Deadly Payoff

by Valerie Hansen

  The restaurant’s dining area was dimly lit and had a rustic-chic aura, complete with small buckets of peanuts on the tables and a floor purposely littered with the empty shells. Country-western music played softly in the background.

  They followed the hostess to a booth in a secluded corner and Delia slid in first, hoping Shaun would choose to sit beside her. He didn’t.

  She looked across the table at him and smiled. When his response was expressionless rather than amiable, she asked, “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Then why do you look so down in the dumps?”

  “Beats me.” He drew his hand over his chin. “I shaved.”

  “I noticed. You look very nice.”

  “Presentable enough to be seen with a Blanchard daughter, you mean?”

  “Just nice.” Delia pulled a face. “Where did you get the chip on your shoulder? I thought we were getting along pretty well, considering.”

  “Considering what?” He concentrated on the menu rather than making eye contact with her.

  “Considering the fact that we spent the better part of the day sitting in a creepy mental hospital and poring over my mother’s old records. Give me a break, Shaun. I wasn’t the one who twisted your arm to get you to come. Nobody’s keeping you here, either. You can grab your bag and hop the first bus to wherever you want to go, anytime.”

  His head snapped up and he glowered at her. “You think I’d leave you? Just like that?”

  “I don’t know. You’re sure acting like you’d rather be somewhere else.”

  “Wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to let myself take it out on you.” Delia paused and sighed heavily. “The past few months have been a nightmare for me, Shaun, and I’m afraid the worst isn’t over.”

  She had to bite the inside of her lower lip to regain control of her emotions and continue. “If you still want to go to the zoo tomorrow, it’s fine with me.” To her surprise, he didn’t seem as happy about her decision as she’d thought he’d be.

  “You’re sure? What did they say about Howard when you called?”

  “Nothing much. The doctors are almost ready to send him home. They just need to check the last of the reports from the tests they did. Apparently, his potassium levels were through the roof when he was admitted and that chemical imbalance upset his whole system. It could have been fatal. It nearly was.”

  Shaun’s brow knit. “That’s it? That’s all they found?”

  “So far. Miranda says the excess potassium would have been enough to cause his symptoms but nobody’s sure how he got that way. They suspect he may have been confused and overdosed himself, although I don’t know how. Peg takes care of his prescriptions and she’s with him all the time.”

  “All the time?”

  “Well, nearly. She’s been amazingly faithful, considering how difficult Grandfather can be sometimes. Of course she can’t sit with him 24–7. Sometimes our maid, Sonya Garcia, takes over and sometimes Miranda or Winnie watches him for a little while if no other professional nurses are available to relieve Peg.”

  “What about Juliet? Isn’t she living in the house, too?”

  “Yes, but she doesn’t dare go near Grandfather’s room. Remember? He gets delusional and thinks she’s Mother.”

  “Oh, right. I’d forgotten. Sometimes it’s hard to keep all the players straight in your family.”

  “Want me to have a program printed for you?”

  That inane suggestion brought a lopsided grin to Shaun’s handsome face and thrilled Delia all the way to her toes, inspiring her to continue. “I could run it on the computer in Father’s study, print it out for you and update the file daily.”

  “Think that would be often enough?”

  “I doubt it.” She plucked a peanut from the bucket between them and crushed the brittle shell with her fingers.

  Shaun followed suit. “There’d have to be lots of footnotes,” he said, munching on the peanuts he’d just shelled. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t know which Shakespearian play everybody was from, assuming it matters.”

  “Cynic.” Delia lobbed an unshelled nut at him.

  He ducked, laughing quietly. “Well, it’s true. That business about Cymbeline Corporation is so obscure I’d have missed it completely if you hadn’t been there. Romeo and Juliet or Hamlet I can handle but I’d never heard of Cymbeline.”

  “It was a tragedy,” Delia said as she crushed another shell. “One of those plays where everybody is out to get everybody else and people keep getting wiped out.” She gave a little huff of derision. “Actually, it’s a lot like what’s been happening behind the scenes in my family for as long as I can remember.”

  Delia dawdled through dinner and toyed with the dessert she’d ordered. Anything but say goodnight to Shaun and go back to the lonely solitude of her room.

  He had long since finished eating and had already paid the tab so she figured she’d better declare herself full before he lost patience. She pushed away her partially eaten slice of lemon pie, wiped her mouth on the linen napkin and laid it on the table beside the plate.

  “Are you done?” he asked.

  “I guess so. I’m stuffed.”

  “Too many peanuts,” Shaun said, smiling. He stood and tossed a generous tip on the table. “For a little person you sure can pack in the food.”

  “I’m active. At least most of the time.” Delia grabbed the strap of her purse and slid out of the booth. “I think one of the reasons I’ve been so out of sorts is because I’ve been sitting around too much.”

  “Well, we’ll fix that tomorrow. The Canfield Zoo is spread over acres and acres.”

  She arched an eyebrow and smiled back at him as he held the exit door for her. “Oh? Are you sure you can keep up with me?”

  “If I get too tired we’ll take the tram,” Shaun answered. “We may want to anyway. I don’t think we can see everything in one day if we don’t ride through part of it.”

  “Okay. Then I guess we’d better get to bed. Her cheeks reddened and she suddenly felt overly warm in spite of the cool evening air. “I mean…”

  He laughed heartily. “I know what you meant, Delia. We’re both beat. Even if you gave me your key tonight I’d be too tired to take advantage of you.”

  “I know you’d never do that anyway,” she said seriously. “It’s fun to tease but we both know right from wrong.”

  And just because something feels as if it’s right doesn’t make it so, she added to herself. Like when I defied my father and ran off with you.

  Oh, God forgive me, she continued, blinking back unshed tears and hoping Shaun didn’t notice, I wish I could go back and do exactly the same thing again.

  TEN

  Judging by the approach to the Canfield Zoo, Delia wasn’t all that impressed. By the time she and Shaun were inside, however, she’d changed her mind.

  They’d emerged from a tunnel-like entrance into a veritable Garden of Eden. Some of the plants even reminded her of those indigenous to her island home.

  “Oh, Shaun, it’s beautiful!”

  “I thought you’d like it. Hold on a sec,” he said, heading toward a nearby kiosk that displayed headgear and assorted souvenirs. “You need a hat.”

  “I never wear hats. How about a visor?”

  “That’s not much shade.”

  “I’ll stand in your shade if I need to,” Delia said teasingly. “I practically live on the beach most of the year. I think I can take a little Illinois sunshine.”

  “Okay, okay. Just trying to help.”

  “How about you? You didn’t bring your Murphy Woodworkers cap, either.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “Nope. If I have to wear a hat, so do you.”

  “Are you always this difficult?”

  Delia laughed. “No. Sometimes I’m much worse. Now, what color do you like?”

  “Black,” Shaun said.

  “The guys in the black hats are always
the bad guys, Murphy. You need a white one. Definitely a white one.”

  “Does that mean you think I’m one of the good guys?”

  “Absolutely.”

  She chose a bright yellow visor that matched her T-shirt while Shaun compromised on a red baseball cap. While he was paying for their hats she wandered to the next booth and bought a disposable camera.

  As he handed her the visor he eyed her purchase. “What’s that for?”

  “The butterflies,” she said, hoping he wouldn’t press her further. She really did intend to take photos in the butterfly house. She also wanted a concrete remembrance of her time with Shaun. Whether he objected or not, she was determined to snap some candid photos of him. Those pictures might be a poor substitute for the real thing in the years to come but they’d be better than nothing, which is what she’d had for the past twelve years. Sadly, everything had happened so fast the day of their wedding they hadn’t thought to have even one picture made and she’d always been sorry for that oversight.

  “Where to first?” Shaun asked.

  “This is your party. You tell me.”

  He nodded toward the camera in her hand. “Well, since you’re ready for the butterflies, how about starting there?”

  “Fine.”

  Delia was glad she’d brought her sunglasses. Between the glasses darkening her eyes and the visor shading them, she was able to hide her roiling emotions. It was one thing to want a souvenir of her time with Shaun and quite another to reveal how important it was to her.

  She lagged back. “Stand over there by the door and I’ll take a picture of it.”

  “Why don’t you let me take your picture there, instead?”

  “I asked you first.”

  When he reached for the cardboard camera, Delia held it out of reach so he leaned closer to try to grab it.

  She whirled, shielding it with her body the way a basketball player guards the ball from an opponent. Shaun faked to one side, then made a grab for the camera with his other hand.

  Delia squealed “No!” and ran.

  Shaun was relentless in his pursuit.

  They were both laughing as they dodged and parried like children. Delia whirled, ducked around a tree and took a quick step. Momentum nearly carried her into an older couple who were approaching on the path, arm in arm.

  Delia put on the brakes so quickly she would have fallen if Shaun hadn’t caught her up at the last moment. She laughed. “Oops! Sorry.”

  The elderly woman grinned. “No problem, dear. I love to see young people enjoying themselves. My husband and I always buy a season pass. We come here all the time. It’s wonderful exercise, although we don’t usually wrestle. We mostly walk.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Delia felt her cheeks burning with well-earned embarrassment.

  “What were you two tussling about?” the woman asked.

  “I wanted to take his picture and the big lug was arguing with me,” Delia replied.

  When Shaun said “She started it,” she jammed her elbow into his ribs and gave him a look of mock disgust.

  “Here. Give me the camera and I’ll take your picture together,” the friendly woman said.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t want you to go to the trouble.”

  “Nonsense, girl. You and your husband just stand over there by those pretty flowers and leave the rest to me.”

  Delia blinked rapidly. Her eyes began to swim with unshed tears behind her dark glasses. Husband? Did she and Shaun really look and act married, or was it a simple case of wishful thinking on the part of their new acquaintance?

  Shaun shepherded her to the spot indicated and pulled her to his side with his arm around her shoulders.

  “You make a lovely couple,” the woman said, sighting through the view finder. “Smile!”

  Delia smiled from reflex but her heart was far from joyful. Being this close to Shaun and having been mistaken for a couple was tearing her apart.

  “Advance the film and take one more, will you?” Shaun called pleasantly.

  The older woman complied and raised the camera again. Delia didn’t have a clue why Shaun had asked for a second picture until he put two fingers under her chin, tilted her face toward him and gently kissed her.

  “Perfect!” the amateur photographer said.

  Delia agreed completely.

  She melted into his embrace and returned his kiss with every fiber of her being. Perfect? No, she mused, barely breathing. Shaun’s kiss was more than perfect. It was as beautiful as a sunrise, as soft as a rose petal and as inspiring as “The Hallelujah Chorus.”

  “Angels and ministers of grace, defend us,” she quoted silently, remembering Hamlet, then turned it into a prayer for divine help. Lord, please save me from myself.

  That was enough to bring her back to her senses and allow her to offer token resistance.

  Smiling bravely she leaned away from Shaun and felt his hold slacken. Instead of speaking to him she turned to the other woman and thanked her as she reclaimed the camera.

  “No problem, dear. Enjoy the zoo.”

  “Thanks. We will.” But not nearly as much as I enjoyed that kiss, she added to herself. Boy, did I!

  She huffed in self-derision. At this rate she might as well throw herself to the alligators and get it over with because she was definitely about to self-destruct.

  Shaun was ready to kick himself. He knew better than to get too near Delia, let alone kiss her again. Every sane thought told him to ignore the pull he felt toward her. But there was a contrary bent to his personality that kept insisting he had to press her, to push her, until she told him the truth about her motives.

  Would he like what he heard, assuming she did eventually decide to confess? He doubted it. Enough honesty had already emerged from her subconscious to make him wary.

  To begin with, her identity was still tied up in the Blanchard family. Oh, she might think she’d gained her independence from Ronald and the rest of her kin but she hadn’t. She never would. She was a product of her upbringing just as he was the result of all the history that had gone before in his life. History that had left scars.

  For a long time he’d believed that his biggest scar was from his failed marriage. Now that he could look back with more objectivity he could see that losing Delia had merely set him up for everything else that had happened. It had driven him from Stoneley into the military and that had led to the fatal accident that had left him with both literal and figurative scars.

  He couldn’t blame her directly but he couldn’t overlook her part in the tragedy, either. It was as if she had been the force of gravity that had started his roll down a steep hill and the death of his army buddies had been the crash at the bottom—resulting in memories he’d been trying to escape ever since.

  It would be nice if he could blame God instead of Delia or stop shouldering so much of the responsibility himself, Shaun thought. The trouble was, in order to blame God he had to believe in Him in the first place, to give Him the credit for blessing him with the good times as well as shepherding him through the bad.

  Shaun wasn’t ready to do that again. He’d prayed his heart out when he and Delia had been forced apart by her father and again when he’d been waiting with his unit for the army medics to arrive. What good had any of it done? He wasn’t patient the way she was. He wasn’t willing to wait a lifetime for an answer to prayer. If God had really cared about their marriage, He’d have intervened to help them preserve it years ago, when it had counted.

  They stayed so busy, saw so much, the day passed in a blur. By the time Delia crawled back into the SUV late in the afternoon she was more than ready to sit down.

  She was still awed by the beauty they’d beheld in the butterfly house. Though not many of the butterflies had emerged from their chrysalises this early in the spring, she’d managed to use up the rest of the film taking pictures of the glorious foliage inside the greenhouse.

  “Whew! What a day.” She flashed Shaun an appreciative smile. “Thanks fo
r suggesting it.”

  “You’re welcome. Would you like to grab dinner on the way back to the hotel or freshen up first and then go out?”

  A few hours ago, Shaun had extended their stay at the hotel for one more night since the outing at the zoo had tired them out. They planned to get a good night’s rest and make the trek back to Stoneley in the morning.

  Delia settled into the seat and sighed. “Neither. I’m running out of clean clothes to change into and I don’t think I can eat another bite, either. I’m stuffed.”

  “Must be because of the last corn dog.”

  “Or the two before it,” she said, chuckling. “Or maybe the cotton candy.”

  “That, too.” Shaun’s smile warmed her far more than the sweatshirt she had purchased at the gift shop when the temperature had dropped.

  “I’m really not a bit hungry,” she insisted. “But if you are, I’ll be glad to keep you company while you eat.”

  “No. I’m not hungry, either. I just didn’t want you to think you had to sit in your room and scarf down more candy bars.”

  “Can’t. I ate ’em all,” she said with a rueful smirk. “That’s what I should have bought at the gift shop. Candy.”

  “How about some fresh fruit, instead?”

  She arched her eyebrows expressively. “What’s with you, Murphy? Do you moonlight for the dietary police or something?”

  “No. I’m just trying to take good care of you.”

  “Why?” Delia visualized him saying it was because he was madly in love with her.

  Instead, he said, “Because you don’t seem to care about doing it yourself.”

  “I do okay.”

  “Oh, sure. Not only do you eat like you have a death wish, you tell me you like to swim in thirty-foot swells with sharks and poisonous jellyfish. Does that sound sensible to you?”

  “Perfectly.”

  “Well, it doesn’t to me.”

  Crossing her arms in a defensive posture, Delia hunkered down in the car seat and withdrew from him emotionally. Shaun was doing it again—sounding way too much like her ultracontrolling father. To listen to Shaun, a person would think all her choices were wrong and all her decisions stank. Why, she couldn’t even be trusted to feed herself adequately, could she?