“Hiya, Vicks.”
“Oh, Jack, I’m so glad you’re here! I was so scared before.”
“So I heard. Your Mommy said you had a bad dream.”
As Vicky launched into her account of Mr. Grape-grabber’s plots against Ms. Jelliroll, Gia marveled again at the rapport between Jack and her daughter. They were like old friends. At a time like this she sorely wished Jack were a different sort of man. Vicky needed a father so, but not one whose work required guns and knives.
Jack held his hand out to Gia for the doll. Mr. Grape-grabber was made of plastic; a lean, wiry fellow with long arms and legs, entirely purple but for his face and a black top hat. Jack studied the doll.
“He does sort of look like Snidely Whiplash. Put a crow on his shoulder and he’d be Will Eisner’s Mr. Carrion.” He held the doll up to Vicky. “Is this the guy you thought you saw outside?”
“Yes,” Vicky said, nodding. “Only he wasn’t wearing his hat.”
“What was he wearing?”
“I couldn’t see. All I could see was his eyes. They were yellow.”
Jack started violently, almost dropping Vicky. Gia instinctively reached out a hand to catch her daughter in case she fell.
“Jack, what’s the matter?”
He smiled—weakly, she thought.
“Nothing. Just a spasm in my arm from playing tennis. Gone now.” He looked at Vicky. “But about those eyes—it must have been a cat you saw. Mr. Grape-grabber doesn’t have yellow eyes.”
Vicky nodded vigorously. “He did tonight. So did the other one.”
Gia was watching Jack and could swear a sick look passed over his face. It worried her because it was not an expression she ever expected to see there.
“Other one?” he said.
“Uh-huh. Mr. Grape-grabber must have brought along a helper.”
Jack was silent a moment, then he hefted Vicky in his arms and carried her back into the bedroom.
“Time for sleep, Vicks. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Vicky made some half-hearted protests as he left the bedroom, then rolled over and lay quiet as soon as Gia tucked her in. Jack was nowhere in sight when Gia returned to the hall. She found him downstairs in the walnut paneled library, working on the alarm box with a tiny screwdriver.
“What are you doing?”
“Reconnecting the upper floors. This should have been done right after Grace disappeared. There! Now no one gets in or out without raising cain.”
Gia could tell he was hiding something from her and that was unfair.
“What do you know?”
“Nothing.” He continued to study the insides of the box. “Nothing that makes any sense, anyway.”
That wasn’t what Gia wanted to hear. She wanted someone —anyone—to make some sense out of what had happened here in the past week. Something Vicky said had disturbed Jack. Gia wanted to know what it was.
“Maybe it will make sense to me.”
“I doubt it.”
Gia flared into anger. “I’ll be the judge of that! Vicky and I have been here most of the week and we’ll probably have to stay here a few more days in case there’s any word from Nellie. If you’ve got any information about what’s going on here, I want to hear it!”
Jack looked at her for the first time since she had entered the room.
“Okay. Here it is: There’s been a rotten smell that has come and gone in my apartment for the last two nights. And last night there were two sets of yellow eyes looking in the window of my tv room.”
“Jack, you’re on the third floor!”
“They were there.”
Gia felt something twist inside her. She sat down on the settee and shivered.
“God! That gives me the creeps!”
“It had to be cats.”
Gia looked at him and knew that he didn’t believe that. She pulled her robe more tightly about her. She wished she hadn’t demanded to know what he was thinking, and wished even more that he hadn’t told her.
“Right,” she said, playing along with the game. “Cats. Had to be.”
Jack stretched and yawned as he moved toward the center of the room. “It’s late and I’m tired. Think it’d be all right if I spent the night here?”
Gia bottled a sudden gush of relief to keep it from showing on her face.
“I suppose so.”
“Good.” He settled into Nellie’s recliner and pushed it all the way back. “I’ll just bed down right here while you go up with Vicky.”
He turned on the reading lamp next to the chair and reached for a magazine from the pile next to the dish full of the Black Magic chocolates. Gia felt a lump swell in her throat at the thought of Nellie’s child-like glee at receiving that box of candy.
“Need a blanket?”
“No. I’m fine. I’ll just read for a little while. Good night.”
Gia rose and walked toward the door.
“Goodnight.”
She flipped off the room lights, leaving Jack in a pool of light in the center of the darkened room. She hurried up to Vicky’s side and snuggled against her, hunting sleep. But despite the quiet and the knowledge that Jack was on guard downstairs, sleep never came.
Jack… He had come when needed and had single-handedly accomplished what the New York Police force had been unable to do: He had made her feel safe tonight. Without him she would have spent the remaining hours until daylight in a shuddering panic. She had a growing urge to be with him. She fought it but found herself losing. Vicky breathed slowly and rhythmically at her side. She was safe. They all were safe now that the alarm system was working again—no window or outer door could be opened without setting it off.
Gia slipped out of bed and stole downstairs, taking a lightweight summer blanket with her. She hesitated at the door to the library. What if he rejected her? She had been so cold to him… what if he… ?
Only one way to find out.
She stepped inside the door and found Jack looking at her. He must have heard her come down.
“Sure you don’t need a blanket?” she asked.
His expression was serious. “I could use someone to share it with me.”
Her mouth dry, Gia went to the chair and stretched herself alongside Jack, who spread the blanket over both of them. Neither spoke. There was nothing to say, at least for her. All she could do was lie beside him and contain the hunger within her.
After an eternity, Jack lifted her chin and kissed her. It must have taken him as much courage to do that as it had taken her to come down to him. Gia let herself respond, releasing all the pent-up need in her. She pulled at his clothes, he lifted her nightgown, and then nothing separated them. She clung to him as if to keep him from being torn away from her. This was it, this was what she needed, this was what had been missing from her life.
God help her, this was the man she wanted.
16
Jack lay back in the recliner and tried unsuccessfully to sleep. Gia had taken him completely by surprise tonight. They had made love twice—furiously the first time, more leisurely the second—and now he was alone, more satisfied and content than he could ever remember. For all her knowledge and inventiveness and seemingly inexhaustible passion, Kolabati hadn’t left him feeling like this. This was special. He had always known that he and Gia belonged together. Tonight proved it. There had to be a way for them to get back together and stay that way.
After a long time of drowsy, sated snuggling, Gia had gone back upstairs, saying she didn’t want Vicky to find them both down here in the morning. She had been warm, loving, passionate… everything she hadn’t been the past few months. It baffled him, but he wasn’t fighting it. He must have done something right. Whatever it was, he wanted to keep doing it.
The change in Gia wasn’t all that was keeping him awake, however. The events of the night had sent a confusion of facts, theories, guesses, impressions, and fears whirling through his mind.