"I'll leave as soon as the storm is over," he said in a tranquil voice, knowing he was conceding nothing. The storm would be over when he chose it to be over.

Jeremy nodded. "As long as we understand each other. You're not to touch her, you understand?"

"I understand," he said, agreeing to nothing. "I would have thought you'd be more concerned about your wife than your unmarried stepsister."

"Cynthia knows what she's getting herself into," he said with a faint sneer. "Laura doesn't. She's a complete innocent when it comes to men. Do you understand what I'm telling you? A complete innocent."

He managed a bored yawn, pleased with the effect. "If you're trying to tell me she's still a virgin at her advanced age, then let me assure you, I understand. My command of the English language is actually quite good."

"And she's going to stay that way."

"Why?" It was a simple enough question, but Jeremy looked taken aback.

"Because… because…" he blustered.

"Never mind," Alex said gently. "I've never been all that interested in innocents."

"And Laura is uninterested in men."

It was a patent lie, one that sat between them like a coiled snake. "Of course," Alex murmured politely, following his reluctant host into the darkness.

Jeremy looked disgustingly smug when he walked into the dining room, Laura thought, squashing down her unexpected anger. But the man behind him didn't look the slightest bit embarrassed or chastened.

Oh, she knew perfectly well what Jeremy had told him. That she was a poor, dying virgin. That to touch her was to kill her, and he surely didn't want that on his conscience.

She'd seen it happen time and time again, as her father and then her brothers warned men away from her, and her embarrassment had faded to mild annoyance over the years as she told herself she didn't care.

Tonight was different, and she wasn't certain why. Tonight she was shaking with anger and a strange kind of despair, and she didn't want to examine the reasons too closely for fear of what she might see.

But she'd been nothing but truthful when she told him that she hated lies. And most of all, she hated lying to herself.

She accepted her future—and lack thereof—stoically enough. Accepted her family's overprotectiveness, knowing there was no escape.

She looked at the tall, dark figure in the shadows behind Jeremy. He was watching her from behind his enveloping sunglasses, and she wondered what he saw. A pale, sad creature, doomed to a foreshortened life?

He wouldn't have needed to be warned away from her. He would have no reason to have any interest, not with Cynthia throwing her voluptuous curves at him. He'd been about to kiss her, and Laura had stood in the doorway watching, transfixed.

She hadn't wanted him to kiss Cynthia, to put his cool, wide mouth against Cynthia's. But if he did, she'd wanted to watch. To see how he kissed.

So she could imagine what it would feel like if he kissed her.

"Your face is flushed," he said, his voice husky. Jeremy turned and sent a warning glare at him, but Alex seemed unmoved by the threat.

Laura put a hand to her cheeks. "I'm hot," she admitted. "Too much rushing around."

"You know it's not good for you," Jeremy snapped in a petulant voice. "You shouldn't be waiting on our guest. I think you should come down to the guest house and stay with us. You know I've been trying to get you down there for days. I think Justine and Cynthia could do with your company."

"Stop it, Jeremy!" Laura snapped, fury overcoming her embarrassment. "You don't have to be so transparent. Alex is not going to come creeping into my room in the middle of the night, so you can stop doing the protective-big-brother thing, all right?"

Jeremy looked back at Alex's expressionless face, then at Laura's angry one. He managed a rueful laugh, one that didn't quite work. "I suppose I'm being ridiculous, aren't I?"

"Yes," Laura said firmly.

"Forgive an older brother. I worry about you. I should know by now you can take care of yourself."

"Yes, you should," Laura said firmly.

Alex didn't say a word.

CHAPTER FOUR

Jeremy sat alone in the library, staring into the fire as he nursed his whiskey. He was going to have to kill them all.

It had seemed so simple, so logical, when he first decided on it. William would be proud of him—the weakling son who had no blood claim to any of the Fitzpatrick boldness. He couldn't get the job done, the old man had told him years ago with blistering condescension. He was too weak, too civilized, not like the Fitzpatricks, who'd made their fortune and their power climbing over the dead bodies of the people they'd stabbed in the back.

Ah, but the old man had always underestimated him. He could backstab as well—better than—the next man. He was simply more subtle about it. Not for him the slice and dice.

He worked delicately. With a twist, and just the right amount of pressure, he could eviscerate an enemy and smile while he did it.

He'd been laying his plans carefully, knowing he had only borrowed time. They had to be dead before the old man finally breathed his last or it might all be for nothing. William was too strong, too mean, to die without a hell of a fight, but even he couldn't last forever. And during the past few days, Jeremy had made his plans.

It was to be simple. A carbon monoxide leak from a faulty heater would wipe out his wife, his neurotic stepsister and his drunken brother-in-law. He wouldn't be there—he would be staying up at the big house, at a bedside vigil. In his grief he would be dignified, restrained. Oh, he might allow himself to break down at an opportune moment, just to play it through to the end. After all, Laura was no fool.

But she was gullible, innocent, and had no idea what he was capable of. She'd been spared, in many ways, by her previous brushes with death. There was no need for Jeremy to shorten her life with the others. She wouldn't outlive the old man by long, and she would have no other heirs. All that money would end up where it belonged, with the strongest of them all. The man who could do what needed to be done.

Jeremy Fitzpatrick.

The storm was a mixed blessing. It cut off access to the rest of the world, and it would enable Jeremy to take his time, alter his plans, if need be. He didn't like the newcomer. Not the mirrored sunglasses or the faintly derisive smile on his mouth. Nor the interest he showed in Laura.

But in the end, it would make no difference. Even if the storm had brought them Alex, it kept others away. They were trapped at the mountaintop compound with far fewer than their usual complement of servants and outsiders. Only Mrs. Hawkins and the nurse were there now, and both of them were too centered on the old man to notice anything unusual.

William's unexpected rally gave him more time, but Jeremy didn't want it. He'd looked down into his stepfather's face and smiled a tender, filial smile, but he'd wanted to wrap his fingers around the old man's wattled neck and choke the life out of him.

No, time for the Fitzpatrick family had run out. Ricky and Justine were asleep already—Ricky was drunk, Justine equally comatose from tranquilizers. Cynthia was asleep, as well, her beautiful face flushed and sated. He'd given her what she wanted, since the stranger had refused to succumb, and she'd taken it, clawing at his back, spitting at him when she peaked, her contempt and hatred complete despite her need. She thought he was weak, as well.