Lord of Lightning Page 6

  “Surprise,” Julie said, grinning through the wallpaper paste that decorated her face. She swept an arm toward the table where the metrorail pike was under construction. A tiny skyscraper was listing dangerously toward a mountain range that looked like a reject from Picasso’s cubism stage.

  “What is that?” Lise asked, and then she answered her own question. It was Malibu, after the mud slide.

  “It’s Los Angeles!” the kids cried in unison.

  “Of course, I should have known.” Lise managed a faint smile. It was her own fault. Julie had dropped her off at the house to change her clothes and had gone on ahead to hold down the fort until Lise got there. Lise vaguely remembered suggesting that Julie get the kids started on the layout for their project. It was supposed to be a model of the Los Angeles freeway system, through which their metrorail would run.

  Lise had thought that cutting, pasting, and papier-mâchéing would be a harmless enough diversion—the perfect pastime for twenty restless little minds. Foolish woman. It looked as if they’d taken a wrecking ball to the classroom.

  “Hi, Miss Anderson!” Danny Baxter hollered at her from the back of the room. He was mixing a fresh bucket of wallpaper paste to the consistency of heavy cream, and the circle of kids gathered around him were deliriously tearing paper towels and toilet tissue into confettilike strips.

  The strength to endure, Lise thought, that’s all she asked.

  She was trying to figure out where to start the salvage operation when she noticed how much fun the kids were having. By the look of them they’d probably eaten more paste than they’d slapped onto the wire screen forms, and they were definitely sporting more construction paper than necessary for the metrorail pike. One boy had toilet paper trailing behind him. Another had a “Personals” ad stuck to his cheek. But there was no question about it. They were having a high time of it. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Danny Baxter laughing like that.

  “Come on, Lise,” Julie said. “We need bodies!”

  “Help me get my lipths unstuck, Mith Anderson,” someone mumbled from behind her. Lise turned to see little redheaded Susie Laudermilk muzzled by a patch of dried paste.

  Susie was a nonstop talker, and Lise was toying with the idea of leaving her lips temporarily disabled when a loud crash sounded behind her. A glance over Lise’s shoulder confirmed her worst fears. One of the confetti makers had stumbled into the glop Danny was stirring.

  When you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, Lise thought.

  She rolled up her sleeves.

  By the time school let out that afternoon, Lise was as grungy and paste smeared as the best of them. Working as a team, they’d made impressive strides with their futuristic vision of Los Angeles, and although she was sure most Angelenos wouldn’t have recognized their fair city, she was proud of the kids’ progress and told them so.

  She and Julie were recruiting a cleanup crew when Lise felt someone tugging on the back pocket of her jeans. She turned to see Emily Baxter’s wide gray eyes staring up at her in alarm.

  “Look out the window, Miss Anderson,” Em whispered, her voice shaking. “They got him!”

  “Got who, honey?” Lise bent down to steady the little girl.

  “The spaceman. The sheriffs got him across the street at the museum!”

  When Lise arrived at the museum, she had to fight her way through the curious throng that crowded the marble steps of the proud old Georgian mansion. By the time she’d pushed past Harley Pomerance, the dog-catcher, and several waitresses from the Rib-Eye Restaurant, the crowd began to take notice of her and give way.

  “It’s Miss Anderson,” someone whispered, “let her through.”

  As the human sea parted for her she saw the reason for their avid curiosity. Stephen Gage was surrounded by the gang of roughnecks from Frank’s station. As usual, Buck Thompson was the leader of the pack, making wild accusations and agitating the crowd. The rest of the men were taunting Stephen with verbal gibes and threats, much as a pack of hyenas might bait a cornered lion. And Stephen looked every inch a great golden cat who didn’t know which way to strike out first. He also looked as if he could do great damage if he did strike.

  “What’s going on here?” Lise demanded.

  Sunlight flashed off Stephen’s hair as he saw her. “Stay out of this, Lise. I can handle it.”

  “He’s a damn thief!” Buck spouted.

  “That’s right.” Billy Cornmesser appeared, dangling his brand-new stainless steel handcuffs. Billy had just been sworn in as a deputy sheriff of San Bernardino County, and he took his new responsibilities very seriously.

  “We’ve got ourselves a coupla’ missing statues, Miss Anderson,” Billy said. “And this fellow’s the prime suspect.”

  “Why?” Lise asked. “What did he do?”

  “Well—let’s see now. I think somebody saw him hanging around by the back of the building. Isn’t that right?”

  He looked around at Frank’s boys for agreement, and it took Lise all of ten seconds to figure out what was going on. Buck Thompson and his cohorts were spoiling for some trouble, maybe even a public hanging. Buck obviously saw Stephen as a rival and was determined to get rid of him one way or another. The museum theft had provided him with the perfect opportunity. He’d probably even convinced Billy to detain Stephen.

  “Got any evidence, William?” Lise asked.

  “Evidence, ma’am?”

  “Did you see him steal the statues?”

  “Well—no, ma’am.”

  “Did anyone see him steal them? Or find the statues on his person?” Lise glared at Buck for good measure, and then she swept the gathered crowd with her eyes, folded her arms, and delivered a stern look. “Did anybody see him steal anything?”

  “Well, not exactly.”

  A great deal of mumbling ensued, both from Frank’s boys and from the onlookers. She ignored them all.

  “Then I suggest you let him go, William,” she said. “Unless you want a false arrest suit on your hands.”

  “Wait a minute.” It was Buck Thompson who stepped forward. “What do we know about this guy?” He jerked a thumb in Stephen’s direction. “Who is he? Where did he come from? And what the hell’s he doing up at the Cooper cabin?”

  One of the waitresses spoke up hesitantly. “There is something strange about him. Miss Anderson,” she said. “He made the wall clock stop dead over at the Rib-Eye Restaurant.”

  Lise tossed her head. “Now, Mindy, that clock’s so old a good sneeze could stop it dead, and you know it.”

  “The digital clock in my car’s brand-new,” a woman in the crowd countered. “And it stopped running too. Just yesterday.”

  “Our TV’s gone haywire!” a kid called out. “Maybe he’s giving off weird vibes and jamming the circuits.”

  A wave of buzzing excitement swept the crowd, and suddenly everyone seemed to have a malfunctioning appliance.

  “My damn car radio don’t work!”

  “And what about them UFO lights out at the quarry?”

  “Yeah!” several of them cried at once. “What about the lights?”

  It was getting out of hand, Lise realized. She sensed a building panic among the crowd that had to be defused before it turned into mass hysteria. She glanced at Stephen and saw his head lifted in frozen agony, his eyes strange and unfocused. Fear flashed through her. Something was wrong with him, terribly wrong. He looked caught in a nightmare, like that night in the cabin when she’d awakened to find him standing over her.

  She turned back to the crowd, determined to distract their attention from Stephen and keep it focused on her. “Listen to me now,” she said, crying out over the excited babble. “Listen to me, dammit!”

  They quickly grew quiet. No one in Shady Tree had ever heard Miss Anderson swear before. Or yell for that matter.

  “There are no UFO’s out at the quarry, do you hear me? Someone made that up, and I’ll admit it’s a rousing good story, but it’s not true. There are n
o UFO’s at the quarry—and there are no lights either.”

  A mumbling of protest went up, but Lise persisted. She disliked having to lie about the lights, but she also knew her reputation for honesty might be the only thing that would silence the crowd and put a quick end to the craziness.

  “I’ll tell you what you’ll find out at that quarry,” she said. “Rocks, folks. There’s nothing there but rocks. Harry Barnes”—she turned to one of Frank’s gas jockeys—“did you see anything strange at the Cooper cabin when you were out there this morning?”

  “Just you, Miss Anderson.”

  “Don’t be smart, Harry.”

  He shrugged. “I guess not then. Nothing strange.”

  Somewhere inside of Lise there was a profound sigh of relief waiting to be released. She glanced over at Stephen and saw that he’d raised a hand to his head, as though he were coming out of it, reorienting. Thank Heaven, she thought.

  “All right then,” she said, addressing the crowd, her voice rising with conviction. She was doing the right thing. “You heard Harry. And any one of the other boys here will tell you the same thing. There’s nothing strange going on out there.”

  The “boys” didn’t look terribly happy about having been recruited in the service of Stephen’s defense. But Lise didn’t give them a chance to protest. She worked her way through the pack of men to where Stephen stood and hurriedly hooked her arm through his. “Come on,” she said. “I’m going to get you out of here.”

  “I’m all right,” he said under his breath. “Introduce me to your friends.”

  Lise glanced up at him in surprise and saw that his blue eyes were blazing with life again. They told her to do what he’d asked. No, they commanded her.

  “Uh ... Mr. Gage is a geologist,” she said, turning to the crowd, “and I’d like you all to meet him. He’s on vacation here in Shady Tree, collecting rocks. And now that you’ve been introduced, I know you’ll treat him with the same courtesy that we extend to all our visitors. Why, this town is known for its winter plum pie and its southwestern hospitality.”

  The winter plum pie part was true, anyway.

  The crowd eyed both Lise and Stephen warily. Lise could hear the stir that went through their ranks, the low buzz of conversation. Their reaction now would either make or break everything she’d done.

  The silence extended until a child tugged her mother’s skirt and whispered, “Where’s his green antenna, Mom? You know, like the postman said.”

  The crowd began to titter and laugh.

  Bernice Davenport, a plump, hennaed matron and the town’s librarian, came up first. “Glad to meet you, Mr. Gage,” she said shaking his hand. “Oh!” she squeaked, “I just got a little shock.”

  “The dry weather,” Stephen suggested, irony in his tone.

  Bernice’s twin sister, Eunice, followed almost immediately. Both women fluffed their salmon-pink hair and batted their eyes at Stephen quite outrageously as they invited him to drop by the library and browse through their books on mineralogy.

  “I’d like that,” he said smiling.

  For the next few moments Lise scrutinized the man she’d just rescued, relieved to see that he was back to normal and doing his part in all of this—the Norse god thing—an effortless kind of noblesse oblige that was quite charismatic. He did steal one’s breath away, she thought, watching him charm all comers. She’d been right to interfere.

  There were several among the spectators who didn’t come up, and some who continued to grumble under their breath through the whole episode. Buck Thompson and the rest of Frank’s boys slunk away like jackals deprived of their prey. Still, Lise was reasonably satisfied. She’d set out to defuse the situation, and she’d managed that much.

  As the rest of the crowd began to disperse, Lise called after them, “Now, you’re all going to stay away from the Cooper cabin, aren’t you? It’s private property. Mr. Gage rented it, fair and square, and he deserves his privacy just as the rest of us do.”

  Lise had no idea how Stephen had come to be staying on the Cooper property, but she was determined to add an air of legitimacy to his being there.

  Finally there was no one left on the marble steps but Lise and Stephen. The few actual patrons of the museum who were drifting in and out did little more than eye them curiously.

  “Are you all right?” Lise asked, searching him with her eyes. His features revealed nothing, none of the trancelike confusion she’d seen earlier, none of the agony. She had so many questions to ask him, and all the answers seemed to be stored in the depths of his gaze. Deep space, his eyes. It was so easy to see why people were afraid of him. He wasn’t quite human somehow. He didn’t seem to have a normal man’s flaws, and yet she suspected he carried a flaw that ran far deeper than any normal man.

  “I’m fine,” he said at last, shrugging off her concern. “I get headaches now and then.” He seemed to be studying her features as a slow smile formed. “It’s just that I’ve never been rescued by a woman with paste on her face.”

  She touched her own cheek and felt a scaly patch. She’d never been overly concerned about her appearance, but the thought of making public speeches with white blotches all over her face was a little disconcerting. “I didn’t know. Nobody said anything.”

  “They were probably afraid to. You’re pretty ferocious when you’re angry.” He shook his head at her and laughed. “You lead a dangerous life, lady. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a woman get herself into as much trouble in as little time. And I always seem to be the cause.”

  It took her a moment, but she managed a smile. “Just so I know ... are you planning on getting me into any more trouble, Mr. Gage?”

  They both went silent, struck by what she’d just said.

  The flash of intrigue in Stephen’s eyes was breathtaking. “Maybe ... I hope so.”

  Warmth crept up Lise’s neck. The air was so thick with anticipation, she could breathe it. And him, she thought. She was breathing him. A low wave of sensation caught her, weakening her legs as if she were standing thigh-deep in water. Lilacs, fresh cut grass, and a ghosting of sandalwood drifted on the breezes.

  Stephen rallied first, saving the moment by rubbing at some paste on her chin with his thumb. “I’ve got to be honest though,” he said. “You look better in red flannel than you do in paste. Come on, let’s clean you up.”

  He caught hold of her hand and pulled her along with him to the gardens that were adjacent to the museum. A moss-drenched birdbath sat unused among rainbow garlands of spring flowers, and an ivy bower lent the area an air of seclusion.

  “Lovely,” Lise murmured as she glanced at herself in the mirror of clear water. “Not me, the flowers. I look as though I tangled with a cement truck.”

  “Let me,” he said as she reached to dip her fingers into the water. He tilted her chin up with his hand, wet his fingers, and scrubbed gently at the patches of white. Lise was surprised at how easily she gave in to his wishes, and how often. It seemed every time they were together, he was dressing or undressing her, cleaning her up like a child. It was a strange predicament for a woman who’d always considered herself independent. Correction, she thought, who had fought so hard for her independence.

  “Do you like doing this?” she asked. “Baby-sitting grown women? Taking care of them?”

  He smiled. “Women? Plural? I like baby-sitting you.” He was scraping softly near her upper lip. “I think I’d like doing anything to you.”

  A direct hit, Lise thought. The man had good aim. He got her right where she lived. Every time. She closed her eyes as he brushed his thumb over her lips. Several soft strokes. He’s not cleaning paste anymore, she realized. He’s touching me. Caressing ... me.

  I ought to stop him, she thought. But I don’t think I can. I like it too much. I like what he does to me.

  Lise wasn’t the only one who didn’t know if she could stop.

  Stephen could feel the quiver of her mouth beneath his fingers, and it paralyzed him for
a moment. She fascinated him with her softness and her seeming willingness. He could feel the turmoil in her when he touched her. He could feel her need to resist, and then something happened ... a softening in her body and in her breathing. It tore him up, that sighing moment of abandon when she gave up the fight, when all the resistance went out of her, and her lips parted.

  There was something he had to tell her, something important, but he couldn’t resist the way she responded to him. As his thumb pad brushed the silk of her inner lip, its delicacy brought other, more erotic images to mind ...

  His stomach tightened, hollow again, alive with sensation. He drew his hand away, and her eyes flew open. Her sharp intake of air was like a fist to his ribs. She looked dazed and softened, still totally vulnerable.

  Say what you have to, he told himself.

  “Lise—” He cleared the huskiness from his throat. “You did the right thing at the museum. Telling everyone there were no lights. I don’t want anyone endangered until I know exactly what’s causing the aurora, do you understand? I don’t want anyone out at the quarry.”

  There were questions rising in her eyes, a quick flash of uncertainty. She had doubts and fears, he realized, but she was suppressing them. She wanted to be talked out of them. Her shoulders lifted slightly, then dropped with the breath she exhaled. “Sure,” she said after a moment, “I understand.”

  Lord, he thought, she could stop a Mack Truck with those eyes. Fascinated, he watched her lips part again. Her tongue darted nervously along the inside edge, reminding him how warm she was there, how delicate. He imagined how her lips would feel, all that shiny softness against his mouth. And suddenly he knew he had to do more than imagine.

  There was a pulse in her throat as he rested his hand there, and he could feel the same faint pulse beat in her lips when he bent to take them, gently.

  The sound that breathed out of her made him want to be tender with her. His hands trembled slightly, responding to an impulse stronger than anything he’d felt in years. He had a deep, raging need to be tender. But there was also another urge kindling inside him, the hellfire of sexual desire—and the colliding impulses sent a current of energy straight to his groin. As the deep aching began he knew he would be ready for sex within moments, as ready as he’d been in the cabin. But this ... was just as impossible a predicament. He was mentally prepared to deal with the impulse this time, but the setting was wrong. They were out-of-doors. They were in a park, he reminded himself. Even if she was willing, it was broad daylight.