"Was that your beau, darling?" Grace asked in a cheerful voice. "Who is he? I've never seen him before."

Sophie mounted the wide front steps to the porch, suppressing a sigh. "He's not my beau, Mama," she said. "Far from it. He's just a neighbor. He's renting the Whitten place. You remember."

"I don't remember anything," Grace said sweetly. "But if he's not your beau, why do you look like you've been necking?"

So much for Spacey Gracey, Sophie thought. She could feel the color rise in her face. Grace would see that as well, or at least Doc would. He was watching them both with benign fascination-she wouldn't get any help from that quarter.

"I haven't been necking with anyone," she said calmly. It was technically true. Two thorough kisses didn't quite constitute necking. "You're imagining things."

"It's my memory that's shot, not my powers of observation," Grace said with one of those lightning shifts of rationality that always threw Sophie for a loop. "Is he nice?"

"Who?"

"Don't try that with me, Sophie Marlborough Davis! I'm talking about your young man. Is he nice?"

Escape would be lovely, Sophie thought, eyeing the kitchen door longingly. In a few minutes Grace wouldn't even remember that Sophie had been gone for a while, much less think to ask questions about her companion. "I really need to go inside and wash up..." she began, but Doc, the traitor, forestalled her.

"Oh, sit down and tell us about it," he said with a mischievous look in his faded blue eyes. "It's not often your mother shows an interest in her daughter's romances."

Caught, Sophie thought. Hooked and landed, and if she didn't face the music she'd end up gutted. She plastered a phony smile on her face and dropped into one of the Maine rockers that overlooked the quiet lake.

"It's not a romance, he's not a young man, he's not my beau," she said patiently.

"Then why were you kissing him?" Grace asked.

"I wasn't!"

"You shouldn't lie to your mother, Sophie," Doc said with gentle reproof.

Sophie glanced at him. The old codger was enjoying this, she thought, annoyed. Maybe her own discomfort was a small sacrifice for her mother's temporary interest in the real world.

"I didn't kiss him," she said patiently. "He kissed me."

Her mother's hoot of triumph almost sounded like the old Grace. "I knew it! Was it love at first sight?"

"It's not love, and it certainly wasn't first sight. I have no idea why he kissed me, but I doubt he'll want to do it again."

"I wouldn't doubt it at all, Sophie," Doc said gallantly. "If the man has eyes in his head and half a brain he'd be smitten."

Sophie repressed a sigh. Smitten, eh? She could just imagine Mr. Smith's reaction when he heard the old folks were calling him a smitten beau, and her young man. It might almost be enough to drive him away.

"I wouldn't get your hopes up, Mama," she said wryly. "Mr. Smith isn't my type, and the last thing he's looking for is true love. I have no idea why he kissed me, but it had nothing to do with being attracted to me." Belatedly she remembered the unmistakable bulge of his erection, and she could feel the color rise in her face again. Well, maybe he was attracted to her, or maybe he just got hard every time he kissed a woman, whether he liked her or not. She'd managed to avoid that kind of information, and she'd just as soon never learn about such things.

No, that wasn't strictly true. She simply hadn't been sufficiently tempted before. And wasn't now, she reminded herself sharply, the moment the thought drifted into her unruly consciousness.

"My Sophie's still a virgin," Grace said with the air of someone announcing a terminal illness. "I don't know what I'm going to do about her."

It could have been worse, Sophie thought bleakly. She could have announced it in front of someone other than Doc. She could have announced it in front of Mr. Smith.

"Good for you," Doc said approvingly. "It's refreshing to find a girl who's saving herself for marriage."

Sophie shuddered at the thought. It sounded old-fashioned and priggish, when she was afraid it was simply a matter of her being cold-blooded. "It's not that," she said frankly. "I just haven't found anyone who interests me enough. God knows I don't plan to die a virgin, and I doubt I'll be waiting for my wedding night. I'm just a little...picky."

"It's a good way to be," Doc said fondly. "Don't listen to your mother, Sophie. Virtue is a highly underrated commodity nowadays. Treasure yours."

Sophie resisted the impulse to make a moue. She'd started to think of her relatively untouched state as more of a liability than a selling point, and there had been a number of times when she'd been determined to get rid of it with the next available man. Unfortunately the next available man had always proved unacceptable for one reason or another, and she was now the oldest living virgin in the Northeast Kingdom. Maybe in the entire United States.

"Speaking of random sex, where's Marty?" she asked, changing the subject. Grace laughed, but Doc's sweet face drooped in sorrow.

"Last we saw she was chasing around after the Laflamme boy," he said. "Whatever made you decide to hire him to do the yard work? There's no denying he's a hard worker, but I would have thought you'd try to avoid temptation as far as your wanton younger sister was concerned."

That was going a bit too far. Sophie was allowed to criticize Marty and her flagrant habits-Doc had no right to disapprove.

"She's not wanton," Sophie protested. "Just...young. As for Patrick Laflamme, he seems like a levelheaded young man, and Marge Averill assured me he wouldn't be interested in Marty."

"He's a man," Doc pronounced. "The worst kind-halfway between being a kid and being grown up. He may mean well, but his hormones will make him crazy, and practically unable to resist any kind of temptation. I know his family, and he's a good, smart boy, but your little sister could tempt a saint." His genial tone took the sting out of the words.

"I'll keep an eye on them. As a matter of fact, I'd better look for her right now. Make sure she hasn't dragged young Patrick into the toolshed," she said cheerfully.

"Oh, she wouldn't do that, Sophie," Grace said with all seriousness. "There are too many spiders in there. Ghosts, as well."

Doc's teacup dropped to the porch floor, smashing. "I'm so sorry!" he said, leaping up. "I've broken your pretty dish."

"Don't worry," Sophie said, already picking up the bigger pieces. "All the china is mismatched-I just bought anything that took my fancy." In fact that had been one of her favorites, but she wasn't about to tell Doc that when he was looking so mortified. She turned back to her mother. "What were you saying, Mama?"

Grace just gave her a vague smile. "I don't remember."

"I'm trying to talk your mother into coming to town to have dinner with us. Rima hasn't seen her for a week now, and she gets a little isolated."

"You should go, Mama. You know how you enjoy your little outings," Sophie said, heading for the door, the broken cup in her hand. "If Doc can't pick you up I can drive you."

"I'll come fetch her at five," Doc said. "If that's all right with you, Grace?"

Grace waved an airy hand of acceptance, looking rather like a youthful Queen Elizabeth for a moment, and Sophie disappeared into the kitchen before another awkward question surfaced.

His face was as good as his body, Marty thought, breathing a sigh of relief. She'd put her contacts in, showered and was wearing a halter top and the shortest shorts she owned, the ones that showed off her long, tanned legs to perfection. She knew she looked gorgeous, but Sophie's new gardener was looking at her out of the most beautiful, liquid eyes she had ever seen in her life, and he actually didn't seem interested.

"Hey," Marty said. She'd wanted to wear her high-heeled sandals, the ones that made her legs look even better, but she figured that would have been a bit much. Subtlety had its uses.

"Hey," he said, unpromisingly. He had a gorgeous chest, but to her dismay he quickly pulled a T-shirt on. "Can I help you?"

"I'm Marty Davis. My sister's your boss."

"Yeah," he said, again not very enthusiastic. "I've cut up the three poplars that came down in the last storm, and I was going to start in weeding the flower bed on the east side of the house. Did she have something else she'd rather have me do?" He didn't have a Vermont accent, thank God. Not that she actually minded the Yankee twang of the Northeast Kingdom, but she preferred not hearing it in someone she was trying to seduce.

"I haven't the faintest idea," Marty said. "Isn't it time you took a break? You've been working nonstop for hours."

"I took a break at eleven. I'll stop for lunch at one."

"How do you know which side of the house is east?" she asked, suddenly curious.

"Any fool knows what's east and what's west," he said with barely disguised impatience. "Is there anything I can help you with? Otherwise I need to get back to work."

She'd been told she had a very sexy pout, so she tried it on him. "Don't you like me?" she asked plaintively.

He looked her up and down, slowly, from her toes with their blue polish and three toe rings, up her admirably long legs, over her bare stomach and all the way up to her fuchsia-tinted hair. And then he shrugged, clearly unimpressed. "I don't even know you. Should I?"

Marty's sexy pout turned into a frown. "You tell me."

"I've been trying to tell you I have work to do. So if you haven't got a message from your sister or something you need me to do, I'd appreciate it if you let me get on with it."

"Oh, I have something I want you to do," Marty said in a soft, cooing voice.

"What is it?"

"Go to hell."

She stalked away, majorly pissed. Trust Sophie to find the best-looking homosexual she could find in the area, just to make Marty's life miserable. Well, there were other boys around, men as well. Marty just hadn't made the effort. Maybe she'd hitch a ride with Doc when he went back into town. Of course, Doc gave her the creeps, but then, most old people did. Maybe she could...

"Hey."

She was just about to turn the corner by the inn when she heard his voice. She was half tempted to keep on stalking, but curiosity got the better of her. She turned to glare at him. He was as unmoved by her anger as he'd been by her sexy pout.

"What do you want?" she snapped.

"I'll be eating my lunch down by the lake," he said. "At one."

"And I care because...?"

He grinned then. Big mistake-he had the most delectable smile she'd ever seen in her entire almost eighteen years. "You tell me," he said. And then he turned his back on her, and she could hear him whistling under his breath.

She stomped around the front of the building, in time to see Doc rise and pat Grace's hand. "I'll be back at five," he was saying.

Perfect opportunity. She could get a ride into Colby with Doc, and even get a ride back out if she ever felt like returning to this epitome of boredom. It should have been an easy decision. Doc and freedom, at least for a few hours. Or meeting that smartass down by the lake where anyone could see them.

It was a no-brainer. Sophie's new handyman was the best-looking thing she'd seen since she arrived in Colby-she doubted she'd find anyone nearly as interesting at Audley's. If fate had decided to deliver such a hunk to her own backyard, then he was probably worth the effort.

Besides, she didn't like Doc. It was one thing for her sister and Grace to worry about her, another to have a stranger doing it. She wasn't part of Doc's clientele, and what she did with her time, what she smoked, who she saw, was her business, not his. And if she rode into town with him he'd probably cross-examine her.

No, she was better off staying behind. Seeing if she could make the sourpuss smile again. And seeing if there was any way she could lure him out of sight of the big house.

The book was gone.

One of the odd twists that Grace's illness had brought was a sudden concern with neatness. Grace had always been someone who left her clothes scattered on the floor, who had papers and scarves and paraphernalia trailing after her, who believed making a bed was a waste of time when you were just going to sleep in it again that night. In fact, Sophie hadn't even learned to make a bed until she had gone to live with her father and Eloise in their neat home in Michigan while Grace traveled the world. There were times she thought her almost obsessive fascination with all things housewifely was simply a reaction against her globe-trotting mother, but that seemed too obvious an answer. All she knew was she found safety and comfort in making jars of apple butter and raspberry jam, and old china soothed her soul.

Sophie really had no intention of searching Grace's room. She was merely interested in snitching her resurfaced copy of Murder in the Northeast Kingdom. It should have been lying on top of Grace's neatly made bed, or in an orderly pile on the floor beside it.

It was nowhere.

There were books arranged neatly, by size, in the bookcase, but amid all the Ted Bundys and Boston Stranglers there wasn't a Vermont killer to be found. On a whim Sophie looked under the bed, but there wasn't even a stray dust bunny. When she opened the closet it was more like the old Grace-clothes piled on the floor, hung on hooks instead of hangers, her shoes caked with dried mud.

Sophie closed the door again, thoughtful. When had Grace wandered out on a muddy path? She tried to keep track of her-the only time she thought Grace wasn't accounted for was when she'd visited their surly neighbor in her bare feet. So when had she gone traipsing through the mud? And why?

She leaned against the closet door, staring at her mother's room as if looking for answers. Her windows were open, and she could hear Grace's soft voice from the porch as she said goodbye to Doc. She'd come inside then, only to find her daughter searching her room, Sophie thought, suddenly ashamed of herself. If she wanted to read the book all she had to do was ask her mother.

Except that the book had disappeared, and Grace wouldn't remember where she'd put it.

There was something deeply shameful about spying on one's mother, Sophie thought, opening the dresser drawers as quietly as possible. Even if it was for Grace's own protection, it felt strange, uncomfortable. After all, what did she expect to find? She'd stopped looking for the book-if she really wanted it she could probably get it online. It wasn't as if she had any interest in the old killings, apart from trying to figure out what John Smith's particular fascination with them was. So why was she rifling her mother's drawers?

They were like the closet, jumbled, messy, everything mixed together. The expensive lacy stuff that Grace had always preferred, mixed with the utilitarian cotton that Sophie had bought her on the premise that they were easier to launder. No missing paperback to be found, and Sophie had no earthly reason to keep searching.

Until she found the knife.

He would pray for their souls, he thought, bowing his head. His true path was being pointed out to him, and there was no way he could shun his duty, much as it pained him. The righteous must triumph, the wicked must perish, or there would be no meaning to life, and he had to cling to the belief that it all meant something, otherwise why would God have taken his children from him?

The wicked would die, the righteous would be born again, and he would grieve his part in meting out justice.

Not the fact that he must kill them.

But his pleasure in the act.

Three of them in that old house. Three women, all sinful in their souls, from the old, crazy one to the randy young one. And even the Madonna in the middle was courting temptation. It would be a gift, to have her die in a state of grace. He would tell her he killed the others, so she wouldn't worry. She worried too much about her small family. She would be much happier knowing they were no longer her responsibility.

He could do it all, though it grieved him. He was young, strong, immovable with the Lord's wrath to guide him. He would take them all. And then maybe he could sleep at night.

11.

Sophie woke up with a start, her heart pounding, covered in a film of cold sweat. The moon was shining in her window, almost daylight bright despite the late hour, and she sat up, letting her eyes focus on the dark shapes in the room. They seemed to shift and move, but it was only the shadow of the tab curtains moving in the breeze from the open window.

She didn't move, waiting for her heartbeat to still, waiting for reality to wash over her. It was a cool, silent night in the country, and the only sound was the rustle of leaves as that same soft breeze stirred them. That, and the faint lap of the lake against the sandy shore were all that broke the stillness.

They were noises she was used to, soft, lulling noises that soothed her to sleep. Why had she woken up in such a panic?

She scooted back against the headboard, tucking the plump feather pillows behind her. It must have been a nightmare, though she wasn't quite sure what had set it off. In fact, she hadn't had the world's calmest day. At least Marty had been halfway cheerful, and she'd even taken her dishes out after they finished dinner. Grace had gone off with Doc, and by the time she returned she'd gone straight to bed. Nothing to panic about with either of them, at least for now.

Of course, there was the big hunting knife she'd found hidden beneath Grace's underclothes. That in itself wasn't terribly worrisome-Grace had a habit of appropriating strange things and leaving them in her room. Over the past few months Sophie had retrieved three of her most flowery dresses, a frying pan, four half-eaten boxes of cookies, a trowel, an electric razor from God knows where and a red wool hunting cap. She had no possible use for any of those things, except perhaps the cookies. Grace had never had much of a sweet tooth, and she'd seldom eaten store-bought cookies, but then, she was changing so radically that it was no wonder that Sophie couldn't keep up with her.