door to her left stood ajar. It screeched like an angry crow when she moved it. As she crossed the threshold, she told herself the feeling of being watched came from her mind, not from the premature darkness that had begun to spread throughout the house.
Beyond the weathered walls, purple clouds had given way to brooding black, and she could hear the wind picking up. The first raindrops hit the windows as she started along a dusty corridor toward—what else—another door.
A veritable maze of interconnecting hallways, the ground floor seemed to go on forever. She passed through two kitchens, a pantry, a massive library, three dining rooms and a dozen other spaces whose purposes eluded her.
Part of her could visualize Darkwood Manor as a Corrigan-Ross property, but a much larger part was struggling with the certain knowledge that Katie wouldn’t have ventured in this deep alone.
Spotting a thin door, she wedged it open. Uneven stairs topped by a rickety wooden railing descended from dusky shadow into fathomless black. Welcome to the cellar, she realized. Yuck.
Hesitating, she tapped her fingers on the jamb, then hit the light switch. “I can’t think of a single reason why you’d be down there, Katie, but on the off chance you’ve lost your mind, I’ll check it out. And be really pissed off if I find you.”
From a point far below, she detected a scrape, possibly a trace of smoke. When she leaned forward, a moaning floorboard blotted the sound out, but she knew what she’d heard, and it hadn’t been the foundation settling.
A bulb at the bottom provided only a weak wash of light, barely enough to make out the mud floor. Although the stairs looked sturdier than the railing, she’d encountered dry rot before and fully anticipated it here. Still, what choice did she have?
She set her foot on the first step. When it didn’t splinter, she moved to the next. And the next.
Her scraped palm stung against the stone wall. Her breath wanted to hitch. She wouldn’t let it, but couldn’t stop the prickles that raced over her skin.
“Not going to freak,” she promised herself. “Just please don’t let it be a snake pit down—”
She broke off, sucking in a startled breath as the handrail and one of the treads cracked in tandem.
Her foot shot through the plank, forcing her to grab the portion of railing still attached to the wall. That it held surprised her—but not as much as the arm that hooked her waist and hauled her upright before her trapped ankle snapped in two.
For a moment, Isabella’s head swam. Then her brain clicked in and she swung her head to face a man. Possibly young. Definitely strong.
He smelled good, she noted, like soap and skin and the rain outside. While she couldn’t make out his features, she spied the glimmer in his eyes.
“You don’t want to go down there, Ms. Ross.”
Suspicion crowded out fear. “Who are you? How do you know my name?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.” She pushed on his arm. When he refused to release her, she twisted sideways. “Look, I appreciate the rescue, but I’m fine now, and I really don’t have time to play games.”
Instead of slackening his grip, he drew her closer until his mouth moved against her temple. “Best use of that time you don’t have would be to get in your car and leave.”
She gave him a determined shove. “I’d love to if you’d let me go.”
“Stop squirming and listen. You need to go back to Boston. No questions, no detours, just get on the highway and drive.”
When she continued to struggle, he used the fingers of his other hand to capture her chin. “Do it, Isabella. Now. While you can.” Then he drew her closer still, set his mouth next to her ear and added a soft, “If you want to live, you need to get as far away from this house as possible.”
Chapter Two
He vanished before she could question him further. Vanished as he’d been trained to do by the government. As he’d been able to do long before anyone had thought to train him.
He knew the melodrama hadn’t worked. He hadn’t expected it would. But short of tying a blanket over her head and tossing her on a southbound train, it was the best he could manage.
He wasn’t supposed to be in the house. He’d promised his uncle he would look around discreetly, without fuss. Fuss led to attention, and that would send the rats scurrying.
If they’d been ordinary rats, he wouldn’t have cared. He still wasn’t sure why he did, but his uncle was concerned, so it wouldn’t hurt him to skulk for a while.
If it turned out Haden was right, something should probably be done. Maybe by him, maybe by someone else. The who here depended on how the local authorities reacted to a hot blonde in a long, black leather coat, with skin that shouted peaches and cream and eyes so blue he’d been struck by the color fifty feet away.
The woman had courage. He admired that. She was determined, likely stubborn. Couldn’t fault those qualities. She also had a body under that black coat…
Blanking his mind to the fantasy, he watched her from his crouch on the sheltered side of the house.
Purposeful strides carried her along the driveway to the front gate and through it to the other side. She didn’t use an umbrella, and she didn’t bother to belt her coat. She had the shoulder bag he’d rifled, her 2K camera and, he imagined, an expression on her face that matched her body language.
A reluctant smile tugged on his lips the longer he watched her. Too bad nothing would come of it, but then he was used to nothing, and what he did have—primarily his uncle—more than compensated for the lack.
Her car engine roared. The tires spit wet gravel as she turned it toward Mystic Harbor, Maine, a town where he and more than one of his ancestors had been born.
His name was Donovan Black. Like it or not—and he definitely did not—he was connected to Darkwood Manor. Which was why, no matter how tempting Ms. Isabella Ross might be, he would never be connected to her.
“YOU’RE NOT GOING TO do anything, are you?” Isabella stared down at a thirtysomething man with a crooked nose and very large teeth. “You have more important matters to attend to than searching for a woman, a stranger, that no one, including you or your deputies, has seen. In any case, Darkwood Manor is situated on the fringe of your jurisdiction, so maybe she’s crossed the county line by now. Problem solved. Have a nice night, ma’am.”
The man’s smile didn’t falter. “Could be you’re right there, Ms. Ross. Could also be you’re inventing a crime to drum up publicity for a new hotel.”
Exasperation won out. “That’s ridiculous. My family doesn’t stoop to publicity stunts. We go about things the old-fashioned way. We advertise. And we only do that when a hotel is up and running. Not only is Darkwood Manor not in that category, it isn’t even a hotel.”
“Yet.”
Isabella held fast to her Irish temper. “Sheriff Lucas, I’ve
