Page 6 of Cursed (Decorah Security 2.0, #14)

CHAPTER THREE

Morgan gripped the edge of the car seat, trying to anchor herself, trying to remember who she was—and where she was.

Her name floated into her mind.

She was Linette Sonnier.

Linette.

For a moment, it felt right. Good. Comforting. She liked being the woman in the dream. Then her sense of rightness was shattered as her consciousness swept her back into the terror of the flood waters.

In her mind, the current caught her—carried her away. And she opened her mouth to scream, but no sound came out.

God, no. She was going to die.

She fought the force of the flood. Fought the terror.

“Morgan! Morgan!”

Her eyes flew open. She wasn’t in the water. She was safe

in the car. She was Morgan Kirkland, wearing a borrowed robe. She wasn’t someone named Linette.

Relief flooded through her as she clutched the importance of that fact to her breast.

She was Morgan Kirkland. She hadn’t drowned. She was safe. And as she absorbed that blessed fact, others followed. She worked for Decorah Security, and for some mysterious reason Frank Decorah had wanted her to take this assignment for Andre Gascon.

And he was standing beside her. He was the one who had pulled her out of the water.

She looked up at him and blinked.

“Are you all right?” he asked, and again she was thrown into confusion as images blended and reformed.

He was Andre. Not the man in her vision. The man who had hired Decorah Security. But she must remember there was another man named Andre. Long ago. And she loved him.

No! She loved her husband—Trevor Kirkland. She tried to hold on to his image. But it was like trying to hold on to a picture printed in water.

Deliberately, as she had so many times over the past two years, she brought back the last glorious weekend they had spent together down at the shore.

They had taken a few quiet walks on the beach. But mostly they had spent hours holed up in an expensive motel room, making love, ordering Chinese food and pizza and champagne.

He had said he would come back to her. And she had believed him.

Then she’d heard about an uprising at a prison compound, and she’d prayed that Trevor wasn’t there—that he was all right.

But when two men in business suits had come to her house, her whole body had gone cold.

She’d known what they were going to tell her—that her husband was dead.

Nothing had mattered after that. Not her friends. Not her job. Not her own life.

Now suddenly, everything had changed, and she didn’t like it.

“Morgan, are you all right?”

A man was speaking. His name was Andre. The owner of Belle Vista.

Pushing herself up straighter, she cleared her throat and gave the only answer she could, the only answer she wanted to give. “I’m fine.”

“You looked … spacey.”

“I’m fine!” she repeated, this time snapping out the words. She had always known exactly who she was and what she believed.

And she would not allow herself to be confused.

Yet she recognized that something had happened inside her mind—something beyond her control.

It had to do with the robe she was wearing. She had put it on, and her consciousness had slipped away from the here and now.

She couldn’t explain it. And cold fingers of fear clawed at her insides. Grimly, she shoved them away, as she had shoved so many emotions away.

A man stood over her, his face anxious. She had dreamed of him a little while ago.

Well, not him. Someone who looked a lot like him.

A guy with the same name, but dressed in an old-timey shirt, pants and boots.

Like somebody out of a big-bucks historical movie.

Maybe he was playing a country gentleman from the late nineteenth century.

She gave a small mental shrug. Why try to fix the episode in time? It was just a dream she’d made up because she was having a bad time—here and now in the Louisiana backcountry.

And exhaustion had a lot to do with it, she silently added. She was wrung out, she’d fallen asleep for a few minutes, and she’d tried to escape.

Deep down, she didn’t quite believe the explanation.

What would Andre Gascon say if she told the story to him?

Unable to meet his gaze, she turned her head toward the water. It still flowed across the road, but not as deeply or as swiftly. Soon the flood would be gone, leaving no indication that she’d almost been swept into oblivion.

She shivered, knowing she was wildly off balance, and not just from the near-death experience.

Andre walked around the car and slipped behind the wheel, then shut the door. In the close confines of the car, she breathed in the pungent aroma that clung to him. It was very appealing.

“What kind of aftershave do you use?” she asked.

“Aftershave?”

“Sorry. I was just thinking I liked the way you smelled,” she said, aware that she had shoved her foot farther into her mouth.

Ignoring the comment, he said, “We should go home. It’s going to be dark soon.”

“I’ll feel pretty silly arriving in this robe,” she muttered.

“It’s better than arriving in just a wet blouse.”

She could have done without the comeback. “We could wait until the water goes down. Then we could get my suitcase.”

“That will take too long. The bayou can be dangerous after dark. Especially now.”

‘Why now?”

“Snakes could have washed up on the road.”

Starting the engine, he backed up, then turned the wheel. On the narrow pavement, it took several maneuvers to reverse his direction. But finally, he was able to make a U-turn and head toward Belle Vista.

The sun was sinking toward the horizon when they turned in at a small sign that announced the plantation. The one-lane drive wound through the bayou, the gloom closing in on them as they made their way farther into the natural area.

He was driving fast now, turning the scenery to a dark blur.

“Slow down,” she said, hearing the thin quality of her own voice.

“I know this road,” he answered. “I’ve lived here all my life.”

Since he was obviously anxious to get home, she switched tactics. “How much land do you have?” she asked.

He sighed, making her think he would have preferred silence. But he answered the question. “Around two hundred acres.”

She made a whistling noise. “That’s amazing.”

“Instead of selling it off, we kept it in the family.” He laughed, “Of course a lot of it is an underwater paradise half the year.”

She sat tensely in her seat as they roared around another curve and emerged from the wilderness onto a double-wide drive. Willow trees on either side led to a large house. As they drew closer, her breath caught.

He’d told her about his estate and sent her pictures.

But nothing had adequately prepared her for the reality of Belle Vista.

She stared at the graceful stucco building with its twin curved staircases and two-story porticos surrounded by manicured gardens.

In the glow from the setting sun, it looked like a jewel that had been lovingly polished.

“Your home is stunning,” she breathed.

“Thank you,” he answered, sounding genuinely pleased. “It was getting a little run-down. I wanted to restore it to its former glory.”

As they pulled to a stop in the circular drive, she glanced around at what looked like an oasis in the middle of the bayou.

“Your gardener must spend full time keeping all this up,” she said.

“I do it myself,” he answered.

“All of it?”

“Yes.”

“Isn’t that a lot of work?”

“I’ll tell you about it tomorrow,” he answered, back in tense mode.

“Okay,” she said carefully, wondering what was bothering him now. Maybe the same thing that was bothering her. She’d gotten physically close to him a while ago. Maybe he was having a similar reaction.

She gave him a sidewise glance as he stepped out of the car and turned toward the sunset. “We made it. But you need to get into the house.”

Quickly he exited the SUV, then came around to yank open her door. “Come inside.”

After her narrow escape from death, she wanted to linger in the driveway, watching the sun set over the trees and simply enjoy the wonder of being alive. But the tension radiating from the man standing next to her seeped into the bucolic picture.

Aware once again that she was barefoot and wearing a borrowed robe, she followed him up one of the curving staircases, to a wide porch—where he ushered her through double front doors.

They stopped in a large center hall, lit by a lamp on a marble- topped chest. She was craning her neck, looking up at the floating staircase when the sound of footsteps made her jerk around.

She saw Andre striding rapidly toward the back of the house, disappearing into the darkness at the rear of the hall.

“Wait! Where are you going?”

He left her standing where she was. Alone and a bit confused.

She waited for him to come back. But as the seconds ticked by, she figured that wasn’t going to happen.

What was wrong with him? Had he undergone a personality transplant since their e-mails? Or had he carefully hidden the real Andre Gascon from her? Or did he deal with people better long distance? Was that it?

Because she couldn’t simply stand where she was, she finally started toward the back of the house. Daylight was fading quickly. And there were no windows in the hall. The farther she got from the side lights framing the front door, the more difficult it became to see where she was going.

Then a door in front of her suddenly opened, and the blast of light made her gasp.

Someone else made a startled sound, then stopped short.

“Is that you, Ms. Kirkland?”

“Yes.”

A light snapped on, and she found herself facing a short, gray-haired woman wearing a flowered housedress over her thin body. She looked to be in her early sixties. “Are you Janet Laveren, Mr. Gascon’s housekeeper?” she asked.

“Yes.” The woman spoke slowly, clearly looking Morgan up and down in surprise. “Well, bless your heart. You look a sight. Why are you wearing that robe?”