Secret Sanctuary. Amanda Stevens

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      To the left of the foyer, another set of double doors opened into a ballroom, and Elizabeth glimpsed the dazzling swish of costumes as swaying bodies seemed to float over the dance floor.

      It was like stepping back in time. The women were adorned in glittering jewels and swirling silk ball gowns from another era, another century, while the men were festooned in everything from military uniforms to brocade breeches and powdered wigs.

      And the flowers! Every hothouse from Moriah’s Landing to Boston must have been emptied to accommodate such glorious arrangements, most of them done in red and white in honor of St. Valentine’s Day, although the celebration had very little to do with the holiday. Red and pink cyclamens hovered like butterflies around a colored fountain that had been set up near the buffet tables, and heart-shaped candles floated in the water among fragrant rose petals and gardenia blossoms.

      A more romantic setting, Elizabeth couldn’t imagine, and here she was, dateless as usual.

      As she lingered in the hall, reluctant to join the throng, a woman dressed in a gorgeous blue gown and an elaborate mask of peacock feathers drifted out of the ballroom toward her. The woman lowered the mask, and Elizabeth smiled, happy to see a friendly face.

      Although she didn’t know Rebecca Smith all that well, the two had hit it off when Elizabeth had gone into Threads, a design shop in town that Becca managed, looking for her costume. Becca had gently but firmly steered her away from the more austere designs that Elizabeth had automatically gravitated to and talked her into a golden fantasy concoction with a tight-fitting bodice that laced up the back and a skirt that swirled about her ankles when she walked.

      Elizabeth raised her own swan-like mask to her face and pirouetted for Becca. “Well,” she said. “How do I look?”

      “Breathtaking,” a male voice said behind her.

      Elizabeth whirled, her gaze going immediately to the man who stood at the top of the entryway steps. He’d just come in from the rain, and the shoulders of his black cape glistened with moisture. He shrugged out of the heavy mantle, handing it to the butler without a glance, his gaze never wavering from the two women who stood below him in the foyer. He was dressed all in black, like a phantom, and the golden mask that covered one side of his face was at once hideous and beautiful.

      As he slowly descended the stairs, Elizabeth had to fight the urge to step back from him. There was something about him…

      “My name is Lucian LeCroix,” he said in a voice as dark and liquid as the night. Before Elizabeth had time to catch her breath, he took her hand and lifted it to his lips.

      “Pr-professor LeCroix?” she finally managed to stammer.

      The brow on the unmasked side of his face lifted. “Why, yes. Don’t tell me we’ve met. I’m certain I would have remembered.”

      “No, we’ve never met,” Elizabeth acknowledged. “But I knew you were coming. We’ve been expecting you.”

      The brow lifted again. “We?”

      “The staff at Heathrow College. You’ve come to replace Dr. Vintner, correct?” Ernst Vintner, the chairman of the English Department, had died suddenly from a massive coronary a few weeks ago. Instead of promoting one of his own tenured professors, Dr. Barloft, the college president, had hired the protégé of an old family friend. Professor LeCroix came with impeccable credentials, but Elizabeth couldn’t help feeling a measure of resentment. She had friends among the faculty who should have had that position.

      Professor LeCroix was still holding her hand, and Elizabeth pulled it away. She lifted her chin slightly. “My name is Elizabeth Douglas. I teach courses in criminology at Heathrow.”

      “Dr. Douglas,” Becca said.

      If he was surprised by Elizabeth’s title and her age, Lucian LeCroix managed to conceal it. “I’d say this is certainly my lucky night then. I was hoping to meet a colleague or two at this gathering, and here you are, the first person I see. Now if I can convince you to take pity on me and show me around campus tomorrow, I will, indeed, be a fortunate man.”

      When Elizabeth hesitated, he rushed to add, “If you’re free, of course. I realize I’m being presumptuous, but I’ve just driven up from Boston today, and I haven’t had time to get my bearings.”

      Elizabeth still wavered. She didn’t much want to commit her whole Saturday to a complete stranger, and yet professional courtesy demanded that she grant him the favor. He was new in town and a colleague. And after all, did she really have anything better to do with her weekend? There was laundry, of course. And papers to grade.

      And Elizabeth had to admit that Lucian LeCroix, from what she could see beneath the mask, was a very handsome man. He looked to be about thirty—ten years older than she—with black hair and dark, piercing eyes.

      She could certainly do worse than be seen around campus with the charming new professor, she decided. Maybe then her students would stop calling her Sister Elizabeth behind her back, a reference not so much to her saintly qualities but to her lack of experience in earthly pleasures. How teenage girls could so quickly and accurately—and quite often viciously—size up their teachers remained a mystery to Elizabeth.

      But then, so much of life was a mystery to Elizabeth.

      Chapter Two

      Over his shoulder, Cullen Ryan watched the rain batter the plate-glass window in the Beachway Diner as Brie Dudley topped off his coffee.

      “Thanks,” he mumbled absently, then turned back to the counter when she said something in response. “I’m sorry?”

      She held the steaming coffee carafe in one hand as she gazed out the window behind him. She was a slim, pretty woman with curly red hair and the most amazing green eyes Cullen had ever encountered. “I was just commenting on the weather.”

      “Yeah,” he agreed gloomily. “Not a fit night out for man nor beast, as they say.”

      “It’s been an odd winter,” Brie mused. “No snow, just rain. And now this thunderstorm. But what else would you expect on the 350th anniversary of this town’s founding, right?”

      Cullen shrugged. He wasn’t given to superstition, and he didn’t put a lot of stock in the supernatural tales that had been passed down for generations in Moriah’s Landing. But he was glad anyway that he’d turned down the moonlighting gig as security guard at the Pierces’ big bash tonight. He wasn’t afraid of ghosts, but he’d hate like hell to be patrolling the perimeter of that huge compound, chasing away gatecrashers and sightseers and probably more than a fair share of local hoodlums looking to have a little fun and put a damper on a celebration that had excluded them.

      And he should know about that type because he’d once been there. He’d been a founding member of the gang of misfits who hung out down by the wharf, decked out for trouble in their chains and chin studs and serpent tattoos. He’d once worn some of those same badges of rebellion with a fierce, misplaced pride that had almost been his downfall, but now he wore a different kind of badge. And no one was more astounded by the way he’d turned his life around than Cullen.

      Funny what sleeping on the street could do for a man’s perspective, he thought ironically. He’d learned a lot during his years in Boston, some of which had changed him forever and some of which he didn’t much care СКАЧАТЬ