Dying to Have Her

  “I’m not throwing anyone anything,” Olsen said irritably. “From what I understand, he’s had more work than he did as a cop since he’s gone out on his own. Liam is the best man I know for the job. He knows this place, and these people—especially after the past trouble here.” He paused as a thought came to him. “Didn’t you date Miss McCormack?”

  “Dinners … a few casual dates. Then we became friends,” Bill said.

  Olsen grunted. “Then you have a current relationship, even if it’s friendship. I’m not taking you off the case because of that.”

  “Serena and I had coffee once, dinner once, and saw one movie. Serena and Liam …” Bill was lost for a moment, then he shrugged. “They dated. It was different.”

  “He won’t be taking her to a high school prom.”

  “No, of course not.”

  “This may be a tricky case, Bill. It looks like an accident; it might have been a murder. If Penny wants to be extra careful about the talent, it couldn’t hurt.”

  Bill lifted his hands in resignation. “Yeah, all right.”

  “I need to see both of the producers. Penny and Larkin. Get them in here for me.”

  “Sir, you’ve spoken with them both—”

  Olsen glared at Bill. “And get hold of Liam. We want to try very hard to keep whatever happened here down to just one … accident.”

  Chapter 3

  LIAM TOOK ONE LAST look in the hatch of his black Jeep, marking off the contents. Fishing poles, skis, food boxes, tools, Miller Lite, and—the one major change in this trip’s packing—a few packs of Seagram’s wine coolers. Staring at them, he felt the slightest twinge of unease. He loved the wilderness, a rushing stream, the mountains. California was a great state, filled with boundless natural wonders.

  All his life, he had been fond of the wilderness. All his life, he had been fond of women. He’d just never tried to mix the two before.

  He liked being alone, with the natural world around him, though he didn’t always go alone. Once or twice a year he met Charlie Eagle, a member of the Nez Perce tribe, and they fished, hunted, drank too much beer and shot up tin cans together, discussing the fate of the world. As yet they hadn’t managed to do too much about it.

  Today, though, he’d be taking off with Sharon. Twenty-eight, platinum blond, long-legged—and the toughest little tomboy he’d ever met. She was studying ancient man, and she had visited a number of sites that had been found recently, proving there had been settlements in North America long before what had been previously believed. They’d met when, in the pursuit of a missing person, he’d found human remains in the desert. The remains were those of a murder victim, but as an L.A. medical examiner and his team of experts discovered, the poor fellow had been beheaded before the time of written history on the continent. As it happened, his story had been recorded in a nearby cave drawing, found after the discovery of the body had created an academic frenzy. Sharon and Liam had hit it off right away, which had been nice, since he’d still been lying awake far too often at night, recalling what almost was—and then wasn’t—with Serena McCormack.

  He should have known better, from the beginning. Serena’s world wasn’t real, and his was far too much so. She had been the most incredible woman he had ever seen. Coming close to her had been like throwing gas on a fire, truly explosive. And falling out with her had been the same.

  He slammed the hatchback with far greater vigor than necessary. He told himself that he was going to go and have a good time. He walked back into the house, sliding his fingers through his hair. He was supposed to call Sharon and tell her when he was leaving. He strode into the kitchen and reached into the fridge. Sparse, he thought, surveying the contents. He selected a large bottle of orange juice, shook two aspirin out of a container, and downed them, drinking the juice right out of the bottle. Then he headed for the living room.

  His place was small, a fine old house in Laurel Valley, carved into a canyon. Cowhide in front of the hearth, dark leather sofa and chairs. There was a lot of stonework in the house, and some paneling. A large elk head was flanked by a gazelle and a deer—not animals that he had killed but trophies that were in the house when he bought it from an attorney, who told him that the heads had been there when he had bought the place as well. So, they stayed. They were kind of like friends.

  There were a few pictures on the mantel. One was from his stint in the service, another from when he graduated from the police academy. In another he stood with Conar Markham, who was as avid a diver as he was himself. They had been involved with diving for the force at that time.

  Conar had gone on to acting; Liam had stayed with the police. He had liked his work. Curious, though, even to himself, that soon after the Hitchcock killings, which had involved the cast and crew of Valentine Valley last year, he had suddenly decided to leave the force. Maybe it had even been Serena. He had wanted to change his life, to branch out on his own as a private investigator. It was interesting work. He refused cases that had to do with wives spying on their husbands or vice versa. Most of what he took on were missing persons cases.

  Of course, a few of them had turned out to be wives— or husbands—who had gone off with their lovers. And in a few cases he had been too late. Two had involved kidnapping victims who had been killed almost immediately after being abducted. The best he had been able to give the families was closure, and that was hell. It was, even after all these years, heart-wrenching to tell someone that a loved one wasn’t coming back. But on the positive side, he’d twice found the victims of kidnappings: a woman buried alive in a coffin behind her abductor’s home and a child tied up in a closet. That had felt good, damned good. Rewarding.

  He glanced at the phone on the small table between the couch and one of the leather chairs. He didn’t pick it up to call Sharon. He would do so, soon. He couldn’t help but think about the last time he’d been about to take off on a good wilderness trek. Just before he left, he’d been called to take on a case. Well, he wasn’t a cop anymore. His time was his own.

  To his amazement, the phone rang as he stared at it.

  Let the machine pick it up! he commanded himself.

  He forced himself to remain still. Probably just Sharon, calling him. The machine picked up. He heard his own voice. Then he was surprised to hear the voice of Bill Hutchens, an old coworker.

  “Liam, pick up if you’re around. The boss has asked that I call you and twist your arm. Liam, pick up, pick up …”

  Let it go! he told himself. But it seemed that his hand reached out of its own volition, and his fingers wound around the receiver.

  “Yeah, Bill, it’s me. What’s up?”

  “Accident on the set of Valentine Valley.”

  Despite himself, Liam felt his heart thud against his chest. “Serena?” he inquired.

  “Serena’s fine. But that Jane Dunne who was just hired … dead. Falling spotlight.”

  “And it was an accident?”

  “Olsen wanted me to call you. The producer, Joe Penny, seems afraid that we might wind up with a higher body count.”

  “More lighting equipment is going to fall?” Liam murmured skeptically.

  “Serena was on the set at the same time. Penny wants you watching her.”

  “Me?” Liam said incredulously.

  “With great subtlety, if you will. This hasn’t been discussed with the lady in question yet.”

  “You want me to play bodyguard to a woman who doesn’t know she has a bodyguard?”

  “Something like that—for the moment. Olsen wants to talk to you, then he’ll explain it to her. She’ll know the score soon enough. Hey, not my idea. Olsen wanted you called in.”

  “No. I’m taking off to the lodge. With a date.”

  “Charlie Eagle is a date?”

  “Bill, you asshole, you’ve been in Hollywood too long. No, I have a date with the woman I’m seeing now.”

  Bill whistled softly. “The blonde I saw you with at the Italian restaurant the other night
?”

  “That’s the one. So—no. Tell Olsen thanks, but I can’t take the job.”

  “I’m supposed to twist your arm.”

  “Twist it. The answer will still be ‘Fuck, no.’”

  “You can name your terms.”

  “The department can’t afford me. You can’t begin to imagine the terms I’d demand.”

  “The department won’t be paying—the show is picking up the tab. And this is Hollywood. They give millions of dollars here to assholes who can’t even act but can attract teenage kids. They’ll pay you what you ask—the lady is a major investment to them.”

  Liam’s fingers tightened around the receiver. No, he wasn’t doing it.

  Yes, he was.

  Dammit, no.

  He’d been the one to actually walk away, but she’d been the one with the ability to change things—well, at least that was the way he saw it. Serena had her own opinions. He’d closed the door; he’d made himself walk away. There hadn’t been a way to close the door in his mind, though, so there had still been those nights, lying awake. He could picture her, always, in his mind’s eye. No one in the world had hair like hers, deep, dark auburn, richer than a fire at sunset. And her eyes … like a turquoise sea. And her shape, tall, statuesque.

  “No.”

  “Liam, you have to.”

  “No. I’d want way too much money. I’d want …” He thought for a moment, then named an outrageous sum.

  “Well, I’m going to be gumshoeing it for a fraction of that,” Bill told him wryly. “Shit. I should have left the department. Olsen could have called me in for half of that. But I told you—the producers are paying. Serena is their biggie now, especially with Jennifer Markham off the set.”

  “I still say no.”

  “What if something does happen to her, something you might have prevented?”

  Liam sat on the couch, his grip on the receiver so tight it might snap.

  Hell, he had been the one to walk away.

  Yeah, physically.

  Because she just hadn’t really been with him. He’d been involved to the neck; she’d been involved to her own convenience. Best to back away before he became another casualty along the path of Serena McCormack’s spectacular rise to worldwide domination.

  And still …

  If something were to happen to her that he could have prevented …

  “Where does Olsen want to brief me?”

  “Down at the station.”

  “At the station? What about the set?”

  “The set is closed down today and tomorrow. They’ll reopen after the funeral and the weekend. For now, Olsen wants to see you at the station.”

  “All right, I’ll go to the station. But I need to see the set. As soon as possible.”

  “That can be arranged right after you see Olsen. Who, by the way, has already informed Captain Rigger that he’s trying to bring you in.”

  Captain Rigger. Liam shook his head. The captain had managed the homicide unit as long as he had been with the force. Liam had first met him when he’d been a rebellious teen and the bodies of a friend and his entire family had been found in their house, which had caught fire. Liam had been the one to see the flames and call 911; Rigger had been the detective who tracked down the mother’s boyfriend when it was discovered that the wife and children hadn’t been murdered by the father, who was found with a bullet in his head, a gun by his hand. Forensics had proved that the father had been dead far longer than the mother and children.

  He had met up with Rigger again later when he was diving for the police. Rigger had been impressed with his work and brought him into the regular force. At that time, he’d had no interest in college. Rigger had, over the first years, subtly made him see the benefits to going to night school and taking the time to get a degree in criminology. Eventually, Rigger had brought him off the streets to homicide.

  He owed Rigger. And Olsen.

  “Dammit, Liam, you there?”

  “Yeah, I’m here. All right, you can tell Olsen I’ll be there in a couple of hours.”

  “Thanks. I mean it—thanks.”

  Bill rang off. Liam set down the receiver. “Shit!” he swore. “Shit!”

  He sat on his couch for several minutes, tight as a bowstring. Then he remembered what he was supposed to be doing that day. He picked up the phone and called Sharon.

  She answered with her usual endless cheer. “Are you coming for me?” she asked. “Hey, if you’re sorry that you asked a date along—”

  “I’m not sorry that I asked you. But I need to take a rain check. Something has come up.”

  “Oh?”

  “A case. It involves a lot of old friends. I’m really, honestly, sorry. Do you understand?”

  “Sure.”

  “There’s been a death at a television studio.”

  “Valentine Valley?”

  “How did you know that?” he inquired.

  “When I met you, I knew you’d worked on the last case that involved Valentine Valley. And Serena McCormack,” Sharon said.

  “Serena wasn’t really involved in that case.”

  “You dated her for a while, right?”

  “Yeah, I did. It began and ended, Sharon.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

  “Thanks,” he said.

  “What’s happened?” she asked.

  “A spotlight fell. An actress was killed.”

  “Not Serena McCormack?” Was her voice hopeful?

  His fingers again tightened around the receiver. He forced himself to ease his grip. He was going to break the damned thing.

  “No. Jane Dunne.”

  “Jane Dunne … oh, yeah, I think I saw something on the news about her being a hot property right now and joining the cast. She’s dead? She died on the set?’

  “An accident, except that … I don’t really know all the particulars yet.”

  He could almost see her shiver. “That show is jinxed.”

  “It’s the highest-rated daytime serial out there.”

  “You’re a P.I. now, not a cop.”

  “But I have friends who are calling in favors. The show is important to a lot of people.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure. And it will be more so now. People love to stop and watch the blood at the scene of an accident.”

  “I’ll make this up to you,” he said.

  “You will. And I’ll make it up to you. Remember that if the queen of daytime starts getting nasty. Call me when you can. I’m going to go unpack.”

  “Thanks for understanding.”

  “Oh, sure. Maybe I’ll head out on the dig that’s going on with some folks from UCLA. They’ll still let me in on it, I’m sure.”

  “Great.”

  “I’ll let you know what I’m up to—just in case you do need me. Or want to see me.”

  “Thanks. You’re easy to want to see, Sharon.” Those were words he could say and mean completely. He cared about her. Just not the way he should. Pity he couldn’t explain.

  There was this other woman, once. Perfect and beautiful, but so far from the concept of commitment that there was nowhere left to go. She was into entertainment; he’d spent some time as that entertainment. She dangled men from her career. He hadn’t been able to dangle any longer. It was over. Really over.

  He stared at the fireplace and started swearing again. Then he got up and paced.

  So much for being his own man.

  “Thank God you’re home! Are you all right?”

  It wasn’t going to be a peaceful evening, Serena thought. Melinda was asking a rhetorical question. She had barely gotten home and kicked off her shoes before she’d heard the knock at her door, checked through the peephole, and seen her sister.

  Melinda’s first action was to throw her arms around Serena and hug her tightly enough to break bones. Serena hugged Melinda back, naturally grateful that her sister was so concerned, but both annoyed and unnerved that ev
eryone seemed to feel she had escaped a fate intended for her.

  “I’m fine, Melinda.” She withdrew from her sister’s embrace, realizing that Melinda was very agitated. Melinda passed through the small marble entry and went straight through to the rear of the house, where she stopped by the sliding glass doors that led out to the pool. She stared out at the pool and patio, shaking her head.

  “She’s dead,” Melinda said. She was trembling.

  “It was a terrible accident.”

  “They’re sure that’s all there was to it?” Melinda queried, her back to Serena.

  Serena paused, surprised by her sister’s worried tone. Melinda was five years her senior, and though Serena resembled her sister physically, they were nothing at all alike. Melinda had been a brilliant student; Serena had been good herself in school, but nothing to compare with her sister. She had been far too interested in dance classes, then guitar lessons, mime lessons. She had always known that she wanted to act. She had done theater work through high school and college, and then started landing commercials and guest spots on sitcoms, did movie work, then a stint on an old soap, and finally she’d gotten the chance to be a main character on Valentine Valley. Melinda had gone on to college, then graduate school, then to get her Ph.D. on the pottery of the ancient Etruscans.

  She had married another serious brain, Jeffrey Guelph, and the two of them had lived in academic bliss ever since. They traveled the world—the remote world. They were familiar with dozens of Third World countries and were the only people she knew well who were fluent in Swahili. Serena had been amazed when Joe Penny, at a barbecue at her house one day, had hired Jeff to be a soap opera consultant. Until that time, Serena was quite certain that Melinda and Jeff were basically unaware that there was such a thing as network television.

  After three weeks of working with Jane Dunne, Jeff had come to know her, but why was Melinda so upset?

  “Melinda, naturally there’s an investigation.”

  “Naturally.” Her sister’s back was still to her. “Oh, my God, this is so horrible.”

  “Melinda, it’s upsetting … but I wasn’t aware that you knew Jane so well.”