Wait Until Dark (35 page)

"A skill?" the detective asked.

"Gave her an opportunity to learn photography from some master photographers. I've been telling her for the past four or five years that she should think about exhibiting some of her pictures. She really has a great eye for composition. But modeling is something she fell into at a very early age and stuck with it because, well, because she did well with it. Frankly, I think she's more comfortable on the other side of the camera."

"Really?" Detective Rafferty's eyebrows raised. "I'd have thought... I mean, there are thousands of women who'd do just about anything to do what your sister does."

"Detective, my sister and I came from a really poor background. These days they'd call it disadvantaged. Back then, they just called it poor. For Valerie to have found something that pays her the kind of money she makes for doing little more than standing still and just being her naturally beautiful self was nothing short of a miracle. As much as a miracle as it was for me to be able to play professional ball all those years."

"Interesting." Rafferty nodded. "I did, as I mentioned, cover the break-in at her town house. She certainly doesn't appear to live the celebrity life, if you know what I mean. Her house seemed very, well, the word
modest
comes to mind."

"Val has never been extravagant. She tends to save more than she spends, and has a very good business manager. He's made some excellent investments," Quinn told him.

"My sister has a terrible fear of poverty, detective. Having lived with very little for a very long time, well, I think Val's always saving for that rainy day. You know, when she can't work anymore."

"That day may have arrived," Quinn said softly.

"What about other family members?" The detective turned a page in his notebook.

"None," Cale told him.

"Parents?"

"No idea of where either of them are. Our mother left us when Val was a baby. Our father was a long-haul trucker who had a deeper bond with the bottle than he ever did with either of us. I haven't seen or heard from him in years."

"That's surprising that you never heard from him." Rafferty looked up from his notes. "Both of you being well-known in your fields, you being a bit of a celebrity. You'd think he'd have been in touch. You know, 'my son, the professional ball player' 'My daughter the model.' "

"I didn't say that I
never
heard from him." Cale's eyes narrowed. "I said I haven't seen or heard from him in years."

"How do you know he hasn't contacted your sister?"

"Valerie and I are close, Detective. She would have told me."

"She didn't tell you about the break-in at her house," Rafferty reminded him.

"That's different. Believe me, if our father had contacted her, she'd have told me."

"So there's no other family. How about friends that you think we should talk to?"

"I don't know that Val had that many close friends, except for my sister, Eliza, and she lives in Portland," Quinn responded. "I don't recall ever meeting any friends other than Bruce the times when I visited. There were two women that she went to the gym with one afternoon every week. They'd work out then go for dinner."

"Names?"

"Caroline something. I don't remember that I knew the name of the other woman. Bruce would probably know."

"How about the men she dated?" Rafferty asked as he scribbled a few notes.

"I don't think there was any one man in particular. Actually, I don't think she dated all that much, now that I think of it." Cale turned to his wife. "Quinn, did Val ever talk to you about who she dated?"

"No. I always had the impression that she didn't go out much," Quinn responded. "Though I was never sure if she told me that hoping that I'd pass it on to Sky."

"Sky?" Rafferty raised an eyebrow.

"My brother, Schuyler. He and Val have always sort of had a ... I guess
understanding
is the best way to describe their relationship."

"What kind of understanding?" The detective continued to write.

Cale and Quinn exchanged a long look, then Quinn said, "Neither of them ever said anything, but I just always had the impression they were, well, waiting for each other, somehow."

"And your brother lives where?"

"Back in Montana. Part of the year, he lives at the ranch where we grew up. The other part, he works a farm that our grandparents owned."

"Ranch, huh? Sounds like a real cowboy."

"Actually, both of my brothers are cowboys." Quinn smiled. "And they're both quite proud of it."

"I'm sure they are." Rafferty closed his notebook with a snap.

"So, can you tell us what is being done to find the person who did this to my sister?"

"We have several officers working on it, looking for leads, keeping their ears to the street," the detective said, "But there's not much else we can do until she comes around again. I'll need to talk to her, friends. The people she works with."

"I can get the number of her agent and her business manager for you," Cale offered.

"That will help. But I'm also hoping that she'll remember something else. Maybe there's someone who stares too long at the gas station, the supermarket, the gym. A delivery boy... a neighbor..." He paused, then added, "The next-door neighbor seemed to get on the scene pretty quickly."

"You said the barking dog had alerted him."

"He
said the barking dog alerted him."

"Then I'm certain that's exactly what happened," Quinn told him.

"He was the only one seen around, same as the night of the break-in," Rafferty told them.

"That's out of the question. Bruce would never hurt Valerie." Quinn frowned.

"I don't know how badly the assailant wanted to hurt her. Let's face it, with a knife sharp enough to have cut her face the way it did, he could have killed her. The weapon made an almost scalpel-thin slice. She has no other wounds. Why? If you're going to attack someone, why just cut the face?"

"Because cutting her face would could ruin her career," Quinn answered without thinking.

"Right."

"So maybe it's another model, someone who thinks that Valerie is in her way?” Cale said.

"That's a possibility that we'll be exploring" Rafferty told them. "But I still don't know about this neighbor."

"Why would you suspect Bruce?"

"Well, you know, this guy's an actor. Actors are a dime a hundred out here. Tough to get noticed, tougher still to get any press at all, for a guy like him. But since your sister's attack, he's been interviewed by all the local television stations and the major newspapers. How he rescued the beauty from the beast, that sort of thing..." Rafferty frowned.

"You think he did it for the attention?" Quinn asked incredulously.

"I think it's an angle worth pursuing. He's sure gotten a lot of press these past forty-eight hours."

"I don't believe it. Not for a second. Bruce is her friend." Cale stood and folded his arms over his chest. "Sorry, Detective, but I think you're looking in the wrong place."

"Actually, we're looking everywhere. We have as many men on this as we can spare. That's just one possibility. Certainly we'll pursue every angle. But this guy next door, he had opportunity - that lightbulb had been unscrewed, he could have easily done that - and he knew her routine. He knew when she'd be back, since he was the one taking in her mail, that sort of thing. He has a key to her house."

"Then why didn't he wait inside and attack her then?"

Cale asked. "Why didn't he attack her in her sleep? If he had a key, he could have done this at any time."

"If his motive was to garner attention for himself, as a hero, he'd have to have set it up in a way that he had an out. And the barking dog gave him that out."

"I'm not following you," Quinn said.

"If his plan was to attack Valerie when she came in that night from the airport, but not to hurt her in a way that threatened her life, then he would need an excuse to have cut the assault short. Now, it's a very logical scenario if you're the assailant, you start the attack, there's some commotion, the dog next door starts barking to beat the band. You figure someone's going to come to investigate. So you run away, the neighbor comes out, sees the attack, runs back inside the house and calls 911." He paused in the telling. "This is a logical progression of events."

"So why do you think it didn't happen that way?"

"It just seems that the attack was over too soon." Rafferty shrugged. "Something about it just doesn't sit well with me. But we'll see what else we can learn when our victim here can give us some information."

"Well, if you have questions to ask her, better plan to spend some time here tomorrow or the next day, because after that, all your interviews will be done by phone." Cale told him.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that the doctor told us that if she woke up today, she'd most likely be able to leave day after tomorrow, assuming there are no complications. I plan to have her out of here as soon as possible. So if all goes well, Valerie will be on her way to Montana by Saturday."

The detective frowned and appeared to be about to speak.

"That's not negotiable, Detective Rafferty. My sister needs time to recover, in a place where she's going to be safe. Val and I jointly own a cabin in Montana, right up an old mountain road from my in-laws' place. Unless there are medical reasons to prevent the trip, my wife will be taking my sister there this weekend. So if I were you, I'd plan on stopping by tomorrow to spend some time with Val, since it's going to be a while before she comes back to California." Rafferty frowned.

"But you understand that if someone does intend on harming her further, we can't watch her from here."

"Frankly - and with all due respect - I think she's safer at home."

Quinn nodded. "My parents are close by and my brothers will be keeping an eye on her. We've all discussed it, and it's been decided. Val is going home."

"So I guess your job is to find the person who assaulted her here, and keep him here." Cale offered his hand to the detective to indicate that today's interview was over. "But in the meantime, Detective Rafferty, as soon as we get the green light from the doctors, my sister is going home."

5

QUINN MCALLISTER GLANCED
across the front seat of the car she'd rented in Lewistown, Montana, and wondered whether or not she should awaken her sister-in-law for this last leg of their drive to Larkspur, and beyond, to the High Meadow Ranch, Quinn's family home. In the distance, she could see the Big Snowy Mountains rising, and a smile crossed her lips. There was no place on earth quite like Montana - particularly, to Quinn's way of thinking, like this part of Montana. She never came back without feeling that rush of gratitude, every time, for all the years she'd spent there.

"As close to heaven as you can get on God's green Earth." She murmured her father's expression without realizing she'd spoken aloud.

"My heart catches in my throat every time I look at those mountains," a voice from the passenger side whispered.

"Ah, she awakens." Quinn reached over to pat
Valerie's arm fondly. "I was just wondering if I shouldn't give you a little pinch to bring you around."

"I must have known I was home," Val stretched her legs out before her to ease the kinks. "I can't imagine how I managed to fall asleep again after having slept all the way from Los Angeles to Billings. And then from Billings to Lewistown. And then from Lewistown to here."

"Well, we could start with the fact that you just got out of the hospital this morning after four long days. And let's face it, your body must be a little weakened by your ordeal."

"Well, I'm glad I woke up when I did. I'd hate to miss the view." Val leaned back in her seat and added, "I miss it enough as it is."

"Do you ever think about coming back for good?"

"Sure." Val nodded. “Like every day...”

"Me, too. I keep thinking about someday maybe Cale and I can build a house a little farther down the mountain from my folks. A little closer to town might be nicer for the boys. Growing up, we Hollisters always felt so isolated from everyone and everything that was happening in Larkspur." Quinn smiled at Val. "Of course, you and Cale grew up in town and were close to the action all the time, so you didn't really miss anything, I guess."

Val merely smiled. The things that she and Cale had missed growing up in town ran along the lines of heat in the winter and an occasional meal, but some memories weren't worth bringing back.

"I think about the cabin a lot." Val pushed those times firmly behind her, where she believed they belonged. "I thought I'd be spending much more time here than I have. I didn't expect to be working so much, this past year in particular."

"Well, now you'll have some time off."

"Maybe all the time in the world," Val muttered, then sat up in her seat as the car rounded a bend in the road. "Can't you
just feel
what it was like here a hundred or so years ago? Can't you just see the covered wagons, hear the thunder as the endless herds of buffalo ran across the prairie?"

"Well, with the exception of the fact that there are more cattle now than bison, and that there's more hay growing than prairie grass, I don't imagine it's changed all that much."

"Big Sky," Val said fondly. "Oceans of blue over miles of golden plains. I never feel as small, as insignificant, as I do when I'm here."

"I feel that way when I'm up in the mountains. Like I'm less than a spot. Like ten of me could dance on the head of a pin."

Quinn made a left onto a narrow two-lane road that would take them into the town of Larkspur. On both sides of the road, the prairie spread out as far as the eye could see, dotted here and there with splotches of red, yellow, and blue wildflowers.

"I wonder if the boys are still down at the farm," Quinn said as if to herself.

"The boys?"

"Trevor and Sky are taking turns with three of our Dunham cousins working our grandparents' farm, since my granddad passed away, remember? They put in a few hundred acres of wheat this past spring, like Grandpa used to do. Gramma hasn't decided what to do with the farm in the long run. She doesn't think she wants to stay there but doesn't want to sell the property, either, I think she's hoping that one of the boys will want it. For now, they're taking turns with the fields and the livestock, and she's staying with my aunt Charlotte."

"I guess it's keeping everyone pretty busy."

"That's an understatement. Farming or ranching is tough enough. Trying to do both is ridiculous. I told Sky that the other night, but they feel they owe it to Grandpa to keep the farm going. At the same time, they recognize that Dad isn't getting any younger, either. And of course, Sky decided to try his hand breeding horses last year."

"Sounds like he's got a lot on his hands right now," Val said as if distracted.

"He does. He said ... oh, look, Val, there's Sandy Osborn. Mom said she's buying out Mr. Hiller's old warehouse and she's going to put some boutiques in there."

"In Larkspur?" Val's eyebrows raised. "Who does she think will shop there?"

"Oh, haven't you heard? The Marshalls sold their farm to a developer who's putting in a bunch of mini-ranches on something like ten acres each. I hear he already sold a dozen or so of them."

"All to city people?"

Quinn nodded.

"It's driving the old-timers like my dad crazy because some of these folks are bringing their mountain bikes up into the hiking trails and turning them into mud holes. It's got people so riled up around here that Dalton, my sister CeCe's fiancé, is thinking about running for public office."

"My." Val smiled a crooked half-smile. "That's a lot of news to be coming out of Larkspur all at the same time."

Quinn laughed and slowed down as they approached the town limits.

"Is there anything you need? Would you like me to stop anywhere in town while we're here?"

"No, no, thank you," Val responded just a beat too quickly. "There's nothing I need."

"Well, if you think of something later, you just let me know, and I'll run in and pick it up for you," Quinn said, ignoring the flash of panic that had crossed Val's face.

Val doesn't want anyone to see her,
Quinn realized.
She'd been fine in the airport, where she didn't know anyone, but here, at home, she probably doesn't want anyone to feel sorry for her.

"Thank you, Quinn," Val said simply, her anxiety deflating as quickly as it had risen within her.

Val had tried to protest the trip to Montana, but there was no arguing with Cale. There was no other place where she would be as safe as she'd be there on the mountain, he'd told her bluntly, with the Hollisters to look after her while the police sought her assailant. Only her pleading had gotten him to agree to let her stay at the cabin rather than at the High Meadow Ranch. Val just couldn't bear the thought of others looking at her, at least until she got used to looking at herself. And that might take a while.

As the car rounded the first sharp turn that led up into the hills, Val's fingers sought the side of her face, the tips following the jagged trail from stitch to stitch. When she'd taken her first long, hard look at herself in the hospital, she'd been sickened by what she saw. The angry red slice held together with what could have passed for fishing line was closer to her hairline than she'd first suspected, but its prominence had still come as a shock. The nurses who'd cared for her had been wonderful about not expressing pity, but it had been there, in their eyes.
Such a shame...

At last here, in the hills, she wouldn't have to face anyone but Quinn's family, and Val would do all she could to avoid even the Hollisters for as long as she could.

There had been no words to tell how grateful Val was to hear that Sky was taking his turn at his grandparents' farm just then. She'd dreamed too many times about coming back - coming back for good - and finally having time to find out just what it was that had been lurking under the surface between the two of them for so long. She just hadn't figured on coming back this way, with a track running along the side of her face and purple bruises ringing her throat like an ugly strand of pearls.

No, better that Sky was at the farm, the longer the better. Maybe by the time he came back, the scar would have begun to heal and she wouldn't look so ... so disfigured.

In the side mirror, the hillside flowed behind them like a golden cloak. If she had been driving, she'd have stopped right back there and gotten her camera out of her bag and shot a roll of film trying to catch the way the sun played off that butte down there to the south. Then there was the way the wildflowers dotted the landscape like embroidery on an old quilt. Maybe one day soon, she told herself, she'd come back down on her own and perhaps recapture just that same effect of color and light and shadow.

Dust blew up in pale swirls as the car left the paved road and headed up the dirt drive that would lead to the High Meadow.

"... can't wait to see those little boys. I can't even tell you how much I missed them," Quinn was saying as she began to make her turn.

"Oh. Quinn." Val reached out a hand and tried not to panic. "Would you mind if... I mean, please, let me out here and I'll walk up to the cabin."

"Valerie, what's wrong?" Quinn stopped the car, not bothering to pull over to the side of the road. There was little need for concern for on-coming traffic up here.

"I just...I'm just tired. Do you think your mother would mind if I didn't... if I went to the cabin instead of to the ranch?"

"Well, of course everyone is looking forward to seeing you, but I'm sure they'd understand if you're tired from the trip. Of course my mother wouldn't mind." Quinn leaned over and took Val's hand. It was shaking. "And you just close that door. Of course, I won't have you walking up to the cabin. For heaven's sake, Valerie, close that door."

"I know how anxious you are to see the boys...."

"It will take me five minutes to get you settled," Quinn assured her as she turned the car around and headed back up the gravel road that led farther up the hill. "You can see everyone tomorrow, if you're feeling up to it."

Valerie nodded, not knowing just when she'd be feeling up to it, but relieved that it didn't have to be now. Not now. Not yet...

Quinn stopped the car gently in front of the old log cabin that sat nestled in a stand of pines. Leaning on the steering wheel, she told Val, "I have such fondness for this old place."

"I guess you do." Val smiled, recalling that it was here, at her ancestor Jedidiah McAllister's cabin, that Quinn and Cale, once high school sweethearts, found each other again after many years of being apart. The reunion had been touched by a bit of magic, Val recalled, Quinn insisting that she'd been led to the cabin through a blinding snowstorm by the spirit of her great-great-great grandmother, Elizabeth Dunham.

Val wondered if perhaps a little of that same magic lingered, if Elizabeth's magic worked for Hollister in-laws as well.

"If you'll pop open the trunk, I'll just grab my bags," Val told Quinn, "so that you can just turn around and head back down to the ranch."

"Are you sure you don't need some help?"

"I'm fine. I only have these two bags and my camera gear." Val slammed the trunk lid and walked back to the front of the car to lean in the window.

"Be sure to tell your mom and dad I send my love. I'll see everyone as soon as I get my feet on the ground."

"Well, go on in, then, and get yourself settled," Quinn blew her a kiss. "Call down to the ranch if you think of anything you need or want."

"I will. I promise." Val stepped back from the car and watched Quinn make a tight turn around on the narrow lane, then waved as her sister-in-law passed by on her way back down the hill.

Swinging her travel bag over her shoulder, she turned and took a good look at Jedidiah's old cabin. Made of log and stucco a hundred years and more ago, the cabin had withstood many a fierce whiter storm by virtue of its precise craftsmanship and its sheltered location, tucked in as it was in a dense grove of pine trees that served as a sort of fortress on the north and west sides. It was just three years ago that Val, city-weary from living in New York for almost seven years, and starved for the hills, had decided to bring the cabin into the twenty-first century. To this end, she'd had electricity brought up and had running water installed so that she could have a real bathroom and kitchen. New heavy wool area rugs, new furniture, new everything had made their way on trucks up the narrow road. Delighted with the results, Val had spent every spare moment there that first year. The second year, too, she had come often, wanting to take advantage of all the activity surrounding Cale and Quinn's wedding. But over the past ten months, her career had taken off like a shot, and she'd been so busy that she'd had scant days off since early spring.

The thought occurred to Val then that, had it not been for the assault, she probably wouldn't have gotten there this summer, either.

She was thinking about this as she walked up the steps to the narrow porch that ran across the front of the cabin. Setting her bags down, Val rummaged in her purse for her keys, but then realized that the door was open just a tiny bit. Hesitating, she took two steps back without even realizing she had done so, then sighed, remembering
where
she was. If she were anyplace but
here,
a partially opened door would give her pause after the trauma of the past week. But the cabin was her sanctuary. An open door here meant that someone had opened it for her as a gesture of welcome. She pushed on the door and it swung all the way back, inviting her to enter. Gathering her bags, she stepped inside, using one foot to kick the door dosed behind her.