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Just like that, Maryanne’s last qualms about her father’s move to Peaceful Meadows vanished. Stan Wellborn had found a home.
Her guilt lifted, she relaxed and the afternoon went by fast, full of laughter, good conversation, a killer game of checkers and a serving of her dad’s birthday cake.
All in all, it was a perfect Sunday afternoon.
“Good night, Cookie.”
“Good night, Dad.”
She hadn’t meant to stay so late, but Maryanne hadn’t wanted to leave her father. She’d had a great time, even though liver and onions was not her favorite dish. Dad had wanted her company at dinner, and since all that awaited her back home was an uppity cat and the report she’d written yesterday afternoon, she’d stayed. She could proofread the whole thing in no time once she got home.
The rain started around sunset, typical for a late spring evening in South Central Pennsylvania. Now, on her way out, she lowered her head, covered it with her tote bag, and ran into the night. In her hurry to reach the car, she didn’t watch her step, and her shoe hit a puddle. She slipped, yelped and dropped.
Muscular arms broke her fall.
“Thanks,” she said and then looked up. “NO!”
She froze in the circle of J.Z. Prophet’s clasp, tight against his chest, close to his warmth and clean scent. Not the smartest thing to do, but until she could breathe again, she couldn’t move. To gather her wits, she tried to think of something—anything—other than those intense gray eyes.
“You should be more careful,” he said, his voice deep.
She fought for breath, and this time, gulped in a lungful of fresh-washed air. “What are you doing here?”
“Taking care of business.”
His tone spoke volumes, but she didn’t understand a thing. Still, she had no intention of carrying on a conversation with the miserable creature. Certainly not while she remained in such a vulnerable position—at his mercy.
She shoved against his chest, and to her surprise, he let her go. She almost fell again, but she summoned her strength and stood upright. She tugged down her belt from where it had slid way up on her ribs; she straightened her skirt; she ignored the rain.
“I don’t know what you think you’re doing,” she said. For good measure, she tipped up her chin. “But I do want to know why you’ve been following me.”
Something sparked in his eyes, but he still didn’t speak.
“Fine.” She stepped toward her car. “You can play Mount Rushmore all you want, especially in the rain. Just remember, if I see you again where you don’t belong but I do, I’ll call the cops.”
“Go ahead.”
The rain sluiced over his dark hair, plastered it to his head like a robber’s skullcap. It did nothing to endear him to her.
“If you want to convince me the law doesn’t bother you, then try something new. Quit following me and really mind your business. No sane man would dog an ordinary woman. There’s nothing interesting about me. I’m a librarian with an elderly, disabled dad.”
He shrugged, that incomprehensible intensity as always in his eyes. “I am minding my business, and I’m good at it.”
A shiver racked Maryanne. It had nothing to do with the rain and everything with the man. “Stalking’s a crime, you know,” she said, steps from her Escort…and safety. “They can lock you up for a long time, so quit before they do.”
She fumbled with her keychain, but to her dismay, she dropped it. With the last of her courage, she said, “Go crawl back under the rock from whence you came.”
As she went for her keys, his hand shot out and grabbed them. Fear churned her gut, and she prayed he wasn’t like a dog, able to scent it on her.
With a click, he unlocked her car door then handed her the keys. In silence, he strode into the dark. Maryanne collapsed against the fender and just stood there, drenched in rain and sweat. For long moments she just breathed and shook, thankful she could still do both.
“Lord God, thank you for…for…whatever. Just help me.”
When she could move again, she opened the door and sat. Long minutes later, she turned on the ignition. The drive home was a numb haze—another mindless drive under her belt. If she kept this up, she’d soon qualify as a homing pigeon, functioning on some instinctual plane.
That, and she’d have a couple of centuries of thanks and praise to offer her Lord.
In the garage, Maryanne sat back and tried to relax her shoulder muscles. She failed. Miserably.
The memory of J.Z. Prophet returned with the vengeance of hurricane-spurred ocean waves. What did the man want with her?
Because, without a shadow of a doubt, Maryanne knew J.Z. had come to Peaceful Meadows to keep tabs on her. What she didn’t know was why?
And she’d better figure it out soon…before it was too late.
For her.
At ten the next morning, Maryanne called the cell phone rep Trudy had recommended. In a few minutes’ time, she’d agreed to stop by the kiosk at the mall and sign a contract for a year’s worth of service. Next time J.Z. Prophet showed his face, she’d be ready. Her new phone came with preprogrammable automatic dialing.
The first number she’d record would be 911.
The day went by in the same kind of blur as when she drove home last night. By five, she didn’t remember much of what she’d done. Well, she turned in the report, but other than that…mush.
Determined to regain some semblance of sanity if not control, she concentrated on the drive to the mall. She even sang along with Rebecca St. James’s latest on the radio. She parked, locked the car, ran through the ongoing rain to the food-court entrance and made a beeline for the cell phone and safety.
The young man had the papers ready for her. All Maryanne had to do was sign her name and give him a check. After a handful of directions, she felt confident enough to head home with the gadget and its instruction manual. On her way back to the car, she detoured by the frozen yogurt counter. She didn’t often indulge, but today she ordered a swirl cone. She didn’t want to choose between chocolate and vanilla.
Because of the rain, she opted to finish her treat at one of the food court’s small tables. Then, on her way to the great outdoors and the deluge, she tossed away her napkin and saw the man watching her from the sandwich shop line. She came to a halt.
J.Z. Prophet wasn’t besting her again.
Maryanne marched up to him. “I told you I’d call the cops the next time I saw you.” She pulled out her phone. “Watch me.”
He covered the gadget and her hand with his much larger one, his clasp gentler than she would have imagined. “It won’t do you any good. I know what you are—”
“What are you doing, J.Z.?” asked the other Uni-Comp clown, a bag redolent of corned beef in his hand. “You’re worse than a kid. You can’t leave well enough alone, can you? Do you want Eliza to charge out here and tear a strip off your hide—”
He stopped just when things were about to get interesting, when Maryanne might have learned something about the probably psychotic J.Z. But the two men glared at each other, and if it weren’t for the minor matter of her captured hand, she would have taken her leave. Instead, she looked from one to the other, only too aware of J.Z.’s warm clasp.
“Ahem,” she said.
The men turned.
“Would one of you please tell me which episode of the Twilight Zone you’re rerunning here?”
“Let her go,” J.Z.’s partner said.
J.Z. captured her gaze just as firmly as he held her hand.
“Who are you guys?” Maryanne’s fear fired up again. “What do you want with me? And don’t even mention computers. I know you’ve been following me.”
“Come on, J.Z. Let’s go.”
Maryanne smiled her gratitude at the blond man who didn’t work for Uni-Comp—she wasn’t dumb.
“Yes, J.Z. Let me go. I’ll go my way and you can go yours, and never the twain shall meet. Okay?”
“Let her go,” her pal—Don? Dan? Yeah, Dan Something—repeated.
J.Z. acceded, but a strange look she couldn’t read, not the anger she’d seen, maybe frustration, filled his eyes. “Watch yourself,” he said. “One mistake, and I’ll make my move.”
“Who are you?” she asked yet again.
“Tell her, J.Z. You’ve blown this out of the water, so you may as well tell her now.”
Maryanne’s eyes ping-ponged from one man to the other.
Dan muttered something else, this time nothing Maryanne could make out. He thrust his sandwich bag at J.Z. and rummaged in his back pocket. But instead of the wallet she’d expected, he extended a small leather card case toward her.
“What…?”
“Open it,” he said gently.
She did. Four words jumped out at her: Federal Bureau of Investigations.
Her head spun. Ice replaced her blood. The world tipped under her feet. “Why?”
“You’re under investigation,” J.Z. said in clipped tones. “You’re good, but I’m better. I’m going to get you and your mob pals, so say goodbye to freedom, your frozen yogurt and your little phone.”
Everything went black.
FOUR
“Are you satisfied now?” Dan glared up at J.Z.
J.Z. frowned down at the woman sprawled flat on the mall’s food-court floor. “Come on, lady. We aren’t playing games here—”
“Take her pulse, will ya?”
Dan’s expression gave him no alternative, so J.Z. went down on one knee, took the librarian’s wrist in his hand, and pressed to check for her heartbeat. To his surprise, it was weak and unsteady—just what one expected in a person who’d fainted.
He shook his head. “I told you she was good. I’ve never known someone who could faint on demand. I guess there’s always a first time for everything.”
Dan’s look of disgust hit him like a slap.
“Your compassion underwhelms me,” his partner said. “If you won’t help her, then at least give me a hand and keep this mob from crushing us.”
Only then did J.Z. notice the crowd that had gathered around them. Two sandwich-shop employees flapped their aprons in an obvious attempt to circulate air around Maryanne. A quartet of mall-walkers, senior citizens who exercised in the shelter of the covered mall, whispered among themselves, curiosity and pity in their lined faces. A maintenance guy stood to their right, both hands clasped around the mop’s wooden handle, the bucket-on-wheels contraption where it sat in danger of rolling and leaving him without support.
Heat rushed up J.Z.’s cheeks. “Okay, folks. We have it under control. Please move on so that we can take care of her.”
The onlookers dispersed, their backward glances full of reluctance, his sudden relief at their departure surprisingly strong. Did Dan have a point? Was he overreacting to everything about this woman?
“Think those weird guys there are some of them white slavers in the news?” asked a white-haired lady in lime-green sweats, her voice scissors-sharp as she resumed her laps around the shopping center.
J.Z. groaned. “That’s all we need.”
“What? For someone to report you for manhandling a helpless female? That’s probably what it looked like you were doing.”
“Look. I’m not going to drop the pressure on her. Sooner or later she’ll crack—”
“Either that, or she’ll crack up from your intimidation. Chill, man. You don’t even know she’s involved.”
He snorted. “Did you bother to read the profile we got last month? I’m telling you, the description fits her perfectly.”
“It also fits about fifty percent of the female population. That doesn’t mean they’re all mobsters, does it?”
“Don’t give me that. That fifty percent doesn’t have her kind of access to an old folks’ home where a bunch of seniors died after one of that fifty percent ordered their termination. And don’t forget the Laundromat’s demise.”
Maryanne’s eyelids gave a twitch. Good. She was coming to. But before he could say anything, Dan spoke.
“I’ll admit those e-mails look pretty bad, but any hacker can get into her account to cast suspicion on her.”
“Fine. Let’s assume that’s what happened.” J.Z. ran a hand through his hair. “Where’s the hacker who fits the profile? Who else has access? Who else is the typical ‘neighbor-next-door’ type who won’t raise suspicion? Who else does the dowdy, harmless librarian routine as well as Maryanne Wellborn?”
Dan’s ministrations were having results on Maryanne. Color seeped into her cheeks. With a split-second glance at J.Z., he asked, “Have you bothered to stake out the place?”
“Why would I need to?” J.Z. let his breath out in a gust. “We have the e-mails, the wealthy, dead seniors, the very dead—this time—Laundromat, and finally, her fingerprints on the IV stand. And she’s there, all the time, in and out to see her dad—or so she says. Doesn’t that stink rotten to you?”
“I’m going to tell you one more time,” Dan said through gritted teeth. “Appearances can be deceiving. There’s a reason why clichеs become clichеs. They have a bunch of truth to them, and her appearance, because it reminds you of your past, may be deceiving you.”
“So you want me to believe even the fingerprints are a coincidence.”
Dan shrugged, his attention on the librarian. “She could have moved the stand for a nurse…for Mat, himself. You can’t be sure what happened. You weren’t there.”
J.Z. belabored his point. “Give me a break. What are the chances all these deaths—especially a mobster’s—are unrelated and unconnected to the librarian who sends killer e-mails?”
Maryanne blinked.
J.Z. crossed his arms. “Well?”
Dan muttered, “Not now.”
“It’s as good a time as any,” J.Z countered. “There’s no such thing as coincidence. If something stinks like a skunk, looks like a skunk and skulks like a skunk, then more than likely it’s a skunk.”
When Dan ignored him, J.Z. bulldozed ahead. “That phony librarian look doesn’t fool me. I’ve spent my entire adult life smoking out mob scum. I’m going to bust her.”
Almost more for him than for his partner, he added, “Just because my father chose a life of crime doesn’t mean I’m going to ignore what’s staring me in the face. I’ve chosen to sop up crime, and that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to bring her in.”
