“But we’re not beaten yet.” He rolled the car toward the exit gate. “I’d even go so far as to say we’ve hardly started. I’ve still got a couple of tricks up my sleeve.”
“Such as?”
He gave a Mr. Mona Lisa smile. “All in good time, cookie! Let’s eat first. There must be a restaurant in that park we passed through, after we crossed the bridge.”
“Several, as it happens.”
“Choose one, then,” he said, “and hang the expense. Lunch is on me.”
“We could try The Teahouse.”
“Fine. You’re the navigator. Show me the way.”
They sat at an outdoor table on the terrace, and ate grilled tiger prawns and scallops, accompanied by baby green salad drizzled with raspberry vinaigrette and washed down by chardonnay.
The weather was glorious; obscenely so, she thought, given the dark cloud hanging over her family. Sailboats danced on the waters of English Bay. The North Shore mountains lazed beneath a sultry summer sky. A breeze, light as a baby’s breath and warm as a kiss, teased her face.
“Tell me what else you found out from June,” she said, embarrassed by her guilty pleasure in the moment. “I know there was more than you let on about in front of my mother, and I’ve got a right to know what it is.”
“I don’t dispute that for a minute.”
“So…?” She glared at him, wishing he’d take off those blasted sunglasses, which flung back twin reflections of the striped umbrella at the next table, but revealed nothing of what he might be thinking.
“So give your food a chance to digest before you start fulminating again.”
“I don’t have the time.”
“Unless you want to burn out before we’re halfway through this case, I suggest you make the time.” He slid his glasses halfway down his nose and surveyed her critically. “You’re looking a bit ragged around the edges. A couple of hours relaxing over a meal isn’t going to make or break your niece’s situation, but it’ll go a long way toward relieving the pressure building up inside you. Enjoy the respite while it lasts, Linda, and save your energy for when you really need it.”
Recognizing that to ignore the voice of wisdom and experience when she heard it was nothing short of foolhardy, she tried to follow his advice and found it not impossible. Of course, it didn’t hurt any that she was with the most attractive man in town. Nobody looking at him—and plenty of women did—would have guessed he was a former police detective.
He looked supremely sophisticated and relaxed in his well-cut tan slacks and short-sleeved white shirt. Devastatingly mysterious behind his dark glasses. Elegantly trim and fit, as revealed by his breadth of shoulder and the tanned muscularity of his forearms. Even she had difficulty picturing him with a gun in his hand, prepared to maim or kill if need be. Yet she knew that lethal capability was as deeply ingrained in him as his deceptively lazy smile and casual posture.
“But there is more, isn’t there?” she persisted.
“There’s more,” he admitted, but made her wait until they’d finished eating and were sipping iced coffee before he set down his glass and said, “Okay, what do you want to hear first: the good news, or the not-so-good?”
Apprehension foamed up in her at that. “The not-so-good. Get it over with, please!”
“Your father’s back in town. He’s been in touch with June.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Martin Carr is back. Seems he somehow got wind of everything that’s happened—probably through the newspapers or TV reports—and blew back into town to lend moral support.”
“He wouldn’t know moral support if it jumped up and bit him in the face!”
“Take a deep breath, cookie,” Mac counseled drily. “You’re fulminating again.”
She struggled to contain herself, not because he said she should, but because Martin Carr had created enough upheaval in her life and she’d see him in hell before she let him go on another destructive rampage.
“That’s better,” Mac said, inching her water glass closer, and waited until she’d taken a calming sip before continuing, “Isn’t it possible he’s trying to do the decent thing for once?”
“No. He doesn’t have a decent bone in his body!”
“What makes you so sure, Linda? Is it because he walked out on his family, or because he walked out on a woman in a wheelchair?”
“Take your pick,” she said bitterly. “They both fit.”
“Do you blame him for your mother’s accident?”
“He was the one driving the car that put her where she is today, for God’s sake!”
Clearly taken aback, he said, “I didn’t know that. You haven’t mentioned how she came to be injured, and I was hardly going to ask.”
“I’ll tell you anyway. My father is very charming, very handsome, and very suave. His philosophy has always been Live life to the fullest, a principle he interprets to mean doing what he pleases with whomever he pleases, regardless of the damage it might inflict on those he professes to care about. My mother adored him. All three of us adored him. We thought the sun rose and set on him. But…”
She stopped and fumbled in her purse for a tissue, afraid not that she’d cry, but that if she did, Mac would think her tears sprang from grief when they were inspired by anger.
Watching her with ruinous sympathy, he said, “The problem was that what he had at home wasn’t enough.”
She blinked, and managed to turn a choking sob into a caustic laugh. “What are you, a mind reader?”
He shook his head. “I know the type. For some men, one woman is never enough.”
“So my mother found out, to her lasting cost and utter devastation.”
He toyed with his coffee glass a moment, then said, “I venture to suggest that she appears to have got over the devastation. All things considered, she strikes me as a very well-adjusted woman.”
“You weren’t there. You didn’t see how he hurt her, or how much she changed as a result of what he did. She used to be full of light and…and movement, and so in love with him it dazzled people, just watching them together. June was only a baby at the time, so she doesn’t have much memory of the way they were, but I used to think they were more glamorous than movie stars.”
“He must have played the role of romantic hero very convincingly.”
“He did. He could turn the most ordinary day into something magical. He’d come home and, for no reason at all, waltz her around the kitchen when she was making dinner, or out onto the patio in a thunderstorm. He’d bring her roses every Thursday, because that was the day they met, and leave exquisite gifts on her pillow when he had to go out of town on business because he so much hated being away from her.” She swallowed, and looked out to the far horizon where the Gulf Islands floated in the heat haze. “And then…”
“Then she discovered that he didn’t go alone.”
“Yes.”
“Someone told her?”
“She overheard two of her friends talking in the ladies’ room at a Christmas dinner-dance. One of their husbands had seen him checking into a hotel in Montreal, with a woman hanging all over him. It was someone my mother knew, someone she’d welcomed into her home, and who was actually sitting at their table that night.”
“And?”
“Mom confronted him. He didn’t deny anything, she walked out, he went after her, insisted on driving her home, it was snowing, he drove off the road and plowed into a tree. You’ve seen my mother. You know how the story ended.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not half as sorry as he’ll be, if he dares show his face at our house!” She let out a trembling sigh and looked him squarely in the face again. “I think I’d like to hear your good news about now.”
“June gave me the name and address of Thayer’s adoptive parents.” He reached for her hand and pulled her to her feet. “Next stop, San Francisco, cookie, so let’s go make flight reservations. With any luck, we’ll be there by tomorrow night at the l
atest.”
“Why don’t we just phone them to find out what they know?”
“This isn’t an official investigation, Linda. They don’t have to cooperate, and it’s a whole lot easier for them to hang up on us than it is to ignore us when we’re standing with my big foot jammed inside their front door. Not only that, it’s easier to get a fix on people when you’re talking face to face with them. Often it’s less what people say than how they say it, that counts. A trained eye can usually spot evasions and tension that might not be apparent just from the spoken word.” He slid behind the wheel of the Jaguar. “So where’s the nearest travel agent?”
“In Park Royal shopping mall.” She pointed to a fork in the road as he pulled out of the parking area in front of the restaurant. “Turn left here and follow the signs to the bridge.”
The mall came loaded with everything a person could possibly need or want, including gourmet foods, art, custom jewelry, and enough boutiques selling overpriced clothing to keep the couturier business in clover for a decade.
They left there with plane tickets, pâté de foie gras, imported cheese, Cornish game hens, wine and flowers, and took the scenic lower road to Jessie’s house.
“She’s got company,” Linda said, as he pulled up next to a black BMW. “Either that, or the daily help’s won the lottery.”
But Mac wasn’t fooled. The old radar clicked in the minute they walked in the house and heard the sound of voices coming from the patio in the back garden, and he knew what they’d find. “Linda,” he said, dumping their purchases on the kitchen counter and trying to forestall her before she got to the French doors. “Honey, wait!”
He was too late. By the time he reached her, the well-dressed man sitting at the wrought-iron table opposite Jessie had risen to his feet. And Linda had turned rigid with shock.
“Hello, baby,” Martin Carr said.
She ignored him. Looked clean through him, and said to Jessie, “What’s he doing here? Why have you let this man into our house, Mother?”
“Honey,” Mac said again, laying a restraining hand on her shoulder. “Take it easy, okay?”
She shrugged him off. “Mother?”
“Your mom and I are merely talking, baby,” Martin Carr explained, running a nervous hand over his mane of silver hair. “In times of trouble, families have to pull together.”
“Pull together?” she said with biting scorn. “What would you know about something like that? The only thing you’ve ever shown any talent for is pulling things apart, then bailing out when you get caught.”
A pained expression crossed the still-handsome face. “You have to let go of the past, baby. It doesn’t do any good to hang on to—”
“Don’t you have somewhere else you ought to be? Some popsie’s boudoir, perhaps? Or have you lost your touch? Could it be that the ladies don’t fall at your feet any longer, now that you’re past your prime?”
Carr flinched and Mac, watching the exchange, decided if she’d looked at him the way she looked at her father, he’d probably have been impotent for a week. “We haven’t met,” he said, stepping between her and her father in an effort to fend off full-scale war. “I’m Mac Sullivan.”
His handshake was firm, his voice gravelly with emotion. “Jessie told me about you. We’re deeply grateful to have you on board. And my little girl’s lucky to have a man like you at her side.” Ignoring Linda’s snort of revulsion, he gestured to the bottle in a cooler on the table. “Won’t you join us in a glass of wine and bring us up to speed on what you’ve found out.”
“You’re not privy to what we’ve found out,” Linda spat. “It’s none of your business.”
“Linda,” her mother interjected quietly, “whether or not you like it, Martin is your father, and he is here at my invitation. I’d ask you please to treat him with the same courtesy you’d show to any other guest in our home.”
“You don’t seem the least bit surprised or disturbed to see him, Mom,” she retaliated. “Is it because you’ve known all along that he’s been visiting June, and just forgot to mention it to me?”
“Your mother didn’t know anything,” Martin said, laying a hand on the back of Jessie’s chair. “She had no idea I was back in town until this afternoon and she doesn’t deserve your contempt. If you’re angry with anyone, baby, it’s with me, not her.”
“I am not your baby,” she whispered, spitting out each word from between clenched teeth. “And as far as I’m concerned, you’re not my father.”
Carr backed off, the dapper, well-preserved image of a man in his late fifties who’d done his best to pass for forty, suddenly aging right before everyone’s eyes. He coughed, and smoothed the silk cravat at his throat with an unsteady hand. But if he was shocked at being disowned by his firstborn, Jessie was shattered.
“For pity’s sake, Linda, take that back!” she gasped, tears welling in her eyes.
But Linda was having none of it. “I sorry, Mom, but I can’t. I won’t. You might choose to forget what this man has done to our family, but I never will.”
She pivoted on her heel and stalked back inside the house, leaving the three of them not knowing quite where to look or what to say. A moment later, the front door slammed, echoing through the house like a rifle shot.
Jessie let out a cry of distress and turned her gaze on Carr in unspoken appeal. “Go after our daughter, will you, Mac?” he said, bending to put his arm around her. “I’d go myself, if I thought it would do any good, but I think I can do more by staying here with my wife.”
“Sure,” he said.
He found her at the end of the lane, sitting on a slab of flat rock overlooking the water. “Make room for me,” he said, hunkering down next to her.
She shuffled over without a word and continued staring out to sea. He gave her another ten minutes or so to get herself together, then said, “We might as well talk about what happened back there, cookie. You said some pretty harsh things.”
“I told the truth,” she said, her voice as remote as her expression. “I hate him.”
He debated how to answer and decided truth deserved truth, however unpalatable it might be. “Maybe you do, but your mother doesn’t. She’s still in love with him.”
He might as well have shoved her face-first off the rock and into the sea. She rounded on him, spluttering with outrage. “You’re crazy!”
“Uh-uh!” He shook his head. “She looks at him the way my mother used to look at my dad. And for all his faults and shortcomings, I’d go so far as to say your father’s not entirely indifferent to Jessie.”
Her glare shifted from outrage to horror. “I think I’m going to be sick!”
“You’d do better to accept something you can’t change. You’ve seen your mother’s heart broken once. Are you willing to let it happen again—and know that this time, you’re the cause?”
“I’ll speak to her. Remind her how happy we’ve been without him. When it comes down to making a choice between him and us, she’ll choose us.”
“She shouldn’t have to choose at all.” He sighed and pulled her to lean against him. “You’re not a kid anymore, Linda, and neither is June. You know nobody’s perfect, that people make mistakes. Give the old man the chance to prove he’s learned from his.”
“You can afford to be charitable toward him. You’re not the one he betrayed.”
“No, I’m not. But he’s no fool, cookie. He knows he screwed up big time, as a father and as a husband. Isn’t it just possible that he’s trying to make up for past mistakes by being here now, when your family’s in trouble?”
“We’ll get through this without him, the way we got through all the other tough times. I don’t need him, and neither does my mother.”
“You’re wrong,” he said. “He’s exactly what she needs.”
She turned on him, spitting like a wild cat. “Who are you to tell me what she needs? You don’t even know her, and you certainly don’t know him!”
“Being a quick study of
character is essential in detective work. I have great faith in your mother’s instincts. She lost the use of her legs, Linda, not her brain. She managed without you all the time you were away in Europe. She doesn’t need you as her watchdog now.”
“So what am I supposed to do? Just roll over and play dead?”
“No, darlin’,” he said, hugging her closer. “That wouldn’t be any fun at all. What you do is go back to the house, announce you’re making dinner and invite him to stay.”
“I’ll poison him!”
He laughed and kissed her hair. “Then I’ll cook dinner, and you can sit with him and your mom, and make small talk.”
“I’d rather have my teeth pulled!”
“You’ll do it,” he said in her ear. “You’ll do it because Jessie needs someone to lean on right now, and you and I are taking off first thing tomorrow. You’ll do it because June needs all the moral support she can get while you’re gone.”
She stared at the sun sliding down behind the mountains on the big island offshore. And as late summer dusk stole over the place where they sat, the resistance and anger seeped out of her. She buried her face against his neck and he felt her tears hot on his skin. “I really loved him once, you know,” she sobbed.
“He’s loved you all along, cookie. How could he help himself?”
“He’s got a strange way of showing it.”
“It’s a guy-thing,” he said. “We don’t always know the right things to do or say.”
One thing he did know, though. Holding her like that felt absolutely right. And when she lifted her head, nudging her lips with his felt right, too.
She needed to be kissed, he reasoned. To make her feel better. If it made him feel pretty damn good, too, it was because he enjoyed playing Boy Scout once in a while.
She had a delicious mouth. Warm and sweet and generous. She held nothing back. She fit in his arms as if she’d been designed exactly for that purpose. When he deepened the kiss, she responded. There was none of the awkward bumping of noses or any of that other clumsy stuff to tarnish the moment. It all felt absolutely right.
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