A Rare Chance
Page 19
“Maybe not. I don’t know. I’m just trying to suggest she might have gone off on her own, just to get some space.”
“I see,” Titus said. “I’m certainly not resistant to the idea of Lizzie having taken off on her own accord, but if she did, she could at least have left a note.”
Joshua seemed to take his cue from his older brother. “If she did take off because we were going too fast,” he said quietly, haltingly, “if I did something, disappointed her in some way—well, I hope you’ll tell her that I’d like to talk to her.”
Gabriella managed a weak, sympathetic smile. “If I see her, I’ll tell her.”
“Your friendship with Lizzie goes back a long way,” Titus said, his tone clinical, as if they were discussing a business deal. “But I don’t recall you mentioning her or seeing her, at least in Boston, since you’ve been with us. That’s a year.”
“We hadn’t seen each other since I came to Boston.”
“But her parents live here.”
Gabriella nodded. “Yes, but she tends to visit them when they’re at their home in Florida. This is her first visit to Boston in a year.”
Titus’s eyes narrowed. “Did you two have a falling out?”
It was one thing to keep her promise to her friend, Gabriella thought, but with Lizzie gone, her relationship with Joshua in tatters, there was no good reason not to tell Titus and Joshua about Scag’s unexpected return to Boston, thanks to Lizzie Fairfax. “I didn’t have a falling out with Lizzie so much as with my father.”
“Right,” Titus said with a small, forced smile. He had never been sure, Gabriella knew, what to make of her relationship with the infamous Tony Scagliotti. “But what’s he got to do with Lizzie?”
“She was a part of our argument. I believed she was enabling my father to continue with what I’d come to consider a self-destructive lifestyle. She always came to his aid, so he never had to face the reality of his advancing years, his lack of a stable income, a pension, savings. Lizzie was always there for him.”
Joshua shifted in his chair, but a quick glance from his brother kept him quiet.
Gabriella continued in a steady, even voice. “Anyway, Scag was injured a few weeks ago. He wrecked his knee. I don’t know how serious his injury is—he still won’t see a doctor.”
“You’ve spoken to him?” Titus asked.
She nodded. It was time to be out with it. “Lizzie brought him up here while he recovers and figures out what to do next. Ordinarily he would probably just have stayed in Miami, let Lizzie put him up for a couple weeks, but he knows—I think he knows—he might not be able to go back out into the field.”
Joshua was looking confused, but Titus was alert, focused on her words and their meaning. “Then your father’s in Boston?”
“Yes, he is. He’s tending my orchid collection while he’s on the mend. Lizzie wasn’t sure when she brought him up here how long she’d stay.”
“Why would she keep something like that a secret?” Joshua demanded impatiently. “She’s never mentioned a word to me about your father. Not a word.”
Titus gave Gabriella a pointed look. “And why would you keep it a secret?”
She shrugged, careful not to let her own tension make the situation worse. “I don’t think either of us meant to keep it a secret as such. It just ended up sort of looking that way. I wanted to give Scag some time to figure things out for himself before leaking word that he’s back in Boston.”
Joshua frowned, jumping to his feet in a surge of impatience and impotent frustration. “You must have insisted Lizzie keep quiet. Otherwise she’d have told me. God, I can’t believe that lunatic’s in town. Just what I need on top of my fiancée skipping out on me.”
Titus regarded Gabriella more calmly. “Then I take it your father’s been keeping a low profile?”
She tried not to take offense at Joshua’s open animosity, blaming it instead on his concern for Lizzie. “I don’t think he has anything to do with whatever’s going on with Lizzie. I just wanted you to have all the facts.”
“Finally,” Joshua said sarcastically.
Gabriella ignored him. What would he say if he knew she wasn’t telling the truth even now? She hadn’t given him and Titus “all the facts.” Not even close. She hadn’t mentioned—and wouldn’t—Lizzie’s call yesterday or her package or Pete Darrow or Cam Yeager, all of it pertinent, perhaps, to Lizzie’s behavior.
“I just wanted you to know before you decide what to do next,” Gabriella said, with only the slightest twinge of guilt.
Titus too had gotten to his feet. “But you think it’s possible her disappearance could have something to do with you and Scag rather than with Joshua?”
“I don’t have any idea, really. I don’t know where Lizzie is.”
Joshua had begun to pace back and forth across his brother’s elegant office, giving up any attempt at self-control. “I don’t believe you. I think you know more—far more—than you’re saying.”
Titus remained pensive, not responding at once. Finally he gave Gabriella a grave look. “This is a difficult situation for us all. I wish you’d come to us right away with news your father was in town. But you didn’t. Now I—well, I think Joshua has a point. We can’t be sure you’ve told us everything.”
“Look, I—”
“No, Gabriella. I want you to take a few days off and sort out your priorities. When you’ve decided to tell Joshua and me everything, come back and we’ll talk.”
Gabriella swallowed, uncertainty gripping her. “All right, if that’s what you think’s best.”
Joshua flew around at her. “You don’t have a choice in the matter.”
Titus gave her a pained look but agreed with his younger brother. “Take some time off, Gabriella. Figure out your priorities. We’ll talk.”
Scag looked up from his worktable when Gabriella walked into the greenhouse shortly after one. “What happened? You get fired?”
“I told Joshua and Titus about you. They think—I don’t know, I guess they think you might have snuck Lizzie out of town.”
He grunted. “That wasn’t me. That was you.”
“That was not me, that was her. I had nothing to do with it. Look, they’re just worried about Lizzie. She hasn’t been in touch. With that kidnap attempt on Joshua—”
Scag raised a hand, stopping her. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. Speaking of knotty little problems, Yeager came by this morning, said he wanted to talk, but I think he was just hoping I’d leave him alone for a while, get the place to himself. Does he think you’re hiding Lizzie here?”
Gabriella sighed. “I don’t know what he thinks.”
“Makes for an interesting relationship, doesn’t it?”
She made a face, and her father grinned, knowing, she suspected, that her feelings toward Cam Yeager were both complex and confusing. Yes, it was true—just as he’d said—that a warning bell had gone off in the back of her mind when they’d been so close to making love last night. She hadn’t liked the prospect of him searching her apartment—and her roof—while she was dead to the world, done in from the exercise of pure lust.
Except, of course, it wouldn’t have been an exercise merely of lust. The alarm bell, she knew, hadn’t been just about Lizzie’s package and her loyalty to her friend. She was reasonably confident that even an experienced detective like Cam Yeager would have difficulty finding it in back of the fan in Number Three—at least not before she caught him. No, the alarm bell was also about herself. A night devoted to the physical release of the sexual tension that had built up between Cam and herself had its allure. But kissing him, feeling his mouth on her breasts, she’d realized, with a jolt like none other she’d ever felt, that she wanted more from Cameron Yeager than a casual, throw-away night together.
Damnit, she thought, she was falling for him.
“He’s gone now, isn’t he?” she asked Scag.
“Only because he chose to go. I don’t think I’d have gotten far trying to tos
s him out on his ear. You know,” he went on in his philosophical father tone, turning his attention back to a tiny epiphyte—a tree-growing orchid—he was remounting on a bark slab, “I kind of figured one of these days you’d go for a cop.”
“What do you know about me and cops?”
“A lot more than you think.”
But Gabriella didn’t rise to the bait. She’d learned a little self-control in her year with TJR Associates. She wasn’t going to talk about Cam Yeager or her love life with her father, a man who’d never married her mother, who’d been a part of his only child’s life when it was convenient for him and not necessarily when she needed him. It wasn’t that she still held a grudge. What was the point? Scag was Scag, and she didn’t blame him for her flaws and occasional fits of unhappiness and dissatisfaction. By the time she was in preschool she’d learned to accept her father for who he was. But that didn’t mean she’d trust any advice he had on how to have a satisfying, committed, long-term relationship with anything but an orchid.
“Well, I don’t want to talk about it. I’m going downstairs,” she announced, heading for the door. “I haven’t had lunch yet. If you need me for anything, give a yell.”
By late afternoon she was feeling restless and aggrieved. What if keeping secrets from Joshua and Titus—never mind out of loyalty to Lizzie—ended up costing her her job? What would she do? How could she support her Back Bay lifestyle, hundreds of orchids, a destitute father? What kind of reference could she expect from the Reading brothers? What kind of questions could she expect from a potential employer about why only a year with TJR Associates, why the two years with Tony Scagliotti, what kind of problems they could expect Scag to cause them?
And where the hell was Lizzie? Why hadn’t she called at least to say that she was safe—or even to check on her damned package?
If she were Lizzie Fairfax, Gabriella thought, trying to rein in her free-floating anxieties and frustrations before she did something impulsive, where would she go?
But she’d never been able to think like Lizzie any more than Lizzie had been able to think like her. They’d just learned to accept each other, differences and all. That didn’t mean Lizzie wouldn’t worry about what she perceived as Gabriella’s recklessness and her tendency to speak her mind, when Lizzie was always so attuned to how she was being received. It didn’t mean Gabriella didn’t worry about Lizzie’s obsessiveness in relationships, about what paths her need to love and be loved, her need for drama, would take her down.
She could call Lizzie’s parents and find out if they’d heard from their daughter. It wouldn’t be beyond Lizzie to sneak off to the Fairfax home in Palm Beach and leave Gabriella to wrestle with the resulting mayhem. Lizzie would simply say Gabriella could handle the situation, she was tough, she was a trusted friend.
But Gabriella had her doubts that Lizzie had even considered the consequences of her actions. She hadn’t thought beyond getting her package into Gabriella’s hands and herself out of Boston, away from a relationship she no longer wanted.
Still, Palm Beach was worth a try. Gabriella was reaching for the phone, eager to have something to occupy herself, when her intercom buzzed.
Cam’s voice came over the static. “It’s me.”
She buzzed him up. One, she knew she had no choice. He’d stay down there buzzing her apartment until someone called the police or she let him up. Two, she wanted to see him. She could feel it in every fiber of her body.
“You’re a sick woman, Gabriella Starr.”
When he walked into her small entry, he almost took her breath away. Kissing him—almost making love to him—had only heightened her attraction to him. She noticed everything about him. The faint lines at the corners of his sea-blue eyes. The frayed cuffs on his ancient Bruins sweatshirt. The snug fit of his jeans over his thighs. She herself had on fleece shorts, a cropped, baggy, short-sleeved sweatshirt, and no shoes. It was just barely warm enough for shorts and bare feet.
“Well,” she said, “hello. Scag said you dropped by earlier.”
Cam smiled. “He accused me of wanting to search the place.”
“Did you?”
“Of course. When a suspect is holding back information, a good detective wants an unhampered look at everything she owns.”
“Think I’m holding back?”
“Always.”
It wasn’t an insult. There wasn’t a trace of bitterness or even annoyance in his tone. He was simply stating the facts as he saw them. She started back toward the living room. “Scag’s up on the roof still if you want to see him. I assume, seeing how it’s not yet five, you aren’t here to see me.”
“You are home early, aren’t you?”
“Yep.” She picked up her cordless phone and handed it to him. “Order some Chinese food and we’ll have an early dinner and I’ll explain everything. Okay?”
His eyes zeroed in on her. “Everything?”
“Everything I can,” she amended. “Invite Scag to join us. I’ll just turn off my computer and head on up.”
“I’ve had one hell of an unproductive day, so I’m in no hurry if you need to finish up something.”
Already halfway down the hall to her bedroom, she glanced back at him, surprised by how at ease she felt, considering he’d just admitted he’d search her apartment given half the chance. “Just my resumé. It’ll keep.”
He went still, his gaze staying on her. Then he said, casually, “You like your Chinese food hot or mild?”
“Hot.”
He smiled. “I should have known.”
When he was gone, Gabriella debated a quick call to Palm Beach just to satisfy her curiosity. But she didn’t need Cam dialing for Chinese delivery and overhearing. “Self-control, m’dear,” she mumbled, quickly saving the two lines she’d managed to complete of her revised resumé and turning off her computer. She’d needed something to do, some way to occupy her mind, and under the circumstances, updating her resumé had seemed a good idea.
How much would she tell Cam?
How much should she tell him?
On her way back through the kitchen, the telephone rang. She picked up the extension next to the refrigerator.
“I’m calling from Paris,” Lizzie said.
“Lizzie! Good Lord, are you all right? Hang on a second.”
Gabriella set the receiver on the kitchen counter and quickly checked the stairs up to the roof in case Cam was wandering down in search of her. But the stairs were empty. She picked up the receiver, without an iota of guilt. If he’d search her apartment, she’d talk to her friend.
“I’m back,” she told Lizzie, keeping her voice down. “Are you okay? Paris. My God. Then you meant it when you said you were leaving the country.”
“Of course I meant it, and I’m fine. But I won’t pretend the past few days have been easy.” Her voice cracked, and she paused, regaining her composure; she came across as all raw nerves and conflicting emotions. “I’m sorry, Gabriella. I know what I must be putting you through. I will never take up with a friend’s boss again. Never.”
“It’s okay, Lizzie. Don’t worry about me. But you’ve got to tell me more. Why did you run? Something happened between you and Joshua, didn’t it? You didn’t just get cold feet.”
Lizzie sobbed, on the verge of completely losing control. Gabriella kept quiet, not wanting to say anything that would push her friend over the edge—or make her hang up.
In a moment, Lizzie rallied, clearing her throat as if she were asking the price of a new shade of lipstick. “Everything happened between us,” she said. “Our relationship—marriage—just wasn’t going to work, and I had to get out. I couldn’t think beyond getting free of him, of myself too. It’s hard to explain.”
“You couldn’t just have it out with him?”
“No—no, I’m not like you, Gabriella. Maybe now that I’m here in Paris I can call him; I know he must be worried.” She paused, a steeliness coming into her tone. “But I won’t go back to him. No matter
what, I won’t go back.”
“You don’t have to, Lizzie. No one can force you to marry someone you don’t want to marry or to stay in a relationship that’s run its course. What about Pete Darrow? Did he do anything, say anything that unnerved you?”
“I can’t talk anymore, Gabriella. Maybe after I’ve gotten some distance from this whole experience. I thought—I thought this time I was in love.” She broke down again, but only for a few seconds. “I’m sorry about the position I’ve put you in. I know you love your work, and here I’m—here I’ve made such a scene with Joshua.”
“Take that one off your worry list, Lizzie. I can handle Joshua Reading.” In any case, the horse was already out of the proverbial barn. “You just concentrate on doing what you have to do. If Joshua wants to blame me, that’s his problem.”
“I wish I had half your guts,” she said in a low, self-pitying voice.
“Stop it, Lizzie. You got yourself off to Paris when you felt you needed to, didn’t you?”
“But I’ve left you with my mess.”
“You’ve been there for me plenty of times.” Gabriella meant what she said, her irritation with Lizzie vanishing; she struggled to keep her own emotions from spilling over onto her friend, who was clearly fragile enough as it was. “Don’t go fretting about me, okay? You take care of yourself.”
Lizzie started to cry, her words barely intelligible through her sobs. “Oh, Gabriella, promise me you won’t hate me when this is over.”
“I’m not going to hate you, Lizzie. Not ever.” She spoke briskly, hoping to penetrate Lizzie’s despair.
“My package…”
“I’ve got it,” Gabriella said.
“Oh, thank God.” She sniffled, her relief palpable. “Gabriella, you’re wonderful. I knew I could count on you. You haven’t opened it?”
“I said I wouldn’t. It’s in a safe place, just as I found it.”
Her mood brightened almost instantly. “I just need some time to get my head together. Then I’ll come back and straighten everything out. I promise.”
Gabriella heard it in Lizzie’s voice, knew she was already too late. “Lizzie—damnit, don’t hang up!”