The Burning Point

  "I'll take your word for it that alcohol sometimes affected you badly. But is that the same as being a potential alcoholic?"

  "Maybe not for everyone."

  Her eyes narrowed. "If you're different, why?"

  "Damn it, Kate!" He propelled himself from the chair and began to pace the room. "I don't want to talk about this!"

  She flinched. "Is this the same man who said yesterday that I'd avoided talking for too long?"

  "Hoist by my own petard." He stopped at the window and gazed at the desert night. "Did you know that phrase refers to a grenadier who was blown up by his own bomb?"

  "I knew. Anything to do with explosives has always interested me. Don't try to change the subject, Patrick. What are you not talking about?"

  His hands clenched. "I had to take my drinking seriously because...because my father was a raging alcoholic, and that's often hereditary."

  There was a long moment of silence before she said in an edged voice, "Your father was a raging alcoholic. How very odd that you never happened to mention that."

  "I couldn't, Kate. I just...couldn't."

  "You told me your parents died in a car accident. Had your father been drinking?"

  "His blood alcohol was more than twice the legal limit. He and my mother were killed instantly." He grasped the window sill, fingers tightening until the knuckles showed white. "My little sister didn't die for almost a week." Mary Beth had been so young. Only eleven years old. "The longest week of my life."

  She caught her breath. "I'm so sorry. I didn't realize that. I thought she'd died in the crash, like your parents."

  "How could you know?" His voice was harsh. "I could never stand to talk about the accident, and I asked my relatives not to upset you with such depressing old news."

  "A couple of times I asked Aunt Connie about your family, and she would just shake her head and sigh and say how sad it was," Kate said. "I thought she meant the accident itself. I didn't realize there was more."

  "I don't know if she knew about my father's drinking. It was the Donovan family secret," he said bitterly. "That's another thing I learned in therapy. Families of alcoholics often have a tacit agreement to hide what's going on from outsiders. Even now, it's hard, damned hard, to talk about my father's drinking."

  "Rather like me and my inability to talk about being an abused wife."

  There was enormous relief in knowing that she understood. "Exactly like that. A deep, irrational belief that to talk about the family secrets will destroy you."

  "Was your father a mean drunk?"

  Knowing that it was time--past time--to tell the whole truth, he turned to face her. "Sober, my father had the charm of the Irish, but when he drank he was a vicious bastard. Once he broke my collarbone, another time he cracked a couple of my ribs." He rolled back his left sleeve, revealing a thin scar on the inside of his arm. "I think I told you this came from tripping while I carried a glass?"

  Kate nodded mutely.

  "I lied. It happened when my old man knocked me into a window. An artery was cut. There was an amazing amount of blood. Good thing I was a Boy Scout and knew enough first aid to keep myself from bleeding to death."

  "How old were you when that happened?"

  "Twelve. The hell of it was that when my father was sober, he could be a great guy. He coached my Little League team, took Mary Beth and me crabbing, did the usual good dad things. But as I got older, he was sober less and less often. By the end..."

  "Yes?" Kate's low voice was encouraging.

  "My mother baked a cake for my sixteenth birthday. My father didn't show up for dinner, and we all knew what that meant--he was out drinking with his buddies. Eventually we went ahead and ate, trying to pretend we were having a good time while waiting for the ax to fall.

  "He came home drunk, and exploded when he saw we'd eaten without him. He grabbed my mother to hit her. I went crazy. I was as tall as he was by then, and a hell of a lot more fit, so I slammed him against the wall and said if he ever laid a finger on Mom or Mary Beth or me again, I'd kill him."

  He'd meant it, too. If he lived to be a hundred, he would never forget the sour scent of whiskey on his father's breath, nor the play of emotions in the blue eyes that were so like his own. Shock. Rage. And then fear. When he was sixteen there had been triumph in seeing that fear. Now, on bad nights his father's eyes haunted him.

  "Did standing up to him help?"

  "For a while." He'd been so proud of himself, thinking he'd been heroic. Perhaps he had. Yet though he didn't recognize the fact until years later, his actions had turned him into a bully like his father, using the threat of violence to achieve his aim. He'd gone over to the dark side. "The accident was only a couple of months later." And he would always wonder if his defiance, which had shifted the balance of power in the Donovan family, might have played a part in his father's last lethal drive.

  "Why didn't your mother leave and take you and your sister away?"

  "Where I grew up, people mated for life. A woman was expected to put up with her husband's little vices, as long as he was a good provider. My father was a steelworker at Sparrow's Point, so by local standards, he was a good husband. And to be fair, she loved him. Or at least, she loved the man he was sometimes."

  His fingers drummed the window sill in a tense tattoo. He tried not to think of his family very often, especially not Mary Beth. His feelings about his mother were more complex. He'd loved her, and she'd done everything she could for her children--except protect them. "It...it half killed me when you left, Kate--but I was glad that you had the courage to leave before I hurt you really badly."

  "That wasn't courage, but cowardice."

  "No. You had the strength to break a downward spiral before both of us were destroyed..." He had always been grateful that she'd had that strength. If she hadn't--it didn't bear thinking of.

  "Why are you finally telling me this?"

  "Speaking is hard, but silence is poison. Besides, I can hardly needle you to face the past when I've hidden so much myself." He studied her expression. "Would it have made a difference if you'd known I came from a textbook dysfunctional family, Kate?"

  She hesitated. "I...I don't know. Probably."

  Hell. So if he'd been brave enough to be honest about his childhood, their marriage might have survived. Kate had had endless compassion for wounded souls, and enough common sense to haul them both off to a family counselor if she'd had a better understanding of what was going on inside him. But he hadn't wanted to be a wounded soul--he'd wanted to be her hero.

  And in his heart had been the conviction that if she knew the truth, she could never love anyone as tarnished and unworthy as he.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  Though she was exhausted by the long day and the discussion with Donovan, Kate had trouble getting to sleep. Once she'd believed that she and her husband had shared everything. Instead, there had been this pain-racked side of him that she'd known nothing about. No, not a side, his very roots. Discovering that his father had been an abusive drunk explained so much. Driven to violence in defense of his family and himself, Patrick had learned a lesson that was not easily put aside. The edge that intrigued and alarmed her from their first meeting had come from his pain and anger.

  She'd thought marriage consisted of a man and a woman, and someday, God willing, children. Instead, she'd been sharing her husband with demons of the past.

  And she'd never even known.

  Chapter 20

  The next days were full of furious activity as the Palace was readied to meet its doom. Luther and Jim were utterly reliable, and Kate was a trooper. Donovan was amused to hear how she had established her authority over the covering crew.

  But the job was still exhausting, because he needed it to be perfect. A good thing he didn't require a lot of sleep, because he didn't get much.

  After forty-eight hours of almost non-stop work, he fell asleep at the desk in his bedroom while double-checking that the required permits were in order. A dem
olition permit from the county so they could take down the Palace, and a blasting permit from the fire department to use explosives in the process. A street occupancy permit from the state to close down the Strip for a couple of hours, an air quality permit as a pledge that they weren't going to wreck the city's air. Paperwork had been walked through fourteen different government offices.

  He slouched back in his chair to rest his eyes before checking the special events permit required because PDI would be causing a public disturbance. The next thing he knew, his eyes opened and it was almost six in the morning. Time to get up. He groaned and got to his feet, cramped muscles aching from the uncomfortable position. He felt three days dead and buried.

  Deciding he needed a shower even though he was running late, he unbuttoned his shirt. Before he could take it off, the suite doorbell rang. He emerged from his room to see Kate signing for a room service cart with two covered breakfasts on it. Hell. Somehow his groggy mind had misplaced the fact that they were sharing quarters.

  Before he could retreat, Kate closed the door on the bellman and turned. Her brows arched when she saw Donovan's bare chest. Hardly for the first time, of course, but these conditions made him feel very...naked.

  Kate poured a cup of coffee, added a dollop of milk, and handed it over. "I suggest you get dressed before breakfast. I'm not sure I can stand so much excitement this early in the day."

  Blushing for the first time in more years than he could remember, Donovan beat a hasty retreat. He really could not afford to act brain dead while living with Kate.

  After gulping down the coffee, he took a hasty shower, which improved him to feeling only one day dead. He dressed and entered the living area to find a plate of bacon, eggs, and hash browns waiting under a silver cover.

  Amused but mercifully silent, Kate poured him more coffee while he ate. Eggs over easy, just the way he liked them.

  When he was done, Kate asked, "Have you decided to grow a beard?"

  Lord, he'd forgotten to shave. He rubbed his chin, which bristled like an aspiring porcupine. "Actually, I'm trying the terrorist look. I've always envied how those guys manage to maintain a perfect three-day stubble."

  "There are special razors that adjust to keep stubble at different heights. Sort of like lawnmowers for the chin. Though I would have thought that was a little too affected for your tastes, and that you've just forgotten to shave."

  A pity that she didn't have the decency to forget how to read his mind. "Time is short. Shaving is a luxury."

  Not fooled, she asked, "After all these years and implosions, are you still so uptight on every project? Or is there something about this one you're not telling me?"

  His first reaction was to evade the issue, but he was practicing candor these days. "This is a high profile job, and it has to be perfect. Having a bunch of dynamite jocks blowing up buildings in your community is a pretty scary thing. Our business wouldn't exist without trust. PDI has always been the best, the safest, the explosives crew you wouldn't mind having as next door neighbors. Sam always emphasized the family connections in interviews. His nephew, his son-in-law."

  "Ex-son-in-law."

  "Sam glossed over that part. The old fox knew that the one-big-happy-family image helped establish confidence. That, and our record."

  "But now the record is tarnished, Sam is dead, his nephew is gone, and you have to show the world that PDI is as good as ever."

  "That's it in a nutshell." He spread jam on a muffin. "Not only would the Palace be a tricky project under any circumstances, but dear Cousin Nick is telling the world that he's the genuine Corsi, the shield bearer of the PDI tradition. If this job goes awry, everyone in the demolition industry will know about it five minutes later. That wouldn't be good for business."

  "But Nick is only Sam's nephew. PDI has me, Sam's one and only daughter."

  If Donovan hadn't been still dopey, he would have thought of that himself. "You're right. TV and print journalists will be clamoring for interviews, and you'll be a terrific public relations asset. Smart, a family member, and highly photogenic."

  "And blond. Mustn't forget blond."

  "As I said, photogenic. You'd look great on the cover of Demolition Age. They'd photograph you in your hard hat, perhaps nibbling suggestively on the end of a stick of dynamite."

  "If you say so, Svengali. In the meantime, we concentrate on making this job perfect. Right?"

  "You make it sound easy."

  "Perfect is never easy. But if perfection is what we need, we'll by God do it perfectly." She left the room to wash up.

  Kate was a damned useful woman to have on his side.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  By the end of the afternoon, the area around the Palace was in a state of controlled frenzy as construction and movie workers buzzed about their business. Donovan began to relax a little. His people would have to work late and put in long hours tomorrow, but they would be ready by 2:00 A. M. the following morning, the scheduled shoot time.

  Hank Hawkins, the movie director, rushed up to Donovan and Bull Berrigan, who were conferring outside the building. "Clear out!" the director ordered. "We're about to shoot the tank scene and you're in the way."

  Berrigan said, "I thought you were going to do that after dark so you could match the footage with the night background of the implosion."

  Hawkins snapped his fingers. "Right, I almost forgot. Donovan, the implosion will have to moved up to sunset tomorrow."

  Donovan blinked. "Come again?"

  The director waved his arm at the heavens. "Did you ever see such a sky? Shooting the tank scene to take advantage of it means the implosion footage will have to be filmed with similar lighting. Some minor inconsistencies can be fixed in the lab, but it would be hard to turn night into day."

  Donovan saw that a sullen sunset had transformed the mirrored windows of the Palace into a molten gold that was startling against the dark clouds towering behind. A striking sight.

  But Christ, they couldn't move the implosion forward! They would be working right up to the deadline as it was. "We can't do the shot tomorrow evening. It will have to be the next evening."

  "Impossible! I have to be back in Los Angeles that day. I can't waste time sitting around here."

  Fueled by fatigue, Donovan's temper went into meltdown. He opened his mouth to suggest that Hawkins, a notorious control freak, could either let an assistant oversee filming of the implosion, or Donovan would personally present him with a stick of dynamite in a place where the sun didn't shine.

  Then Kate materialized beside him. "You're quite right, Mr. Hawkins. A sky like this is too good to waste. But we can't change the time of the shot unless the permits can be adjusted properly."

  Hawkins waved one hand. "No problem--I'll get one of my people to help. This is Vegas, they'll listen to Hollywood. But we've got to do the tank scene now--this light won't last more than a few minutes." He raced off to take position with his lead cameraman as crewmen chased people out of visual range.

  "I'll get Carmen," Berrigan said. "She'll murder me if she doesn't see this."

  Kate said, "Come on, Donovan, if we stand over there, we should have a great view."

  "Damn it, we can't finish loading and wiring by sunset tomorrow!"

  "Sure we can. If necessary, we call the office and get another couple of people here, by private jet if we have to, but I think the job is doable. Whatever it takes, we have to give Hawkins what he wants. Remember? We're in the business of rebuilding faith in PDI. We have to make perfection look easy."

  His temper ebbed. She was right. PDI would do what had to be done, and it wasn't good business for him to act like a rabid raccoon. "Actually, we shouldn't have to bring anyone in from Maryland. The contractor who supplied the dynamite is a licensed blaster. I believe he might be willing to pitch in if the price is right. And one of PDI's foremen, Randy Bates, is supervising a job down in Phoenix. He's ahead of schedule, so I can pull him up here for a day or so."

  "Good thinking
." She turned to the Palace. "I can't wait to see this. It's so absurd! This big scary war machine bashing its way out of a casino. Need I say that this is going to be a summer movie?"

  "The news does not surprise me."

  As the last extraneous people were cleared away, a stage hand drove a shiny white Cadillac into the scene. After parking the car, he darted out of camera range. A hush fell over the site. The glass-sheathed hotel, the name "Arroyo" emblazoned across the facade, glowed with hellish red-gold splendor against the thunderous sky. The effect was surreal, both beautiful and ominous.

  To the right, Hawkins, who'd apparently been waiting for the best moment, raised his hand, then chopped it down in a signal to begin. "Action!"

  A mechanical rumbling came from inside the Palace, its pitch rapidly rising to a whine. Then a black tank smashed out of the building at full speed, the artillery barrel and broad treads demonic in the strange light. Windows shattered and sunset-tinged glass glittered as the tank crushed the gleaming Cadillac into scrap metal.

  Donovan caught his breath as the massive vehicle roared toward the main camera. Hawkins stood his ground, unconcerned by the possibility that he might end up as road kill. At the last moment, the tank screamed to a stop in front of the camera.

  There was absolute silence. Then the turret opened and Kenzie Scott emerged, his face covered with fake bruises. The actor looked powerful and dangerous in battered army fatigues.

  A slim hand reached out of the turret to grasp his. Effortlessly he pulled Raine Marlowe up, her apricot hair cascading over her shoulders. She wore an artfully ripped showgirl costume. Donovan grinned. If her spangled and feathered outfit tore any farther, it would change the movie's rating.

  The couple kissed, their entwined bodies silhouetted against the blood-red facade of the hotel. "I can see that wildly romantic kiss as a bedroom poster for half the young women in America," Kate said. "Kenzie Scott is definitely an answer to a maiden's prayer."

  He suspected that she was baiting him to test his jealousy level. "Looks like it will be a fun movie," he said. "Mindless, but fun."