Susan Napier – Secret Seduction (страница 2)

Nine months ago, she had arrived on the island rootless, drifting, searching…In Puriri Bay she had found what she believed she had been looking for: a quiet refuge where she could rediscover her passion to paint. Here she could work long hours with no interruptions, no petty distractions…

Well, almost none, she thought as she stooped to switch on a lamp and spotted the damp black nose cautiously parting the fringed hem of the ivory throw rug that draped the elderly couch.

‘You feel it, too, huh?’ she murmured, snapping her fingers invitingly. The only response was a swift withdrawal of the quivering nose back under the sagging couch. ‘It’s probably just the build-up of static electricity in the air,’ Nina reassured them both loudly, dismissing her vague premonition as the product of her overactive imagination.

As she straightened, she caught sight of her reflection in the glass door and pulled a wry face. She had pinned her hair up out of the way while she worked, but now she saw that the humidity had frizzed her wavy, dark chestnut locks into a mass of corkscrew curls that had sprung from her careless topknot.

Hands on hips, she studied her slightly pear-shaped outline in the darkened glass. In the relaxed island environment, Nina had quickly lost the knack of worrying about her appearance. Dressing for comfort rather than style saved her both time and money. Fortunately, the casual, fresh-scrubbed look seemed to suit her although she didn’t consider herself more than ordinarily pretty.

At twenty-six she was resigned to the fact that her five-foot-six-inch frame had a genetic predisposition to carrying a little extra weight around her hips and thighs. But at least she had the consolation of knowing that the layer of padding was muscle rather than flab, she thought, twisting sideways and slapping a taut, denim-covered buttock, smugly confirming the lack of wobble. She did a lot of walking and cycling around the hilly island, and the fact that there was no fast-food joint within twelve nautical miles was a major encouragement to maintaining a healthy diet!

Thinking about food made her suddenly realise that she was peckish, and she wondered what she could come up with for dinner. Nina usually cooked for Ray, as well, but since he was away visiting his married daughter for the weekend, she could eat on a whim. She didn’t feel like making a meal from scratch, but maybe cooking would cure her attack of the jitters. There might be some leftovers she could throw together to create something interesting.

She crossed to the kitchen to see what was left in the fridge. Perhaps she would have a light snack now and a hot supper later. It wouldn’t do to eat too early and then have the evening stretch endlessly ahead of her. At this rate she could be up all night. She might be able to read or listen to music if she turned the stereo up to full volume, but there was no point in going to bed while the storm was still blowing, not if she was going to just lie there in the dark, obsessing over every huff and puff that shook her house of sticks.

As soon as she opened the refrigerator door, there was a scrabble of claws on polished wood, and she glanced over her shoulder to see a speeding black-and-white bullet shoot out from beneath the couch and trace a curving trajectory around the bench that divided the kitchen from the rest of the room. Nina slammed the door again just in time to prevent the missile imbedding itself in the lower shelves of the fridge where she usually thawed frozen packs of meat and the occasional meaty bone.

‘No!’ she said sternly to the long-haired Jack Russell terrier, who was quivering with outrage at being deprived of his plunder. She pointed to the bowl on the floor by the back door that contained a few crumbs of rice-flecked dog biscuit and a forlorn fishbone. ‘You’ve already had plenty to eat today. You’ll get fat if you’re fed on demand.’

The wiry little dog looked supremely unimpressed. He plunked his hindquarters down on the cold, patterned-vinyl floor in front of the fridge, his beady black eyes fixed hungrily on her face.

‘It’s no use looking at me like that,’ she told him.

He raised one limp front paw and uttered a single, pitiful whine.

Nina rolled her eyes. ‘Hollywood!’ she scoffed.

He sank slowly down on his stomach, his muzzle settling on his crossed paws with what sounded suspiciously like a deep sigh. The jaunty white tail lay flaccid on the dark green floor as if too weak to wag.

Nina echoed his doggy sigh with one of her own. They both knew who was going to crack first. They had played this game many times before. Oh, well…she might as well throw him his tidbit now and stave off the reproachful looks and pathetic whines long enough for her to fill her own belly.

Before she could reopen the fridge, there was a particularly strong gust of wind and she heard the first flurry of raindrops tattoo against the corrugated-iron roof. The dog’s drooping tail and ears pricked up, and the listless waif suddenly turned into an energised ball of barks, hurtling himself at the back door and scratching at the panels.

‘Zorro!’

The little dog glanced back at Nina, the two oblong patches of black fur that surrounded his eyes looking uncannily like the mask of his dashing namesake as he ignored her compelling cry and continued to leap in front of the closed door, barking madly.

Nina almost preferred him cowering under the couch.

‘For goodness’ sake, Zorro, calm down. It’s only the rain.’ She pulled aside the kitchen curtain to peer outside as she spoke, then saw what the dog must have sensed—a shadowy figure coalescing out of the darkness.

Someone was stumbling down the narrow, dead-end road that provided the only vehicle access to the bay. It was a steep, zigzagging road that turned sharply at the bottom of the hill just behind Nina’s cottage and then ran along the flat to the public parking area at the far end of the beach.

Nina cupped her hand to the side of her face and squinted through the rain-smeared glass, her breath fogging the cold surface. Wrapped in a long, flapping coat and bent over against the wind, one hand lifted to protect against the rain that was driving in under the overhanging trees, the tall, bulky figure could have been either a man or a woman.

It obviously wasn’t one of Nina’s neighbours. A local would have been walking along the middle of the road, regardless of the risk of traffic, rather than on the unstable margin. Even in dry weather the ungraded road was inclined to be slippery along the edges where loose gravel collected in drifts. Nina only hoped that the visitor didn’t end up sliding into the open ditch that ran alongside the road.

‘Forget it, Zorro. No-one’s going to come visiting us in this kind of weather,’ she said to the cacophony of barks. ‘It’s just someone on their way to the Petersons or the Freemans—or maybe they just want to check on a boat.’

The barking stopped abruptly, and she was pleasantly surprised at this unprecedented act of instant obedience until she looked around and saw the flapping cat door. The round hinged panel had been installed by some past resident who owned an obviously hefty feline, and Zorro had been quick to appreciate its advantages.

‘Dammit, Zorro!’ Out the window she could see the little dog scampering past the letterbox and up onto the road, staggering sideways with each pummelling gust of wind. ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ Nina yanked open the door to call the dog back, and as she did so, two things happened simultaneously.

A sizzling bolt of blinding white light exploded out of the sky, striking the tallest roadside tree in a shower of sparks; and the rain flurries suddenly turned into a torrential deluge.

Momentarily dazzled by the lightning and disorientated by the ear-shattering thunder that followed barely a split second later, Nina didn’t at first register the danger. But then, through the dark blur of the sheeting rain, she saw the smoking top of the puriri tree begin to peel away from the main trunk, leaving a pale, jagged stump pointing accusingly at the sky. As it toppled, gravity took over and the heavy thicket sheered completely off, plummeting through the threshing branches towards the puny human on the road below.

Her scream of warning was ripped away from her lips, lost to the wind and rain and the echoing roll of thunder as another lethal lightning bolt ripped into the ground farther up the hill. The flash of incandescence momentarily illuminated the ghastly scene, and Nina was forced to watch helplessly as the treetop crashed to the ground, obliterating its victim from view. At the last moment, the rain-lashed figure became aware of what was about to happen but dodged too late to escape the crushing impact.

Nina’s feet unfroze and she dashed out into the maelstrom. She had barely gone a few steps before she was soaked to the skin, the rain drumming savagely down on her exposed head, the punishing drops beating into her eyes and mouth so that she could scarcely see or breathe as she splashed through the rivers of water, gravel and mud streaming down the road.