“Absolutely.”
“But still—”
“Rafe, we were shot at today in Eric’s house. He’ll tell you that that’s the truth.”
Wendy moistened her lips and started to hand out the drinks. She smiled at Tara. “We do believe you. But it’s going to be all right. You’re safe here now. We’re all with you.”
“And in danger,” Ashley added.
Rafe sat her down, taking her hands. “Brad is with the DEA and you’ve known me a long time, I can handle whatever comes up.” He brushed her chin lightly with his knuckles.
“Ashley, whatever you’re into, we’re with you, and you know that!” Tara announced.
Wendy pressed a glass of white wine into Ashley’s fingers. “You needn’t worry about us. No one could have followed Eric here, not in an airboat. You can see for miles and miles.”
“If he goes home,” Ashley murmured miserably, “he’ll still be in danger.”
Wendy watched her with a curious smile, then shrugged. “He made it through three years in Vietnam and helped Brad and me once when we were involved with one of the most cold-blooded killers in history. And no one—no one—knows the swamp like he does. Trust me. Eric will be fine.” She clinked her wineglass with Ashley’s. “Cheers. Come on now, Ashley. Dinner is almost ready, and we’ll get to the bottom of this. I promise.”
Outside, Eric was telling Brad what he knew, from the time that he had found Ashley running through the swamp up to the shots that had been fired into his bedroom.
They sat together on the high slope of lawn leading to the house. Baby had crawled between, as she often did. Eric and Brad had been good friends since Wendy had first met Brad. Then Brad had been the one lost in the swamp, the victim of an undercover operation that had burst wide open.
It had been strange at first, seeing Brad in his brother’s house with Wendy, his brother’s wife. And despite the fact that Brad had brought danger down upon them all, he had liked Brad. He had probably tormented Wendy and Brad by trying to make them see that they could live without one another, but that it wouldn’t really be living.
And he had become involved in the drug case that had brought Brad into the swamp. If he and Brad had not trusted each other instinctively and instantly, Wendy might have been lost to them all.
As it had happened, Eric had found himself the best man at Wendy’s wedding, and his grandfather had given her away, just like a true daughter. And Brad McKenna had become his best friend.
“I didn’t believe her at first,” Eric told Brad as he chewed on a blade of grass. “I thought that she was hysterical. I mean, she came out of that swamp half naked, screaming wildly. And she hates the swamp. She hates it more than you did. I thought that maybe she’d seen a snake or a gator or something and gone a little berserk.”
Brad shook his head worriedly. “But then you were shot at—in the house?”
“Yep. We sat out the storm. I even let a day go by after the storm before rolling up the shutters.” He looked at Brad sharply. Brad’s tawny eyes were clouded.
“There was a murder out here,” he said slowly.
“What?” Eric demanded, half rising. “How do you know?”
“Billy Powell with the tribal police airboated his way here this morning. He had a few messages for me from the office, and he warned us about the body.”
“The body?”
Brad nodded gravely. “They found a man in a yellow rain slicker in one of the canals. He had been stabbed to death.”
“Then she was telling the truth,” Eric said. “Obviously she was telling the truth. First the shots, and now the body. Those prove the whole thing.”
“And that’s why you brought her here?”
Eric shrugged, then grinned. “Where else would I bring my problems?” he asked.
Brad surveyed him for a long moment. “She’s a very beautiful woman. Probably the most exotic I’ve ever seen.”
“Careful,” Eric warned. “You’re married to my sister-in-law, remember?”
Brad laughed. “Sure, I remember. I was just commenting on your behalf. Just in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“I’ll bet he has noticed,” a voice said cheerfully behind them. Eric swung around. Wendy had come out. She fluffed her shoulder-length hair and slid down into her husband’s arm. Looking at Eric, she said, “I think he’s noticed, don’t you, Brad?”
“Wendy-bird, you’re trouble,” Eric warned her, using the nickname he had given her when they had been very young.
It didn’t bother her in the least. She stuck out her tongue at him and smiled up at Brad. “Uh-oh.” Her eyes widened as she watched Eric’s narrow, but her smile deepened. “I think he has even noticed that she isn’t an ordinary woman in any shape or form. Look at him, Brad. He looks as if he wants to scalp me.”
“She needs a good one on the rump, Brad,” Eric said.
“Hey, I sympathize, but what can I tell you?” Brad replied.
“Brat,” Eric commented.
“Hey, watch it, Tonto!” Wendy protested.
Brad looked at his wife sharply. Wendy was one of the few people who could get away with such things with Eric Hawk. And she was pushing it now. “Children, children! We’ve got a problem here.”
“She told us all. I think that she’s concerned about Rafe and Tara’s baby more than anything else.” Wendy smiled demurely. “I told her that we weren’t the type to panic, that we’d weathered a few of our own storms. And I don’t think that Rafe Tyler is the type to panic and run half-cocked, either, do you? Let’s go in and have dinner.”
“Dinner?” Eric murmured.
“Yes, it’s a meal one eats at night,” Wendy said sweetly.
“I think maybe I ought to head out. Talk to the police, see the family—”
“Dinner, I think is what Wendy suggested,” Brad said flatly. Then he smiled, his eyes on Eric. “Runaway. That’s what Seminole means, right? You’re the one who taught me. You aren’t thinking about trying to run away from a redhead, are you?”
Eric scowled fiercely. “I don’t run from anything, and you know it.”
Brad grinned. “This is fun. I never thought to see you behaving so strangely. It must have been one heckuva storm.”
“You know that it was a bad storm. You weathered it here.”
“No, no. I’m talking about the one that took place inside your house.”
“I told you about shots being fired and that Ashley saw a murder take place and—”
“And I’m talking about your love life. Hmm, this is going to be fun. Remember how he tortured us as first, Wendy? He didn’t want to leave you alone with me.”
“For good reason,” Eric retorted.
“Then he kept telling us all the reasons we shouldn’t be together.”
“So that you would see how stupid you were being,” Eric told him with exasperation.
“This is going to be fun,” Brad repeated to Wendy.
“It isn’t going to be anything,” Eric said softly. “The emerald lady is going to fly away. Back to New York, away from danger. And that’s that.”
“What did happen during that storm?” Wendy whispered softly to Brad.
“Shots were fired—” Eric began.
“But this is far more important in the long run,” Wendy insisted, her silver eyes huge and taunting.
“There won’t be any long run if this doesn’t get settled,” Eric said, standing. He stared at the swamp, pointedly ending the conversation.
“Let’s have dinner,” Brad said. “No one’s going to bother anyone with Baby prowling around out here. And I haven’t taken down many of the shutters. We’ll be safe inside. I don’t think that anyone could have followed you here anyway, not without your seeing them. You didn’t see anything, did you?”
Eric shook his head slowly. No one had followed him here, he knew. He relaxed. “Dinner,” he agreed, and they went in together.
Rafe was in the living room, and he was quick to demand to kn
ow Eric’s version of everything that had happened. Then he thanked Eric for keeping Ashley safe.
“I don’t need to be thanked,” Eric told him.
“None of us would have made it without you,” Rafe said. Eric noticed that Ashley, talking to Wendy across the room as she sipped a glass of wine, had looked up. His eyes met hers, and he quickly turned away with a shrug. He shouldn’t have come here, except that he’d had to. But then he should have dropped Ashley off and run. Runaway. Just like Brad had said.
He turned back to Rafe, who was sipping a beer. “I’m just glad that Wendy knows her stuff.”
Tara appeared and kissed Eric’s cheek, demanding he come to see the baby. Amy was in the guest bedroom now, in her little drawer, and sound asleep again. Something about the infant and her mother’s sublime happiness touched him and he smiled, daring to caress the tiny cheek. “She’s…beautiful,” he told Tara.
Tara shivered. “And alive, and healthy, and so am I! We’re so very grateful.” She laughed softly. “Well, we might have survived without you. Rafe is resourceful, but he wasn’t counting on my miscalculations. He didn’t want me to be out there, but I had been so insistent, and well…never mind. I’m awfully glad that you found us and brought us here.” A shadow passed over her eyes and she shivered. “And then there’s Ashley. She’s like a sister, and if she’d been left alone there with a murderer…I don’t even dare think about it.”
“I didn’t do anything. She stumbled into me.”
Searching out his eyes, Tara smiled suddenly. “Don’t ever kid yourself, Mr. Hawk. Ashley is tough. She’s made it through a number of very rough spots before, and she’s never lacked courage.”
“She did very well,” he heard himself say.
“She’s been shot at before.”
“I heard about the trouble in Venezuela.”
Tara blushed. “Yes. I guess it made a lot of the newspapers.”
“I’m glad everything came out so well.”
“Yes, so am I.” She tucked a tiny blanket around her baby. “Thank goodness your sister-in-law has supplies for a baby!” She looked up at him. “The police have promised to get us a chopper tomorrow. I have to go to a hospital with the baby. I’ve never felt better in my entire life, but Wendy insists that I should go and Rafe agrees. I almost hate to leave, but I’ll be glad to get Ashley away, after what has happened.”
She was smiling and speaking so sweetly, so softly. He felt as if she had cast scalding oil over him and sliced him from midsection to groin. Ashley would be going away with them. Back where she belonged. She hadn’t told him.
It didn’t matter that she hadn’t had much of a chance. It just suddenly hurt like all hell, and then he felt like a fool. He had known it all along. She was a beautiful gem cast down in the mud, and he had picked her up and cleaned her off—but now she was going back to her different world where she could shine in a black-velvet setting. He had been a fool to get involved.
Somehow, he just hadn’t expected her to leave so quickly.
“I guess we’d better get on out,” Tara whispered, taking his arm. She led him back to the living and dining room combination. “I did want to say thank you. You did so very much for us.”
“I didn’t do a thing. Wendy did.”
Wendy heard him. She laughed. “I know all about birthing babies!” she teased with wide eyes. Then she came over to them, dragging Ashley along with her. “Isn’t she just darling? Oh, Eric, she’s just beautiful. All that hair! Josh didn’t have that much hair until he was almost six months old! Come, let’s eat.”
They sat at the dining table, and the longer the meal went on, the more Eric wished that he had departed right after bringing Ashley. It wasn’t that Wendy couldn’t cook—she could. She and Brad had a generator, so she had been able to make a big tray of lasagna with canned spinach and tons of garlic bread.
And conversation flowed easily. Brad had lived in New York for a while, and he and Rafe discussed streets and buildings, theater and music and ball games in the park. Tara got Eric’s attention by telling him how her labor pains started about two minutes after he had left them at Wendy and Brad’s door, and now they had called the hospital only to be warned that the roads were already impassable and that she was best off staying where she was.
Ashley smiled at Eric, but it wasn’t a warm smile. “You never mentioned any of this.”
“I thought that they were well on their way out of the swamp,” he said, looking at her. He smiled crookedly and took a long sip of burgundy wine. “You never mentioned, Miss Dane, that you were flying out of here in a helicopter tomorrow.”
“I didn’t have a chance.”
She was hurt, and he knew it. He hadn’t touched her, he hadn’t gone near her, he had barely acknowledged her existence, and she was sitting right next to him.
She didn’t understand. They were back in the real world. The Tylers might be the nicest people in the world, but theirs was still a different world, and pretty soon, Ashley would realize that. Wendy’s table was set with beautiful linen and china and crystal wine goblets, but the table still sat in the middle of the swamp.
And Ashley was still a glittering gem, accidentally dropped into that swamp. Somehow, being here with Wendy made the past cascade down on him with great ferocity. He didn’t want to, but when he closed his eyes, he could see Wendy’s face when they had gone to the mortuary together to identify Leif and Elizabeth. He could imagine his own face. He could see the blood spilled all over his wife’s white dress and Leif’s white dinner jacket. His brother had died defending Elizabeth, and he had sworn then that he would always defend Wendy. Wendy had Brad now, but she and Eric would also always have their link. Stronger than blood, maybe. He knew that Wendy wanted him to have a future, but tonight, all he could see was the past. He suddenly felt wrong. He’d had women before, but he’d never felt the way he did with Ashley. Never felt the guilt, as if he were giving more than he had the right to give, as if he were taking more than he had the right to demand.
“So, Eric, how did the two of you manage during all those days of wind and rain and havoc?” Brad asked.
Eric glanced down the table. Brad had a mischievous and very self-satisfied look about his eyes.
“Fine,” Eric said flatly.
“No television, no movies, no music! What on earth did you do to keep occupied?” Wendy questioned innocently.
“I can imagine what he wanted to be doing,” Brad said not so innocently.
Eric heard a choking sound. It was Ashley. Brad patted her on the back, handing her a glass of water. “Sorry, Ashley. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine!” Ashley gasped.
“That was a guilty choke if I ever heard one,” Tara said, then smiled sweetly.
“Still choking,” Brad said, shaking his head. “I hope that she’s all right.”
“I doubt if she is,” Wendy said sweetly. She looked at the Tylers with wide, innocent eyes. “He’s such a son of a gun, my brother-in-law.”
“Nasty as all hell,” Brad agreed pleasantly. Then he looked at Eric again. “How did you pass the time? Ashley, was he decent to you?”
“Brad!” There was an edge to Eric’s warning.
Ashley still looked as if she were strangling. Beautiful, pale, stunned and very ill at ease. “Of course, he was decent.”
“A perfect gentleman,” Wendy drawled.
“Wendy!” Tara piped in sweetly. “I’m sure that he was good to her, much more than good.”
“Tara!” Ashley snapped.
“What were you all expecting?” Rafe asked pleasantly. “The man is very ethical.”
“Well, you just never know with Eric,” Brad said. “We had a bit of trouble down here a few years ago on our doorstep and Eric had one of the culprits convinced that he was about to be skinned alive.”
“Finding a naked, red-haired beauty in the swamp, who knows what he did!” Wendy said sweetly.
“I was not naked!” Ashley protested.
She looked at Eric, and her eyes shone brightly against the porcelain beauty of her flesh. He tried to smile but gritted his teeth instead and turned to his sister-in-law. “Wendy-bird, the great spirits might very well come out of the sky and get you for this,” he warned.
“I’ll take my chances,” Wendy said with a laugh.
Eric stood, achingly aware of how he wanted to sweep Ashley into his arms, hold her against him and tell them all to go to hell and that he’d enjoyed every second of the storm. But the storm was over.
She wasn’t admitting anything. Neither was he.
He decided he wasn’t going to be very good company, not for the rest of that night.
He spoke, careful to keep smiling. “I’ve got to go.”
“Go!” Wendy said.
“I want to check on Mary and Willie and the kids. I know that they went to Big Cypress, but I’m willing to bet that they’re back at the village. I would have gone earlier except for…except for Ashley. But she’s safe here with you.”
Ashley was already standing. They all were. Eric reached into his pocket for the emeralds he had scooped off his side table. “Here, these are yours, right?”
Rafe glanced down at the gems and looked into Eric’s eyes. “Thanks for returning them. But they aren’t important. My wife is, Ashley is. If we don’t get to see you again, thanks for everything you did for them. And if you come to New York, make sure you see us. Please. If there’s anything you ever need…”
Eric nodded. “I do come to New York from time to time. Maybe I will see you. Tara, good luck with the baby.” He faced Ashley at last. “And good luck to you, Ashley,” he said simply.
He turned away quickly. He didn’t want to see the widening of her emerald eyes when she looked up at him. He didn’t want to think of her, and he didn’t want to remember her. It was over.
He started to say goodbye to Wendy, then paused, frowning. He heard something.
Baby. She was screeching and growling, the way she did when some stranger came around. Then he heard a distant airboat motor.
“What is it?” Wendy asked him anxiously.
“Someone, something,” he said.
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