the meantime all he could do was wait.
He walked into the kitchen, grabbed a cold soda from the refrigerator and popped the top. He took a long swallow, then moved to the window to stare outside.
He’d called the sheriff’s office earlier to let Vic Taylor, one of his deputies know he needed to take a day or two off. Even though Keller had told him to keep a normal routine, he couldn’t very well leave a blind woman to her own devices in strange surroundings.
He’d begun to perpetuate the cover story, telling Vic that a friend had stopped by for a surprise visit.
There had been no new breaks on the Casanova case, nothing else pressing that couldn’t wait a day or two. Vic had assured him that the four deputies could handle whatever arose and Jesse had hung up, knowing the people who worked for him were good, competent and fair lawmen.
He took another sip of his soda and moved away from the window with another glance at his watch. A scream ripped through the silence of the house.
For an instant, Jesse froze. The scream had come from the guest room. Adrenaline pumped through him. He slammed his drink down and grabbed his gun from the holster hanging on a hook near the back door. He flipped off the safety and advanced slowly, cautiously down the hallway.
Had somebody managed to track her here? Was somebody in the bedroom with her now? Damn Keller for not telling him more. Damn Keller for not warning him she might be in imminent danger.
He reached the closed bedroom door and paused, listening for a sound, any sound that might indicate what was happening on the other side of the hollow wood. Nothing. Not a sound. Not a single noise.
Was she already dead? Would he open the door to find her lifeless body draped across the bed? If somebody had entered through the window, she would have never seen him coming. She wouldn’t have known she wasn’t alone in the room until hands had closed around her throat, or a blade had touched the flesh of her neck.
Jesse grabbed the doorknob and turned it slowly, soundlessly. Although emotion demanded he hurry—fling open the door and burst inside—training and instinct warned him to go slow, to face the unknown with caution. He eased the door open and stepped inside, the gun leveled in front of him.
Nothing.
The room appeared empty. The bedspread was wrinkled and a depression marked the center of one of the pillows. The window was closed, the curtains neatly in place. Nothing looked out of the ordinary, except Cecilia Webster was no place in sight.
A renewed burst of adrenaline flooded him as he heard a thump come from the closet. The closet door was half-open, but the waning light of dusk threw deep shadows that obscured the interior of the small space.
Jesse advanced, his gun once again leading the way. With one hand, he eased the closet door fully open. She was there.
He lowered his gun and muttered a soft curse beneath his breath. As he gazed at her, curled up in the corner, her eyes squeezed tightly shut and her cheeks stained with tears, he wondered what in the hell she’d been through, and what in the hell he’d gotten himself into!
Chapter 2
She could see through the wooden slats of the closet door, saw the two men burst into the house with their guns drawn.
“Hey. Hey…!” John exclaimed. “What’s wrong? What’s going on?”
Allison watched in horror as her sister and brother-in-law backed away from the men, stood just in front of where she hid in the closet.
“Don’t do anything stu—” John’s voice was lost in the eruption of gunfire.
Gunshots resounded in the air. A total of six. Miniexplosions not loud enough to penetrate the walls of the house, not loud enough to beckon help. But loud enough, strong enough for the bullets to kill John and Alicia.
John fell forward, crashing to the floor like a huge oak felled by a lumberjack’s ax. Alicia flew backward and smashed into the closet door. A bullet slammed into the wall just above Allison’s head. Blood splattered through the slats, a fine spray on her face, her chest.
Shoving a hand against her mouth, Allison tried to still a scream of disbelieving terror. No! Oh, God…no! This couldn’t be happening. Her mind raced frantically to make sense of the scene unfolding in front of her.
She fought the impulse to run to her sister, to try to help her. Someplace in her terror-filled mind, the instinct of survival kept her rooted in her hiding place.
Quiet. She had to stay quiet. If they found her, they’d kill her, too. She had to stay alive. She had to stay alive so she could tell somebody what happened here….
“Cecilia.”
The voice came from some distant place, but it had nothing to do with her. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and shoved her hand harder against her mouth.
Blood. There was too much blood. Alicia was dead—murdered, her blood on Allison’s face. Dear God, all that blood. Why had this happened? Why? Why?
“Cecilia!” The deep male voice called again, this time more forcefully.
She shrank deeper into the closet, pressing her back into the corner in an attempt to escape.
A stinging slap across one of her cheeks jarred her from her nightmare landscape to the present. In an instant, she realized she was a long way from John and Alicia’s home. She was in Montana. Mustang, Montana.
“Sheriff Wilder?” she whispered hesitantly.
“Jesse,” he corrected her. “I’m right here.” His hand closed around one of hers. His hand was large and warm, and offered comfort despite its unfamiliar feel.
Her other hand reached up, hit clothes hanging above her. “I’m in the closet, aren’t I?” Weary discouragement weighed heavy on her shoulders.
