by Harper Allen
“You’re the stripped-down model, like those performance cars companies test on the racetrack before they modify them and sell them as road vehicles. But you weren’t ever modified.” She looked over at him. “That’s why you didn’t think twice about going in after Petra. That’s also why if you knocked the gearshift into drive and plowed into the car ahead of us you’d tell yourself I made you do it. You’re so male it’s not even—”
“You finish your shift and find someplace to cry, don’t you?” Finally the light had changed. Stone accelerated slightly faster than he’d meant to. “Then you use your little premoistened washcloths and drive home like nothing’s happened.”
He shrugged without looking over at her. “If that’s what you want to do now, we can go to a park or something and I’ll take a walk. When you’re all cleaned up again you can honk the horn to let me know it’s okay to come back.”
Out of the corner of his eye he saw her stiffen. “What I do or don’t do is none of your business, McQueen. And despite the sensitivity of your offer, I’ll pass, thanks. I’d like to get home in case Uncle Jack’s been trying to reach us.”
She inhaled sharply. “You know, that performance car analogy I just came up with was all wrong. Life’s more of a demolition derby for you, isn’t it? Other people try to steer around things, but you don’t even bother to look over your shoulder to see who you just crashed into.”
Just ahead of them was an empty parking space. Pulling into it abruptly, Stone snapped the ignition off and turned to her.
“How the hell can you say I crash into you when there’s no way you can feel it, honey? You’re a damn tank, for God’s sake. The armor plating’s so thick no one gets through.”
“I don’t think I even want to know what this conversation’s about.” Coolly she met his gaze. “We’ve been thrown together for a few days, McQueen, that’s all. If and when we find out who started the fire that killed Claudia, whatever connection there is between us is over. Not that there’s much of one now,” she added. “A ghost from your past? You throw a cryptic remark like that at me without any further explanation and then tell me I’m sealed off?”
“Like I said yesterday, if it turns out I’m right I’ll fill you in.” He shook his head. “If I’m wrong then it’s just ancient history, and I never liked history that much. But that’s not what this is about and you know it. You’ve been hanging on to those damn letters like a drowning woman clutching a lifebelt since we left the lawyer’s office, but you haven’t glanced at them once. Hendricks gave them to you when I took Petra out into the reception area, didn’t he? And if they hadn’t made such a bundle, I’ll bet you would have crammed them into your purse and never mentioned them to me or to anyone else.”
“What’s to mention?” Her tone was edged. “Apparently Petra was right—her mom, for some unknown reason, wrote me every couple of months for the whole seven years she was gone. Except instead of sending the letters to me she mailed them to the lawyer who’d handled her own mother’s estate and told Hendricks to keep them on file, along with her will and the instructions she’d left about contacting me in the event of her death. What do you expect me to do, McQueen—rip them open in front of you and start sobbing over them?”
She glanced down at the taped bundle of envelopes in her lap. With an impatient gesture, she twisted around and tossed them into the back seat of the car. When she turned to face him once more her face was expressionless.
“I wish she hadn’t died the way she did, and yeah, I’ll look through them in case there’s anything in there that gives us a lead on why she was killed, although I’m not expecting to find any clues. But Claudia’s a part of my past, McQueen, and history never was my favorite subject, either.”
She tucked the stray strand of hair he’d noticed earlier behind her ear. “Like I seem to recall you saying once, the sharing’s been swell. Can we go now?”
“You really can’t stand it, can you, honey?” Stone heard the whiplash of heat in his own voice, and was powerless to control it. She flicked him a disinterested glance and started to turn away, but swiftly he reached over and caught her by the shoulders.
“You just can’t stand to have another human being catch a glimpse of tough Tamara King being vulnerable. Hell, you’re probably still kicking yourself for almost letting a few tears escape when you realized your best friend had been killed, for God’s sake. You don’t cry in front of anyone, do you?”
Her gaze was so electric he could almost feel her fury. He was blowing it with her, he realized. With his usual unerring talent, he was going about this in the worst possible way, and with every word he spoke he could feel her withdrawing. The hell of it was, he didn’t know what else he could do to get through to her. He plunged on recklessly, unable to stop.
“From what you said yesterday, your first week as a probie you got hit with a fire that the most experienced guys on the crew had trouble handling. You seem to be ashamed you even let it get to you. At the hospital two days ago you couldn’t clam up fast enough when you realized you’d actually let your defences down for a second. Now you’re trying to tell yourself that sad collection of letters from a dead woman doesn’t mean squat to you.”
He shook his head tightly at her. “You’re a liar, honey. You care, all right. You care about what you see on the job, you care that Claudia never got up the nerve to send those letters to you, and it’s tearing you apart that Petra told Hendricks today she didn’t know if she wanted to live with you. But you’ll die before you admit it. And if anyone comes close to seeing the real you behind that shell, you make damned sure they never get near enough to take a second look.”
“Too bad you went in for arson investigation, McQueen.” Under his hands her shoulders were rigid. “Obviously pop psychology’s your forte. Maybe if you’d taken that up in the first place you wouldn’t have crashed and burned the way you did. Maybe Donna Burke might even be alive.”
Her words drove into him with such force that Stone felt as if he’d just taken an actual physical blow. His hands fell away from her shoulders and for a moment he found it impossible to get his breath.
“That was unforgivable of me.” Her face white, Tamara stared at him in horror. “Unforgivable and stupid and—and untrue. Stone, I’m sorry. I just said the cruelest thing I could think of.”
He opened his mouth, and was vaguely surprised to find his voice still worked. “Hell, no. I—I deserved that.” He blinked, and her stricken face swam back into focus again. “It’s like you said, I go through life crashing into people, honey. I pushed you and you pushed back, that’s all.”
He fumbled for the door handle. “Listen, there’s something I wanted to ask Chandra about so I arranged for us to meet her at a diner not far from here, the Red Spot. You probably know the place since it’s a hangout for you jakeys.” He tried to smile. “If I get any information worth passing on I’ll let Jack know, okay?”
He stopped pushing down on the door handle and pulled up, and with relief he felt the damned thing unlatch. He had to get out of here, Stone thought. He’d blown it with her and this time he wasn’t going to get another chance to put things right, so he had to get away.
“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” As the door swung open he started to get out, but suddenly her hand was clamped around his upper arm, pulling him back. “Stone, you’re broke and you don’t have anywhere to stay. I—I don’t want to think of you without a place to stay.”
Her voice cracked on the last few words. He had no idea why it had, so he ignored that and addressed the one thing she’d said that he did feel capable of facing. “I’m not broke, honey.” He frowned, wondering if he’d heard her right. “Where’d you get that idea?”
“You were living in a flophouse. You don’t have to keep up any kind of pretence with me, Stone.”
“I lived in places like that because I didn’t want to run into anyone I used to know,” he said tightly. “But I’ve been working since I was sixteen, and I socked
away a good chunk of my pay in investments. Honey, when you grow up on the mean streets, you don’t leave anything to chance.”
He saw her lips form a surprised little o. Her mouth looked like a pink velvet bow, he thought stupidly. It would feel like velvet, too. It was time to end this.
Luckily, he was good at ending things.
“Like you say, we were thrown together for a few days. But be honest, babe—most of the time I rubbed you the wrong way, didn’t I?”
“Most of the time you drove me crazy.” Her gaze still held his. Her voice was still uneven. Her mouth still looked like velvet.
“Hell, I guess if I was a gentleman I wouldn’t admit it, but being a gentleman is one of the few things you haven’t accused me of. You drove me crazy, too.” He gave her a hard grin. “So we’re both off the hook here. Take care of yourself, honey.”
This time when he opened the door she didn’t stop him. He gave her one last glance, taking in the live fire of the tendrils of hair curving into the ivory of her cheeks, the rounded firmness of her uplifted chin, the shimmering silver tracks that were making their way down her face.
It was fate, buddy, he told himself harshly. This was never in the cards for you, and you knew it almost from the start. Say goodbye to the lady, McQueen.
But he couldn’t, and he knew that, too. Without another word he got out of the car and walked away as fast as he could.
He’d gone half a block before he stopped in his tracks.
“For God’s sake, she was crying, McQueen,” he said out loud. “Tough Tamara King was actually crying—and you walked away from her, dammit!”
He made it back to the car in seconds. Wrenching open the door, he stared in at her, still sitting in the passenger seat where he’d left her. On her lap was a litter of torn foil packets and crumpled towelettes.
Streaming blue eyes met his in a glare.
“Yeah, you drive me crazy, McQueen.” It would have been a pretty good facsimile of his own growl but for the hiccup. She tossed a tissue aside and ripped open a new packet. “I didn’t say I didn’t like it.”
“You don’t cry.” It was the first thing that came into his head.
“I know I don’t cry, McQueen. Not where anyone can see me, anyway. Do you blame me?”
She wiped angrily at a fresh torrent of tears. Helplessly he stood there, feeling as if his heart had ballooned up to about ten times its normal size, and was still swelling.
She didn’t cry pretty. The tip of her nose was a bright pink. Her whole face was wet and shiny and red. She looked as if she was about Petra’s age, and had miserably reached the tail end of a tantrum.
He still thought she looked beautiful, but of course that was because he was in love with her, Stone told himself impatiently. He’d thought she’d looked beautiful with a helmet crammed onto her head and her face streaked with soot. He’d thought she’d looked beautiful in those mismatched pajamas.
He’d known she was beautiful the night they’d—
“Stone?” She was looking up at him, and all at once he knew he was seeing the real Tamara King behind the tough mask. Her voice was a raw whisper. “Oh, Stone, I hurt you.”
There was so much pain in the simple declaration that all he could think of was that he had to make it go away for her somehow. He shook his head, and started to get into the car.
“No, honey—” he began, but before he could get another word out he felt a heavy hand drop onto his shoulder and heard a gratingly familiar voice close behind him.
“I see he’s still got the magic touch, Bill. They’re either slapping his face or crying their eyes out. Tell me, McQueen, how come women always leave you like this?”
Chapter Nine
Slowly Stone turned to face the two men. Even more slowly he looked at the hand clamped on to his shoulder, and then at its beefy owner.
“Well, well, Trainor and Knopf. And still in each other’s pockets, I see.” There was no inflection in his voice. “Which one of you two clowns wants to take me on first?”
Judging from the tone of his voice, Tamara thought in alarm, she had roughly a two-second window of opportunity before Stone did something that would end up with her having to trot down to the police station later to bail him out.
She was out of the car and sprinting around it just as the window began to close.
“You giving us fair warning, McQueen? In the old days your streetfighting used to be dirtier than that.” The heavy-set man with his hand on Stone’s shoulder was wearing a plaid sports jacket. “You must have soaked up some religion in those church basements they hold the meetings in, huh? I hear you spent the last seven years soaking up something, anyway.”
“Tommy, cool it.” His companion moved hesitantly forward. “This isn’t why we’re here.” Muddy brown eyes blinked behind round gold-framed glasses. He looked relieved as Tamara approached.
“Besides, there’s a lady present,” he added.
“Oh, please,” she snapped, marching past him to the other two. Reaching up, she plucked the beefy man’s hand from Stone’s shoulder.
“Think of me as the recess monitor, boys,” she said flatly. “You wanna lower those testosterone levels a notch before some nervous citizen calls the cops?”
“I know you.” The beefy man’s eyes were small to begin with. When he narrowed them they almost disappeared. “You’re Jack Foley’s little girl, aren’t you?”
“If you say so.” She gave him a cool stare. “I guess that makes you Mrs. Knopf’s little Tommy then, doesn’t it?”
“And you think I’m a jerk,” Stone said. He nodded toward the younger man, who was still hanging back. “Bill Trainor, the other half of the daring duo. So how come you two master investigators aren’t hot on the trail of some arsonist?”
“We dropped in at the Red Spot.” Trainor shot Stone a glance of pure dislike. “You heading that way, McQueen?”
“Yeah, as soon as I get the gas can out of the trunk. Anybody besides me think the Red Spot’s roast-beef sandwich is a little on the stringy side lately?” Stone patted his jeans pockets. “I was sure I had matches on me somewhere,” he muttered.
Trainor’s fair skin pinkened. “Watch it, Stone.” He swallowed, and Tamara saw his Adam’s apple bob. “You know damn well we could take you in on the strength of that.”
“I know damn well you could try. And I know damn well you wouldn’t succeed.” Stone’s reply was innocuous enough, but at the look in his eyes Trainor took an involuntary step back.
“Calm down, Bill, he’s jerking your chain.” Knopf threw his partner an impatient glance. “It’s how he gets his rocks off. You always thought you were pretty smart, didn’t you, McQueen?”
“Let’s just say the competition didn’t worry me, Tommy.” Stone lifted his shoulders. “Look, this old lang syne crap’s warmed my heart, but you boys probably have a dumpster fire or something like that to look into, so I’ll see you around. Let’s go, Tam.”
“It’s not a dumpster fire we’re working on. But you knew that, didn’t you?” Knopf planted his bulk in their path. “Imagine my surprise when I came across your name on the list of residents in that rooming house, McQueen. And imagine my surprise when I found that Chandra Boyleston had signed you out of the hospital.”
His smile was unpleasant. “The lieutenant didn’t want to tell us where you were until I reminded her of the penalties for obstructing an arson investigation. You make a habit of offering a bed to guys who get burned out of their homes, sweetheart?”
This last question was directed at Tamara, and at it she felt Stone’s hand on her arm tense. She drew in a tight breath.
“If you’ve got a point, get to it, Knopf. Otherwise move out of my way.” She kept her voice steady. “Because if you don’t, imagine your surprise when I make you.”
Knopf’s small eyes blinked. “Okay,” he said evenly. “I’ll keep it short. You were seen near the site yesterday, McQueen. If I find out you’re trying to cowboy in on this investig
ation, I’m taking you down and your firefighter girlfriend with you. Is that straight enough?”
“Straight as a die, Tommy.” Without making a move that Tamara could see, Stone seemed somehow bigger, as if he’d shifted his weight to the balls of his feet. “And I’ll be just as straight with you. If I even think you’re trying to drag Tamara into our private little feud, I’ll make sure the rest of your career consists of giving Sparky the firedog safety talks to grade-schoolers. The Dazzlers fire wasn’t the only one you two screwed up.”
“You’re never going to let that go, are you, McQueen?”
Unexpectedly, Trainor spoke. He moved slightly and the sunlight caught the thick lenses of his glasses, reflecting blindingly off them. Tamara was reminded of childhood experiments she and Claudia had performed with a magnifying glass and small piles of dried grass.
“This isn’t the Dazzlers nightclub, so if you’re looking to get back into the department in a blaze of glory you picked the wrong case. Right now it doesn’t even look like arson, luckily for you.”
He stopped abruptly, as if he’d said more than he’d meant to, and Tamara saw Knopf’s face darken.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” In the sudden silence Stone’s question sounded startlingly loud. Knopf shook his head.
“Nothing, McQueen. Nothing at all. You just got Billy boy going, that’s all.” He didn’t look at Trainor as he spoke. “Don’t forget what I said. This was a friendly warning, McQueen. It’s the only one you’re going to get.”
With a curt jerk of his head at Trainor he started to move away, but the younger man didn’t follow him immediately. Instead his gaze sought Tamara’s, and when he spoke the rancor he’d displayed a moment earlier was no longer in evidence.
“You and she used to be close, didn’t you? I—I was sorry to hear about her death.”
Above his collar his Adam’s apple bobbed once more, and then with an awkward shrug he turned on his heel. As he and Knopf strode away Tamara saw the heavier man remonstrating with him, but Trainor seemed to be ignoring him.