No Ordinary Man

Jess put the car into gear, but she saw Kelsey nod very seriously in the rearview mirror.

“You have to remember to stay close to the house. Don’t go anywhere alone. Especially at night,” Rob instructed. “Jess has to remember that, too.”

Jess looked over at him.

“You’ve got to keep the doors and windows locked,” he said in a low voice. “Promise me you will, okay?”

He cares about me, Jess thought, suddenly deliriously happy despite the frightening newspaper story, despite the fact that Rob remained such a mystery. “I promise,” she agreed. She glanced at Kelsey as she pulled out onto the main road, heading west toward Siesta Key and the Pelican Club. “Okay, Kel,” she added, “You got your drawing pad and pencils?”

Kelsey rummaged through her backpack. “Check.”

“You got your Star Trek dolls?”

“Check.”

“How about the sticker book, coloring book and crayons, giant monster mazes book?”

“Check, check and…check.”

“Look in my bag for me. Did I forget anything?”

Kelsey opened Jess’s bag and peeked inside. “Extra guitar strings, capo, tuner, two cords,” the girl said. “Pitch pipe, Swiss army knife and your little box of picks.”

“Thanks. Okay. Now tell me again. What are the rules?”

“No talking to you during the set,” Kelsey recited. “And stay close, where you can see me. I won’t go out of your sight, and I won’t talk to strangers.”

“Good,” Jess said. “Course, this time it’ll be different, because Rob’s here.” She glanced up and found him watching her, and felt a flash of warmth. Rob’s here.

“Rob and I are going to eat dinner while you sing,” Kelsey said. “I’m going to have the broiled scrod.”

“Oh, Bug, what a thrill.” Rob grinned as he turned sideways in his seat to look back at Kelsey. “I can’t tell you how often I’ve longed for a dinner date with a beautiful woman who actually knows what she wants to order before we even walk into the restaurant.”

“We Baxter women are known for our decisiveness,” Jess said, then laughed. “Of course, I realized as soon as I said that, that I can’t decide which song to open my first set with.”

“’Country Waltz’ or ‘Jamaica Farewell,’” Kelsey suggested.

“I can’t start a set with a song that has farewell in the title,” Jess protested.

“Then ‘Country Waltz,’” Kelsey said. “There. You decided. No sweat.”

Jess looked at Rob and grinned. “Life should always be so simple, shouldn’t it?”

THIS TIME HE FELT IT begin as he was in the car. He had gotten depressed again after last night, and even thought about turning himself in. But as he slipped out of his depression and into the warm feeling of expectation, he basked in the rush of knowing that he would, that he must, strike again.

For a moment, he wondered what made him know that it was time again to start the game. The thought had barely formed before it was pushed aside by an almost giddy confidence. The urge was upon him, and he would fulfill it. He was totally in control, completely unstoppable. His senses were so keen he had to turn the radio down to barely a whisper to keep the sound from hurting his ears. He put his sunglasses on to protect his eyes from the brightness of the blue sky.

When the car stopped at a red light, he tried to identify the taste in his mouth. Then, as the light turned green, he smiled and surged forward.

Of course.

The taste in his mouth was blood.

Chapter Three

The Pelican Club’s outside bar was already crowded, and Jess quickly set up the house sound system. She was still fifteen minutes early, but this job paid particularly well. If she left a good impression, it could become a weekly gig. She tried not to think of all the things in her life that needed to be repaired or replaced. Instead she concentrated on adjusting the small mixing board and hooking up the microphone and the cord from her guitar.

She tuned up quickly, put her gleaming guitar into a stand, and crossed to the bar.

The bartender was a man she’d never seen at the Pelican Club before. He was different from the usual beefcake-types she’d met there in the past. He was older, shorter, slighter. He was average height and build, with short dark hair that curled slightly in the humidity and looked as if it hadn’t been combed after he’d taken a shower. He wore the tight red T-shirt with khaki shorts that were the standard uniform for all of the staff at the Pelican Club. He had a typical beach bum’s two-day growth of beard, but something about him seemed oddly out of place, as if he didn’t belong here.

“Hi, I’m singing here tonight,” she said, when he looked up from replacing glasses in the overhead rack. “Lenny said someone named Pete would be on duty…?”

“I’m Pete.” He had silver-gray eyes and a smile that came and went far too quickly, leaving his rather angular face looking almost stern. “You’re Jess Baxter. You look just like your picture.”

“My picture…?”

“The manager pinned it to an easel in the lobby,” Pete explained. “Where it says, ‘Tonight’s Entertainment.’”

He leaned his elbows against the bar, his body relaxed and loose. But his eyes were watchful and sharp, and he seemed to study her face, her dress and her body beneath it.

“I’m going to start in a few minutes,” Jess said, backing away from him. Glancing around, she spotted Rob and Kelsey sitting at a table at the side of the crowded deck. Rob had his back to the railing that looked out over the water. As their eyes met, she felt a familiar surge of energy and excitement. She had to force herself to look back at Pete. “I’ll need you to turn off the tape that’s playing.”

Pete nodded. He gestured with his head toward Rob and Kelsey. “Is that your family?”

“My daughter,” Jess said. “And…a friend.”

The bartender nodded, glancing again at Rob. It was a seemingly casual move, but Jess couldn’t shake the feeling that those odd, silvery eyes missed nothing. “Just let me know when you want the music turned off,” Pete said, moving away to serve a customer.

Jess crossed the room, toward Rob and Kelsey. What was it about the bartender that seemed so odd? Sure, his eyes were an unusual color, and he didn’t smile very much, but that wasn’t it. There was something else that seemed wrong.

“Problem?” Rob asked, rising to his feet as she approached their table.

Jess shook her head. “No, just stage fright, I guess.” She took a deep breath in and let it out in a rush, forcing herself to smile. “Believe it or not, after all these years of performing, I still sometimes get it.”

“You know, I read a book once,” Rob told her, “that said what you call something, what you label it, helps determine whether or not you feel positively or negatively about it. Like, some people get what they call ‘stage fright’ and become terrified or sick from it, but other people call that same feeling ‘excitement’ and they get pumped up and really jazzed about a performance. It’s the same feeling of anticipation—that kind of butterflies in the stomach feeling—but what these different people label it determines how they’re going to react to it.”

Jess was looking at him peculiarly, her eyebrows slightly raised. “You’re not following me, are you?” he added.

But she shook her head. “Yeah, actually I am,” she said. “And I agree with everything you just said. You’re right. Usually I don’t call this feeling stage fright.” She looked out over the rail at the calm water of the harbor. “But tonight, for some reason, I’m particularly nervous.” She turned to look at him again. “I think I’m more nervous about being here with you than I am about singing,” she admitted frankly.

But before he could respond, she changed the subject. “You do read a lot, don’t you,” she said.

Rob nodded, relieved to be on safer ground. “Yeah,” he replied. “That’s usually what I do when I’m not working.” But not by choice. He didn’t say those words aloud, but as he met Jess’s eyes, he knew that she could read his face as clearly as one of his books.

“I like books,” he said almost defensively. He just wouldn’t spend all of his time reading—living a fantasy life—if he had any kind of choice.

But he hadn’t had a choice in so long…