“You know, you make it hard to be properly grateful when you take that senior-officer-chewing-out-a-subordinate attitude.”
He brooded for a moment.
“Why the hell did you go back there tonight?” he asked.
She leaned against the edge of the sink and contemplated the label on the beer bottle. “You heard what I said to McPherson. It’s been bothering me that Pamela didn’t leave a suicide note. Tonight, after you and Jason left after dinner, I got to thinking about it. I still had the utility room key. So I drove out to the house to take a look. The intruder interrupted me while I was searching upstairs.”
“I heard what you told McPherson.” Luke’s mouth twisted humorlessly. “I also know you lied through your teeth.”
She felt her face turn hot. “What do you mean?”
“You don’t believe Pamela committed suicide, so you didn’t go to the Webb house to look for a note. You went looking for something else.” He paused a beat and lowered his voice. “What’s more, I think you found it.”
When in doubt, stall, she thought.
“Out of curiosity, what makes you say that?” she asked.
“Call me psychic.”
“I’m no more in the mood for games than you are tonight,” she said tightly.
“You and I have spent more serious quality time together in the past couple of days than a lot of married couples do in a year. Let’s just say I’ve learned a few things about you. When I listened to you give your story to McPherson, I got a real solid hunch that you weren’t being one hundred percent straight with him.”
“We found a dead woman together, escaped from an exploding house fire set by an arsonist and conducted a couple of unpleasant conversations with the local police and a U.S. senator. You’ve got an odd notion of quality time.”
“Probably.” He watched her with a relentless expression. “You going to tell me what you found?”
Why not tell him? Unlike Sam McPherson and Ryland Webb, he was at least taking her semi-seriously.
“In the old days Pamela had a hiding place in her bedroom,” she said quietly. “A small space behind a light switch plate. That was where she kept the things that she didn’t want her father or the housekeeper to find. Not that either of them seemed to care enough to actually look for any of her secrets. At any rate, she showed the hiding place to me and made me promise never to reveal it. I got to thinking about it tonight and decided to take a look.”
“Switch plate?” He nodded to himself. “Well, that explains the screwdriver. I wondered where you found it and what you planned to do with it.”
“When I heard the intruder enter the house, I realized that the screwdriver was all I had in the way of a weapon.” The beer bottle trembled in her fingers. She tightened her grip on it. “In case he found me, you see. I didn’t know what else to do.”
Very deliberately Luke set down his bottle, removed hers from her shaking fingers and put it on the counter beside his own.
His powerful hands closed around her shoulders.
“It would have made a very good weapon, if you’d needed one,” he said. His tone was low and rough but curiously soothing.
She realized that he was trying to comfort her. The temptation to let herself relax against that strong wall of reassurance and understanding was almost overwhelming.
Common sense smashed through her. This was not good, she thought. She had spent years cultivating the self-control that protected her. Damned if she would fall apart now in front of this man—a man she barely knew, quality time or not.
“The screwdriver wouldn’t have been much use against that inferno of a house fire,” she said evenly.
He moved his hands upward from her shoulders, cradling her face between his palms. “What did you find in the Webb house tonight?”
She exhaled slowly and reached into the front pocket of her black jeans. “Nothing that looks like a terrifically useful clue. Which is why I didn’t mention it to Sam McPherson.”
She withdrew the key and held it out to him on her palm.
He lowered his hands from her face and picked up the key.
“Any idea what this opens?” he asked, examining it closely.
She shook her head. “No. Looks like a very ordinary key, doesn’t it?”
“Ordinary is right. A key like this could open anything. House, storage locker, toolshed, garage.” He frowned a little. “It’s a high-quality key, though. The kind you can’t get duplicated, at least not at the usual instant key-making places. Someone spent some money to have an expensive piece of hardware installed somewhere.”
“There’s no way of knowing when Pamela stashed it behind the light switch plate,” she said. “For all I know she tucked it away years ago and forgot about it.” She hesitated, thinking. “Except—”
“Except what?”
“It looks new, don’t you think? It’s still bright and shiny. It hasn’t had a chance to get scratched or dulled with use. Also, there was a thin coating of dust on the inside of the junction box, but none on the key. Wouldn’t you think that if it had been sitting inside that wall for several years it would have collected some dust?”
“Are you sure about the dust inside the box? It was night and you only had a flashlight.”
She wanted to tell him that she was absolutely positive. But she had to admit he had a point. She had been working with extremely limited light tonight when she removed the switch plate. In addition, she had been jazzed on adrenaline and anxiety.
“I’ll give you that one.” She rubbed the nape of her neck with her right hand, trying to ease some of the tension that still gripped her. “I can’t swear that there wasn’t any dust on the key. If there was some, it was wiped off when I put it into my pocket.”
“Tell me again why you didn’t show the key to Sam McPherson,” he said, his tone a little too neutral.
Her mouth tightened. “Sam cut me some slack tonight because of the past and because half of Dunsley thinks I’m a walking case of post-traumatic stress disorder, even though they aren’t sure how to spell it.” She broke off when she saw an expression of startled surprise flash across his face. “What?”
“Post-traumatic stress disorder?” he repeated in the same, very even tone.
“That would be the fancy term. The bottom line is that there is a school of thought around here which holds that because of what happened when my parents died, I’m not what you’d call normal.”
“Huh. Normal.”
“It’s a technical term,” she said.
“Right. Got it. Go on.”
She swung around and paced out of the tiny kitchenette into the living room area. “The point is, although I knew that Sam probably wouldn’t throw me in jail because I let myself into the Webb house tonight, I wasn’t so sure how he would react if he found out I’d removed that key from Pamela’s old hiding place.”
“I still don’t believe a damn word you’re saying.”
She stopped and turned to face him. “That’s your problem, not mine.”
“The hell it is. You have definitely become a very big problem for me. Why didn’t you tell McPherson about the key?”
“Okay, okay.” She paused. “I have a hunch that Sam is looking for every possible excuse not to conduct an investigation into Pamela’s death. I was afraid he would either ignore the key or make it go away. Either way, I’d lose it.”
To her surprise, Luke assumed a meditative air. “I’ll be damned. You think McPherson is cooperating in a cover-up, don’t you?”
“I have to assume that’s a possibility.” She straightened her shoulders. “I do know for a fact that Senator Webb doesn’t want an investigation. I also know that most people in this town are only too happy to fulfill any request that comes from a member of the Webb family.”
“I keep hearing that.” Luke picked up his beer and drained the bottle. He set the empty on the counter and considered her for a long moment. “People really tell you that you’ve got post-tra
umatic stress disorder?”
“That was the diagnosis I got when my aunt put me in counseling for a while after my parents died. Got the same diagnosis from a few other therapists over the years.”
“Did the therapy do any good?”
“A little.” She cleared her throat. “But it was generally agreed that I would not make any major improvement unless I learned to take a rational, adult view of the facts. I, uh, sort of refused to do that.”
“Because you can’t or won’t accept the facts that were given to you,” he said. It wasn’t a question.
“I refuse to believe that my father murdered my mother and then took his own life. It violates everything I ever knew or believed about him. The therapists said I won’t get any closure until I come to grips with reality.”
“What did you tell the therapists?”
“That the only thing that will ever give me anything approaching real closure is the truth.” She sighed. “I guess that sounds like your basic obsessed, dysfunctional personality talking, doesn’t it?”
“Sure, but I can relate. My family slapped me with the same diagnosis about six months back.”
She blinked a couple of times, absorbing that piece of data. “They did?”
He shrugged. “Can’t say for sure they’re wrong. Got to admit, I’m a little different these days.”
The iron ring of quiet certainty in his words shook her. She had never talked intimately to anyone else who had been stuck with the PTSD label, she thought.
“Got a few rituals?” she asked tentatively. “Maybe some private rules that you go out of your way not to break even though you know other people might think you are a little strange?”
“Like leaving the lights on all night?”
She winced. “Yes.”
“You bet.”
“Get a little moody at times?” she pressed.
“That, too.”
“Have bad dreams now and again?”
“Hey, who doesn’t?”
“The way I look at it,” she said softly, “the line between normal and not-so-normal is a little murky at times.”
“On that point I am in complete, one hundred percent agreement.” He crossed the short distance that separated them and came to a halt directly in front of her. “Got to say, though, that right now kissing you feels like it would be the most normal, natural thing in the world.”
Heat arced through her at his words. The unfamiliar rush of intense sensation startled her. She opened her mouth to explain that this was one of the areas of life in which she had concluded that she was not quite normal.
But she did not get the opportunity to go into an extended conversation on the subject of her limited arousal capability, because Luke’s mouth had already closed over hers and she was suddenly deeply, intensely, stunningly aroused.
Electricity danced across nerve endings that had already been set on edge by the effects of too much adrenaline and tension. She wasn’t just aroused, she thought, she was ravenous. The hunger was unlike anything she had ever experienced—fierce, exciting and utterly compelling.
Luke muttered something urgent against her mouth and wrapped one hand around the back of her head, anchoring her where he wanted her for the kiss. His other hand flattened against the curve of her waist, locking her lower body snugly against his own. She could feel the shape of him through the denim of his jeans—hard, intense and demanding.
His mouth moved heavily on hers, urging her lips apart. In spite of her excitement, she resisted. The headlong rush into sexual intimacy had caught her off guard. This wasn’t her usual slow, boring, cautious routine, she thought.
But Luke used his tongue the way a skillful fencer uses a foil—swift, teasing, provocative strokes that caused her to dig her nails into the back of his shoulders. Instead of making her nervous, she found herself wanting to engage and parry.
Very delicately, feeling enormously adventurous, she nibbled on his lower lip. In response, his fingers slid beneath the bottom edge of her sweater. His hands were warm and strong on her bare skin.
She was channeling lightning now. She wound her arms around Luke and hung on for dear life. Energy and heat crackled through her all the way to her toes.
Luke’s breathing roughened. When she stood on tiptoe and took the lobe of his ear between her teeth, she felt a heavy shudder go through him.
Maybe she wasn’t quite as inhibited as she and the depressingly short list of men who had shared her bed had concluded.
Luke raised his head, breaking off the torrid embrace with what seemed to be an extraordinary effort of will.
“I’d better get out of here while I can still walk,” he said. “If I wait any longer, I won’t be going anywhere for the rest of the night.”
It dawned on her that he was the one who was calling a halt. How embarrassing. Another couple of minutes and she would have tripped him and hauled him down onto the floor.
She cleared her throat, aware of the fiery warmth in her face. “We did get a little carried away, didn’t we? Probably the aftereffects of all that adrenaline that was pouring through us earlier. I’ve read that it can really do a number on you. Something about the basic survival instinct kicking in after a close brush with disaster. An elemental need to seek the life force.”
“Yeah?” He smiled slowly. “You read up on stuff like that?”
She was beyond embarrassed now. “Well, it’s not as if we have what anyone could call a close relationship. For heaven’s sake, we hardly know each other.”
“You’re forgetting about all that quality time I mentioned earlier.”
There was something wrong with her center of gravity. Her body kept trying to fall forward, straight back into his arms. To counter the impulse she sat down abruptly on the padded arm of the sofa, crossed one leg over the other and made a heroic effort to look sophisticated and cool. It was just a kiss, for heaven’s sake. Get a grip.
She tried tilting her chin in what she hoped was a self-possessed manner. “I think we’d better change the subject, don’t you?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“It’s for the best. I’m sure we’re both going to feel a little awkward about this in the morning.”
He glanced at his watch. “Got news for you—it’s damn near five A.M. and I don’t feel even a little bit awkward.”
“You need sleep. We both do.”
“Doubt if I’ll be able to sleep,” he said, remarkably unconcerned. He moved toward the door. “You know, I’m probably going to hate myself for asking, but I’d rather avoid any more late-night surprises. What are you going to do now that the Webb house is in smoking ruins?”
The question stopped her cold.
“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “I think the next step is to find out who Pamela employed to take care of the house. It’s safe to say she didn’t do her own cleaning and dusting. She grew up with housekeepers, after all. I doubt if she would have known how to run a household without one. Besides, she didn’t spend much time here in Dunsley. She would have needed someone to keep an eye on the place.”
He nodded, as if she had merely confirmed whatever conclusion he had already reached.
“Figured you weren’t going to give up,” he said.
“I can’t. Not yet.”
“I know.”
He did understand, she thought. He had major doubts about the wisdom of what she was doing, but he understood.
“See you in the morning,” Luke said. He opened the door, letting in the cold night air. He moved out onto the porch, stopped and turned. “By the way, you know that little theory of yours, the one about how we almost had hot, sweaty sex on account of we were both running on leftover adrenaline and our primitive survival instincts were kicking in and all that other psychobabble?”
She stiffened warily. “What about it?”
“It’s garbage as far as I’m concerned. I’ve been wanting to have sex with you since the first time I saw you standing there at the fro
nt desk, pounding the little silver bell.”
He went out into the night and closed the door before she could even begin to get her brain back in gear.
Seventeen
You burned down a house?” Jason started so sharply that the pat of butter he had been in the process of conveying to his plate splashed into his orange juice instead. “I thought you were going over to Irene’s cabin for a second helping of corn bread. Or something. You two went out and burned down a house together instead?”
“You know damn well that’s not what I meant.” Luke shoveled three slices of the French toast he had just finished cooking onto his own plate, carried his breakfast to the table and sat down. “Someone else torched the Webb house. Irene and I just happened to be on the upstairs deck at the time.”
“Boy, howdy, wait until the family hears about this.” Jason used a fork to fish the butter out of the orange juice. “On the plus side, at least I can report back that you went out on a real date while I was here.”
Luke speared a healthy-sized bite of French toast. “I don’t think Irene looked at it in quite that spirit.”
But she had kissed him good night, he reminded himself. And it had been a serious, state-of-the-art, top-of-the-line, full-on kiss. In spite of events, he hadn’t felt this good in the morning for longer than he cared to contemplate. And it had been only a kiss. His brain reeled at the thought of how he would have been feeling today if she had actually invited him into her bed.
“Luke?” Jason waved his fork and snapped his fingers. “Hello? Anybody home in there? Stay with me here, Big Brother. Answer my question.”
“What question?”
“About this arson thing. Are we talking potential legal issues? Because if so, we need to let the Old Man and Gordon know what’s happening.”
“This doesn’t involve the family or the business. No one’s threatening to arrest me. Yet, at any rate.”
“That’s certainly reassuring.” Jason’s expression turned abruptly somber. “You say the house was owned by Senator Ryland Webb?”
“Got a feeling he’ll want to keep the arson quiet, the same way he wants to keep his daughter’s overdose quiet. He does not want to distract fund-raisers and potential donors.”