Wicked Game

  Oh, God…

  Becca pressed her palm into her flushed cheek, embarrassed and guilty anew, aware that she’d used Jessie’s disappearance and Hudson’s confusion and grief to her own advantage. Sure, it had been much later, after Hudson and Becca were out of high school and Jessie had been missing for years, but Becca now knew her own motives had not been pure. She’d been in love with Hudson. And when the opportunity arose for her to have her shining moment with him, she’d grabbed it with both hands and had vowed never to let go.

  How foolish it all seemed now and yet, after all the years that had passed, over twenty since she’d first laid eyes upon him, those old feelings could rise to the surface in an instant. She’d read somewhere that first love never truly disappeared, that it always lay just under the surface, lingering there, waiting, like dry tinder that only needed the touch of a match, a spark, to ignite.

  Did she still feel some of that? She hoped not. She hoped her first love was long behind her.

  Yet she couldn’t stop thinking about Jessie. And Hudson. And her schoolgirl infatuation that she’d believed was true love. She’d harbored her feelings for years, then had seized her chance to make fantasy a reality.

  It had been the summer after high school for Becca; the summer after his first year of college for Hudson when opportunity knocked. She’d ostensibly “run into him” one hot evening, although she’d driven by his parents’ home enough times to learn Hudson’s schedule and then had followed him to Dino’s, a pizzeria that had popped up that year, a place frequented by teenagers and the newly graduated.

  Hudson had been meeting Zeke St. John at the pizzeria, as it turned out, and when Becca blithely swept through the swinging doors, she’d managed to hide her disappointment that Hudson wasn’t alone behind a bright smile. Zeke and Hudson had been friends in high school and apparently still were, Becca assumed, although she learned later that the friendship was barely on life support.

  But when she sailed inside the pizzeria that evening, she only knew that she wanted to connect with Hudson. Her pulse ran light and fast, and though her grin was wide, she was trembling a bit. If she wasn’t careful her lips would quiver in a kind of excited fear, and she couldn’t have that. She sensed that she’d been treated as an afterthought with his group. Hudson’s twin sister, Renee, had barely looked at her, and it was only a carefully cultivated friendship with another girl, Tamara Pitts, that allowed Becca entry into their tight circle. Being a year behind them was like having a demerit—or worse yet, a scar that said “nerdy underclassman” burned into her forehead. So that night she needed to be confident, in control, and friendly.

  She pretended not to see Hudson and Zeke straightaway, striding up to the counter and staring overhead at the listings of traditional and exotic pizzas. She ordered a small pepperoni pizza and a Diet RC, paid, then with her plastic number in hand, looked around for a table. She made eye contact with Hudson and let a surprised smile of greeting cross her face. Hudson lifted a hand back, then waved her over. As she neared, he indicated the chair next to him.

  “Thanks,” Becca said gratefully. “This place is always crowded.”

  Zeke St. John was maybe more handsome than Hudson, at least in the classic sense, with dark hair and grayish eyes and a chiseled jaw. He didn’t smile when Becca appeared, but the look Hudson sent her was warm. Amused. As if he could damned well read her mind.

  Which was ridiculous.

  She couldn’t really recall what she said after that. It was idle chatter on her part, though she asked a few pertinent questions, then soaked in the information Hudson offered about himself to dissect later. She learned that he had just finished his first year at Oregon State University in business, as had Zeke. They were both heading back to school in a couple of months, and Zeke was spending the summer working for his dad’s auto parts business, while Hudson was working on his father’s ranch near Laurelton, one of the far western suburbs outside Portland.

  Becca herself was playing gofer at a law office, delivering coffee, making photocopies, answering the phones during lunch hours. She was due to start school at a local community college because she didn’t have enough money to leave home just yet.

  After their “chance” meeting, Hudson called Becca. She could still remember how sweaty her palms had been on the telephone receiver. He asked if she wanted to go with him to see some mindless comedy at a local movie theater, and she jumped at the chance. All she recalled of the film was Hudson’s profile and some equally mindless conversation about the staleness of the popcorn, the lack of fizz in the sodas. And the fact that he called her out.

  “You followed me to Dino’s the other night,” he said as he drove her to her parents’ house.

  She shook her head violently and tried like hell not to blush, to give herself away. Oh, Lord, she just didn’t have the flirting thing down yet. Maybe she never would. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Sure you do.” He flipped on his blinker and turned the corner at the end of her block.

  “No, really—”

  One side of his mouth lifted in that grin that alternately made her want to kiss him and shake him senseless.

  “I just wanted a pizza.”

  “You passed three pizzerias on the way from your house to Dino’s.”

  So he knew where she lived. That warmed her inside. “I wanted a special kind.”

  “Pepperoni is pretty special, all right.”

  “Dino’s is the best. And your ego’s running away with you.”

  He had the audacity to laugh as he pulled into her driveway and cut the engine, leaving the silence broken by crickets and voices emanating from the neighbors’ backyard where, from the sounds of laughter and conversation and the thin layer of burning charcoal drifting over the fence, they were hosting a barbecue.

  “You’re right, okay?” Becca admitted. “I knew you’d be there.”

  “Glad we got that straight.”

  “So now you think I’m a stalker.”

  “I think…it was an excellent ploy.”

  “God. Ploy.” She cringed inside.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t think of it first. I could have been learning all your favorite spots and following you around instead of having to wait for you.”

  “Are you making fun of me?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.

  “No.”

  “Did you tell Zeke you thought I was following you?” she asked with sudden horror.

  “I don’t tell Zeke much,” he assured her.

  “Renee, then.”

  “I don’t confide in my sister, either.” He reached across the car to touch her nape. Tiny tingles of anticipation ran up her neck and she knew she was in trouble. “What kind of guy do you take me for?”

  “I really don’t know, do I?”

  “Wanna find out?”

  They stared at each other for long moments. Becca could feel her pulse beating slow and strong. “Maybe…”

  Then she climbed out of the car and hurried into the house before she could make a bigger fool of herself. She told herself the ball was in his court and it was up to him now—dreadfully afraid he would let her down. But he didn’t. He called before she fell asleep that night and made a date with her for the next day.

  Two weeks later he kissed her good night outside her door and she was lost all over again, telling herself that she was falling in love and not trying very hard to fight the rush of adrenaline that slipped through her bloodstream whenever she thought of him.

  She thought about making love to him. About what it would feel like. And she knew she couldn’t wait long.

  She was right.

  A couple of nights afterward they came together on a blanket laid out under the stars, far from the lights of his parents’ ranch house, kissing and touching and sighing and then the heat…the incredible heat and desire that caused her to throw away any lingering doubts as easily as stripping him of his T-shirt and jeans. Even now, almost twenty years later, sh
e remembered that first time, the tautness of his body, the strain of his muscles as he moved over her, the firm warmth of his lips as she opened to him. What little pain there had been when he’d first entered her had quickly disappeared in the rapture and need of her first time. Her first love. It was glorious. Heart-stoppingly incredible. She wrapped herself around him and squeezed her eyes tightly shut and swore she would make him hers forever.

  Now, thinking back, her tea cold, the dog asleep on the couch near her, the picture of the Madonna statue still starkly visible on the folded page of the newspaper, Becca knew what a fool she’d been. A schoolgirl creating silly fantasies of a perfect life with a perfect man. On this Valentine’s Day, she knew the folly of the whole perfect-man thing. Come on. How naive had she been? “Pretty damned,” she told herself while she scratched Ringo behind his ears and he made happy little grunting sounds without raising an eyelid.

  That summer had raced by with the heat and intensity of a prairie fire stoked by hot winds. Becca and Hudson spent every night they could making love: on the sandy shores of the creek while their fishing poles and bathing suits were strung forgotten on the banks; on a blanket in the hayloft with the horses snorting in their stalls below; in the backseat of Hudson’s car or in his bed when his parents were gone and the window was open to let in the soft summer breezes and thrum of bats’ wings.

  They couldn’t get enough of each other as the months bled together. They spent time with other friends, of course, and Zeke, Hudson’s best friend, seemed to always be hanging around, though as the weeks passed, he became distant and the relationship between them seemed strained. At the time, Becca had thought her relationship with Hudson had somehow made Zeke uncomfortable. Later she learned that it was Jessie’s disappearance that still affected the one-time best friends.

  Jessie, always Jessie.

  Now Becca picked up the paper again gingerly, as if its very touch could harm her in some way. She scoured the article once more. There was no mention of the sex of the remains. Nothing more than the bones’ discovery. But they had to be Jessie’s, didn’t they? Had to be.

  You should call someone.

  She put her hand on the phone. Picked up the receiver and pressed it to her ear. It rang in her hand and she nearly dropped it. For a wild moment she thought it was Jessie, calling from her opened grave.

  For the love of God, Becca, get a grip!

  “Hello?” she said, clearing her throat, determined to shake off her case of nostalgia and nerves.

  “Becca? Rebecca…Sutcliff? Rebecca Ryan, in high school?”

  Her fingers clenched around the receiver. She knew his voice. Damn, but she’d just been thinking of him! Hudson Walker. Her lunatic pulse jumped as it had all those years ago and she inwardly chided herself. “Yeah, Hudson, it’s me.”

  “Good. Uh…how’ve you been?”

  “Great,” she lied. “Fine.” As if he’d called to inquire about her health. Oh, yeah, sure. After all these years. “I take it you saw the news.”

  “I turned it on after I got a call from my sister.”

  In her mind’s eye Becca conjured up Hudson’s sister—tall and thin, with dark hair that had, in high school, feathered around large eyes as brown as her twin’s were blue. Renee had never liked Becca much and had made no secret of her feelings. “So she was calling about what those kids found in the maze at St. Lizzie’s? The bones?”

  “Yeah.” His voice lowered a bit and she imagined his dark eyebrows pulled together in a knot, just as they had years ago whenever he’d been disturbed.

  “You think it’s Jessie.” There was no reason to pull punches. After all, he was the guy who’d wanted things honest way back when…well, at least until things had gotten tense between them. Then where had the honesty fled?

  “Maybe.”

  “And you called me?”

  “I got your number from Tamara. I take it you sometimes still hang out?”

  Tamara, with her curly red hair, porcelain skin, and belief in all things mystical, was one of the few people with whom Becca had kept in contact. At St. Elizabeth’s Tamara had been a couple of steps outside of mainstream, but she’d still been a part of Hudson’s crowd, even putting up with the constant teasing from some of the other kids, including Christopher Delacroix, the richest kid in the school at the time and the only one who had numerals after his name, as he had the same name as Daddy and Granddaddy. Hence his nickname of The Third. As Becca remembered him, The Third was a privileged kid who got his kicks out of embarrassing others. In short, a dyed-in-the-wool jerk. He had constantly needled Tamara.

  “Tamara and I keep in touch. See each other once in a while,” Becca admitted.

  “Renee is pretty freaked out about the discovery of the skeleton and she wants us all to get together,” Hudson said, sounding not quite certain about the wisdom of that.

  I bet she doesn’t want me, Becca thought, but kept it to herself. She was trying her best to concentrate on the conversation at hand and not on eighteen-year-old questions she wanted to ask him. She hadn’t spoken to Hudson in years, had only run into him twice since that summer of their affair. But both of those times she’d been with Ben, and nothing more than a few polite hellos had been exchanged between them.

  Which was probably just as well.

  Let sleeping dogs lie, Becca. No need to bring up the past that you’ve worked so hard to bury.

  “What does she think will come of that?” Becca asked as Ringo, opening his eyes, stretched on the couch.

  “I don’t know. She thinks the bones are Jessie’s.”

  So do I. That’s why I had the vision. “What do you think?”

  “I always thought she ran away,” Hudson stated. “She had a history of it.”

  “I remember.”

  This was surreal. Her first phone call with Hudson, and they were talking about Jessie again after all these years.

  “Renee’s a reporter for the Valley Star.”

  Becca knew as much. The Star was a local paper; not exactly the big time that Renee had always talked up years before. Even in high school, Renee Walker had ambitions that had been far reaching, a lot farther reaching than the circulation of a second-rate newspaper.

  “She’s already talked to the kids who found the body, even though their parents were cautioned by the police. But you know her, she gets what she wants.”

  Except that dream job.

  “Anyway, Renee’s been doing some follow-up. She wants us all to get together at Blue Note on Thursday.”

  “The restaurant? Why?” The request seemed to come out of left field.

  “To find out if anyone can remember anything that might help identify the bones.”

  “You mean if they’re Jessie’s.”

  “Well, yeah, that would be the first supposition.”

  Becca wasn’t sure getting the old gang together because of a shallow grave and remains up at the school was such a good idea, but she said, “Okay.”

  “Scott and Glenn own Blue Note. It’s in Raleigh Hills. I’ve got the address…” He rattled off the street address and she remembered the area in the west hills, only a few minutes’ drive through a tunnel and into the heart of Portland.

  “Scott Pascal and Glenn Stafford own a restaurant together?” she asked, thinking of two of the boys she’d known at St. Elizabeth’s. She hadn’t heard that they’d gone into business together and she didn’t recall them being particularly good friends in school, but that had been a long time ago. Things change. And business partners didn’t necessarily make the best friends or bedfellows.

  “Not just Blue Note. They have another restaurant in Lincoln City, I think.”

  “I wouldn’t have guessed,” she said. But then I wouldn’t have guessed that you would call me after all this time, or that a body that could be Jessie’s would be discovered at the school…

  “Renee wants everyone to meet Thursday after work, around seven, if they can make it.” Becca heard a bit of hesitation in his v
oice, as if he was second-guessing his sister’s plan.

  “I can be there.”

  “Good.”

  “Is it?”

  Again a bit of hesitation, then he said, “Who knows? Renee seems to think none of us have gotten over it.”

  “‘It’ being Jessie’s disappearance.”

  “Yeah.”

  Have you? Becca wondered and doubted it.

  Hudson added, “She thinks there’s maybe some course of action we should take to find out if it’s Jessie.”

  “Like going to the police?” Becca said dryly.

  “The police weren’t exactly our friends,” Hudson agreed.

  Becca leaned back against the couch and glanced out the living room window. The night was dark. Thick. Rain still ran down the windowpanes. Absently she rubbed Ringo’s furry head and thought back. The police had subjected them all to hours of interrogation in the wake of Jessie’s disappearance. The guys had suffered the brunt of the authorities’ scrutiny, but the girls had been interviewed as well. Though the general consensus at the school and police department had been that Jessie had run away again, there’d been one cop who’d insisted she was murdered and he put Hudson and the guys in their group through the wringer, interrogating them over and over again until The Third’s father, a Portland lawyer who owned several buildings near the waterfront, had threatened to sue the department for harassment. The cop had backed off a little, or so it had seemed, but Becca had felt that he’d had a personal vendetta to fulfill.

  Between Christopher Delacroix Junior’s threats, lack of evidence, and a missing body, the case had gone stone cold.

  “I’ll see you Thursday,” Hudson said, breaking into Becca’s reverie.

  “Will Tamara be there?”

  “Think so.”

  “Good. Hey, before you hang up, what was that cop’s name? The one who wouldn’t believe Jessie ran away?”

  “Sam McNally,” Hudson said, a distinct chill to his voice.

  “Mac,” Becca said, remembering. Though the cop, only about ten years older than the kids he was interrogating, had mostly left her alone, he’d haunted their days and nights long after Jessie disappeared. “So now do you think he was right? About Jessie being murdered?”