The Switch

by Sandra Brown

  After a moment of reflection, Chief said, "I'll think about it."

  "That's the only promise I ask of you."

  "No strings for your hospitality today?"

  "I wouldn't trust you if such a small favor could so easily sway an important decision." They sat for a time with only the ticking clock to break the ponderous silence. When Longtree spoke again, he switched subjects. "Gillian, the twin, you liked her?"

  The old man's eyes seemed to drill straight into him, demanding undiluted honesty. Chief heard himself saying, "Yes. I liked her a lot."

  Longtree nodded sagely, then switched the subject again. "What is your strategy from here?"

  "To go to the Temple and confront Brother Gabriel." Longtree frowned. "I don't think it'll be that simple. There are guarded security gates, I'm told. Cameras and such. How do you intend to get in?"

  "Any suggestions?"

  "The sheriff up there is a man named Max Ritchey. He cooperates with the reservation police force. Seems like a reasonable man. You could start with him."

  "I appreciate the tip." Chief stood and stretched. "I'm beat. If you'll excuse me, I've got to get some sleep. Would you mind if I showered?"

  "You'll have to ask Melina. The bathroom is attached to the bedroom."

  "Okay."

  "I'll be leaving soon to attend to some business and won't be back until midafternoon. Make yourselves at home."

  Knowing that Longtree would be uncomfortable with an effusive display of gratitude, Chief said simply, "Thanks for everything."

  "You're welcome."

  He was on his way through the door when Longtree called him back, for the first time addressing him as Chief instead of colonel. He turned. "Yeah?"

  The older man said, "Quanah Parker didn't relinquish every aspect of Comanche life. To the consternation of the BIA, he practiced polygamy."

  Chief raised one shoulder in a half shrug of misapprehension.

  Longtree said, "Apparently your kinsman thought it was possible to be in love with two women at the same time. I thought it might relieve you to know that."

  CHAPTER 33

  He knocked. "Come in."

  Melina was bending from the waist, head upside down, toweling her hair dry. She was in bra and panties, nothing else, and the sight of so much flesh stopped Chief in his tracks. "Sorry. I thought you said to come in."

  In one fluid motion, she stood up straight and flung her damp hair away from her face. "Where's the mystery? I figured that since you'd seen Gillian—"

  "I've seen you."

  "Essentially. And you've seen my underwear."

  Right. He had. But it looked a hell of a lot different on her than it had hanging on the shower curtain rod. He was gawking like a schoolboy. Her breasts swelled above the cups of her brassiere, the nipples dusky shadows beneath ivory lace. And there, on that spot just below her navel, was where he'd first touched her with his lips.

  No, not her, dammit. Gillian.

  "Chief? Are you all right?"

  No, he was not all right. His heart was thumping like a son of a bitch and his mouth felt cottony. "Sure." "I'm flesh and blood, you know."

  "No argument there."

  "But you look like you're seeing a ghost."

  It was true. He was experiencing a bad case of déjà vu. Or, more to the point, déjà hard on, pardon the French. Except for the bruise discoloring her collarbone where she'd caught the doorjamb in her struggle with Tobias's imposter, she was identical to Gillian. Identical in every way. So much like her that he relived a thousand erotic memories in the span of a few seconds.

  That curve of hip perfectly fit his palm. That patch of skin had a light dusting of peach fuzz. That hollow was particularly sensitive to nibbling. When touched there, she gave a little whimper of arousal.

  "Sorry." He curbed the impulse to vigorously rub his eyes like a cartoon character confronted with a phantasm. But he did avert his eyes. A bit crossly, he said, "It could've been Longtree who knocked. How'd you know it was me?"

  "By your tread. I first noticed it when you walked through Pax's airplane hangar. You have a very distinctive gait."

  "Oh."

  He knew his face must look stiff and strained because she was still regarding him with uncertainty. "Look, Chief, if I've made you uncomfortable, I apologize. Gillian was the modest twin."

  Recalling how she had stood up and seductively slipped out of her dress that night, he said thickly, "Not very."

  "Really?"

  "Oh." For a moment she considered that thoughtfully, then said, "But she was pretending to be me, remember?" "Right."

  Still looking at him uneasily, she said, "If you'd rather I dress—"

  "Of course not."

  "It's just that I'm exhausted. The thought of sleeping in clothes that I've been wearing since—"

  "No explanation necessary, Melina. I was just startled to see you like this. It's not every day a man is lucky enough to walk in on a half-naked woman."

  He tried to grin but wasn't sure he succeeded in making it appear genuine. In fact, he was pretty sure it wasn't convincing at all. Even so, she took his statement at face value and acknowledged it only with a huge yawn.

  She sat down on the edge of the bed and reapplied the towel to her hair, briskly rubbing strands of it between the faded terrycloth. He groped for something intelligent to say. "Longtree suggested that we start with the sheriff up there near the Temple."

  "That's probably a good idea."

  "With the local law on our side, we might have a better shot at getting into the compound. It's guarded, he said."

  "How will we convince the sheriff that we're not a couple of nutcases?"

  "We'll have a hundred-mile drive to think up something to say."

  "Drive? I assumed we would fly."

  "It's your call, but if you want my opinion..."

  When he paused, she glanced over at him. "Shoot."

  "This morning we were able to sneak in because we had Longtree making arrangements and that landing strip was private and remote. But if two out-of-towners land at a public airfield, it could attract attention."

  "You're right. I'd rather our arrival not be announced. I'd also like to get there before dark, if possible, so we'll have a chance to look around."

  "There is one major problem with the plan to drive. We don't have wheels."

  "I'm sure Chief Longtree would find us a vehicle."

  "I'm sure he would if you ask him," he said, partially beneath his breath.

  "He's a very distinguished gentleman, isn't he?"

  Her glowing review of their host irked him. He agreed that Longtree seemed like a decent man, but he wasn't as carried away as Melina obviously was. "He's okay, I guess."

  "I love his face."

  "You love his face?"

  "His appearance. The way he looks."

  "He looks like a wrinkled old Indian."

  She shot him a reproving frown. "But the wrinkles are an enhancement. His features are so proud, so..." She paused to search for the proper adjective and finally came up with one. "Noble."

  Chief had a sour comeback for that, but he settled on a noncommittal harrumph. Out of fairness, he said, "He's had his share of tragedy." He then related the story of Longtree's loss.

  "How horrible," she said when he was finished. "His wife and his baby."

  "Yeah, that's rough."

  She stared into near space for a time, then looked over at him. "He reminds me of you."

  "What?" he exclaimed.

  "Not physically. Obviously. But the way you hold yourselves... intact. That rigid self-control."

  "Part of being an Indian, I guess. Aren't we supposed to be a stoic people?"

  He'd said it half in jest, but she addressed it seriously. "Maybe. But maybe you and Chief Longtree have even more than that in common."

  Before he could pursue the topic, she dropped the damp towel onto the floor and lay down, pulling the covers up to her chin. "Lord, I don't remember ever bein
g this tired." She adjusted her head on the pillow. Her eyes closed instantly.

  "You don't mind if I use the shower, do you?"

  "It's not my shower," she mumbled. Then she rolled onto her side and brought her knees up even with her waist.

  Chief went into the bathroom. As soon as he closed the door, he unbuttoned his jeans to relieve the pressure on his own proud and noble feature. He remained there with his forehead and palms pressed hard against the wood, his eyes closed, breathing slowly and deeply to maintain the rigid self-control Melina had erroneously attributed to him.

  When after several minutes he turned into the room, he noticed that the tub had been wiped dry. She'd neatly hung her used towel on the bar. The room smelled of soap and toothpaste and damp skin. Female skin. Soft, bare female skin. Gillian's skin. Melina's skin.

  Chief turned on the faucets and stripped off his clothes. His motions were jerky and angry. At the very least irritable. He soaped and shampooed and when he got out of the tub, he availed himself of the tube of toothpaste and washed his teeth with his index finger, as Melina must have done because they hadn't even carried toothbrushes with them when they left Dallas.

  And all that while Chief wondered what the hell Longtree was implying with that irrelevant crack about Quanah Parker's ability to be in love with more than one woman at a time.

  He dismissed it as ancient Apache mumbo jumbo. Hocus-pocus. Part of that mystical stuff about visions and crap, which he'd never bought into. Among his mother's tribe there had been old men with stringy gray hair and weather beaten faces who'd scared the hell out of him when he was a kid. During ceremonies, their low, guttural chanting had frightened him. In adolescence, he'd ridiculed them for being such fools.

  Dexter Longtree hadn't lapsed into any chants, but about half of everything he said was cloaked in innuendo and riddles. Chief was certain the old man talked like that to sound wiser than he was, to make it seem as though he were tapped into the spirit realm. Longtree wanted to come across as the wise old medicine man who could read omens and such.

  "Bullshit," Chief muttered as he reluctantly pulled on his jeans again. He was a scientist. He believed in what had been proved or what he had seen and experienced for himself. For all he knew, Longtree's ramblings were peyote-inspired.

  Or maybe he wasn't altogether there. He'd admitted to going a little crazy when his wife and baby died. Maybe he'd stayed crazy as a bedbug all these years.

  Whatever. Colonel Christopher Hart put no credence in any revelations expressed by an old man with a proud and noble face that Melina loved.

  He was in a pissy mood when he left the bathroom. He even let the door swing open wide enough to bang loudly against the wall. Melina didn't stir. He'd put his jeans back on in case she made an issue of his climbing into bed beside her.

  But why shouldn't he?

  He'd flown the frigging airplane while she napped in her seat. The past couple of days his life had been in just as much danger as hers. Why should he settle for the lumpy-looking sofa in that drab living room when the nice, comfy-looking bed was big enough for both of them?

  But when he lay down beside her, she didn't utter a peep of protest. Her breathing remained even and deep. There was no reaction from her when he plumped his pillow several times. She gave no indication of knowing, or caring, that he was anywhere near her.

  He didn't know whether to be relieved or annoyed.

  "Have a seat, gentlemen." Sheriff Max Ritchey motioned the two men into chairs on the opposite side of his desk. "Can I offer you a soft drink?"

  "No, thanks," Lawson replied. "We just had lunch. Green chile stew."

  "How'd you like it?"

  "Delicious."

  "Good. Good." By settling his butt more comfortably into the seat of his desk chair, the sheriff signaled that the pleasantries were over now and that he was ready to get down to business. "You didn't come all the way from Dallas to eat our regional specialty. What can I do for you?"

  "You remember speaking to me on the phone a few days ago?" Lawson asked.

  "Sure. Homicide case."

  "Gillian Lloyd."

  "I was under the impression the case was solved. You knew the identity of the culprit, right? When you phoned me, you were just tying up some loose ends."

  "That's true." The detective recounted the facts for him, although Ritchey remembered them.

  "As I reported back to you, Detective Lawson, I went up to the Temple and made inquiries about this Dale Gordon. They remembered him because he called frequently and was obviously a mental case. Way over the edge. I think his suicide proves that." Baffled, the sheriff raised his arms. "So what's the problem? Unless there's more to this homicide and suicide than you originally thought."

  "Significantly more, Sheriff Ritchey." In somber tones and with little elaboration, Special Agent Tobias brought him up to speed.

  As Ritchey listened, his dread increased. Each sentence was like a stone added to a pile, until they had formed a mound of worries he must contend with. When these two men showed up at his department unannounced, he'd recognized them as heralds of bad news. A homicide detective from out of state didn't come to Lamesa County accompanied by an FBI agent out of Washington unless they were investigating a case of national importance.

  Instinctively, Max Ritchey knew that his virtually uneventful, well-organized, well-balanced life was about to be drastically rocked. He hoped he could prevent it from being completely toppled.

  "We're testing the bullet that killed Jem Hennings," Tobias was saying. "But chances of tracing it are next to nil. We're fairly certain it was fired by a professional."

  "Like a hired assassin?" Ritchey asked.

  "That's one possibility," Tobias replied evasively.

  Lawson picked it up from there. "Hennings was Gillian Lloyd's fiancé. Dale Gordon worked in the clinic where she was artificially inseminated the day before her murder. Hennings had connections to Brother Gabriel's ministry, which we're investigating further. It's been confirmed that Dale Gordon had direct contact with the Temple on a routine basis." He raised his shoulders in an implicit shrug. "You add it up."

  Ritchey recoiled with astonishment, exclaiming, "You're not suggesting that Brother Gabriel had anything to do with these three deaths."

  "Not at all."

  Ritchey didn't believe the FBI agent's smooth denial. "Then why are you here?"

  "Because someone else does believe that Brother Gabriel is involved," Lawson told him. "Gillian Lloyd's sister. A twin. A dead ringer. Her name is Melina Lloyd. She was with Hennings when he was shot."

  Ritchey thoughtfully tugged on his lower lip. "If this Hennings was romancing her sister for some illicit purpose, she's got motive," he said, quoting a line he'd recently heard on his favorite detective show. "I'm sure you've thought of that."

  "We thought of it, but it doesn't hold. Hennings was shot through a window from across the street. She didn't do it, but she's a material witness. We want to question her before she does something crazy."

  "Such as?"

  "Such as storm the gates of Brother Gabriel's castle. She wants answers same as us," Lawson told him.

  "We—Mr. Lawson and I; and you, Sheriff—are constrained to get answers by going through proper channels," Tobias explained. "Unfortunately, Ms. Lloyd feels no such constraint. She's proven herself to be a very resourceful individual. She's managed to elude us, and she's motivated by the strongest motivation there is. Revenge."

  "Sounds to me like she's gone around the bend, too. She might be as unstable as Dale Gordon."

  Tobias denied that with a firm shake of his head. "No doubt she's emotionally reactive, but her reasoning is sound. Another employee of the Waters Clinic was murdered yesterday afternoon. Within hours of speaking with Ms. Lloyd," he added after a significant pause for emphasis.

  "I see you're shocked, Sheriff. Rightfully so. Ms. Lloyd knows she's on to something, and I don't think she'll stop until she gets some answers. She won't quit until she kn
ows for certain why her twin was killed. Detective Lawson and I are reasonably sure that she'll turn up here."

  "Sooner rather than later," the detective added.

  Ritchey released a long breath. "I'll notify the Temple immediately, but if she or anyone had tried to barge into the compound, I would have heard about it. The security up there is tight."

  "Why's that?" Lawson asked.

  "Ask John Lennon. Ask that designer fellow in Florida. Brother Gabriel is an international celebrity. High-profile people make good targets for nobodies who want to get their names in the news."

  Tobias frowned thoughtfully. "Are you sure that's the only reason the Temple security is so tight?"

  "Why else?"

  The FBI agent leaned forward in his chair. Ritchey noticed that the French cuffs of his shirt were monogrammed with his initials. "Sheriff Ritchey, have you ever been inside the compound?"

  "Only twice. Last time was three days ago when I questioned Brother Gabriel about Dale Gordon."

  "How did it strike you?"

  "I'm not sure I catch your meaning." Tobias reacted with impatience to his reply, and Lawson looked ready to shake information out of him with his square, blunt hands. "What I mean is, in what way? My impressions of the place? The grounds are spotless. The buildings are—"

  "The general mood. The people," Lawson said, cutting him off. "Did you see any evidence of people being held there against their will?"

  Ritchey barked a dry laugh. "You're kidding, right?"

  The two men stared back at him with all the levity of hooded executioners.

  Nervously he recalled his smile and cleared his throat. "My understanding is that it's an honor for Brother Gabriel's followers to live and work there. People apply for the opportunity. There's a merit system. You do some special work for the ministry, you earn a place in the Temple. Something like that."

  "What kind of special work?"

  "Pardon?"

  "You said if a follower did some special work for the ministry ..."

  "Good deeds. Fund-raising. Proselytizing. Isn't that what most churches are about? Earning points?"