Smoke in Mirrors

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

SMOKE IN MIRRORS

A
Jove
Book / published by arrangement with the author

All rights reserved.

Copyright ©
2002
by
Jayne Ann Krentz

This book may not be reproduced in whole or part, by mimeograph or any other means, without permission. Making or distributing electronic copies of this book constitutes copyright infringement and could subject the infringer to criminal and civil liability.

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The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Putnam Inc.,

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

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ISBN:
0-7865-3890-2

A
JOVE
BOOK®

Jove
Books first published by The Jove Publishing Group, a member of Penguin Putnam Inc.,

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Electronic edition: June, 2003

For Alberta Castle, mom and role model, with love

O
NE YEAR EARLIER

The hallucinations were
worsening rapidly.

She halted at the top of the staircase and tried to steady herself. The hall of dark mirrors stretched away into infinity, a treacherous fun house filled with night and shifting shadows. She had to forge a path through this disorienting landscape before she lost her grip on the last remnants of her sanity.

The planes and angles of the shadowed corridor were melting and flowing into bizarre shapes that reminded her of Möbius strips. Endless loops with no beginning and no end. She did not know how much longer she could hold together the disintegrating fragments of her awareness. She longed for sleep but she could not give in to the nearly overwhelming urge. Not yet. There was something she had to do first.

The electricity had flickered out of existence a moment ago. Weak starlight seeped in through the narrow
windows at either end of the endless corridor. She gazed down the length of the writhing passage and saw a sharp sliver of silver. She knew it marked the entrance to the library. Fourth door on the left.

A desperate urgency swept through her. If she could get to that shard of light she could leave her message.

“Bethany?” The killer’s voice came from shadows at the foot of the stairs. “Where are you? Let me help you. You must be very sleepy by now.”

A bolt of icy panic gave her the energy required to overcome the drug’s effects for a moment. She tightened her grip on the strap of her purse, staggered a few steps down the hall and came to a stop again. She fought to remember what it was that she had to do. It had been so clear there at the bottom of the stairs. But now it kept slipping away.

She stared into the nearest of the dozens of black mirrors that lined the walls. In the gloom she could just barely make out the heavily gilded and scrolled frame of the eighteenth-century looking glass. She searched the bottomless pool behind the glass for wisps of her memory.

There was something she had to do before she went to sleep.

“I can help you, Bethany.”

She thought she saw a shifting of the shadows in the old looking glass. An image gelled there for an instant. She struggled to make sense of it. The library. She had to get to the library. Yes. That was it. She had to go there before the killer found her.

A number swirled up out of the depths of her disappearing memory.

Four.

The entrance to the library was the fourth door on the left.

She clung gratefully to the number. It steadied her as
nothing else could have done. She was at home in the universe of mathematics; comfortable and serenely content in a way she had never been in the world where human emotions made things complicated and illogical.

Four doors down on the left.

Getting there meant running the gauntlet of mirrors. The enormity of the challenge almost paralyzed her.

“There’s no need to hide from me, Bethany. I only want to help you.”

She had to do this. Deke would need answers. He would not be able to rest until he got them. And Thomas would help him because Deke was his brother and the Walker brothers stuck together. She had never fully understood the depths of that kind of bond, but her logical mind accepted the strength of the link that existed between Deke and Thomas. It was as real as any mathematical relationship.

Summoning every ounce of will she possessed, she made her way toward the shard of light that marked the library door.

The hallucinations intensified. Strange creatures pulsed behind the reflective surfaces of the antique looking glasses that surrounded her. They beckoned her to join them.

Not yet.

She set her teeth and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.

She dared not look directly into any of the old, dark mirrors for fear that she would be sucked into the world on the other side. It was not that she was afraid to go there, it was just that she knew she had to stay in this universe for a few more minutes. She owed that much to Deke and Thomas.

“Bethany? You’re ill, Bethany. Let me help you.”

The killer was in the hallway behind her.

“Not much longer now, Bethany. The hallucinations must be terrible. But soon you’ll sleep and then it will all be over.”

She focused intently on the triangle of moonlight. The glowing lines drew her and calmed her. The mathematical purity of the moonlit angles was a strong, if temporary, antidote to the hallucinations.

She reached the fourth door, went through it and paused in the middle of an aisle of books, trying to think. There was a small office in here somewhere. And inside the office there was a book. She had been looking at it just this afternoon. It was a very important book because it contained a picture of her killer. She had to mark the picture for Deke and Thomas.

The shelves of books around her curved and warped themselves into a maze. Gathering her waning strength, she staggered through the twisting corridors to the office.

The little book was lying on the desk, just as she remembered. She got it open and stared helplessly at the first page. The picture was here somewhere. She had to find it quickly. The killer was halfway down the hall.

She turned pages, taking refuge once more in the comfort of numbers.

Seventy-nine.

Eighty.

Eighty-one. There it was. A picture of the killer.

There was a pen next to the book. After three attempts she finally managed to pick it up. She was beyond being able to write a name but she had enough eye-hand coordination left to draw a shaky circle around the picture on page eighty-one.

She paused when she finished, concentrating hard.

There was something else she wanted to do just to make sure Deke and Thomas understood.

The envelope, please.

She smiled with satisfaction as the memory blazed clearly in the fog of her thoughts.

The envelope was in the purse draped over her shoulder. She got it out. Managed to slip it inside the book.

Now what?

Hide the book and the envelope. She could not risk having the killer discover them.

“I know where you are, Bethany. Did you think you could hide in the library?”

She looked around, searching for a place in which to conceal the book and the envelope.

The large, old-fashioned wooden card catalog stood against one wall, the rows of little drawers neatly organized in lovely straight lines.

Perfect.

“Mirror, mirror on the wall,”
the killer chanted from the door of the library.
“Who is the smartest one of all? Not you, Bethany. Not Sebastian Eubanks, either. I’m the smartest one of all, Bethany.”

She ignored the taunting and wedged the book with the envelope inside into the hiding place. Deke and Thomas would find it sooner or later.

It was done. A sense of peace flowed through her. She had completed the task. She could sleep now. She turned around, clutching the desk for support.

The killer came to stand silhouetted in the office doorway.

“I’m the smartest one of all, Bethany.”

Bethany Walker did not respond. She closed her eyes and slipped into a peaceful world on the other side of the looking glass, where the laws of mathematics reigned supreme and everything made sense.

T
HE PRESENT . . .

A shifting of
the light reflected in the mirror above the dresser was the only warning she had that she was not alone in the dead woman’s apartment. Her hands went cold. The fine hair on the nape of her neck stirred as if she had been zapped with an electrical charge.

Leonora straightened swiftly from the drawer she had been searching and spun around, a soft, pale pink cashmere sweater in her hands.

Two junkyard dogs stood in the doorway of the bedroom.

One of them was human.

His broad shoulders filled a lot of the available space and cut off the view of the hall behind him. There was about him the deceptively relaxed, totally centered grace of the natural-born predator. Not an impulsive young hunter overeager to take down the first of the prey that bolts from cover, rather a jaded pro who prefers to pick and choose his targets. He had the face of a man who had
done a lot of things in life the hard way and he also had the cold gray eyes to match.

The ghost-gray beast at his heels had a lot in common with his companion. Not real big, but very solid. One of his ears was permanently bent, the result of a fight, no doubt. It was difficult to imagine this creature springing playfully in pursuit of a Frisbee. Probably tear the thing to shreds and eat the plastic raw.

Both of the intruders looked dangerous but her intuition told her to keep her eyes on the man. She could not see his hands. They were thrust casually into the deep pockets of a charcoal-colored windbreaker. He wore the lightweight jacket open over a button-down denim shirt and a pair of khaki trousers. His feet were shod in leather work boots. The boots looked large.

Both man and beast were damp from the rain that misted this stretch of the southern California coast today. Each gave the impression that going for her throat would be no big deal. All in a morning’s work.

“Were you a friend of hers or did you just happen to hear that she was dead and decide to drop in to see if there was anything worth stealing?” the human junkyard dog asked.

His voice suited him. A low, dark, very soft growl.

She got a grip on her hyperactive imagination. “Who are you?”

“I asked you first. Which is it, friend or casual opportunist? Either way, I figure you’re a thief so maybe the answer is moot.”

“How dare you?” Outrage incinerated some of the alarm that had quickened her pulse. “I am not a thief. I’m a librarian.” Damn, that sounded dumb. Well, no one could say that she couldn’t hold her own when it came to snappy repartee, she thought.

“No kidding.” His mouth curved into a mockery of a smile. “Looking for overdue books? You should have
known better than to give Meredith Spooner a library card. Doubt if she ever returned anything she stole in her entire life.”

“Your sense of humor leaves a lot to be desired.”

“I’m not auditioning for a late-night comedy show.”

One had to be forceful in situations such as this, Leonora thought. Take the initiative. Take charge. Gain the upper hand with a show of confidence and authority. It wasn’t as though she had not had some experience with difficult people. In the course of her career as an academic librarian she was occasionally obliged to deal with a variety of obnoxious patrons, from egotistical, demanding faculty members to boorish frat boys.

She went deliberately toward the door, praying that the stranger and his dog would step back in that automatic way most creatures did when you made it clear that you wanted to move past them.

“As a matter of fact I have every right to be here, which is probably a good deal more than you can say.” She gave man and dog a steely smile. “I suggest we discuss this with the apartment manager.”