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DANGEROUS CONNECTIONS
By
Patricia Oshier Bruening
© copyright by Patricia Oshier Bruening, January 2009
Cover Art by Alex DeShanks, January 2009
ISBN 978-1-60394-261-4
New Concepts Publishing
Lake Park, GA 31636
www.newconceptspublishing.com
This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.
Chapter One
Rachel Mackenzie stared into her mirror, dread churning her stomach. The reflected face, hers, yet not hers, had the same luminous green eyes, the same wild mane of dark red hair, but it was somehow harder, more world-weary than Rachel ever believed herself to be. Her breath caught in her throat as she stared at the reflection. Her heart beat a frantic rhythm against her ribcage. Fear—no, pure terror—tormented those other green eyes—eyes that pleaded for help.
A loud clap of thunder snapped Rachel’s attention to the bedroom window and the storm raging outside. A brief flash of lightning blinded her for a second. Her ears rang from the thunder that followed. She looked back at the mirror and her own nervous reflection. She studied it carefully but only her face stared back at her. Realizing she held her breath, she exhaled slowly. A trick of the storm, she told her pounding heart. But even her thoughts lacked conviction, as they always did.
Denying the phenomenon, Rachel shook her head and backed away from the mirror. It was not the first time she had seen that oddly altered reflection. She often experienced thoughts, even feelings, that didn’t seem to come from her. For as long as she could remember, Rachel had been plagued by a faint sense of someone else in her life, a presence never seen or heard, only felt.
“Get your neurosis under control and get to work,” she ordered herself, striding purposefully out of the bedroom. “Put your overactive imagination on paper.”
She sat at the computer and gave the power button a determined jab. Waiting for the machine to cycle through its power-up procedure, including the virus screen, she looked around the living room she had converted into an office. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases lined every wall. The only empty space existed where the large window took up a large portion of the outside wall. She had custom-built shelves under the window. There were no keepsakes, knick/knacks, or pictures—only the books that made up her world.
The computer beeped at her and she typed in the required password. She inserted a clearly labeled disc and called up her personal journal. For the next several minutes, she typed an account of the morning’s strange sensations, describing that odd reflection in great detail. She never mentioned the strange experiences to anyone though she knew instinctively one other person would believe her.
Rachel shook off her fanciful notions and replaced her journal disc with another one. The disc file opened to a page of text as she opened a spiral-bound notebook. After a brief glance at her written notes, she typed steadily until her entry buzzer sounded. Scowling, she went to the intercom and pressed the button.
“Who is it?” Her tone left no doubt of her displeasure at being disturbed.
“Mail—I have a package that requires your signature.”
“I’ll be right down.”
With a groan of frustration, she yanked open her front door and stalked down the hall to the building entrance.
She paid a hefty rent to live in the secure building but that did not deter interruptions. She gave a wry smile. Only the mailman ever buzzed her. No one visited. She had no relatives she was aware of and no friends. So, who sent her a package? She already had the galley proofs of her last book. She keyed in a digital code and opened the outside door. The mailman stood on the step, a stack of mail in his hand.
“Morning, ma’am,” he greeted her with his ever present smile.
“Morning, Sam,” Rachel returned his pleasant greeting, careful to keep the irritation out of her voice. “What have you got?”
“The usual, plus a package. Sign please.” He handed her a clipboard with a pen attached and pointed to a blank line next to her printed name.
She signed with her customary flourish. He handed her the day’s mail and touched the brim of his hat. “Good day, Ms. Mackenzie.”
She nodded absently as she removed the large brown envelope from the bottom of the stack. Studying it closely, she returned to her apartment. The plain brown ten-by-thirteen envelope looked like the ones she used to mail manuscripts. Her name and address had been written in the very center of the envelope in the spidery handwriting she normally associated with elderly women. Rachel frowned at the Tucson, AZ postmark, with only a post office box return address in Wilcox, AZ.
“Wilcox,” she muttered. “I don’t know anyone there.”
She turned the package over but found no other clues. A stalker, she thought on a wave of apprehension.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she scolded her imagination. “Just open it.”
Afraid, but at the same time mysteriously compelled, she unfastened the clasp with trembling fingers. She upended the envelope over the counter dividing her office from the kitchen. A spiral notebook slid out, followed by a folded piece of paper torn from a notepad. The morning’s deep sense of dread returned full force. She backed away from the counter, her stricken gaze riveted to the notebook.
“It’s just a notebook.” The words echoed in her ears. “It’s probably a manuscript from a fan who managed to get my address.”
Said aloud, her speculation lacked conviction. Her real name and address were strict secrets with her agent and her publisher. She wrote under a penname and all fan mail went to her publisher.
Hesitant and wary, she approached the counter slowly and reached for the notebook. Don’t touch it, her mind screamed, don’t open it! Dread turned to fear but she had to open it, had to see what was inside. Of its own accord, her hand passed over the notebook and picked up the note. The paper shook as she unfolded it. Her hands trembled but she forced herself to read the note, expecting a threat or a crazed stalker.
Save your sister!
The words jumped off the page at her. A harsh gasp escaped her throat and her shaking hands lost their grip. The paper fluttered onto the counter and lay open, the written words beckoning her.
Sister! The word screeched through her brain. Blood rushed to her head. She clutched the edge of the counter for support. Heart pounding erratically, her vision narrowed to include only the spidery script of the note.
Save your sister!
I have a sister? The question circled her mind then formed a statement rendered aloud, “I have a sister.”
A profound sense of joy and curiosity overwhelmed her for a brief moment, only to become trepidation. She retrieved the note.
“Save your sister,” she repeated the cryptic instruction, “but from what, from whom?”
The notebook caught her attention again. Maybe it held some answers. Rachel picked up the notebook, compelled by an unknown force that flowed through and around her. She stared at the notebook, her only connection to her unknown sister. Eager to know more, she opened it to the first page.
Dear Rachel. Her own name leaped off the page. Startled and bewildered, she stared at the flowing feminine script for several seconds then forced herself to read further.
It gives me great comfort to use your name, she read. Though I don’t know you anymore, I feel as though you are always with me. I don’t know how to explain the calm, the comfort, the compassion I feel as I write in my journal. It’s as though I am talking to you alone, in private, sharing secrets, dreams, and desires, as only sisters do—as we did once. It’s the only calm peaceful oasis in the chaos of my life.
Rachel looked up from the page, tears blurring her vision and an ache in her heart. A flood of despair swept over her, radiating from something or someone outside herself. Did it come from her sister? The mysterious presence, the connection clicked in her mind on a burst of excited realization. Her sister had to be the other person in her mirror—the presence just out of conscious reach.
She frowned, unable to remember having a sister. Alone in foster care, believed an orphan, she had no memory before the age of eight and her first foster care home. With everything she had apparently forgotten of those first eight years, how could she have forgotten her sister?
You didn’t forget, her heart whispered. With the feelings, images, and the sense of someone else, her heart remembered what her mind escaped.
Escape? Where had that notion come from? She searched for a memory, a name, any scrap of the past, but none came.
“I have to remember!”
Her frustrated cry echoed around the room. She closed her eyes and stared hard into the darkness but no images appeared. The first eight years of her life remained out of reach. Frustrated, she slapped a hand on the counter and scowled.
“Why can’t I remember?” she demanded of her sister’s journal. “What happened to us? How were we separated? Why?” I woke up in a hospital, in pain, with no idea what happened to me. Then came social services and foster homes. I barely remember my own name. With a heavy sigh, Rachel eyed the journal again.
Grim determination gripped her. She intended to find the answers and the journal was a good place to start. If nothing else, she would start to know her sister. That shadowy presence was real. She made a second pot of coffee then settled on a stool at the counter to read a piece of her sister’s life.
A few hours later, she set the notebook aside, her face flaming after reading the erotic details of her sister’s love life. “My god,” she muttered, “she certainly is a passionate woman.”
Comfortable being a reclusive writer, Rachel did not experience passion except in writing. But writing romance, writing love scenes, was not the same as living them. Her sister lived and loved. Rachel only wrote about it. A sigh of regret for her decision escaped her, but she squelched the feeling. She did not want to change her life. No one hurt her as long as she kept to herself.
She dumped the remains of her coffee and turned away from the sink. The note on the counter caught her attention and she grabbed it.
Save your sister!
She frowned. Something was wrong. Her sister was in some kind of trouble. Someone wanted Rachel’s help, but what could she do? How could she help? Her attention wavered between the note and the erotic journal. Her sister had a flair for words that matched hers.
She opened the journal at a random page and read it again without skipping whole paragraphs, as she had on first perusal. Like a voyeur peeking into a lover’s bedroom, she could not stop herself.
His mouth ravaged mine. I nearly swooned. Fueled by his passion, I wanted—no, craved more. He moved his hand to my breast. I stroked him boldly through his tight jeans. He swelled more, filling my hand. I had no doubt he wanted me.
Her face flushed hot, Rachel dropped the journal. If she wrote such erotic scenes, her agent and her editor would be shocked. Rachel struggled to write love scenes, finding it difficult to write about something with which she had no experience. Her sister’s writing showed experience and pleasure in the subject.
“Just because I don’t do it doesn’t mean I don’t know anything,” she insisted to the empty room.
An ironic chuckle echoed in her mind. Try it, you might like it. The thought popped into her head as though someone stood next to her and spoke the words aloud. She shot an anxious glance around the room but it remained silent and empty. What the…? Where had the voice come from? She shook her head, denying that weird occurrence. She would not start hearing voices.
Rachel closed the notebook and stared, unseeing, at its red cover, the scene she’d read coming to mind. Oh, to have such a grand, glorious passion, she thought on a wistful sigh. What would it be like to touch such a man, to have such a love?
She closed her eyes and dared to imagine the touch of a lover. Tender caresses and fierce kisses, a longing that burned body and soul, a passion she craved yet feared. A pleasant shiver rippled through her.
Feared? Her eyes snapped open and she sat up, remembering the note. If her sister was as happy as the journal indicated, only a week ago, why did she need to be saved? Rachel frowned, confused. The handwriting on the note matched that on the envelope but did not resemble in any way her sister’s in the notebook. Someone else mailed it. Who and why—those questions circled her mind.
Something nagged at her. She opened the notebook to read it more carefully. She read until after midnight, until her eyelids drooped and the words blurred on the page. Smothering a tired yawn, she carried the journal to her bedroom. Stripped to her underwear, she crawled into bed. With the blankets pulled up to her chin, she dropped into sleep.
A delicious sensation stole over her. A feather-like touch stroked over her shoulder and trailed down her arm to linger on her hip. Firm warmth at her back snuggled closer. A calloused yet gentle hand urged her to roll over and she gave in to the pressure. She found herself cuddled up to a hard, muscular chest. Her nipples hardened. Her breasts swelled, aching for more intimate attention. Firm, warm lips moved smoothly, expertly over hers. Her lips parted under the insistent pressure of his deepening kiss. She squirmed. Anticipation built to a craving that consumed her. His moist tongue caressed hers, dueling with it as he explored her mouth. He swept his hand along her ribcage to cup her straining breast, to fulfill the promise of his touch.
She groaned, wanting him, and looked into his face, but darkness hid him from view. He shifted and lay over her, his mouth fused to hers. She devoured his passion, made it hers, and thrived on it. She shifted slightly as he settled between her thighs. His hand slipped from her breast to her most intimate folds.
Shocked awake, Rachel snapped her eyes open in the gray light of dawn, startled to find herself alone in her king-sized waterbed. The overwhelming erotic sensations faded but her body throbbed with a longing foreign to her.
“It was so real,” she whispered, awed by the sensuality that hovered around her. Eventually, as the spell dissipated, she dragged her body out of the warm bed. The journal caught her eye so she took it into the bathroom.
Hesitant, she looked into the mirror. Her face stared back at her with none of the sensuality of her dreams. Confusion and apprehension lingered in her eyes. The whole situation had the tones of a gothic mystery. A real mystery had been dropped into her lap, a mystery that, once solved, might answer the questions about her life.
Rachel soon had her suitcase packed and was waiting by the front door. After a last, sweeping glance around the apartment, she took her suitcase and her laptop computer to her car. A sense of urgency dogged her footsteps. Was it too late? Her only clue was a post office box.
Two hours later, Rachel stood in the lobby of the Wilcox Post Office, keeping a careful eye on Box 113. As expected, the clerk refused to give her the name of the person who used that box, so she waited. An hour before closing time, her patient vigil was rewarded by the sight of an elderly woman retrieving a stack of mail from the box. Without giving herself a chance to think, Rachel followed the woman to the parking lot. Minutes later, she drove behind the woman’s older model Cutlass, over the railroad tracks, to a small house on a corner lot. The name Trenton had been carved on a rectangular piece of wood over the door. Rachel wrote down the name and address then drove away and checked into a local motel, part of an inexpensive national chain.
As eager as she was to confront the woman, Rachel curbed her impatience. She took a much-needed, refreshing shower, put on clean black jeans and a red silk blouse, and then drove down the busy street to the local truck stop restaurant for dinner.
She ordered a decent, inexpensive but filling and lonely meal. Used to solitary meals, Rachel stared at her plate and grappled with the realization of loneliness. Why, suddenly, did eating alone bother her as it never had before?
As her gaze roamed the restaurant, a pair of startling blue eyes in a tanned, rugged, blatantly masculine face snared her attention. A sardonic gleam lit the man’s eyes and his lips curved in a smile that did not reach his eyes. She nodded curt acknowledgement and pointedly looked away. She had no time for staring at a man, even if he possessed the most incredible blue eyes she had ever seen.
Staring. The idea shocked her. She never stared at men. In fact, she stayed as far away from men as possible. She forced herself to concentrate on eating until her attention wandered again to the man across the aisle. He leaned back indolently in the corner of his booth seat, a beer bottle in his loose grip, his unwavering gaze fixed on her. She fidgeted, uncomfortable being the object of such intense scrutiny. Though not handsome in a classical sense, his rugged, lean good looks stirred something in her. Those bright blue eyes bored into her. His firm, sculpted lips made her want to beg for his kisses.
Her face flamed at the erotic nature of her thoughts. She shook her head in fierce denial. One erotic dream and she lusted after the first man who looked at her! Appalled at herself, Rachel beat a hasty retreat, pausing only long enough to pay for her dinner. She reached her car in seconds only to be halted abruptly by a firm hand on her upper arm.
“Not so fast,” a stern, clipped baritone hissed in her ear.
Rachel turned, somehow not surprised to find the blue-eyed stranger behind her. His grip tightened as he glared down at her through icy blue eyes.
“Leave me alone, please,” she whispered, hoarse from a sudden fear of attack.
Uncertainty flickered in his eyes for just a second as he searched her face. A puzzled frown softened his fierce expression and he loosened his grip.
Her heart pounded frantically as she backed up into the side of the car, fumbling behind her for the door handle. Locked, it didn’t budge.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded. His hard tone snapped her attention back to his face.
“N—nothing.” Cursing the tremor in her voice, she pulled her keys from her pocket. Her hands shook, jingling the keys. “I have to go.”
“Fine, I thought I could help,” he snapped. “I guess not.” He turned on his heel and stalked away.
Rachel breathed a sigh of relief, forced her heart to slow down, and unlocked the door. She scrambled inside, started the engine, and fled the parking lot.
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