Heavenly Stranger

by Tina Wainscott

  “Pirate racing,” Chase said without even thinking. “Treasure ships, pirate ships and neutrals. We had to capture flags.”

  Allister’s face went white. “You remember?”

  He did! He relished the feeling of the memory itself, and having a piece of his past. “Sometimes I get a…knowing or a flash of a memory. Usually it’s nothing helpful, nothing specific enough to trigger the rest.” He’d obviously thrown his father off. Allister sat in silence for a few minutes, until Chase said, “Go on.”

  “I think losing your mother at sea drove you to sailing. We never talked it about.” Allister grabbed another cigarette from the oak box. He went through a ritual, passing it beneath his nose and across his lips. He directed this to Maddie: “He was always the adventurous, volatile one. He did what he damn well pleased. Had no interest in the company, though he did make a show of working there for a while. I fired him when I thought his resentment might blow up the place.”

  Chase didn’t want to hear about that kind of anger. “Do I have a temper?”

  “Sometimes.”

  Chase stiffened. They were getting closer to what happened that awful day.

  But Allister went on with the past. “I won’t say our relationship was cozy. I raised my sons to be ambitious, hardworking, dedicated. You were, but not for the company that provided so well for you. We didn’t talk much, you and I, while you were off living out of a duffel bag, going from one regatta to another. You told me it was the college of life and sailing. You had to put in your dues and learn. You always were the risk-taker in the family.”

  Chase exchanged a chagrinned look with Maddie. So, I’m worse than your husband, he said with his eyes.

  Allister started turning pages in the scrapbook. “It’s all in here. Your victories in the SORC, your death-defying feats climbing up the mast during a storm to untangle the jammed halyard during Cowes Week, and how the boat capsized anyway in a race that’s claimed even the bravest sailors.”

  “What does Skidbladnir mean?” Maddie asked, seeing the name of the boat in the picture.

  “It’s a Scandinavian myth, a collapsible ship with favoring winds.” Chase blinked, realizing, just as Maddie did, that he’d known without even thinking about it.

  Each article was neatly cut and mounted in the book. Some of the headlines were grim, lives lost during a storm, boats sunk or damaged. As the dates moved forward, his name was mentioned more often, the whiz kid from Miami as captain of this boat or that one, coming in third, second, and sometimes first in major campaigns.

  “No matter how many arguments we had, how many long-distance phone calls we ended by slamming the phone down, I still kept up with your activities.”

  “At least he knew you were proud of him in some ways,” Maddie said.

  “No, he didn’t. Because I never told him I had this.”

  Chase met his father’s gaze, but he didn’t know what to say to an admission he knew was major. “You gave me a watch.”

  Allister nodded. “Out of guilt, I’m afraid. You knew it, too. If you hadn’t liked the watch so much, you probably wouldn’t have worn it.”

  The man sitting across from him may as well have been a stranger, though they’d obviously had a volatile past. “I’m afraid I had to sell it. I had no money.”

  “I’m glad it helped you.”

  Chase returned to the book and found an article about the boat with Augustine Aero painted on the side.

  “That’s when I decided to stop fighting you. You were determined to make your way as a sailor, though I know you hated our dissension. I hated it, too. We compromised. I sponsored your first boat. It wasn’t entirely unselfish. The company got exposure. It was the only way to make you a company man.”

  Not much different from Maddie’s family’s manipulations.

  “For a while, anyway,” Allister added. “After losing the bid to challenge for the America’s Cup—”

  “I sailed in the America’s Cup Regatta?” Chase asked, astonished.

  “Yes, but not very well. Not your fault. You had a run of bad luck, equipment failures, crew failures. You didn’t tolerate incompetence. So, you got it in your head that you wanted to sail in a solo race.”

  “The Around Alone.”

  “You remember?” Allister asked.

  “Read about it in an article.” He traded a look with Maddie. It bothered him that they’d become close enough to read each other’s expressions. She was thinking about the iceberg memory, and he was telling her he didn’t want Allister to know how much he remembered.

  “You always were a bit of a loner. I thought it might be because you’d lost your mother at such a young age, that maybe it impaired your ability to relate to people. Especially women.”

  He raised his eyebrows at that, but before he could ask what it meant, Maddie said, “He relates very well to women.”

  Allister took them in with an iron gaze, and Chase changed the subject. “Augustine Aero didn’t sponsor this boat.”

  “I offered, but you refused. You wanted to do it on your own. And so you did.”

  He’d come in second overall in Class II, first in Leg Three. He felt a surge of pride, but only in a peripheral way. He couldn’t remember the victory of that first-place win, or of completing the 27,000 nautical mile race. It was as though he were proud of someone else’s accomplishment.

  But his mind wouldn’t let him stray too far from his father’s previous comment. “When you say I don’t relate to women well, you don’t mean…”

  Allister jerked his head back. “You’re not gay. I wouldn’t have tolerated that.”

  He slid a gaze to Maddie. He definitely liked women, at least this one. “I was married. And divorced.”

  “You married Lila when you were both nineteen. Her father owned one of the sailboats you crewed on. You were married for a year and a half.” He lit the cigarette, inhaled the smoke and snuffed it out. “She cried the hardest at your funeral.”

  Those words struck him in the gut. “I had a funeral.”

  “You’re not officially considered dead, but your friends…we needed closure.”

  “I understand.” But he couldn’t explain the eerie feeling that people had gone to his funeral, had cried. “I’m sorry I put you through that.”

  He’d put them through more than just the funeral, though. Allister looked grim, and Chase knew it was time to hear what had happened.

  “I leased out your apartment. We—Patrick and I—discovered you were different than we thought. You liked classical music and the kind of books they make you read in English class. You never let on.”

  Chase felt at last some connection to his former self. Now he wasn’t too cool to indulge in public. “What about my sailboat?”

  “Chase the Wind is still impounded.”

  This was it, Chase decided. Because his near future depended on what he’d done in the recent past.

  “You can stay here, of course,” his father said, still avoiding the issue. “In fact, this is the wisest place to stay.”

  “That might not be a good idea, considering…” Time to face it.

  The door burst open and a man about Chase’s age charged in. His light skin was fused with red, his blond hair nearly standing on end with rage. He took in Chase, then Maddie, then back to Chase.

  “Now, Patrick…” Allister soothed.

  “I stopped by with some papers…the way Eduardo was acting, I knew something was up.” He threw his sunglasses and the papers on the table and stalked closer.

  “Sit down, Patrick.” Allister’s voice was calm but authoritative.

  Patrick gathered his rage for a moment, then lunged at Chase. “You son of a bitch! You killed her!” Patrick’s lanky weight landed on Chase and his big hands went around his throat. “I wanted you to be dead!”

  CHAPTER 17

  “I wanted…you to be…dead!” When Patrick yelled the words again, they were broken up by his sobs.

  Maddie had already been on
the defense, but Chase waved her and his father away and struggled to get out from beneath him. Patrick staggered back, his face still crimson. Chase stood to face him and whatever he had to say.

  “Who did I kill?” He briefly met Allister’s agonized expression.

  Patrick ran his hand across his damp face. “The woman I was going to marry.”

  Chase dropped back down on the couch, his legs unable to hold him. He didn’t know what to say. Sorry was pitifully inadequate.

  “He doesn’t remember anything,” Allister said, pulling Patrick back into a chair.

  Though Patrick jerked away, he complied. But the venom hadn’t left his blue eyes. “He’s a damned liar.”

  “Why do you think it took him so long to come back to us?”

  “Because he’s a coward! He thought he could run away and hide from what he’d done. Maybe he ran out of money.” His gaze raked over Chase’s faded clothes and long hair. “So he came to get daddy to bail him out again.”

  Chase was beginning to hate himself more and more. He couldn’t even meet Maddie’s gaze.

  “This is different,” Allister said. “He’s not a kid taking out people’s boats without their permission. Or getting into a drunken fight.”

  There was that mention of drinking again.

  “No, it’s murder this time.”

  “Tell me what happened,” Chase said, an ache growing in his chest.

  “You were screwing around with the woman I loved,” Patrick spat out, rapidly sliding his hand back through his hair. “And then you killed her!”

  “It was an accident,” Allister said in that decisive way.

  “You’re telling me he strangled her by accident?” Patrick started to get to his feet, but one look from Allister quelled him. Still, he gripped the arms of the chair. “No matter what he’s done, you’ll always defend him. I put in twelve-hour days at the factory since I’m sixteen, and what do I mean to you? Zip. Zero. Nada. He plays and calls it work and he was your damned hero.” He glared at the sailing picture on the wall, then the scrapbook on the table. His voice went menacingly low. “Well, he’s not a hero anymore.”

  Chase surged to his feet. “Tell me what happened, dammit. That’s why I came, to make it right.”

  “You’ll never make it right,” Patrick said. “You—”

  “I’ll tell him.” Allister silenced Patrick even with his low voice. “You’re being a hothead.”

  In the initial scuffle, Allister had dropped his last cigarette on the blue carpet and Patrick’s foot had crushed it. Maddie tugged on the back of Chase’s jeans, urging him to sit down. She grabbed his hand as soon as he did. He stared at their linked hands, knowing that whatever she heard now was going to send her home.

  That’s the way it had to be.

  Allister took out another cigarette and settled it between his lips. “Only you know—or knew what happened. The night before you disappeared, you were at Salty’s—”

  “As usual,” Patrick added, jerking his hand back through his hair several times again.

  Chase met their eyes. “Was I a freakin’ drunk?”

  “Yes,” Patrick said without hesitation.

  “No,” Allister said, punching that one word with power. “You just drank too much on occasion.”

  It was getting worse. He put his head in his hands for a moment, but raised it again to face the consequences. “Did I drink when I sailed?”

  “Probably,” Patrick said.

  “You weren’t stupid.” Allister sucked on the cigarette, then exhaled as though it were lit. “But you had a habit of hanging out at Salty’s too often with your friends, doing tequila shots like they were candy.”

  Chase summoned that bar memory, knocking back tequila with the sexy blonde.

  “You told your friends you weren’t up to catching a cab home, so you were going to crash on your boat. The next morning you and the boat were gone.”

  Patrick said, “You took her—”

  “Enough,” Allister said. The ache in Chase’s chest increased as the story progressed. He already knew the end; he needed to know what had happened in between.

  “The next day your yacht was spotted several miles off the coast. The autopilot was running, but there was no one aboard. The Coast Guard towed it in. There wasn’t a clue as to what had happened to you. When they reached the dock, they saw her.”

  A sob ripped through Patrick, but it didn’t lessen the hatred in his eyes. He looked at odds, dress shirt and tie with his contorted expression.

  “Her body,” Allister said in a dulled voice, “had been caught on the keel. You had one of those fancy designs fashioned after the boat you sailed in The Cup. The autopsy revealed she’d hit her head, but that wasn’t what killed her. She’d been strangled.”

  Patrick surged to his feet, muscles corded. “And now you’re faking amnesia in some lame attempt to get away with it. Well, it’s not going to work. The police have all they need to convict you. Not only was it your boat, but your friends placed you at the scene. You’re going to pay no matter what your story is.”

  Chase came to his feet, too. His brother was an inch taller, and Chase knew he’d held that inch over Chase’s head for years. “I’m back to face the consequences.”

  “That’ll be a first,” Patrick said on a bitter laugh. “It was bad enough that you were screwing her behind my back. Why did you have to kill her?”

  “That’s what I need to find out,” Chase said. Maddie squeezed his hand, but he still couldn’t face her.

  “Maybe you put some moves on her she didn’t like that night. She fought you, and you…strangled her.”

  Those words chilled Chase’s heart. His memory of fighting with someone, then seeing her fall. “Were we having an affair?” he asked. “Do you know that for sure?”

  “Why else would she be on that boat with you? I should have suspected it earlier. Every Tuesday she’d go off to her adult ed class. Later I found out that even though she was still going, they were on break.”

  “Why would I get involved with your woman? Even if we didn’t get along, that’s sick.”

  “Because you could. You step on people without thinking of the consequences. You don’t even like brunettes, but you still went for Julie.”

  Brunettes. So Julie wasn’t the sexy woman in his flash of memory. Chase finally looked over at Maddie, hoping to see disgust in her eyes. At the same time, hoping he wouldn’t. Her hazel eyes shone bright with faith.

  Jeez, was she naïve.

  “I’m going to turn myself in, but I need time to figure out what happened. I need…to find myself first before I face charges for a crime I don’t remember committing.”

  Both men said, “No,” at the same time.

  “You go to the police now,” Patrick said.

  Allister quelled him with a look. “He doesn’t go to the police at all. As far as anyone is concerned, Chase is dead. He’s come back to face his crime, and that’s what counts. His crime being that he was seeing Julie. The evidence is circumstantial.”

  “Let the police decide that,” Patrick said.

  “The police won’t have all the information to process. Chase is the only one who knows what happened. With the evidence to hand, he’ll go down for murder. It won’t be a fair trial; he has no defense. I make any decisions regarding my family. Chase already has lost his life, punishment enough.”

  “What are you suggesting?” Chase asked, watching Patrick seethe in his chair.

  “You stay missing. We get you another identity. The long hair is good, but your face and voice are too distinctive to allow you to remain in Miami. Unfortunately, it will be a, pardon the pun, dead giveaway if you return to sport sailing. Too many people know you. I’ll give you access to a bank account in the Caymans. You used to talk about bumming, as you put it, around the islands when you were a teenager. You can do that for a while if you wish. I’ll purchase a home somewhere, and you can live there. It’s the only solution.”

 
; “Bull!” Patrick said, once again surging to his feet. “You can’t keep covering for him. That’s why he’s in this predicament.”

  Allister put the cigarette in his mouth. The paper was crinkled from handling. “I know you loved Julie, but she was cheating on you. With your own brother. Why demand justice for her death now and cause your family and the business to undergo scandal and scrutiny? Isn’t it enough that he has to give up his family, his identity and the ability to do what he loves?”

  Patrick narrowed his eyes at Chase. “No.”

  “I said I’d face the charges.”

  Patrick started to head out. “And you’ll do it now.”

  “He will not,” Allister said in a voice that became menacing. “You will tell no one about his arrival. You’ll accept that justice has been served and continue to oversee Augustine Aero as president. Everything will go on as normal.”

  Chase could see tension ripple through Patrick’s body. He looked at Chase, then at their father, and the venomous hatred never dimmed. “I understand.” Then he walked out.

  “You’ve always had bad blood between you. Competitive, both of you. And so different. He never made it a secret that he resented being the only son dedicated to the company.” Allister stood. “Now, then. I’ve got some calls to make, being as I know nothing about securing a new identity. Fortunately, I haven’t lived in Miami all my life without making some connections.”

  Chase stood, bringing Maddie up with him since he was still gripping her hand. “I can’t run away from this.”

  Allister stopped looking through his leather-bound address book. “I’ll say the same thing to you as I did to Patrick. Do you want to bring shame to the family and the business when it’s not necessary? Not to mention bringing shame to yourself. And God, think of prison. You’re a mystery now. The respected sailor lost at sea, a woman’s body found with the boat. Go public, and you’ll be a thug and a murderer. With you gone, they couldn’t do much. It’s just another unsolved murder. If you go to them, you’re going to bring upheaval to us all. You’re still paying a big price. I’m not buying a mansion, and there won’t be any staff.”