Spectre of Intention Read online

  “Yeah, I know.”

  He reached into the pocket of his jeans, pulled out the tiny pot of cream.

  “Keep this. You’ll probably need it again tomorrow.”

  I took it. Then his hand went back into his pocket and came out as a fist. He flipped it over, uncurled his fingers. Nestled in the folds of his palm was a tiny white tablet. One of my sleeping pills.

  “Do you want it?”

  I hesitated. I really didn’t like those things. But I also knew I wouldn’t be sleeping at all tonight without it. My fingers looked so small as I picked the pill out of his palm.

  “Thanks.”

  Jessie walked over to the wall pad, tapped on it a couple times.

  “I’ve reset your security to exclude housekeeping and maintenance. Emergency services only.” He reached for the handle. “Don’t forget to engage the sliding bolt while you’re in here.”

  “Yes, Daddy.”

  “Alright, then.” He looked around the room one more time. “Alright, then,” he repeated. His eyes dipped down to the marks on my shoulders. “If you see anything, if anything happens—”

  “I’ll call. I always do. Goodnight, Jessie.”

  He nodded. “The bolt,” he repeated as he slipped out the door.

  I pushed the door the rest of the way closed, flipped the sliding bolt over the hook, twisted the deadbolt into place. As I rested my forehead against the emergency escape sign, a blast of fear and worry slammed into me from the other side of the door. Fear, worry, and just a hint of lust that was quickly quashed. Even in his private mind, my boss believed in propriety. Or maybe part of him really did believe in my little parlor trick.

  I turned and looked around the precision tidiness of my cabin, marred only by my bag splayed across the bed.

  Not running.

  I crossed to the closet, saw all of Kaitlin’s clothes hung neatly. Pretty, sophisticated clothes that at first Jessie, then I, had chosen with care to create a confident career woman. Sometimes the only way I could coax Kaitlin back was to go through the purely mechanical motions of being her. So, I eschewed the cotton camisole and shorts and instead pulled out a silk and lace nightgown.

  Not running.

  My eyes dropped to the suitcase. My breath shook out.

  Not running.

  I took the nightgown to the bathroom, carefully, precisely brushed my teeth, washed my face, combed out my hair. The comb clattered to the counter as I fumbled it. I straightened it next to my bottle of facial cream, next to Jessie’s pot of bruise ointment, next to the pill. I unzipped my summer dress and pulled it over my head. I stared at myself in the mirror. My shoulders and arms were covered with red and purple marks. My eyelids, the hollows of my cheeks were highlighted in greenish black. My eyes were red and swollen.

  Oh, god.

  No.

  Not running.

  My arm lit up with pain as I twisted it behind me to unclasp my bra. All of this would hurt so much worse tomorrow. I discarded the bra and slid the nightgown down over me, grateful for the gentle caress of the silk.

  It took me three tries to get hold of the pill. I dry swallowed it.

  I wandered back out to the room, stared at the bed. I drifted past the door, ran my hand over the sliding bolt, the dead bolt. I lifted the edge of the comforter, let it fall from my fingers. Too vulnerable. So vulnerable without Jessie here to fill up the room.

  I circled the bed, crossed the sitting area to the balcony window. I flung open the curtains.

  No, no bogeyman there. I knew that. I was a hard person to sneak up on.

  But she’d done it.

  I backed away from the window. My arm wrapped around my stomach; my hand wrapped around my mouth.

  I never even knew her name. Just those eyes. The look in those eyes.

  I’d told him I wouldn’t touch a gun. I told him I didn’t even want to be on a run where there was a gun involved at all. But that was Stephan. Never contradicting you. Never forcing you. Just subtly maneuvering everything around you until he had you where he wanted you.

  And there I was with a gun in my hand.

  Watch the stairs, he said.

  Here take this, he said.

  It’s not loaded, he said.

  And there I was at the bottom of the oak stairs in the dark while he and Amilee popped the bedroom safe. I stood in that dark and shook, trying to breathe, hating where I was, who I’d become, unable to fathom how I’d gotten there. Part of my brain said, Just leave. Just walk away. But my friends, my best friend and my lover were up there unprotected. They loved me; I loved them. That made them good people, right? Then what were they, what were we doing in here violating someone’s home, destroying someone’s sense of security?

  Again.

  I stared at the complex metal and plastic firearm in my hand. It felt cold and heavy, toxic in my hand. I didn’t want to touch it. Nausea rose in my throat. I started looking for someplace to put the gun down.

  That must have been when she walked in.

  I heard the foot fall. Such a tiny, quiet sound. But it spun me around.

  Such a giant explosion, the gunfire in that tiny space, in that vast silence. Wood splinters sprayed out from the dining room doorsill. A smell like fireworks.

  She screamed.

  Those eyes stared at me as she screamed and screamed and screamed. Blood gushed down the side of her face, between her fingers as she grasped the side of her head.

  I couldn’t move.

  Stephan and Amilee called my name. The girl crumpled to the floor. The stairs rumbled behind me. Stephan pulled the gun from my hand. I tried—then—to go to her, the staring girl who screamed at the blood running red down her white arms. Stephan blocked my way.

  It’s one of Mak’s girls, he said. We’ve got to get out of here.

  He grabbed me. I shoved at him, trying to get past him, trying to get to her.

  My screams mingled with hers. We can’t leave her. I shot her. We can’t just leave her. She’s going to die!

  Stephan silenced my screams with a hand across my mouth. His mind invaded mine, held me limp as he dragged me from the house.

  But those eyes came with me.

  Those screams, they never left.

  “Please, please, we have to go back. We can’t just leave her!”

  “Shh. You’re fine. She’s fine. Just scratched up a little.”

  A comforting weight settled into my hair, stroked my head, my cheek.

  “We have to…”

  “Shh. It’s over, Ash. You’re safe.”

  That warm weight settled into my mind. It wrapped around me and held me. The frantic thrashing eased. Peace, an unfamiliar, beautiful tranquility, flowed from the roots of my hair, over my eyes, my cheeks, down through my chest, my belly, out through my limbs.

  I shivered, reached one last time for the girl as she faded. A hand grasped mine, lips pressed against my fingers.

  “It’s okay. I’ve got you now. You’re safe, Ash. You’re safe.”

  I woke only because the sun shone bright enough to pierce my skull even through my eyelids. I groaned pitifully. As I rolled my head to the side, I remembered all too clearly why I hated those sleeping pills. The toxic sludge inside my skull rolled with the movement; the cottony paste inside my mouth had my tongue swollen to twice its normal size. I raised my hand to my face, but the fingers were bloated and barely responsive so much blood had pooled into them during my state of hyper-relaxation.

  Sleeping on the couch didn’t help.

  Today was going to be long and miserable.

  Finally giving up, I stretched myself out as much as I could on the slippery little love seat, forcing my muscles to reengage. I caught the comforter before it fell and looked over to the coffee table with its sharp edge dangerously close to eye level. The glass surface was covered with red crumbs. I sat up.

  In thick scrawl across the table top was the message:

  It’s just a door, Ashley.

  Next to the m
essage, my tube of red lipstick lay carefully recapped.

  “Oh, god.”

  I looked down at the comforter on my legs. Knew I hadn’t put that there. I threw it off of me, scrambled away from the couch. I ran to the balcony window. Jerked at the handle: locked. I sprinted over to the cabin door, checked the sliding bolt and the dead bolt with my eyes and hands.

  “How the hell? Oh god, I’ve got to get out of here!”

  I flew back over to the closet, threw open the door. I wrenched my clothes from the rod, hangers and all. Propping up the lid to my suitcase with my elbow, I shoved them inside. I had to drop to my knees in front of the suitcase rack to push and pull at the tangled silk and linen that refused to release the zipper. My shaking hands wouldn’t hold still enough to work the threads free from the teeth.

  I stopped.

  I pulled my hand away and watched it tremble.

  You can’t live like this.

  I gripped the black leather handle of my suitcase and pressed it into my forehead.

  “Jessie,” I pleaded.

  In my mind, he watched me. His arms were folded over that powerful chest, his eyes waited.

  I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t do this to him. I couldn’t do this to Paula and Gerard. And Jessie was right; I didn’t want to give them up. I didn’t want to give up the chance to get to know Cam, to prove that I could pull off this project.

  “If I run, I give him the power, but if I stay…”

  Don’t think about that, Kaitlin warned.

  Her voice was strong in my mind. I gripped that strength, pressed my forehead one last time to the handle of the bag, then I drew my feet under me and rose. I looked in the glass mirror of the door. I ignored the wild hair and the beads of saltwater panic shining from my face. In that mirror, I saw what I needed to see: the eyes of Kaitlin Osgood, Senior VP of Sales and Project Management for Countermeasures International. She was smart, she was competent, and she would find a way through this. With the help of her friends. Her real friends.

  I strode to the bathroom, pulled out a package of make-up removal pads. Attacking the tissue dispenser, I amassed a giant handful of tissue. I took my arsenal straight to the coffee table.

  “Get. Out. Of. My. Room!”

  By the time I finished scrubbing that glass not a streak of crimson-tinted castor oil showed, and the entire wad of tissue was stained blood red. I crammed that and Stephan’s goddamn message into the garbage can.

  When I came back out again, I pulled my bag off the floor and rifled through its leather compartments. I found my mini between a mangled energy bar and a wallet of electronic keys.

  Are you still with me? the message flashed. It was ten-thirty already. I had missed the ten o’clock meeting. I was surprised he wasn’t beating down the door.

  Overslept. Need twenty minutes. Where should I meet you guys?

  Setting up temporary office in 5-B. Bring food, he replied.

  That was standard operating procedure. We always ate in the office—lunch breaks were for training, but my finger hesitated over the screen. The idea of wandering the ship alone sent snakes slithering through the nerves of my shoulders. Should I tell him about the visitor, about Stephan’s little message? I’d promised I would, but if I said anything, I’d probably find myself with a roommate—my boss. That would put Jessie in the middle of it. Just the thought made me nauseous.

  But I’d promised.

  Kaitlin gritted her teeth and put the mini back in her bag.

  Having the billowing gold shower curtain block my view of the room nearly undid my hard-won nerve. The second the last of the conditioner was gone from my hair, I wrenched the water off and flung back the curtain.

  No one.

  But someone was beating the crap out of my cabin door.

  I let out the breath I’d been holding, reached out, and pulled the thick white towel from the rod. I should have known better than to think that Jessie wouldn’t worry. Hurriedly, I dried my hair, then wrapped the towel around me as I ran to answer the door. I peered through the peephole, but all I could see was a well-developed shoulder clad in army green. It didn’t feel like Stephan or Mak. It felt impatient and a little bit bored. I undid the latches and pulled open the door.

  “Gerard?”

  My co-boss grinned. “Very nice, Kaitlin. I’ll have to volunteer for these errands a little more often.” He gave my towel a little tug. I grabbed the top to keep it from falling.

  Without giving Ashley a chance to panic, Kaitlin waved him into the room.

  “I’ll just be about five more minutes.”

  Gerard strolled in and I closed and bolted the door behind him.

  “Oh, don’t mind me. I’m just here to enjoy the show.”

  I began to wonder if Jessie had sent him to annoy the nerves out of me. At least I could be grateful for one thing: no ghostly imaginings dangled off the front of him. I really didn’t need to see what he wanted to be doing with his hands right now. Could a person really think about sex that much? Maybe it was a medical condition. A severe medical condition.

  Leaving him to ogle, I tried to pull an outfit from the twisted heap in my suitcase—one handed. Today would be a manual labor day. I would need a top that could double—

  “Jesus, Kat. What the hell happened in here?”

  The sex vibe vanished. Gerard looked from the bed to the sofa, came over to take a closer look at my suitcase. He lifted a wooden hotel hanger still entangled in the straps of a blue camisole.

  “Goin’ somewhere?” He held the hanger up to me, but before his gaze reached mine, it hit my shoulder. I hitched my towel up higher while he stared. My wet hair didn’t cover what by now were some very pretty bruises.

  “Those are fingerprints.” He dropped the hanger. Anger burned from his eyes, his body. He pulled out his mini, while he tossed the room. Like Jessie had, he banged around the closet door, flipped back the open curtains. Then he headed for the bathroom, walked out with the wastepaper basket full of red tissue. Dropping that, he made straight for the coffee table, grabbed the lipstick tube, opened it and twisted up the mangled tip for inspection. He even managed to find a streak of message on the glass that I’d missed.

  “Call Jessie,” he ordered into the mini.

  That spurred me into action.

  “No, please.” I ran to the sitting area. I pulled at his arm as if I thought I could move it. “Please, Gerard. Don’t.”

  Gerard hesitated, then cancelled the operation, lowered his phone.

  “Why?”

  “He’ll worry. He knows about the bruises already. If he finds out about the rest of this,” I waved at the room, “it’ll just freak him out. He told me what to do. I’ll take care of it. Please.” I waited, holding my breath, knowing it was like asking a wife not to tell her husband something. Futile.

  He turned to face me, looked down at me for a very long time.

  “It’s that thing you do with your eyes.” I searched his face as he spoke, not understanding. “That’s when I can understand why Jessie took you in, why he turned his goddamned world upside down for you.” He reached out and brushed his finger tips under my eyes. “It’s like there are two women living inside you. One could blast my balls off with a look and the other might disintegrate if I freakin’ breathe too hard.”

  I pulled my hand away and stared at him, feeling utterly exposed in front of the man I had always tried so hard to avoid being vulnerable around. My heart knocked against my breastbone as I took a step back. I gripped the towel tighter to my chest.

  “See. That.” He waved his hand at me. “I hate that. Fucking pick one. Me, I prefer the boardroom bitch. She’s more fun, less work.”

  I barked out a laugh. “I’ll keep that in mind.” Would have been funnier, if he hadn’t been serious.

  I turned away, headed back for the closet. The second I did, the sex vibe was back. I rolled my eyes. The man truly never stopped. Of course, I’d lost half the towel by now. I needed to get dressed, get do
wnstairs, and get re-engaged with life. The day a conversation with Gerard could throw me for an emotional loop was a pathetic day indeed.

  The one-armed wrestling match with my wardrobe commenced once again.

  “You could just drop the towel.”

  “Or you could get your useless ass over here and help. Or, even better, step out into the hall.”

  Gerard grinned. “And miss the chance to pick through Kaitlin Osgood’s lingerie? Not a chance.”

  I turned to glare at him. If he wanted the boardroom bitch, Kaitlin was more than happy to deliver. “Did it ever occur to you that I might have landed you this contract to make it worth my time when I finally sue your ass?”

  He only laughed and reached past me into the suitcase. “Here, this should do the trick.” He pulled out a red scoop-necked evening blouse—one that would have shown much more than cleavage as I unpacked boxes of equipment. Maybe Jessie really did send him to annoy the nerves out of me. Because I could feel it starting to work.

  Gerard held the shirt up to me. I opened my mouth to order him into the hallway when the sex vibe shifted abruptly back to anger and concern.

  “Those are fuckin’ fingerprints, Kaitlin! Did you write all over the frickin’ coffee table or was it this guy? What did it say?”

  It’s just a door, Ashley.

  And that door began closing over my mind, darkness filling up the outer edges. Ashley welcomed the escape, the release. Even Kaitlin offered little resistance.

  “Whoa, okay. Don’t do that. God, Jessie would kick my ass from here all the way back to Miami. Shit. Don’t you fuckin’ do that.”

  I caught myself on his arm. I shook my head out, embarrassment flooding my cheeks. Had I almost fainted in front of Gerard “Horndog” O’Connell? Could this day get any worse?

  I gingerly patted the grab marks out of the sleeve of his T-shirt, staring as though this required all my concentration. “I…I need to not talk about this for a little while. Alright?” Sparks of darkness still flew in my vision.

  “Ya know what? I’m gonna go out in the hall.”

  And rat me out. Great.