Petr Ivanov, a man with no human feelings whatsoever, had been sent to find and eliminate Lev, should he still be alive. He had reported back that Lev had indeed died in the yacht accident. The body had never been found, but the investigation had been thorough. If Ivanov hadn't really been convinced of Lev's death, he wouldn't have risked his reputation on his report. Everyone had supposedly stopped looking for his brother. Did that mean they really believed Lev was dead? Or were they setting up Stefan to lead them to his brother?
He didn't react to the news scrolling across his screen. Like Lev, he was not a man to give in to panic. He waited in silence. In stillness. A new message appeared on the computer screen, and his heart jumped before it settled.
He was to go to Sea Haven and establish a relationship with Judith Henderson. Files would follow detailing the mission. He felt himself go very still. Originally, he was to interrogate Jean-Claude when they broke him out of prison. He would easily acquire the needed information from La Roux and his handlers knew he would. Traveling to Sea Haven, as much as he wanted to go find out about his brother, would be stepping into a mine field.
He waited another heartbeat and sent back his reply. I do not understand. I am to interrogate Jean-Claude.
The anonymous orders continued to scroll across the screen. The plan had been changed. If anything went wrong when La Roux escaped from prison, they wanted to make certain they could acquire him should he go to Sea Haven. Stefan needed to get there well ahead of him and establish his cover with Judith Henderson. If necessary, should the crime lord show up, he would interrogate both Jean-Claude and the woman once he had both of them in his custody.
Stefan's gut reacted, lurching sickeningly. He actually tasted bile in his mouth. Extracting information from La Roux was one thing, but the woman too? He opened his eyes to look at the text a second time, willing the orders to magically change. He must be damn tired to have such a physical reaction to the order.
He closed his eyes briefly, shaking his head. This mission was definitely something other than what he was being told. It made no sense to think agents would break Jean-Claude from prison and then lose him. He was being sent to Sea Haven, not because they thought they'd lose the crime lord, but because he was bait to lure his brother, Lev, out into the open. They hadn't accepted Petr Ivanov's report on his brother's death after all. The orders served a twofold purpose. Revealing Lev's whereabouts, and if by some miracle La Roux slipped away from the other agents, he would be in place to extract the information they needed and then kill him.
Swallowing his absolute repugnance of the orders, he typed in his agreement. Moments later, he received a downloaded file containing everything they had on Judith Henderson. He signed off and poured himself a cup of coffee, sank down into a chair, rubbing his temples. He'd been getting blinding headaches lately, another sign he was crashing. This assignment had gone south fast. He couldn't afford to be crashing, not if they were sending him to Sea Haven.
A part of him wanted to go, and that sent a frisson of concern through him. He didn't want to lead Petr Ivanov to Lev, and if Lev was in Sea Haven, he would find Stefan, no matter how solid the cover was. He swore in three languages and took a sip of his coffee. Judith. Damn the woman. She'd gotten under his skin in that prison cell. He hadn't known it was possible for anyone to do that, let alone a woman he'd never met.
He opened the file, reading about her life. Japanese mother. American father. Both deceased in a car accident. She got her height from her father. Those long, beautiful legs. He forced his mind back to data, committing her life to memory. She had one brother, older, who had raised her after the death of her parents.
Paul Henderson, now deceased, executed, with a single gunshot to the forehead, but not before he'd been tortured. He had gone to Paris and left with his sister. They both disappeared and Paul resurfaced in Greece. He was killed there. Judith turned up after Jean-Claude was imprisoned and took her brother's body home to the States. What did that mean?
Had Jean-Claude been looking for Judith? He turned the thought over and over in his mind. It fit. It was possible she'd run from the man with her brother's help. She was intelligent, and men like La Roux couldn't afford intelligent women. They figured things out. Once she realized La Roux was dirty, Judith may not have been able to live with it. On the other hand, she may have taken something valuable from him.
The thought didn't sit well with Stefan, but either scenario could explain both the death of her brother and Jean-Claude's continued interest in her. As did the fact that she'd dropped out of sight until Jean-Claude had been imprisoned. Judith's resurfacing suggested she truly didn't know just how dangerous La Roux really was, or just how far and expertly he could wield his considerable power from his prison cell.
Stefan continued to scroll through the downloaded dossier. The file included several images of Judith's paintings, both the ones she'd painted before she left Paris, and the ones she'd painted after. The moment his gaze touched the first painting he felt a hard one-two punch to his gut. Her drive and passion literally robbed his lungs of air. He couldn't take his eyes from the series, studying each painting carefully. They were intriguing and beautiful, deep, three-dimensional colors, amazing lines, all passion and fire. Her drive and passion.
"There you are," he whispered. "I see you."
She poured herself into the painting, holding nothing back, breathing life into her work so that every seascape, every tree, cloud or bush had movement and sang or sobbed. Color was a musical instrument in her hand, wielded by an expert, her courage astounding. She understood colors and their meaning. She drew her strokes like caresses, both bold and shy, sensual and innocent. She was a seductress with her colors, a dream within reach, yet unattainable.
Stefan ran both hands through his hair. She was out there for the entire world to see. She had bared her soul in these paintings. God, she was breathtaking. He felt his body stir, a shock beyond imagining. He was always in command of himself, physically and mentally. He'd been trained since he was a child. His body came to life at his command and performed when and where he needed it to. What the hell was this woman doing to him with her paintings and her photographs?
There was more of the real woman in the paintings than in the mysterious photograph he'd stolen from the crime lord. She'd hidden herself, drawn inward, held herself aloof from the world, but here, in every bold stroke he could see her fire and passion.
Stefan forced himself to move on. Her time with Jean-Claude was well documented. The rumors about La Roux had begun to surface and there were a few pictures of a younger Judith smiling up at Jean-Claude, wearing happiness like a second skin in all the surveillance photos. His reaction to seeing the crime lord with her was primeval, visceral, even animalistic. He wanted to kill the man with his bare hands. He flexed his fingers and slowed his breathing, pushing all emotion from his mind.
Stefan studied Jean-Claude's expression. The arm around Judith's narrow waist was possessive, as was his expression, but there was something more. If a man like La Roux was capable of love, it was there. Whatever it was, maybe obsession--and Stefan was beginning to understand the word--the look on Jean-Claude's face as he stared down at the laughing Judith, said it all. He would pay any price to keep her. For certain, if the man eluded the other agents, he would be going to Sea Haven to collect whatever he thought of as his--and that included Judith.
Stefan read the file carefully, committing it to memory before examining the few photographs of Judith's work after her escape from La Roux. Each painting was good, no doubt about it, but her later work was far different from her originals. She was very restrained, showing the absolute beauty of the piece she worked on. Flawless color schemes, bold, courageous strokes, but for him, the painting themselves were flat. They were still beautiful, but she--Judith, the essence of the woman--wasn't there anymore. All her passion and fire was restrained, gone, replaced by a mask that was good, brilliant even, but not real.
"Too late to c
over up now. I see you," he whispered again. "I'm coming for you."
He pressed his fingers hard just over his eyes where a headache was beginning. Damn it all. He didn't want another life. He didn't dream about another life. He played the cards dealt to him like the automaton he'd taught himself to become. He didn't feel. He didn't even want to feel. He no longer thought about his parents and how, in the darkness of his homeland, guns had been put to his mother's and father's heads and the triggers pulled. There was no safety inside four walls. There would be no safety for him anywhere--ever. And anyone with him would be at risk. Anyone he loved would be taken from him. Better not to ever take the chance, so never feel.
He repeated the mantra softly aloud. His steps whispered on the carpet before he even knew his own intention. He crossed to the dresser and picked up the photograph of Judith Henderson again, drawn by some force greater than he could resist. A woman who spoke seven languages. Intelligent. Beautiful. An artist. He didn't even know what that would be like, to have the freedom to paint, to pour your heart and soul onto a canvas.
He knew languages. He was intelligent. And he knew paintings. Everything about them. It was all necessary to his business of shedding one skin and acquiring another. His temples throbbed and he sank back into his chair, the photograph in his hand. What was it about her? That lost, lonely look? The wind in her hair? The sun shining on the water? His imagination, so long repressed, leapt forward in spite of his desire to suppress it. She was waiting for someone to come and unlock that passion and fire. She was waiting for the right man to give it to.
What the hell was he thinking?
2
DARK purples swirling with black lines moved across the high cobalt ceiling, weeping crystalline tears. With so much sorrow filling the room, floor to ceiling, simple stone and wood could barely contain the intensity of emotion. Sorrow lived and breathed.
Rage moved in the walls, breathing in and out, so that the slashes of red and orange undulated, bulging outward and then pressing back, great gulps of air to control the force of anger, the need for retribution, for vengeance. Rage lived and breathed alongside sorrow there in the spacious confines of the large, dark studio.
A breeze drifted in from the open French doors leading to the patio and backyard where great grasses obscured all view of the studio from outside, teasing at the flames flickering at the tip of each of the dark candles illuminating the paintings. The dancing light caught glints of jagged glass embedded in the dark, angry paintings. Bold, red Japanese characters wept out a single name--Paul Henderson.
Judith Henderson leaned forward in the high-backed chair and swept a great bold stroke of black to draw in all light and consume it. There could be no forgiveness. Never. She could not forgive the torture of her brother, his senseless death. Tears ran down her face and she brushed them away with her forearm, added another weeping stroke to intersect with a fierce, bold promise of vengeance.
"Someday, my brother," she promised aloud to the seething room. "I'll find the right instrument to strike back and I won't hesitate--not this time. I'll wield it with deadly force and I will avenge your torture and murder." Her soul was already black with her own guilt. What was one more deadly sin among so many?
She touched the edge of the canvas almost reverently. Paul had stretched this one, as he had so many of her earliest paintings and she reworked it, over and over in oil, trying desperately to rid herself of the dark rage permeating her soul. Sometimes she could leave this studio as it should be, dark and locked away from the world, but other times, like now, she was driven to come here, obsessed with her need to let out the dark, obscene rage, the guilt and tremendous sorrow that was stamped into her very bones.
This studio, and the art hidden away inside it, held all her darker emotions--feelings she didn't dare allow out into the universe. Anger. Fury. Defiance and guilt. She poured those things into her paintings and the individual cells for the kaleidoscope. Sometimes she shook when she painted, strokes bold and angry, sweeping across the canvas as she allowed herself the freedom of true expression. In this room she used only big, broad brushes, nothing like the finer brushes used in her restoration and painting for the public.
Every dark thought, every dark need, strong enough to wake her in the middle of the night and leave her sweating on the sheets, was carefully left in this room, just as carefully and deliberately as she cared for her paints and brushes. This was a room of depression and madness. Dark. Ugly. One of heavy sorrow, guilt, shame and absolute, utter despair.
Judith sent another bold stroke sideways from corner to corner, the brush sweeping along its side, giving the edgy quality she needed for the rage in her to express itself. She gave the same attention, if not more, to these paintings. This studio was the only place she dared allow life to the darker emotions seething like a volcano deep inside her.
In the center of the room was her worst and best masterpiece, a large kaleidoscope she kept covered, just as she did the paintings. She didn't want anyone accidentally stumbling into this place of dark power. The kaleidoscope was particularly dangerous, each cell compiling a year's worth of murderous fury, five of them, for each of the years that had passed following her brother's murder. She had a separate studio for working on kaleidoscopes, but it was far different from this one. She sent another stroke screaming across the canvas, this one a deep, almost midnight purple.
The breeze slid again into the room, sending the flames flickering again and the overpowering scent of the dense oils creeping into the very walls, giving the black anger held prisoner there a distinct odor. She took the edge of her brush and splashed a thin line across that promise of vengeance as an exclamation point. A jagged piece of glass ripped a cut through the skin on the outside of her hand, not for the first time, dripping her blood into the painting. Her sweat and tears often ended up inside these paintings, mixing deep into the sections of glass so that when she painted over the shards, pieces of herself were just as deeply embedded.
Judith cursed her "gift" for the thousandth time. She could bind any element to her, she shared emotion, and she could amplify and use that emotion for destructive purposes. Here, in this room, it was safe enough to allow herself the luxury of tears, of anger, of hatred, of the very real need for revenge, but she could never risk taking those things outside these four walls.
The breeze blew insistently, carrying with it a melodic note. Soft, incessant--one that penetrated the layers of her concentration.
"Judith."
Her name sounded like the whisper of wind shifting the scent of darkness.
"The telephone is ringing. Where are you? You home?"
Judith blinked several times, looked down at the great fat drops of blood dripping onto the floor now. It took a moment to focus, to remember where she was and what she was doing. She'd lost herself completely this time, pouring her hatred and guilt onto the canvas. She recognized the voice of Airiana Rydell, one of her beloved sisters. It wasn't that hard to imagine her padding barefoot through the house, bare feet sinking into the thick, creamy carpet, platinum hair swinging as she searched for Judith.
A hint of urgency crept into the melodic voice. "Judith? Are you all right? Answer me."
Judith made her way to the edge of the French doors and inhaled sharply to try to clear her head. She was consumed by her painting, still in a deep fog, struggling to get out and make sense of where she was and what she needed to do. It took a few moments to push back the dark, swirling waters of rage and sorrow threatening to eat her from the inside out and find the way back to sanity.
"Be out in a minute, Airiana." She struggled to keep her voice even as she wrapped a clean cloth around her hand to soak up the drops of blood. "Take a message for me, will you?"
Very carefully she cleaned her brushes, taking her time, knowing Airiana would cover for her on the phone. Airiana would know she was fighting her way back. She came into this room only when the darkness threatened to completely consume her and she had to find
a way to dissipate some of it. She feared if she didn't, sooner or later, her emotions would escape and she would harm someone accidentally.
"Breathe in. Breathe out. Find beauty in the world around you." She allowed the familiar mantra to take her back to the world she lived in.
She had sisters. Five of them. Each one of them had shared an equally traumatic experience. They had met in Monterey, California, a beautiful coastal town where an amazing woman had brought together a group of victims of violence--of murder--for counseling. Each of the women felt responsible and each was at the very end of their ability to cope with shame and guilt. Until Monterey. Until they met one another and formed their lasting sisterhood.
They trusted few people. Believed in even fewer. But together they were strong. Together they could live their lives in peace. Find happiness again. Maybe not in the way others would have thought was right, but it was their way and Judith embraced her life in the small village of Sea Haven where she worked.
They called each other family and that's what they were--sisters. Many people in the world had family of the heart, kin by choice rather than by blood, and hers had come along in her darkest hour and saved her life. Five years ago they'd made the decision to buy a farm together just outside of the village of Sea Haven, on the Northern California coast. The community was small and close, the villagers interdependent on one another for success, which made them all very friendly and tolerant of one another.
"You okay, Judith?" Airiana called again, this time insistent.
It was a common question they all asked one another.
"Be right out," she said again, dodging the question. It was never good to outright lie. Bad karma, and in any case, Airiana was fairly good at seeing through lies.
Airiana was the most difficult of all her sisters to mislead. Like Judith, she could read auras, the electromagnetic field of pure energy surrounding human beings. She saw the energy in colors surrounding people, allowing glimpses into their emotions as well as character. Judith rarely trusted her gift, while Airiana relied on hers. All of her sisters knew that if Judith was in this particular studio, it wasn't a good day.