On Fire

by Carla Neggers

  “Well, ace, stupid is as stupid does.”

  Riley was the first woman he’d touched—virtually the first woman he’d had any contact with—since his self-imposed isolation. Of course he’d think about her in her red bra, covered in rosewater soapsuds in her shower, doing toe touches in her little shorts. It was natural. Like ducks and imprinting or something.

  He raked both hands through his hair in frustration. Why the devil did it have to be Riley St. Joe who’d paddled out to his island? She was all wrong. She’d never be anything but all wrong. She liked doing things like donning big rubber boots and wading into ice-cold water to help stranded whales. She lived in Cambridge. She had a lot of science degrees. She was maybe a notch above Emile when it came to social skills. Her family was weird.

  And he, John Straker, wounded FBI agent, someone she’d known and disliked pretty much all her life, was the last man on the planet she’d want fantasizing about going to bed with her.

  He swallowed the last of his coffee and shot to his feet. No, she wouldn’t—and that was half the problem. She was out there trying to run off the same fantasies he was having.

  He wanted to find out how Sam Cassain’s body had ended up on Labreque Island. He wanted to find out where Emile had taken himself off to. If shadowing Riley would help him get answers, Straker needed to maintain a high degree of self-control.

  She burst in after her run, and he knew he was doomed. Even with sweat glistening on her arms and legs and dampening the ends of her hair, he found her sexy. He wanted to take her into the shower, peel off her running clothes slowly and completely, and go from there.

  “I’ve got a dinner tonight,” she said. “I need to get dressed. Can you check the local news and see if they’ve picked up the story about Sam yet? I’d like to know what I’m in for.”

  “Sure.”

  She frowned. “Are you okay? Maybe you should go for a run. It energized me.”

  That wasn’t what he needed to hear. Something about his expression must have told her so because she took a step backward, gulped and quickly retreated into her bedroom.

  Another night on the futon just wasn’t going to work. He’d rather strap on an IV and jump back in his hospital bed than torture himself trying to spend another night under the same roof with her. Swearing softly, he flipped on the tiny television in the front room.

  One of the local stations had the story: “Mystery and tragedy once again swirl around world-famous oceanographer Emile Labreque.” The report didn’t have all the details. It said the death of the former captain of the ill-fated Encounter was under investigation and police were as yet unable to locate Emile, who had a habit of vanishing for days at a time without notice.

  The report didn’t mention who had found Cassain, and it called the island where his body was discovered “uninhabited.”

  The news shifted to a traffic report. Straker shut off the television and considered the ramifications of reporters on Riley’s doorstep. It was bound to happen. Right now they’d just want a quote from her as the granddaughter of the famous, tragic Emile Labreque. When they found out she was the one who’d spotted Cassain’s body on the rocks, they’d swarm.

  Toss a recuperating FBI agent into the mix, Straker thought, and there’d be no peace. He wanted to maintain some level of maneuverability and anonymity. Riley was already cramping his style. Reporters would do him in.

  The doorbell rang. Reporters already? He looked out the window and saw two cops on the doorstep of Riley’s building. Maine CID. Hell, he’d rather have reporters. He debated hiding in a closet, but his car was parked two down from theirs. Beat-up Subaru, Maine plates. He couldn’t pretend he’d gone back to his island.

  Riley emerged from her bedroom in a simple black dinner dress that was perfect for her trim little body. She hadn’t put on her stockings or shoes, and she had a towel wound around her wet hair. The intimacy and normalcy of the moment struck him, reminded him of the barren life he led, not just since Labreque Island, but before. For a long time work and the occasional affair had been enough. He’d thought after his months alone on a five-acre island he’d go back to that life. Now he wasn’t so sure.

  Of course, he reminded himself, it wasn’t exactly normal to have two state cops at the door.

  She adjusted a small earring. “Someone’s here?”

  “It looks like a couple of Maine State Police detectives.”

  Her earring flew out of her hand. “Can you let them in? I’ll slip on some shoes and comb my hair.” She squatted down, running a palm over the floor in search of her earring. Straker could feel her nervousness. No one liked having the police at their door. “I suppose they want to talk to me about Sam.” She scooped up the earring, a tiny bit of gold, and got to her feet. Her towel had come loose. He watched her swallow. “And Emile. Damn. Straker, I don’t know anything.”

  “Tell them that.”

  “You think it’ll be that easy?”

  “No.”

  The doorbell rang again.

  She nodded at him. “Go ahead.”

  He trotted down the stairs and opened up for the two detectives. “John Straker,” the older of the pair said, shaking his head. Teddy Palladino. Straker knew him to say hello. He was a stringy, smart detective on the verge of retirement. “You go to an island to recuperate and a stiff lands practically on your doorstep?”

  “Lucky me.”

  “Yeah. Well, I’m not surprised Sheriff Dorrman thought it might be someone out to kill you.” He grinned at his own sick humor, then frowned, beady eyes narrowed. “What’re you doing here?”

  “I was just watching TV.”

  The detective snorted. “Dorrman warned me about you, Straker. I take it you’re not here in any official capacity?”

  “No.”

  “You a friend of the family or just Emile?”

  “I’ve known Riley St. Joe all my life.”

  Palladino let the sideways answer go. “She in?”

  “She’s powdering her nose just for you.” Straker motioned up the dark, narrow staircase. “After you, gentlemen.”

  Riley was waiting on the futon couch. She’d finger-styled her damp hair, slipped into stockings and low-heeled shoes and rosied her cheeks and lips with a bit of makeup. She looked poised, if a little pale. Straker saw the detectives take in the clutter, the nautical charts, the flamingo Beanie Baby. They didn’t know what to make of her, either. If he had his island, Straker thought, she had her kooky egghead apartment. A narrow escape from death, a grandfather’s reputation shattered, five people dead. The Encounter disaster had left her with her own demons to fight. This was a good place to keep them at bay.

  Palladino introduced himself and his partner, Chris Donelson. “We’d like to ask you a few questions, Miss St. Joe.”

  “Sure.”

  He turned to Straker. “You mind taking a walk for a half hour?”

  “I’ll go put my feet up in the bedroom.”

  “What, you don’t trust us?”

  “Nah. I just could use forty winks.”

  He was wide-awake. He had no intention of sleeping, but if he left the building, he wasn’t sure that, in her current frame of mind, Riley would let him back in. She’d never admit it, but she was close to snapping. Sam Cassain dead on Labreque Island, Emile gone and now two Maine CID detectives in her living room—it was enough.

  On his way back to her bedroom, he heard Palladino say, “You know the body you found on Sunday has been identified?”

  “Yes, it was Sam Cassain.” She said it as if she were in science class. “He was captain of the Encounter until it sank last year.”

  “And you didn’t recognize him?”

  “No.”

  Straker shut the bedroom door behind him. He’d let Palladino and Donelson do their job. Riley would hold up, and she had nothing to hide. She had no more idea of what was going on than any of them did.

  The bedroom was softly lit, the colors warm and soothing. Straker took in thin
gs he’d missed that morning when he’d barged in after Sig’s call. She had a fluffy down comforter and lace-trimmed sheets, the bedstand piled with a mix of popular novels, magazines and work-related documents and texts.

  He noticed a watercolor on the wall, recognized the surf and rocks of Schoodic Point. It was signed in the lower right corner by Sig St. Joe. Straker stared at the painting. It captured both the resilience and fragility of the Maine coast, as well as its beauty—everything he missed most during his years away at college, law school, Quantico, his various assignments with the FBI, first in the Boston field office, more recently with a counter-terrorism unit based in Washington. Where to next—he didn’t know.

  Looking at Sig’s painting, he could understand, if not articulate, why her little sister worked so hard rescuing and rehabilitating marine animals—why the world’s oceans so consumed her family. It was different from the forces that had driven Strakers to sea for generations, although his lobsterman father always seemed to understand Emile’s passion and dedication to oceanographic research and conservation.

  Straker pulled his gaze away. He hadn’t chosen a life on the water. He couldn’t predict what would happen to the North Atlantic in fifty years—but he could predict what questions the detectives were asking Riley St. Joe. They would ask her what she knew about the animosity between her grandfather and Sam Cassain, details about their working relationship over the years, her take on the Encounter tragedy. They’d ask her how she’d come to be on Labreque Island to find Sam’s body. Why she was visiting Emile, why she hadn’t told anyone, why she was kayaking alone, how she’d come to be caught in the fog. They might get to Emile’s relationship with the center he’d founded, the Granger family, his own family. But they might wait on that, too.

  They’d ask her if she had any idea where her grandfather was. Straker was convinced she didn’t, not because she wasn’t above hiding that information from him. If it suited her, she’d lie to him—but she didn’t know because otherwise she wouldn’t be here, dressed for dinner. She’d be out pestering Emile. She’d never let him just sneak off on her. That wasn’t her style. She thought she had the right to know everything. It was the same natural curiosity that had led her to learn the Latin names of seaweed and mussels and all the other little creatures in a Maine tide pool.

  Straker sat on the edge of her bed. Dangerous territory. He felt a little as if he were trespassing. He concentrated on the questions at hand. He was operating under the assumption that Emile had taken off on his own because he’d guessed the identity of the body Riley had stumbled on. But what if he’d run into trouble? What if he’d been hurt, kidnapped, killed?

  Straker jumped up from the bed. Time to quit dithering. He needed to get out of here. He needed to go after Emile without Riley breathing down his neck. Or him breathing down hers.

  Palladino pushed open the bedroom door. “Walk out with us?”

  My turn, Straker thought. He started toward the door. “Let’s go.”

  Riley talked herself out of skipping Abigail’s dinner. She needed her routines. She needed her friends and colleagues. She also needed to get away from Straker, she thought, but that wasn’t working out too well. He had all but stuffed her into his car to give her a ride to Beacon Hill.

  “I could have taken the subway or driven my own car,” she repeated for at least the fourth time as he drove up Mount Vernon, Beacon Hill’s widest and most well-known street. “It’s not as if I need a bodyguard.”

  “I’m being nice.”

  “No, you’re not. You’re just a control freak. That’s why you joined the FBI.”

  He glanced at her as if she’d turned purple. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Well,” she said, “I don’t need you to give me a ride home. I’ll take the subway or get a ride from someone at the dinner.”

  “Take a cab. Don’t take the subway.”

  “Straker, it’s not as if someone’s going to hit me over the head and dump my body on the rocks. We don’t know Sam was murdered.”

  “I know,” he said.

  She scowled. “You’re in fine form tonight. A control freak and a know-it-all. That’s Louisburg Square.” She pointed to an intersection up ahead. “Drop me off on the corner. I’ll walk to Abigail’s.”

  “Don’t want to be seen with me?”

  “Absolutely not. What are you going to do?”

  He pulled over to the curb. His rusting Subaru with its Maine plates didn’t exactly fit in with the expensive cars and stately town houses. “Go back to your apartment and rummage through your underwear drawer.”

  “You are such a jerk.”

  He grinned, the evening light darkening his gray eyes. “I’ll go back and watch TV.”

  “Liar. You’re going to snoop around here. If you cause me any trouble, Straker, I’ll have your head. I swear I will. These are my friends and colleagues. This is my job.”

  “Looks like a Beacon Hill dinner party to me.”

  “I’m serious. I’m already on thin ice. You wouldn’t be easy to explain if I hadn’t just found Sam dead.”

  Straker leaned back in his seat. He didn’t look too worried. “Sure you can handle a brick sidewalk and cobblestones in those little shoes of yours?”

  She jumped out of the car without bothering to answer. Instead of heading up Mount Vernon, he lingered. Riley felt his gaze on her as she negotiated the brick sidewalk to Louisburg Square, famous for its cobblestone streets and graceful nineteenth-century homes on a small, enclosed private park. After her husband’s death last year, Caroline insisted on moving to a condo on the water, and Abigail had reluctantly moved back into her childhood home. Matthew and Sig had a town house on Chestnut Street, two blocks over. At least for now. Riley didn’t want to speculate what would happen if her sister’s marriage ended in divorce.

  Most of the guests had already arrived, gathering in the parlor of the elegant bowfront house. Good, Riley thought. That reduced the chances anyone had seen her arrive with Straker. She did not want to have to explain him.

  Caroline Granger was the first to greet her. “Riley, I’m so glad you decided to come tonight. It’s the very best thing you could do for yourself.”

  Her warm words helped Riley to relax. She’d come to admire Caroline’s grace and fine manners, her acute sense of duty. Just sixty, an attractive woman with silvery-blond hair, her life had been in limbo since Bennett’s sudden, horrible death aboard the Encounter. They’d been married only seven years. This was Caroline’s second experience with widowhood. Her first husband, a corporate executive, had died of a heart attack when she was in her early forties. She had no children, and she’d taken great pains not to overstep with Bennett’s two adult children. She was the sort of wife who made her husband’s interests her own, and even now, she was doing what she could to support the center and provide a smooth transition to the next generation of Grangers.

  “I heard about Captain Cassain,” she said. “I can’t imagine what it must have been like for you.”

  “It was pretty awful.”

  “Yes, so I gathered from what the police told me. They interviewed me earlier this afternoon. They asked about Sam’s visit to Maine. He stopped by the cocktail party—did you see him?”

  Riley shook her head. “No. I spent most of the cocktail party trying not to hyperventilate, so I was glad just to be back on terra firma. I’ll get over it, but that was my first time on a boat since…” She didn’t finish.

  “I understand,” Caroline said quickly. “Well, Sam didn’t stay long. He was in a good mood. But…” She smiled. “Enough said about that. How’s Emile? I heard he’s gone off on one of his jaunts. His timing’s awkward, but I told the police this was vintage Emile. I miss him. I know that’s heresy in some quarters, but it’s true.”

  “It was good to see him.” Riley swept a glass of champagne from a nearby table. She knew she should abstain from alcohol under the circumstances, but the champagne went down easily.
“I think he likes his new life.”

  “So long as he’s close to the ocean, he’ll do fine.” Her eyes misted, and Riley wondered how many glasses of champagne she’d had. “Ben loved your grandfather. They accepted each other’s weaknesses along with their strengths. Even if Emile did make a mistake, Ben wouldn’t have wanted to see him…” She stopped herself, manufactured another society smile. “It’s a tragedy. I’m sure everyone can agree on that much. Now, tell me, how is Sig?”

  “Painting again,” Riley said, and they chatted for another minute before Caroline melted into the throng of other guests.

  Her champagne finished, Riley slipped out to the courtyard, one of Beacon Hill’s many “secret” gardens. She paused at a classical stone fountain. The gurgling water and sweet scent of end-of-the-summer flowers calmed her, made her feel less exposed and vulnerable. She blamed Straker. Seeing him with the two Maine detectives had forced her to admit he wasn’t the obnoxious, raging teenager she’d pelted with a rock at twelve—nor was he a salt-of-the-earth Maine lobsterman like his father. He was an FBI agent. Confident, disciplined, self-possessed.

  “Hey, kid.”

  She smiled at her father. He’d put on his one dinner suit, but no matter what he wore, Richard always managed to look rumpled—and dinner parties just made him awkward. “Are you hiding, too?” she asked.

  “Not yet. I saw you and came on out. Everything okay?”

  “I was thinking about how I could go for a dozen whales stranding themselves on a Cape Cod beach right about now. Isn’t that awful?”

  “It would take your mind off things.”

  “I shouldn’t have come. Everyone knows about Sam. Everyone thinks Emile had something to do with his death. They won’t say so, but it’s obvious.”

  “Is that what you think?”

  She sighed. “I’m trying not to think.”