In the Mists of Time (11 page)

“I went to the caravan to ask Thierry to fix my computer. Ron opened the door.”

“Did he say what he was doing there?” Davidson asked.

Glenn sat down with the tray, began pouring coffee into mugs and shoving them across the table, gesturing towards milk and sugar.

Louise let her lips twist into a derisive smile. “He said he was waiting for Thierry, but when Thierry turned up, I realized they weren't friends at all.” She took a deep breath and picked up the mug in front of her. “It was there I spoke to him about Nicole.”

“I see.” Davidson regarded her thoughtfully, then without warning spoke to Thierry, “Do you know what he did in there? Did he take anything?”

“Don't think he took anything, no,” Thierry replied. Glenn stretched out one hand with a mug of black coffee and Thierry met him halfway to take it. “He had a good look around. Things were moved, rifled, and I'm pretty sure he tried to get on to my computer.”

“Could he have found something that might have hurt you? Caused you any trouble?”

“No.”

Davidson smiled faintly. “You sound very certain.”

“I am.” Thierry lifted his mug and drank.

“Where were you on Friday evening between about nine and midnight?”

Louise, staring into her coffee, let her gaze flicker briefly to Thierry. She prayed the betraying flush of her body would be invisible to everyone. Thierry never glanced at her.

“I was in Oban for most of it.”

“With the rest of the Ardknocken House crew?” Clearly, Davidson was familiar with their habits.

“Actually, no,” Thierry said. “I went for dinner. With Louise.”

Davidson's eyes didn't waver. He already knew. Perhaps Aidan had told him. “Did you stay in Oban all night?”

“No, we drove home. Got back to Ardknocken around eleven, maybe a few minutes after.”

“Where did you go then?”

“I dropped Louise off and drove up to the house.”

He was lying for her.

Chapter Ten

Slowly, Louise lifted her gaze to him. What was going on? What was he doing? Saving her from suspicion? From gossip? Whatever, her heart beat faster than ever. She just didn't know what to do about it. Should she call him a liar, force him to accept the alibi she provided? She swallowed down the instinct. She didn't know what he was doing or why. So she held her tongue.

Aidan too was looking at him. Her brother must have known she didn't come home until morning, but he said nothing. Thierry himself looked only at Davidson.

“Did you go straight to the caravan?” Davidson asked him.

“No. On impulse I drove past the gates, parked and walked a little way up Ardknocken Hill.”

“In the mist?” Davidson asked mildly.

Thierry gave his characteristic half smile. “Yes, in the mist. I like mist. It helps me to think, and I had an idea for a computer game I wanted to get straight in my head.”

“That's what we were talking about when you came in,” Glenn added. “We're going to call it Mists of Time.”

“I see.” Davidson leaned forward and heaped some sugar into his mug, added a slosh of milk before raising his gaze to Thierry once more. “Did you meet anyone on the hill?”

Thierry shook his head.

“Hear anything? See anyone or anything unusual?”

“No one and nothing. If Ron was there at the time, I didn't see him.”

“Did you go as far as the waterfall?” Davidson asked, cradling his mug in both hands.

“Nowhere near. The mist was impenetrable. I came back and went to bed.”

Louise's body flamed.

“Do you know what time this was?” Davidson asked. “When you went to bed?”

Thierry shrugged. “Not exactly. Maybe midnight.”

“Well, we might have a more definite time of death after the autopsy,” Davidson said. “But for now, did anyone see you come back here? Before you went to bed? While you were in bed.”

Thierry shook his head. Davidson looked at Glenn who merely shook his head.

“Do they all need alibis?” Aidan enquired. “Or just Thierry?”

“Possibly not even Thierry,” Davidson said easily. “We haven't established foul play. It's just suspicious that he died while he was investigating Thierry.”

“I'm not a violent criminal,” Thierry said with a hint of mockery. “Ask anyone.”

“Oh I have. I also know that you've stated to several people that you'll never go back to prison.”

“Then killing someone on my own doorstep would be pretty bloody stupid, wouldn't it?” Thierry retorted. “I don't think anyone will tell you I'm stupid.”

Davidson curled his lip. “You got caught, didn't you?”

“Technically, I gave myself up.”

“Leaving old crimes aside,” Glenn interrupted, setting his mug on the table in such a way as caught Davidson's attention. “I never heard it was standard practice to demand alibis from suspects before you've even established a crime. Sounds like a waste of police time.”

Davidson smiled faintly. “It wouldn't be the first.”

Aidan said, “But you're not looking for a murderer, are you? Not yet. You're looking for the money.”

A quick, irritated frown tugged Davidson's brow and was gone.

“Oh for—” Thierry unwrapped himself from the chair and shoved his empty mug across the table. He looked Davidson in the eye. “There is no money for you to find. Whatever Ron was looking for, I don't have it. I never did. I never will.”

And abruptly, Louise understood. While Davidson frowned—even Aidan betrayed a hint of bafflement, for truth seemed to shine out of Thierry's words and his fierce, dark eyes—Louise grasped that either he was the best liar she'd ever encountered, or he really was telling the truth. Which meant he'd lied to her last night. Or…

Or he'd taken the money from London and Scottish and given it directly to someone else.
“I don't have it. I never did. I never will.”

Thierry had never been a true criminal like the others here. Maybe that was one reason Glenn liked him so much. Their friendship had never been the one-sided relationship some imagined—mere gratitude on Thierry's part for Glenn's physical protection in prison. Louise knew enough of Glenn to understand he'd been searching for redemption in prison, and he'd found it in one of the truly good men he'd ever encountered. Glenn and the others here were all trying to find a better way to live their lives. Thierry's had been a temporary, if deliberate, fall from grace, for which he'd always intended to pay the price.

Ruled by fear for his sister and fury at the injustice of the company that just took and took and refused to play its part when they needed it to, he'd taken the law into his own hands. He'd made it pay. And he'd punished without personal gain.

Something twisted inside her. It felt like pride and pain rolled into one. She had to control the gasp that parted her lips, but she couldn't take her eyes off Thierry. As if he felt the intensity of her gaze, he glanced at her, and for the first time that afternoon, didn't look immediately away. He didn't smile. But then, neither did she.

“Well.” Davidson drank and put his mug down on the table before getting to his feet. “That was definite. Thanks for your help. I'll be in touch again if I need to. Thanks for the coffee.”

Glenn followed him from the room, presumably to see he went straight out.

Louise, released at last from Thierry's mesmerizing gaze, said to Aidan, “You'll notice we don't get offered a lift back down the hill?”

Aidan gave a perfunctory smile. He was looking out the window. “I hope you know what you're doing,” he murmured. It seemed to be aimed at Thierry, who didn't answer.

Aidan turned to face him. “I have to go back to Glasgow. If you want to talk, Louise has my number.” He strolled across the room, gave Louise a brief one-armed hug in passing and left.

Louise, still holding her cup because it was something to do, said awkwardly, “Aidan isn't out to get you. He's trying to stop you going back to prison.”

Thierry didn't respond to that either. He'd taken Aidan's place by the window, presumably watching the departure of the detective, and of Aidan who'd been a different kind of policeman and was now involved in private security. No wonder he felt hunted. And yet, still he'd lied to keep secret her presence on the hill and in his bed.

“Why didn't you tell them I was there?” she blurted. “We alibi each other.”

“We don't need alibis,” Thierry said without looking at her. “At least, I don't think we do.” Abruptly, he turned to face her. “Why would Ron have gone up there in a pea-soup fog?”

She shrugged. “Why did we?”

“You think he had a girl with him?”

“No, it would have been all over the village by now. But maybe he just likes mist. As you and I do.”

Thierry nodded. “That's what I thought.” His frown deepened. “He was out in the other mist too, when you and I were. He assaulted Nicole, as if overcome by uncontrollable lust. As you and I were.”

Warm blood flooded into her face, spread through her body. “I never heard that mist was an aphrodisiac. It's cold and damp.”

“And yet we had sex twice surrounded by this mist. Ron tried to have sex with Nicole. Maybe on Friday night, he was so restless with lust he just kept walking until he fell over the edge.”

She stared at him. “Are you really trying to wriggle out of responsibility for your own actions? You had sex. Get over it. Trust me, it won't happen again, not with me.”

He dragged an impetuous hand through his hair as she flung away from him. “Shit, don't,” he said. “Louise, wait.” In one quick movement, he caught up with her, grasped her hand to hold her still. Upstairs, Jack laughed and Glenn's voice rumbled. “Look, we can't talk here in Glenn's place. I'm trying to put some very weird thoughts into words, and I can't if you get offended.”

“How can I be offended by the idea that you're ashamed to have had sex with me?”

“Ashamed?” He stared at her. “Ashamed? A girl like you shouldn't even
look
at a man like me, and yet…”

Her breath caught. “You think I had sex with you just to get information for Aidan or Ron or the police or London and bloody Scottish. You think
you
had sex with
me
because the mist overcame your natural repulsion. What the fuck is the matter with you?”

Laughter seemed to choke him. Unexpectedly, both his arms went around her. “God, you are so wrong! And so good for me. Don't be angry. I admit I'm an arse sometimes, but—” He broke off as Jack's voice sounded at the top of the stairs. He was only calling something to Izzy and Glenn on his way to the front door, but it served as a reminder that they were in someone else's home and hardly alone.

“But what?” she demanded.

He pushed a strand of her hair behind her ear. “But I would always have wanted you. I always did. I'm just not sure that without the mist I would ever have had the fortune—or the courage—to take you.”

She searched his eyes, almost fearful. “Thierry, the mist didn't make me do anything. I think this new game of yours is muddling your head.”

And yet, even as she spoke, she remembered how stunned she'd been by what she'd done with Thierry that first afternoon in the mist.

“Maybe the desire was there,” he said quietly. “I know it was for me. But I think you acted out of character. Which was why I wanted you to be very sure before we did it again…a scruple that kept me—just—away from you in Oban. Yet as soon as we hit that mist, nothing mattered but being inside you. It drew us in.”

Her body heated, mingling memory with fresh lust. “That's nonsense, Thierry. Even if it isn't, I don't want not to have
chosen
this. Shit, I don't want
you
not to have chosen this! I hate what you're making me think.” She jerked in his arms, trying to pull away from him, but he held her firm.

“In my fantasy,” he said, “I would have chosen this. So let's choose now, while there's no mist.”

She stared up at him in silence for several moments, letting her anger melt away into very physical awareness of his lean, hard body. Her nipples were suddenly hard and oversensitive against his chest. Butterflies gambolled in her stomach, sweeping lower. She took a fistful of his shirt and tugged. “I wish you'd parked your caravan in the woods.”

He shook with silent laughter. “So do I. Come for a walk instead.”

She let her head fall onto his chest and closed her eyes. “What if Davidson's out there with every cop in the Highlands?”

“Let them watch. After all, they already know we were out for dinner.”

“Were you saving my reputation? Is that why you told them you dropped me at home?”

“Partly,” he admitted. “I thought it would make things easier for you in the village. Whether or not we ever find a way past our suspicions. Louise?”

She glanced up at him and found his mouth tantalizingly close to hers. “Yes?” she said huskily.

“I'm sorry for what I said last night.”

“You mean I'm not a damned good fuck?”

His breath hitched, his heart drumming against her. Smiling, he bent his head, and the door above them slammed, causing them to spring apart. Stupid. Izzy already knew they'd spent the night together on Friday, and she had to assume whatever Izzy knew, Glenn did too.

“Come on,” Thierry muttered, seizing her hand. At the last minute, he remembered to scoop up his laptop and shove it in the bag he swung over one shoulder.

“Bye, guys!” Louise called as Thierry all but dragged her through the door. Outside, they had to walk down the narrow stairs in single file. It was beginning to rain, big, slow drops that splashed on their heads and the ground in front of them.

As they rounded the front of the house, Chrissy disappeared through the front door and closed it.

“Aidan must have left for Glasgow,” Louise commented thoughtfully. “Come on.”

This time, she led the way, not into the woods and the hills, but down the path towards the beach. The sea was loud today, the waves white and wild. As the rain got heavier, Louise pulled up the hood of her jacket, and as she dropped her hand again, without looking at him, she threaded her damp fingers through Thierry's.

He said, “I've always wanted to make love to you in the rain.”

The tingling in her stomach intensified. “Always?” she said lightly. “You haven't known me a week.”

“It's been a good week.” His thumb caressed the soft skin at the base of hers. “Where are we going? I presume you know somewhere not overlooked by the house or the village or the beach.”

“I do.” She paused at the fork in the path as she caught sight of Mairi Moore on the beach with her dog, fortunately heading back towards the village. The tide was coming in fast and there wasn't much sand still visible. Louise held on to Thierry's hand. “One moment… Okay.” She tugged him on around the fork and along the path, where Aidan and Chrissy's renovated cottage stood. The wind whipped at her hair.

“I think Aidan and Chrissy might object,” Thierry said, his tone neutral.

“No, they won't. Not this once.” She led him up the repaired steps and along the side of the cottage to the back door, hidden from the paths and the house and the beach. As if released from a sling, Thierry spun around, bumping her back against the wooden door.

“What's the matter?” His breath came just a little ragged. “Don't you like sex in the rain?”

“I've never—” The rest of her denial was lost in his mouth, which devoured hers, hot and demanding. She gasped, lifting her hand to his face as she kissed him back. Rain ran down his hair and onto her face, trickling onto their fused lips until she could taste it in her mouth and his.