The Backup Plan

by Sherryl Woods

  Dinah had had her doubts, but right now she was glad for that gun Peter had insisted on carrying whenever they went on assignment, happier still that he was trained and unafraid to use it. It gave them an edge—a chance—albeit a very slight one.

  “One!”

  Peter’s steady voice jarred her. They had minutes, maybe only seconds, to make decisions that could change whether they lived or died.

  “I love you,” she whispered, wanting to believe that she would have a million other opportunities, but needing to say the words now, just in case she didn’t.

  She fisted a handful of his shirt in her hand, pulled him toward her and kissed him hard, knowing it could be for the last time. In that couple of seconds, she tried to memorize the taste and texture of his mouth, then released him.

  He winked at her. “Two,” he said and gave her hand a reassuring squeeze.

  This was it, then. Dinah turned and reached for the handle on the door.

  “Three!”

  Never looking back, Peter stepped from the car, already firing his gun, the flimsy door his only protection. Dinah fought the temptation to watch. Instead she rolled out the open door on her side, staying low, praying that Peter had the full attention of the insurgents. She was behind the car, out of view in an instant, the uneven fire fight raging around her.

  And then she sucked in a deep, cleansing breath and ran, away from the battle toward town, just as she and Peter had agreed, anticipating at any second the sharp pain of a bullet hitting her in the back.

  She’d gone only a hundred yards or so when the world exploded around her. She was lifted into the air by the force of it, then came down face-first on the dusty road, rocks cutting into her painfully.

  The sky rained more rocks down on her. She covered her head from the worst of it, knowing her arms would be bloodied, if not broken, then waited as the noise echoed for what seemed like an eternity before finally dying.

  Only when it was quiet, the air oddly still, did she finally struggle to sit up, then dare to look back. The earth where the car had been was scorched. The metal of the car—or at least the part that was still identifiable—was blackened. Acrid smoke billowed in the air. Bodies littered the road.

  “Oh God, no!” The cry tore from her throat. She made herself get up and make the frantic dash back to the last place she’d seen Peter.

  In that split second before she reached the scene, she told herself she’d find him wounded, but alive. She promised herself that.

  But as she drew closer, she saw that there was no hope. She’d seen this kind of car-bombing horror before, but never with anyone she knew at the center of it, never when she’d escaped it herself by a matter of seconds.

  At first she couldn’t make sense of it. Why detonate a car bomb here? Had it been accidentally set off in the flurry of gunfire? That was the only explanation that made sense.

  Shaking, she examined every piece of debris. When at last she found a shred of the flak jacket Peter had worn, she clutched it in her hand, looking desperately for more, terrified she would find it, terrified she wouldn’t.

  When she finally found him, barely recognizable amid the rubble and scattered remains, she knelt by the side of the road and retched, her stomach heaving for what seemed like an eternity.

  Her heart, always full when Peter was around, emptied of all feeling. The drive and ambition that motivated her to take risks died right there on that deserted road. In that instant she knew she had nothing left to give, not to her profession, not to herself. Icy with shock, she sat beside what was left of the man she’d loved, and shivered, clutching his broken and bloodied hand in hers.

  It was hours later when a convoy of American soldiers found her, dazed and incoherent. She wasn’t surprised when they insisted on taking her for medical treatment for the cuts and scrapes she’d suffered when she’d been thrown to the ground and pelted by flying debris. She didn’t think anything would ever surprise her again.

  “Dinah!”

  Cord’s voice finally snapped her out of the horror of that scene. Only when he touched her cheek did she realized she’d been crying.

  “Tell me,” he pleaded, his gaze filled with worry and compassion.

  She shook her head. “I can’t talk about it.”

  “Then there is something to talk about, something specific?”

  “Leave it alone, Cord, please.”

  He regarded her with obvious reluctance, but he finally nodded. “Okay, darlin’,” he said softly. “I’ll leave it alone for now, but not forever.”

  Dinah wasn’t worried about forever. She didn’t much believe in it anymore, anyway.

  9

  “Dinah, honey, is that you?” Dorothy Davis called out when Dinah returned home.

  Dinah bit back a groan. The last thing she needed after spending several hours defending herself to Cord was to tap-dance around her mother’s questions about how she’d spent her evening. Nor was she anxious for her mother to get a good look at her eyes, which were probably still puffy from crying and even if they weren’t, Dorothy Davis had radar when it came to her daughter’s state of emotions. Still, she concluded with resignation, there was no ignoring her.

  She walked into the living room, where her mother was seated at an antique Queen Anne desk strewn with papers. She had a surprising pair of drugstore reading glasses on the tip of her nose. For a woman who’d never held an actual job in her life, she seemed to have the knack for bringing home more work than her banker husband.

  “You look busy,” Dinah said.

  “Budget figures and cost projections for Covington Plantation,” her mother said. “I like to be sure they’re in order before the rest of the board gets their hands on them.”

  “Isn’t that something Daddy could help you with? Where is he, by the way? I didn’t see his car outside.”

  Her mother shrugged. “He’s at a business meeting of some sort, I suppose.”

  “You don’t know?” she asked.

  “He doesn’t check in, Dinah,” her mother responded irritably. “As for Covington, he doesn’t like to get involved in what he refers to as my little projects.”

  Dinah had never realized that. She’d always assumed that they’d been a team. “Why on earth not?” she asked, wondering what else she’d gotten wrong about her parents’ marriage. Added to the argument she’d overheard, she was beginning to wonder if they were having real problems. Surely the upright, pillar-of-the-community Marshall Davis wasn’t sneaking around behind her mother’s back having an affair. Not that she intended to ask her mother that question. Dorothy would probably slap her silly for such impertinence.

  “He claims it’s smarter that way,” her mother replied, then added with an unmistakable edge of sarcasm, “No one will ever be able to accuse us of conspiring to cook the books, I suppose.”

  Dinah stuck to the one fissure in the relationship that seemed safe enough. “Are you serious? Dad has never backed any of your projects?”

  “Not a one,” her mother confirmed.

  “And the bank? Surely it’s involved.”

  “No. I deal with another one.”

  “But that doesn’t make any sense,” Dinah protested, indignant on her mother’s behalf. “Daddy’s bank has al ways prided itself on its civic projects.”

  “As long as they’re not mine,” her mother explained. “That would be a conflict of interest for board members,” she added, then forced a smile. “Now tell me where you’ve been. Maybelle said you left here with a very handsome young man. It’s wonderful to know you’re seeing someone here.”

  Dinah reluctantly changed the subject. “Cord took me to dinner at Murrells Inlet,” she said. “No big deal.”

  “How perfectly lovely!” her mother exclaimed. “Shrimp and onion rings, I imagine.”

  Dinah laughed. “Am I that predictable?”

  “Only when it comes to that one thing, I’m sure,” her mother soothed. “The fact that you went with Cord definitely wasn’t pr
edictable. I thought you two didn’t get along that well. You certainly didn’t as children. Bobby was always the one for you.”

  “Times change,” Dinah said lightly. “But don’t go making anything out of this. It was just a casual dinner. We got to talking after you left Covington. He mentioned Murrells Inlet and I couldn’t resist the chance to see if the food was as delicious as I remembered.”

  “Was it?”

  “Even better,” she said.

  “And the company?”

  Dinah searched for a word that wouldn’t stir up even more questions. “Acceptable.”

  Her mother regarded her with amusement. “I saw the way you looked at him earlier this afternoon, Dinah. There was something there, a little spark. You could do worse, you know. There are a lot of women in Charleston who’d be thrilled to have Cord ask them on a date. He made a fortune for the plantation project last year when we held a bachelor auction.”

  Dinah nearly choked. The image boggled the mind. “Cord let himself be auctioned off for charity?”

  “To the tune of five thousand dollars, as I recall. It was the high bid of the night.”

  “Who on earth paid that much to spend an evening with him?” she demanded, her tone incredulous. It had to have been some bored widow or divorcée.

  Her mother grinned. “As a matter of fact, it was Maggie.”

  Dinah couldn’t have been more shocked if her mother had announced that she was the one who’d paid big bucks for a few hours of Cord’s company. “That doesn’t make any sense. I can’t imagine Maggie being that desperate.”

  “Oh, sweetie, I don’t think desperation had anything to do with it,” her mother chided. “The man is a certifiable hunk and one of Charleston’s most sought-after single men. Maggie has the money. And it’s a very worthwhile cause. It was a win-win situation for every one.”

  “But Cord is infuriating, impossible and impertinent. Why on earth would Maggie spend a single dime to waste an evening with him?” she asked before she recalled that Maggie had actually informed her that she thought Cord was hot. So she’d paid to see just how hot? Dinah was appalled at the apparently sorry state of her friend’s social life if she was reduced to such a level.

  Her mother’s eyebrows rose at the description. “Why on earth would you say Cord is impertinent? In what way?”

  “Surely you’ve seen it, Mother. He was certainly in your face at the plantation this afternoon. I can’t imagine you tolerating that from anyone else. I was stunned that you didn’t bring him down a peg or two, especially with all those workmen looking on.”

  Her mother waved off the comment. “That’s just the way Cord and I communicate.” Her gaze turned speculative. “Please tell me, though, that he didn’t do anything out of line with you tonight.”

  Dinah didn’t want to travel down that path. Not only would it be untrue, but she didn’t want to cause a rift between her mother and Cord when they obviously enjoyed working together. “Of course not, at least not the way you mean. He was just poking his nose into things that are none of his business.”

  “Such as?”

  “Things I didn’t want to talk about.”

  Her mother’s gaze narrowed. “Used to be you didn’t hide anything. You had the sunniest, most open disposition of any child I’ve ever seen. Your life was an open book. Being a journalist has changed that. Is your own life now off the record, the way some of your sources probably insist on being?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with that. I’ve grown up,” Dinah said defensively. “There are some things that are supposed to be private. It will be a cold day in hell be fore I let Cordell Beaufort pick apart the choices I’ve made.”

  “That’s up to you, of course,” her mother said, her tone suddenly more placating. “But something’s troubling you, Dinah. We can all see it. If you won’t talk to your family, then open up to someone else. Maggie, perhaps. You two have always been best friends. I can’t imagine that all these years apart have changed that.”

  “No, of course not,” Dinah said, mostly to satisfy her mother.

  But Maggie had kept Bobby’s engagement from Dinah, so how good a friend was she really? She’d let Dinah be blindsided by the news. And she’d humiliated herself by paying to go out on a date with Cord. Maybe Maggie was more messed up than Dinah was. She was too tired to try to figure any of that out tonight.

  “Mother, I’m exhausted. I’m going up to bed, unless you’d like me to keep you company until Dad gets home.”

  “No telling when that will be. You go on.” Her mother looked as if she wanted to say something more, but then she merely sighed. “Good night, darling. Sleep well.”

  “You, too.”

  But as she plodded wearily up the stairs, Dinah doubted she would ever sleep well again. Her best friend had withheld an important fact from her, something she never would have suspected, and now Dinah had the nagging sense that her parents’ marriage was not all she’d believed it to be. She wondered what other beliefs were about to crumble around her.

  Dinah set out for Maggie’s house the next morning.

  She found Maggie on the tiny brick patio in back of her carriage house, sipping a cup of tea and eating what looked to be a fresh orange-cranberry scone with real clotted cream.

  “Is there another one of those?” she asked, startling Maggie so badly she spilled tea all over the table.

  “What on earth?” Maggie said as she mopped up the mess. She stared hard at Dinah. “You’re out and about awfully early. Is something wrong?”

  “I wanted to catch you before you went to the gallery.”

  “Any particular reason?”

  “We need to talk and it’s not something I think we should get into when anyone could come wandering in and overhear us.”

  Maggie regarded her warily. “Oh? Is this about you? Do you finally want to talk about your real reason for coming home?”

  “No, it’s about you, and I absolutely refuse to get into it until you tell me where I can find another one of those scones.”

  Maggie grinned. “Nice to know your priorities haven’t changed as much as I feared they had. You al ways did put food first, at least until you started to panic that every pound would show up on camera. The scones are on the kitchen counter. Help yourself. Tea’s in the pot right next to them.”

  “I guess the novelty of having me home has worn off. A couple of weeks ago, you would have gotten them for me.”

  “And now I need the time to brace myself for what ever it is that brought you over here not much past the crack of dawn. You know your way around my kitchen.”

  Dinah went inside and found the scones, still warm from the oven. She poured a cup of tea, then brought the entire plate of scones back with her. It was likely to be a stressful conversation.

  She sat down at the wrought-iron table, put a dollop of the heavy cream on the scone and bit into it. “Oh, my God, where did you get these?”

  “I baked them.”

  Dinah stared at her in amazement. “You’re kidding.”

  Amusement spread across Maggie’s face. “Sweetie, while you were learning to ask all those tough interview questions, I was learning to be a proper wife. There’s not a recipe that I can’t follow when pressed.”

  “If you bake like this all the time, why aren’t you the size of a house?”

  “Because I only bake when I’m stressed out.”

  There was the opening Dinah had hoped for. “Why are you stressed out? Isn’t the gallery working out the way you’d hoped?”

  “The gallery is an amazing success.”

  “And you enjoy it?”

  “Of course I do.” Maggie peered at her curiously. “Why do you ask?”

  “You said you were stressed. I’m just trying to get to the bottom of that rather cryptic remark. Is it about a man? Cordell, perhaps?”

  Maggie burst out laughing. “Is that what brought you scurrying over here this morning? You want to know if I have the hots for Cord?”
r />   Dinah saw little point in denying it. “Something like that. Do you?”

  “I think he’s gorgeous and definitely hot, but I told you that the other day. It’s hardly a deep, dark secret. Why are you bringing it up again?”

  “Because I just found out last night that you paid five thousand dollars to go out with him. I’d say that implies more than a casual interest in the man.”

  Maggie shrugged. “A moment of temporary insanity for a good cause.”

  “I hope so,” Dinah said worriedly. “I can’t think what possessed you to bid on any man at an auction, much less Cordell. You’re this totally fantastic, successful woman. You don’t need to buy a date.”

  “You make it sound as if I called some tacky escort service. This was a charity auction. There were a lot of other women paying for dates that night. It was all in good fun. It was a chance to buy into a fantasy.”

  Dinah didn’t find that explanation nearly as reassuring as Maggie evidently intended her to. “And you’ve been fantasizing about Cord? For how long?” And why the hell had she been trying to push Dinah together with him, if she wanted him for herself?

  “Most of my adult life,” Maggie said. “But before you go too far down this road you’re on, let’s do a reality check here. The man is not the least bit interested in me. He never has been.”

  “Well, he should be!” Dinah said with only the slightest twinge of regret. “What can I do to help? If you want him, then let’s get him for you. We were certainly well-schooled in every feminine trick in the book.”

  Maggie regarded her with evident dismay. “God, it’s no wonder you thought you could snap your fingers and Bobby would come running,” she said. “You really do have absolutely no idea how relationships work. It’s all about the chemistry, sweetie. Cord and I don’t have it, much as I might wish otherwise. Neither do you and Bobby, if you don’t mind me saying so for the umpteenth time. Now Cord and you…” She fanned herself dramatically. “That’s chemistry.”