Lover Beware 03 - After Midnight

certain formality in his dealings with both Jane and Patrick, unwilling to hurt a dying man, because he couldn't keep his hands off Patrick O'Reilly's wife, but right now he was too steamed to walk anywhere.
    When he drew up next to the O'Reilly cottage, the long extended twilight had condensed into early dusk, helped along by the thick mantle of cloud. All the lights were off in the house, and Jess was barking.
    Michael knocked on the front door. When there was no reply, he walked around the side of the house, his gaze brooding as he knocked on the kitchen door, then scanned the smoothly mown lawns, the neatly weeded vegetable garden, and the lush shrubbery. Jess was tied up, which meant Jane was out.
    He strolled over to the kennel and went down on his haunches beside the little dog. She whined and shoved her muzzle at his hand. He rubbed behind her ears. "At least you're not afraid of me."
    He had a strong suspicion that Jane was frightened out of her skin of him, and the way he felt right now, she should be.
    He did a quick circuit of the outbuildings, automatically testing the locks, the urge to check the security of the buildings ingrained. The O'Reilly place was, in stark contrast to his, as neat and tidy as a new pin. A small herd of southdown sheep grazed in the paddock adjacent to the house, their wool recently clipped. The fences and the stockyard were in good repair, and the barn had just had a fresh coat of paint. He checked her garage and saw that it was empty.
    Cursing beneath his breath, he thumped the side of the small weatherboard building. Damned if he'd leave without After Midnight
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    letting her know he'd been here. Jane had been avoiding him for days. The blank stare she'd given him in the car park outside the police station was the sum total of their interaction , since he'd come back.
    He strode back to his truck, reached into the glove box, pulled out a pen, and ripped a sheet from his diary. Scribbling a note, he anchored the piece of paper on the doormat of the front door with a rock he found in the garden.
    It was hardly satisfactory, but it conveyed his message. He was finished with playing games. He'd waited seven years.
    As far as he was concerned that was seven years too long.
    JANE EDGED THE car into her garage. It was dark, the night moonless and overcast as she slung the strap of her hand-bag over her shoulder and hauled her bags of groceries out of the boot. Juggling the bags, she locked the car and the garage door, then trudged the short distance to the house and set the groceries down on the path while she went to let Jess off the leash.
    Jess strained at the collar, tail wagging, as Jane struggled to unclip the leash. A wet tongue swiped across her face, then the clip came free, and Jess bounded off into the night, doing her customary tour of the grounds as Jane collected the groceries and mounted the steps to the verandah. As she set the groceries down, the pale luminescence of a piece of white paper caught her eye. She retrieved the note, and set the rock that had anchored it to the doormat to one side, unlocked the door, and flicked on the hall and porch lights.
    The note was brief and to the point.
    "Call me, Michael."
    Raw heat flashed through her, making her belly clench and her knees turn to jelly. The moment Michael's gaze had locked on hers outside the police station replayed itself in her mind, and abruptly she was spun back almost seven years when she'd opened the door, and found him on her doorstep dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, his hair damp as if he'd not long stepped from the shower. His wife had left just days before, and she had also been on her own because Patrick had been in hospital for an operation.
    He hadn't asked to come in, and she hadn't offered any hospitality. The lack of manners on her part had been unspeak-200
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    ably rude for a small country community, but erecting some kind of barrier had been necessary, because the moment she looked into his dark gaze the reason he affected her so badly was suddenly clear, and the revelation shook her to the core.
    His dark gaze pinned her. "The reason Clare left is that she knows I'm in love with you."
    The words dropped into a pool of silence and for a moment she wondered if she'd misheard, or even worse, if her guilty mind had somehow supplied the words she wanted to hear.
    She'd felt dazed, at once present and peculiarly removed from the scene taking place, as if there were two Janes—one who