Moonrise by Anne Stuart Page B

only one bed upstairs. Two rooms, but one was used for storage. The other was almost nauseatingly cute—ruffled curtains at the multipaned windows, chintz bedspread, rag rugs on the floor. The bed was big enough for two or three, but Annie had no intention of sharing it with McKinley. No intention of sharing it with anyone.
    She moved to the window, looking out over the canyon below. She’d never spent much time in California—it had always seemed too alien to her East Coast sensibilities. Win had always said that grown-ups didn’t live in California, and Annie had agreed.
    Now she wasn’t quite sure why. Why she’d disliked California, why she’d blindly agreed with everything her father had decreed. Win had never seemed that overbearing. He’d influenced her through his gentle, mocking charm.
    She pushed open the window, letting the soft breeze fill the room. She could smell the distant tang of wood smoke, and she wondered if Los Angeles was burning once more. She found she didn’t really care.
    She sat on the bed, kicking off her shoes. She was too tired to stay awake, too weary to sleep. She stretched out, trying to clear her mind of everything but the clear blue sky outside the window. All she could see was blood and death and danger.
    If she fell asleep, maybe everything would be back to normal when she woke up. Maybe James would be the elderly cipher she’d conveniently thought him. Maybe her father would rest peacefully in his grave instead of haunting her, demanding revenge. Maybe she could find her safe, comfortable life once more.
    She didn’t think so. Life had shifted, changed irrevocably over the past six months, in ways she hadn’t even realized. All culminating in the past forty-eight hours, with McKinley’s paranoid fantasies of death and war.
    She wanted it to go away. And it wouldn’t take much to make that happen—she could simply put her shoes back on, go downstairs, and call a taxi. Tell James she’d changed her mind—she didn’t want answers or revenge.
    Because already she wasn’t liking the answersshe was getting. And revenge was a two-edged sword.
    She lay on the bed, wide-eyed, sleepless. She could hear James moving almost soundlessly through the small house. The snick of metal as he fiddled with some kind of machinery in the adjoining storage room that looked out over the winding drive, the rustle of cloth, the scuff of shoes, a few distant thumps and thuds from the valley below. All familiar, normal sounds of life. All with sinister explanations.
    She climbed off the bed, not bothering with her shoes, and crossed the small hallway. The door to the storage room was ajar, and she pushed it open, expecting to see James in there.
    The room was empty. Just the boxes and covered furniture she’d discovered on her earlier foray. But now there was something else. A rifle was mounted on a tripod-type device, pointing out toward the road.
    She stared at it with sick horror. He couldn’t have brought it with him—customs had been rigorous, and they’d only brought out what they could carry from the seaside cottage. But the gun hadn’t been set up an hour before. What was he planning to do with it? Surely he wasn’t capable of using it?
    “In case we get any unwanted visitors.” Hisvoice came from directly behind her, answering her unvoiced question.
    She turned. He was closer than she’d expected, and she controlled her tiny shiver of unease. “Do you know how to use that gun?”
    “It’s a sniper rifle,” he said. “I could reel off the statistics, but I don’t think it would mean much to you. And yes, I know how to use it.”
    He’d changed. He was wearing a black T-shirt and jeans, and his hair was wet. He looked lean and fit and dangerous. “I remember,” she said. She saw the glitter in his eyes, and her misgivings grew. “Have you been drinking?”
    “Not enough to notice. Don’t worry, Annie, I’ll keep the bogey man away.”
    “But what if you’re the bogey