Pursued by Shadows by Medora Sale Read Free Book Online Page B

out for yourself, John Sanders. You need it more than I do.”
    Jane left her suitcase in the car, picked up the attaché case, and walked confidently up the broad steps into the hotel. A couple were planted in front of the registration desk, expostulating with the clerk. She paused discreetly to admire a display of local crafts and to allow them to finish their business.
    â€œNothing at all?” the man was saying despairingly.
    â€œSorry, not even a broom closet,” said the pleasant-looking man behind the counter. “We’ve been booked through Sunday for a couple of months now.”
    â€œDamn it,” she swore softly and turned away. Now what? She couldn’t just stand here in the hotel lobby in Skaneateles, New York, staring at dolls and waiting for inspiration. A party of six dressed in silk and linen drifted by her into the dining room. She glanced down with slight amusement at her jeans and comfortable cotton sweater. Not for the first time in her life, she was seriously under-dressed. The place reeked of white linen and polished silver. But on the other side of the room was a very discreetly carved sign intimating that beyond the door it was attached to was a bar. No one was going to throw her out of a bar, and she turned abruptly away from her intense study of a display of dolls, all clad most suitably in silks and satins as well.
    As she walked in, a welcoming burst of noise and laughter greeted her; she had stepped across a magic threshold, out of the world of polished antiques and elegant carpets and into one of warm, noisy familiarity.
    She was in an annex to the hotel, a large dark room, constructed of wood stained a mellow whiskey colour with panels painted dark green, like a broad comfortable porch on a cottage. The booths were all filled, mostly with men in working clothes—from accountant’s pinstripe to mechanic’s coveralls. Two wall-mounted television sets blared commentary on a baseball game. “A Scotch,” she said to the bartender, as she slipped onto an empty stool in front of him. “Any kind. With water.”
    The man sitting sideways at the next stool let his eyes drift away from the game and fix themselves on her. After she had been under close and constant study for a good thirty seconds, all the frustrations of the day burst out of her in an enormous sense of grievance; she turned her head and glared, full force. “Something wrong with drinking Scotch?” she snapped.
    â€œNot at all,” he said politely and turned back to the game. “But most of the local girls drink Coke and something and the tourists all drink white wine. That makes you strange, that’s all. And interesting.”
    â€œI see.” She slipped some bills over the bar. “That’s about right. I’m not local, and I’m sure as hell not a tourist.”
    â€œAnd of course you talk funny,” he added in the same flat voice, keeping his eyes on the game all the time he was talking, as if her responses were of no importance to him at all.
    â€œThat’s because I’m a Canadian.”
    He shook his head. “No it isn’t. Lots of Canadians around here. I can spot them.”
    â€œI
am
a Canadian, but I just spent a year in England. You can’t help it—you pick up the way they talk after a while,” she protested defensively. Now she turned and studied him. He was a significantly good-looking man, she decided. And quite possibly in possession of a sense of humor. A little taller than she was, quick-moving and muscular under his plaid shirt and jeans, with dark red hair and a rakish face.
    He flashed a crooked smile in her direction. “You staying here?”
    â€œNot a chance. There isn’t even room in the lobby. You wouldn’t know of any place else to stay, would you? I have business to look after around here. I’m in something of a bind.”
    â€œThere’s a cheap motel about five—ten