Vic stepped across her narrow office from the doorway to the desk in one stride and leaned his palms on the edge of the desk with his face not far from hers. Wasn't this what he'd done this morning, too? He couldn't remember, and he didn't care.

"Look me in the face and tell me you believe I'd do something like that to you or anybody else," he. said "Tell me that's what you think about me and I'll walk out of here and never bother you again."

She raised her gaze gradually to meet his, but she didn't say anything right away. He suddenly wondered if maybe he shouldn't have given her such an easy out. What if she told him that was exactly what she wanted, for him to walk out of here right now and leave her alone for good? The thought sent a chill through him as cold as the winter wind outside the darkness of her office window.

"I don't," she said quietly.

"What?" he asked, still a little shaken by how terrible the idea of losing her altogether made him feel.

"I don't really believe you would do something like that."

He gazed back into her blue-gray eyes. They told him she was speaking the truth. What flashed through him then was as different from the cold chill of a moment ago as it could be. What flashed through him was a hot rush of desire. He stepped away from the desk and settled into the chair next to the doorway. He didn't dare stay close to her.

He was afraid she might be able to detect the intensity of the heat he was feeling or at least see it burning in his eyes.

"Good" was all he said.

"What are you doing back in this place, anyway?" she asked. She'd started fiddling with those file folders again. This time she looked as if she was actually about to do some work on them.

"I thought we were alone here." "We? Is somebody else here?"

"Sprite's in the playroom. I was just down there checking on her before you accosted me with that deadly weapon of yours."

Vic managed a smile at his own foolishness.

"What were you in such a hurry about, anyway?" he asked.

"I didn't want to miss Tooley Pennebaker when she shows up. She should be here soon. She's taking Sprite to a friend's house for the night."

"Do you think that's safe for Sprite?"

Katherine shrugged her shoulders and sighed.

"It's about as safe as being with me. Whoever is after Coyote may have broken into Tooley's, but they didn't leave a threatening message like they did at my place. I think Sprite will be safer away from my apartment and from Tooley's. The friend's mother has agreed to take Sprite overnight and to bring her to the Christmas party." At her last words, Katherine's voice and her eyebrows rose questioningly.

"The open house I throw every year," Vic confirmed. "I told you that's why I put up the tree. It's for the kids from the center and their parents and anyone from the center who wants to attend. But that's not important now."

He took a deep breath before adding, "We need to get through tonight first, and I think you should stay with me again."

Katherine looked up quickly from her file folders. He could see in her eyes that he shouldn't have said anything about staying together.

Maybe she thought that was just about as dangerous as being out there with a stalker after her. He wished he hadn't suggested it. He wouldn't make that particular error again.

"At least let me drive behind you after you leave here," he said.

"Just to make sure these jokers don't follow you home."

He didn't think he was anywhere near as dangerous as whoever had torn up Tooley's place and broken into Katherine's apartment. At least, not dangerous where personal harm to Katherine or her property was concerned. Being alone with her would create another kind of danger.

There was no mistaking the resistance in Katherine's expression. She opened her mouth, probably to give him an argument about following her. The knock at the window came before she could say what she had on her mind. She and Vic both turned to find Tooley Pennebaker gesturing at them through the gla.s.s. Katherine motioned in the direction of the main door to the center.

"I'll let you in," she said.

Tooley nodded her understanding and headed in the direction of the entrance.

Katherine moved from behind the desk.

"We'll be back in a minute," she said as she left the office.

I'll be waiting. "

Vic intended to keep his word about that. He also intended to follow Katherine home tonight whether she wanted him to or not.

Chapter Fifteen Katherine didn't want Vic to follow her. She'd told him she would be all right on her own, even though she wasn't at all certain that was true. She had to weigh what could be more dangerous to her, the chance that she'd be revisited by the animals who slashed Daniel's portrait or the possibility of ending up somewhere alone with Vic Maltese. In her office earlier she'd felt drawn to him. He'd leaned over her desk again, just as he'd done in the morning, but this second time there'd been no shield of anger to protect her. This time there was only Vic, inches away, and that irresistible urge she felt to move even closer. A magnetic attraction, that's what it was, as if she were being drawn inevitably to him by a power she was helpless to resist.

She'd been more vulnerable than usual this evening to start with. She couldn't remember the last time she was unstrung enough to give way to a fit of giggles. Of course, he had looked wonderfully ridiculous at the time, brandish ing a sc.r.a.p of wood and calling out, "Halt or I'll shoot," like the hero in a bad western movie. She couldn't help but chuckle to herself even now as she angled into the parking place she was so pleased to find at this hour near the edge of Washington Park and not far from her building. What a sight he'd been, that broad-shouldered, intimidating man with his dark good looks and leather jacket, reduced to holding the villains at bay with a locker-room key. The remembered image brought with it a flush of affection so tender she was all but overwhelmed.

Katherine grasped the handle and pushed the car door open, hop ing a blast of cold air would snap her back to her senses before she had to deal with Vic in person again. She stepped onto the running board and down from *the tall vehicle. The almost incessant sharp wind was deflected to some extent by the old, broad trees that lined this access road to the park. The trees were bare of leaves so they didn't block entirely the light from the pole lamps that lined the road. Still, it was far more gloomy than bright here, and there were moving shadows everywhere. She locked the car as hastily as she could manage with fingers that trembled, probably not just from the cold.

She looked around for Vic. She'd last noted his low, distinctive headlights behind her just before turning into the parking lot. She could make out no sign of either him or his car now. Maybe he'd meant it literally when he said he would follow her home. He'd shadowed her safely to her block, and then he'd driven on. Maybe he felt the same trepidation about being alone with her as she did with him. She'd recognized a confused play of emotions in his eyes more than once when he looked at her. Suddenly, Katherine wished she had asked him to accompany her to her front door. She would feel a lot more secure right now with Vic by her side.

She thought about calling his name, but instinct kept her from doing so. Instead, she hurried back along the access road toward the turnoff she'd taken in the Cherokee from State Street into the park.

Ordinarily, she would have mushed over the snow mounded lawn s.p.a.ce in a shortcut between where she'd parked on the access road and the sidewalk that bordered the park. She was taking this longer way around because there were fewer deep shadows here. She wished that made her feel more secure.

Katherine hurried out onto State Street, still scanning the road behind her in vain for a glimpse of Vic. He was nowhere to be seen.

In fact, there was no one to be seen. She was alone on the street.

There wasn't much nightlife in this part of Albany, not even so close to Christmas Day. She was reminded of that fast-approaching event by colored lights in a number of windows of the buildings across the way.

Though this side of State Street was populated only by trees and their inhabitants, the opposite sidewalk was lined with buildings dating mostly from the last century. Brick fronts and Gothic stone graced tall, narrow structures attached to one another all the way down the block. Katherine loved the decorative detail painstakingly wrought by craftsman of another, less rushed era than her own. She especially enjoyed looking at the way so much of the wrought-iron entry rails, window gratings and even fire escapes had been twined with greenery and red bows in keeping with the season, as d.i.c.kens would say. However, she didn't slow her pace to appreciate any of that tonight as she targeted her building, across the road and halfway down the block, and hurried directly toward it.

Katherine unlocked the street door with caution. She would have liked to think this lock afforded some protection from intruders, but she was all too aware how untrue that was. Admittance would be easy to manage for just about anyone. Hitting two or three of the several apartment b.u.t.tons outside almost always resulted in a responding long buzz, which opened the front door to the building. At this time of year that was more likely than ever. The frequency of gift-package deliveries, house and party guests running in and out, not to mention the general spirit of the goodwill season, had everybody's guard down. She won red if that was how the intruder or intruders had gouen into her apartment the night before. While she picked her way up the one flight of stairs to the second floor, being careful to keep to the carpeted center where her steps would make little sound, she wished she could feel half as carefree as her neighbors.

She had made the turn around the banister on the first floor when she saw it. Her front door was ajar, just a crack but enough for her to notice. She ventured closer to the entrance way even as she tracked backward in her mind till that morning, trying to remember if there could be a chance she'd forgotten to lock up before leaving for the center. She was so regular in her habits she couldn't imagine such a lapse. Yet, her extra errands with Sprite had made that morning so much less than regular, she couldn't be sure what she'd done.

She'd worked late tonight on the thick file of applications for the Most Needy Cases Fund in preparation for distributing the huge donation that had come in that afternoon. She might be bone-tired from those long hours, but she wasn't stupid. She wasn't going to walk into what could be trouble again.

She had approached to within a couple of feet of the partly open door. She began to back away from it now, without moving her eyes from the crack between the bottom of the door and the jamb. She was listening, too, for anything that might signal danger. Still, at first she wasn't sure she had really heard the sound, faint as it was from behind the door. Then, she heard it again and froze where she stood, barely breathing, as her memory raced back to her stepson Daniel in his narrow bed before the doctors came to take away his discomfort. What she was listening to tonight was what she had listened to with such torment then, the sound of someone moaning in pain.

Her first thought was of Vic. Could he have parked closer to the building than she was able to manage and had himself buzzed in here to run unaware into a violent intruder? The possibility brought a thin cry to her throat. She clamped her lips tight to keep from breaking the silence of the corridor. A third moan, slightly louder, shattered her caution and sent her bolting through the door into the dimly lit entryway to her living room. Even in the gloom, she immediately made out the body slumped on the floor in front of the fireplace where she'd found Daniel's slashed portrait on the mantelpiece the night before.

Katherine ran to the form on the floor. Her rational mind told her this wasn't Vic. The shape was far too small. Still, she knelt down with an unexpectedly fervent prayer for his safety in her heart.

She'd been blocking the light from the open door into the hallway before she knelt down. Now, that light fell upon the head of the person on the floor. Katherine gasped at the unmistakable tumble of red curls and the matting of darker red close to the scalp.

"Megan" was Katherine's anguished whisper barely audible to her own ears beneath the sudden, insistent blare of the door buzzer being rung over and over again by someone in the building entryway below.

VIc HAD BARRELED into Katherine's apartment and found her kneeling over Megan on the floor.

"Where am I?" Megan asked after she'd come to, to find Katherine and Vic on either side of her.

Megan's voice was so soft and shaky Vic could hardly hear what she was saying. He thought maybe they shouldn't let her talk, but there were things he had to know. His naturally suspicious nature had been working overtime ever since he saw the scene in Katherine's apartment. He was on his way toward putting together a picture of what was going on here. Megan might be able to fill in some of the blank spots. Vic had the feeling that, if he didn't finish painting that picture real soon, more people than just Megan could be attacked, or possibly even worse.

"You're in Katherine's apartment," he said.

"Try not to move around.

We don't know how badly you may be' hurt. "

"My head," she whispered.

"Somebody hit me on the head."

"Did you see who it was?"

Megan tried to shake her head, but Vic wouldn't let her. "Lie still,"

he said.

"An ambulance is on the way."

"Okay," she murmured, sounding like she might be ready to pa.s.s out again.

He didn't like to see Megan so weak. Most of the time, she was about as lively as anybody he'd ever known. He had to make sure she got back to being that way again. Now that she was awake, he'd do whatever was needed to keep her that way. He knew how important it was that a person with a head injury stay awake.

"Whoever hit you," Vic said, "was he inside or outside Katherine's apartment when you got here?"

Megan sighed, as if she might be barely up to staying awake much less answering questions. Vic felt like a heel for doing it, but he wasn't going to let her off the hook.

"Think hard, Megan. Was the guy inside or outside?"

"It may not have been a guy," she said.

"I don't know about that. I do know he, or she, was inside the apartment."

She closed her eyes, looking like she might have tired herself out.

"Don't fade on me now, Megan. How did you get into Katherine's place? Did the person who hit you open the door for you?"

"Key," Megan murmured.

"Had a key." "Who had a key?" "me."

"I'd given her a set of keys," Katherine told him.

"She took care of my plants when I went to Chicago a few months ago."

Megan sighed again, more deeply this time, and closed her eyes.

Moments later, the ambulance arrived. The technicians transferred Megan to a stretcher, and Vic and Katherine followed in Katherine's Cherokee.

She pulled to a stop at the entrance of the emergency wing of Albany Medical Center on New Scotland Avenue and jumped from her side of the car. He followed her inside to the admissions desk, where she gave information to the on-duty nurse.

Down the long corridor off the admissions area, Vic noticed the technicians from the ambulance. The last thing he saw before they disappeared through two, large swinging doors was Megan's blood-matted red hair in stark contrast with the whiteness around her.

KATHERINE HADN'T BEEN inside a hospital since the day Daniel died.

She stood at the desk now answering questions, but her mind was far away in Chicago a year ago or more. The details were differenta"this was a larger place and more public than the specialized facility where Daniel spent his last hours. But too much of the rest was similar, especially the swarm of medical professionals bustling up and down hallWays, always with blank or sober expressions on their faces. Even the sight of the woman at this counter, with her manner that was more efficient than friendly, chilled Katherine to the bone. She forced herself to answer what she could, but she was having a hard time with it.

Then, thank heaven, Vic appeared at her side and took over. She listened distractedly as he reported that Megan had been attacked after she let herself into Katherine's place. She'd forgotten Megan had keys to both the street door and the apartment itself since the time a few months ago when she'd had to go back to Chicago to clear up some' legal details regarding her divorce. Her marriage had been in trouble even before Daniel's illness, and by the time of his death, what was left of her relationship with her husband had long since died.

Katherine turned away from the admission desk and the woman with the frosty expression. She tried to turn away from her painful thoughts, as well. As much as possible, she kept her mind away from the past and the hard, heartbreaking scenes that had happened in places like this. Now, she could feel all of those memories threatening to surge up inside her with the force of a flood powerful enough to drown her in its depths. That was why she didn't object at first when Vic, who had finished with the interrogation at the hospital desk, took her by the arm and steered her back through the automatic sliding doors, out of the emergency room and toward the parking lot.

"Where are we going?" she had the presence of mind to ask at last, as the chilly night air snapped her back to some semblance of sensibility.

"We have to get out of here."

She tried to stop her forward movement by planting her feet solidly beneath her, but Vic kept on pulling her along. He was too strong to resist. Even the deep-treaded, hard-rubber soles of her hiking boots couldn't sustain a foothold against his obvious determination.

"I have to stay with Megan," she protested, continuing to resist despite the futility of her efforts.

"There's nothing you can do for her now. I've given them as much information as she gave me. I don't think she knows any more than that. I told the admitting nurse to call the center in the morning for the health-insurance details. She said they would do that. Now, it's up to the doctors."

"I can't jUst leave Megan here," Katherine said, her voice loud enough that a couple on their way out of the lot turned to look.

Vic stopped and turned to Katherine, putting an arm around her shoulders, acting every inch the concerned husband trying to calm a distressed wife. For a moment, Katherine let her thoughts linger on that fantasy.

"You have to listen to me," he said in a tone so serious, even desperate, that she couldn't help but do what he asked. "I'm listening," she said.

"I told that nurse exactly what Megan told me, that she was attacked, hit on the head, by somebody waiting in the dark inside your apartment. What do you think is going to happen next?"

Katherine stared up at him as he leaned down toward her with fierce intensity in his dark eyes. She wasn't quite sure what he was asking.

The hospital was still having its effect on her senses.

"I don't know what you mean," she said.

"I mean that in very quick time this place is going to be knee-deep in cops. I just reported a case of criminal a.s.sault. The law says the hospital has to call in the police.

We shouldn't be here when they come. "

"Why not?"

Katherine was suddenly aware of questions about Vic crowding through the haze of her confused thoughts and troubled emotions. What was there about contact with the police that upset him so much that he seemed willing to do just about anything to avoid it?

He leaned closer.