Jeopardy (13 page)

Of course she had, she thought with self-dis-gust. She had acted like a madwoman. “I’m so sorry. So
truly
sorry. I think tonight it would be better if you slept in your room. That way you won’t be disturbed.”

“To hell with my being disturbed! You’re the one I’m concerned about.”

She pressed fingers to her temple. "I really don’t want to talk about this.”

“Angelica—”

“No.” She wheeled and headed for the door. “I’m going to see if the chef can whip up something chocolate for me, and then I’m going to get to work. I have a lot to do today.”

“Angelica."

His voice stopped her before she reached the door. She looked over her shoulder.

“I’ll be here tonight."

“There’s no need. I’ll be quite safe. I’ll even lock the door."

“I’ll be here tonight.”

Angelica threw herself with gusto into the final plans for the ball, following up on the tiniest detail and making work when there was none. Anything to keep her mind from switching to the contents of her dreams.

She felt as if she were being haunted. She didn’t know what the dreams meant, but they were so vivid, so utterly clear, it was as if they weren't really dreams at all. And that was at night. During the day they had begun to consume her.

Every once in a while she would look up from whatever she happened to be doing at the moment and she would see Amarillo watching her. She accepted his vigilance. She would not allow guards, and so he was keeping track of her. As long as she didn’t feel closed in. she wouldn’t complain, and he was obviously smart enough to know it.

He sensed danger and it was his nature to be a protector.

She, too, sensed danger, but an internal danger that was more frightening to her than whatever the man who had been calling had planned for her.

Intellectually she knew her dreams
must
be connected in some way to the calls and the note. She was being harassed by some unknown person, and it was logical that the distress she felt would manifest itself in her dreams.

Up to a point, everything made sense.

Except—inside her there was a certain knowledge she couldn’t explain or justify, a knowledge that was telling her that the dreams had very little to do with the calls and the note.

That evening she chose to eat in the dining room. She wanted to be around people, to hear them as they talked and laughed. She wanted to pretend she was, like them, completely normal.

Amarillo joined her at her table, elegant, charming, and very determined to be with her. He was silent for the most part, and she concentrated on eating, resolved he would have no cause to try to make her eat. After dinner they drifted apart as they mingled with the guests.

She was staving off that time when she would have to go upstairs to sleep. Eventually, though, her eyelids began to grow heavy, and suddenly Amarillo was beside her, taking her arm and leading her to the elevator.

“I suppose you’re going to insist on coming to my room tonight,” she said, leaning against the burgundy velvet padded walls of the elevator interior and gazing at him.

He nodded. “That’s right.”

“You can sleep in the same bed with me if you want, but I’m not going to make love with you.” 

“Whatever you want is fine with me,” he said, the expression in his golden eyes solemn. Then he stepped to her, lowered his body against hers so that she was pressed against the velvet padded wall, and kissed her.

“Now what do you want?” he whispered against her mouth a moment later.

“You,” she answered. “Lord, I want you.”

And several hours passed before she slept and dreamed.

There was the darkness again, the fear, the crying. There was the music, the laughter, and the voices. And everything was mixed together with a surrealistic horror—the laughter with the crying, the music with the fear, the voices with the darkness.

She awoke with a gasp, and for a minute lay perfectly still, trying to separate reality from the dream. She was awake, she assured herself, not still caught up in the dark, intricate labyrinth of her subconscious.

Beside her she heard the deep, steady breathing of Amarillo. She gave silent thanks for the further reassurance she wasn’t dreaming and for the fact that she hadn’t awakened him.

As quietly as possible, she slipped from the bed, and taking the lace coverlet with her, she made her way to the open French door. Wrapping the coverlet around her, she sat down on the floor and rested her back against the doorjamb.

From the bed Amarillo watched her from beneath half-closed eyes. She looked so fragile, so vulnerable, his heart ached. With eveiy minute, with every hour, she was withdrawing more and more from him. And he didn’t know how to stop her.

A huge silver moon hung out over the water, lighting the night. Angelica focused on it, concentrating hard on its beauty and its mystery. By doing that, she didn’t have to think about a horrible truth: She was losing her mind.

Eight

Peter came up behind Angelica as she was sitting in a second-floor meeting area, going through her notes. “Miss DiFrenza?”

Angelica started and jerked around. “What
is
it?”

The young bellman’s eyes widened at her reaction. “I’m soriy. Am I bothering you?”

Angelica sighed. She was tired and her nerves were strung to the breaking point, but that was no reason to take it out on him, she realized. “No, Peter, you aren’t bothering me, and I’m sorry I snapped at you."

He grinned with relief. “Don’t worry about it. I know with the ball tomorrow night you must have a lot on your mind.”

“I do, but that's no excuse. At any rate, what can I do for you?”

“Oh, right!” He grinned again, thinking that a guy could be forgiven for losing his train of thought just by looking at her. She was great, not to mention gorgeous. He mentally brought himself up short. She was also a Deverell and that took her way out of his league. “I came up to tell you that Mr. Breckinridge has checked in and wanted you to be told he'd arrived.”

She nodded. "Thank you. I do want to speak with him. Could you call his room for me and ask him if now would be a good time for him to meet me? Here?”

“Sure will, Miss DiFrenza. Anything else I can do to help?"

She graced him with a smile. “I’d love a pot of tea. And if you wouldn’t mind, have the kitchen add several cups to the tray. I’m setting up shop here for a while. The guests for the ball have started arriving, and I don’t have time right now to greet eveiyone. Oh, and see if the kitchen has any chocolate bars.”

“No problem, Miss DiFrenza. Tea and chocolate bars it is.”

Minutes later, when William Breckinridge appeared, Angelica did her best to shake off her strained mood, even though she noted that he appeared to be under somewhat of a strain himself. “I hope your trip was pleasant and uneventful.”

"Yes, it was, thank you. The jewels are locked away in a safe I had brought in and placed in the room I’ve been assigned, and I’ve already sent back to Boston the guard who accompanied me here.”

A sudden thought occurred to her. “Did I remember to tell you that Mr. Smith is handling the extra security here?”

“He notified me, and I plan to check in with him just as soon as you and I are through.”

As usual his formality was getting her down, and she decided to try to inteiject some lightness into their conversation. “It sounds as if you have everything under control. I hope you plan to utilize some of SwanSea’s facilities while you’re here. Do you play tennis?”

“No, I’m afraid I don’t, but I’m sure I’ll find plenty to keep myself busy.”

She tried to imagine him walking along the beach, picking up seashells, and failed completely. “That’s good. By the way, sometime today I would like to get the rubies.”

Dismay puckered his brow. “I’m not sure that would be wise, Miss DiFrenza. They should stay in the safe right up until the time you plan to wear them. That’s the procedure I follow with all the ladies.”

"I see. Well, I’ll speak with Mr. Smith about it. At any rate, I’m glad you and the jewels have arrived safely. And now that you’re here, try to relax and have a good time.”

A strange expression crossed his face, and he seemed to hesitate. He was probably trying to decide if he should tell her that his idea of a good time would be to sit in front of the vault all day and watch it, she thought, then immediately chastised herself. He was a valued employee of DiFrenza’s and had been for years. She just wished he weren’t so tiring.

“Good-bye, Mr. Breckinridge.”

“Good-bye, Miss DiFrenza.”

* * *

By late afternoon Angelica had a pounding headache, a still uncompleted list of things she needed to do, and a growing sense that the walls were closing in around her. Barely conscious of making the decision to flee, she escaped the house by a back door and headed toward the woods.

The day was warm, the breeze gentle. Quite a few people were out, strolling through the gardens, heading to and from the swimming pool and the tennis courts, or simply sitting on the lawn in padded lounge chairs, enjoying the view and the sun. The latter activity appealed greatly to her, and she wondered fleetingly if it was possible for the sun to bake away the demons that seemed to be filling her head and giving her the dreams.

Sometime later, Amarillo found her stretched out on a soft, luxuriant section of grass by a clear running brook, an arm across her closed eyes. He quietly lowered himself to the ground beside her.

She felt his presence as an increase in warmth on her skin and an acceleration of her pulse, but she had mixed emotions about his being there. She didn’t feel fit to be around anyone, especially him. For him she wanted to be at her best, and she was anything but that now.

During the past half hour she had been going over and over her dreams, trying to find a thread of reason within their chaos.

Who was the child who cried? Who was the man who handled her so roughly? And who was the lady with the sweet, familiar voice? She should
know,
but she had racked her brain and had come up with no memories. In the end, she had succeeded only in increasing her anxiety and tension.

“How did you find me?” she asked without moving her arm.

“Peter saw you go into the woods. I think he has a crush on you.”

“He’s a nice boy."

“I’m sure he wouldn’t be thrilled to hear you call him a boy.”

Slowly she lowered her arms and opened her eyes. “Was there some reason in particular you wanted to see me?” She couldn’t believe what she was saying even as she was saying it. Her aloof tone was even harder to believe. It reinforced what she already knew—she had found no peace here by the brook, and the state of her nerves was at a critical point. Dear Lord,
was there any hope for her
?

His gaze narrowed on her. “There are a lot of reasons, the main one being I don’t like you out of my sight too long.”

“You really do need to curb those protective tendencies of yours, Amarillo.”

“I can’t seem to do that, at least not with you,” he said, unperturbed by her sarcasm. “How are things going?”

She sat up, wishing she could open up and tell him everything she was thinking—that she wasn’t doing at all well, that bit by bit she was losing control, and that soon she would be completely insane. But she loved him too much to burden him with her problems. . . .

"I really can't complain, although today’s been a little hectic,” she said lightly. "I got a call from Boston, telling me that one of my buyers, who’s in Italy buying for the fall season, has fallen in love with an Italian.” She shrugged. “Go figure. He pinched her bottom and won her heart. She quit on the spot.. Seems she’s going to redirect her life. The message was a little garbled, but it had to do with sports cars, pasta, and bambinos. I had to dispatch someone to replace her. Then the florist called to tell me that his number one assistant has developed an allergy to flowers and won’t be able to help him tomorrow. He’s frantic and assures me he can’t go on.” She checked her watch. “An hour and a half ago the confection chef got in a huff because his grocery order was short four bags of sugar and he stormed out of the kitchen, vowing never to return. But all in all, it’s going really well.”

"That’s good.”

She met his gaze, half expecting to see the familiar twinkle of humor in his eye. Instead, she saw concern. “Hey, I’ll handle it somehow, and I have every faith that tomorrow night there will be a ball.”

“I couldn’t care less about the damned ball, Angelica.”

It was the dreams, she thought with sudden dread. He was going to ask her about the dreams, and she wouldn’t be able to stand it. She felt physically and mentally incapable of voicing her fears and confusion at this point. She had just been through it with herself, and the ordeal had left her feeling scraped raw. Besides, he deserved better than to be dragged into the horrible twists and turns of her mind, especially when she herself didn’t know what was there.

She rushed to another subject. “Have you come up with anything on the man who has been harassing me?”

“Not a thing. I have our people in Boston working on it. The police are running his method of operation through the computer, the note has been sent to the lab, and the tap is still on your phone. But so far nothing.”

“It’s been three days since he sent the note. Maybe he’s given up.”

“I’d like to believe that, but I don’t. Not for a minute. I think he knows I’m involved and is trying to figure out the best way to get around me.” 

A chill ran down her spine. “That sounds very ruthless.”

“You better believe it.” He paused. “Have you given any more thought to who this man could be?”

She drew her legs up and wrapped her arms around them. “No.”

Suddenly he let out a string of curses. “I can’t take any more of this. Talk to me, Angelica.”

She looked at him in surprise. “I thought I was.”

“No. You’re talking, but not to me. Ever since the dreams have gotten worse, you’ve pulled away from me and withdrawn into yourself. I’m sure what’s happening with you isn’t obvious to other people, but it’s damned obvious to me. And if I let things go on as they have been, pretty soon I won’t be able to reach you at all."