Lucky's Woman

Calling up all those memories of two violent deaths had drained her. She had known the task would be unpleasant and difficult, but until her head had begun to swim and she’d looked across the table to see two Luckys as her vision doubled, she hadn’t known how difficult.

Twice in her adult life, this inherited ability had surfaced in spite of her refusal to accept and hone it. In Nashville, as now, a murder that might’ve gone unsolved had been the crux of the problem. The dreams were bad enough, but they didn’t come alone. They came with draining, uncontrollable, unwanted glimpses into the minds and hearts of others. It was as if the dreams unlocked a gate bursting through the defenses she’d so carefully constructed.

Maybe once she completed this mission—if that’s what it was—the visions would cease again, for a while. Being tortured with vivid and all-too-true nightmares, and suffering from unwanted flashes of precognition once every four or five years, was doable, she supposed.

Annie sank into her soft mattress, relaxing completely. She’d done all she could to find the truth, so maybe tonight she wouldn’t dream about the murdered couple. That would be nice. Maybe instead of death she’d dream about life. Maybe she’d dream about Lucky.

It had been a long time since she’d found herself face-to-face with a man she was attracted to. True, she wasn’t his type—and he wasn’t hers. Gorgeous or not, he was stodgy and conservative, and he liked his life neat and orderly and without surprise. She was too peculiar for him, even without the psychic ability. She was creative; he was logical—and she suspected he was quite the control freak. They probably didn’t like any of the same movies or books.

But there was something between them—something besides a creepy killer. Chemistry. Hormones. One lonely person sensing another and reaching out in a primal, unmistakable way.

Lucky would never think of himself as lonely, but in his own way he was every bit as lonely as she was.

Too tired to think clearly any longer, Annie drifted toward sleep. As she fell into a slumber she remembered what it had felt like when Lucky had taken her arm, when he’d gently wiped her face and neck. And she recalled the vision of him hovering above her, naked and possessive. Her fingers moved along the sheet, tracing the scar she had not yet touched.

And when she dreamed, the images were not of death, but of life at its finest.

Lucky dialed Murphy’s cell number as he stepped out of his car. The bed-and-breakfast that would be home for the next day or two was well-lit and eerily old-fashioned. He half expected a Southern belle in a hoop skirt to saunter onto the porch to greet him, maybe with a mint julep in hand.

Murphy answered on the second ring. “What’s up?” he asked.

“Nothing much.” Lucky sat in a rocking chair on the porch, since the cell signal here was clear and strong. “Did Cal tell you much about this case?”

Murphy laughed lightly. “The kook? Apparently she was very persistent on the telephone. Cal said you could handle her, though. Will you be here tomorrow? The new guys are even greener than the last batch, though there are one or two who have promise.”

“No, I won’t be there tomorrow. I’m sticking around here for a couple of days, with the kook.”

There was a long moment of silence, followed by a disbelieving “You are?” And then a moment later, “Why?”

Lucky was glad Murphy couldn’t see his smile. “I think maybe she’s for real.”

Again, there was that small, meaningful pause. Murphy probably wore his own huge grin, thinking he’d pulled one over on Lucky. But instead of egging Lucky on in his newfound belief, he exploded with a crisp “You’re kidding me, right? No, this is all wrong. You’re a rock, man. You can’t go flaky on me. I’m going to tell Cal to order you home ASAP, you hear me? If you start seeing auras and…and meditating…”

“Hold on,” Lucky ordered. “I’m just pulling your leg.”

“Oh.” There was a lot of relief in that one syllable. “So why are you staying? I get it,” Murphy continued before Lucky had a chance to respond. “She’s, like, gorgeous, right?”

“Pretty enough,” Lucky conceded.

“Oh.” Again there was a world of meaning in that one word. Lucky Santana didn’t go for women who were simply pretty enough. “Don’t stay there too long,” Murphy continued. “I have some new, kickin’ toys.”

Murphy was Benning’s computer and gadget expert. His toys were always interesting. “A couple of days, maybe.”

“Cool. Be careful.”

Lucky flipped his phone closed and headed for the door. Not Murphy, then. So who had told pretty enough Annie Lockhart that he’d once had the major hots for Sadie?

That was the true mystery, one he was determined to solve before he headed south to kick someone’s sorry ass for playing this practical joke on him.

Chapter 3

After a restless night filled with disjointed dreams that made no sense, Lucky was awakened by a knock on his door and a cheerful “Good morning! Breakfast is ready!” He glanced at the bedside clock and growled low in his throat.

He recognized the overly bright voice as belonging to the woman who owned and operated this bed-and-breakfast. Somehow he always associated elderly women with the job of landlady, especially in an older home like this one, but Kristie Bentley and her husband, Stu, were a young couple—probably not even thirty years old. They were newlyweds, married less than a year, and they were both attractive and friendly. And much too freakin’ cheerful.

Lucky crawled out of bed, quickly pulled on a pair of pants and opened the door with a jerk. He caught Kristie midknock.

Oblivious to his displeasure, she grinned at him. She had to look up to meet his glare, since she wasn’t much more than five feet tall. “Good morning, Mr. Santana. Breakfast is ready. We have pancakes, eggs, muffins, fresh fruit, bacon and country ham.”

“It’s seven forty-five,” Lucky grumbled.

Kristie cocked her head to one side, and her smile faded. “I’m so sorry.”

Lucky began to nod. At least she had the good grace to apologize.

“Annie said you’d want to be up by seven-thirty, since you have a busy morning ahead of you, but I had my hands full in the kitchen and Stu was helping the Hendersons to their car. They had so much luggage, and as I’m sure you noticed, Mr. Henderson has a sprained wrist.”

He hadn’t noticed. Then again, he’d only passed the older couple in the downstairs hallway once, last night after his conversation with Murphy. His mind had been elsewhere at the time.

In truth, he was ready to start looking into the supposed murders that had Annie all wound up. And besides, he was hungry. “I’ll be down in five minutes.”

Kristie nodded, her smile widened to its usual brightness once again and she backed away. Her long dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and it flipped gently as she turned around. The woman looked like she’d just stepped out of a shampoo commercial, freshly scrubbed and squeaky clean.

He’d bet this woman and Annie were friends. Maybe that’s why he was staying here instead of at a real hotel where they didn’t wake you up at the crack of dawn unless you personally asked for a wake-up call.

The old house had been renovated so that each bedroom had its own bath, thank goodness. Lucky slammed his door and headed in the direction of the small bath that might’ve once been a closet—judging by the size. Shower, breakfast, Internet. And after he proved that Annie Lockhart was full of crap, he could brush her off with a clean conscience.

Training a bunch of green recruits and testing Murphy’s newest toys was beginning to look damn good.

Annie spent Tuesday morning at the Mercerville location of Annie’s Closet, delivering two hats, taking inventory and talking to the store manager about adding on new personnel for the busy holiday season. She didn’t let on that her life had been turned upside down in the past few days. With any luck, no one would ever have to know.

She hadn’t had disturbing dreams last night, but whatever was happening to her hadn’t abated. As she looked around, she was all but assaulted with words and pictures that did not come from her own mind. If she concentrated, it all began to make sense. June, the manager, was preoccupied with her love life. A customer, someone Annie didn’t know, was thinking of lifting a small purse and walking out with it, but she was being too closely watched so she didn’t. She’d lift a different purse from a department store in Sevierville later this afternoon. Michelle, the newest employee, had dreams of owning a shop of her own one day, though she was really more interested in designing jewelry than hats and handbags. A woman picking up an order was thinking of her grocery list as she paid for her purchase. She was going to forget the milk.

Annie did her best to dismiss the intrusive thoughts of others and concentrate on small, ordinary things, like paying the bills and deciding what should go in the new window display. Eventually the nagging little voices faded, and then they stopped. Still, she was afraid they’d start again, so she took care of her business and very gratefully left the store—and all those jarring thoughts—behind. Home had never felt so good as it did when she closed the door behind her and experienced a moment of pure, total silence.

In the safety and silence of her own home, she had to ask herself the questions she most dreaded. What if this time the voices didn’t stop? It was possible that Grams had been wrong, and, practice or not, the ability was here to stay. She was so certain that catching the killer would end this, but what if Lucky couldn’t find the killer, or even worse, what if as soon as this murderer was caught, another round of violent dreams began?

What if the dreams stopped, but the newly rejuvenated psychic ability remained? Would she have to hide away for the rest of her life, keeping a distance between herself and others because she never knew when she might be assaulted by images and thoughts and secrets that were not her own?

As she had at the store, Annie buried herself in minute details that seemed to wipe away the thoughts she didn’t need or want. She designed a new bag, organized the supplies that were crowding her out of her own great room, and balanced the checkbook. It was a pleasant and ordinary day. She really, really liked ordinary.

She expected Lucky to arrive at the cabin by two, and at 1:50 she heard his car pull into the driveway. As the car door slammed with excessive force, she held her breath and listened to the crisp steps on her front porch grow closer and louder.

He wasn’t happy.

Annie waited for him to knock, and she wasn’t surprised by the force of his knuckles on her front door. He would want explanations, logical explanations, and she didn’t have any. She knew what she knew. There was no logic in it.

The confrontation was inevitable. She garnered her courage and opened the door to reveal an angry, tense, confused Lucky Santana.

He walked past her, shaking a notebook, which was now filled with loose sheets of paper that stuck out at all angles.

“How did you do it? How did you know this case stunk to high heaven?”

“Hello?” she said with a touch of sarcasm as she closed the door. “How are you? Lovely weather we’re having.”

He turned and glared at her, and looking into those vibrant eyes caused what felt like an electrical jolt to pass through her body.

“This isn’t a social call,” Lucky said with a decided lack of patience. “This is business. If you want chitchat, walk down the hill and visit with your perky friend Kristie.”

He said “perky” as if it were an insult.

“There’s no reason to make this unpleasant,” Annie argued, even though there was nothing pleasant about this situation. Her knees wobbled a little, and that made her glad she was wearing a long, loose skirt. Maybe Lucky couldn’t see her reaction. She crossed the room to take a chair before her knees gave out entirely. “Okay, everything about this is unpleasant. You know, I was half hoping that you’d come by and tell me I was wrong about everything. I’d be very happy to write this off as a nervous breakdown brought on by stress, but that’s not the case, is it?” She lifted her head to look him in the eye.

“I don’t have access to case files—not yet—but I did talk to an overly chatty deputy, and just checking the stories on the Internet and looking through newspapers at the library gave me a very clear picture of a piss-poor investigation and a lot of angry relatives who want answers they haven’t gotten.” A muscle in his taut jaw twitched. “There was no reason for Huff to murder his wife and then himself. None. From everything I’ve found, it looks like Jenna Huff was a dedicated, loving wife. Trey Huff was a simple enough guy who was well on his way to starting his own furniture refinishing business. He’d put a deposit down on a building, and had bought most of the supplies he needed to get started. The only explanation for a violent and unexpected murder/suicide is that Trey had a nervous breakdown, and that’s extremely unlikely.”

“I told you he didn’t do it,” she said. “Why do you sound so surprised?”

Again, that muscle in Lucky’s jaw twitched. The man needed to relax in the worst way. “All of this hinges on a dream. That’s not the way it works.” He was desperate for logical answers. “I work for you, so you can tell me anything and everything without fear of reprisal. Did you talk to someone who saw something they shouldn’t? Do you know who did this, and you’re afraid to tell me or anyone else how you know? Give me something I can work with, Annie. Tell me the truth.”

“I’ve never told you anything but the truth.”

Frustration shone through, even though he tried to appear calm and reasonable. “At the very least, let me take this to the sheriff.”

Ignoring the lurch of her heart, Annie gestured for Lucky to sit down, and after a moment of hesitation he did. He tossed his notebook to an end table and gripped the bridge of his nose between two fingers as he closed his eyes and reached for the calm and patience he wished to possess. Neither came naturally to him.

He wasn’t going to like what she had to say, but he needed to hear it.

“Five years ago, when I lived in Nashville, I had a dream about a murder. The dream was very much like the ones I’ve been having lately. Violent, vivid, all too real.” She told him the details, as quickly and painlessly as she could. She spared him the gory details of the dreams themselves. “A woman was killed, supposedly during a break-in at her apartment. It was her boyfriend. Thanks to the dreams I knew it was him, without a single doubt, so I went to the police. They didn’t believe me, of course, but when it turned out I was right about some of the details…” She shrugged her shoulders, trying to make it appear that the details didn’t matter, when in fact they mattered very much. “I don’t want to relive that time, not even to tell you how they treated me, how I was questioned, what it felt like to believe that I was going to end up in prison for a crime I didn’t commit because I tried to help. I can’t go to the sheriff with this, and neither can you. They won’t believe either of us.”

Lucky took a deep breath. He wanted to get out of here so badly. She hated that. They gotten off to a rocky start, but she did like him, and there was that vision of what was to be. What might be.

For a moment she had a clear and uncluttered glimpse into Lucky’s complicated mind. He wasn’t thinking of a grocery list, or his love life, or shoplifting. Instead he was thinking about her and this case and how much he didn’t want to believe her. A part of him did believe, though, and that scared him a little. She didn’t want him to be scared of her.

She also didn’t want to spend her life seeing into other people’s hearts and minds. Sitting there, Annie did her best to shut Lucky out. She did everything she could to quiet the ability that had brought him here. After a moment, it began to work. She could shut down her abilities. She could put up a shield that would keep Lucky, and everyone else, out of her head. She erected that shield now, basically separating herself from him and everyone else. A moment of calm descended, and she breathed a sigh of relief, even though she had no idea how long the shield would last.

If she wanted this thing to go away altogether, she had to help Lucky find the man who had murdered Trey and Jenna Huff.

“I understand your reasoning, but I still think we should take what we have to the sheriff,” Lucky said after a long moment of silence. “Without the case files I can’t—”

“No!” Annie came up out of her chair. “Didn’t you hear a word I said about what happened in Nashville? Do I have to go into detail to make you understand? Fine. I lost the man I loved, my friends, my job, my life. I won’t go through that again. I hired you, Mr. Santana. You work for me, and I will not allow you to take what I’ve told you to the sheriff or anyone else. Is that clear?” When he didn’t respond she asked again, more loudly. “Is that clear?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Lucky answered sarcastically. “I’ll just sit on the knowledge that a man has gotten away with murder.”

Drained and frustrated, Annie sat once again. “We have to stop him, I know that. I’m not suggesting that we do nothing. With what I’ve told you, you should be able to find out who the killer is and collect some hard evidence and then take that to the sheriff.”

“You want me to work the case backward.”

“Sure. Why not?”

Lucky leaned back in his chair and thrust out long legs. He appeared to relax, but in truth he was still wound tight. It took no unnatural gift to see that fact. Was he always so tense?

“It’s going to take time.”

Annie closed her eyes. She had some money saved, and if she held off on opening the third store she could afford to keep Lucky on the payroll for a week or two. Would that be enough? The Benning Agency didn’t come cheap, and while she had money, she was far from independently wealthy.

“Do it,” she finally said. What choice did she have?

She heard the rustle of papers, and opened her eyes to see Lucky spreading his notes across the table where they’d worked last night. Relief spread through her, warming her body from head to toe. This time she wasn’t alone. This time she had Lucky Santana to help her.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“You’re welcome,” he responded dryly, without pausing in his work. When he had the papers arranged in a manner that suited him, he turned to her. “I’m not saying that I don’t believe you, but I still think it’s possible that there’s a reasonable explanation for the way you figured this out. You read the articles in the newspaper, you saw the relatives on television, you…you put two and two together, and the pieces came together in your dreams.”

“If that’s what you have to believe in order to do what has to be done, then do it. I don’t care.”

“Just one thing,” he said too casually. “Who told you about Sadie? Not that there’s anything to tell, mind you, but she is my old partner, and there was a time when…well, someone might’ve thought that I…So, who told you about Sadie? Cal? Dante?”

“You told me,” Annie answered in a lowered voice.

Lucky glared at her. He was, at this moment, a little angry, very puzzled and more than a little determined. Determination on a man like Lucky Santana was very appealing. There weren’t very many men like this one in the world, and wasn’t that a pity.

“Fine,” he snapped. “If you’re really psychic, then get me something I can use. How about the killer’s address?”

The rain started to fall while Annie studied his notes and—on occasion—touched them. Lucky kept his eyes on her face. He saw her anxiety, her indecision and her dread at the job she had before her.

He’d asked her to try to see more, in order to give him something to work with. She didn’t want to, but she’d consented. They had come to a compromise. He wouldn’t mention her name to the sheriff; she would try to bring on the visions that she obviously didn’t want.

Her reluctance made him think maybe…just maybe…she had an ability he didn’t understand. Then again, she might just be a very good actress.

He didn’t think she was acting.

The most logical explanation for Annie’s suppositions about the Huffs’ deaths was the one he’d put to her earlier; she’d put two and two together in the back of her mind and came up with dreams that seemed real. She didn’t believe that explanation, but the brain was a complicated machine, and anything was possible. Well, almost anything.

For the moment, he was stuck here. Not because Cal had sent him here, not because Annie had hired him. He felt responsible for Annie Lockhart. She needed him, and he couldn’t turn his back on her. That was his downfall. Always.

She even looked like a kook. Today she didn’t wear low-rise jeans and a snug T-shirt, but instead had dressed in a long, full bluish-greenish skirt, a white blouse with a touch of ruffles and sandals. The toenails were still pink, but the yellow toe ring had been replaced with plain silver. Her short blond hair looked purposely mussed—he supposed it was meant to be trendy—and long silver earrings dangled almost to her shoulders. Everything about her screamed damsel in distress. His weakness.

Even when she attempted to be tough, as she had when she’d put him in his place a couple of hours ago, there was a vulnerability in Annie Lockhart that appealed to his hero-complex. Save the girl, allow her to get as close as was wise and then walk away before she got too close. Wasn’t that the way it always worked? For the past few years, anyway. At least he had learned to walk away before everything went to hell.

“He watched them,” Annie said softly, her fingertips tailing across a sheet of paper. “For a long time, he watched. He was drawn to their happiness because he has none of his own.”

“That’s fine,” Lucky said in a reassuring voice. “Good. What else do you see? Can you look beyond his mind to what was going on around him? What does he look like? Did the Huffs know him? Did they trust him?” How else could the killer have gotten so close?

“He watched from a distance at first, and then he moved closer.” She shivered, almost uncontrollably. “They knew him. They weren’t afraid until it was too late.” She closed her eyes and swayed slightly, and Lucky immediately placed his arm around her and drew her away from the table.

“That’s enough for now,” he said. “I don’t want you passing out on me.” He lowered her into her chair, and there she leaned her head back and took a deep, cleansing breath. He watched her closely, as the color returned to her face.

“We’ll do this in stages,” he said. “I don’t want you trying to do too much at once.” Whether her ability was real or imagined, she did exhaust herself when she reached for visions.

A timid smile transformed her face. “You’re very protective.”

“It’s my job.”

“But this isn’t a normal job, is it?” she asked.

“Not even close. In Nashville, you knew who the killer was. This time, things seem to be less clear. Why?”

Annie shuddered. “Back then I saw it all, as if I were a fly on the wall. Now I seem to be watching through the killer’s eyes. I can’t see him.” She closed her eyes. “It’s very frustrating.”

Lucky tried to ignore Annie’s responses while he made work of straightening his notes. He still hadn’t decided how he was going to tell Cal it was possible the kook was legit. At the very least, she’d pointed him toward a case that didn’t make any sense, and he couldn’t walk away.

As for how…He was still putting his money on some hard-to-explain function of the brain. Some people were good at math. Annie was just good with disjointed puzzles. Whatever the reason, with luck she’d soon lead him right to the killer. If not, he’d find evidence on his own. He’d gather evidence, work the case backward, invent some legitimate reasoning for the investigation and put the bad guy behind bars. No one would ever have to know that Annie had led him to the killer.