Passion

by Marilyn Pappano

  They really are the house that Jack built. A private joke? Something she’d shared only with John Smith?

  He swore out loud, viciously enough to make a passing customer shrink away. That had to be it. The bitch had been testing him. Something—or someone, damn Teryl to hell—had aroused Rebecca’s suspicions, and so she had called him, demanding that he meet her for lunch, pulling him away from his work, all so she could test him with her stupid little inside joke.

  And he had failed her test. He had acted as if he’d never heard it before—which, of course, he hadn’t—and hadn’t been interested enough to even understand it.

  John Smith didn’t matter. He was as good as dead. Teryl’s suspicions didn’t matter, either, because she was going to die with Smith. As for the younger sister who was the sum total of Smith’s personal life, she didn’t present much of a threat. Like Teryl, all she knew was what her deranged brother had told her. Like Teryl, if she became a problem, she would be dead.

  Rebecca Robertson, though, was another matter. He couldn’t afford for her to doubt him. He couldn’t afford for her to get skeptical, to start looking into his background and maybe, like that slut Teryl, start spreading her doubts around.

  He had planned to wait for the right time to tie up all the loose ends, but already he had waited too long. If only he had known sooner that he had failed in Colorado. If only he had waited around that dreary little town to be sure that John Smith had died. If only he hadn’t been so goddamned sure of himself, of his plan, of his infallibility.

  He would take care of them tonight. By midnight his two biggest problems would be out of his life forever, and no one would suspect him—with the possible exception of Debra Jane, but he could handle her; he’d been doing it for nine years. If the police looked hard enough, they would find the stores where he would, this afternoon, buy the necessary supplies; they would find the credit card receipts in John Smith’s name, would get the clerks’ vague descriptions that closely matched Smith’s, and they would find out about the strange fire in Colorado recently. It would be such a tragedy, a young woman murdered by the mysterious stranger she had picked up on a trip, but then, these were the nineties. What did a woman expect when she acted without discretion, with such careless disregard for her safety?

  There would be questions, of course. The cops might discover that the house in Colorado had belonged to Simon Tremont, and they might question him. They would be intrigued by the coincidences: that this man claiming to be John Smith had been at the scene when Simon’s house was destroyed, that Smith had gone to New Orleans when Simon was there, that there he’d met up with Teryl, who just happened to be Simon’s agent’s assistant, that Teryl’s house was destroyed—and both Teryl’s and her mystery lover’s lives ended—in the same manner that the Colorado house was destroyed.

  Simon would have his answers ready. Yes, he’d recently lost his house in Colorado to fire. Yes, he had moved away more than four months ago. No, he hadn’t sold the house; he’d intended to return for vacations. No, he hadn’t given anyone permission to use the place. No, he didn’t know anyone matching this man’s description.

  He would see to it that Debra Jane’s answers were ready, too. She would tell them how she’d met the stranger, how secretive and furtive he’d been. She would tell them how he had controlled Teryl, how her foster sister had had bruises from where he’d tied her up, how he had introduced her to sick, kinky sex games.

  He would also make sure that Rebecca had the right answers. They would paint a picture of a mysterious, secretive, deceptive man who had become obsessed with the author he idolized, how he had broken into and destroyed his idol’s home, how he had made his way to the city where Simon was appearing for the first time ever, how he had insinuated himself with Teryl, who had some connection to Simon, and had then made his way to the city where Simon now lived. They would show his obsession, his sickness, his derangement, and the cops would close the case.

  Murder-suicide. It happened every day. Such a tragedy for the woman’s family.

  Such good fortune for Simon Tremont.

  “Are you ready for bed?”

  Resisting a yawn prompted by John’s question, Teryl reached for the remote control and shut off the television. Once its noise was gone, the house seemed inordinately quiet. All she could hear was John’s breathing, her own breath sounds, and, outside, the gentle drip of the rain. The storms had passed out of the area by noon, but the rain hadn’t stopped yet. At least it was gentler now, not those torrential downpours that temporarily flooded the streets and were so hard on her garden. This was the kind of soaker rain that could lull a person to sleep. For the last hour she’d been halfway there already, snuggled in the big chair with John’s arms around her, all but the dimmest light turned off, safe, warm, and relaxed. She wasn’t sure she wanted to wake up enough to go upstairs and go to bed.

  But she got to her feet, stretched, and finally gave in to the yawn. She was putting the remote on the table at the end of the couch when the phone there rang.

  “I’m going on up,” John said, squeezing past her. “Don’t be too long.”

  She picked up the phone before the first ring was completed. Hearing D.J.’s voice at the other end, she sank down onto the couch, curling her feet under her, settling in for a long chat.

  “Hey, girl, how have you been? You still have a job after last week’s little escapade?”

  “Yeah, I’m still working.”

  “How’s John-boy? Is he still hanging around?”

  “Yes, and he’s fine. How are you?”

  There was a long silence, then a sigh. “I’ve been worse… but I’ve also been a hell of a lot better.” Her voice was uncharacteristically serious and more than a little depressed.

  “Anything you want to talk about?” Teryl asked gently, but she knew the answer. D.J. had been only fourteen or fifteen years old when she’d stopped confiding in Teryl or anyone else. There had been an entire area of her life that was off-limits to discussion, involving men—not boys—and sex. She had mastered evasive techniques that any spy could have been proud of, had lied, deceived, manipulated, and maneuvered every conversation away from that side of her life. After a time, Teryl had learned not to pry, but tonight was a special circumstance. D.J. rarely got serious and never got depressed.

  The telephone line hummed during another long silence, then the words came out in a rush. “I don’t know how I screwed up so badly, you know. I kept thinking that if I just gave him time, if I did what he wanted, if I made him happy, then sooner or later he would have to appreciate me, right? He’d have to see how much I’d done for him, how much he needed me. Sooner or later he would have to love me.”

  Teryl sat in stunned silence. She had never imagined D.J. talking about making one particular man happy, about being needed and loved. All of their adult lives, her friend had made such a show of loving all men, of wanting all men, of never being tied down to only one. She’d had no interest in commitment and thought monogamy was for fools. When Teryl had discovered that Gregory was married and had gone crying to her foster sister for sympathy, D.J. honestly hadn’t shared her dismay. Teryl enjoyed his company, didn’t she? She enjoyed the sex. So what was the problem? Eventually, D.J. had said the things Teryl had needed to hear, but her heart hadn’t been in it. She had only been mouthing the words; she certainly hadn’t shared the sentiments.

  “Damn it, Teryl, I’ve fucked up big this time. The things I’ve done… I just wanted… jeez, I wanted him to love me, that’s all. I never meant for anyone to get hurt. I never intended for anything like this… I don’t know what he’s going to do, I don’t know how… but I can’t stop him. I tried talking to him, I tried reasoning with him, but when he gets like this… I didn’t mean for this to happen. Do you understand, Teryl? It wasn’t supposed to… Damn it, he was just supposed to love me!” D.J.’s voice broke, dissolving into a choked sob.

  Tears. Oh, God, something really is wrong, Teryl thought. D.J. wa
sn’t a crier. Teryl would bet she hadn’t shed even one tear in the last fifteen years, and the only crying before then had been involuntary, when she was awakened by a bad dream and couldn’t stop herself. She hated tears, thought they were a sign of weakness, and she was too damned tough to ever let herself be weak. But she was crying now, mournful, aching sobs that tore at Teryl’s heart. “Are you at home, D.J.? I’m going to come over. We need to talk, okay? Give me a few minutes to let John know, then I’ll be there in fifteen, twenty minutes, tops, all right?

  The outburst of tears slacked off as quickly as it had begun. “No, don’t be crazy. It’s eleven o’clock at night, and it’s still raining. I’m fine, Teryl.”

  “No, you’re not. Come on, whatever’s happened, it can’t be so bad. Everything can be dealt with. I’ll come over, you’ll tell me what’s going on, and we’ll figure a way out of it. Whatever it is, we can come up with some solution, D.J. Every problem has a solution.”

  “No,” D.J. said flatly. “I’m not at home, and you can’t come where I am.” She sniffled a few times, drew a deep breath, then spoke in a nearly normal voice. “I’m sorry I dumped this on you tonight. I shouldn’t have bothered you. I just needed… I’m sorry, Teryl.”

  “D.J., please tell me where you are,” she said quickly, frantically. “Please let me know—”

  She was talking to a dial tone.

  With a frustrated sigh, she hung up, then immediately picked up the receiver again and dialed D.J.’s number. The phone rang three times before the machine clicked on. She hung up without waiting to hear the message. Switching off the lamp on the table, she sat for a moment in the dark.

  She knew D.J. better than anyone else in the world, but she never would have guessed that her best friend was involved in a serious relationship. The only thing D.J. had ever been serious about—only two things, she corrected herself—were the family and sex. Men made the short list only because they were necessary for the sex. As for falling in love… Teryl had honestly—if shamefully—wondered if her friend was even capable of it. Every relationship she’d ever had had been physical; she’d kept her partners at an emotional distance. She’d kept everyone, even the family, at a distance.

  And now she’d fallen in love—and with someone who obviously was not healthy for her.

  For the first time in their lives, D.J.’s situation, Teryl thought morbidly, wasn’t so different from her own. She had fallen in love, too, and while she was now as convinced of John’s sanity as her own, she had no doubt that he was unhealthy for her, too. Someday soon he was going to leave—he’d made that clear—and when he did, he was going to break her heart. She and D.J. could be heartbroken and lonesome together.

  She was rising from the couch when, from the patio outside, came the sound of wind chimes. It wasn’t the gentle brushing of one pipe against another, the way the breeze usually sounded them, but a discordant clang that made her freeze in place. She knew the sound well; she heard it every time she forgot they were hanging there and walked into them on her way to water the garden or to pick a few roses for her desk. It would take a hard wind to produce a similar jangle, but, as hard as she listened, she couldn’t detect even a slight rustle in the trees.

  She did hear a small thud, though, right in front of the first set of French doors. It made chill bumps rise on her arms, and the little hairs at her nape stood on end. A moment later the sound was repeated, this time in front of the middle set of doors, and only a few seconds later she heard it once again at the third pair. Staring hard at the sheer curtains, she saw a shadowy movement, bending, rising, then gliding silently away.

  Her heart pounding, she began edging toward the hall door, sliding first one foot, then the other, over the tile floor. She was afraid to step out into the hallway, afraid to look to her left toward the back door where the outside light always burned and see the shadow of someone there, afraid of somehow being seen. Taking a deep breath for courage, she dashed across the hall, then took the stairs two at a time.

  John was on his way from the bathroom to her room; she ran into him at the top of the stairs, colliding with the solid warmth of his chest, and forced herself to swallow back a scream. “There’s someone outside!” she whispered, clutching his arms tightly, too afraid to let go, too afraid to speak aloud. “I heard the chimes and some noises, and I saw someone, John, I swear I did!”

  For a moment he simply stared at her. He didn’t try to brush her off, didn’t try to explain away the sounds as the wind or her overactive imagination. “Do you have any sort of weapon in the house?”

  She shook her head slowly. “You kidnapped me. Don’t you have some sort of weapon?”

  He smiled tautly. “Just Tom’s Boy Scout knife. I’ll check outside. You wait right here, and if I don’t come back or if anything happens out there, call the police immediately. Understand?”

  “Let’s both wait here and call the police anyway,” she suggested.

  He pulled away from her and tugged the shirt he had just removed back over his head. “It’s probably nothing, not worth disturbing them with. I’ll have a look around—”

  Teryl stopped him as he took the first step. “What if it’s him, John?”

  The look he gave her was sharp and serious.

  “He blew up your house while you were in it, but you were lucky enough to survive. What if he’s trying to kill you again? What if the noise was just a ploy to get you outside? What if he’s waiting out there in the trees with a gun?”

  After a moment, he gave her a nervous smile. “Oh, lady, you do have a way of building up my confidence. Go ahead and call 911. I’m just going to look.” He gave her a little push toward the bedroom, then he went on downstairs, moving easily, silently in the darkness.

  Teryl went into her room and automatically turned out the light before picking up the phone on the nightstand. She dialed the emergency number and was listening to it ring when a shout came from downstairs.

  “Teryl!” There was sheer panic in John’s voice. “Hang up the damned phone and get down here!”

  Dropping the receiver, she raced down the stairs, spun around at the bottom, and turned toward the back of the house, where John had gone. Once again she ran into him in the hallway; this time he was the one to grab her. “I was looking out the kitchen window,” he said, trembling almost as badly as she was. “He’s got bombs out there, Teryl, a whole shitload of them, the same kind he used on my house. He’s going to blow this place sky-high! We’ve got to get out!”

  He was pulling her toward the door, but she was hanging back, digging her feet in but sliding along the tile anyway. “What if he is waiting out there, John? What if he doesn’t intend to let you escape this time?”

  “We’ve got to take our chances. A gunshot wound can be survived. An explosion fueled by God knows how many gallons of gasoline can’t.” Still, at the back door, he hesitated. Was he afraid to open the door? she wondered, knowing that she was. She wasn’t sure she could make her fingers close around the lock and twist it. She was pretty damned sure she couldn’t make herself turn the doorknob, pull open the door, and face whatever was out there.

  “When I open the door,” John whispered in her ear, “stay low, head for the truck, and run like hell. Don’t stop for anything.”

  She nodded, even though it was too dark for him to see, even though he was peering outside the edge of the curtain on the back door instead of looking at her. After a long, silent moment that seemed to last forever, he took her hand in his, unfastened the lock, and yanked the door open. Immediately outside the door, she caught a glimpse of a glass jar, heard the tinkle of glass on stone as one of them—she wasn’t sure whether she was responsible or John was—kicked it over on their dash across the patio, then onto the paving stones that led to the parking court.

  As they approached the Blazer, he released her hand and sprinted around to the driver’s side. In the time it took her to fumble the door open, climb inside, and fumble it shut again, he was already
in the driver’s seat, starting the engine, shifting into reverse, and releasing the emergency brake all at once. The tires squealed on the wet stones, and the back end fishtailed as he backed up in a tight circle around her car, then accelerated at dangerous speeds down the curving driveway.

  They weren’t more than a hundred yards away when the first explosion rocked the truck. John didn’t stop, didn’t take his eyes off the road or even slow down, but Teryl twisted around in the seat to watch. The remaining blasts came within seconds—she counted eight total—and sent debris flying through the air and flames shooting high into the sky. By the light of the eerie flames in the rain, she could catch glimpses of holes where walls used to be, of great gaping places where the red tiled roof had vanished. The entire portion of roof over her bedroom was gone, part of it probably blasted out, the rest fallen in on her dressing table, her floor, her bed.

  Dear God, if that call from D.J. hadn’t delayed her from going upstairs with John, they would have been in that bed. She wouldn’t have heard Simon prowling around out back, wouldn’t have seen him on the patio; John wouldn’t have discovered the bombs, and they wouldn’t have escaped. They would be dead now.

  Slowly, numbly, she faced forward again, fastened her seat belt, and sank back into the seat. This attempt on their lives tonight shouldn’t have come as a total surprise; John had pointed out that the only way that man could truly become Simon Tremont was by killing the real Simon. After he had tried and failed in Colorado, it was a given that he would try again, that this time he would be desperate to succeed. They should have been prepared for the possibility. Still, she was more than surprised; she was absolutely shocked. Learning the details of the attempt on John’s life in Colorado had been unsettling, but also somehow unreal. She hadn’t been there, hadn’t witnessed the explosions, hadn’t felt the concussions, hadn’t smelled the gasoline, the flames, the smoke. This was real.