The Homecoming Baby

He…he looked exactly like Teague Ellis. How could it be? And yet…

She’d seen pictures of Teague often enough. The sexy, bad-tempered mouth, the wavy black hair that fell into deep-set, deep-blue eyes. She’d never forget the scruffy animal glamour—like James Dean, she’d thought. James Dean drawn in a palette of devil-black and bedroom-blue.

And oh, those eyes…those eyes said the boy had known pain and would know, in turn, how to inflict it.

But, in the space of a couple of seconds, she came to her senses. The man in front of her smiled, and the hypnotic vision shifted to something more prosaic. An eerie, but coincidental, resemblance. Similar height, similar coloring…and the rest was the product of overactive nerves and the haunting power of this place.

“I’m sorry,” the man said. His voice was cultured and deep. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

He moved toward the pebbled edge of the stream. As he bent over to help retrieve the wildflowers she’d dropped, he looked up at her and smiled, the sun beaming straight into his amazing blue eyes. “I walked in just now. My car broke down a little way down the road, and I was looking for a telephone.”

She smiled back, feeling finally returning to her fingertips. Not Teague, of course not. How could she have been so idiotic?

For one thing, Teague had been nineteen the night he disappeared. This man must be nearly thirty, though that sexy mouth and brooding eyes certainly gave his looks the gut-kick virility of a hot-blooded teenager.

“You didn’t startle me,” she lied, hurrying to pick up the rest of her flowers before the stream carried them away. “Or rather, it’s just that I thought I was alone.”

“Yes.” He turned and scanned the dusty, broken buildings. “This place could make you feel you were all alone in the whole world, couldn’t it? I could tell right away I wasn’t going to find a phone, but I couldn’t resist the urge to explore. It’s fascinating.”

She nodded, pleased that he seemed sensitive to the atmosphere—and that he didn’t find it depressing or ugly. She’d always thought the intense solitude was one of Silverton’s charms. It was a good place to think things over.

“I’m afraid there’s never been a single telephone in the town of Silverton,” she said. “The mine closed up at least ten years before it was invented.”

He handed her the flowers. “I was afraid of that,” he said. “Well, I guess I’d better start hiking back, then.”

He smiled again, and the smile was so open and friendly that his resemblance to Teague Ellis faded even further. You could tell from Teague’s picture that he had rarely smiled, and when he had it probably had possessed a sinister, wolfish quality.

“Maybe,” the man who wasn’t Teague said, “you’d be willing to point me in the direction of the nearest town that isn’t a ghost town.”

She hesitated just a second. She could almost hear Trish now, ordering her not to be naive. You couldn’t go giving a man a lift in your car just because he was handsome, wore an expensive suit and had a nice smile. Bad guys didn’t come equipped with neon signs that said Danger. Murderers and thieves sometimes looked exactly like bankers and lawyers.

Still, if this man had wanted to harm her, couldn’t he have done it already? If he wanted to bash her over the head and steal her earrings, or toss her down in the chilly stream and ravish her, there certainly wasn’t anyone in Silverton to stop him.

After sharing a deserted ghost town with him, would letting him into her car really be so much more dangerous?

“The nearest gas station is in Enchantment,” she said. “That’s only about ten miles from here. I’d be glad to give you a ride.”

He tilted his head with a well-bred diffidence. “Are you sure? I wouldn’t want to take you out of your way.”

“It’s not out of my way at all. I live in Enchantment.” She transferred the flowers to her left arm and held out her hand. “By the way, I’m Celia Brice—” she looked down at the flowers “—wildflower enthusiast.”

His handshake was strong and warm, but entirely civilized and respectful. There was really no reason for Celia to start shivering.

The spring wind must have decided to turn cool, as it sometimes did up here in the mountains. Of course it didn’t help that she was standing ankle deep in a running brook.

Or that this was the sexiest man she’d ever seen.

“Patrick Torrance,” he said, letting go of her hand at the perfect moment. Obviously he wasn’t harboring a single, solitary, ravish-related thought. “And I would be very grateful for a ride into Enchantment. I was actually on my way there when the car broke down.”

“You were? Why?”

She hadn’t meant to sound so astonished. But Enchantment was a small town, and while it attracted its fair share of tourists, this man didn’t look like a tourist somehow. Enchantment’s other claim to fame was the birthing center, which was the best in the region. She paused, irrationally disliking that idea. He hadn’t mentioned having anyone with him. Surely he wouldn’t have left a pregnant wife back at the stranded car all alone.

But men sometimes did come to the birthing center alone, looking for their wives or their girlfriends, looking to mend a rift, to claim their unborn children…

No. She didn’t believe it. This man was too confident, too poised and powerful. He wasn’t the type who had to chase women anywhere. If anything, he was probably running away from one.

He chuckled softly. “You’re frowning—and you sounded pretty shocked. Is there something wrong with Enchantment? I had planned to spend a week or two there. Should I rethink?”

She flushed. “No. Of course not. It’s just that—Well, we’re not big and famous, not like Taos or Santa Fe. During the winter, when the ski slopes are active, things get pretty busy, but this is spring, and I just wondered why someone like you would—”

She broke off, embarrassed. She sounded as if she were fishing for personal information, which, she realized, she was. She couldn’t help it. She found him very attractive, and having him materialize before her like this had created an artificial sense of intimacy.

But artificial was the important word. What did she think—that Patrick Torrance was her own personal ghost, and now she could take him home and keep him?

“I’m sorry,” she said, fidgeting with the flowers. “I was just being nosy. Forget I said anything. Let me put on my shoes, and we’ll get started.”

He didn’t argue with her, or insist on spilling his plans. He obviously wasn’t used to explaining himself to anyone, least of all some kooky, barefoot woman he stumbled over in the local ghost town.

He followed her to the rocky bank of the stream, where she’d left her shoes. He watched as she sat down on a large, fallen tree trunk, which made the perfect bench, and began to brush the sand and leaves from the soles of her feet.

When she picked up her shoe, though, a simple white sneaker, she found that a spider had crawled into it. She tried to tip him out, but he crawled farther into the toe. She hadn’t seen his markings, so she hesitated to reach in and whisk him out with her fingers.

She shook the shoe. “Come on out, darn it.”

“Here,” Patrick Torrance said, coming closer and holding out his hand. “I’ll kill it for you.”

She looked up at him. “Kill him? Why would you kill him?”

He tilted his head, and then he smiled. “Did I say kill it? I mean to say I’d get it out for you. A purely harmless relocation.”

She smiled back and handed over the shoe. “Okay.” For a city boy, he caught on quickly. “Thanks.”

He had found a curved twig on the ground, and he maneuvered the point into the toe of her shoe. He had good hands. Gentle. He angled his wrist subtly a couple of times, with a minute scooping movement.

He tilted the shoe up to his face and peered into the shadows. Finally he eased his hand out, bringing the twig free, with the little spider clinging to it.

He walked over to a nearby patch of dead leaves—the ideal new home for a spider—and then he lay the twig and spider down, so deftly that the spider didn’t even scurry away. The little guy probably thought the whole move had been his own idea.

“Well done,” she said with a smile.

Then he came over and knelt on the ground before her. “Your slipper, my lady.”

Oh. Flushing, she found that she almost couldn’t let him do it. It was too personal, too oddly sexy. Besides, she wasn’t much for fancy clothes and shoes, and those sneakers had tramped many a mile around the dusty roads of Silverton and Enchantment.

Darn. She hoped her foot was clean enough. For the first time in her life, she wished she wore toenail polish.

But he was waiting, so she stuck out her foot. He was just kidding around. She was getting way too worked up. Maybe she shouldn’t have given up men after all—it had left her too susceptible to the slightest flirtation.