Sylvie Kurtz - Mask Of A Hunter

She was used to order, to things done her way, to being the master of her days. This baby, who didn’t look much bigger than a library edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, actually had her pulse skittering as if she were facing an armed madman demanding she produce plans for a nuclear device. She swallowed hard. “I don’t know anything about babies.”

She hadn’t realized she’d spoken out loud until Candace’s voice grated against her ears. “Hannah’s an easy baby.”

Which meant next to nothing to Rory. Easy was an instruction manual, and she didn’t see one lying conveniently around. She let her tapestry tote bag slip from her shoulders to the rust-carpeted floor and peered farther over the edge of the crib at the creature sleeping there. What did Hannah eat? How long did she sleep? How did one entertain a nine-month-old child? Then there were diapers and baths and tears. The responsibility of it all gave her legs the sturdiness of wet sponges. She’d never worn helplessness well. “Tell me about her routine.”

Candace, dressed in black stretch pants and a light-blue sweatshirt with a sledding snowman printed on the front, finished tidying up the coffeemaker in the kitchenette and moved to the tiny living room where a soap opera played on the television. “Felicia usually covers the breakfast and lunch shifts at the diner, so Hannah goes to the sitter’s around 5:00 a.m. and gets picked up around 3:00 p.m.”

Candace headed to a pile of knitting on the seat of a faded lime-green armchair. She stuffed the balls of light-blue yarn and steel needles into a yellowing canvas bag with a Summersfield town centennial logo. Then hands on hips, she frowned at the floor as if she were looking for something. “Other than that, Hannah pretty much leads the way. She still takes a couple of naps a day, but sleeps through the night. She’s a good eater. It doesn’t take much to keep her happy.”

With a humph, Candace bent at the waist and picked up a glossy magazine, featuring a snowflake sweater and a rosy-cheeked pre-schooler, that had somehow strayed beneath the armchair. The map of lines on the older woman’s face placed her age on the strong side of fifty. Her short, bristle-stiff hair was still brown, although gray roots showed. Rory had not seen her stand in place for longer than a second since she’d arrived—and even then, her knitting needles had clicked like an old-fashioned typewriter manned by manic fingers. There was nothing soft or sweet about her, yet there was a spirit of generosity Rory found hard to ignore.

“Thanks for waiting for me.” She could handle Hannah on her own. Felicia had done it. So could she. How hard could it be?

Candace humphed again as she grabbed her black Mary Poppins handbag from the half wall separating the narrow kitchenette from the living room. “She’s a good kid.”

Rory wasn’t sure if she meant Felicia or Hannah. “Have you heard from Felicia?”

“Not a word.”

“Aren’t you worried?”

Candace slid the handles of the canvas knitting bag over her shoulders. “I learned a long time ago to mind my own business.”

“But—”

“Summersfield ain’t no Currier and Ives postcard, honey. It’s all I know, and I don’t want to cause myself any grief. Felicia, well, she made some decisions that are hard to undo. And if you want my advice—although somehow I doubt you’ll take it—I’d wrap that pretty baby up and take her away.”

“I have to find Felicia.” For all her faults her sister had finally done something right.

“It ain’t going to change anything.”

“You think she’s…hurt?” Rory could not bring herself to say dead out loud.

Frowning, Candace rummaged through her bag. “What I think don’t matter.”

“If Felicia’s in danger, I have to help her.”

Out came a purple bear with one ragged ear. Candace handed the plush toy to Rory. “Have you ever thought that maybe it’s too late to help her?”

Rory blinked in surprise. “No, I hadn’t.”

Not really.

At least she’d discounted that dire possibility. She still thought of Felicia as the headstrong kid who had a knack for checking out when the going got tough. She’d run away from school on a regular basis. She’d run from summer camp. She’d run from home. Rory had thought Hannah’s arrival had changed Felicia…and on the trip up to New Hampshire, she’d talked herself into believing this was just another one of Felicia’s disappearing acts that would resolve itself within a few days. Once she worked herself out of the quagmire of her emotions, Felicia usually returned.

Except that Candace’s phone call asking her to come get Hannah had spooked Rory. It was so premeditated an action for a girl like Felicia who lived for the moment. Sebastian’s assertion that Felicia was working undercover for the ATF hadn’t helped. That, too, was out of character. It just didn’t make sense. Felicia would never have done that. Not after what had happened to their parents.

Except maybe for a chance to stay with Hannah.

Rory kneaded at the tension hiking her shoulders to her ears.

Then when Ace—really, what kind of name was that for a grown man?—had brought up his theory that Felicia was hiding, she’d jumped at the saving grace of the probability that she wasn’t too late. Because if something had happened to Felicia, then that long-haired Italian pirate with his show-off muscles was right, and Rory had waited too long to find her courage. And if she’d failed Felicia when Felicia needed her most, Rory wasn’t sure she could live with the guilt.

Felicia was alive. Scared, but alive. Rory had to believe that.

Candace jerked her head toward the kitchenette. “My number’s on the memo board on the fridge. Penny Webster sits for Hannah. She’s right upstairs. Her number’s there, too, if you need her. So’s the number of Hannah’s doctor.”

“Thank you for all you’ve done.” Rory rubbed her arms against a core-deep chill that shivered through her in spite of the warm afternoon sunlight pouring through the bay window.

Candace wrung the doorknob and yanked the door open. “She’d have done the same for me.”

With that, Candace was gone, and Hannah was all hers. Rory slanted a glance at the sleeping baby and gulped. She reached into her tote bag for her laptop. First things first. She needed information on nine-month-old children, and she needed it fast: www.parenting.com. Then she could worry about Ace Lyon and Mike Fletcher and the illegal activities that hid behind the illusion of New England small-town charm in Summersfield.

RORY WAS STRUGGLING with a spoonful of mashed carrots when the roar of a motorcycle peeling around the town common snapped her out of her concentration and Hannah, who was strapped to her high chair, into a wail. Whatever Felicia lacked in proper nutrition for herself, she’d made sure Hannah would not run out of junior meat sticks, vegetables and fruits any time soon. There were enough jars in the cupboard to feed an entire daycare class for a year. Rory had spent the last half hour trying to interest Hannah in chicken sticks, mashed carrots and green beans. Finger eating might encourage dexterity, but it sure didn’t make for a neat meal. Armed with a baby spoon she waved like a baton, Hannah had seemed more interested in decorating Rory’s hair with carrots than eating them.

Until the motorcycle.

What kind of idiot races down a main road where children could be playing? Rory picked up the bawling Hannah and headed for the bay window facing the street.

The black-and-chrome steel monster stopped below. When the bearded Viking looked up, she swallowed hard. Was it too late to douse the lights and pretend no one was home? She recognized him, of course. Felicia had sent pictures. Even in the Christmas family portrait that was supposed to show tight bonds, there was something cold and empty about Mike’s eyes that had her questioning what Felicia saw in him.