When Twilight Comes - By B. J. Daniels Page 0,31
her stomach. “Who were you waving to?” she asked, fighting to keep the growing fear out of her voice.
“That man.”
“Elmer. The nice man who gave us the room?”
Lexi shook her head. “The one with the funny hair on his lip.”
Jenna’s heart began to pound. “A man with a mustache?”
Lexi nodded and Jenna turned to look in the direction of the other pool, where Lexi had been gazing. “I don’t see anyone.” Her voice broke. “Is he still there?” she asked in a hoarse, scared whisper.
Lexi shook her head. “He’s gone. I guess he didn’t want you to see him.”
Jenna couldn’t breathe. “What do you mean?”
Lexi shrugged and bobbed up and down in the water, clearly losing interest in the conversation.
Fear compressed Jenna’s chest, making it hard to catch her breath, let alone talk. “What did the man look like?”
Her daughter sighed, scrunching her face up in thought. She’d always been dramatic, using her hands and a variety of facial expressions when she talked. Now she let out a big sigh.
“Mommy,” she said, throwing her arms wide, “he just looked like a man.” She frowned as if she’d thought of something. “He was wearing funny clothes and his hair was wet.”
“Wet?” Jenna thought of the photograph of the man in the tuxedo. His hair was oiled and combed straight back.
Lexi ducked under the water again, and despite the warmth of the hot springs, Jenna shivered. It wasn’t possible that Lexi had seen the man.
They had to get out of this place. Get the money to Lorenzo. Then she would take Lexi as far from here as possible.
“Did you see me go all the way to the bottom?” Lexi asked, bobbing up again.
“I saw,” Jenna managed to say.
“Wanna see me swim?” Lexi didn’t wait for an answer. She took off, paddling wildly, sending spray in all directions, then stopped to grin back at her mother. “Did you see?”
Jenna nodded and smiled, her heart a hammer. She tried to convince herself that she shouldn’t be scared, that this was only a very imaginative, bright little girl. But she remembered how Lexi used to scare Lorenzo by seeming old for her age—and wise beyond her years.
Her preschool teachers said she was gifted.
Or maybe she just has the gift.
“Lexi, it’s time to go.” Upset and shaking, Jenna started to get out of the pool.
“No, not yet, Mommy!”
Weak from the hot water and her fears, Jenna let herself slip back into the water. “A few more minutes, but then no arguments, agreed?”
Lexi grudgingly nodded.
Jenna sank neck deep in the water, feeling cold now. Why had she thought these pools, this place, at all enchanting?
HARRY BALLANTINE WATCHED Jenna and her daughter through the steam rising off the pool, shaken.
The little girl had seen him. How was that possible? No one had seen him in seventy years. He’d been in a vaporous limbo, drifting in the wind. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Until the woman and child had arrived last night from out of the rain and darkness and he’d gone to the window. Was it possible the woman had seen him, too? She’d looked up as if knowing he was there.
My God, it was the first time anyone had seen him—let alone felt his touch. Did he dare hope?
He moved toward the pools, half-afraid.
The woman was in a deeper end of a pool, not far from her daughter. Her eyes were closed, but he could tell she was listening to the little girl chattering away to herself nearby.
He watched the woman brush a strand of dark hair back from her face. She really was lovely. High cheekbones, porcelain smooth skin, dark fringed lashes. There was an innocence about her that pulled at something deep within him.
You are beautiful, Jenna.
She stirred, her eyes coming open as if she’d heard him.
Can you hear me?
Her dark eyes widened and she looked around.
My God, she could hear him.
Don’t be afraid. I won’t hurt you.
He was so close now that he could see she was trembling.
Remember last night?
The pulse at her throat began to pound. She reached for the side of the pool as she tried to find bottom.
“Lexi, we have to go now.” Her words came out choked with fear.
No, please don’t leave.
“Mommy, it’s not time. You said we could stay for a little while longer,” Lexi cried. “Please, just a few more minutes. Please.”
He touched Jenna’s shoulder and she froze, eyes wide with terror—and something else he recognized. Need.
SHE WAS LOSING HER MIND.
I’m here. It’s all right.
She let out the breath she’d been