Dark Powers (18 page)

“No.”

“So why did you stick around?”

He dragged in a breath and let it out. “I stumbled on a conspiracy. Or rather a mutiny. A bunch of the sex slaves were planning a rebellion. I knew that if they got caught, a lot of them would be killed.”

She wanted to reach for his hand, but she kept her arms at her sides.

“And you stuck around to help.”

“Yes. But while I was sticking around bad things happened. Some of the slaves did get caught. They were tortured and killed.”

“That wasn’t your fault. It sounds to me like you keep ascribing the worst possible motives to yourself.”

“If you’d been in my position, you would have too.”

“It was a horrible situation to be in. You were putting yourself in jeopardy every minute you were there.”

“I got out alive.”

“Don’t punish yourself any longer. You could have bailed out long before you did. I’ll bet a lot more people would have died if you’d left earlier.”

She watched him swallow, hoping she had nudged him toward a more favorable view of those hellish months. But she knew he’d have to come to terms with it on his own.

“There’s something else,” he said in a low voice.

“Which is?” she asked, wary again.

“You really want to hang out with a guy who’s haunted?”

She could only stare at him. “Haunted?”

“What would you call it?”

“I thought haunted meant when a ghost comes after a person. Isn’t it the other way around with you?”

He shrugged. “Maybe, if you want to get technical.”

“You think of it as a liability? Doesn’t your boss think of it as an asset? A power you can use?”

“A dark power.”

“A power you use for good.”

He snorted. “Frank Decorah likes it because he doesn’t have to do it.”

“I’m sorry,” she murmured as she remembered what it had been like for him. Still, she couldn’t stop herself from saying, “Are you trying to find every excuse you can to distance yourself from me?”

“No,” he answered, but she was sure he was lying.

“Tell me what else you’re thinking about,” she demanded.

He kept his gaze steady as he said, “I dreamed about you.”

“And?”

“We were on the
Windward
together. You were a dominatrix. You were punishing me for what I’d done there.”

She tried to conceal her shock, but she knew he had picked up on it.

“What do you think about that?” he asked.

“I . . .don’t know. How was I punishing you?”

“You had me naked on a wooden table in a dungeon. You were whipping me.”

Again she was sure he’d said it for the shock value. “When did you have the dream?”

“Yesterday.

“Before or after . . . I found you standing by the window.”

“After.”

She absorbed that. “Okay.”

“Okay what? You’re all right with that?”

“It was a dream. You can’t control your dreams.”

“But what does it say about me?”

“That you’re human—like everyone else.”

Before he could think of anything else to say that he thought she didn’t want to hear, she said, “It’s almost dinner time, and we haven’t eaten anything since that bologna sandwich in jail.”

“Don’t remind me.” He gave a mirthless laugh. “We’re lucky it wasn’t dog food.”

“We can have a meal at the Crab Shack and see if that couple who wanted to talk to us shows up. And we can check out Bettie Henderson again.”

“You’re still interested in her?”

“Maybe she knows something she hasn’t told us. Maybe she called Chief Judd when we left the restaurant last time.”

He climbed out of bed naked, and she had another chance to admire his lean, hard-muscled body. Rummaging in his bag, he got out clean clothes and took them into the bathroom.

While the door was closed, she pulled on a tee shirt and jeans. When he was finished in the bathroom, she ducked inside and showered and dressed. As she dried her hair, she peered at herself in the mirror.

If Ben could feel guilty, so could she. They’d come to Doncaster to find her sister, and she’d ended up making love with a man she found very desirable. Perhaps her punishment was that he seemed determined to make sure the relationship went nowhere, since he’d brought up everything from that slave ship to ghosts.

She sighed. She’d been cautious about men all her life because she didn’t want to follow in her mother’s footsteps. Which meant that she hadn’t had many relationships. Only Adam and Larry, and neither one had turned out well. And she was beginning to think her caution and lack of trust had helped drive them away.

She didn’t want that to happen with Ben. But her insight about herself didn’t mean she knew how to change the dynamics between them. At his core, Ben was a good man. At the harbor, he’d jumped into the water after her—without a thought for himself. And in the jail cell, he’d done his darnedest to take the edge off the miserable experience. For the first time, he’d really opened up with her because he knew she needed to focus on something besides being at the mercy of Chief Judd. He’d been putting her and Laurel first since they’d gone to Gary Baker’s house. But he thought of himself as damaged goods, and she didn’t have enough experience to help him deal with it.

Great.

She came out of the bathroom to find him holding the curtains aside, looking out.

“Any bad guys?”

“No. Maybe they’re giving us time to get out of town.”

“Well, they’re going to be surprised when we stick around,” she answered, then walked to the bed and started straightening the covers. Ben moved to the other side and helped her. Was she trying to wipe out the evidence that they’d done anything more there than sleep?

They drove to the Crab Shack.

To Sage’s disappointment, the older couple wasn’t there.

“I hear you got into some trouble yesterday,” Bettie Henderson said as she led them to a window seat.

“How do you know?” Ben asked.

“This is a small town. News gets around. One of the patrol officers is the nephew of my seafood supplier. He told me this morning. And when I stopped in to check out the clothing sale at Beach Duds, Doris Jenkins mentioned it, too.”

“What kind of trouble did we get into?” Ben asked.

“Trespassing.”

“That’s it?”

“It’s all I heard. Was there more to it?”

“Trespassing,” he confirmed.

Sage shot him a look, and Bettie was about to say something when a man called out to her, “We’d like to be seated.”

The hostess bustled away, and Sage looked at Ben. “Just trespassing,” she whispered.

“I didn’t say just. But I think there’s a downside to saying anything else. Mark Linton threatened to tell the world what we’d found if Chief Judd didn’t let us go. I don’t want to be the source of any more information about Magdalina.”

Sage nodded.

This time, a waitress they hadn’t met before served them, and they didn’t bring up either Magdalina or Laurel. In fact, they didn’t talk much as they ate, though Sage noticed Bettie glanced at them every so often.

When they finished, Ben surprised Sage by asking for the dessert menu.

“We both could use some extra calories. How about splitting some apple pie and ice cream?” he asked.

“Okay,” she answered, hoping that thinking of dessert was a sign that he was easing up on himself.

When it came, they took turns taking forkfuls of the classic dessert.

“I’d forgotten how good this is,” Sage admitted. And how good it was to share it with Ben. Was she storing up memories for afterwards, when he walked away from her? She pushed that thought out of her mind. She should be thinking about her sister, not her relationship with Ben.

As soon as they were outside, she asked, “Did you notice Bettie looking at us?”

“Yeah.”

“You think she knows something?”

“Or maybe she wants to ask questions, and she’s afraid to stir up trouble for herself, given the atmosphere in town.”

oOo

The sun had almost set by the time they headed across the parking lot. As they crossed the gravel, Ben noticed a car on Main Street. He was pretty sure it was the black sedan that had tried to drive them off the road.

He braced for trouble, but the car went past and continued down the street.

A few moments later, the chief’s expensive truck went by. And then a string of high-end cars.

“Come on,” he said.

“Where?”

“I think something’s happening.”

He hurried back to his Honda with Sage right behind him. As soon as they were both belted in, he took off, following the vehicles he’d spotted.

“What is it?” Sage asked.

“I don’t know.”

He dropped back as they drove out of town and then onto a two-lane highway that led to the road along the river that Sage had shown him after they’d first arrived in town.

The black sedan and the chief’s truck had disappeared, but he could still see some of the other cars that had followed. They turned in at one of the estates, and Ben drove on past.

“Do you know who owns this place?” he asked.

“This isn’t exactly my neck of the woods. Obviously someone with money.”

He kept driving slowly up the road. In the rearview mirror he saw one more car enter the grounds of the estate.

It had disappeared by the time he turned around and came back.

The other side of the road was wooded, and he was able to drive into a turnoff.

Opening the glove compartment, he reached for his Sig.

Sage eyed the weapon. “What are we doing?”

“Going in prepared.” He dragged in a breath and let it out. “I’d ask you to wait here, but I have the feeling it wouldn’t have much effect.”

“Right.”

They headed back up the road toward the driveway where the cars had turned in. Ben crossed the blacktop before they reached the entrance road, then cut into the woods.

Sage followed.

They walked carefully through the woods, Ben looking for devices that might alert the inhabitants that someone was sneaking up on the house.

But they reached the building without any problems. The drive was lined with vehicles, the chief’s truck and the black sedan among them.

They circled around to the side, moving cautiously, stopping when a motion detector triggered a floodlight. But after several moments, when nobody took any notice, they kept moving.

Ben heard the sound of voices. Quietly approaching a window, he raised his eyes just above the sill and saw a group of people, mostly well-dressed middle-aged men, sitting on sofas and easy chairs facing each other. Chief Judd was among them, wearing his uniform.

“A big crowd in there,” he whispered to Sage when he ducked back down.

“Let me have a look.”

oOo

Sage peered over the sill, recognizing almost everyone in the room. It gave her a chill to see them all gathered here. Not for a party or to play cards. They all looked grim as they talked among themselves.

“Who are they?” Ben asked in a barely audible whisper.

She answered in a similar voice. “Remember when I got pushed into the harbor and I saw Craig Fellows, the hardware store owner, Martin Kendley, the president of the bank, and the mayor, William Hinton, watching like it was a piece of performance art?”

He nodded.

“They’re all here. Also George Myers, who owns Pine Fairways. Phil Davis, the realtor who sells high-end properties. And Doris Jenkins, who owns three or four of the clothing boutiques in town.”

“The town movers and shakers. You mentioned them when we first arrived.”

“Yes. And there are some others, too. Pat Raymond who owns a couple of restaurants. Ted Weston who owns a shop that sells local crafts and regional books. And Malcolm Varney, who has a men’s clothing store.”

Sage’s rundown of the participants ended when Mayor Hinton raised his voice. “Thank you for coming,” he said.

“That’s the mayor,” Sage whispered. “I’ll tell you who’s talking as they speak.”

He squeezed her hand. “Thanks.”

“Did we have a choice?” Ted Weston called out.

“You always have a choice,” Hinton answered.

“I don’t like the way this is going down,” Phil Davis put in.

“Up until now, it was just those foreign gals,” Pat Raymond said. “I mean, the same kind as work for me. They don’t know the ropes here. Anything could have happened to them. Some guy could have sweet-talked them into going off with him—then sold them into white slavery.”

There were murmurs of agreement.

“Until that Laurel Baker went missing. She’s a local girl,” Judd pointed out.

“There’s no proof foul play was involved in any of it,” Doris Jenkins said.