Shrouded in Darkness (Shrouded Series) (21 page)

Margot laughed harshly. Who was she fooling? Last night had been pure heaven. Everything about Jake left her wanting more

—his hot, naked skin against her own, the urgent need of his lips and hands, the warmth of his breath against her brow.

Sighing, she threw off the covers. Sleep was impossible. There was no point even trying. Margot slipped from bed, crossed the cold floor on bare feet and snatched her thick housecoat draped over the bedroom chair. Shrugging into its sleeves, she tied the belt snuggly around her middle, and walked over to the window to pull the curtain aside.

The lab, a thick, dark shadow, sat stooped in front of an outcropping of aspen and Ponderosa pine. A light appeared in the window, throwing a shallow glow over the once gray snow.

Margot stiffened, clutching the curtain between her fingers. So that’s where he’d gone.

“Who are you, Jake? You’ve got so many secrets,” she whispered, her breath misting the glass’s frigid pane. “What are you hiding?”

The barn and the light from within beckoned. Her answers were down there. Answers she planned on learning today.

Malcolm sat in the back of the squad car and burned. Behind his back, the metal handcuffs bit into his wrists. He stared out the window over the manicured lawn of the Georgian styled brick house. His house.

Movement at the corner of his vision made him turn. The neighbor, Harry or Henry—some stupid name that started with an H

—walked across the opposite side of the street with his prized golden retriever. His gray, fake hair flopped with each stride. It couldn’t be anything else but a sick attempt at a hair transplant, because the guy had been bald as a bat months before.

Back ramrod straight, Malcolm glared through the closed window. He couldn’t miss—no one could—the way Harry or Henry rubbernecked to get a look at who sat inside the cop car. After all, it wasn’t every day someone saw the police parked in front of a house in the neighborhood. This was probably the most excitement anyone had seen in a while.

Humiliation crept up Malcolm’s neck and burned into his face.

He knew exactly who’d done this to him. A stupid kid could even figure this one out.

Jake.

Rage surged and mixed with humiliation. Malcolm didn’t want to think of how he’d driven up his driveway to find several cops sniffing through his house. The crack cocaine on the dining room table, the semi-automatic rifles, all unlicensed, tasted like bile against his throat. He’d underestimated Jake. For some reason, he hadn’t thought Jake had it in him to lower himself beyond his sick ethics and frame him. He’d made it so easy and so simple for Jake to do it.

He never intended to underestimate Jake again. He’d made two huge mistakes—Carl and now Jake. Well, he’d taken care of Carl, and as far as Jake, he’d fix him just as good. If Jake wanted to play with the big boys, then he was in for a surprise. Jake might have won this scrimmage, but it was far from over between them.

Malcolm twisted his wrists against the handcuffs, which tightened and dug deeper into his flesh. What other things had he missed?

Or who?

Margot. Hell. Could Jake somehow have involved her? Malcolm mashed his teeth together. She could very well be another threat. What if she had a hand in this whole stinking mess? Maybe she’d been the one to put Jake up to it. It was possible. Hell knew, she could get down and fling dirt like the worst of them.

Well, they were both in for a surprise if they thought this was over.

After scrambling into pair of jeans, a thick woolen sweater and socks, Margot raced downstairs, rammed her feet into a pair of boots and grabbed her jacket. Outside, she turned up her collar and stuffed her hands into the big pockets of her down jacket—

anything to ward off the icy air snapping at her exposed skin. Snowdrifts and patches of ice hampered her way to the lab. By the time she reached the building, her breath came out in rapid, cloud-like puffs.

Margot opened the door, stepped quickly inside and shut it tight against the cold. The lab’s sterile light glared off the lab equipment and furniture.

No sign of Jake.

Or anyone.

But the computer was on. Frowning, she walked over to the desk and sat down. The chair’s warmth penetrated through the fabric of her jeans. Jake must have been here just recently, though, in this chair, working on the computer.

Margot jiggled the mouse. Formulas. They all looked so innocent, but she knew they were deadly. She scrolled down the screen. Nothing made sense. But she didn’t know anything when it came to science. The subject in college had never been something she’d aspired to. She’d never had the logic or the patience to understand. But right this second, she desperately wanted to make sense of everything in front of her.

The information displayed on the monitor held the key to Johnny’s murder, maybe even Carl’s. Could all three, Jake, Malcolm, and Carl, be linked together? Carl might not have been the smartest person, but some way, some how he could have become unknowingly involved. It was just too much of a coincidence otherwise. But she didn’t understand the link with Carl. He’d mentioned a secret Whatever it was, it had to be of grave importance, something serious enough to be murdered for.

A footstep, soft but unmistakable, sounded from behind. Margot pivoted, swinging the chair around 180 degrees.

“Jake?”

The place remained deathly still. The hum of the refrigerator in the back and the computer’s hard drive were the only sounds that permeated the room. She clutched the chair’s armrests with rigid fingers.

“Johnny?”

Nothing.

The door to the lab remained closed. But she could feel something or someone in the room with her.

She waited, while her heart crashed against her ribs. Her breathing became quick and shallow. Frozen in the chair, she waited longer. Seconds passed. Then minutes. Still nothing.

“Johnny? Is that you?”

Clamping down on her fear, Margot searched the room, not only with her eyes, but all her senses. She felt something or some type of presence.

“Fine,” she told the empty room with bravado. “Have it your way.”

Margot forced herself to turn around and face the monitor. The hairs on the back of her nape rose. She gripped the armrests even harder. Something was behind her.

She was afraid to look. Afraid to see what or who. But the need to know was too powerful.

A crash resounded through the barn. Frigid air rushed into the room. She swung wildly round in her chair. The lab door gaped open, having banged against the wall. Someone must have rushed outside.

“What the—”

Margot stumbled to her feet, raced toward the threshold, and hit a foot against a metal trashcan. Paper tumbled from the basket and kicked up into the air.

She stepped outside and squinted against the sun as its rays crested over the horizon and bounced off the snow. Nothing. No one. Just a bunch of barren trees.

God. Was she going crazy? Was she finally hallucinating? Closing her eyes, she rubbed the bridge of her nose with a thumb and forefinger, mentally shaking her head.

She opened her eyes and began to lower her arm, but stilled. She’d almost missed it. An imprint in the snow. A footprint. And they weren’t hers. They were much larger. After closing the lab door, she followed cautiously up the embankment toward the house.

She plodded through snow as thick as the silence around her. Every now and then she looked over her shoulder to check if someone followed her. She was still spooked, fearful of what or who might be out here with her. When she reached the steps to the porch, the footprints abruptly disappeared. She’d shoveled off the steps and veranda after the last storm, too impatient to wait for the local teenager she’d hired to come and shovel after each snowfall.

The front door stood closed, just as she’d left it. But whoever had been in the lab was now in the house. Call it gut, call it intuition, or just call it common sense.

If Jake was the one inside, then why had he run from her and escaped out of the barn like that? It made no sense.

But who else could it be? There wasn’t any other car in the driveway, no other sign of someone else other than Jake.

Malcolm.

She faltered on the stairs to the porch. No. It couldn’t be Malcolm. Jake had said something about jail and him not bothering her again. God only knew what that meant. She was afraid to even think about what Jake had been talking about.

The front entrance showed no forced entry, no sign of someone breaking the lock. She groaned at her own stupidity. Of course not! She’d left the door unlocked. Stupid. Stupid. She should have known better after the last break-in.

Margot grabbed the shovel resting up against the wall and hefted it in both hands to get a good feel of its weight. She wouldn’t hesitate to use it. Granted, she didn’t consider it the best of weapons, but it sure beat having nothing.

With the shovel in one hand, Margot opened the door on silent hinges. She stepped inside, and closed the door with the heel of her boot. A quick glance found the place as she’d left it.

Then she saw the water—little puddles of melted snow on the wood floor by her feet. She gripped the metal handle of the shovel tighter beneath her palms.

Margot wasn’t alone.

Her breathing, ragged and rapid, sounded far too loud in the empty foyer. She opened her mouth to call out but the words caught against her throat.

The melted snow not only sprinkled the floor by her feet but further down the hall. She followed, all the while holding the shovel in a vise-like grip and high in the air. The puddles led right to Jake’s room. She stopped and stared at the closed door.

She lowered the shovel.

Jake. She’d slept with this man, done things with him in her bed that she’d never even done with Malcolm. She’d let herself become completely vulnerable, desperate with want and need, with a man filled with secrets. Mysteries that were dark, dangerous and far too frightening.

What did she really know about him? Only the things he’d told her. Only what she’d really wanted to hear. And what was beyond the door? She knew he was in there right this minute. But what would she find?

The last time she’d stood in front of this very door, Jake had been shut inside and filled with such heart-wrenching pain. Like a wounded animal, he’d turned his back on her to deal with it alone.

Very carefully, fearful of making any sound, Margot turned the knob. It moved easily beneath her fingers. She eased the door open silently into the room, exposing the interior inside.

Margot dropped the shovel. It clanged against the floor. The sound reverberated through the hall and into the bedroom.

Whatever was inside froze.

Shock glued her boots to the floor, froze her limbs, widened her eyes and locked the scream from getting past her throat.

A pair of jeans, an opened shirt, and nothing in it. The clothing hung in mid-air. They both moved as if propelled by an invisible force.

Pivoting, stumbling over feet that wouldn’t do what she wanted quickly enough, she raced down the hall. She slipped on the melted snow, almost fell, but grabbed the wall with the flat of her hand.

“Margot!”

Jake.

But not Jake.

What she’d seen wasn’t human.

His cry didn’t stop her, but only made her more determined to get away. She almost slammed against the wall in her hurry to get out of the house. She fumbled with the knob, and bolted out, scrambling down the porch steps and away from the house.

The car.

No. The keys were in the house. In the kitchen. She didn’t dare go back.

The lab. It had a lock, even a phone.

Margot veered in that direction, sliding on a slab of ice. It knocked her feet from under her. She landed hard on her hands and knees. The fall stole the air from her lungs. Small, jagged rocks imbedded in the ice, cut into her jeans and the palms of her hands.

The pain didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but getting away.

He was following. She heard him from behind—his feet against the ground, his breathing, heavy, labored.

“Margot! Stop!”

She scrambled to her feet and leaped forward. Margot ran faster, ducked under a tree branch and dove through the snowdrifts, kicking up powdered snow into her face and hair. It hurt to breathe. She struggled for air as she wove through the pines and down the bank toward the lab.

Another fifty yards and she’d make it.

“Damn it!”

Something grabbed her shoulder, something invisible, something not human. Margot yanked her shoulder from its grasp, but it latched on and wouldn’t let go. Forced to a stop, she turned around.

“It’s me—Jake. Don’t be afraid—”

But Margot was. How could she not? This thing in front of her didn’t exist, didn’t have shape or form. She lashed out, kicking into the pants, slamming her fist into the empty space below the shirt’s collar. Her hand connected with skin and bone, human flesh.

She heard a grunt.

It let go. She stumbled backward, almost falling at the unexpectedness of being free. Her hair slapped against her face and into her eyes, obscuring her vision. She scraped back the cold strands, pivoted on the slippery snow and raced toward the lab. Frigid air cut into her lungs as she struggled to catch her breath and push herself forward, but her body was weakening, her strength ebbing.

Margot dodged past an aspen, a snow topped boulder, a fallen log. She slipped once, twice, but regained her balance both times. The lab door came into view. Twenty feet now. If she could just move faster, just—

But she didn’t think she’d make it.

It—he followed right behind, his breath at her neck. Knowing she couldn’t get into the lab and lock the door in time, she turned suddenly and rounded the building.

She saw the garbage pail too late.

Margot hit the metal can. She grunted. Her feet left the ground. The force propelled her sideways. The lab’s window raced toward her. Unable to slow the momentum of her fall, she covered her face with an arm. Then something collided from behind, pushing her backward. Glass shattered. Metal crashed.