White Hot

by Sandra Brown

  Beck looked across at Chris, shrugged, and continued to thumb through the outdated People magazine. “What’s the problem between them?”

  “It goes back to when Sayre was a teenager. She was high school sweethearts with Clark Daly.”

  Beck looked at him pointedly.

  “Yes, that’s the one,” Chris said.

  Beck knew Clark Daly from the foundry. Several times his foreman had sent him home for reporting to work drunk. He was even caught with a flask of whiskey in his lunch box. It was surprising to learn that Sayre had been involved with him.

  “For a while Huff was okay with their little romance,” Chris continued. “It seemed harmless enough. But when it looked like the puppy love was growing more serious, he put a halt to it.”

  “Did he have a drinking problem back then?”

  “Nothing worse than sneaking a beer every now and then. He was a star athlete, student leader.”

  “Then what was the problem?”

  “I don’t know the details. I was already at LSU. I wasn’t interested in Sayre’s affairs and didn’t follow the courtship closely. I only know that Huff wasn’t too keen on having Clark Daly as his son-in-law. As soon as they graduated high school, he stepped in and put a stop to the romance.”

  “How did Sayre react?”

  Chris gave a crooked smile. “How do you think? With fireworks on the scale of Vesuvius. Or so I’ve been told. When her tantrums didn’t make an impact on Huff, she went into a deep funk, lost a lot of weight, moved around the house like a ghost. Who’s that character in the book, traipses around in her moldy wedding gown?”

  “Miss Havisham?”

  “Right. I remember coming home one weekend and barely recognizing Sayre. She looked like hell. She wasn’t attending college, wasn’t working, wasn’t doing anything, and never left the house. When I asked Selma about it, she started crying, told me Sayre had turned into a ‘poor little haint, bless her heart.’ Danny said she hadn’t spoken to Huff for months, avoided being in the same room with him.”

  Chris paused to take a sip of his canned soft drink. Beck wanted to know the rest of the story but didn’t prod Chris to continue. He didn’t want to appear overly interested. Fortunately, Chris continued without being prompted.

  “This went on for months. Finally Huff had his fill of it. He told her to stop sulking and get it together, or he was going to send her to a psychiatric hospital.”

  “That was Huff’s cure for a teenage broken heart? He threatened to commit her?”

  “It sounds severe, doesn’t it? But it worked. Because when Huff picked out a guy and insisted she marry him, she went willingly enough to the altar. I guess she figured marriage was better than the loony bin.”

  Beck stared thoughtfully at the closed double doors that led into the ICU. “That’s a long time to hold a grudge against Huff for coming between her and her high school sweetheart.”

  “That’s Sayre. Even when she was a little kid, she always had a burr up her butt over something. She’s still like that. Takes every little thing so damn seriously.” He stood up and stretched his back, then moved to the window.

  For a long time, he stood there silently, staring out, seemingly at nothing. Eventually Beck asked, “Something on your mind, Chris?”

  He raised his shoulders with an indifference that Beck knew was feigned. “That business today.”

  “It’s been an eventful day. Which business?”

  “In the sheriff’s office. Will they arrest me, do you think?”

  “No.”

  “I didn’t like jail the first time, Beck. Huff bailed me out within hours, but it’s not a place where I want to spend any amount of time.”

  “They’re not going to arrest you. They don’t have enough evidence yet.”

  Chris came around. “Yet?”

  “Is there more for them to find, Chris? I need to know.”

  His dark eyes flashed. “If my own lawyer doesn’t believe me, who will?”

  “I believe you. But you have to admit that, right now, it’s not looking very good for you.”

  Chris relaxed his stance. “Right, it’s not. I’ve been giving this a lot of thought, and I’ve come to a conclusion.” He paused, then said, “Somebody’s framing me.”

  “Framing you?”

  “You sound skeptical.”

  “I am.”

  Chris returned to his chair and leaned across the narrow space separating them. “Think about it, Beck. Because of that Iverson case, which is still on the books as an unsolved missing person and possible homicide, wouldn’t I make an ideal fall guy?”

  “For whom?”

  “Slap Watkins.”

  Beck laughed shortly. “Slap Watkins?”

  “Hear me out,” Chris said irritably. “He resents the Hoyle brothers. You, too, for that matter. He’s got an ax to grind.”

  “Over a barroom brawl that took place three years ago?”

  “But he hasn’t forgotten it. You told Huff he mentioned it to you in the diner last night.”

  “Okay, but—”

  “It’s not just that. On a hunch, I had Danny’s secretary check the job applications we’ve received over the last few weeks, and guess what turned up?” He withdrew a folded sheet of paper from his trousers pocket and waved it at Beck. “Slap Watkins filled one out.”

  “He applied for a job at the foundry?”

  “Danny rejected his application. Slap has another reason to dislike the Hoyles.”

  “Enough to murder Danny?”

  “A guy like that, it wouldn’t take much provocation.”

  “I suppose it’s feasible,” Beck said thoughtfully.

  “Certainly worth checking into.”

  “Have you mentioned this to Red?”

  “Not yet. I’d just seen the rejected application when Huff had his heart attack. I haven’t had a chance to talk to anybody about it.”

  Beck thought for another moment, then shook his head. “There’s a problem with it, Chris.”

  “What?”

  “How did Watkins get Danny out to the fishing camp?”

  Chris considered the question for several seconds before admitting that he didn’t know. “But he was a cagey bastard to start with, and he had three years’ coaching in prison.” Glancing up, he saw Sayre emerge from the ICU. “We can talk about it later.”

  They stood up as she approached. “He’s fine,” she declared. “Hardly on the brink of departing this world.”

  “Then why was he so adamant about seeing you?”

  “No cause for alarm, Chris. He didn’t change his will and appoint me his sole heir, if that’s what you’re worried about. He called me back for his own entertainment.” Turning to Beck, she said, “Will you please go outside and unlock your pickup so I can get my bag?”

  “Are you flying out tonight?”

  “I dismissed the jet because I didn’t know when I would be leaving. But I hope the rental car . . . What?” she asked, when Beck started shaking his head.

  “It’s already been picked up. I took the liberty of calling for you to check.”

  “Well, I planned on spending the night at The Lodge anyway. I’ll get another car tomorrow.” Beck offered to drive her to the motel, but she said, “I’ll call a taxi.”

  Chris informed her that Destiny’s only taxi company was no longer in service. “It folded years ago.”

  It was clear to Beck that she wanted to remove herself from them as swiftly as possible and was irritated by these roadblocks to her escape. “All right,” she said with resignation. “If it’s not too far out of your way, I would appreciate a ride to the motel.”

  “No trouble at all. Chris, are you staying here?”

  “I’ll hang around until Doc Caroe comes back for his evening rounds. If he thinks Huff is out of immediate danger, I’ll leave.”

  They agreed to keep their cell phones handy in case one needed to notify the other of a change in Huff’s condition and said their good-byes.


  On their way to the ground floor, Beck asked for a more detailed assessment of Huff’s condition. “If meanness equates to longevity,” she said, “he’ll outlive us all.”

  Then she pushed through the revolving door. He wanted to pick up the conversation outside, but reading her body language, he thought better of asking her to recount what she and Huff had said to each other.

  “You look tired,” he said as he gave her a hand up into the cab of the truck.

  “Encounters with Huff always leave me feeling tired.”

  He went around and got in. As he turned the ignition key, he apologized for the heat inside the cab. “I should have left the windows open an inch or so.”

  “I don’t mind it.” She laid her head on the back of her seat and closed her eyes. “When it’s fifty degrees in July in San Francisco, I miss the real summertime. I actually like the heat.”

  “I would guess that about you.”

  She opened her eyes and looked across at him. Their gazes held, causing the temperature in the truck to rise. At least Beck’s temperature went up significantly. Semireclined as she was, she looked defenseless and altogether feminine. Fine strands at her hairline had curled in defiance of the chemical control she imposed on them, lending her a softness she would disclaim. Her cheeks were flushed, and again he imagined that her skin would be hot to the touch.

  He ached to find out, but he didn’t risk it, afraid that if he touched her, he would upset some delicate balance that had been struck, and that it wouldn’t tilt in his favor. Instead he said, “Hungry, Sayre?”

  She lifted her head from the headrest. Her eyes looked foggy with misapprehension. “What?”

  “Hungry?”

  “Oh.” Shaking her head slightly, she said, “No.”

  “Bet you are.”

  He continued staring at her for several moments before engaging the gears of the pickup. Leaving the hospital parking lot, he headed in the direction opposite that of the motel.

  She said, “The Lodge is on the other side of town.”

  “Trust me.”

  “Not as far as I could throw you.”

  He merely grinned. She said nothing else, which he took as her consent to go along with whatever he had in mind. Just beyond the outskirts of town, he turned off the main highway onto a rutted gravel road that wound through dense forest. He followed it to its dead end, where there was a clearing on the elevated bank of a wide bayou. Several vehicles were parked around a small building that seemed on the verge of collapse.

  Sayre turned to him. “You know this place?”

  “You sound surprised.”

  “I thought it was a secret known only to us natives.”

  “I’m not that much of an outsider anymore.”

  The drive-up fish shack had been owned and operated by the same family since the early 1930s, when bootleg liquor was their actual drawing card. The building was constructed of corrugated tin that had fallen victim to rust decades ago. It listed several degrees. It was only ten feet wide, and all of it was kitchen.

  Through a narrow window were served oysters on the half shell with a red sauce hot enough to make your eyes water, a dense gumbo flavored with filé and okra, and a crawfish étouffée so delicious you used a chunk of French bread to clean the paper plate. Everything from alligator meat to dill pickles could be had batter-dipped and deep-fried.

  Beck ordered them cups of gumbo and fried shrimp po’boy sandwiches. While their order was being prepared, he went to the water trough at the side of the shack and worked his hand through the chipped ice until he found two longneck bottles of beer. He opened them by using the church key that dangled from a dirty string nailed to a tree.

  “It’s cold,” he warned Sayre as he passed her one of the frosted bottles. “Want a glass?”

  “They would be insulted.”

  She tilted the bottle to her mouth like a pro. He smiled down at her. “That upped your approval rating.”

  “I’m not gunning for your approval.”

  His grin stretched wider. “That’s a damn shame. It’s off the charts.”

  When their order was ready, they carried the paper boats of food to a weathered picnic table beneath an umbrella of live oaks. Strands of colored Christmas lights had been ineptly strung from the lower branches and through the Spanish moss. Another customer had tuned the radio in his car to a station that played zydeco, which added to the ambience.

  They ate their cups of gumbo first, then Beck watched Sayre unwrap the tissue paper around her sandwich. The home-baked roll was hot, buttery, and crusty on the outside, soft in the center. It was piled high with fat, breaded shrimp straight out of the frying grease, shredded lettuce, and rémoulade sauce. To this she added a liberal sprinkling of Tabasco from the bottle on the table.

  She took a large bite. “Delicious,” she said when she had swallowed. “San Francisco has incredible food, but this tastes like . . .”

  “What?”

  “Home.” She smiled, but it was a sad, wistful expression.

  He concentrated on her as much as on his meal, and he sensed that she was concentrating on him concentrating on her. His unwavering attention made her uncomfortable, though she tried to appear nonchalant.

  Finally, she frowned at him. “Do I have sauce on my face or something?”

  “No.”

  “Then why do you keep staring at me?”

  His gaze challenged her to take a wild guess, but of course she didn’t. They resumed eating. After a time he said, “Do you ever sweat?”

  She looked across at him and blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

  “It’s hotter than hell out here. There’s no breeze. The humidity must be ninety-nine percent. You’re eating red pepper sauce practically by the tablespoon. But you’re not sweating. Your skin isn’t even dewy. How is that possible?”

  “You’re not sweating either.”

  He blotted his forehead with his sleeve, then extended his arm to show her the damp spot. “Pints of it are rolling down my trunk and pooling at my waist.” That was somewhat of an exaggeration, but it got a genuine smile out of her.

  “I sweat. Not often,” she admitted. “I have to really exert myself.”

  “Ahh, good to know,” he said. “I was beginning to think you might be an alien with no sweat glands.”

  When they finished their meal, he gathered up the trash and threw it in one of the oil drums used for that purpose. When he returned to the table, he sat on it and placed his feet on the bench beside her. He took a sip of beer, then looked down at her. “What have you got against Doc Caroe?”

  She carefully set down her bottle of beer and wiped the condensation from her palm with a paper napkin. “Was my dislike that obvious?”

  “Very. Given a choice between shaking hands with him or being held against me . . .” He paused and waited until she had looked up at him before finishing. “You preferred not to shake hands with Caroe. Knowing of your dislike for me, I’d say you must really despise that man.”

  She averted her head and looked at a group of people who were eating at one of the other tables. There was a burst of laughter, as though one of them had just delivered a good punch line. Their children were chasing lightning bugs through the trees, squealing delight each time they caught one.

  “They’re having a good time, aren’t they?”

  “Seems like,” he said. Then he nudged her thigh with the toe of his shoe. “Why don’t you like Doc Caroe?”

  Her gaze moved back up to him. “He’s a peacock. That ridiculous hair. He has a Napoleonic complex. He’s a menace to anyone who goes to him for healing because he’s incompetent, and either too stupid or too vain to accept his limitations. He should have had his license revoked years ago.”

  “Other than that, what have you got against him?”

  Picking up on his teasing tone, she ducked her head and laughed softly. “I got carried away. Sorry.”

  “Don’t be. I like you better when you get carri
ed away. I don’t think you let yourself get carried away nearly often enough.”

  “You enjoy psychoanalyzing me, don’t you?”

  “Doc Caroe?”

  Her smile gradually retreated. “He was my mother’s doctor when she got stomach cancer.”

  “Chris told me about that. It was tough for all of you.”

  “Once she was diagnosed, it was probably too far advanced for any treatment to have worked. But I couldn’t accept that Dr. Caroe was doing everything he could to save her.”

  “You were a little girl, Sayre. You wanted a quick fix. Then when Laurel died, you needed someone to blame.”

  “I’m sure you’re right.”

  “I felt the same when my dad died.” She raised her head and looked up at him. “I was about the same age you were when you lost your mother.”

  “That must have been awful for you.”

  For a moment she let all her defenses down. Her expression was soft, her eyes were unguarded, and she spoke with more sincerity than she had since they’d met.

  “It was a long time ago,” he said, “but I remember how angry I was. I stayed angry for a long time, which made the situation even harder for my mom.”

  Propping her chin on her hand, she asked, “What did you do when you first heard that your father was gone? The very first thing.”

  “I took my baseball bat to the outside wall of our garage.” He didn’t even have to search his memory. It was that fresh. “I knocked the hell out of it again and again until the wood splintered. Don’t ask me why. I guess I wanted to hurt something as badly as I was hurting.”

  He eased himself down onto the bench beside her, keeping his back to the table, assuming the same juxtaposition they’d had on the piano bench. This picnic table bench was much longer, but he sat just as close to her now as then.

  “What did you do when you learned your mother had died?”

  “I went into her bedroom,” she said. “It always smelled good, like the talcum powder she put on every night after her bath. I’ll remember until the day I die how she smelled every night when she came to my bedroom to tuck me in and kiss me good night. She would take my face between her hands, which always felt so cool.”

  Putting words to action, she cupped her face between her hands. Lost in the recollection, she remained that way for several moments, then slowly lowered her hands. “Anyway, when Huff came home from the hospital and told us that she had died, I went into her bedroom. It was Huff’s room, too, but it was feminine and frilly, like her. I lay down on her side of the bed, and buried my face in her pillow and cried my heart out.