Sorcha watched him narrow-eyed as he strode into the room and squatted beside Carolyn, running his fingers gently over her skull.
“She’s in shock. Make her something hot and sweet to drink,” Ben ordered, “but don’t touch anything else.”
“Can you sit up?” he asked. To her surprise Carolyn nodded and gingerly tried to climb to her feet. Ben helped her and then pulled her into his lap, where she burst into tears.
Ben held Sorcha’s gaze over Carolyn’s head, and mouthed, “I don’t hit women.” His lips pressed together as if he were disappointed with her for even thinking it.
Disappointment was a sentiment she understood only too well.
“D-did you see anyone?” She tried and failed to control the tremors in her voice. “He ran out the back when I came home.”
“There wasn’t anyone there when I came by—and what the hell were you planning to do anyway? Tie another fucking knot in a hanky?”
Bowing her head, she screwed up her eyes and backed away. She slumped over the kitchen counter, repeatedly swallowed the saliva that pooled in her mouth. She’d made a mistake, but when he’d appeared out of nowhere like that, he’d scared her to death.
She put the kettle on, grabbed cups, wondering at the same time why she was suddenly following orders when just seconds ago, she’d thought he was a potential murderer.
It didn’t take long for the kettle to boil and, clutching three mugs of tea, she walked into the lounge and knelt on the floor beside them. She passed a cup to Carolyn and put Ben’s on the floor. Their eyes collided, his, cold, angry, and dark enough to see her reflection in.
She didn’t know what she’d done wrong but disgust blazed in his eyes.
Carolyn smiled through the blood, grimaced as she took a sip of the sweet brew. “Ouch. Thanks.” Carolyn was always polite, but right now it seemed absurd.
Hot tears burned in Sorcha’s eyes. “I’m so sorry, Caro.” She wiped her face on her sleeve, but couldn’t stop them spilling over.
Carolyn held out her hand and Sorcha took it, gripping hard. “It’s not your fault.”
“I should have been here.”
Ben stopped them both with a firm reprimand. “Stop it. Some bastard attacks a woman, it’s his fault.” He stared hard at Carolyn. “Don’t get into the blame game. Those scumbags love to mess with people’s heads.”
Carolyn nodded, but her eyes were downcast and she didn’t look convinced. Neither was Sorcha. Too many bad things had happened for her to think this was just another coincidence.
“Did you recognize him?” Ben’s voice was tentative, like that first step on a frozen lake.
Carolyn shook her head, wiped her nose with a tissue and started to cry all over again. “But it wasn’t anyone I know.” She hiccupped and frowned. “At least I don’t think it was. He smelled dreadful.” She shuddered.
Sorcha recalled the same thing and nodded in agreement, but Ben wasn’t looking at her.
“What did he look like? What was he wearing?” Ben asked.
Sorcha touched his arm to make him stop. He was pumping Carolyn with questions like a policeman, or a vengeful boyfriend. God knew what Kevin would make of this.
Carolyn shook her head. “I don’t know. It was so dark. I came home early and I couldn’t get the light to work.” Her expression was pinched, clearly in pain. “I came inside and someone hit me on the head.” She fingered a gash on her temple. Winced. “When I woke up he was trying to—to…” She started sobbing all over again and couldn’t finish.
Blood matted the fine strands of Carolyn’s hair, but Ben cradled her, rocked her tenderly against his chest. Sorcha met his gaze over the other girl’s head.
“It looks like he was robbing the place,” Sorcha said. As if they had anything worth stealing. Christ, he could take the lot. It wasn’t worth the damage he’d done to Carolyn, whose face was starting to swell.
“Where were you?” Ben asked.
His question was accusatory, making the guilt she felt intensify. She felt physically ill as blood trickled down the other girl’s face.
“At a discussion group. I left early.”
Not early enough.
“The bus was late and I only just got home.” The distress she felt overwhelmed her. The violence of the attack made her insides churn. She reached out. “I’m so sorry, Caro.”
Carolyn held her hand and squeezed Sorcha’s fingers. “You
saved
me.”
“Where are the damn paramedics?” Ben asked abruptly.
Drawing back, Sorcha checked her watch. “They should be here soon, and the police.”
Ben eased Carolyn off his lap and helped her onto the sofa. He picked up the mugs and took them through to the kitchen, dumped them in the sink. Sorcha followed, caught him staring out the backdoor, frustration ripe in the set of his mouth.
“Did you see anybody on the beach?” She walked up to him, close enough to smell the fresh scent of soap on his skin. He didn’t smell like the intruder had and there hadn’t been time for him to shower. She touched his arm in mute apology. Wanted to wrap her arms around him for a much-needed hug, but didn’t dare after what they’d been through tonight.
He shook his head and turned to look at her, fury radiating from him in waves. Wary, she withdrew her hand.
“You thought I did that?”
A lump formed in Sorcha’s throat. She tried to swallow it, but the harder she tried, the bigger the obstacle became. She turned away, unwilling for him to see her distress.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, holding the counter for balance. “But I don’t really know you very well, do I?”
“I’d hoped you knew me better than that.” His voice was velvet soft, his eyes demanding answers, but she didn’t have any. Shock and pain made her woozy. What the hell did he want from her?
“I’m sorry,” she said again, and right now, it was all she could manage.
***
He ripped off his balaclava in the shadow of the ancient sea wall. Fury pounded through his veins. Hotness surging through blood vessels and throbbing like a bitch in heat. Seething hatred made him want to kill and smash and maim everyone inside that little cottage. He’d wanted to pound the girl’s face until there was nothing left but ugliness. Grind it into the floor and fuck her senseless.
Joy from her pain had nearly made him come even before he’d got between her legs. The power of taking what he wanted, of grabbing hold and forcing her to submit, made him hard just thinking about it. And the power of life and death…
The ultimate rush. Better than drugs. Better than the mind games he’d been playing for years. But the rush had made him forget the journals and forget his mission. The thrill of anticipation had distracted him from his focus.
If Sorcha hadn’t come home, he’d have done the brunette and dragged her body down to the surf, just like he’d done with little Evie.
Would anybody have even noticed?
But Sorcha—
bitch
—had walked in and he’d wanted to kill her on the spot. He’d almost done it, but he had other plans.
He ached.
Sweat dried on his face and his skin itched. Easing his frustration, he stroked himself through the denim of his jeans. Forensics didn’t faze him. The sea destroyed most evidence and by the time tests were finished, he’d be long gone.
Everything was in place.
He let the forbidden thrill of touching himself trickle through his mind. Delicious warmth spread through him. Breath caught in his throat as he ground his teeth together and held back a cry. Screams of release bit at his control as semen hit the rocks with a savage slap. Outwardly he was silent. Inside he screamed until babies squealed and dogs howled.
Ben forced his eyes wide, opened the window and let a blast of freezing air wash over his face. There was no traffic on the road at 3:00 a.m. Sorcha was slumped against the passenger door of his rental car as they drove back from Ninewells hospital in Dundee. Her eyes were closed and, judging from the regularity of her breathing, she was fast asleep.
She’d been determined to go with Carolyn in the ambulance, only her uncle had insisted she stay and answer his questions first. She’d been pissed, and then she’d looked as if she might faint.
So he’d driven Sorcha to the hospital. No buses ran at this time of night and she’d needed to be checked out by the docs anyway. It gave him the perfect opportunity to stick close to his suspect.
He glanced over at Sleeping Beauty. The dashboard lights trimmed her features with an icy glow. Her lips were soft and full, slightly parted. Bruises of exhaustion shadowed her lashes and there was something fragile about her. Even in sleep she looked as though she might shatter.
He closed the window.
Drug trafficking was a bitch.
She had a cut on the back of her scalp that had been taped, but no broken bones or concussion.
She was lucky.
Had the attack on Carolyn been a case of mistaken identity? Had the real attack been meant for Sorcha?
The doctors said Carolyn was okay, though they were keeping her in for observation. They’d run a rape kit, though she’d sworn the lowlife hadn’t actually got that far when Sorcha scared him off.
Thank God
. He’d just beaten the crap out of her.
Ben’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel as his foot pressed the Renault’s gas pedal to the floor. The attack had been planned. The main light bulb had been removed from the fitting in the living room and placed on a side table. The cottage had been searched, not burgled. Ben knew the difference.
And so did Sergeant Davy Logan.
The attacker had stayed long enough to have a little extracurricular fun. Ben struck his fist against the steering wheel. He hadn’t been the only one contemplating a little B&E, but while he’d been cleaning up, someone else had ransacked the joint. And attacked a lone woman.
If I’d been five minutes earlier…
But he knew from experience self-recrimination did no good.
Had the intruder found what he was looking for? Sorcha swore nothing was missing, but would she tell him if there was? Cocaine for example? Or money? She’d been distraught when he’d found her, genuinely believing he might have been the attacker. No way in hell she’d faked that visceral response.
He didn’t know what to think. And the timing stank. Ben didn’t believe in coincidence. So why today?
Was it linked to Sorcha’s trip out to the Isle of May and her supposed argument with the warden—who was more likely her accomplice? Or was it something to do with that goon she’d run into in the bar last night? He didn’t think this was some random stranger attack. According to his sources, there were no unsolved sexual assaults in the area, although a local prostitute had been reported missing.
Something told him Sorcha was way out of her league, and while he might want her in prison, he didn’t want to see her hurt.
Driving past St. Andrews’s spookily lit ruins of a twelfth-century cathedral, he slowed. The roads were curved and dangerous, but right now he needed a release for the pent-up energy that prowled his insides and screwed up his head. The engine roared as he shifted down gear to go over a narrow bridge.
Was it really this crazy witch vendetta she was obsessed with? Or a drug deal gone bad? Had she double-crossed the wrong person, pissed off another criminal enough to try and take her out of the equation?
Questions whirled and his brain ached from lack of solid evidence and deficit of sleep. He rubbed his eyes, saw the blink of the lighthouse as he crested a hill and accelerated down the long straight toward Anstruther.
The speedometer crept up to ninety. His heartbeat calmed, a breath of satisfaction whooshed from his lungs as he finally hit a speed that concentrated his mind.
He slammed on the brakes to take the hard corner at the bottom of the stretch.
“That was some ride.” Her voice was soft as honey and caressed his ragged temper.
“Sorry.” He flashed a grin that said anything but. He liked speed. Always had. One vice he could live with.
“That’s okay, but the police like to sit just inside the town limits and catch speed-boys like you.” Her smile looked indulgent and warm, an electric jolt to his burned-out senses. “Just so you know.”
He grinned back, unable to help himself even though it fueled his frustration, made him shift uncomfortably in his seat and secretly pissed him off. “You ever done anything illegal, Sorcha?”
It was a loaded question, but you never knew. The woman must be exhausted. Maybe she’d confess and shoot a bullet through his instincts.
Sorcha snorted, sat up and straightened her hair. “No way.”
And the cocaine on the Isle of May was a figment of his imagination? “Come on?” He pushed. “Not even a speeding ticket or graffiti on a park bench?”
“You must be joking.”
Oh sure, he was a laugh a minute. Just ask his dead partner.
She adjusted her seat upright, stretched her legs as much as she could in the confines of the compact car. “I was the town freak when I went to live with my mother, or haven’t you worked that out yet?”
He’d figured it out all right, although it didn’t sit well. Had it twisted her mind? Taught her to hate? Made her crave power and revenge?
“When I went to Cornwall to live with Mom I was so desperate to fit in, I was the model child. I ate everything put on my plate, including tomatoes, which I hate, and I got good grades. I kept my room immaculate and by the time I was eleven I even did laundry.”
His fingers tightened around the gear shift. He knew all about trying to fit in, conforming until there was nothing left of you but lies.
Jesus, he’d tried so hard as a child to make up for whatever was wrong with him. When he’d been growing up, his grandfather had been so emotionally distant he’d rarely even looked at him, let alone spoke. So as a teenager Ben had set fire to the garage just to get the old bastard’s attention. He’d got it all right. If the cop next door hadn’t broken in, Ben was pretty sure he’d have been beaten to death with his own aluminum baseball bat.
Conversely that night had saved him. He could have followed the other neighborhood dirtbags into the drug trade, made enough fast cash to rub his puritanical grandfather’s nose in expensive cars and designer threads. Instead he’d joined the fight against crime, kept his honor, and watched his partner bleed out on the floor.
And ended up sitting right here next to Sorcha Logan.
Streetlights made it easier to see her expression. She picked up her bag from the foot well and pulled out a tube of lip balm, smoothed it over her lips. It took real effort to drag his gaze back to the road.
“My mother wasn’t exactly Martha Stewart,” she told him. “She abandoned me and my dad and didn’t really want me back. I behaved myself or else I’d have ended up in foster care.”
The mother sounded like a piece of work. “Where is she now?” He knew. Another test.
“She died of cancer a couple of years ago.” Sorcha pressed her lips together.
Ben loved his mother, but she hadn’t backed him up when he’d needed her, hadn’t protected him from the old man’s brutality. He knew better than anyone how to rely only on himself. The way Sorcha seemed to rely on herself. “That sucks. Sorry.”
Her soft sigh added a sharp twist of guilt to his conscience.
“It’s okay.” Her voice got quieter, barely audible above the blast of the heater. “The strange thing is when she got ill she actually started to need me.”
He heard her swallow though he kept his eyes fixed on the road.
“Before she died we became close. I finally got to know the woman, rather than this resentful being who couldn’t fit herself into the mold of a mother.”
He forced the image of a lonely child out of his consciousness. The insights into her childhood evoked the sort of sympathy that hit too close to home.
“What kind of books do you write?” she asked suddenly.
His eyes widened for a fraction of a second—he’d already forgotten how to lie. “True Crime.” It was as close to reality as he could manage.
She huffed out a quiet laugh. “That explains it then—”
“Explains what?”
“The way you always seem gravitate toward trouble.”
“Me?” He curled his lip in a mock sneer. “I’m not the one who went chasing intruders in the dark.”
She grimaced.
He pulled up into his parking spot, a rare patch of concrete wedged between two cottages. Pervasive shadows filled the empty spaces. If the attack on Carolyn
had
been a case of mistaken identity, Sorcha would be alone in her cottage and possibly in danger.
“Pack a bag,” he ordered. “You’re staying with me till you get your security ramped up.” Damn. This was a mistake but what else could he do?
She slumped in her seat. “He won’t come back.”
“What if he does, Sorcha?” It was 3:30 a.m. and he didn’t remember the last time he’d slept properly. There was no finesse left in him anymore.
“I don’t know.” Sorcha looked at her front door and bit her lip.
“Come on. I’ll check out the place while you grab your gear.” He put his hand on her knee and a charge crackled over his skin. Not just lust. Something else. Something he didn’t want to examine.
What the hell he was doing?
***
Internal pressure pounded her skull, threatening to split it wide open. The voices struggled to escape. Sorcha twisted first one way and then the other, too agitated to get back to sleep. Ghosts crowded her mind, all vying for attention. Waves throbbed against the beach in an unremitting cadence. No matter how exhausted she was, sleep was impossible.
She’d dreamt again.
Seen her father’s face a second before a ferocious wave ripped him from the lifeboat. Uncle Angus’s tears soaking her hair when he’d held her tight and told her it wasn’t her fault, and her mother laughing as orange flames engulfed her. And the dream that woke her every single night—of flames and tight bonds, naked flesh and searing heat. People screaming as their bodies blackened and charred.
Sorcha jerked upright, frightened, unsettled. Her eyes darted to the closed curtains, unable to shake the sensation of unseen eyes. She grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders before going to the window. Holding her breath, she whipped the drapes apart. But there was no one out on the street. It was still dark. Feeling ridiculous, she turned away.
Cautiously she crept into the lounge, glanced at the telephone, but it was too early to phone the hospital to check on Carolyn.
Soft amber lamplight lit the room. The chair by the window was empty and she tried to make herself feel glad rather than lonely. Walking toward the telescope, she jolted as her pale reflection hit the glass, her heart banging violently.
She kept expecting to see her father’s ghost.
Despite the blanket, she shivered because sometimes the chill went deeper than skin and bone.
The first time he’d appeared had been in Australia, not long after her granny died, when she was finishing her Master’s thesis. Late one night she was heading home through the elegant columns of the Great Hall and he’d been walking across the grass away from her, wearing his Arran sweater in the subtropical heat.
It might have been years since she saw him, but she’d recognized his bandy-legged walk, the short hair on the back of his head. Frantic, she’d chased him, thinking his death had been some terrible misunderstanding. But no matter how fast she sprinted, she couldn’t catch up and he’d left her lying there stretched out in the dirt, sobbing in the dark.
Not long after that she’d started hearing voices, as though she was eavesdropping on private conversations—only the people weren’t there. And her father had begun turning up all over the place, his silent misery as loud as a foghorn across the firth.
She’d spent her spare weekends volunteering as a Surf Life Saver on the Gold Coast. Didn’t take a genius to work out why she’d taken up that sport. One day Iain Logan had begun showing up there too. Standing in the Coral Sea, waves up to his waist, the heavy jumper he’d died in, dragging him beneath the surf.
She’d nearly drowned trying to save him, and after the second or third time, people had started to whisper and point. So she’d confided in Bruce.
She closed her eyes. God, she’d been so dumb. Put all her trust and love into a man with the backbone of microwaved squid.
She banged into the telescope and cringed as it thudded off the glass.
Damn
. She darted a glance at Ben’s bedroom, heard nothing from inside. He’d looked knackered when he’d gone to bed.
Her head hurt and she needed to take more painkillers, but a boat’s running lights glowed offshore and captured her attention. Indistinguishable figures hauled a couple of streaming lobster creels over the side. She pointed the scope toward it, looked through the lens and smiled as she made out the distinctive image of a horse painted next to the nameplate.
The
Kilmore
had been her daddy’s fishing trawler, named after a famous Grand National winner. Her yacht was called
Red Rum
after another legendary racehorse. According to Uncle Davy, Iain Logan bet one hundred pounds on the British Grand National every year and faithfully recorded the outcome in his diary.
An image flashed in her head and her heart fluttered beneath her breastbone.
Where were his diaries?
Chewing her lip, she frowned. She’d forgotten about them. Maybe they were in the cottage somewhere? Would Uncle Angus know? Or maybe his wife had put them up and never told her. Sorcha would have to go and ask her, though even the thought of visiting Aunty Eileen made her shoulders slump as she blew out a dejected sigh.
Another memory tumbled out of the ether.
Crabbit.
Her dad had always said that Aunty Eileen was
fair crabbit.