Always in My Dreams Read Online Free PDF Page A

up. It wasn't to be. She winced as Black Cap pushed himself into a kneeling position, swiped at his icy chin with the back of his hand, and looked over his shoulder at the prey who had become the predator.
    "You're a nasty bit of business, ain't you?" Black Cap muttered. "You afraid to face me with your fists?"
    The stranger stood his ground, saying nothing.
    "That's what I thought." He reached into the pocket of his coat and pulled out a derringer, a deadly weapon in the right hands and at close range. "Then go up against this, you bastard."
    The stranger didn't wait until Black Cap finished his sentence before he attacked. His lithe body was a blur of motion, spinning, flying, leaping. A single kick dislodged the gun from Black Cap's hand. His wrist, devoid of all feeling now, was trapped beneath the stranger's foot. A second solid kick to Black Cap's gut drove the breath from his lungs. Black Cap collapsed and never saw the blow that centered between his shoulder blades. His body shuddered once, then was as still as his partner's.
    The stranger stepped back and paused, looking at his felled attackers. Skye thought he might be using the time to catch his breath, but he wasn't winded in the least. He simply seemed to be indulging in a moment of detached curiosity.
    Skye watched him take his fill. He shook his head back and forth slowly, as if he could not quite believe what had taken place, or at least couldn't comprehend the stupidity of his assailants. Although his back was to Skye, she imagined that she could see his mouth curved in an ironic sort of half smile.
    "You were never in any danger, ma'am."
    Skye started, blinking widely. She looked around, her eyes darting to shadows on the other side of the path. It didn't seem possible that he intended his comment for her.
    "Or is it 'miss'?" he asked.
    Mary Schyler inched away from the pine tree but not out from under its protective canopy. "Sure and I'm thinkin' it's none of your concern," she said cheekily, affecting her mother's lilting Irish brogue.
    He turned toward her and the moon shining on his face gave Skye slender evidence of a smile that was a bit menacing in its coolness. "You're right," he said. "You'd better be on your way."
    Skye didn't want to leave the safety of the sheltering pines. She was merely a shadow to him and she wanted to remain that way. "You first." He ducked his head and she thought the action hid a more fulsome smile. She wished she could see him better, yet to do so would have compromised her own anonymity.
    "I need to look after these men, don't you think?" he asked her.
    Since both Black Cap and Yellow Cap seemed to be perfectly unconscious, Skye could only imagine what his "looking after" might entail. "You're going to kill them?" she asked. "Right here in the park?" She thought she heard him chuckle. The low, husky, back-of-the-throat sound sent a shiver up her spine, yet she recognized it wasn't fear that she felt, but something just as elemental and infinitely more intimate.
    "I'm going to tie them up."
    Remembering what Black Cap had pulled out of his pocket after reaching inside, Skye held her breath as the stranger's hand slipped into his own overcoat. A normal rhythm resumed when he held out a length of rope and dangled it in front of her. "You were prepared," she said.
    "I've learned to be."
    She wondered what sort of man he was that he had anticipated a walk in the park would be so fraught with danger. It occurred to Skye that she didn't even know which side of the law he was on. "Why were they after you?" she asked.
    "Sure, and I'm thinkin' it's none of your concern," he said, echoing her earlier words as well as her accent.
    This time she heard the smile in his voice even if she couldn't see it. He was amused by her and that didn't set well with Skye. "I could scream," she told him, "and bring down the beat cops on your head."
    "You could," he said. He knelt beside Black Cap, drew out a knife, and cut off a length of rope. In