Nicholas Vickers, private investigator, was as comfortable in a graveyard as he was in his own game room. That the graveyard hadn't seen a new grave dug in a very long time only enhanced his sense of belonging.

Wrapping the night's shadows around himself like a cloak, he stood beneath a large maple tree and watched a biker gang enjoying the ambiance of Ten Oaks Cemetery. Their idea of fun did not include showing respect for the dead.

Eight of them had roared up on bikes half an hour ago. The two who'd brought girls with them had made use of the scant privacy afforded by a pair of chipped and listing headstones to satisfy their sexual needs. They were now relaxing with their friends, lounging among the tall grass and weeds.

A scruffy blonde in a leather jacket finished off his beer, tossed the can over his shoulder and opened another. He took a swig just as one of his cohorts leaned over to deliver the punch line of a joke. The blonde laughed uproariously, spraying beer all over the head-stone next to the fallen one on which his butt was perched. Another partygoer clambered to his feet and wandered off into the shadows only to return a minute later, zipping his fly.

Nick watched the goings-on with disgust. These animals had no respect for sacred ground. Or any other ground, as far as he could tell.

Over the past several weeks, he'd learned that the repulsive crew had ridden down from Baltimore, about twenty miles north, to enjoy the rural atmosphere of Howard County. School playgrounds, local parks, old cow pastures — they'd put their unique stamp on a number of spots. But Ten Oaks Cemetery seemed to be their favorite. Unfortunately for them.

The small burial ground was a stark contrast to Dayton Acres, a new development of two-story colonials that stood only a cornfield away. Not surprisingly, the owners weren't eager to share their costly locale with a bunch of crude invaders. They'd complained to the cops, who had come out a few times but, failing to catch the bikers in any illegal acts, had more or less washed their hands of the problem.

Frustrated but determined, the homeowners' association had taken matters into its own hands and hired Nick.

As Nick watched, two of the big lugs pushed over a gravestone. It fell to the ground with a thud and cracked in half.

"Oops!"

The witticism drew a burst of laughter from the leather- clad crowd.

"Okay, gentlemen, it's time," Nick muttered. He was going to enjoy scaring the spit out of these worthless jerks.

He was wearing one of his favorite outfits, a reproduction of an eighteenth-century highwayman's costume — black shirt, black britches and high black boots. In his machine shop, he'd made two flintlock replicas, except instead of holding a single shot, they each held a sixteen-shot clip filled with blanks. He stuck the weapons into his belt, then donned the other props he'd brought — a hood and vest, both black. The hood was painted like a skull, while the vest was adorned with ribs and vertebrae, all in white fluorescent paint.

He hated to resort to cheap tricks, but he figured it was the fastest, cleanest way to get rid of these brainless slobs. And, really, he couldn't suppress an evil grin as he imagined his quarries' reactions to the surprise he had in store for them.

Halloween costume in place, he drew one of the pistols and stepped from under the shadows of the maple. In the next instant, he charged.

Moving with superhuman speed, feet barely touching the ground, he zoomed toward the gang. At the last second, just before reaching the blonde, he veered off, whipping past the little cemetery like a creature who had clawed his way up from one of the graves.

"Wha' the hell was that?" one of the bikers gasped.

"Dunno," his companion replied.

Nick changed his angle of attack. Weaving among the headstones, using the moves he'd learned in one of the video games he liked to play, he fired off a couple of blanks. Like a wraith out of "Phantom Combat," he reached out with his free hand to knock over a couple of the revelers as he sped past.

The two guys cried out as they hit the ground. The women who'd come for fun and games screamed like banshees. Nick let loose with his best Tales from the Crypt cackle, then fired off a couple more shots.

By the time he wheeled around for another pass, the bikers and their lady friends were scrambling for their hogs. Only one of them was dumb enough to stay and challenge the supernatural intruder who had interrupted their party.

Nick recognized the moron as Butch McCard, the unofficial leader of the group. Reaching into his boot, McCard pulled out a small pistol and fired in Nick's general direction. The bullet took a chunk off the top of a headstone five or six feet away.

"Big mistake," Nick growled, zooming toward the shooter like a monster escaped from a horror movie, firing blanks from the pistols as he went.

The guy stumbled backward a few paces. "No! Please! Don't kill me!"

"Be gone!" Nick roared. Suiting action to words, he shoved his pistol into his belt and jammed his hands into McCard's armpits. Lifting the two-hundred-plus-pound man as if he were a bag of lemons, Nick tossed him so hard that he landed twenty feet away, in the cornfield beside the burial ground.

The jerk lay still for a moment, gasping for breath. Then he scrambled up and dashed toward his bike.

The engine wouldn't start, and he desperately cranked the ignition, cursing like a sailor. When his bike roared to life, he didn't even look back as he raced away into the night.

Nick stood at the edge of the cemetery, watching the departing figure and fighting a vague feeling of disappointment. The bikers hadn't been much of a challenge.

Turning, he surveyed the beer cans and fast-food wrappers littering the ground. Cleanup wasn't part of his job, but he returned to his hiding place, shucked his skeleton costume and pulled out the plastic garbage bag he'd brought along. He left the trash neatly at the side of the access road. Then, finished with the night's work, he walked across the field to the car he'd hidden behind a tangle of honeysuckle vines, and headed for home.

He'd purchased the Victorian farmhouse and surrounding twenty-five acres when prices were still reasonable. From the outside, none of the eccentric renovations he'd made showed, changes made to bring the place up to his specifications — along with a few ideas borrowed from Batman.

The garage was underground, the ramp hidden by a door that looked like a wooden retaining wall. Behind the garage were his workshop and laboratory. He'd made certain that the contractor who had done the work would never tell anyone about it.

As far as the interior of the house went, Nick had done most of the work himself, utilizing some of the useful skills he'd acquired over the years. As he walked through the lower level to the restored first floor and looked around, he felt a familiar sense of satisfaction. His home was a showplace decorated with eighteenth-and nineteenth- century antiques. He'd made a satisfying life for himself here, and he intended to hang on to it as long as he could. Which was why he kept to himself. None of his neighbors and only a few of his clients had ever set foot inside the house, and he meant to keep it that way.

And yet...

His gut was telling him that change was coming. It had overtaken him too often in the past for him not to feel the vibrations. He wasn't ready for it — he never was — but if time had taught him anything, it was that change was inevitable. It would come whether or not he was ready and, good or bad, he would have to face it.

Something else he'd learned — worrying about the future was energy wasted.

Moving quickly, he strode down the hall to his office, where his computer appeared as a strangely modern addition to the Winthrop desk on which it sat. Pulling up his chair, he typed a report on the evening's activities for the Dayton Acres Community Association, attached a bill and e-mailed it to the organization's president.

Not that he needed the money. He could have lived very nicely on his investments. But having once "enjoyed" a life of leisure, he knew he'd be bored witless inside a week if he didn't keep busy.

He checked his e-mail for the next chess move from his opponent in Quito, Ecuador. Juan had moved his knight into a position that would prove vulnerable six moves down the line. In the library he moved the piece to its new position.

Work and play finished for the night, he went downstairs to the basement to set the alarm system — not a conventional alarm but something a lot more creative that he'd invented in his spare time. After crossing the unfinished section of the basement, he stepped through a doorway that led into a completely different environment: his private living quarters, with its comfortable lounge and bedroom, and an admittedly sybaritic bathroom.

Sleep tugged at him. Yet he sat for an hour on the wide leather couch in the lounge, surfing the hundreds of television channels beamed in through his satellite dish. He used all six screens, flicking through multiple images in four languages — English, Spanish, French and Arabic.

He knew why he was avoiding the inevitability of sleep, and in the privacy of his own thoughts, he could acknowledge the cowardice involved. He didn't want to face the dreams that had been disturbing his slumber for the past few weeks.

Sometimes they were scenes from long ago, scenes that he had struggled to banish from his mind. He saw Jeanette again. He saw himself, bound and helpless. He saw a monster — a monster he recognized — leading Jeanette off to her death.

Then, as his dreaming self watched in confusion, Jeanette was transformed. Her sophisticated French upsweep had become straight, shoulder-length and blond. Her large brown eyes changed to blue, her small rosebud mouth widened into full, sensual lips and her complexion paled.

He was dreaming about another woman. He was certain he'd never met her, yet she returned again and again to haunt his sleep. At first, the dreams had all been nightmares of her death. Lately, though, things had taken a very different turn.

He'd be holding Jeanette in his arms, kissing her, making sweet love to her with all the tender emotions he had felt so long ago. And then, suddenly, it was the other woman he was holding, and all the passion he'd learned to keep tightly in check was unleashed. Their clothing vanished, and they were skin-to-skin close, chest to breasts, legs tangling together amid silky-soft sheets. His mouth devoured hers as he caressed her breast with one hand and, with the other, searched to find the slick heat between her legs. She lay back on the bed and held out her arms, and he came down on top of her...then awoke, blood pounding, breathing ragged, body covered with sweat.

He squeezed his eyes shut, struggling to banish the heated scene from his mind. He didn't want to dream. Not of the few sweetly tender moments of love he'd shared with Jeanette, nor of her death or the fiend who had caused it. And certainly not of wildly erotic love-making with a woman who, if she even existed, he'd never met and could never hope to have.

Finally, when his body dictated that sleep was his only option, Nick wearily undressed and lay down on his bed. His last conscious thought was to hope that the dreams would leave him be.