Midnight Hour

by Debra Dixon

  Susan’s cultured voice snatched his attention away from the fantasy. “I like this idea about getting corporations to sponsor the table decorations. Fresh flower centerpieces are horribly expensive; the less we spend the more we make for the hospital. I can get my assistant to give us a list of likely companies.”

  “We’re going to have upward of two hundred tables, Susan,” Mercy said. “That’s a lot of companies.”

  “Not so many. You’d be surprised how many business contacts you make handling family law. Family-owned corporations and partnerships are the major bones of contention in a lot of my divorce cases.”

  “I would have thought the children would be,” Mercy said in surprise.

  “Unfortunately, the children are only bargaining chips to some parents. You know, one spouse will say to the other, ‘You can’t have the children unless …’ ”

  “That’s a rotten way to treat a child,” Nick said.

  “Yeah, it is,” Susan agreed. “But divorce is such a bitter time in most people’s lives that they can’t think past tomorrow’s revenge.”

  “How sad that must be for them,” Mercy whispered. “Wait a minute! What am I talking about? How horrible for you. I can’t imagine having to work with adults who spend all their time creating misery.” She leaned closer to Nick to reach the dish as she carefully fished for a spoon of ice cream and nuts. “I never gave it much thought before, but I’d guess being a divorce lawyer is a pretty stressful way to earn a buck. I doubt you get much call to referee ‘amicable’ divorces.”

  “Ha!” Susan waggled her spoon in the air. “There is no such thing as an ‘amicable’ divorce. Civilized maybe, but not amicable, at least not during the divorce process. Amicable comes later, sort of like perspective, but during the divorce, it hurts like hell. For at least one of them. The one who believed in forever.”

  The one who believed in forever. How could you not believe in forever, if you believed in love? A little shiver slipped up Mercy’s spine and raised the hairs on the back of her neck. “Whatever happened to ‘until death us do part’?”

  “MTV,” Susan quipped. “No one in America has an attention span of more than ten seconds.” Turning toward Nick, she asked, “What about you? You haven’t said much. Stop practicing your impression of the strong, silent type and tell me if you agree with my rock-video diagnosis as the cause of divorce.”

  “I wouldn’t dare disagree.” He grinned at her. “Seems to me that you’re the expert.”

  “Now, I thought a doctor, of all people, would know what causes broken hearts.” Susan looked back and forth between the two of them. “What? What’d I say that was so funny?”

  “Private joke. You had to be there,” Mercy told her, amazed that she could remember that first uncomfortable conversation with Nick and think it was funny. She looked at him and their eyes locked. Suddenly an amusing memory turned into the realization that they now had shared history. One of the most compelling bonds was the bond created by memories, the ability to turn to someone and say, “Remember when …?”

  She had to accept the fact that every moment she spent with him was going to create more memories. Some intimate, some funny, some intense, and she was very much afraid some would be sad, unless she was very, very careful with her heart.

  “Well, are you going to keep me in suspense or what?” Susan demanded.

  “It loses a little something in the telling,” Nick explained, his gaze still on Mercy. Knowing he had to break the spell of intimacy that threatened to engulf him, he dragged his attention away from the questions and promises he saw reflected in the blue depths of Mercy’s eyes. To the other woman he said, “Have you ever been divorced, counselor?”

  “Are you kidding? In order to be divorced, first I would have to find a man who could put up with me long enough to propose and marry me.”

  “You couldn’t be that hard to take,” Mercy chided. She couldn’t imagine how a bright, beautiful, articulate woman like Susan could have any trouble finding the right man.

  “Trust me. I’m never home, and I want everything yesterday. I’m rarely tactful. I bribe my secretary and paralegal with fat bonuses so they won’t leave me for a kinder boss. Who’d want me?”

  “Try again, Susan,” Nick told her. “You’re talking to someone who knows you’ve got a soft spot in your heart for people in need. You’re the president of and driving force behind Kentucky Parents.”

  “Well, it’s not like I invented the organization! I got involved with the group because one of my clients was feeling a little guilty about not doing his share for the less fortunate of this world. He had money but no time, and asked me to find a charity he could throw all that guilty money at. I found Kentucky Parents and liked it so much I stayed around.”

  “At least he threw money. Most people leave it at ‘I’d like to help, but I just can’t find the time,’ ” Nick remarked. “Every day it’s a race to see who can use up all the hours in the day first. People pack so much into their schedules they don’t have any time left over to remember things like anniversaries, birthdays, or even if they fed the cat.”

  “Like my parents,” Mercy agreed.

  Susan pushed the bowl of ice cream toward Mercy and shook her head to indicate she didn’t want any more. “That sounds perfectly ominous and like a story begging to be told. What’s wrong with your parents?”

  “Take my name, for instance. It’s a perfect example.”

  “Okay,” Nick agreed slowly. He drew his brows together. “You were named for Mercy Hospital. What does that have to do with anything?”

  Mercy swirled the melting ice cream with her spoon. “I was named Mercy not because of my parents’ attachment to the hospital, but because it was easy to remember. I got my middle name, May, for the same reason. Mercy May Malone. Guess which month I was born in?”

  “They didn’t!” exclaimed Susan, trying her best not to laugh.

  “They did. Mercy May Malone. Mom never missed a birth month. She never got the birthday right, but she always remembered it was sometime in May. All she had to do was get mad at me and say, ‘Mercy May!’ in that disapproving parental tone, and you could see it in her eyes. That horrified I’ve-got-to-get-my-daughter-a-birthday-present look. So don’t laugh, Susan! If you think it’s so funny, tell us your middle name. Everyone hates their middle names.”

  “I don’t. Honest. Susan Elizabeth Alastair. All perfectly normal and plain.” She looked directly at Nick and gave him a tiny half smile that was almost flirty. Mercy didn’t have any trouble reading the invitation in the other woman’s eyes. In a voice that was much too low for Mercy’s taste, Susan prompted, “Your turn, Nick.”

  He didn’t answer right away. Instead he twisted his head to study Mercy, giving her the once-over, as if trying to decide if she could be trusted with his secret. Finally, he said, “Octave. Nicholas Octave Fontenot until Papa Jack Devereaux married my mother and adopted me.”

  “Octave?” Mercy’s question was strained from the effort to accept the news calmly.

  “Octave.” He scooted his chair back a few inches and silently dared either woman to say a word.

  “How colorful,” Susan managed, and then she and Mercy lost the battle to suppress their laughter.

  Nick might have taken offense except that Mercy had placed her hand on his thigh, holding tight as she giggled through an apology. “It’s a lovely name. Really. I’m sorry we’re laughing.”

  “It’s all right, chère.” Graciously, Nick accepted her apology. “I just don’t ever wanna hear it slip out in conversation.”

  At the moment he probably would have forgiven her for a multitude of sins. Whether Mercy realized it or not, she had finally taken a giant step in their relationship. Her hand rested naturally on his thigh. She’d reached out for him, touched him as though she had a right to, as though something more than friendship bound them together.

  Any guilt Nick felt over warning off the cop evaporated. Both he and Mercy had staked a clai
m tonight. She’d just been more subtle about it. Nick watched Susan’s eyes flick briefly over the sight of Mercy’s hand on his thigh. Message received. It was a message he had no intention of contradicting.

  Three more weeks. Three more weeks, Mercy chanted to herself as she sat down in Sister Agatha’s office to wait for the nun. Three more weeks, and this benefit would be behind her. The end to her torture couldn’t come a moment too soon. She desperately needed time away from Nick to regain her perspective, and that wasn’t going to happen as long as they were working together on the benefit. Nick was a virus in her bloodstream that she couldn’t seem to shake.

  Grimacing, Mercy remembered that she had actually picked up the phone yesterday to check in with Nick. Not because she had to talk about the fund-raiser, but because somewhere along the line, Nick had become a good friend.

  He showed up at the city of Haunt’s Fourth of July picnic auction and bid fifty-two dollars for her picnic basket. To be completely honest, her heart tripped over itself when she heard his voice start the bidding. She had casually mentioned the picnic, but she hadn’t expected him to be there. Not really. After all, her parents had never managed to make the school Christmas pageants or piano recitals; she was used to being the only one without family in the audience. She hadn’t expected him to be any different than her parents, until he had been.

  To make matters worse, her body’s ridiculous physical lust for the man was getting all screwed up with her acceptance of him as a platonic part of her life. Lately, she felt like two people: One was scared to death of letting herself take that last step toward physical intimacy, and the other didn’t care about anything but that delicious feeling that settled in the pit of her stomach when Nick was around.

  Even when he wasn’t around, she couldn’t escape the thought of making love with Nick. If she had to watch that damn promo one more time, she thought she’d scream. Every time she turned the television on, there he was again! It wasn’t that she minded sharing the spotlight. If only she hadn’t had to share it with Nick.

  Somehow, Caroline in publicity had gotten a look at Nick and made one of her famous snap decisions to use him in the promos. When she heard him speak, Caroline picked up the phone and talked a local advertising firm into donating their expertise for a series of television spots for Ghouls’ Nite Out. Every blasted one of them featured voice-overs of Nick using that shamelessly sensual accent of his to sell tickets.

  Hogwash! They’re selling Nick, Mercy thought irritably.

  In the first spot, all anyone could see was the sexy, dark outline of a well-built man waiting in the shadows at the edge of a swamp-surrounded graveyard, waiting to claim Mercy Malone on Ghouls’ Nite Out. Waiting for his chance to come out of the eerie shadows created by moss-laden cypress trees and low-rising mist.

  Each promo brought what the whole city was calling “the sexy swamp thing” closer to the full light of the moon, closer to a spellbound Mercy Malone, who leaned forlornly against an old graveyard monument. The camera closed in as she promised in an uncertain whisper that she was a match for anything, man or beast, that roamed the night. Every promo spot hinted at a tortured past, hidden evil, and one chance to reunite the lovers on Ghouls’ Nite Out.

  Every time she saw the damned thing she could feel the swirl of sexually charged mist as it wove around her legs; she could even hear Nick’s promo slogan in her sleep. As the camera pulled back for a wide shot of the graveyard, Nick’s earthy accent promised, “Sometimes, all a body needs is a little magic. Help us create some magic on Ghouls’ Nite Out.” In the promo the screen would fade to black, showing only the information on the event and a telephone number for ordering tickets. In her dreams, something else entirely happened.

  “Argh!” Mercy growled, refusing to waste her time brooding about the fantasies that cluttered her sleep.

  She couldn’t even complain about the melodramatic commercials being a bad idea. Tickets were flying out of the offices of Kentucky Parents. At the rate they were being bought, the event would be a sellout by the end of the week. Before the station even started running the promo featuring a lusty kiss between the swamp thing and Mercy Malone.

  Running the tip of a fingernail absently along her bottom lip, Mercy remembered doing that spot over and over, take after take, kiss after kiss. Flesh to flesh. As usual, she hadn’t been wearing much of anything, and Nick wore only a pair of jeans that Caroline insisted were not indecently tight. Well, she wasn’t belly to belly with the man. There wasn’t a soul at the taping who didn’t know exactly how Nick felt about kissing Mercy Malone. All they had to do was look below the waist. His jeans hid nothing.

  When the door opened behind her, Mercy forced herself to put aside her troubling thoughts. She turned with a smile that froze on her face as Nick said, “Howdy, chère.”

  At least he looked like a doctor today, in pale blue scrubs with a laminated hospital ID clipped to his pocket.

  “Nick.” She wasn’t certain if his name came out as a greeting or a groan.

  She hoped it sounded like a greeting, and she hoped he wouldn’t notice the fact that her palms had started sweating the moment she saw him. Guilt most likely. Standing up, Mercy surreptitiously wiped her palms against the back of the white jeans she wore. “Why are you here? Sister asked me to drop by after my show was taped and go over the complimentary invitations for the people who’ve made substantial cash donations.”

  “She’s hung up in a meeting.” Nick noticed the way she rubbed her hands against her rump and realized that Mercy was beginning to simmer quite nicely. Maybe the time had come to stir her up again. He hadn’t kissed her since they shot the promos, weeks ago. Dieu, he’d wanted to, but he’d kept his hands and his lips to himself.

  As he walked around the desk he said, “Sister asked me to look in her desk for the patrons’ list. That is, if you don’t mind going over the list with me?”

  “No. No, of course not.” Liar.

  For the next half hour she made a pretense of paying attention to the list and nodding her head as Nick suggested the number of tickets for each patron. In the end, she picked up the list and said, “I don’t see any problems. I’ll get this right over to Kentucky Parents.”

  “No need to go rushin’ round. Why don’t we fax it?” Nick suggested as he pulled on the piece of paper that she clutched in a death grip.

  “Oh. What a good idea. Why didn’t I think of that?”

  “Maybe because you were too busy trying to escape from me. You’ve perfected escape to an art form in the last week. I thought we were friends.”

  “I’ve been a little busier than usual is all.”

  “Right,” Nick said, dragging out the word so that it sounded like an accusation as he flipped through the Rolodex and placed the list in the fax machine on the credenza. After he dialed, he waited for the tone and pushed the send button. “There. It’s all done. All we have to do now is call and tell them what we just faxed over.”

  Picking up the regular phone receiver on the desk, he dialed the committee’s office. “Janey? Hey, your fax machine should be spitting out a list of people who should be put on the free-invitation list. Yeah, that’s right. These are the heavy hitters who made contributions straight to the fund set up at the hospital.” He paused while Janey went to check her fax machine. “Yeah. That’s it. The number of invitations they should get is in parentheses behind their name. Right. So how is everything going over there?”

  Mercy saw her opportunity to slip out the door, and she attempted to take it. With a halfhearted wave good-bye, she picked up her small purse and slung it over her shoulder. Nick frowned at her and started to put his hand over the mouthpiece to tell her to stay, but before he could, he jerked his hand away and shouted “What!” into the phone.

  Startled, Mercy froze. She hated bad news.

  NINE

  “Both hands?” Nick’s eyes closed, and he shook his head gently. “When did you find out? Well, why didn’t somebody call me yesterd
ay?”

  Nick made a gesture as though asking God to save him from fools. “He suggested a band? Have you checked them out? No? Where are they playing?” He grabbed a pad to write on. “Yeah, I know the place. Mercy Malone’s here with me. If I can work it out, we’ll catch a few sets tonight and make a decision on whether or not to go with live music. Let Susan and Paul know the plan.”

  Putting the phone down, Nick cursed fluently in Frengish, a Cajun combination of French and English, before he told Mercy what she’d already guessed from the phone conversation. “The disk jockey managed to break both his hands.”

  “How?”

  “The first one while catching a baseball.”

  Mercy whistled. “Must have been some fastball.”

  “The second one when his wife slammed the van door on his good hand at the emergency room. Dieu! It’s a little late to be scrounging around for entertainment, but I’d rather have a band than another deejay. So we gotta check out a band tonight.”

  “No, we don’t have to check out a band. I didn’t volunteer for the entertainment committee. Besides, you can’t go anywhere. You’re on duty until midnight or something.”

  Nick waved that objection aside. “I’ll get Greene to cover for me. He owes me a few favors.”

  “Good, then you can go out clubbing. Me, I’ve got to get home to Witch. She’s pregnant, and there is a limit to how much I can ask of her kidneys.”

  “Surely one of your neighbors knows where you keep the spare house key for emergencies like this one? No? Then I’ll bet Sophie has a key of her very own. No way you gonna leave a pregnant dog without a backup baby-sitter. Am I right?”

  Pursing her lips, Mercy grudgingly admitted, “Unfortunately.”

  Nick picked up the receiver. “Call her.” When she hesitated, he prodded, “Come on, chère. Be a pal. Don’t make me go alone. I guar-ran-tee you’ll have a good time. If you want, I’ll even teach you the Cajun two-step.”

  Walking over to the desk to snatch the receiver from his hand, Mercy punched in the number with a series of short jabs that punctuated her words. “Like I care whether or not you teach me anything! I’m only going because I’ve seen your cassette collection. Heaven knows what kind of band you’d hire if I didn’t go along. Hello, Sophie …”