He lifted a dark brow. For a second he’d looked like one of those caricatures of Satan with his knowing leer and upraised eyebrows. “I’m just saying.”
“Yeah, well, I’m buying the place and that’s that.”
Now, a week later, she wondered what that was all about. It was almost as if her brother had been warning her.
And Shea hadn’t been the only naysayer. Oh, no! Her other brothers had weighed in over the past few weeks, grown men who seemed to think they still held some sway over her. She snorted in disgust as she remembered Robert advising her to put her money in the bank. But she would only earn some pittance on it. Robert! The man was running through his share of the inheritance like water, buying a sports car and going through a major midlife crisis that included ditching his wife and kids. As for Aaron, her oldest sibling, he’d already lost some of his money on speculative stocks. Not to mention that weekend in Reno and the rumors of him having been up thirty thousand dollars at the blackjack table, only to end up losing and playing double-up to catch up. It hadn’t worked and Aaron had been touchy about it ever since.
Then there was Oliver, who was pledging all of his money to the church and God. Of course, she thought, frowning, wondering if Oliver’s sudden renewed faith was because of her. Guilt dug a deeper hole in her heart as she remembered that after the accident, when Ryan had lost his life and Neville had disappeared, Oliver had turned ultrareligious, to the point that he’d applied to the seminary and now was studying for the priesthood. Her part in his newfound faith was murky. Unclear. However, her being accused of her husband’s murder had been a factor.
Shannon shrugged it off, wouldn’t revisit that familiar but forbidden territory.
She suspected her brother Shea was the one who’d been careful with his share of the inheritance. But then, he was always careful. With his money. With his life. A secretive sort, who trod softly but heavily armed. He not only carried a big stick but a bazooka and grenades as well.
Who were her brothers to offer up advice? They could spout their negative opinions until hel
l froze over, but she’d do what she thought best. She was nothing if not as stubborn as they were.
It was probably all their negative vibes that had made her nervous the last time she’d walked the overgrown acres. That was all.
Then why, suddenly, was she so anxious? Not sleeping? Jumping at shadows? Awaking from god-awful nightmares?
She grimaced and dropped her washcloth into the sink. Maybe it was time to visit her shrink again. It had been over a year since she’d felt strong enough to end the weekly sessions that had helped her sort out her life.
Though she didn’t much like the thought, maybe she truly was one of those people who needed therapy just to keep functioning.
“Great,” she muttered.
Lord, it was hot. The temperatures had been teetering around one hundred all week, the evenings barely cooling into the high eighties. All over town there was talk of a serious drought and, of course, the escalating threat of fire.
She refused to gaze at her reflection again. “You’ll look better in the morning,” she said, then wondered if there was enough foundation in the warehouses of Revlon to make her appear fresh-faced. She couldn’t begin to imagine how many drops of Visine it was going to take when she slipped her contact lenses into her eyes in a few hours.
Her mouth tasted foul. She rubbed some toothpaste over her teeth, rinsed, then twisted hard on the handles of the dripping faucet, listening as the old pipes groaned in protest. Still the scent of smoke and fire lingered.
Dabbing her mouth dry with a hand towel, she wondered why she couldn’t get the acrid odor out of her nostrils.
At that moment she heard Khan growl. Low. Warning.
Still holding the towel she glanced through the doorway and saw a gray-and-brown blur as he leapt onto the bed.
“What the devil?” she asked as he stared out the window.
Only then did she realize what was wrong. The smoke still lingered in her nose and throat because it was more than just a conjured image in her dream. It was real.
Her heart nearly stopped. She raced across the floor as Khan, body stiff, hackles on end, began to bark wildly.
Oh, God, what was it?
Fear crawled up her spine. She peered anxiously through the screen and saw nothing but the night. A sliver of moon was rising over the surrounding hills and beginning to lighten the five acres abutting her property, an expanse of arid, weed-infested fields that was about to be turned into a subdivision. A sudden gust of dry wind, bearing hard from the east, stole through the valley, shook the branches of the trees near the house and rustled the already dead and dying leaves.
Nothing seemed amiss.
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
Except for the smell.
Her fear deepened.
Khan growled again, his head low, eyes peering through the open window. Suddenly aware that her naked body was silhouetted against the lamp glow, she clicked off the light, then scrounged blindly in the drawer of the nightstand for her glasses. All the while her gaze moved over the shadowy, moon-dappled ground. She saw nothing…or was that a glow in the south pasture? Oh, Jesus. Her throat closed. She found her glasses, knocking over the bedside lamp as she yanked them from their case. In a second she had them perched over the bridge of her nose and was squinting into the darkness.