Moonlight Masquerade (Edilean 8)

She watched while he took the saddle off the horse and made the animal comfortable. Food and water had been left there, so it looked as though arrangements had been made for their arrival. He cares about animals as well as people, she thought.

There was a quick flash of lightning, then a clap of thunder so loud that Sophie jumped.

Reede held out his hand to her. “Let’s go,” he said.

She took his hand and followed him as they ran out of the shed and down a brick path to a house that was barely visible. Vines grew up trellises on the walls, and overgrown shrubs obscured the windows. She doubted that the building could be seen from the road.

Reede had some trouble getting the door open. It wasn’t locked but it was stuck—and he knew exactly where to kick it so it opened.

“It’s always been like that,” he said as, still holding her hand, he led her inside.

They entered a big room that was open all the way up to the roof. A double row of heavy wooden beams was overhead. There were a few pieces of furniture about, but it all looked old and used. The house had an air of vacancy about it, as though no one had lived in it for years.

Turning, she looked up at him in question. His eyes were obscured by the mask, but she could see that they were blue and his lashes were long. Dr. Reede Aldredge was a gorgeous man. She wondered why she didn’t remember seeing photos of him in college, and if he’d visited Kim, why hadn’t she seen him? But then she remembered. He’d said there’d never been anything between him and Jecca, but that wasn’t quite true. “Jecca is why I don’t remember you,” she said.

He looked at her in puzzlement for a moment, then smiled. Dropping her hand, he went around a corner of the big room and into a kitchen. On the old countertop was a big picnic basket.

“You’re right. Kim hoped to marry me off to Jecca,” he said as he opened the lid and looked inside.

“I’d forgotten that. Every time you visited, I was sent away. But Jecca didn’t . . . ”

“Marry me?” he asked, smiling. “Tris got to her first.”

“Right,” Sophie said and suddenly felt let down. It looked like she was second choice.

Reede gave her a long, lingering, full-body look. “I’m glad he did. Jecca can’t make a sculpture of me with the children I came to love, she can’t make a home out of an old warehouse, and she does not look like you.” He gave her a look of such appreciation that Sophie felt her face turn red.

“Now,” he said, “where should we eat?”

Sophie wanted to say “Nowhere,” because when they finished they’d have to leave. She wanted to postpone the end. “Is this your house?”

“No,” he said, and stepped away from the basket. “But I know it well. Would you like to see it?”

“Sure.”

For a moment he was silent, as though trying to decide what to say. He looked at Sophie and smiled. It should have been odd, since they were both wearing masks, but that seemed to add to the intimacy of the moment. “I wanted to buy this house,” he said. “It belonged to the family of a friend of mine, and when I was a kid I often stayed here. I—” Suddenly, the rain increased, and the torrent was loud. Reede’s eyes widened. “Quick!” he said as he hurried around the countertop and started throwing open cabinet doors. He pulled out a stack of beat-up old pots and held out a couple to Sophie.

She had no idea what he was doing, but then a drop of rain hit her head. “Oh!”

“Right! Oh,” Reede said as he ran to the far end of the room and put a big pan on the floor. In the next second a trickle of rain came down and went directly into the pot. Sophie stepped back and put a plastic tub where she’d been standing, and the rain dripped into it. “Where else?” she asked Reede.

“There, in that corner.”

It took them minutes of scurrying about, running from leak to leak, to get all the kettles and pots and saucepans down. They ran back into the kitchen—which seemed to be dry—to look at their handiwork.

“Did we get them all?” Sophie asked.

“I think so.” He was looking at her with pride. “Thanks for the help, and I must say that it was a joy to watch you run about the room.”

She started to say something modest but changed her mind. “Those tall boots of yours are doing it for me.”

Reede laughed. “I’ll have to thank Sara.” He put his hand on the picnic basket. “We could sit at the table and eat.”

The way he said it seemed to have a question at the end. “Or . . . ?” she asked.

He stepped back into the living room and looked upward. “See those little doors up there?”

High up, at one end of the tall, open ceiling was a set of louvered doors no more than three feet tall.