Spellbound in His Arms by Angel Sefer Page A

nightfall. She was determined not to spend another
night in this place, not after what happened last night.
    She saw Michael coming out the front door of the mansion
and felt a rush of relief. He was going to look for the intruder, just as she
had anticipated. She waited, until after he entered the woods and then hurried
back to the mansion.
    Walking inside the study, she noticed the secret door
was closed this time and smiled. So it was Michael she thought. It had
to be him.
    She opened the entrance to the underground secret room,
walked downstairs, and opened the steel door. Then she sat on the sofa and
carefully started going through the documents that were in the folders left on
the mahogany table.
    She set the Demiris Company shares aside and then turned
her attention to the other documents. She read through every piece of paper—a
will and the property titles—and finally, exhausted and shocked as well, she
leaned back in her chair and raised her arms above her head. Stephanos was in
for a big surprise.
    What now? she wondered.
This could change everything. She thought of Stephanos and sweet little
Aphrodite. What should she do? Maybe, she could… no, she pushed the thought
right out of her mind. She couldn’t do that—she couldn’t destroy the will—and
she was sure Stephanos wouldn’t want her to either.
    After a moment’s hesitation, she put all the documents
back in their folders and placed them back in the cabinet. For now, this was
the only place safe enough to hide them. She needed to talk to Stephanos and
leave the decision up to him.
    She left the secret room, closing the steel door behind
her and climbed up the stairs. Then she turned the hound’s head to close the
opening, carefully taking care to leave everything as she found it, and went
back to the kitchen. She was in a desperate need of a hot cup of coffee.
    ***
    A few minutes later, Michael walked in the kitchen, to
find Jackie sitting at the table, holding a steaming cup of coffee in her
hands.
    “Where have you been?” she asked innocently and immediately
got alarmed, seeing the frown on his face. What now ? she wondered.
    “Nancy Felini is dead!” he said and gave her an accusing
look.
    “What?” Jackie asked, confused. She was about to ask him
who Nancy Felini was, when it suddenly, dawned on her… the attorney !
    “She’s dead!” Michael repeated, without taking his eyes
off her face.
    “I don’t understand,” Jackie whispered and her hands
holding the coffee cup started to shake violently.
    “She was found murdered this morning.”
    “ Murdered? ” Jackie screamed and jumped up,
spilling coffee all over the place.
    Not another murder ! she
heard a voice in the back of her mind.
    Suddenly, she saw the coffin again and Maria’s face
white and motionless.
    ***
    Michael watched her going pale and grabbed her right
before she hit the floor. This time he was sure her reaction was genuine. She
had no idea about the murder.
    He was even shocked himself and furious that he hadn’t
foreseen it. His partner had filled him in on the details. The attorney had
been found dead in her office by the cleaning lady this morning. Someone had
cut her throat and turned her entire office upside down. Whoever had done it
was obviously looking for something.
    Michael was still very puzzled. He had gone to the
woods, looking for some clues that could lead him to the intruder but had found
nothing.The man had vanished from the face of the earth.
    He had probably parked his car before the bridge and,
after the storm, crossed the creek on foot and managed to get away. Unless
he knew of the back way to the property. But, that wasn’t common knowledge.
Only the owners of the house and some people very close to them knew of the
little dirt road which ran all the way down to the beach and up the other side
of the hill. The road twisted and turned in the woods and someone could get
lost very easily. No car had driven on it for decades and weeds had grown