Silent Masquerade Read online

  “It’s okay, Cara. Nobody’s here.”

  Cara crept into the apartment on tiptoe, her eyes luminous with fear. “Are you sure?”

  Bill met her in the little foyer and took her hands. They were icy, and he chafed them automatically. “Yeah, whoever was here is gone.”

  “Did they take anything?”

  Bill laughed. “Like what?”

  She looked surprised, but then smiled weakly. “Oh, yeah, you’re right.” Still, she moved with great caution down the central hall, as if someone might jump out at her. Bill had left lights on in every room.

  “Who do you suppose it was?” she asked, inching forward to peer through the kitchen doorway.

  “Probably a potential thief who was discouraged by the lack of salable items,” Bill said. “I don’t think he’ll be back.”

  Cara nodded. “You’re probably right.” She pulled open a cabinet drawer and stared down at the odd assortment of unmatched flatware.

  Bill went to her and looked over her shoulder. “Nothing missing, right?” he asked gently, with a half smile.

  “What? Oh, right.” She shut the drawer and looked around. Suddenly a chill swept over her, and she hugged herself for warmth. “It feels like such an invasion, anyway.”

  Bill agreed. “Still, when word gets out that we aren’t worth the effort, I think the druggies and down-and-outers will strike us off their list of possible donors.”

  Cara gave Bill a searching look. “You’re enjoying this,” she said accusingly.

  He couldn’t tell her he was almost relieved that this had happened, that something had brought them back to reality after that mind-boggling kiss. If they hadn’t found their apartment had been invaded, wouldn’t they now be in bed, all caution thrown to the wind?

  He shrugged and grinned. “I’m feeling a little smug, because our would-be burglar got zilch for his trouble.”

  The smile died on his lips as he suddenly realized he’d made a terrible mistake. He looked around, dumbfounded by his own idiocy.

  “What’s wrong with this picture?” he muttered.

  “Bill...what’s wrong?”

  He ignored her as he stalked out of the kitchen and went from room to room, swearing under his breath.

  A burglar would have trashed the place, would have hoped to find hidden bounty under or in other things. Most important, the intruder wouldn’t have bypassed the locked briefcase—he or she would have assumed that the lock indicated treasure of some sort inside.

  Suddenly the unlocked door seemed a sign of something far more ominous than a mere burglary. Bill went to the foyer and bent to examine the door lock more closely. No damage. The intruder had used a standard device, something as simple as a credit card. Bill hadn’t thought to reinforce the lock, because he knew locks couldn’t keep out the guys he was running from.

  So this wasn’t a thwarted burglary. But what, then? If it was Alvaretti’s people, wouldn’t they have waited and taken him out the minute he walked through the door?

  “I’m going down to talk to Mick,” he called out to Cara. “Lock up, and I’ll be right back.”

  He could still hear her calling out questions as he ran down the flight of stairs and the long hall to the back of the building where Mickey, the landlord, lived.

  Mick came to the door in a tattered corduroy robe, the sleeves short enough to expose the tattoos on his bare forearms.

  “Honest, Hamlin, I didn’t have no reason to go up to your place today,” the caretaker said defensively when Bill questioned him. Bill was inclined to believe him, partly because he knew Mickey was too lazy to climb that flight of stairs even when there was a reason. When Bill and Cara had come to look at the apartment, Mick had just handed them the key and gestured toward the stairs. “Go on up and look it over. Let me know if you want it,” he’d said. He’d never even asked if they’d locked up when they came back down.

  “Did you see anyone around the place who doesn’t live here?” Bill asked next.

  “Naw. Same old same old. Most of you guys work over to the pier so I don’t see you around during the day. Saw Mrs. Jones, of course. She don’t go out much. Maybe she seen something or someone don’t belong.” Bill knew Mick spent more time watching the tube than he did taking care of the building or its tenants. It was likely the man hadn’t been out all that day.

  Mrs. Jones, according to Mickey, was a widow who had lived in the building before it became a residence for transients and seasonal workers. Most of the time she sat in her apartment on the first floor and watched people pass by her living room window, which was directly beneath Bill’s.

  “No, I didn’t see anyone I haven’t seen before,” Mrs. Jones said in answer to Bill’s inquiry. “You young people come and go so quickly these days, it’s hard to keep up, but you know I have an excellent memory for faces.”

  Bill decided to reserve judgment on whether or not she had such a good memory, but for now he had to accept her word. “No visitors out at the pool today?” he asked.

  “Not today. Only people in the pool all day were 3B and 2C.”

  He thanked her and went out into the hall, wondering if it was worth it to question anyone else in the building. But then he thought that would only draw attention to himself and to Cara and decided against it.

  Maybe he was making too much of this in the first place. After all, it was just as likely that there’d been no intruder, that one of them had actually just forgotten to lock the door on their way out. He tried to recall which of them had been the last out, but for some reason all he could remember was their homecoming and their aborted lovemaking.

  * * *

  CARA LAY AWAKE for a long time that night.

  At first, when Bill came back up from speaking to Mick, she’d expected him to say they would have to move. He hadn’t however, and that had made her realize he didn’t feel threatened. It had been a relief to see Bill without his usual paranoia ruling him.

  Now, lying alone in the darkened room, she wondered if they would have made love if they hadn’t found the door open. She’d never have admitted it aloud, but she knew she would have given herself to him with no hesitation. She had moved out of the realm of friendship in her feelings for Bill. Past the place of pretense. Past the point of weighing pros and cons. She’d out-and-out lusted after the man, and he could have had her right there on the front stoop if he’d wanted her.

  Oh, yes, and he did want me, she thought. He may have changed his mind after the fact, but for a moment there, he was as hot for me as I was for him.

  Just thinking about his heavy breathing, the way his eyes had glazed over, made her want him now. She turned on her side and willed the thought away. After some effort, she began to relax, began to drift toward nirvana. Her last thoughts were about the open door.

  Bill had told her that he’d decided they hadn’t really checked to make sure the lock was properly engaged when they left that day. She hadn’t argued with him, because it had been such a relief to believe for the moment that they hadn’t had an intruder.

  But just as she was falling asleep, her memory returned to that morning, when they’d been leaving the apartment for work. She had been the last one out, and she had turned back and tried the knob, making sure the door had caught and was locked.

  Chapter Six

  The next day, Bill met her on her break and brought her bad news.

  “They’ve asked me to work a different schedule, Cara,” he said as they came to a park bench and sat down. “I’ll be doing a split shift, coming in from ten till two and then coming back at six to work to closing.”

  Cara watched a family with small children settle on the grass to eat a picnic lunch as she digested what Bill had told her. “I guess that puts an end to our meals together.”

  “We could have breakfast together, if you wanted to eat a little earlier.”

  “I was just thinking that now most of the restaurants will be closed by the time you get off work.”

  Bill sh
rugged that off. “The only thing I’m worried about is you walking home alone every night.”

  “Why?” Suddenly the idea of entering the apartment alone at night loomed in her mind.

  But Bill didn’t refer to the previous day’s episode. “There are a lot of nuts out there, Cara, people who mess with other people just for the fun of it. A woman alone, on the street, particularly at night... I’m just scared for you.”

  He sounded so truly worried that Cara’s heart did a flip. Last night he’d shown his desire for her. Today he was showing concern for her welfare. The combination added up to something far more serious than mere friendship, in her estimation.

  “I wouldn’t be alone, Bill. There’s always a whole parade of people from here to our street.”

  “And among that crowd could be a serial killer, or a drug-crazed mugger, or even a gang of teenage boys looking for a thrill at some woman’s expense.”

  Cara shivered, despite the warmth of the day. “You really know how to put a girl’s mind at ease, Hamlin.”

  “Cara, I’m scared to death that you’re too much at ease. You need to keep in mind that we’re fugitives, first of all, and secondly that you’re a beautiful, sexy woman who’s going to attract attention from all types of guys—perverts included!”

  Beautiful. Sexy. They were his words, though he’d delivered them with a lashing tongue, with a frown on his face and eyes that glared angrily at her. She couldn’t help but recall the night before, when those eyes had gazed helplessly, longingly, into hers.

  She put a hand up to his face and caressed his soft beard. “It’s sweet of you to worry about me, Bill, and I promise I’ll be careful. But you have to work the hours they ask you to, and I have to walk home alone at night. There’s nothing we can do about it.”

  He put his hand over hers, enjoying the feel of her palm against his face, holding it there a moment longer. “You could hang around here until closing, or I could tell them I have to leave at eight every night for fifteen minutes, just long enough to walk you home and come back.”

  Cara shook her head. “No. That’s too much. You’re always saying we shouldn’t do anything to draw undue attention to ourselves. Wouldn’t that make us stand out from all the other employees?”

  Bill had to admit she was right. In order to develop and maintain anonymity, they needed to blend into the mass of boardwalk workers, as well as the community of ex-hippies, artists and tourists in their neighborhood. His first plan had been for them to move around a lot, but she had convinced him that settling down would make them seem less conspicuous and would tell the world they were just a normal married couple. And he was pretty sure she was right. If he had reservations, it was only because he stayed in his self-preservation mode at all times, regardless of the situation. Like last night. A false alarm, he was pretty sure, but he had to check it out, not take chances.

  “Okay, but I want you to promise you’ll keep your guard up when you go home at night.”

  “I promise, Daddy,” Cara said, teasingly, yanking on his beard for emphasis.

  Laughing, he slapped at her hand, tilting his head out of her reach. “Okay, you can make fun if you want, but just be sure you keep that promise.”

  Their breaks were over, and they headed back to their respective stations.

  “By the way,” Bill said just before they reached the bumper cars, “we’re off on Sunday. Why don’t we take the car and go exploring? We could go up into the mountains, to Felton, or maybe down to Carmel.”

  “Great! Oh, Bill, that’s a wonderful idea. Thank you for suggesting it.”

  “Yeah, well...we need to drive the car once in a while, or the battery will go dead.”

  She thought about the pending trip on her way home, and about the way Bill had diminished the invitation by pretending his first thought had been for the car. It was almost as if Bill just couldn’t stand to admit that anything in life was fun. Everything had to be so serious, so earnest. And yet she’d seen glimmers of humor—of teasing—in his personality, and the outing on Sunday had been his idea, something he’d obviously given some thought to.

  Mr. Gambrini’s nephew, Georgio, was her relief man this time, and she smiled and waved as she approached the ice-cream cart.

  “Bella, Miss Cara,” Georgio whispered, taking her hand and holding it to his chest for a moment.

  “Talk about earnest,” Cara said with a huge smile as she pulled her hand free.

  “Beg pardon, Miss Cara?”

  “Nothing. Forget it, Georgio.” She pulled her hat from her jacket pocket and put it back on. She’d taken to doing her hair in a French braid, and the cap fit neatly atop that.

  “See you at eight,” she called out as the young man strutted off into the crowd.

  A group of teenagers came up just then, and it took a long time to fill their orders, what with the way they kept changing their minds about which flavors they wanted. There was one moment, as she waited, ice-cream scoop poised between rocky road and bubblegum, when she looked up and saw a man standing across the boardwalk, staring at her, and her pulse quickened in her chest. Was it the man from Mount View and the museum in San Francisco? She couldn’t be sure, because of the sunglasses. But when she’d filled the cone and looked up again, the man wasn’t there. She didn’t think of him again until she started her walk home alone that night.

  It was still light out, and, as she’d pointed out to Bill earlier, there were plenty of people coming and going around her.

  But she was used to a leisurely stroll beside Bill, their arms often brushing, his hand sometimes grabbing her elbow to keep her steady when someone bumped into them. She hadn’t realized how much she’d miss that.

  Tonight she seemed to be pushed along by the moving throng, almost battered in the turmoil of people hurrying to enjoy the last couple of hours of entertainment at the pier, or rushing to get back to their cars or homes after a tiring afternoon at the park. She wanted to stand still, balking, refusing to move another inch at any pace but her own. But if she did that, she’d make a fool of herself at best, and be trampled underfoot at worst.

  She saw the man again, just a few feet ahead of her, keeping pace with the crowd, his head towering inches above those on either side of him. She was sure it was the same man, because of his height, his thick blond hair, and the dark shirt he wore.

  Chilled air seemed to spiral down the back of her neck, but then it occurred to her that the man was ahead of her, not following her, so he couldn’t be someone she should fear. Hanging out with Bill was definitely having an adverse affect on her.

  That was when she remembered another word Bill had used that day. Fugitives. “We’re fugitives,” he’d said.

  She put the word into a familiar context in her mind.

  Fugitives from the law.

  She stopped in her tracks, unmindful now of the people around her, unmindful of the people who brushed past her and against her, until one almost knocked her down. She moved off the sidewalk, ducking into the nearest doorway. It was the Italian restaurant where they’d had dinner their first night in Santa Cruz.

  The place was fairly busy at this hour, but she found a small table set against the back wall and fell onto a chair as her mind spun in an eddy of remembered phrases, recalled images.

  The waiter called out something as he passed by with a laden tray at his shoulder. The words didn’t penetrate Cara’s consciousness.

  If Bill was a fugitive from the law, didn’t that mean he was one of the very same bad guys he’d warned her about when he was cautioning her about walking home alone? For all she knew, he could be an escaped convict, a bank robber on the run, a rapist... Her mind flashed to the intensity of his embrace the night before. What if they hadn’t been out in the open when he kissed her, what if she’d refused to go any further. Would Bill have refused to take no for an answer? His arms had been so strong, so tight around her. Would she have been able to escape them if he was determined to hold her against her will?
/>   A gasp of anguished fear filled her throat, caught on a ragged breath, turned into a harshly burning cough. The waiter came running up with a glass of water, shoving it at her, patting her on the back.

  She took a swallow, choked, pushed it away. “Th-thanks.” She coughed again, swallowed again, cleared her throat and smiled through her tears. “I’m f-fine, really,” she insisted. She wiped her eyes with the palms of her hands, and when she lowered her hands, she realized the other diners were all looking over at her with concern.

  She snatched up a menu and pretended to read it, keeping her face hidden until she was sure the other patrons had turned back to their own business.

  * * *

  LEFEBRE LIFTED HIS HAND and looked into the small mirror cupped in his palm. Moving it back and forth, he studied the reflections of faces over his shoulder, looking for the girl. Gone.

  He spun around and searched the crowd, people pushing past him, some muttering angrily that he was in the way. Obviously, Cara had made a stop in the last block and a half. He moved to his right and joined the group moving back toward the pier.

  When he came to the Italian restaurant, he peered in through the windows. He didn’t see her at first. She was all the way at the back of the room, near the kitchen doors.

  Should he take a chance on her recognizing him, or wait outside? And what about Hamlin? Where was he? Cara’d stopped at the bumper cars as usual, but then gone on alone after waving at someone, ostensibly her pseudohusband. He’d been alternating his tracking of the couple, some days following Hamlin, some days Cara Davis. His decision to follow her, rather than wait and follow Hamlin had been based on something other than professional wisdom. He couldn’t remember exactly when she’d begun to occupy so many of his thoughts. Had it been when he stood in the doorway of her bedroom, after studying Hamlin’s room, and realized it had the pristine quality of a place where a woman slept alone? Or had it been the day at the boardwalk, when he watched her kneel and lift the hem of her dress to wipe the eyes of a crying child who had apparently become separated from its parents? He’d had a good view of a long, smooth thigh, right up to that place where hip meets panty in a beckoning curve toward one of the most vulnerable parts of a woman’s body, and he’d felt the telltale clamoring in the pit of his stomach.