Slow Burn

by Heather Graham

  When she went topside again, the vessel was moving quickly, slicing cleanly through the water. Spencer sat on one of the seats in the stern, still completely baffled. He couldn’t be this keyed up over an accidental meeting with Gene Vichy, so he must have known that she’d planned it. But if he had known that, why hadn’t he stopped it?

  He faced the onrushing wind, not even looking at her. Finally, when they were just off Bear Cut, he cut the throttle.

  The heat was intense; it was another of those summer days when the air seemed to dance and sizzle. The sun beat down on the water, giving it the appearance of a field of diamonds. The waves were light, and the yacht rocked slightly.

  David dropped the anchor, then stood, looking off to the little island of shrub and sand in the distance.

  “David, tell me what the hell is going on—right now—or I swear I’ll take my chances swimming back.”

  He spun to face her. “All right. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  This was over Vichy.

  “I—there was nothing to tell. He called me, but—”

  “What are you talking about?” he demanded.

  “What are you talking about?” she asked carefully.

  “Who called you?”

  “What are you talking about?” she repeated, ignoring his question.

  “The circle game again, pure insanity,” he said, throwing up his arms. He was wearing a lightweight suit, but since coming aboard, he’d doffed his jacket. Now he jerked at his tie, loosening it, then ripped it from around his neck and undid the top buttons of his tailored shirt. “Who called you, Spencer? Vichy?”

  “I—” She wanted to lie, but she felt his eyes on her and knew it was time for the truth. “Yes, Vichy called. Friday. He said he’d be at the club today and wanted to talk to me. It didn’t seem like a bad idea to hear what he had to say.”

  “Jesus Christ, Spencer, you should be smarter than that! If you really want to get to the truth of things, we’ve got to play together. How in goddamned hell can I fight for you when you’re always against me?”

  She leaped up. “Maybe, just maybe, he would have said something to me that he wouldn’t say to you. Something that would help!”

  He sat suddenly, running his fingers through his hair, his head down. Then he raised his head and stared at her. “All right, Spencer. Please, from this point on, let’s make it a team effort.”

  “Are you going to treat me like a part of your team?”

  “Spencer, I don’t want to see you killed. I owe that much to Danny.”

  “Right,” she said evenly.

  “Let’s play twenty questions,” he said.

  “All right,” Spencer said, confused and wary. “You tell me what—”

  “No, no. I get to start. You tell me, Spencer. Just exactly what relationships have you formed since Danny died? Is there someone out there who you’re not telling me about?”

  “What?” she asked incredulously.

  “Who have you been sleeping with?”

  She stared at him, astounded, then rose, feeling as if an ice-cold wall had formed around her.

  “How dare you?” she said quietly, her temper simmering beneath the tight lid she was trying desperately to keep on it. “You have no right—”

  “I’ve got to know, Spencer! Is there someone in your past who could—”

  “You’re accusing me of having had an affair with someone? Someone who might have killed Danny? Who might be trying to kill me now?”

  “No,” he said softly.

  “Then what?”

  “Spencer, answer the question, please.”

  “It’s none of your business.”

  “The hell it isn’t!” he raged.

  She backed away from him. She hadn’t seen him like this since…

  Since the day she’d walked out of his life. Years ago.

  “Damn you, David,” she grated. “I don’t know what this is about, but there’s no one else in my life. There was Danny. But he’s dead. And now there’s…Oh, you know! Satisfied? Do I need to swear on a Bible?”

  “Damn you, Spencer!” he said softly, turning away from her for a moment, eyes brooding as he stared across the water. Then he looked at her and spoke, his voice low, deep. Passionate. “All right, I’ll get to the point. Trust me, I have no intention of making demands, of intruding in your life. But I am telling you one thing. Don’t you dare get an abortion.”

  “What?” Spencer breathed.

  “Cecily told me. That you were pregnant.”

  Thank God there was a seat immediately behind her, because she fell into it, amazed. “What?” she repeated.

  “Cecily told me—”

  “But—” Spencer began.

  Then she broke off. And watching her, David realized that Cecily had probably been right. But Spencer hadn’t been keeping anything from him; she had just now realized the possibility herself.

  She shook her head. “Don’t be absurd. Cecily couldn’t possibly know such a thing. We’re barely talking three weeks. I—”

  “Maybe you should check, then.”

  “You don’t know—”

  “For God’s sake, I have a sister. I have eyes. I watch television. Buy one of those tests with the plus and minus signs or the blue lines or whatever it is.”

  “Oh, my God! Plus and minus signs, blue lines!” she exploded.

  Then he was suddenly worried, because she started to laugh, tears streaming down her cheeks. She buried her face in her hands for a moment, then looked up at him and started to laugh again.

  “Spencer…” He took a step toward her, gripping her shoulders. “Spencer, stop it!”

  “You don’t know!” she whispered. “You don’t know!”

  She wrenched away from him, leaped to the deck, then plunged into the water.

  What in God’s name…!

  He kicked off his shoes and socks and plunged in after her.

  The water felt good. He followed her ashore to a stretch of sand that was totally private on a Monday afternoon. She was sitting half in and half out of the water, knees up, arms wrapped around them, head down on her arms. Her wet shirt and shorts clung to her, and a strand of seaweed hung from her hair.

  He sat down beside her. “Spencer, please…”

  Forcefully, he lifted her chin. The misery in her eyes was so stark that he was taken aback, seeming to tighten against the pain that knifed into his heart. She didn’t want anything to do with him, and she didn’t want to be pregnant. Not with his child.

  He released her chin, stared at his soaked suit pants, his bare heels digging into the wet sand. A fiddler crab was running past.

  “I told you, I don’t intend to intrude in your life,” he began.

  “It’s not that!” The words were spoken in barely a whisper. He glanced over to see that she was staring at the water, tears forming in her crystal blue eyes. “You don’t understand.” She paused, moistening her lips.

  “Spencer, what—”

  “I don’t know whether Cecily is right or not,” she said. She was lying. He could tell. She knew, or at least she suspected. “But I…”

  “What?”

  “I wouldn’t get—an abortion.”

  He felt dizzy. Thank God. Thank God for every little favor…

  She stared at him. “Danny…Danny came out that day to—to tell you he was coming home. We…”

  “You were trying to make a baby,” David said, looking out over the water himself.

  She winced. “Damn it!” she said, suddenly fierce. “You knew!”

  “He was my best friend, Spencer. Yes, I knew you two were trying to plan a family.” He hesitated. “And I did find you naked except for a black tie that day.”

  “It’s just not fair,” she whispered. “He wanted a baby so badly, and now—it’s like God is laughing at us. At me.”

  Suddenly irritated, David stood, then reached down and caught her by the shoulders, drawing her to her feet. “Danny is dead. I’m sorry. You�
��re sorry. We both loved him, and neither of us would ever have wanted anything to happen to him. Damn it, Spencer, if you loved him so much, remember what he was like! He would have wanted you to be happy.”

  She jerked her shoulders free, stepping back. She didn’t want to hear this. Not from him. And certainly not now. “I’d like to go home,” she told him.

  “Fine.” He pointed to the boat. “Sorry. There’s no choice but to go back the way we came.”

  She nodded and kept staring at him. Under other circumstances he might have smiled. He’d never seen Spencer Anne Montogmery—Huntington—look so lost in her life.

  She walked into the water and started swimming. Once again he followed behind her, climbing up the stern ladder first when they reached the boat, then extending a hand to help her up. She hesitated for a second.

  “Dammit, Spencer.”

  She grasped his hand, a flash of anger in her eyes, and disappeared into the cabin as soon as she was aboard.

  Spencer showered and changed. He stayed in his salty, ruined trousers and bare feet.

  Just before they made it to the club, she appeared on deck. Her makeup was gone, her face fresh scrubbed, and she was still pale. But her eyes were clear.

  She helped him tie up the yacht, but when he would have leaped off, leaving her alone, she called his name. “David.”

  “What?” he asked warily.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t even know if this is happening yet, but I didn’t mean to be so hateful. I just need some time. I suppose I need to find out if it’s true, as well.”

  He nodded, leaped to the dock, then reached for her. She stepped out alongside him, wearing a soft, sleeveless yellow knit dress and sandals. She walked ahead of him to the parking lot, then paused.

  “Sly is gone, remember? My car,” he whispered against her ear.

  Her shoulders squared, but she followed him without a word. He opened the passenger door, seated her, then settled into the driver’s seat.

  “Home?” he asked her.

  “Yes, please. Wait, no. I’ve got to go to the office for my car.”

  At least she seemed to be coming back to the land of the living, he thought, driving through Coconut Grove to her office. Traffic was already growing heavy. There were a number of private shools along the winding roads that hugged the bay, and every day at about this time, things started to clog up with school buses and parents out to pick up their kids.

  His heart suddenly seemed to quicken. Kids…The world was full of them. He liked them. He’d always liked them. Their enthusiasm, their trust. Their belief in miracles and in magic. He’d always wanted them, too. He wanted to share his father’s dream of freedom with them. The dream of success in America that Michael MacCloud had given his grandchildren. He wanted them to feel the sun, to learn to sail, to grow in this melting-pot community where all things were possible.

  And, once upon a time, he’d even dared to want children with Spencer.

  He was glad his hands were on the wheel. Otherwise they would have been trembling, and he didn’t want her to see just how shaken he was.

  He reached the offices of Montgomery Enterprises and let her out by the door. “I’ll see you at the house,” he told her.

  She nodded and tried to close the car door, but he held it open. “Spencer?”

  “Yes?”

  “You’re still in danger. You know that. I have to keep my promise to Sly, whether you want to see me or not.”

  “I’m not arguing,” she told him, then closed the door and disappeared into the office.

  He stared after her a moment, then dialed Jimmy on the cellular phone. “Can you make it here quickly? I want a tail on her at all times now.”

  “Sure. I’ll just drive right over the school buses,” Jimmy said cheerfully. David started to reply, then realized that Jimmy was already on his way. He smiled and clicked off.

  There was a lot he had to do, he thought as he drove away. For one thing, he had to spend some time with Mr. Gene Vichy. Plus he needed to find Willie, get back to the Newport police and check in with his contacts on the Miami force.

  Today, they could all wait.

  Spencer saw Jimmy when she left her office. She waved to him, trying hard to look calm, though she felt anything but.

  As she drove home, she wondered how Cecily had realized what was going on before she did herself. Anyway, Cecily could be wrong, damn it. Cecily and her fixation with pre-baby bodies!

  True, she hadn’t been feeling quite right. Not bad, really, just not great. But that didn’t mean anything.

  It was just that she was usually as regular as clockwork. So regular that she didn’t even think about it. Of course, she was under a lot of stress….

  She reached her house and got out of her car mechanically, then headed for the door as Jimmy pulled up behind her car.

  She was trying to find the right key on her ring when she looked up.

  David was there, standing on the front porch, waiting for her. He took the keys from her fingers.

  “David,” she whispered uneasily. “I need a little bit of time to think—”

  “So do I,” he said flatly. “But I want to know what I’m thinking about.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that it’s time to find out if we’ve got a plus or a minus sign.”

  “But I don’t have—”

  He held up a small bag from the drugstore. “But I do. Moment of truth, Spencer. Then I’ll leave you alone and give you time. I swear it.”

  She felt as if the blood had drained from her face, her whole body. The possibility of a plus sign…

  She almost started laughing, but she didn’t dare, because she would have laughed until she cried again.

  He’d changed cars. He was certain Delgado had seen the blue sedan, so now he was using a ten-year-old black Mercedes coupe.

  Didn’t matter. He couldn’t park on her block any longer. He didn’t even dare get too close to the house, but that was all right. He’d dressed as a meter reader that morning and combed his way through the nearby backyards, ripping up enough foliage to get a good, straight line of vision from the street where he was parked alongside the Huntington house to the cars parked in the front. Now he could tell who was coming and going, and when.

  He picked up his car phone. “Mrs. Huntington is home. Delgado got here first and waited for her at the door. Larimore came up behind them, but he’s gone now. I think Delgado and Mrs. Huntington are in for the night.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  He snickered. “Just a hunch.”

  There was a moment’s silence while a conversation went on at the other end of the line. Then, “Stay with them,” followed by a click, then static.

  He continued to stare at the house, wondering if he should risk a walk through the foliage to the fence again. No, they wouldn’t be out by the pool again. They’d known he’d been watching. Delgado had almost caught him.

  He wondered what the boss would decide to do about the woman. If the boss decided to whack her…

  What a waste. He sure as hell hoped he’d get a chance with her first.

  He got out of the car, unable to sit any longer, his imagination on fire. He wasn’t supposed to be taking risks, but he was in a new car. The cops weren’t around; the one P.I. had already taken off. And Delgado would be…involved.

  He walked forward another step, finding a knoll, trying to peer over the fence.

  A branch crackled behind him, and he spun around. Too late.

  Something smashed into his face with the power of a steel battering ram. Dimly, just before the blackness descended, he heard the cracking sound as his nose broke.

  17

  “This is insane. I don’t owe you anything, and I don’t have to agree to anything.”

  “Humor me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m trying to keep you alive.”

  “Well, I can’t very well humor you. The directions say
that you’re supposed to test in the morning.”

  They were standing in Spencer’s kitchen. With a great deal of marked aggravation she’d taken the bag from him, the box from the bag and the instructions from the box. Then she’d poured herself a glass of wine, which he’d snatched away. Next she had gone for a diet soda. He hadn’t liked that, either.

  “May I have water?”

  “I don’t know. Is there lead in the pipes?”

  “Oh, will you stop?”

  “No.”

  “We don’t even know whether—”

  “So take the test.” At that point he took the instructions from her.

  “Spencer…look. It doesn’t matter if you test first thing in the morning if it’s after the first few days.”

  She snatched the paper back. “It hasn’t been long enough.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “I don’t believe this!”

  She grabbed the box and started out of the kitchen toward the stairs.

  He was right behind her.

  She swung on him. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “I don’t trust you.”

  “You are not following me any farther. I draw the line at that. So help me God, David, I mean it.”

  His knuckles whitened around the banister. “Swear to God you’ll be honest.”

  She hesitated.

  “Spencer?”

  She exhaled. “Yes.”

  He walked away, and she started up the stairs. She could hear his footsteps as he paced the living room.

  The test took less than a minute to perform, but you weren’t supposed to check the results for at least three minutes, so Spencer set the little white stick on the back of the commode and stared at her pale reflection.

  She was amazed to realize that she was feeling a flicker of excitement. If only the circumstances had been different….

  She closed her eyes. She didn’t know how she felt. Her emotions were in a tremendous uproar. It had hurt so badly at first to think how hard she had tried with Danny. This possibility had seemed too ironic, the most incredible joke. And now…