Midnight Jewels

the door. He left the vault unlocked but closed behind him. He stepped out into the shadows of the garden, remembering his first thought when he had seen the pool room.
    A good place to hunt or hide.
    Gravel crunched under his booted foot. A false sense of well-being must be making him careless. Or had the crunching sound come from someone else? He ought to be able to tell the difference, damn it.
    A heavy palm frond blocked his path. Croft put out a hand and shoved it aside with a sense of impatience. There was someone else in the garden, he was sure of it. Not a guest. A guest wouldn't have cared how much noise he or she made. Whoever it was was trying to hide.
    Time to play hunter, Croft told himself, feeling suddenly invincible. Mercy was always saying he reminded her of a ghost. Well, now was the time to play ghost.
    Another crunch of leather on gravel. His own footstep or someone else's? Croft wiped the back of his hand across his forehead and discovered he was sweating.
    Couldn't be nerves. He knew what fear tasted like and he wasn't tasting it tonight. Not yet at any rate.
    Instinctively he headed toward the pool. There was more light in that direction. He would force the other hunter to reveal himself against the blue glow of the underwater lighting. He chose another path and started toward the center of the garden.
    What a truly brilliant idea, he thought. Make the other guy reveal himself. Too bad Mercy wasn't here to appreciate his brilliance. Croft got the feeling that on occasion she didn't think too highly of his strategic planning capabilities. Little did she know. He was good at this kind of thing.
    Damn good.
    But not good enough that night.
    Croft sensed the movement behind him but his body didn't react the way it had been trained to do. Everything went wrong.
    He tried to turn and stumbled, slightly off balance. The movement hardly qualified as a stunning example of training and coordination, but it probably saved his life. The blow that had been meant to land on the back of his head caught him mostly on the shoulder.
    Croft had a distant impression of someone hovering in the bushes, watching him. But he couldn't concentrate on his unseen opponent. Searing pain shot through his arm and up his neck. It was followed by a sense of rage that would have been earth shaking if he had been in any condition to give voice to it.
    The only thing he could do was go with the flow. He let the force of the blow send him over the edge of the pool and into the water.
    Blind, dumb instinct kept him from moving so much as- a muscle as he hit the surface. He floated face down in the water and concentrated on holding his breath. After all those years of breathing exercises, he ought to at least be able to hold his breath for a while. Croft knew his survival probably depended on his assailant assuming that he would quickly drown.
    It was a logical assumption under the circumstances. Drunks who got struck on the head and wound up facedown in a swimming pool usually did drown.
    Croft opened his eyes and stared down through the depths of the glowing water. Mercy was right. The color of the pool water bore an uncanny resemblance to Gladstone's eyes.
    Mercy. Sweet Mercy, I need you.

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Chapter THIRTEEN

    Much to Mercy's surprise, she found herself interested in the conversation with Micah Morgan, Gladstone and Isobel. Micah's enthusiasm was contagious, and if Gladstone's comments weren't always amazingly insightful or brilliant, one could always take pleasure in just listening to his marvelous speaking voice.
    "The important thing about working in Santa Fe," Micah was explaining very seriously, "is the fact that there would still be a couple thousand miles between me and New York. You wouldn't have to worry about me being influenced by the East Coast art establishment. You were absolutely right two years ago when you told me I needed to get out of New York. But I'm changing again. I really think it's time I left the colony. I'm beginning to feel stifled there."
    "Moving to Santa Fe isn't the answer for you, Micah. Too much West Coast influence there now," Gladstone told him soothingly. "The hard edges would bleed through into your work. You need time to solidify your unique style before you try to take it to either L.A., New York or Santa Fe. Trust me. You need the control and isolation of the colony for a while longer. It's done wonders for you."
    Micah's head bobbed up and down like a yoyo on a string. "I know,