Rendezvous at Midnight (9 page)

Michael ran the fingers of his free hand through his hair. “Kind of. Yeah.”

But she knew there was something else. She’d get it out of him later, she vowed silently.

Rostov looked up from his scrutiny of Brant and grinned at her. “Don’t let him get away with that one. Make him tell you. Come on, idiot. You’ve got a long day ahead of you.”

He began to drag his prisoner, who had stopped gasping. Brant glared at them both. “There are more of us. And when I challenge your ownership of the network, they’ll see you for what you are.”

“No. No you won’t, and no they won’t.” Michael sent a shimmering wave between himself and Brant. It looked like a heat wave, the kind that could be seen in a desert, and from Brant’s reaction, it felt like one, too. He flicked an apologetic glance at Rostov. “Sorry, man. Couldn’t resist.”

“You are one awesome sensitive,” Rostov said. “And you’re not a virgin?”

Shocked, Lisa met Michael’s amused smile.

“Oh no,” he said, straight to her. “I’m not a virgin. Haven’t been one of those for some time.”

Chuckling, Rostov led Brant out of the room.

Lisa found herself pulled fully into Michael’s arms. His hands smoothed over her back in a soothing gesture. “Why didn’t you leave with Cliff?”

“I was about to, and then Brant blocked the door. I thought I might as well have it out with him now. He dumped me, you know. He demanded I give up my job and stay home to look after him, and I said no. He said I’d come around.”

“Well, I want you to keep your job.” He tilted her chin up with one hand. “You’re a definite asset to the network, you know. We’ve made
Ghosts At Home
nationally syndicated, you and me, and we can do even more.”

“Why do you do it?”

He kissed her before he replied. “Because I can. And because many of these spirits are in agony. I can help to release some. I love the TV industry, always have, so they seemed to kind of go together. According to the public, I’m a gifted medium, nothing more. Hide in plain sight, Mr. Smith always says. It worked for me.”

“It sure does. I had no idea.”

“Good.”

She kept his gaze, knowing she’d found the man she was made for.

And who is made for you
.

But one thing still troubled her. “Will they hurt Brant? Will they do anything illegal?”

His arms tightened around her. “No, they won’t do anything illegal, unless there’s a law against mind cleansing. There are some specialists, people with my kind of gift, and they will discover what we need to know first, where the rest of Brant’s cell is. Mr. Smith will send men in to capture who and what they can, computers, cameras, that kind of thing, and Brant will be cleansed of the taint. They’ll take every memory of the anti-sensitives away from him, try to redeem him if they can, and send him on his way.”

“They will? What if they can’t?”

He paused, and she knew from the shadows in his mind he was avoiding answering directly. “Brant isn’t a member from conviction. Greed drove him, not idealism. People like that are much easier to persuade. I think we’ll be getting his resignation letter soon. He’ll be okay, Lisa. But you won’t be seeing him again. I’ll give him a reference and send him on his way. Nobody would expect us to employ him after what he tried to do to me.”

She snuggled in. He hadn’t told her all of it, she was sure, but she read the sincerity in his voice when he promised Brant wouldn’t be permanently damaged. For the rest, she was content Brant was out of her life.

And that Michael was in it.

Chapter Seven

Later in the day, when Michael was resting next to Lisa in her bed, Mr. Smith contacted him by the unusual method of using his cell phone. Michael picked it up before it started ringing and woke Lisa up. “Hi.”

“Scott. Thought you’d like to know. Brant is more than just an anti-sensitive. He had more at stake than that. He’s the son of Cory Selhurst.”

“What?” Michael forgot to keep his voice down and felt Lisa stir. “How is that possible? Wait, hang on, Lisa needs to know this.”

“Michael?” Lisa’s sleepy, sexy voice almost made him tell Mr. Smith to wait until later. But not quite. He needed to know what was going on.

He’d emptied the contents of his trousers on the bedside table, and he took a moment to put the phone on speaker. Lisa listened while Mr. Smith told them.

“A few years after Rosanna Perez died, Selhurst was caught embezzling. It was the beginning of the end. He’d taken kickbacks, involved himself in every dirty plan he could to get rid of his political rivals. The news rocked the financial and political worlds, and Selhurst was finished.”

“I know that,” Lisa murmured, but Mr. Smith carried on talking.

“Selhurst took what he had left, which was precious little, and moved to the West Coast. He changed his name to McManus and married again. He had a son by his second wife, and yes, you’ve guessed it, called him Brant. When Brant was eighteen, he found some old photos and news clippings, and put two and two together. His father told him the story and persuaded Brant that he was the injured party, that Lisa’s family had started the rumors, and conspired to bring Selhurst down. Brant chose to believe his father.”

“Pretty lame in a journalist,” Michael commented.

“Sure. But he got the job at your network
because
Lisa was there. He always planned to bring her down. Then he fell in love with her. It looks as if he regarded her as his personal property, a kind of redemption from the story of Lisa and her mother. He wanted to own her. He joined the anti-sensitives as a way to get a handle on some power. There are some influential people financing that operation. This weekend, he planned to kill or discredit Michael and then make a bid for Michael’s share of the company. Then he would have tried to disgrace Lisa’s family and made her completely dependent on him.”

“Bastard,” Michael said heatedly. Lisa put her hand on his stomach, and he put his own over hers, turning his head to meet her eyes with gentle sympathy. “So what now?”

“The plan stays the same. He gave up the rest of the cell remarkably easily, once he realized the game was up. We’ll cleanse his mind of the anti-sensitive memories, which don’t go too deep, and let him go. Probably take him home, and instill in his mind the thought he’d been ill, and needed a break before getting another job. Hollywood should suit him. It’s full of self-centered power freaks.”

Lisa grinned. “He’ll be right at home there.”

“Sure. In the meantime, take care of yourselves. Keep me in the loop, Scott.”

“You bet.”

Mr. Smith hung up. Michael took Lisa into his arms and kissed her, soft and long.

“We have to get to work,” he said, regretfully.

“Yes,” she answered, equally regretfully.

They had decided to shoot one more sequence, a vigil in suite number one. Michael was convinced Rosanna needed to pass on, to be brought to realize she was dead and the past was gone. Since they only had one cameraman left, one of the soundmen would take the other camera and they’d do a combined séance. Michael and Ayesha would link their forces. Later, they decided to send actors on to the ship to re-enact the fateful night, but Lisa didn’t want to be there then. Too painful for her to watch someone reconstruct her mother’s death, especially after the traumatic scene they’d had.

“After this, I want to take you home. To my home. We’ll keep the door closed and the phone hooked up to the answering machine for—oh, maybe forever.”

“Sounds good.”

Chuckling, she swept back the sheets and headed for the shower. He wasn’t long in joining her.

***

Suite number one stood ready for them, lit only by dim, portable spotlights. They would put on the night vision and conduct the séance in the dark. The séances were the high point of the program. They had never yet had to rely on ghostly footsteps or the occasional light, but there was always a first time.

Lisa doubted the first time would be tonight. Even she, usually oblivious to presences until they actually made a sound or contacted Michael, felt a crackling, prickling sensation, as though the atmosphere was filled with static electricity. Perhaps it was because one of the ghosts meant something to her personally.

Michael took her hand. Brant had obviously told no one about finding them in bed together because when he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it, Ayesha smiled at her, and Cliff nearly dropped the sound boom. But nobody said anything.

They sat at the table set in the middle of the bedroom, one brought into the room just for this occasion. The table was hexagonal, and they’d invited a couple of the security guards to make up the number and act as witnesses. Michael didn’t drop her hand, but sat on one side of the table, while Ayesha sat opposite him. All of them linked hands, one of the security men taking Lisa’s other side. This would be a handheld camera affair. The two cameramen stood to either side of the table, their night-vision lenses in place.

Lisa had set the scene about a half hour before, discussing the case, and touring the rooms in the suite. Now she spoke to camera, deliberately building the tension. Not that it needed any heightening, as far as she was concerned.

“We’re about to try to make direct contact with the woman who haunted my childhood. I’ve come to know her this weekend, and something about her character. Although I look very much like her, I never knew her, so this weekend has laid my personal ghosts to rest. Now let’s see if we can help her in the same way.”

She glanced at Michael, but it was Ayesha who started the ball rolling. Lisa always left it to the mediums to decide, but secretly she guessed if she had tried to direct them, they wouldn’t have taken any notice of her.

“If any spirit is here, please let yourself be known.” Ayesha’s rich, honeyed tones seeped through the atmosphere of the room. Lisa felt the hairs of the back of her neck prickle with the tension.

But they heard nothing. This wasn’t unusual. It took some time for the atmosphere to quiet, and they could wait for up to an hour before anything happened. So Lisa settled down for a long wait.

Or maybe not. Michael gripped her hand, and she felt the wave pass from him to her. “I have something,” he said. “A man, middle aged. He tells me he is ‘in his prime’.”

“Who is it? What’s his name?”

Michael listened patiently, and then Lisa heard a male voice, not Michael’s. It spoke to her down the internal path linking her with her lover. “Cory. Remember me, sweetheart? I’m the man who killed you.”

***

Lisa opened her eyes, not recalling having closed them. Memories chased her, but she couldn’t grasp them for a moment. Then she remembered. Why was it suddenly so light?

Because it was daytime. She wasn’t in the suite. She was in the changing room of the pool, soaking wet. She must have been for a swim, because her white one-piece suit clung to her, the fabric rapidly becoming clammy and uncomfortable.

She’d go up to the suite. Perhaps now, when the material clung to her curvy body, now was the time to try to seduce Cory.

Lisa paused, but the body she occupied didn’t. She had no control over it, no control over her movements. When she caught sight of herself in a mirror on her way out of the changing room, she saw herself, but subtly different. Her figure was more rounded, more voluptuous, and her face a little broader.

She wasn’t looking at herself. She was looking at Rosanna Perez. Her mother.

How had she gotten here? What was happening?

Rosanna paused before the mirror and studied her reflection critically. Somehow, Lisa could hear her own thoughts and her mother’s. Rosanna flicked her hair back and pushed up her breasts, pulling the costume down at the bottom to accentuate the curves of her body and get rid of any wrinkles.

Michael
?

I’m here, love. Hang on. Go with it, don’t try to fight it. She has you anchored inside her, but I’ll get you out. Relax
.

The sense of relief almost overpowered her. He was with her, and he knew what he was doing. Michael would get her out.

She did as he’d told her and tried to relax, concentrating on her observation rather than her feelings. It helped, a little.

Rosanna left the pool area and took the stairs, her bare feet slapping against the tiles outside. The only thing she held was a key. The key to suite one. She decided to forgo a towel, not wanting anything to obscure Cory’s vision of her body. If she took him by surprise, he’d probably fall on her. Then she’d have him for sure. Cory had been a perfect gentleman, had proposed over dinner. She’d persuaded him her husband was a brute. She would be divorced soon. She might have to take the baby, though if she married Cory, she could employ a nanny. She’d never have to see the kid from one week to the next. It had been a mistake, that pregnancy, but it was done now, and thank God she’d gotten her figure back.

She passed a couple of people on the stairs, but she took no notice of them, even the wolf whistle that followed her up the first class staircase. She wasn’t for sale any more. She could choose the men she slept with.

Her attraction to Cory hadn’t just been his wealth. Of course, if he’d been dirt poor she wouldn’t have touched him. She’d had enough of dirt poor. But it didn’t hurt that Cory Selhurst was extremely good looking and had a body to die for. What she’d seen of it.

She’d tried everything to get him into bed. If she could just do that, just once, she’d have him for sure. She still couldn’t believe he wouldn’t just dump her in New York. After all, why would he show such attraction to her? She was gorgeous, and she kept herself well, but Rosanna didn’t fool herself. She had no money, nothing but herself to bring to him. Only her mother caring for her baby back home while she worked to put bread on the table. He could have her, dump her, and move on. Not that she’d let him. And, God help her, she wanted him. That was the truth. She wanted Cory Selhurst.

Reaching the suite, she opened the door with her own key and looked around. No one was inside. That was a blow. Okay, so what next?