Shadows At Sunset - Anne Stuart [95]
Older brother. The words echoed in her head. Or maybe they were the voices of the ghosts, she could never be sure. Older brother. He’s your brother. He knows who you are.
She sat down, hard, on the sofa that Dean had abandoned last night, staring at the rubble on the floor. Her brother. That’s who the ghosts meant, when they’d warned her. Dean wasn’t looking out for her—not Dean with his one-track mind. Dean loved her, but he was unlikely to do anything about it, much less stand up to Jackson.
It was Coltrane who was looking out for her. Coltrane, her long-lost brother, who must have known all along.
She heard the voices then, drifting down the stairs, and for a moment she froze, listening for the ghosts. But in a moment she recognized Jilly’s voice, unexpectedly husky with laughter. And Coltrane’s response.
She didn’t hesitate, didn’t stop to think. She jumped up, raced out of the living room and up the stairs, storming into Jilly’s room without knocking.
Coltrane stood silhouetted against the window, wearing a pair of jeans and nothing else. Jilly was sitting on the bed, wrapped in a sheet, looking like…
Looking like exactly what she was. A woman who’d just had the best sex of her life. A woman in love.
Her sister, and her brother. One by blood, one by heart. Coltrane was looking across the room at Rachel-Ann, an enigmatic expression on his face. In his green eyes, just like her own green eyes, she saw that she’d been a fool not to see it before.
“You’re my brother, aren’t you?” she said abruptly. Almost from a distance she could hear Jilly’s indrawn gasp of breath.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Rachel-Ann. He’s no relation to us.”
“No, thank God, or you’d obviously have a lot to answer for,” Rachel-Ann said in a controlled voice. “He’s only related to me. Aren’t you?”
She half expected him to deny it. He glanced at Jilly, who was sitting in the middle of the bed, the sheet wrapped tight around her, that blissed-out expression vanished in the cold light of day.
“Yes,” he said. “I’m your brother.”
22
Jilly sat in the huge, swan-shaped bed, frozen, watching them. How had she missed the obvious? They were so much alike, and she’d never even guessed.
“What are you doing here, Rachel-Ann?” Coltrane demanded. “I thought you’d have enough sense to keep miles away from this place.”
“I’ve never been known for my good sense,” Rachel-Ann retorted. “Why was I supposed to stay away? So I wouldn’t figure it out and tell Jilly? Well, guess what? I figured it out, and Jilly knows. Forget about me—what are you doing here? Did you come here to find me?”
Coltrane moved away from the window. He didn’t even glance at Jilly, huddled beneath the sheets in a knot of pain and betrayal. “I didn’t know you existed until I saw you,” he said slowly. “I came to L.A. to find out what happened to my mother. Our mother. She died out here, over thirty years ago. My father told me she was murdered.”
“Your father?” Rachel-Ann echoed. “We don’t have the same father?”
“No.”
A spasm of fear crossed Rachel-Ann’s pale face, and Jilly wanted to move, to comfort her, to protect her. But she was trapped inside her own sense of betrayal.
“Does Jackson know who you are? Why you’re here?” Rachel-Ann demanded hoarsely.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“He’s the reason I’m here,” Coltrane said in a cool, emotionless voice. “My mother lived here with him and a bunch of others in the late sixties, and he killed her. He murdered my mother. Your mother. I came here to find the truth. And to make him pay.”
“You bastard,” Rachel-Ann said softly. “It’s a lie! He couldn’t—”
“Don’t!” He stopped her. Still refusing to look at Jilly. “I don’t give a damn what you think, but you have to get out of here. He’ll be coming here. He thinks I’m bringing you here, keeping you for him. He’s going