Into the Fire - Anne Stuart [88]
Except he’d never seen the Duchess fuss over anyone but Nate. And there was no way he was going to count on Jamie being safe without checking.
He hadn’t heard the Duchess’s voice in twelve years, and he could have happily spent the rest of his life without that particular pleasure.
“Is Jamie there?” He didn’t bother trying to disguise his voice—she’d never paid him enough attention that she might remember. He knew she couldn’t have made it home yet—not unless she ditched the car and flew. But a stranger wouldn’t know that. At least he could find out if Isobel had heard from her.
“Who’s calling, please?”
Trust the Duchess to add that “please” in her peremptory tone, making it even more of a command rather than softening it.
“I’m an old friend of hers from college,” he said easily. “James MacPherson. Could I speak to her?”
“She’s not here.”
He’d been set to hang up the moment he heard her voice, but the chill that had been sitting in the pit of his stomach suddenly exploded.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t remember her mentioning any James MacPherson,” she said, her voice suspicious. “And I’m not about to tell a perfect stranger where my daughter is—”
“Where the fuck is she?”
“Dillon.” It wasn’t a question, it was a statement.
He didn’t bother denying it—the panic was too strong. “Is she on her way home? Do you know where she is?”
“As a matter of fact, I do. She’s stopping on her way back, but I have no intention of telling you where—”
“Shit.” He closed his eyes. “Did she go to Connecticut? To the Dungeon?”
The Duchess’s silence was answer enough. He slammed down the phone, cursing himself and everyone he’d ever known. How stupid could he have been? Nate’s message hadn’t just been for him. It had been for Jamie, as well. Nate had always despised his little cousin, even before jealousy over Dillon had come into it. He would have known exactly what Dillon and Jamie had been doing the last few days, and his hatred would have grown to unmanageable levels. It wasn’t just Dillon he wanted to kill.
If he didn’t get to the Dungeon in time, Jamie was going to be dead. It would be no consolation that he’d tear Nate to pieces with his bare hands this time, to make sure no mistakes were made.
But it wasn’t going to happen. He was going to get to the Dungeon before anything happened.
He had to.
20
The snow followed her east, like a hungry ghost, waiting to devour her. She kept expecting to drive out of the storm, but it kept pace with her, and when the finally turned on the AM radio in the old Cadillac, the weather reports weren’t encouraging. The storm was moving east, and another one was coming up from the south to join it.
When she was young she’d loved snow. It covered everything with a beautiful whiteness, it closed schools and made everything a wonderland.
But now, for all its whiteness, it seemed a dark, oppressive thing, slicking the roads, shadowing the sky, drifts of doom and disaster falling around her.
It was early afternoon when Jamie finally reached the town of Danvers, Connecticut, but it was already growing dark. She got off the interstate and headed down the secondary roads, expecting something like her home in Rhode Island. Old colonial houses, stately trees, New England at its best.
The town looked deserted. The main street consisted of deserted storefronts, most of them boarded up. Some well-meaning person had put up Christmas decorations, but half the lights were out, so that the outline of the snowman looked like a question mark.
She stopped at a gas station, to gas up the ever-ravenous tank of the Cadillac, and was surprised to have someone appear to fill it, just as she was about to climb out of the car.
“I’ll take care of that, ma’am,” the wizened old man said. “We’re a full-service gas station. Want me to check your oil?”
“It’s fine. I checked it last time I stopped for gas.”
“Sure is a beauty,” the man said. He had to be in his late sixties at the very least, old enough to have known a car like this in his youth. “How’s she run?”
“Just fine.”