CHAPTER 8
Jared had done his share of living. In his thirty-nine years, he had had many friends, and of those, many had been women. He had been through numerous relationships, two live-in loves, and one wife. But no woman had ever looked at him with quite the need he had seen in Savannah’s eyes. From the moment at the studio when she had turned around and looked at him, he had seen the need. And the admiration. There had also been admiration in her eyes.
He was used to admiration. Women took to his looks, just as they did to his voice, and he played on the latter. His voice was a marketable commodity. It was largely responsible for the appeal of his show. He intentionally enhanced it with his choice of words and his tone.
But he did nothing to enhance his looks and deliberately kept as low a profile as possible. He enjoyed the anonymity he’d found in Rhode Island; he enjoyed being able to walk the streets unknown. When a PR event took place, he sent one of the other DJs. When the request was specifically for Jared Snow, he turned it down with a firm excuse. He treasured his newfound privacy. It was critical to him at this time in his life, when he was feeling his way along, waiting for the ultimate inspiration to hit.
Then along came Savannah’s need. He had been skeptical at first, wondering if she was after something as simple as sex. As they talked, though, he’d begun to wonder. She didn’t make a play for him. She didn’t do anything remotely seductive—at least, not intentionally. There had been that moment when he’d been in the sound booth and had looked out at her through the glass. She’d just taken off her coat. He suspected he would have stared even if she hadn’t bent over to retrieve her briefcase.
She was not striking. Nor was she gorgeous. But in an understated way, she was sexy as hell. Her features were smooth and appealing, her skin soft and fair. Her hair was a glossy brown mass gathered into a sedate knot, begging, just begging, for release. In fact, that was what was so sexy about her—her neatness was a challenge. She was the consummate professional, yet she held hints of sweetness that tried a man’s soul. She didn’t hide the slender length of her legs or the slight turn of her hips or the gentle swell of her breasts, yet none were boldly broadcast. There was a mystery to her. She was alluring.
She turned him on.
“I won’t hold it against you, y’know,” he teased in a voice that was just loud enough to rise above the noise of the idling engine.
Safely strapped into the passenger seat of his Pathfinder, Savannah focused on the pedestrians passing by.
He tried again. “You can look at me any way you want. I don’t mind.”
She turned her head away, but not before he caught a hint of color on her cheeks.
“You’re under a lot of pressure,” he said. “I’m glad to help.”
The traffic light turned. He accelerated smoothly, and for several minutes the noise of the engine was the only sound in the car. Then, speaking quietly, she said, “I would have pegged you for a Porsche.”
He kept his eyes on the road. “Me? Nah. I need something more practical.”
“For what?”
“Carting equipment.”
Her voice remained wary, but he sensed her eyes were turned toward him, which was a step in the right direction. “Don’t you have gofers to do that, or is that only with TV?”
“TV, mostly. We don’t have the need. But I wasn’t talking about the station. I was talking about my boat.”
She was silent for a minute. “What kind of boat is it?”
“A forty-six-foot Morgan.” He kept his voice low and slow. “She’s in dry dock right now, but I’ll be putting her in the water in another month. From April through November, she’s my home.”
“You live on a boat?” she asked, unable to conceal her enthusiasm.
He nodded.
“What’s it like?”
He thought for a minute. “Peaceful. You’ve been on the ocean, haven’t you?”
She nodded.
“Sensed that freedom?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, it’s kind of like that. It doesn’t matter how tightly you’re moored or how calm the tide, you still feel that lulling. And the sense of freedom is always there. You know that whenever things get tense, you can cast off. Even if you don’t often do it, knowing you can gives you a psychological edge.”
He stopped at another red light. Savannah was staring out the window again. “There are times,” she said in a distant voice, “when I’d give anything to be able to cast off, when I want to get away from everything, to run away.” Returning to the present, she sent him an awkward half-smile. “Irresponsible, hmm?”
“If I say yes, I condemn myself. Everyone feels that at times.”
She wasn’t so sure. There were people in the world without worries or responsibilities. Looking away again, she said, “When I was little, I was always zipping around. My energy level was incredible. Sometimes I’d lose control and run smack into whatever was in my path. But that was okay. I just had to stand up and brush myself off.
“Then I got my driver’s license, and I imagined the same thing would happen, that I’d get going too fast and lose control, only if I started colliding with things, I’d be in real trouble.”
She focused unseeingly on the scenery that, with the turn of the traffic light, was passing once more. “There are times when I feel that I’ve lost control of my life, that I’m on the verge of a huge collision. It’s like I’m on a slide; I’m steadily gaining momentum, and I want to get off, but I can’t.”
“Sure, you can.”
“No. There are commitments, responsibilities. I’m an adult. An adult can’t quit when the going gets rough.”
“I take it,” Jared said softly, “this is one of the rough times.” He glanced at her in time to catch her nod. “What happens during the easy times?”
She gave a high-pitched laugh. “I’m usually bored.” With a quick breath, she looked over at him. “Between the rough times and the easy times are the times I love. They’re the times when the challenge is there without the trauma. Thank God, they come most often.”
“You’re lucky. Some people can’t say that.”
“I know.” Her voice lowered. “Take your next right.”
They drove along in silence for several minutes, but Savannah didn’t mind that. Jared was still a comfort, a solid presence. He was someone separate from her career, separate from her past. He was an eye in the storm of her life.
Too soon, she directed him to the Vandermeers’ circular drive. At the front door, he shifted into neutral and asked, “Will you stay long?”
“That depends on how Will is. If he’s running around the house waving a gun, it might take a little longer to calm him down than if he’s just sitting in a chair tossing off threats.”
“Can I wait?”
She shook her head. “You shouldn’t be here at all. We’ve tried to involve as few people as possible. As it is, I’ll have some explaining to do when I get inside. I’m sure they’ve seen us.”
Jared would have been glad to come in and help with the explaining. Instinctively, he knew that she would not allow it. For all her talk of escape, she wasn’t a coward. She was a professional, through and through.
But she wasn’t racing to get out of the car.
So he asked gently, “When is Megan due back?”
“The money is to be delivered at eight. Sometime after that, Will should get a call telling him where she is, and sometime after that we’ll pick her up.” She looked worried. “God only knows what will happen then.”
He reached over and touched her cheek lightly with one finger. It was a gesture of encouragement that came, left its mark, and vanished. “You’ll be working late.”
She nodded.
“You were with me last night, then at the office today. Tonight you’ll be here, or wherever. When do you sleep?”
“I’m like you, I guess. I don’t need much. And when I need more than I get, I make up for it on weekends.”
“But weekends should be for regenerating.”
“Sleep is regenerative.”
“I was thinking about taking in shows and concerts and museums, skiing, shopping, sunbathing on the lawn.”
“Sunbathing on the lawn.” She smiled. “Mmmm, that sounds nice.”
Her smile was so soft and alluring that Jared wanted to take back what he had just said. He could spend the weekend in bed with her, and it would probably be the most regenerative thing he would ever do.
Watching the gray flecks in his eyes darken, Savannah felt an answering awareness deep inside. “I have to run,” she whispered and reached for her briefcase. When she had its straps firmly on her shoulder, she gripped the door handle. Although she knew she should resist, she looked back at Jared for a final eyeful of his strength.
He swore softly. Nearly as softly, and very hoarsely, he said, “I may have the patience of a saint, but I’m not made of stone. So help me, Savannah, the next time you look at me that way, I’m going to kiss you.”
Her heart beat wildly. “I have to run.”
“Did you hear what I said?”
Opening the door, she said, “Thanks for driving me here. It was a break.” She slid out.
He leaned across the seat. “Savannah?”
She swung the door closed, but he quickly rolled down the window. As though she’d intended to all along, she leaned in. “Will you let me know if you find anything in those reports?”
“You know I will,” he said gruffly. Tugging open the glove compartment, he pulled out a small pad of paper and a pen. He jotted down several phone numbers, tore off the sheet of paper, and held it out. “You can reach me at any time.”
Savannah grasped the paper but he didn’t immediately release it. Uncompromisingly, his eyes held hers.
“I have to go,” she whispered in a pleading tone.
Still he bound her, reinforcing the bond between them with each second that passed. Finally, when his own heart was thudding under the pressure, he released the paper.
Savannah quickly pocketed it. “Thanks. Thanks for everything, Jared.”
“Savannah—”
“I’ll talk with you later.” With a wave she was away from the car, an elegant figure trotting up the front steps. The door opened as soon as she reached it. Without a backward glance, she was gone.
* * *
William Vandermeer wasn’t running around the house waving a gun, mainly because the gun had vanished with Megan, but he was far from the numb creature he had been through much of the wait. There was a wildness in his eyes, a combination of desperation and sheer terror that was chilling in its own right.
Surrounded by Susan, Sam, and Hank, Savannah sat with him and talked. She ran through one argument after another, trying to convince him to stay cool, and when she’d gone through them all, Sam thought up more. Between them, they seemed to calm him.
With the insurance company set to deliver the money at four that afternoon and nothing to do until then, Savannah managed to convince him to rest for a while. Soon after he went upstairs, she and Susan went into the living room to talk.
“Are you okay?” she asked quietly. She sat sideways facing Susan, who wasn’t drinking but looked as though she badly wanted to.
Susan leaned back against the sofa’s brocade cushions and closed her eyes. “Ask me that in a week when I’m back home with all this forgotten.”
“I’m really grateful to you. You know that, don’t you? I couldn’t be here and at work at the same time, and Will needed one of us.”
Resting her head against the sofa, Susan opened one eye toward Savannah. “It’s sad, Will needing us. The Vandermeers were always such a well-known family. He should have dozens of people rallying ’round.”
“This is a kidnapping, not a party. He wanted to keep things quiet.”
“What he wanted,” Susan corrected, “was to keep the shortage of money quiet. You should see this place, Savvy. It’s looking pretty dumpy.”
“Not dumpy. Just tired. And only at spots.”
“What happened? What did Will do to the business?”
Savannah shrugged. “By his own admission, he’s a lousy money manager.”
“But he could have hired people to manage the money for him. When you come right down to it, how many people in his position do you know of who don’t have armies of financial advisers and accountants?”
“The Vandermeers were always different that way. They were self-contained. Will’s father and uncle built the business from scratch. Each had a strength. Apparently, Will’s uncle was the whiz with figures, not Will’s dad, and certainly not Will.”
“I still can’t believe he’s blown it all. Meggie deserves better.”
“She does, but only because things were so tough for her growing up. Will adores her. Maybe that compensates for whatever financial problems they have.”
Susan wasn’t buying that. “I can’t imagine a love that strong. I mean, if you’re talking a decrease of income from eighty thousand a year to sixty-five, that may be true. There’s no abrupt change of lifestyle then. But from a million down to three hundred thousand, with most of that being poured back into the business—when a woman assumes she’s marrying onto easy street and suddenly finds that she has to budget money for a weekend at the spa, that love would have to be phenomenal.” She shook her head. “No love’s that strong.” Stretched out in her yellow sweat suit, with her ankles crossed over leg warmers and aerobic sneakers, she looked and sounded surprisingly authoritative.
“Sad to feel that way,” Savannah mused.
“Realistic.”
“But sad. Don’t you ever dream that you’ll love a man that way? Or that a man will love you that way?”
“No.”
“Never?”
“Never. Do you?”
Savannah hesitated before saying tentatively, “I have.”
“Because you’re a romantic. You dream through rose-colored glasses.”
“Isn’t a dream, by definition, something rosy?”
“Not necessarily. A dream can be practical. It doesn’t have to be so overblown as to be unattainable. That’s your problem, Savvy. You shoot too high.”
“There’s nothing unrealistic about hoping for love.”
“Not when it’s a realistic kind of love.”
“How would you define a ‘realistic’ kind of love?”
“One where two people take pleasure from a relationship. That pleasure can be financial or social. It doesn’t always have to be interpersonal, and it certainly isn’t the kind of all-powerful thing you have in mind. Your expectations for love are as high as your expectations for everything else in your life. But you’re only setting yourself up for a fall. Don’t you see that?”
Savannah didn’t want to. “The way I look at it,” she said, “if my expectations are high, I stand more of a chance of getting what I want than if I’d aimed lower to start with.”
She grew quiet when Sam wandered into the room. She smiled at him when he moved on into the library. The French door had been fixed. Propping a forearm high against its frame, he looked out over the patio.
Susan resumed the conversation in a voice that was low and private but carried conviction. “The thing that matters most in a relationship is respect. Respect comes from power, and power comes from money. Statistics show that financial pressures are behind most divorces.”
“What do statistics know? If the marriage is strong, the couple can handle the financial pressures.”
“But money matters.” Her eyes strayed to Sam’s lanky frame. “It’s a sign of power. When a man has money, he has a name for himself. People seek him out. They listen to him. He has clout. I respect a man who can make things happen.” Her mouth slanted into a catlike grin. “I love him if he can make them happen for me.”
“Did Dirk do that?”
The grin vanished. “No.” Her eyes stayed on Sam.
“But you loved him.”
“I tho
ught I did.” She paused. “Dirk was great in bed. He made things happen for me there, all right.”
“But not elsewhere? I don’t understand, Suse. You had a great house, a Jaguar, clothes, and jewelry, and—”
“I had to fight for everything. Dirk was one of the tightest men I’ve ever met. Not a romantic bone in his body.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Now, if sex was all I wanted, I’d go after Sam. He has a kind of raw, male appeal, don’t you think?”
Savannah knew other women felt it, though she’d never personally been drawn. “He doesn’t have much money,” she whispered back as a reminder to Susan, to whom money meant so much.
“Maybe not,” Susan breathed, “but, Lord, he fills his jeans well.”
Savannah debated that, finally conceding, “He has a nice butt, I suppose.”
“Wait till he turns around and shows off the front.”
“You sound as though he’s purposely flaunting something.”
“I’ve been wondering about that.”
“Well, don’t. Sam Craig isn’t an exhibitionist. It’s not his fault you’re fixated on his fly.”
Susan shrugged.
Savannah grunted. “This conversation is totally inappropriate.”
“Not really. Let me tell you, there have been times in the past two days that I’ve wanted nothing more than for that man to throw me over his shoulder, take me up to bed, and make me forget everything that’s happening here.” She pursed her lips, then sent Savannah a sidelong glance. “Are you shocked?”
Savannah wasn’t shocked for one very good reason. In essence, there wasn’t much difference between Susan’s thoughts about Sam and hers about Jared. She had made love to Jared in her mind countless times when she had been alone at night with only his voice for company, or when she’d needed an escape from the worries of her life.
Shocked? If Susan thought Sam well endowed, she should see Jared.
“You are shocked,” Susan said. “You’re blushing.”
Heart of the Night: A Novel Page 14