She tossed her car keys on the table, switched on the light and looked around. The house had looked more welcoming by daylight than it did now but where else could she have gone? Not to Thorpe House. Travis had been right about that, at least. The miserable old house was a mausoleum. The sooner she sold it, the better.
Alex went to the stairs and looked up. It was awfully dark up there. She hesitated, then made a face.
"You're an independent woman now," she muttered. "Are the shadows at the top of the stairs going to turn your knees to jelly?"
Maybe, especially if the thunder and lightning rolling over the valley got any closer.
She laughed nervously, took a deep breath and went upstairs.
There were lots of bedrooms, some of them still furnished. She picked one at random and dumped her overnight bag on the bed. There wasn't much in the bag, just some toiletries she'd picked up at a supermarket, her old robe, jeans, underwear, a T-shirt and sneakers. No real clothes, though. How could there be, when nothing of hers remained at Thorpe House? Travis had taken all of it, emptied her closets and drawers the day he had decided she was going to live with him.
Had he asked her? No. Had he even thought about asking her?
"No," she said, and her mouth thinned.
Arrogant, egotistical, self-centered bastard! Oh, she was far, far better off without him.
She peeled off her silk suit and blouse, her panty hose and pumps, all the things she'd worn today to mark what she'd thought would be her introduction into Travis's real life.
From now on, the only "real life" she was interested in was her own. The last vestiges of the old Alexandra had fallen away early this evening, when she'd realized-thank heavens-that she didn't love Travis at all. She'd just needed to think she did to justify the fact that she was sleeping with him. The effect of living a conservative, tradition-bound existence didn't fade so easily.
It would, now. She was free at last, free of everything.
Free of Travis.
The shower worked, which was more than she'd hoped for. There was a scratchy stack of towels in a cupboard beside the sink. She dried off quickly, ran her fingers through her hair and slipped on her robe. -
How pathetic, that she'd tried to convince herself she loved him. Sex. Good old, down-and-dirty sex, was what their relationship had been all about. It was time she accepted that.
A jagged slash of lightning arced past the bathroom window. Alex jumped as thunder roared overhead. If only the storm would pass. She'd be all right, though. The house was big and old and, okay, a bit spooky, but so long as the roof didn't leak and the lights didn't go out...
Even imagining such a thing had been a mistake. Lightning flashed again, and the house was plunged into darkness.
Alex swallowed hard. She moved carefully into the bedroom and waited. The lights would come on again in a minute...
They did.
"You see?" she said shakily, and laughed.,
The lights had come on, and life was going to improve, now that she'd taken charge of her existence. She supposed she had Travis to thank for that. If today hadn't happened, if he hadn't told her she was more than a mistress, she'd probably have gone on living with him right up until the minute he decided it was time for a new playmate. Because that was all she'd been to him. A playmate. An attractive, intelligent, quick-learning toy.
Tears burned behind Alex's eyes but crying over Travis would be ridiculous. What was there to cry about?
"Nothing," she said gruffly, and wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands.
Not one pathetic little thing. She'd behaved like a fool but at least she had the satisfaction of knowing she'd ended the affair, not he. Maybe that wasn't much but it was better than nothing. Definitely, it was. And now that she was free of Travis, she had lots of plans to make.
Alex plopped down on the bed and crossed her legs under her. First thing, she'd sell Thorpe House. She'd buy a condo in Brentwood. Or a place at Huntington Beach. She could even move in here. Well, no. She'd already agreed to sell this place. Why would she want to live here, anyway? There wasn't even any real reason she'd come here tonight...
Thunder roared. Lightning sizzled. And the room went dark again.
Alex waited, but this time the lights stayed off. The darkness was impenetrable. It was like being encased in black velvet. She couldn't see a thing.. .but she could hear. A scratching at the window. A tap. A sigh.
"Stop it," she whispered.
It was a tree branch, at the window. Rain, on the roof. It was the wind she heard moaning, not a person...
Lightning tore the room apart. Alex screamed and ran for the door but where was the door? She couldn't see it. She didn't know this house at all. She needed light, but where would she find candles or a flashlight?
In the kitchen. That was where such things were kept, at Thorpe House. All she had to do was get there.
Carefully, hands outstretched, she made her way out of the bedroom and down the endless stairs. She opened a door and walked into a closet but, finally, she felt tile under her feet, felt the outline of a stove under her fingertips.
The walls were lined with cabinets. Blindly, she felt her way from one to the other, opening drawers, feeling around in them, trying not to think about the creepy-crawlies that might be lurking in these long unused places.
It had been silly, driving here. Los Angeles was filled with hotels. Shee could have stayed in one, or tolerated one more night at Thorpe House. Coming here had been pointless. It was only that she still owned this house, that it was empty...
That it was filled with memories.
Was that the reason she'd come? So she could immerse herself in remembrance of the day she'd come here to sell Peregrine to a faceless stranger and, instead, ended up in Travis's arms?
No, of course not. She was here because she'd needed to get away from L.A. and everything that was familiar. Travis wasn't the reason. She didn't love him. She'd slept with him, that was all. Surely, she was woman enough to come to grips with that.
Thunder roared again. The house shook in the grip of the storm. Where were those damned candles? What about a flashlight? There had to be one...
There was. Alex heaved a sigh of relief as her hand closed around it. Now if it would just work....
"Yes," she said happily, as a beam of light shot across the kitchen.
That was lots better. Some light. Some logic. Maybe even something to warm her bones. Wine. Surely, there'd be some here.
She searched the kitchen. The living room. The dining room. Perplexed, she stood in the foyer, trying to imagine where the wine, assuming there was some, would be kept. Her father, then Carl, had always kept spirits in the library.
She found the library easily enough. She'd missed it the first time but she came on it the second time, just off the living room. Actually, she thought as she shone the light around, actually, this was, as she'd always thought, a house with great possibilities. Too bad she'd agreed to sell it. Living here might be fun.
And she was due for some fun. Oh, it was good to be running her own life again instead of letting Travis do it for her.
That was how she'd ended up in this mess. She'd let him take over. He'd made arrangements, and she'd been stuck with them. If he'd asked her to move in with him the way any polite, civilized man would have done, she'd surely have said no. The arrogance of him, to have assumed she'd leap at the chance. Why would she have?
She was an attractive, capable, intelligent woman. She had no desire to tie herself to one man. She had interests. An income. A veritable empire to look after. She didn't need a man to mess around in her life and tell her what to do, certainly not one like Travis, who'd thought nothing of organizing her existence as if she were incapable of making her own choices.
Alex stood in the center of the library and shone the flashlight beam into each dark corner. Aha! There was a built-in bar. And some bottles-admittedly dusty but so what? Didn't wine improve with age?
Fine. She'd stay here until the lights came on again. Of all the rooms in the house, this one was the coziest-if you could call mahogany-paneled walls, overstuffed sofas, a desk the size of a baseball field and acres of leather-bound books cozy.
She padded to the bar, tucked the flashlight under her arm, checked over the bottles and selected a Cabernet Sauvignon with a Peregrine falcon on the label. She poured herself a healthy couple of inches. Then, light in one hand, glass in the other, she settled onto a bar stool.
No, she thought grimly, she had not appreciated having Travis commandeer her life but that was what he'd done, right from the beginning.
She took a sip of the wine.
He had swept her across that dance floor, the night they'd met, despite all her objections. He'd kissed her, in front of everybody. Come to her house, unasked, broken into it, forced himself on her...
The glass trembled in her hand.