Season of Storm (6 page)

"The house. It looks to me as though it was designed by Johnny Winterhawk. Wasn't it? I've seen a few of the private residences he's done, and—" She broke off and gazed at her abductor. He was rigidly immobile, looking at her with the oddest expression in his eyes.

"What's the matter?" she frowned. "Don't you know who designed your house?"

Johnny Winterhawk wasn't exactly a household name, but she would have expected at least a spark of recognition. Winterhawk held very original opinions about awkward locations and natural sites, and he had designed a number of public buildings in Vancouver and a university in the States that they were still talking about.

"He's very good, isn't he?" Her glance wandered to the house again. "I wanted a Winterhawk house when we built the house we're in now," she remembered wistfully. "But Daddy...."

As the realization crystallized in her brain Smith's voice died, and her lips parted on a soft gasp. Slowly, slowly she turned her head to look at her dark, hatchet-faced abductor. He was staring at her, his eyes filled with mingled amazement and disbelief. He looked thunderstruck.

No more thunderstruck than she.

"You can't be. You
can't
be!" she whispered, her eyes mirroring his amazement. "But you are!
You're
Johnny Winterhawk
!"
 

"Damn it! Damn it to hell! You mean to say you didn't
know?"
Johnny Winterhawk thundered, looking as though he wanted to hit something.
 

Five

Smith stared up into the furious dark eyes in amazement. Of course she recognized him now—Johnny Winterhawk had designed enough important buildings in Vancouver for her to have seen his photo in the newspaper several times, but she wouldn't have thought he courted personal fame.

"No, I didn't recognize you before," she said. "Why?"

"You must have!" he thundered. "The moment you pulled off my mask."

"This is an odd time to be concerned about fame, I must say," Smith said. "I'm a kidnap victim, not a prospective client, believe me!"

"You didn't recognize me?" he asked, an odd emphasis in his voice. He was standing one step above her, and he was a lot taller than she was to begin with; if they stayed here much longer she was going to get a sore neck. "But you...."

"All right," she capitulated, shrugging. "I did recognize you. You're my favourite architect. Is that what you want?"

He looked at her, his mouth a grim line. Smith stared back.

"You may stop laughing when you hear what I have to say," Johnny Winterhawk said. "When you ripped off my mask I got the distinct impression that you recognized me. That, Miss St. John, is the only reason you're here right now."

It took a second to sink in.
"What?"
she demanded.
 

He said, his jaw tight, "You didn't recognize me?"

"I wouldn't have recognized Elvis Presley if he'd bitten me!" Smith returned. "I still don't see—"

He interrupted. "What was that look that crossed your face?"

Smith thought back to the terror-filled moment of insane bravado when she had ripped off the white-trimmed mask. "I—I suddenly realized how stupid it was to have got myself a look at your face," she remembered. "That's the only thing I can think of." She'd realized it meant they would have to kill her, but she wasn't telling him that.

Johnny Winterhawk made an exasperated noise. "Yes, it was," he said. "Very damn stupid. So was I, obviously, but it was a tense moment, and you're here now."

Ever since she'd recognized him, Smith's fear had been slowly leaving her, and when he admitted he hadn't wanted to kidnap her she'd felt as though the world was returning to normal. But that "you're here now" had a finality about it that jerked her back to apprehension.

"What do you mean?" she demanded, leaping up the last step and grabbing at Johnny Winterhawk's arm as he turned to open the door.

He looked at her without speaking and stood back for her to enter the house. Smith looked into the beautiful, inviting interior past his shoulder and felt a sudden inexplicable dread. Once she entered this house her life would never be the same again. She wanted to plead with him, but she didn't know for what, and his silence suddenly seemed implacable. Smith took a quick deep breath, straightened her back and walked past Johnny Winterhawk into his extraordinary house.

It was rough-hewn inside, not at all like the interiors of the elegant homes he had designed for some of Vancouver's wealthy, which Smith had visited or seen in magazine photo spreads. In his own house the interior was an extension of the exterior, all golden cedar and hewn rock. And entire walls were made of glass, so that the forest seemed an integral part of the house.

On the varnished cedar floors were scattered woven Indian rugs, and on the cedar walls hung a collection of antique and modern masks and carvings and paintings that even her inexperienced eye could tell comprised a variety of contributions from different native tribes of Canada. Works of Haida and Chopa and Kwakiutl artists she picked out without difficulty, but there were many that she did not recognize.

The house was like a staircase up the steep hillside; Johnny led her up through a few rooms and several levels, then opened a door onto a bedroom that looked out over the soft waterfall she had seen outside. It was surrounded by lush forest growth. Smith felt the peace of the house enveloping her like a physical thing. She sighed deeply.

Johnny Winterhawk stood in the doorway, looking very dark in his black jersey and trousers, and half smiled down at her.

"If there's a way out of this," he said, "I'm too tired to think of it right now." He paused uncertainly and rubbed his hand over his head. "There's no way off the island except by boat, and I've got the keys. Can I trust you to try to get some sleep yourself, or do I have to stay with you to prevent you from trying to burn down the house for a signal fire?" As Smith blinked protestingly up at him he smiled. "And don't tell me you wouldn't consider it."

He seemed to think she was very resourceful and ruthless. Burn down the house for a signal fire! As if she would do any such thing! Still, it was a thought....Her gaze dropped from his, and she stared unseeingly out the window. Well, why not? A kidnapper deserved whatever he got. And a victim had the right to escape by any method she could.

Johnny Winterhawk laughed shortly, watching the thoughts play across her face. "All right," he said. "I won't put temptation in your way." And stepping into the room behind her he closed the door.

Smith stood stiffly against the alarm that ran up her spine. "What are you going to do?" she asked levelly.

He half smiled at her. "Are you always so cool under fire?"

"Am I under fire?"  

"You do let yourself get angry," he mused. "Is that the only emotion you ever show, or do you allow yourself others?"

She compressed her lips and stared at him, measuring his size against her own agility, weighing her chances.

"If you try to rape me the emotion you can expect is murderous rage," Smith said. "And I do mean murderous."

Johnny Winterhawk stared at her in irritated disbelief. "If I
rape
you?" he repeated. "What the hell are you talking about? Of course I'm not going to rape you!"
 

She wanted to believe him; she wanted to be able to trust him. "You closed the door," she pointed out, "and then you asked me about showing emotion."

"Look," he said, "I want some sleep. I've been up for about fifty hours straight. I'm seeing double, and kidnapping you wasn't exactly easy." He smiled briefly. "I'm not leaving you alone while I sleep. That's all."

He crossed to the bed and as she watched began to pull it across the room. Before she was quite aware of his intention the wide pine bed, its mattress covered with a woven blanket with a Kwakiutl design, was solidly jammed against the door. Johnny Winterhawk stood gazing at her across it.

"Through that door," he said, pointing across the room, "is a bathroom. There may be a book or two in that closet." Another door. "I am going to steep—on this side of the bed. If you want to lie on the other side you can be sure that I will not touch you. However, if you try to break the windows or move the bed from the door—or set a fire—I will wake up." He smiled at her with his eyes. "If you get bored while I'm sleeping remind yourself that you could have promised not to try to burn the house down."

With that he dropped down on the bed, stretched out and fell asleep.

***

She awoke with an unfamiliar slow ease to find her head resting on a black-clad shoulder. For one exhilarating moment of looking into the face of the dark, sleeping stranger, Shulamith couldn't remember who she was. Then she jerked away from the warmth of his nearness back to her own side of the bed.

She felt a sudden sense of loss, as though she had dreamed that they belonged together and found him in the dream. She gazed in wonder at the dark face on the pillow. It was an effort not to roll back into the comfort of his body.

At that moment Johnny Winterhawk opened his eyes and looked across the bed at her, directly into her soul.

Smith sat up with a gasp and swung her legs over the side of the bed, turning her back on him. After a moment her breathing and her emotions were back under control. "Sorry, did I wake you?" she asked, then stood and turned to look down at him, proving—to herself? to him?—that there had never been a moment when she was afraid to look into Johnny Winterhawk's eyes.

"I don't know what woke me," he said. He rolled onto his back, watching her as she crossed to gaze out the window. "Did you sleep or pace the cage?"

Smith turned away from the view out the window and looked back at him in some irritation, thrusting her hands deep into the pockets of the overlarge jeans.

"I'm not a wild animal, you know," she observed. Johnny Winterhawk swung his feet to the floor and sat up.

"Except when you're cornered," he answered with a grin. He rubbed his hands lazily in his shining black hair. "I haven't forgotten how you tried to pitch me overboard, or the way you threw the phone at my head."

"I hope it connected," Smith said with relish. "You were lucky. If that towel—" She broke off and turned back to the window, remembering the terror of the night with a shudder. It was hard to believe that only a few hours ago she had been safe in her bed and in her life.

A noise made her turn around: Johnny Winterhawk was dragging the bed away from the door back to its original position. He thumped it into place with his leg, then crossed to open the door. He held it open and waited for her.

"Yes, I was lucky," he agreed. "You're a quick thinker and a tough fighter. If I was in a tight corner I'd rather have you on my side than against me."

Smith could think of nothing to say in answer to this, so she said nothing, passing out of the room in front of him at his invitation. What else could she do?

He led her back down through the house, then onto a square, open balcony that had several trees growing right up through the floor of it.

"I always thought a site had to be completely cleared before a house could be built!" she exclaimed, thinking of the rather lovely wooded lot that had been ravaged when her father had the new house built.

"That's a myth perpetrated by lazy architects," Johnny Winterhawk replied, "and accepted by tradition-bound clients. Even if a site does have to be dismantled during construction, it can be restored afterward. It's criminal to import shrubs and lawn for a site like this."

Smith sighed, thinking of the terraced expanse of green surrounding her father's house, so unnatural amid the natural flora of the mountain.

The balcony looked west, overhanging a rugged gorge where, many feet below, a narrow arm of the sea pounded magnificently against the rocks. Beyond was the ocean, sprinkled in the distance with the dark mossy mounds of neighbouring islands. The view was breathtaking. Smith crossed over to the railing and stared down at the hypnotic motion of the waves running in and out and breaking whitely over the rocky shore.  The sun was still behind her in the east—they hadn't slept long.

Her hair had lost the string she had tied it back with, and it blew wildly around her face and body in the wind that rushed up the gorge. It had been an age since she had last worn her hair loose. This past year in Europe had been unremittingly formal and constrained. She'd had a great deal to learn, many people to please. The marketing end of a large lumber concern was no small operation, as her father's European manager had soon shown her. Smith felt suddenly as free as her hair.

Smith laughed into the wind and turned to meet Johnny Winterhawk's eyes. "This is one beautiful house," she said, and smiled at him in real admiration.

The kitchen had two large windows—one facing on the same view, slightly below the balcony. The window opposite looked out over the rock staircase they had arrived by earlier.

Johnny Winterhawk made the best scrambled eggs she could remember eating since her favourite cook had quit at the St. John logging camp in Dog's Ear four or five years ago.