The Raven Master. Diana Whitney
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patients were broken people, with lives destroyed by an addiction they were powerless to control. They wanted help—my help—and I failed them.”
A dusty sadness clouded her dark eyes, an exquisite empathy that jolted him to the core. She laid a slender hand on his arm. “So you gave up your career?”
His skin tingled beneath her soft touch. “It seemed a good time to reevaluate my life and my priorities.” After accepting her sympathetic nod, he offered a poignant smile. “Now that I’ve revealed all my innermost secrets, perhaps you’ll return the favor.”
Instantly wary, Janine retrieved her hand and shielded herself with tightly crossed arms. “I have no innermost secrets,” she lied. “Sorry to disappoint you.”
Although he returned her thin smile, his eyes were again veiled, unreadable. “In that case, I hope that you can reassure me that I won’t awaken to find one of your guests hovering over me with a boning knife.”
“You are quite safe,” Janine said quickly, believing that assurance in spite of having been undeniably shaken by events of the past days. “It’s just that everyone has been so jittery since the fire. Although frayed nerves have a tendency to exaggerate eccentricities, I can assure you that we’re all quite harmless. Everything will be back to normal in a few days.” She smiled brightly and fervently hoped that was true. “So you see, no innermost secrets there, either. Unless, of course, you consider the house itself.”
Janine winced, wondering what had possessed her to blurt something so foolish. The words had slipped from her lips the moment she’d noticed Quinn glance toward the stairs, as though preparing to leave. For some odd reason, she hadn’t wanted him to go. Now that he was watching her with renewed interest, she felt silly.
“A house with secrets?” An attractive web of laugh lines crinkled the corners of his eyes. “Should I keep an eye out for ghosts?”
“The place only looks haunted, but it does have a rather colorful history. It, uh, used to be—” she cleared her throat and smiled wanly “—a bawdy house.”
He arched a brow. “Complete with red velvet wallpaper?”
“I, uh…” She coughed away an embarrassed tickle. “I wouldn’t know. This has been a respectable dwelling for over sixty years.”
“And before that?”
“Before that, this lovely old mansion was the highlight of Darby Ridge social life.” She couldn’t help smiling at his bemused expression and found herself relating the ancient gossip with considerable zeal. “Apparently, turn-of-the-century loggers were quite a rowdy bunch, and when the townsfolk finally got tired of the riffraff, they hired a marshal to clean up the town. The rumor is that the marshal took his job seriously, but after months of nightly raids never made a single arrest.”
“Why not?”
“There was never anyone to arrest. The deputies would stake out the place and see dozens of, uh, clients enter, but when the posse stormed inside they found no one except the ladies.”
A gleam of amusement lightened his gaze. “So where did the men go?”
“No one knows for certain, but there was whispered speculation that when the marshal came through the front door, the brothel’s clients escaped through a secret tunnel leading to the ravine behind the house, then forded the little creek and crept quietly back to their homes.”
The amused twinkle faded. “Where is this tunnel?”
“As far as I know, there isn’t one.” Janine was surprised by his serious tone and sudden interest. “The story is just folklore.”
“Folklore is usually based on fact.”
“Perhaps, but over so many decades, facts are frequently embellished to the point of fiction. Besides, I’ve lived here for three years and can assure you that there’s not a hidden door or secret passage in the entire house.”
He considered that for a moment. “You’re probably right. Still, it’s an intriguing story, isn’t it?” He paused. “Well, I’ve held you up long enough. I’ll leave you to your work.”
As he headed toward the stairs, Janine stopped him. “Mr. Coulliard?”
Hesitating on the third step, he glanced over his shoulder. “Yes?”
She smiled sweetly. “You forgot the bucket.”
CHAPTER THREE
After rubbing cleaning foam into the stained carpet, Janine dropped the sponge into the bucket and decided that it was a losing battle. She sat back on her heels, disgusted. Even if she got the stupid spot out, the carpet would still be ugly. The putrid color reminded her of rotten lettuce and the original sculpted contour had long ago been tromped flat.
Eventually she hoped to scrape together enough money to replace the matted mess—she’d already managed to recarpet all the bedrooms except her own—but until then there was little she could do to keep the upstairs hallway from looking like a moldy meadow.
With a resigned sigh, she protected the wet spots with colorful plastic barrier, gathered the cleaning supplies and hurried downstairs. Since Jules and Edna were doing volunteer work at the church bazaar and Althea’s shift at the diner ended somewhere around midafternoon, there was little time left to complete her Saturday chores before the tenants returned.
As for the mysterious Mr. Coulliard, Janine hadn’t seen him since breakfast. His van was still parked at the edge of the gravel cul-de-sac so she assumed that he hadn’t gone far. But then the man was constantly disappearing and popping up in the most unexpected places. His random schedule was puzzling. None of her business, of course, but definitely odd.
As Janine replaced the cleaning supplies in the sink cupboard, she idly wondered if her newest boarder was a nature lover who enjoyed taking solitary hikes through the surrounding woods. Or perhaps he walked into town and spent long hours warming a bar stool at one of the town pubs.
That was doubtful, though, since he never smelled of alcohol and hadn’t exhibited even the slightest symptom of inebriation. Besides, it seemed unlikely that a man who had once counseled alcoholics would spend his spare time in a bar—assuming, of course, that Quinn had been truthful about his background. That might be a rather large assumption but Janine believed him. At least, she wanted to believe him and at the moment she had no reason not to—except for a nagging intuition continually whispering that Quinn Coulliard wasn’t precisely what he seemed.
Shaking off the disquieting notion, Janine focused on her chores by setting a package of pork chops on the counter to thaw. As she removed the vacuum cleaner from the broom closet, an agitated yowl in the backyard was followed by a peculiar rustling and a hollow wood-on-wood clunking sound. Then there was a horrible, bloodcurdling shriek.
Rushing to the kitchen window, Janine saw the source of the ruckus was a huge black raven perched on a stack of firewood. One of the bird’s massive wings was fully extended; the other slanted down at an awkward angle. A stalking cat circled the woodpile, then flattened into a threatening crouch. The bird screeched, hopped to the edge of the woodpile and tried to intimidate its feline adversary with bristling feathers and a fierce hiss.
The cat was not impressed. As Janine watched in horror, the animal leaped onto the woodpile and tried to bite the bird’s neck. The gutsy raven pecked viciously, forcing the thwarted feline into a temporary withdrawal. Janine feared that in spite of such bravado the injured raven would be hard-pressed to fend off another attack, so she snatched up a flimsy flyswatter and ran out the back door.
An angry male shout greeted her. She jerked to a stop, and glanced around in confusion just as Quinn Coulliard appeared and shooed the frustrated cat away. Then the most extraordinary thing happened. Quinn knelt, extended his hand and spoke softly to the terrified bird. In less than a heartbeat, the raven hopped down from the woodpile and limped toward his rescuer.
Quinn