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Across the wide, semidark hallway from her apartment was a carved oak door. She opened it and went swiftly through a short, narrow corridor and then a door that opened into a rose garden near the front of the house.
It was a little before one a.m. now, and June gloom was upon the entire Carmel Valley, bringing damp, biting temperatures. As she stepped outside she cursed herself for forgetting a jacket. Too late to turn back for one, though.
Just above the rim of a nearby hill, a half moon veiled by clouds managed to look eerie rather than helpful. It cast no solid shadows, only pale glimmers of gray that turned every would-be shadow into formless, evanescent ghosts moving deep within it. She pulled a small flashlight out of her pants pocket, turning it on but shading it with her other hand and pointing it only toward the ground. It was important to watch for snares.
Newly blossoming roses assailed her nostrils with a rich scent that was far too powerful, overriding all other senses. She quickly moved away from the garden, keeping her back against the wall of the adobe convent. Along this side was an arched stone colonnade over a cobbled walk. She followed the colonnade to the field in back, where several small buildings stood. One was a women’s center for learning, another the horse barn and another a greenhouse. A tiny adobe chapel had been built several yards behind the convent by a couple of runaway Carmelite friars in the 1600s. They put down stakes here when the rest of their party sailed off, and after they died, no one lived here until the early 1900s, when the nuns came. They found the humble little monastery the friars had built and expanded it for their use.
The gentle old friars, Abby thought, would never have been the type to murder living, growing things. If there were lilacs in their gardens back then, they would have brought them inside in huge, fragrant bunches to dress their kitchen table for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
As she paused there on the edge of the field, her mind played tricks. Several coastal live oaks dotted the ankle-high grass, their black branches dripping with moss that swayed and twisted like angry snakes in the dank wind. The perfect setting for the demise of one Frank Frett, she thought, shivering.
Or me.
She shook herself, feeling a tremor of anxiety. Focus, Abby.
It worried her that her mind had been wandering. Did her target know she would do that? Did he know she’d be an easy mark, once surrounded by her beloved gardens and the multitude of wonderful scents in the night air? That she’d go off on some historical reverie of days gone by and lose her concentration for the job at hand?
Possible. He knew too much about her, didn’t he? So, then. She would have to go against her norm, act in some way he wouldn’t expect.
Carefully steering away from the oak trees and the greenhouse beyond them, she picked her way along a rutted track to the horse barn. Thick old eucalyptus trees lined the track, but they were too far apart to provide absolute cover. Abby crouched and moved swiftly but silently between each one, standing only when she knew she couldn’t be seen from the windows lining this side of the dilapidated barn.
Barely breathing, she listened for even the slightest sound. Certain rustlings, she knew, came from the four horses inside, softly snorting. Now and then a hoof thudded against the floor of a stall. The other sounds were night animals: raccoons, mice, coyotes. Of them, the raccoons worried her the most. She’d gone up against the fierce little buggers more than once, and they’d love nothing more than to chomp down on her foot and run off with it. At one point, when she’d tried to shoo one away outside the Prayer House kitchen, he’d grabbed the broom from her and carried it off in his paws.
A spotlight at the front of the barn shone bright as day on a corral and about fifty square feet of open ground. Both stood between her and the barn. The thought of being that exposed worried her, but she had no other choice. If Frank Frett was in there and she ran to the greenhouse and gardening shed without first checking out the barn, she would only be handing him her back.
Watching a few moments, she didn’t catch any movement at the windows along this side of the old building. Still, she knew there were cracks here and there in the wooden siding where the boards had warped from the winter’s hard rains. Frett could have stationed himself at one of those cracks, where he could easily see out, yet be invisible to her.
Abby took her gun from its bag and held it at the ready, then ran as silently as she could toward the barn. Her heart pounded under the too-bright spotlight, and the only thing in her mind was, He can see me now. The man is evil, spawn of the devil, and if he’s at one of those windows, he can see me now. Her imagination, always in top form, was so strong she could almost feel him grabbing her from every side. He was before her, no, behind her, he had a finger on the trigger of his own gun—
Damn.
As she came within feet of the barn, she saw that one of the two big doors in front, usually locked up at night, stood half-open. An invitation.
How considerate. But sorry, Frank. I have other plans.
Veering off toward the far side of the building, she ran the way she’d been taught, barely touching the ground and with little sound. But as she reached that side, her heart jumped to her throat.
The usual porch light wasn’t on over here.
The fixture was on the wall at the far end of the stable. It should have illuminated this side dimly—just enough to see if someone else had gotten here before her—but the bulb had apparently burned out. Or Frett had knocked it out. It was so black here, it felt like the dark side of the moon. And the air was thick. Thick with fear. She thought she heard another heart beating, and her legs turned to jelly.
Several moments later, she realized she was hearing the heartbeat of one of the horses on the other side of the barn wall. Only then did she know that her hearing had improved because her own heart had actually stopped a few beats. She’d been holding her breath so long, it was a wonder she hadn’t passed out.
She sucked in air, steadied herself and listened a few more moments for any human sounds.
Nothing.
But that might not matter. Frank Frett would know better than to reveal himself that carelessly. He could be anywhere inside the stables—in the tack room, the feed room, in Sister Ellen’s office—and no matter where he was, he wouldn’t make a sound.
She was so sure of that, she made an on-the-spot decision and did what any impulsive, get-the-job-done person like her wouldn’t do.
She sat down.
She didn’t barge in screaming like a banshee, hoping to shock her target and take him by surprise, risking a shot in the back. Nor did she sneak around to the back door or through a window the way he’d expect her to.
No, he’d be covering the back door, the windows, all the routes she might take to outwit him. After all, she was the type to barrel right in, wasn’t she? That was pretty much what he’d said the other day, mixing both clichés and awkward metaphors. “You’re an open book, Abby, and anybody can hear you coming a mile away.”
Much to her chagrin, she had to admit he was at least half-right.
So, instead of the expected, she just sat down.
It shouldn’t take long, she thought, squatting and easing her back against a tree opposite the barn wall. Five or ten minutes of absolute silence, and if he was in there, he’d get impatient and wonder where she was. He’d come out—and that’s when she’d get him. Frank Frett wasn’t the type to sit around, and several minutes without any kind of movement from her would drive him nuts.
While she waited, she imagined the things she would do to the lilac killer, once he was good and dead. She’d get something from the gardening shed…lye, perhaps. Yes, lye. That should do it. She’d dig a grave just deep enough to dump him in it. Then she’d pour the lye over his entire body. It would eat away at his skin and other mucous membranes in no time. His eyes would go first, but whether it would eat through his bones, she didn’t know. It really didn’t matter. The pain is what mattered. The same kind of pain her lilacs had felt when they were burned by poison at the hands of Frank Frett.
Lye, she recalled, was what they used when they buried people in the old days to prevent diseases from spreading. She remembered, too, a story about St. Margaret Mary, who claimed to have had visions of the Blessed Mother and was told by her to begin a devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. She did, and it was said that when they dug her up years later, her heart was still red and fresh, that the lye hadn’t touched it. It was God’s grace that her heart was preserved, the Church said, because of her love for the Blessed Mother. It was one of the miracles, Abby thought she recalled, that was used to prove her a saint.
Well, Frank Frett’s heart would never be touched by God’s grace. If they ever dug him up, they’d find it was cold, black and hard as a rock. Even lye couldn’t eat through a heart that hated lilacs.
A too-sweet smell of hay filtered through the wall of the stable, along with the sweaty odor of horses in their warmed stalls. Abby’s nose began to itch, and she pressed a finger under it to keep herself from sneezing. That did nothing for the smell of manure, which was faint but enough to make her empty stomach clutch. She hadn’t eaten in twelve hours, and she was hungry suddenly, though not in a good, healthy way. Instead, she really thought she was about to vomit. Covering her mouth with both hands, she gulped back the bile that rose in her throat, telling herself over and over, It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay. Just don’t make a sound, not a sound.
It was Frett himself who saved her. Just when she thought she couldn’t hold it back any longer, she heard movement at the rear of the barn. She forgot all about throwing up and crouched, moving that way, listening for a direction. Then she saw him. He was crouching, too, and then running from the barn toward the little chapel, his body nothing more than a black form about fifty feet ahead of her.
She brought her gun up and pointed it at his back. “Stop!”
He twisted around, his own weapon raised. But she’d taken him by surprise, and she shot first. He went down.
Abby ran over to him, touching his leg with her foot. He didn’t move, and the splattered red blotch on his chest told her she’d hit her mark.
“Gotcha,” she said softly. “Your days of poisoning lilacs are over, Frank Frett.”
“You think so?” he taunted, grabbing her pant leg and yanking at it. She was so surprised, she lost her footing and fell, dropping her gun. Stumbling to her feet, she picked it up, but he was already running again. Reaching a live oak tree, he stood behind it for cover, and she ran in a zigzag pattern until she was close enough to shoot again.
It didn’t work, and she saw it coming before she felt it. He stepped out from behind the tree and aimed his Shocktech 2003 at her. The thrust went straight to her heart, and she went down with an enormous rush of breath and a moan.
She wasn’t faking it the way he had. The pain was sharp and stinging, and for a few seconds everything went black. Then, her vision clearing, she saw “Frank Frett” kneeling over her in the person of Ben Schaeffer, her lover, his face twisted in anger.
“Dammit all to hell, Abby! Why aren’t you wearing your protective gear? A face mask, at least! Paintballs can blind you, you know.”
3
Considering Abby’s “injury,” Ben wasn’t all that gentle as he dumped her from his shoulder onto her bed.
“If you’d worn the damned chest protector I bought for you, this never would have happened!”
“Don’t swear,” she said, laughing facedown into her pillow. “The nuns might hear.”
“I don’t give—” He checked himself and lowered his voice. “And why the hell didn’t you wear your face mask?”
“It makes me sweat,” she said.
“So you’d rather lose an eye? Turn over.”
“No.”
“Turn over!”
She pressed her belly into the sheets rather than give in.
He tugged at her shoulder. “C’mon, Abby. I want to see how bad you’re hurt. If you don’t turn over, I’ll turn you myself.”
She knew he could do it, so she rolled over, grinning. “You think that silly little paintball did me in? No way.”
“It got you square on the chest,” he argued. “For God’s sake, it almost knocked you out.”
“Don’t be so dramatic! All it did was smart and knock the wind out of me. A little. Besides, I got you first.”
“So you did. But I, at least, was wearing my chest protector,” he pointed out.
Pulling her jersey up over her chest, he swore again. His fingers carefully wiped the crimson glop from the flesh over her heart—where, despite her brilliant plan to one-up his character of “Frank Frett, the evil lilac killer,” he’d managed to get her with a big red splat of paint. The spot where the paintball had hit was badly inflamed. Ben stroked it gently. “Abby, this is final. If you don’t start wearing protective gear, I’m not—” He sighed.
“Not what?”
“Playing anymore.” The tone of his voice told her he knew the words sounded ridiculous, but his eyes were dead serious.
She pulled him down on the bed beside her and nuzzled his neck, while at the same time pressing herself seductively against him. “You’re not playing anymore? You sure about that?”
“I’m serious,” he said sternly. “This game is getting out of hand.”
She planted her lips against his ear. “And whose idea was it in the first place?” she murmured. “Who left me that scenario about some crazy gardener named Frank Frett killing off somebody’s lilacs? And where the hell did you get that scenario, anyway?”
He rubbed noses with her. “From watching you with your rose garden, of course. You almost leveled poor Sister Binny that day you caught her with a spray gun.”
She touched his lips with hers. “Only because I didn’t know she was using organic spray. And I made it up to her by letting her have all the lavender she wanted.”
“How kind of you. To be nice to a nun, of all people.”
“Not as kind as you, leaving that barn door open for me so I’d walk right into your snare, Frank Frett. I can’t believe you thought I’d fall for that.”
“Ah, but you did believe my fake death.”
“Okay, so I’m easy to fool where you’re concerned.”
Ben turned serious. “Easy to fool? What exactly does that mean?”
The way he said it made her think there was something she was missing. But she already regretted her choice of words. If there was something she was being a fool about, and lately her instincts had been telling her there was, she honestly didn’t want to know it. Not yet. Life was complicated enough, as her mother would say, without looking for dust balls under the bed.
“I didn’t mean a thing,” she said. “And by the way, don’t forget you promised to help us finish the remodel on the old friar’s chapel out back.”
“Don’t try to change the subject, Abby. Dammit, this is it. It’s the second time you’ve been hurt during one of our paintball capers, and that wasn’t what the game started out to be.”
She grinned. “I know. But don’t pretend you don’t enjoy it. It’s our best sexual fantasy. If you hadn’t knocked me off my feet tonight, just imagine what might have happened.”
“I don’t even want to think about what could have happened to you.” He frowned. “Abby, ever since—Never mind. The point is, you’re way too reckless. What if you’d lost an eye?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Ben. People play paintball all the time.”
“They get hurt all the time, too. There are thousands of cases every year of people being blinded by a paint-ball—and worse.” He swore. “I never should have taken you to survivor camp with me last fall. You’ve got to let this go, Abby.”
“But you agreed I needed to get my self-confidence back. And my experience there made a great article for Action Pursuit Games.”
“An article that barely paid you anything, and you already have more money than you know what to do with.”
“Not true. There’s the little chapel, and the Women’s Center for Learning needs expanding, and the old horse barn could use a ton of work—”
He groaned. “Look, I admire the fact that you decided to buy the Prayer House from Lydia and help the nuns out. But why do you have to live here?”
And now we’re getting to the real meat of things, Abby thought. What he means is, Why weren’t you happy enough living with me?
“I love your apartment in town,” she said. “But, Ben, you were out most of the time chasing criminals around Carmel, and I was alone. I wanted to be around people more.”
“You could walk around Carmel Village anytime and be up to your knees in tourists from every hemisphere.”
“But I can think better out here. It’s quiet. Besides, I can still drive to the village whenever I want to.”
The truth was, she didn’t want to all that often. Windhaven, the multimillion-dollar Ocean Drive house that she’d lived in with her husband, still held too many bad memories. Just driving by it gave her the willies.
“And as for chasing criminals around in quaint little old Carmel,” Ben said, “it’s not exactly the way I thought it would be when I moved down here from San Francisco. I thought having a chance to be chief one day would be the perfect job.”
“It’s not?” Abby was surprised. They had never talked about this before.
“It could be,” he said, “for the right person. But don’t you ever get the feeling that living in Carmel is like living in a bubble? We’re so isolated here. A two-hour drive to San Francisco, no direct flights out of Monterey to most cities…”
“Sweetie,” Abby murmured, leaning over to kiss his cheek, “you’re not old enough to be having a midlife crisis.”
“Ha. I’m over forty.”
“No!” she said mockingly. “You’re that old? Good grief, what’s a young thirty-eight-year-old like me doing with the likes of you?”
“Growing old,” he said, grinning, “and way too fast, if you’re not careful.”
She punched him on the shoulder. “Okay, so how about this? You get a hobby.”
He snorted. “Like what?”
“Painting, maybe. Or golf.”
“Great. Then there would be three million and one painters in Monterey County. And four million and one golfers.”
