Judi Lind - Veil Of Fear

At that moment, the doorbell rang. Mary raised an eyebrow. To Jonathan she said, “Well, at least your bodyguard’s prompt. What did you say his name was—Armstrong?”

“That’s right. Be sure to see his identification before you let him in.”

“Jonathan, I’m not a child,” she said through clenched teeth. Honestly, sometimes his protective nature was a little confining. Before she could protest further, the doorbell buzzed again. And again.

This Armstrong might be prompt, but apparently patience wasn’t one of his virtues.

After finally breaking the connection with Jonathan, Mary ran her fingers through her hair, then grabbed her robe off the bed and stuffed her arms into the sleeves as she hurried into the living room.

The hulking bodybuilder in the hallway had punched the doorbell twice more while she was en route.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she called as she tiptoed up to look out the peephole. “Who is it?”

“Name’s Trace Armstrong. Sent by a Bob Newland.”

Mary couldn’t see anything through the peephole but a vague shadow. She unlocked the dead bolt, but left the brass safety latch in place and peered out the small slit. The man stood between Mary’s vision and the soft lighting behind him, casting his form into a backlit silhouette. But he sure didn’t look as large as she’d imagined. “Could I see some identification, please?”

“At least you have some common sense,” he grumbled as he handed her a plastic card case.

Mary looked at the state-issued identification card and shrugged. What was she supposed to be looking for? The card was issued to a Trace Armstrong and it looked official. Still, from his ID photo, Armstrong looked like an escaped felon. She passed his card case to him through the slit. “Just a moment,” she murmured as she shut the door in order to undo the security latch.

The door opened. Expecting the muscle-bound hulk of her imagination, Mary started when the lean figure eased across her threshold. As the diffuse light from the overhead lamp illuminated his face, Mary’s breath stopped. Trace Armstrong wasn’t pretty-boy handsome, but he literally reeked of raw, masculine power.

Closing the door softly behind him, he thrust his hand in her direction. “Mary Wilder? I hear you’ve been having a little problem.”

Mary slipped her hand into his and looked up, losing herself in the most incredible pair of eyes she’d ever seen.

Trace Armstrong leaned casually against the doorframe. Mary was caught in time, her gaze locked with his. His hazel eyes, reflecting golden light like those of a panther, flickered over her, cataloging and assessing.

Trace wasn’t as large a man as she’d expected. Instead of blatantly protruding muscles on an apelike frame, he was as lithe and sinewy as a jaguar.

Spare and rangy, yet wide-shouldered, he exuded a powerful catlike aura. A lush head of pitch-black hair fell in shaggy abandon, the ends curling against his collar. He wore black Levi’s, a creamy shirt and a charcoal sport coat. Mary thought the sport coat was a rare concession; like a tiger wearing a bow tie. He looked uncomfortable and a little surprised every time he moved his shoulders.

When he tilted his head, Mary noticed sooty stubble darkening the bottom of his face, framing an angular, aggressive jawline. But his most arresting feature were those startling eyes that continued to study her with laserlike intensity.

There was a gritty hardness about the man, a rugged unsparing toughness that made other men fade by comparison. And made Mary’s nerves jangle with an ominous premonition.

She wrenched herself away from her thoughts and finally recaptured her voice. “Please, come into the living room, Mr. Armstrong. We can talk there.”

She led the way into the dark room and flicked on a table lamp. Then two. She needed to flood the room with enough light to dispel this trance that had ensnared her ever since she’d opened the door.

Mary curled in the corner of the sofa and waved a hand toward a pair of easy chairs a safe ten feet away. “Have a seat, Mr. Armstrong. I suppose you’ll want to ask me some questions.”

Moving with the casual grace of the jungle cat he resembled, Trace tread lightly toward her, poised on the balls of his feet as if ready to pounce on unsuspecting prey. Mary had the fleeting sensation of being a field mouse, caught in a trap, unable to escape the advancing danger.

Not taking the proffered chair, Trace asked without preamble, “Is that door the only access into this apartment?” His voice was low-pitched, velvety and shot with a hint of menace.

Mary pushed a wayward lock of hair from her eyes. “No. There’s the balcony. But we’re on the eighth floor. I can’t imagine anyone scaling an eight-story brick wall to break in. There’s also a connecting door to the suite next door, but—”

“Show me.”

Taken aback by his brusque, almost rude manner, Mary decided two could play his game. Wordlessly, she uncoiled from the sofa and led the way down the hall, to her bedroom. Without turning on the light, she leaned in the doorway and pointed to a pair of white doors set in the pale blue wall. She didn’t bother to mention that one door connected with the adjoining suite, the other led to her closet.

He strode through the maze of her shadowy bedroom, looking neither to the right nor left, yet avoiding the dresser, the foot of the bed, even the jumble of clothing she’d dropped on the carpet. Again, Mary had the image of a jaguar weaving its way through the underbrush without disturbing a single leaf.

Trace grasped one of the door handles and tugged, pulling open the closet door. Undeterred, he entered the small walk-in and made a careful inspection of the interior. Then he stepped back outside and tested the connecting door to the adjoining suite.

“We’ll need to put a reinforcing dead bolt on this side of the door,” he said. “A child could pick this lock.”

Mary shook her head. “Jonathan—Jonathan Regent, my fiancé—owns this hotel. Both of these suites are reserved for his private use. No one ever uses the adjoining apartment. It’s always empty.”

Trace snorted in disbelief. “If that’s true, it’s even more dangerous.”

Mary’s forehead crinkled in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“Anyone who knows that room is never occupied would feel pretty secure about using it without permission. How many people know about it?”

Again, Mary shook her head in protest. “Hardly anyone.”

With a cock of his eyebrow, Trace held up his hand and began ticking off possibilities on his fingertips. “Let’s see, you know it’s empty, and now I know, as well. Then, there’s Mr. Regent and his key people. Not to mention the entire hotel staff, and probably most of their friends and relatives. Any other people live full-time in this hotel?”

Mary shrugged. “There are six penthouse apartments on this floor. Jon—my fiancé—retains two of them, there’s an old man who has a long-term lease, and a Japanese corporation keeps the fourth for when their executives visit the area. That leaves two penthouse units for visiting dignitaries. You’d have to ask the manager about the other floors.”

Nodding, Trace counted along on his fingertips. “So, in addition to the old man and the Japanese corporation, we could add Regent’s friends and business associates, and former hotel employees, as well. All in all, I’d say more than a few people are probably aware of the easy access to that vacant apartment.”

“Perhaps,” Mary said quietly. “But none of those people would want to harm me.”

He continued to watch her from across the room. The only illumination was the dusky light that seeped in through the window. Yet from the intensity of his stare, Mary had the strongest notion that Trace possessed powerful night vision like that of his feline counterpart.