Morgan Hayes - Tall, Dark And Wanted

Maybe it was paranoia, but the name Sergio Sabatini jumped to the front of his mind. It was too late at night for lost or stranded tourists, and even if it was just some hapless soul, Barb’s was certainly not the first—and definitely not the most obvious—house along the lakeshore road.

It was that thought and a renewed sense of self-preservation that spurred Mitch away from the window and into action.

MOLLY COULDN’T PUT a finger on the bad feeling that had started in the pit of her stomach from the moment she’d seen Barb Newcombe’s name on the mailbox, but the feeling had risen steadily with each step she took toward the virtually unlit house. A dim but warm light slipped through the shuttered windows of a single downstairs room, flickering through the driving snow. The only other light came from the front porch.

As she mounted the steps, Molly switched off her flash-light and shoved it into a pocket of her anorak. She brushed herself off, removing one glove and wiping at the melted snow on her face while she stared at the set of double front doors.

The bad feeling moved up from her stomach and clutched at her lungs. She took a deep breath to try to calm it.

It wasn’t like the feeling she would sometimes get while working a case, moments before something went very wrong. And it was different from the kind that had saved her skin on more than a couple of occasions in the line of duty. But it was definitely a “feeling.”

Maybe she was tired.

Then again, maybe she was just worried, Molly rationalized. Worried about the kind of reception she might receive from Mitch after all these years.

She lifted a hand to one door and knocked solidly.

She waited.

Nothing happened.

Again she knocked. And again, nothing. The cold, black silence of the night, so different from the bright lights of Chicago, only added to her sense of unease as she reached for the door’s brass handle.

And that unease intensified when the latch moved freely and the door swung open. Maybe it was one of those gut feelings she was having, Molly thought as she took the first tentative step into the house and lowered her knapsack to the floor. Something definitely felt wrong.

What if Sabatini had gotten to Mitch first? The thought sent a hot prickle of fear along her skin. Lifting the bottom edge of her anorak, she unclipped the holster at her hip and removed her duty weapon. The Glock’s grip was cold, and her fingers shivered along the icy nickel as she drew back the slide.

She refused the urge to call out Mitch’s name. If Sabatini’s men had already found the house, there was the chance they were still on the premises. She certainly couldn’t afford to announce herself, she thought, taking another step into the dimly lit foyer and nudging the door closed behind her.

Vaguely, she was aware of the interior, the predominance of pine, the spaciousness of what had initially appeared to be a small house, and the tasteful, expensive decor including huge plants that thrived in the abundance of natural light that undoubtedly flooded through the floor-to-ceiling windows and the several skylights overhead during the day. The curved staircase reached up toward a darkened second floor, and to her right was the living room.

A warm glow flickered across the hardwood floors from the blazing fireplace. The only other light was a reading lamp beside an empty chair. As Molly moved cautiously through the room, she spotted the sketches on the coffee table. Architectural sketches.

Mitch was here. Or, at least, he had been.

Molly tucked a stray wisp of hair behind her ear and looked to the hearth. If Sabatini’s men had found Mitch, it had been very recently. She’d not seen any headlights in her long walk from where the Jeep had finally run out of gas, and the fire had been recently stoked. So maybe they were still here.

Like a sixth sense, the bad feeling gripped her again. It shivered its warning along her spine and caused the fine hairs at the back of her neck to bristle. Tightening her grip around her weapon, she started down the shadow-filled hallway to what she guessed was the kitchen.

But Molly didn’t get far. Barely two steps through the arched doorway, a blinding pain stopped her in her tracks—a pain that seared along the base of her skull and pitched her to her knees. For one wavering moment, Molly was aware of the floor’s ceramic tile, cool against her cheek. And in the next, blackness swallowed her.

ALL OF A SUDDEN the chunk of firewood in his hands seemed unbearably heavy—heavier than it had before he’d swung it high and felt its reverberating, almost sickening contact with the woman’s skull. With a small twinge of guilt, Mitch set the makeshift weapon down next to the body sprawled across the kitchen floor. He hadn’t thought it would be that easy when he’d taken up the piece of firewood and slipped into the kitchen before the first knock at the door.

His grip had tightened around the wood as he’d listened to her move through the front hall, then the living room. And when she’d rounded the corner to the kitchen, stepped through the doorway past his hiding spot, and he’d seen the light from the living room glint along the metal of the gun she held in her hand, he’d needed no more incentive. Mitch had swung.

Maybe he’d brandished the log a little too hard, though, he mused now as he turned on the kitchen lights and knelt beside her unmoving body. Thankfully there was no blood, but what if he’d broken her neck?

Part of him knew he shouldn’t care; after all, she’d come here to kill him. If he hadn’t attacked her first, she would have turned that gun on him. Still, she was a woman, and he had just struck her with a blow beyond anything he’d considered himself capable of inflicting on another human being.

Mitch slipped his hand beneath the collar of the woman’s anorak to the soft skin along her throat. Relief swept through him. There was a pulse.

In the harsh glare of the kitchen’s overhead fluorescents, Mitch was surprised at her small stature. When he’d seen her shadowed figure come through the arched doorway, her back to him, she’d looked bigger somehow. Or maybe it was the gun that had made her appear more formidable. But now, with her face turned away and her arm splayed out across the tiles as though she were reaching for him, she looked almost fragile.

Taking a deep, fortifying breath, Mitch reached for her. He grasped her shoulders in his hands and slowly eased her limp body over.

He wasn’t certain what came out of his mouth first: a curse or her name. But as he stared into her face, disbelief washing over him, there was no stopping the string of expletives that escaped his lips.

Her complexion seemed pale—almost frighteningly so—and Mitch felt for her pulse again.

“Come on, Molly. Snap out of it.” His voice filled the silence of the house, panic causing it to waver. “Molly, come on. I know you’re tough. Don’t do this to me. You’re going to be all right. Come on, honey.”

But there wasn’t so much as a moan or a twitch. She was out cold.

He should take her to the hospital, Mitch reasoned. But how could he? Even if anonymity wasn’t a crucial factor in his life right now, the closest ER had to be a good hour away at least, and that didn’t take into account the storm.

God, if he’d only known it was her. What was she doing here? How had she found him? Why hadn’t she called out for him? What had possessed her to just walk in with her gun drawn? And then Mitch was cursing her all over again as he unzipped her jacket. He checked her pulse a third time.

Beneath the dark green fleece lining, she wore a form-fitting thermal top tucked into her jeans. It puckered around the leather strap of her gun’s empty holster, drawing suggestively over the gentle swell of her breasts and her delicate rib cage. Mitch watched the fabric pull slightly as she took another shallow breath.

Twelve years…They’d certainly been good ones to Molly, he thought, staring into her face. The rounder lines that had been there in her youth had been replaced with more angular, mature features that accentuated the extraordinary bone structure beneath. Mitch was reminded of all the photos he’d seen of Molly’s mother. And when he looked at the seductive curve of Molly’s slightly parted lips, full and still moist, it was as though the years hadn’t passed, as though it was only yesterday that he’d tasted that tantalizing mouth.

Reaching out to brush back a stray wisp of dark hair, he touched her cheek. So soft. Like silk. He could still remember the feel of her skin…its softness against his, the supple curves of her body molding into his, the eager heat of her passion melding with his until he’d hardly known where his longing had begun and hers ended….

“Come on, Molly,” he murmured again, trying like hell to push the torrid memories back. “If you can hear me, you’ve gotta snap out of this. You’re scaring me, honey. Do you hear me? Molly?”

He leaned even closer to her, not sure what to do next, but knowing that he had to get her off the cold, hard kitchen floor. And that was when he smelled her—subtle traces of jasmine mingling with that intoxicating scent that was undeniably and forever Molly. The years melted away…they were in her father’s house, in Molly’s bedroom. She’d lit candles, while old Elton John tunes played on her stereo. She’d been bolder that night than she’d ever been, knowing her father was working midnight shift at the precinct. In twelve years, Mitch had never forgotten the tantalizing smile that had played on her lips when she’d shed the short, silk kimono, letting it fall to the floor as she stood naked before him, her skin glowing in the candlelight, her dark hair tumbling over her tanned shoulders and the shadows playing along each seductive curve, while he lay on her bed…waiting.

It was the last time they’d made love, one week before fall semester started, the night before he’d had to return to Boston. The last time he’d ever seen Molly…

“Molly, please…” he begged her again, but this time he slid his arms beneath her and gently lifted her delicate body from the floor. “Please, honey…”

God, she had to be all right, Mitch prayed. She had to be.

Molly was aware of the pain first. The dull throb stemmed from the base of her skull and spiked upward. Then she felt the heat—a radiating warmth against her left cheek—and she could hear the low crackle of fire in the hearth.

The memories came together like scattered pieces of a puzzle. She’d walked through the house, seen Mitch’s sketches on the coffee table, moved down the hall with her gun drawn, and finally there had been the blow and the blinding pain. Silently, she cursed herself. Yes, she’d certainly done a good job of walking directly into someone’s trap.

Sabatini’s trap? It had to be. She pushed back the instantaneous surge of panic. His men must have gotten to Mitch first, then had probably left her for dead.

But…the last thing she remembered was the cold, ceramic tiles of the kitchen floor. Even without opening her eyes, she knew she was on the leather sofa she’d seen in the living room. Why would Sabatini’s men move her?

“How do you feel?”

In twelve years…no, in a million years, she’d never forget his voice. Its deep, resonant tone slipped through the silence, smoothing out the sharper edges of her pain and wrapping itself around her like a lover’s embrace.

The only thing more seductive than that was the sight of him.

Mitch sat less than three feet away, perched on the edge of the coffee table. He leaned forward with his elbows braced against his knees. His forehead creased and those dark eyes narrowed with what appeared to be genuine concern.