Devious (27 page)
Authors: Lisa Jackson
Today, as clouds gathered overhead, blocking the sun, she glanced at the slide, a corkscrew of twisted metal, and remembered one bossy girl barely older than she was who had blocked the ladder. “This is mine,” the girl had said with a sneer; then, once Valerie had backed down, she’d climbed up awkwardly, dragging a foot in a cast signed by most of the older kids.
Even Val’s infant sister had been separated from her, and it had been Valerie’s worst nightmare that she would never see little Camille again. Thankfully, the Renards had adopted them both.
And now, even that was under suspicion.
Lucia dropped the small package into the postal slot and automatically made the sign of the cross over her chest.
There. It was done.
She almost heard Sister Camille’s low laughter. “I knew you couldn’t keep a promise,” she would have said, her eyes glinting with a quick intelligence. “Some friend you turned out to be.”
Oh, dear God.
Lucia was such a failure!
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, nearly running into a boy of about three who had strayed too far from his mother, a woman holding another baby while juggling a diaper bag and three boxes. The boy slid behind his mother’s legs, staring up at Lucia with round eyes. She offered the child a faint smile. “God be with you,” she said to his mother, and hurried out of the door feeling like the fraud she was.
The glare and heat hit her full in the face. Though clouds threatened the sun, the humidity was high, and she was sweating. From the weather, or her own case of tangled nerves?
“You know what your problem is?” Camille had asked her one day while they’d been walking from the chapel, through the cool dark halls.
“My problem?”
“You don’t have any real sense of conviction.” Camille’s sky-blue eyes had darkened like an angry sea. “You’re afraid, Lucia. If I had to guess, I’d say you were running from something . . . or someone.”
“No, I—”
“Sure you are,” Camille had insisted, leaning closer, whispering into Lucia’s ear. “But I’ll let you in on a little secret. We all are.” She’d straightened and grinned then, her lips twisting into that little, knowing smile. “Anyway, I trust you to keep this,” and she’d dropped her prized possession into Lucia’s hands. “Don’t lose it.”
Now, Lucia’s stomach twisted. She’d been lying to herself, trying to convince herself that she wasn’t a coward. But Camille had been right.
Seeing Cruz Montoya, talking with him, had only driven the point home. Even now, in broad daylight, walking swiftly down the crowded street, she felt her cheeks flush, her pulse race just thinking of how his dark gaze had drilled into hers, silently prodding her, reminding her of what they’d shared. And he’d given her his phone number, one she’d stupidly seared into her brain. As if she would ever call him!
“Help me,” she whispered as she stepped off the curb.
A horn blasted.
She jumped, catching a glimpse of a huge, speeding SUV.
“Watch out!” someone yelled as she stumbled backward, her heel hitting the curb.
Immense tires screeched over the thunderous rumble of an engine.
As if in slow motion, she started to fall. Caught sight of the metallic beast with its grinning maw of a grill and headlights like chrome and glass eyes.
Strong arms surrounded her and jerked her back to the sidewalk. The dirty SUV flashed by only inches from her. It swerved and veered, cutting across traffic in a blur of dirty side panels and smoked glass windows.
Heart thudding inside her ribs, adrenaline and fear chasing through her blood, Lucia felt the strong arms slacken a bit. Just as she caught a whiff of a familiar aftershave.
“Oh, no,” she whispered, and found herself staring into the dark, assessing gaze of Cruz Montoya.
A
t St. Elsinore’s, slightly bugged that Slade hadn’t returned, Valerie tried to shrug off the dark memories that clung to her. She met a few of the nuns and lay teachers at the orphanage, those who had worked with Camille, none of whom wore habits. When she mentioned the wardrobe to Sister Georgia, the older woman nodded. “We’re not as steeped in tradition as St. Marguerite’s,” she said. “Our priest, Father Thomas, is fairly progressive, and I, for one, was glad to see the habits and wimples and antiquated dress go. To each his own, of course, but here, I hope, we’re more modern and have more flexibility, in keeping with the congregation. Our mission is to serve God, of course, but I don’t think he minds if we’re a little more comfortable as we do it.”
t St. Elsinore’s, slightly bugged that Slade hadn’t returned, Valerie tried to shrug off the dark memories that clung to her. She met a few of the nuns and lay teachers at the orphanage, those who had worked with Camille, none of whom wore habits. When she mentioned the wardrobe to Sister Georgia, the older woman nodded. “We’re not as steeped in tradition as St. Marguerite’s,” she said. “Our priest, Father Thomas, is fairly progressive, and I, for one, was glad to see the habits and wimples and antiquated dress go. To each his own, of course, but here, I hope, we’re more modern and have more flexibility, in keeping with the congregation. Our mission is to serve God, of course, but I don’t think he minds if we’re a little more comfortable as we do it.”
Val kept up with the energetic mother superior, walking swiftly but on the lookout for Slade, who had seemed to disappear with the phone call. How odd. From his end of the conversation, she assumed that one of his brothers had called from the ranch to discuss a problem with the livestock, but that should have been easily handled. Unless he, too, needed to talk to a vet or the ranch foreman or someone . . .
She did look through the windows and spotted Slade’s truck, parked where he’d left it, so she decided whatever had happened he’d deal with it and catch up with them.
She was introduced to several people, two nuns and a cook, none of whom could offer her more than a few words of comfort and kind thoughts about Camille.
“A lovely woman who enjoyed the children,” the tall, impossibly thin cook had said as she’d tossed a dirty apron into a hamper and hung up her hair net.
“Helped me in the infirmary whenever I needed it,” Sister Rosaria, an older nurse, agreed when they’d found her checking stock in a locked medications closet. She was frowning as she counted the vials and jars but paused to offer Val some encouragement. “I could always count on Camille to help with the kids.” She glanced up at Valerie over the lenses of her thin glasses. “No matter how you sugarcoat it, kids hate shots.” She offered a weary smile. “I’ll miss Camille, and I’m truly sorry for you and your family.”
Val fought a tightening in her throat as they walked from the infirmary to a hallway she knew, from memory, led to the chapel.
“Oh, here we go,” the reverend mother said as they passed a window with a view of the playground. “Sister Simone was very close to Camille.” She walked rapidly toward a doorway leading outside, where a woman, Sister Simone presumably, was gathering some balls and a Wiffle-ball bat that had been forgotten during cleanup.
With coffee-colored skin and curly black hair, Simone was nearly five ten, big-boned with dark, slightly suspicious eyes. She’d been humming to herself, a pop song Valerie couldn’t quite name, but stopped abruptly as they approached.
When Sister Georgia introduced them and explained that Val was Camille’s sister, Simone’s face fell into sadness. She offered her condolences, then said, “I’m really going to miss Camille. She was never late, always had a smile.”
“Sister Georgia?” the receptionist called from a doorway. “There you are! You have a phone call.”
“I’m sorry,” Sister Georgia said quickly. “No rest for the wicked. Isn’t that what they say?”
“Or weary,” Sister Simone said. Her curly black hair was unruly, her smile a wide slash of white against her smooth skin. “Works either way.”
“Of course it does.” The mother superior was distracted. “Would you mind showing Valerie around?”
Before Simone could answer, the reverend mother bustled off and through the doorway.
“I guess you’re on,” Val said, “whether you want to be or not.”
“Sister, are you all right?” a blond woman asked Lucia, who was still stunned from the near accident and the fact that Cruz, still holding her, had probably saved her life.
She realized that people were still looking at her—no, make that at
them
. She in full nun’s habit—wimple, scapular, veil, and all—and Cruz in his T-shirt and jeans, his arms lingering a little too long around her as he yanked her from the street.
them
. She in full nun’s habit—wimple, scapular, veil, and all—and Cruz in his T-shirt and jeans, his arms lingering a little too long around her as he yanked her from the street.
“I’m fine . . . fine,” she assured the woman and a few others who had gathered—two black teens who cast suspicious glances her way, the blond woman with her two children, and a group of young girls, each with a cell phone attached firmly to her ear. There were a couple of businessmen as well, and, as luck would have it, a priest speaking to a homeless guy pushing a shopping cart. Lucia wanted to die a thousand deaths. “I, um, I guess I was lost in thought.” She forced a smile to the blonde and felt the heat wash up her face.
The light changed, and most of the pedestrians crossed, the worried woman clutching her children’s hands as they hurried across the street to the park where playground equipment was visible through the stands of live oaks and hedgerows of vibrant crepe myrtle.
Lucia didn’t follow but took a deep breath, then turned her attention to Cruz, her erstwhile savior. “So what are you doing here?” she demanded, casting a nervous glance at the post office. “Following me?”
“Yep.”
Oh, dear Mother, this was not what she needed! Not now. Well, not ever.
His mouth was that insanely sexy slash of white, and she mentally kicked herself for noticing.
“Why?”
“To save you from deadly SUVs?”
She almost laughed. Almost. “The real reason?”
“Because the last time we talked, you told me to stay away, something like forever.”
“You’re impossible.”
“Part of my charm.”
“Right.” Still shaken from nearly being run down, she started walking along the sidewalk, away from the corner and the few remaining people who still cast curious glances her way. Quickly, she walked along the storefronts, and as she did, she told herself her nerves were stretched tight because of the adrenaline still racing through her bloodstream, that it had nothing to do with Cruz. But, of course, she was lying to herself again.
This lying, it was becoming a habit. Not healthy.
To her consternation, Cruz fell into step with her. “I think we’re even now, right?”
“Even?” She shook her head. “I’m not keeping score.”
“Sure.”
She wasn’t going to be baited by him. “You still haven’t said why you were following me.” She thought of the package she’d just mailed, and her palms began to sweat. Mother Mary, she was a horrible liar. “I thought I made myself pretty clear that we couldn’t see each other.”
“I know, but I thought you were a little on the melodramatic side.”
“So what? I was serious.”
“Don’t believe it.”
She’d forgotten how irritating he could be. “Believe what you want to,” she said, mentally scolding herself for kissing him, for giving him the slightest glimpse that she still cared. “Just leave me alone.”
She stopped under the overhang of a little dress shop and caught their reflection in the glass. Faint, as if a superimposed negative over a display of sundresses, was the image of a man and a woman; he in battered jeans and a faded T-shirt, and she in her voluminous habit and veil. An odd couple, and yet, there was more. A glimpse of hidden emotions in the blush of her cheeks, the intensity of his gaze.
The memory of a forbidden kiss.
His gaze caught hers, and her heart began to throb, a pulse beating at her throat. She looked away, blinking, catching a glimpse of something else in the panes, something as disturbing as the clouds collecting overhead.
The wavering image of a man of the cloth—a priest wearing sunglasses. She froze. Something was off about the guy.
“What?” Cruz asked, and in that flicker of an instant, when she turned her attention to him, the image of the priest was gone. She turned to look over her shoulder to the park.
“Did you see him?”
“Who?”
“The priest.”
“What priest? The one helping the homeless guy on the corner?” Cruz’s gaze followed hers to the empty park.
“I don’t know,” she said, thinking maybe she’d conjured up the image, and yet it burned in her brain. Cold as dry ice and just as foggy.
Like the night so long ago.
She had been in Cruz’s car, the radio playing loudly. As if it were yesterday, she remembered that last night of their youth, of the exhilaration of being with him, of doing something dangerous, of defying her father . . . They’d been kids then, teens, and the world had been a big, vast, exciting place where their future had seemed to stretch out endlessly.
Until the moment she’d seen the deer in Cruz’s headlights, the spindly legged animal frozen in fear in the rising mist, twin beams mirrored in the doe’s glassy eyes.
A voice as rough as sandpaper gritted in her ears. “Lucifer’s son is the harbinger of death.”
She’d screamed as the tires spun out of control, the axle twisting, metal groaning. Glass shattered. Panic and pain sizzled up her spine....
Now, looking at the empty park, she felt the same chill, the flesh on her arms pimpling at a dark, unknown danger.
“I have to go,” she insisted, glancing up at Cruz to the cleft in his eyebrow, evidence of that night.
He grabbed her arm. “Lucia, please . . .”
Knowing she would be damned in hell forever, she stood on tiptoes and brushed a kiss across his cheek. He tried to catch her lips with his, but she pulled away. “Cruz, if you love me, please . . . don’t follow me.” And with that, she pulled away, dashing across the street and into the park.
She didn’t look back, but she felt the weight of Cruz’s gaze, heavy against her back.
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