There was no question but that it was far too late to intervene now. Arizona had gone too deep into her strange, private world. Now her talent controlled her.
Grace wondered if Fallon Jones ever worried that he, too, might someday get trapped forever in his own world of plots and counterplots, unable to find his way back to reality. He was trying to do too much, she thought. On several occasions during the past few months she had heard the exhaustion in his voice. Running the West Coast office of J&J was obviously too big a job for one person. He needed an assistant.
It started to rain. Fat drops spattered on the windshield. She turned on the wipers and wondered if it was raining in Hawaii. When she got bored thinking about the weather in the islands she wondered if she was pushing her luck by taking this assignment from J&J. The what-ifs loomed in her imagination. What if she couldn’t handle the mission? What if Luther Malone uncovered her secrets?
Don’t think like that, she mentally scolded herself. How much trouble could a guy on a cane possibly be? You’ve been hiding in Eclipse Bay long enough.
The courier from the Arcane Society—a young man who seemed thrilled to be performing a role, however small, for the legendary firm of J&J—delivered the packet to Grace at the airport hotel. He handed it to her in the lobby, so close she could feel the pulse and power of his talent. A para-hunter, she thought. She didn’t have to jack up her own senses to know that he was strong.
“What’s your name?” she asked, automatically stepping back to put some distance between them.
“Sean Jones, ma’am,” he said.
Of course, she thought. The Jones family tree was filled with hunter talents of various kinds.
She thanked him and hurried back to the elevator, ripping open the sealed packet as soon as she reached the privacy of her room. The contents tumbled onto the table—Luther Malone’s phony driver’s license on top. She picked it up and studied the picture, consumed by a curiosity she could not explain.
Like most license photos, the shot was not intended to be flattering. It was possible that it was the lighting that made Malone look so hard but her intuition told her that the brutal planes and angles of his face would look just as austere in person. His dark hair was cut short. The note said his eyes were brown but in the picture they looked unreadable, the eyes of a lone wolf.
The picture should have been off-putting. Malone appeared to be stone cold. But for some reason she could not stop staring at the image.
Reluctantly she put the license down and reached for her plane ticket and the resort reservation.
Approximately sixty seconds later—the length of time it took her to get her shaking fingers under control—she dialed the now-familiar number in Scargill Cove.
“You didn’t tell me that Malone and I would be registering as Mr. and Mrs. Carstairs,” she said, her voice rising in spite of her determination to remain cool and professional. “There’s only one room.”
“Take it easy,” Fallon said, uncharacteristically soothing. “I made sure you got a suite. Take the bedroom. It has its own bath. Tell Malone he can have the pull-out bed in the living room.”
“I don’t know if I can do this, sir. You should have warned me.”
“I knew you’d panic if I told you that you and Malone would be checking in as husband and wife.” Fallon sounded aggrieved, the voice of a put-upon employer forced to work with a difficult, temperamental employee.
“You were right.”
“There’s absolutely nothing to worry about. Malone is a pro. He’s there as your bodyguard and this is the only arrangement that will allow him to do his job.”
She swallowed hard. Fallon was right. Malone was a professional. She was the amateur. If she wanted to become a real agent for J&J, she had to start acting like one.
“Mr. Malone agreed to this plan?” she asked warily.
“He’ll be fine with it.”
“Wait a second, are you saying he doesn’t yet know that he and I are supposed to pose as a married couple on this assignment?”
“Thought I’d let you break it to him,” Fallon said.
“Oh, gee, thanks.”
For the first time in her association with Fallon Jones, she ended the call before he could cut the connection.
For a long time she stood there, looking at Malone’s phony driver’s license and the hotel registration.
Got to learn to live in the now.
FIVE
The concourse was crowded with tourists and business travelers from around the world. The planes landing and taking off on the runway bore the logos of nations from every part of the globe, including a few from countries that would have been unfamiliar to most people living outside the South Pacific. The warm, silken breeze carried the twin scents of jet fuel and the light mist that was sweeping down from the mountains.
Luther lounged against the wall, his hand wrapped around the handle of the cane, and watched the dark-haired woman walking toward him. She had come into view at the far end of the walkway a couple of minutes ago. For some reason, he found his attention shifting back to her again and again.
What the hell, he had a few minutes to kill. According to the monitors, Grace Renquist’s plane had landed on time a short while ago at the main terminal but it would take her a while to find her way to the interisland terminal. She was an elderly lady so she would probably wait for the Wiki-Wiki bus that connected the terminals rather than make the long hike along the concourse.
The dark-haired woman disappeared behind a large tour group of senior citizens heavily draped in leis. Anticipation zinged through him while he waited for her to reappear. When she popped back into view she was closer, still coming his way. He could see her more distinctly now. She was pulling a carry-on suitcase with one hand. Her stride was lithe and purposeful and somehow sexy. A frisson of excitement hummed through his senses, all his senses. That hadn’t happened in longer than he cared to think about.
Her hair was cut at a dramatic angle that started high at the nape of her neck and ended in two sweeping wings just below her cheek-bones. She had him riveted now but damned if he could figure out why. She was attractive in some indefinable, out-of-the-ordinary way but she was no glossy cover model; far from it. There was something proud and determined about the strong lines of her nose and jaw; a cool, touch-me-not attitude that radiated sexual challenge, at least to him. Dark glasses veiled her eyes. That was hardly unusual in Hawaii where everyone wore shades, but for some reason the glasses seemed to add to the air of exotic, sensual mystery that stirred the atmosphere around her.