Stranger in the Moonlight Read online

  Kim knew that whatever happened she needed to keep her cool. She couldn’t go running to the two sons of Randall Maxwell and gush about what she’d just been told. Would they smile at her in an indulgent way and say they knew all that? That they’d figured it out long ago? Kim didn’t think she could bear that humiliation.

  She stopped outside the door to the diner and took a deep breath. She needed to keep a straight face and do what the Maxwell boys did and keep secrets to herself.

  There were few people in the diner, and Travis and Russell stood out. They were at a little round wooden table close to a wall, with their backs to her. There was a big bowl of popcorn between them and they were eating and drinking beer as they looked up at a TV screen. A soccer match was playing and both men seemed totally absorbed in it.

  Yet again, Kim marveled at how alike the two men were. If they changed clothes, and she saw them from the back, she wondered if she could tell them apart.

  Travis turned and saw her. For a moment he looked at her so hard she thought he knew where she’d been. But then his face relaxed, he smiled, and moved a chair out for her.

  “You didn’t buy anything?” he asked.

  “Buy . . . ?” She had to remember that she did go to a store. “I didn’t see anything I liked.”

  Russell was staring at her. “You look like something happened.”

  “Just looking forward to the company of two gorgeous men,” Kim said quickly. So much for keeping secrets, she thought. “So what’s good to eat here?” she asked.

  “We waited for you,” Travis said. He was still looking at her as though he was trying to read her mind. “Ol’ Russell here has something to show us, but he wanted to wait until you were here.”

  Kim refused to meet Travis’s eyes. She didn’t want him seeing more than she wanted him to know. “That sounds interesting. What is it?”

  Russell got up from the table and went to the side wall where there was a package, about two feet by three feet, wrapped in brown paper. As he picked it up and began to open it, he put his back to them so they couldn’t see what he had. When he turned around, he was holding what was obviously a picture and from the look of the back of the canvas, it was quite old. He held it facing him, concealing it from them.

  “Ever the showman,” Travis said.

  “You should talk, Maxwell,” Russell said as he looked at Kim. “I was curious about these Dr. Tristans so I did a search and some photos came up. Distinctive-looking man is your cousin.”

  Kim couldn’t help smiling. That was one way of putting it about her cousin’s extraordinary beauty.

  Still looking at Kim, Russell turned the picture around, and she gasped. The man in the portrait looked very much like her cousin Dr. Tristan Aldredge. “Is that him? The doctor who was killed in the mine?” she asked.

  Russell leaned the portrait against the wall and took his seat at the table. They were all three facing it. “That’s James Hanleigh, born 1880, died 1982.”

  “But . . .” Kim began. “He really does look like my cousin Tristan.”

  Travis looked back at the two of them. “Wrong side of the blanket?”

  “That’s my guess,” Russell said. He started to say more but the waitress came to take their orders. Kim ordered a club sandwich and Travis got crab cakes with a triple order of coleslaw and a beer. She wasn’t the least surprised when Russell said he’d have the same. She tried not to glance at him but she couldn’t help herself. As she knew he would be, Russell’s eyes were dancing with merriment. She wanted to kick him under the table.

  Their lunch conversation was about how the portrait had been found. It seemed that Russell’s uncle Bernie had discovered it.

  “I needed to give him something to do to work off all that food,” Russell said. “He told me that last night he’d run off some photos of the present Dr. Tristan Aldredge that he’d found online, passed them around to his mother’s relatives, and told them to see if anyone in town recognized him. Sometimes blood relatives look like each other,” Russell said—and again he looked at Kim with a smile.

  “And he found this portrait in one of the stores?” Travis asked.

  “No. That would be too easy. He found some old man who said he thought maybe he’d seen a picture of Dr. Aldredge but he couldn’t remember where. Uncle Bernie sent relatives out looking and asking and—”

  “This all happened while we were at the Old Mill?” Travis asked.

  “Every bit of it. I think my relatives were like a locust invasion on little Janes Creek.”

  “And where did they find it?” Kim asked.

  “In the home of a little old lady who bought it at a yard sale thirty years ago for fifty bucks.”

  “How much?” Travis asked.

  “Fifty—”

  “No, how much did I have to pay for it?”

  “Twelve grand.”

  “What?!” Kim said.

  “She drove a hard bargain,” Russell said, obviously enjoying himself, “and besides, she needed a new roof.”

  “I’ll reimburse—” Kim began but stopped at the look Travis gave her.

  “So how is he related and how does he fit in the family tree?” Travis asked.

  “I haven’t found that out yet. Give me the afternoon and at dinner I’ll tell you everything.”

  “So you don’t know if there are any Hanleighs still in town?” Travis’s tone was that of a challenge.

  “Not yet.” Russell was calm, amused even.

  Kim kept her attention on her food. Her mind was so full of all that Mrs. Pendergast had told her that she couldn’t think about finding the descendant of some young man who may or may not be her relative.

  When they finished eating, Travis asked if she was ready to go to the jewelry store.

  For a moment she had no idea what he was talking about and stared at him blankly.

  He smiled at her, his eyes alight. “I agree,” he said in a voice that could only be described as seductive. Travis looked at Russell. “Kim and I are going to . . .”

  “Take a nap,” Russell said.

  “Well put,” Travis said as he backed his chair out, and held out his arm to Kim. “Thanks for lunch and we’ll see you at dinner.”

  Travis led her out of the diner and to the car. The ride back to the B&B was silent.

  Kim knew that Travis was hinting at sex. And why shouldn’t he? It was a romantic little town, a charming B&B. They were young and by all accounts in love, so they should be spending every waking moment together in bed. Isn’t that what she’d told her brother that she wanted? What had she said? “I’ll take all the passionate sex I can get. Days of it. Weeks if I can get it. Months would be divine.”

  So now she had it and what she really wanted was to call her friend Jecca and spend about four hours on the telephone. Right now what Kim needed more than anything else was the release that discussion would bring.

  So maybe I should find Red and ask him for advice, she thought. Ask the man who caused all the problems how to fix them? She gave a snort of laughter.

  “What was that about?” Travis asked as he parked the car.

  “Nothing,” she said as she got out.

  He held her hand as they went up the stairs to their connecting rooms. Once they were inside, he bent to kiss her, but Kim pushed back.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I have a . . . a headache and I think I should lie down for a while.”

  Travis stepped away from her. “Can I get you anything?”

  “No, nothing,” Kim said. “I just need some time . . . alone.”

  “Sure, of course,” he said. He walked to the door to his room, opened it, went through and shut it behind him.

  Kim looked at the bed. Maybe if she took a nap she’d feel better, but she knew she couldn’t sleep. Mrs. Pendergast’s words ran through her head. How much to tell? How much to hide? How much to—?

  “No!” Travis said from the open door. “This isn’t all right. None of it is. Something happened to you t