“Maybe I don’t like people having unfounded impressions of me.”

“People?” Nita tilted her own fl ashlight and Deo turned her face away, but not before Nita saw the unhappiness in her eyes. “What people?”

Deo grabbed Nita’s hand and tugged. “Come on. Let’s check out the kitchen.”

• 103 •

RADCLY fFE

Recognizing the avoidance ploy because she used it so often herself when there was something she didn’t want to discuss, Nita didn’t push. Deo was certainly entitled to her privacy, and besides, discussing personal matters wasn’t the wisest thing to do when she was trying to keep her distance. Whatever Deo’s troubles might be, they weren’t her concern.

The wide central hall was divided in the center of the house into two narrower passages by the take off of the central staircase that rose to a second-fl oor balcony level. As she recalled, the formal living room and dining room were off the right hallway, and the parlor and library were off the left. The large kitchen occupied the entire fi rst fl oor rear. With only their fl ashlights to guide them, Nita felt the oppressive atmosphere of the long abandoned house closing in around her. Refl exively, she tightened her grip on Deo’s hand. Deo’s palm was slightly bumpy—

work calluses, she presumed—and very warm. For a fl eeting second she imagined how that rough, heated skin would feel chafi ng over her nipples. The unexpected image and the sharp stab of excitement that shot through her groin made her gasp.

“You okay?” Deo asked.

“Yes,” Nita responded sharply, aware that her voice sounded breathy.

“Even though the place has been closed up for years, it doesn’t smell damp or moldy,” Deo observed, stopping just inside the kitchen.

She shone her light over the fl oor, walls, and ceiling fi rst and then moved on to highlight the wood counters and cabinets. The appliances had all been removed long ago. “No evidence of water damage. That’s a good sign. The roof is likely sound and the window casements are probably in good shape.”

Nita extracted her hand from Deo’s, and immediately the tension in her chest eased. She took a deep breath and chided herself for her mindless response. She had gone far too long without any kind of physical intimacy. That’s all it was.

“So what do you think?”

“I’m sorry?” Nita realized Deo had asked her a question while she’d been analyzing her reaction to Deo’s touch.

“I was asking whether you wanted to convert the interior to something contemporary or go for a historical restoration.”

“If I’d wanted a contemporary house, I would have bought one.”

• 104 •

Winds of Fortune

“Well, that makes sense,” Deo said, a note of confusion in her voice.

Nita fl ushed. She was making too much of a brief visceral reaction and allowing it to completely disrupt her control. It was ridiculous. “I want to renovate the house with materials and design that are historically suitable, within reason. I don’t intend to walk around the house at night carrying a candle.”

Deo laughed. “I think it probably would have been gaslights.”

“I consider fl ush toilets, electricity, central heat and air, telephones, and cable to be essential,” Nita said dryly.

“It’s going to cost you something to put in the air and bring the electrical system up to today’s standards,” Deo observed.

“I have considered that.” Nita saw no reason to explain that she had money. Her family would take nothing from her now and being single and having gone to medical school on scholarships, she had very little debt. The house was her indulgence.

“I want to check the cellar before we go upstairs,” Deo said. “I recommend you wait here.”

“To save us repeating this conversation, I’m buying this house and therefore I’m coming with you.”

Deo illuminated Nita’s face again. “Afraid of spiders?”

Even in the semi-darkness, Nita could make out the mischief in her eyes. She gave Deo a cold stare.

Deo grinned. “Guess not.” She reached for Nita’s hand once more, and after a second’s hesitation, Nita took it. “Stay close, okay? People leave the damnedest things lying around in these empty houses, and who knows what kind of critters might be living down there.”

“Charming,” Nita muttered, moving closer to Deo in the impenetrable darkness that enclosed her as soon as Deo moved her light away. As she followed, she couldn’t help but occasionally brush up against Deo’s back. Even if her nipples hadn’t tightened at the slightest touch of her breasts against Deo’s body, she wouldn’t have been able to deny how much she enjoyed the contact. Her blood was practically singing with excitement.

“I don’t think anyone’s been down here for a while,” Deo grunted as she tucked the fl ashlight under her arm and banged the slide bolt with the heel of her hand. It moved with a rusty groan. After pushing the door open and fl ooding the stairwell with her bright light, she

• 105 •

RADCLY fFE

announced, “All the stairs are here and look like they’re in reasonably good shape. Just let me test each one on the way down.”

“Maybe we should postpone this until tomorrow,” Nita said.

“There’s no point in taking chances.”

Deo pivoted on the top stair, the movement bringing her face very close to Nita’s. “Is that what you really believe? Or are you just afraid that you might like it?”

Nita’s jaw tightened. “You’re in a dangerous position if your intention is to irritate me.” She rested her index fi ngertip lightly in the center of Deo’s chest. “It wouldn’t take much to knock you down these stairs on your ass.”

“I like you when you’re angry.” Deo let go of Nita’s hand and grasped her fi nger. She lifted it and delicately touched her tongue to the tip. When Nita snatched it away, she laughed. “I don’t mind taking risks.”

“One more move like that and this inspection is over,” Nita said, closing her fi st until the tingling in her fi nger dissipated.

“All right,” Deo said softly. “I promise I won’t touch you again until you ask me to.”

“Then that will be never.”

“I do need to hold your hand on these stairs, though,” Deo amended and extended her hand.

Nita took it. “As long as you remember it’s just business.”

“Fair enough.”

“And as it happens, I’m not wild about spiders,” Nita remarked as she followed Deo downstairs. “Feel free to dispense with any webs that come our way.”

Laughing, Deo swept her arm over their heads as she walked.

“Wait at the bottom of the stairs until I get a good look at what’s down here.”

Nita had the sense of a large room interrupted at intervals by thick fl oor-to-ceiling wooden posts. The bright circle of her light illuminated several rough wooden chests overlaid with inches of dust, a chifforobe, several broken chairs, and a rusty oil tank next to an ancient furnace.

The fl oor was hard packed dirt. A faint shimmering illumination at the far end of the room marked Deo’s location.

“Anything of interest down there?” Nita called.

“Not much. Looks like someone tried to jack up the— shit! ”

• 106 •

Winds of Fortune

Nita jumped at the sound of a loud crash. At the same time, Deo’s light winked out and a cloud of dust rolled eerily toward her through the beam of light she directed at Deo’s location. Quickly, she covered her face and turned away. She felt grit coat the back of her neck and her exposed forearms, but she didn’t even consider rushing back upstairs.

Something had happened to Deo, and nothing else mattered.

“Deo! Deo, are you hurt?”

At the sound of coughing, the fear squeezing Nita’s heart eased.

“Deo?”

“Broke my fucking light,” Deo grumbled from somewhere in the darkness.

“Just stand still and keep talking. I’m coming to get you.”

“No! There’s debris all over the fl oor.”

Ignoring her, Nita started forward, alternating between illuminating the ceiling above her and the fl oor in front of her. What looked like large chunks of lathe and plaster lay heaped about.

“What happened?” Nita called.

“Someone used a fence post for a strut and it was rotted through. A piece of the underfl ooring came down. Shine the light at the ceiling and stop walking. God damn it,” Deo snapped, “I’ll come to you.”

Since it made sense for Deo to walk out of darkness toward the light, rather than for her to keep pushing into darkness, Nita did as Deo requested. A minute later Deo, her dark hair and T-shirt white with dust, appeared within the circle of Nita’s light. Against the pale powder coating Deo’s face, the bright red trickle of blood that ran from her right temple down her cheek looked garish, as if it had been intentionally painted there.

“You’re hurt,” Nita said, and while her physician’s mind told her that the injury could not be serious considering that Deo was walking under her own steam and talking coherently, her stomach clenched with worry.

“A few scratches,” Deo said in disgust. “I can’t believe I was stupid enough to shake that damned strut. Fucking beginner’s mistake.”

“When I was in medical school,” Nita said quietly, “the lover of one of the residents was killed in an accident almost exactly like this.”

Tentatively, she touched Deo’s cheek next to the thick red rivulet of blood. “Except in her case, a beam hit her in the back of the neck and killed her instantly.”

• 107 •

RADCLY fFE

Deo raised her hand as if to take Nita’s, then let it fall. “Freak accidents happen. Most of the time you get a few bumps, a couple of scrapes, and you forget about it a minute later. I’m fi ne.”

“We’ll need to get that cleaned up and make sure you don’t need sutures.” Nita backed away, not wanting to think about the surge of panic she’d experienced when she thought Deo might have been seriously injured. It didn’t mean anything. She would have felt the same for anyone she was with.