by Sandra Brown
“A preponderance of it.”
“But no physical evidence.”
“They matched his DNA,” she argued.
“A couple strands of his hair. Susan’s clothing also had traces of Mr. So-and-So’s dandruff and Mr. What’s-His-Name’s skin cells. She’d danced with a lot of men. She was crawling with DNA from a dozen or more people.”
“But Strickland’s saliva—”
“He admitted to kissing her open-mouthed and that his mouth had also been on her breasts.”
“What you’re saying is that you think Allen Strickland killed her.”
“No. I’m only saying that he was Moody’s best guess. But if Allen Strickland was the guilty party and sent to Huntsville to contemplate his sin for twenty long years, justice was served, right? Why, then, is somebody terrifying the hell out of you for bringing the world’s attention to it? And speaking of…” He placed his arm over her shoulder and brought her close to his side as he turned around and started walking away from the swing set. “I wonder who the guy in the pickup is.”
“What guy? Where?”
“Don’t look.” He hugged her tighter to keep her facing forward. “Just keep walking.”
“Someone is watching us?”
“Can’t be sure. But the same truck has driven by twice in the last few minutes. I wouldn’t have thought much about it except that he’s now coming by for a third pass. This is a pretty park, but I don’t think he’s admiring the duck pond or the gazebo. He doesn’t look the type.”
“What type does he look like?”
“I can’t make out his facial features, but his truck screams bad-ass bubba. Lots of bumper stickers, skull and crossbones on the mud flaps, get-the-blank-out-of-my-way tires. I’d bet money there’s a gun rack in the cab.”
“You noticed all that?”
“I’m used to searching the horizon for aircraft I must avoid, which usually look like a moving speck. One pickup roughly the size of my apartment is easy to spot. Do you know anyone who drives a truck like that?”
She shot him a look.
“I didn’t think so.” He stopped and bent down as though to pick a dandelion, and in the process glanced down the street in time to see the pickup round a corner a few blocks away. “Gone.”
Bellamy looked in that direction, but was too late to catch a glimpse of the pickup. “It could have been anybody.”
“It could have been, but I’ve come down with a bad case of paranoia.”
“I think we’re both being paranoid.”
“Don’t try to bullshit a bullshitter, A.k.a. You had a meltdown a few minutes ago. You’re scared, with reason. You said yourself that our guy doesn’t want you to remember what really went down.”
“I said that, yes, because I know about my memory loss. He doesn’t.”
“Which makes him even more desperate to learn what you’re up to, why you’ve stayed silent till now.”
“If I’d known something crucial to the case, I would have come forward with it during the investigation. I would have told everything I saw.”
“Not if what you saw scared you senseless.” He looked deeply into her eyes and said what she probably knew but hadn’t had the courage to acknowledge, even to herself. “Like witnessing your sister’s murder.”
She recoiled. “But I didn’t.”
“Someone thinks you might have. I think you might have.”
“Well, you’re wrong. I would remember that.”
“Okay,” he said, not wanting to add to her distress. “But we need verification of everything you do remember, or think you do. We need someone who was there to fill in the gaps that you and I can’t.” He hesitated. “We need to talk to your parents.”
“About this? Absolutely not, Dent.”
“They need to know.”
“I won’t resurrect the worst time in their lives.”
“You already did.”
“Well, thank you for reminding me of that,” she snapped. “When I began writing Low Pressure, I didn’t know that it would be published when Daddy was fighting for his life.”
“You may soon be fighting for yours, and they would want to know that.”
“You saw a redneck in a souped-up truck, like that’s a rarity in Texas. But suddenly my life is in danger? You’re blowing this way out of proportion.”
“Oh, denial now. That’s healthy.”
She had the grace to look away in concession.
“Your parents need to know about the potential danger.”
Adamantly, she shook her head.
“Howard’s got money. He could hire a bodyguard for you.”
“Have you lost your mind? I’m not going to have a bodyguard.”
He backed down from that. “Tell them, Bellamy.”
“No.”
“Talking about it with them could shake something loose.”
“I said no! And that’s final. Drop it.”
He hadn’t counted on getting her to agree, but her insistence was aggravating. He placed his hands on his hips and exhaled. “Okay then, Steven. And before you butt in with all the reasons why not, hear me out. You and he were at least in the same general vicinity when the tornado struck, which coincides with the time your memory goes kaput. He’s the next logical choice of who we should talk to.”
Reluctantly, she mumbled, “Probably.”
“Did he help supply you with missing facts when you were writing the book?”
“We met once in New York for lunch.”
He waited expectantly to hear more, but when she offered nothing, he said, “I’m not interested in what you ate.”
“Steven wasn’t very forthcoming with his impressions of that Memorial Day.”
“Why not?”
“He wasn’t very forthcoming about that, either.”
Dent frowned.
“Don’t read anything into it,” she said. “That was a terrible time for him, too. It’s in his past. Over. Buried. I don’t really blame him for not wanting to talk about it.”
“You said he went back east when he left Austin. Where?”
“He’s in Atlanta now.”
“Atlanta.” He checked his wristwatch, then resumed walking, but at a brisker pace. “If we hurry, we can make the four-thirty nonstop flight.”
“How do you know there’s a—”
“I used to fly it.”
Ray Strickland drove away from the park and out of Bellamy Price’s neighborhood. He didn’t believe he’d drawn her and Denton Carter’s notice, but he didn’t want to. He wanted to wait until he was ready to make his move. Then they’d notice him, all right.
Heeding his growling stomach, he stopped at a 7-Eleven on the access road off the interstate and bought a burrito and a Big Gulp. He returned to his truck and, as he ate seated behind the steering wheel, he ruminated on what he’d witnessed and what his next course of action should be.
The bitch was no longer hawking her book on his TV every time he turned the damn thing on. But did that matter? Not really. To Ray’s way of thinking, the damage had been done the day the book went on sale. It was still out there, being read by thousands of people every day.
Viciously, he tore off another bite of the burrito.
She’d made his big brother look like a patsy at best, and a killer at worst. She had to die for that. But, not wanting to make it too easy on her, he’d planned on playing with her for a while before he killed her.
He’d especially enjoyed getting into her car and rubbing his hands over the leather seat still warm from her ass. That had almost been as good as sifting through the panties in her bureau drawer.
But while these small violations had been fun, he was ready to get on with it. He could practically hear Allen whispering in his ear, “Strike while the iron is hot,” and Ray always heeded Allen’s advice.
That strutting pilot was another reason to move things along. Ray would have given one of his tattoos—except for the snake—to see Dent Carter’s face when he saw what had bee
n done to his airplane. He would have gone ballistic. Ray wasn’t afraid of him. Hell, no. But he was an additional complication that must be taken into account.
Ray had been keeping an eye on her house all morning, and sure enough, when she returned, Dent had been with her. Police had come and gone, but Ray wasn’t too worried on that score. While inside her house, he’d been very careful. Besides, he didn’t have a police record. He’d never been fingerprinted.
In fact, outside of his workplace, few people even knew he was alive. It wasn’t like he had a large circle of friends. He went to work. He came home. He worked out there with his own set of weights. If he went out, to a diner, to the movies, he went alone. If he felt like talking to someone, he pretended Allen was there, listening, laughing, giving him advice.
He’d continued to watch Bellamy’s house while the hours ticked by. Ray wondered what they were doing in there. Cleaning up the mess he’d made, or something more fun? Dent-the-superstud was probably after a piece of baby sister’s snatch, wanted to see how she compared to the other one.
What really had gotten to him, though, was their little stroll to the park. They’d looked so carefree, when they should have felt his threat, sensed his lurking, even if they hadn’t seen him.
Swinging, for godsake. Like a couple of kids without a worry in the world. Heads together. What had they been whispering about? What a sucker Allen Strickland had been? It made Ray’s blood boil.
He wanted vengeance for Allen, and he wanted it now. No more pussyfooting around. He was a man of action. Jean-Claude Van Damme wouldn’t wait around. Vin Diesel wouldn’t put off till tomorrow what should be done today.
He stuffed the remainder of the burrito into his mouth, balled up the wrapper and tossed it to the floorboard of his truck, then sucked half his Big Gulp through the plastic straw.
He was about to start his truck when his cell phone rang. His boss, calling again. This made about the tenth time today he’d tried to reach him, but Ray had ignored the calls because he knew why the guy was calling. He wanted to know why Ray hadn’t been on the job for the third day in a row.
Because Ray Strickland had more important things to do, that was why. He didn’t have to answer to anybody. He made his own decisions.
He picked up the phone, said, “Fuck you,” to the caller ID, then switched it over to vibrate so it wouldn’t bug him anymore.
He cranked on the truck, peeled out of the 7-Eleven parking lot, and headed back toward the neighborhood he’d recently left. He made two circuits around the park. They were no longer there. He drove toward her house, propelled by blood lust, no particular plan in mind except to stop Bellamy Price from breathing. Getting that asshole Denton Carter at the same time would be a bonus. Extra points. Allen would be tickled pink.
But as Ray turned onto Bellamy’s block, the Vette streaked past him in a blur of crimson.
All Ray had time to note was that there were two people inside it.
He gunned his truck and made a U-turn at his earliest opportunity. But his pickup couldn’t match the Vette for speed and maneuverability. By the time Ray was headed in the right direction, the Vette had vanished.
As soon as the flight went airborne, Bellamy said to Dent, “I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.”
“First class?”
“The trip.”
“We’ll get there in time to have some dinner, get a good night’s sleep, see your brother first thing tomorrow, come back. Less than twenty-four hours.”
“During which I’ll be out of pocket. I’m afraid Daddy will take a turn.”
“If you get a call, we’ll charter a jet back.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“You can afford it. You’re rich and getting richer.”
She said nothing to that. “But not telling them that we’re going feels devious.”
She had called Olivia en route to the Austin airport and had spoken to her father as well. Both had assured her that he was comfortable, that the drugs were working to curb the side effects of the most recent chemotherapy, and that for the time being he was holding his own. Even so, his oncologist had urged him to remain hospitalized so he could be closely monitored.
“I agree that’s best,” Bellamy had told her dad. “But I miss you.”
“Miss you, too, sweetheart. I’ve become accustomed to seeing you nearly every day.”
Although he had put up a brave front, he’d sounded feeble, which had only intensified her guilty feelings for leaving Austin without notifying them of her trip to go and see Steven.
With Dent setting the pace, they had practically jogged from the park back to her house, where he’d allotted her only five minutes to toss a change of clothing and some toiletries into a bag before hustling her out to his car.
He wove through Austin’s insane traffic at seventy miles an hour, which would have left her breathless with fright had she not been navigating the airline’s equally maddening telephone reservation lines.
The security check line had never been so long or slow moving. They made it to the boarding gate with only minutes to spare. Bellamy insisted on sitting on the aisle, telling Dent she didn’t like the window. He’d said God forbid that she look out and spot a cloud.
They’d been bickering ever since. Now she said, “You didn’t even give me time to think about it.”
“If you’d thought about it, you wouldn’t have come.” He looked around the first-class cabin. “Where’s the flight attendant?”
“The seat belt sign hasn’t been turned off yet.” She spoke absently because her mind was elsewhere. “The man in the pickup—”
“I didn’t get a good look.”
“Neither did I. You were driving too fast. All I caught was a glimpse of his tattooed arm, which was propped in the open driver’s window.” She paused, then said, “It could have been a coincidence that he was going in the direction of my house.”
“It could have been.”
“But you don’t think it was.”
“Put that truck in some areas around Austin, and it would fit right in. In your neighborhood, in the municipal park…” He shook his head. “Uh-uh. What was a guy like that doing cruising the streets of white-bread suburbia? Looking for his lost pit bull?”
Anything else they said would’ve been speculative, so there was no point in discussing it further. Besides, Dent’s fidgeting had become annoying. “What’s the matter with you?” she asked.
“Nothing.”
“Do you need the bathroom?”
“No.”
“Then… Oh.” Suddenly she realized why he was so restless. “You dislike being a passenger. You want to be piloting the plane.”
“Damn right.”
“Are you still qualified?”
“Qualified, yes. But no longer licensed for this size jet. I’d have to be retyped.”
“But you could fly it.”
“In a heartbeat.”
“You sound confident.”
“You don’t want to fly with a pilot who isn’t.”
“I don’t want to fly with one who’s overconfident, either.”
He held her gaze for several beats. “Something on your mind, A.k.a.?”
She wanted to ask him about the incident that had cost him his career in commercial flying, but his hard expression caused her to shy away. “The attendant is up now.”
“About freaking time.”
When she reached their aisle, she smiled down at Bellamy. “It’s a pleasure to have you on board, Ms. Price. I loved your book.”
“Thank you.”
“Are you on a book tour?”
“No, I’m taking some time off.”
“Don’t make us wait too long for the next book. Something to drink?”
“Diet Coke, please.”
The attendant reached across her to set two cocktail napkins on the armrest between her and Dent. “And for you, sir? Something stronger?”
“You read my mind.”
“I’m good at that.”
“I’ll bet you are,” he said, giving her a slow grin. “Bourbon on the rocks.”
“That would have been my first guess.”
“Make it a double.”
“That would’ve been my second guess,” she said with cheekiness, then pulled back and started up the aisle toward the galley.
Bellamy gave him an arch look.
He said, “If I can’t work the kite strings, I’d just as well drink.”
“It’s not that. It’s…” She looked after the shapely attendant as she made her way forward toward the galley. “It’s always been easy for you, hasn’t it?”
Catching her drift, he said, “Flirting? It would be easy for you, too, if you’d let it be.”
“Never. I’m not equipped.”
He slid a glance over her. “Your equipment is fine. Better than fine. But you’ve got this TFR posted—”
“TFR?”
“Temporary flight restriction posted around yourself that defies anyone to breach your airspace.” He turned slightly in his seat to study her better. “Why the barrier?”
“Just my nature, I suppose.”
“Try again.”
“Okay, blame the gene pool.”
“Meaning?”
“Susan inherited all the ‘it factor’ genes. When I came along, there were no more left.”
“You’re full of crap. Want to know what I think?”
“Actually, no.”
“I think your ex is to blame.”
The flight attendant returned with their drinks before Bellamy had a chance to respond. Dent absently thanked her for the drinks, but his attention stayed fixed on Bellamy, who was made uneasy by his scrutiny. She poured her cola into the glass of ice and took a sip. Finally, because he didn’t relent, she turned to face him. “You’re dying to know?”
“Hmm.”
“He was an up-and-coming electronics engineer in our company. Brilliant. Innovative. Hardworking. Handsome in his own way.”
“Otherwise known as ugly.”
“Average good looks.”
“If you say so.”
“We began going out together after business meetings, first with a group, then by ourselves, and that evolved into actual dating. Olivia and Daddy approved of him one hundred percent. He was pleasant company, he was a gentleman, he was easygoing in any given situation. We got along beautifully. We became engaged at Christmas and were married in June. Lovely wedding with all the trimmings.” She glanced down at the armrest. “Your ice is melting.”