The Novels of Nora Roberts, Volume 2

by Nora Roberts

  “Not everyone would be so up-front about the mistakes they made along the way. You’ve always been brutally honest about what you did, where you were.”

  “Part of my personal philosophy. I had fame once, and I handled it badly. I have it again, and I don’t take any of it for granted.”

  She glanced around the spacious dressing room with its plump sofa, fresh flowers. “Some say Roxy saved my life, but they’re wrong. I saved my life, and part of the process was putting my relationship with Sam Tanner in perspective. I loved him. He loved Julie. And look what that got her.”

  She plucked a glossy green grape from a bowl, popped it in her mouth. “Look what getting dumped by him got me.”

  “How did you feel about her?”

  “I hated her.” She said it cheerfully, without a hint of guilt. “Not only did she have what I wanted, but she came off looking like the wholesome girl next door while I was the used-up former lover. I was thrilled when their marriage hit the rocks, when Sam started showing up at clubs and parties again. The old Sam. Looking for action, asking for trouble.”

  “Did you give it to him? The action? The trouble?”

  For the first time since the interview began, she hesitated. Stalling, she rose to refill her glass. “I was different back then. Selfish, single-minded. Destructive. He’d come into a party, make some comment about Julie being tired or tied up. But I knew him, knew that edge in his eyes. He was unhappy and angry and restless. I was between marriages to Asshole Number One and Asshole Number Two. And I was still in love with Sam. Pitifully in love with him.”

  She turned then, looking smart and sophisticated in the snazzy red suit she would wear to shoot the upcoming scene. “This is painful. I didn’t realize it would be painful. Well . . .” She lifted her glass in salute and offered him her signature self-mocking smile. “Builds character. At one of those ubiquitous parties we indulged ourselves in during that regrettable era, Sam and I shared a couple of lines for old times’ sake. I won’t say who hosted the party, it doesn’t really matter. It could have been anyone. We were in a bedroom, sitting at this ornate glass table. The mirror, the silver knife, the pretty little straws. I egged him on about Julie. I knew what buttons to push.”

  Her gaze turned inward, and this time he thought he saw regret in them. “He said he knew she was fucking Lucas—Lucas Manning. He was going to put a stop to that, by Christ, and she was going to pay for cheating on him. She was keeping his daughter away from him, turning the kid against him. He’d see them all in hell before she replaced him with that son of a bitch. They didn’t know who they were dealing with, and he’d show them just who they were dealing with. He was ranting, and I pushed him along, telling him exactly what he wanted to hear. All I could think was, he’ll leave her and come back to me. Where he belongs. Instead he turned on me, shoved me away. We ended up screaming at each other. Just before he slammed out he looked at me, sneered at me. He said I’d never have any class, never be anything but a second-rate whore pretending to be a star. That I’d never be Julie.

  “Two days later, she was dead. He made her pay,” Lydia said with a sigh. “If he’d killed her that night, the night he left me at that party, I don’t think I’d have survived it. For purely selfish reasons I’m grateful he waited just long enough so I was sure he’d forgotten me again. You know, it took me years to realize how lucky I was he never loved me.”

  “Did he ever hit you?”

  “Sure.” The humor came back into her eyes. “We hit each other. It was part of our sexual dance. We were violent, arrogant people.”

  “But there weren’t any reports of abuse or violence in his marriage until the summer she died. What do you think about that?”

  “I think she was able to change him, for a time. Or that he was able to change himself, for a time. Love can do that, or very great need. Noah . . .” She came back and sat. “I believe he really, really wanted to be the person he was with her. And it was working. I don’t know why it stopped working. But he was a weak man who wanted to be strong, a good actor who wanted to be a great one. Maybe, because of that, he was always doomed to fail.”

  There was a brisk knock at the door. “Ms. Loring? You’re needed on the set.”

  “Two minutes, honey.” She set her glass aside, grinned at Noah. “Work, work, work.”

  “I appreciate your squeezing some time into your schedule for me.”

  When he rose, she eyed him up and down, with a sly cat smile on her face. “I imagine I could . . . squeeze more if you’re interested . . .”

  “I’m bound to have some follow-up questions along the way.”

  She stepped closer, tapped a finger to his cheek. “You look like such a bright young man, Noah. I think you know I was talking about a more personal session.”

  “Yeah. Ah, the thing is, Lydia, you scare me.”

  She threw back her head and laughed in delight. “Oh, what a lovely thing to say. What if I promise to be gentle?”

  “I’d say you’re a liar.” Relieved by her laugh, he grinned back at her.

  “There, I said you were bright. Well . . .” She hooked her arm through his as they walked to the door. “You know how to get in touch now if you change your mind. Older women are very creative, Noah.”

  She turned, gave him a sharp, little nip on the bottom lip that had both heat and nerves swimming into his blood.

  “Now you’re really scaring me. One last thing?”

  “Mmmm.” She turned again, leaned back against the door. “Yes?”

  “Was Julie having an affair with Lucas Manning?”

  “All business, aren’t you? I find that very sexy. But since I don’t have time to attempt a worthwhile seduction, I’ll tell you that I don’t know the answer. At the time, there were two camps on that subject. The one that believed it—delighted in believing it—and the one that didn’t, and wouldn’t have if Julie and Lucas had been caught in bed naked at the Beverly Hills Hotel.”

  “Which camp were you in?”

  “Oh, the first, of course. I got off hearing anything negative or juicy about Julie in those days. But that was then, and this isn’t. Later, years later, when Lucas and I had our obligatory affair—” She lifted her brows when his eyes narrowed. “Oh, didn’t dig that up, I see. Yes, Lucas and I had a few memorable months together. But he never told me if he’d slept with her. So I can only tell you I don’t know. But Sam believed it, so it hardly matters.”

  It mattered, Noah thought. Every piece mattered.

  Like any self-respecting resident of Los Angeles, Noah conducted a great deal of business on the freeway. As he wound through traffic toward home, he used his cell phone to try to contact Charles Brighton Smith.

  Sam Tanner’s renowned defense attorney was seventy-eight, still practicing law when the mood struck him, on his fifth wife—this one a gorgeous twenty-seven-year-old paralegal—and currently enjoying the sun and surf at his island retreat on St. Bart’s.

  With tenacity, Noah managed to get as far as an administrative assistant who informed him in snippy tones that Mr. Smith was incommunicado, but the message and request for an interview would be related at the earliest convenience.

  Interpreting that to mean anytime from tomorrow to never, Noah went to work on accessing a copy of the trial transcript.

  He toyed with swinging off the exit to his parents’ house, then decided he would treat his father professionally, try to keep their personal relationship separate. Somehow.

  It was time, he thought, to sit down at his machine and begin working out an outline for the book. He’d already decided on the form. It wouldn’t begin with the murder, as he’d once planned, but with all that had led up to it.

  A section on Sam Tanner’s rise through Hollywood, paralleled by a section on Julie MacBride’s. The meeting that had changed them, the fast-forward love affair sliding, from all reports, into a blissful marriage that had produced a much-loved child.

  Then the disintegration of that marriage, of lo
ve turning to obsession and obsession to violence.

  And a section on the child. One who had seen the horrors of that violence. A section on the woman she’d become and how she lived with it.

  Murder didn’t stop with death. That, Noah thought as he turned toward home, was something he’d learned from his father. And what, most of all, he tried to illustrate in his work.

  It hurt that the man he admired and respected most didn’t understand that.

  He parked, jingling his keys in his hand as he walked toward his front door. It annoyed him that he couldn’t seem to shake that need for his father’s approval. If I’d been a cop, he thought, scowling, that would’ve been just dandy. Then we’d sit around over a beer and talk shop, crime and punishment, and he’d brag about his son, the detective, at his weekly pinochle game.

  But I write about murders instead of investigating them, so it’s like some slightly embarrassing secret.

  “Get over it, Brady,” he muttered, then started to jab the key in the lock.

  He didn’t need to. He didn’t have to be a homicide detective to see the door was unlocked and not quite closed. The muscles of his stomach clutched into one tight, nasty ball as he gently nudged the door open.

  He stood, staring in shock at the destruction of his house.

  It looked as if a team of mad demons had danced over every surface, ripped and torn at every fabric, smashed every piece of glass.

  He leaped inside, already swearing and felt only a quick flutter of relief when he saw his stereo equipment still in place.

  Not a burglary then, he thought, hearing the buzz of blood in his head as he waded through the mess. Papers were strewn everywhere, glass and pottery crunched under his feet.

  He found his bedroom in worse condition. The mattress had been shredded, the filling spilling out like guts from a belly wound. Drawers were upended and thrown against the wall to splinter the wood. When he found his favorite jeans sliced from the waist down to their frayed hems, the buzz turned to a roar.

  “She’s crazy. She’s fucking insane.”

  Then anger turned to sheer horror. “No, no, no,” he hissed under his breath as he raced from the bedroom into his office. “Oh God, oh shit.”

  His basketball trophy was now stuck dead center in his computer monitor. The keyboard, ripped away from the unit, was covered with potting soil from the ornamental lemon tree that had thrived in the corner. His files were scattered, torn, covered with dirt.

  Before it had been destroyed, his computer had been used to generate the single clean sheet of paper and message that was taped to the base of the trophy:

  I WON’T STOP UNTIL YOU DO.

  Rage washed through him like a tidal wave, in one vicious, screaming flood. Before he could think, he dug for his phone, then only cursed bitterly when he found the receiver smashed.

  “Okay, Caryn, you want war, you got war. Lunatic bitch.”

  He stormed back into the living room for the briefcase he’d dropped, tearing through it for his cell phone.

  When he realized his hands were shaking, he walked outside, sucked in air, then just sat down and dropped his head into his hands.

  He was sick, dizzy, with the fury still pumping through him in fast, hot beats. But under it was the baffled outrage of the victim. When he was able to use the phone, he didn’t call Caryn, but his father.

  “Dad. I’ve got a problem here. Can you come over?”

  Twenty minutes later, Frank pulled up and Noah was sitting in exactly the same spot. He hadn’t worked up the energy to go back inside but got to his feet now.

  “Are you all right?” Moving fast, Frank came up the walk, took his son by the arm.

  “Yeah, but . . . well, take a look for yourself.” He gestured toward the door, then braced himself to step inside.

  “God almighty, Noah.” This time Frank laid a hand on Noah’s shoulder in support, even as he scanned the room, picking up details in the chaos. “When did you find this?”

  “About a half hour ago, I guess. I had an appointment in Burbank, just got back. I’ve been gone all day doing research.”

  “Did you call the cops?”

  “No, not yet.”

  “That’s the first step. I’ll do it.” He took Noah’s phone and made the call. “The electronics are still here,” he began when he disconnected. “You keep any cash in the house?”

  “Yeah, some.” He stepped through the debris and into the office, kicking papers out of the way. He found his desk drawer in the corner, with a fifty-dollar bill under it. “I probably had a couple of hundred,” he said, holding up the bill. “I’d guess the rest is buried under here somewhere. Everything’s still here, Dad. It’s just trashed.”

  “Yeah, I think we can rule out burglary.” He studied the monitor, felt a twinge of his own. He remembered when Noah had won that MVP trophy, the pride and excitement they’d shared. “Got a beer?”

  “I did, before I left this morning.”

  “Let’s see if you still do. And we’ll go sit out on the deck.”

  “It’ll take me weeks to replace some of this data,” Noah said as he rose. “Some I’ll never be able to replace. I can buy a goddamn new computer, but not what was in it.”

  “I know. I’m sorry, Noah. Let’s go outside and sit down until the uniforms get here.”

  “Sure, what the hell.” More sick than angry now, Noah found two beers in the refrigerator, popped tops on both and sat with Frank on the back deck.

  “You got any idea who or why on this?”

  Noah let out a short laugh, then tipped back the beer to drink deeply. “Just a little bunny boiler I know.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Caryn.” Noah dragged a hand through his hair, then sprang up to pace. “A little clip from Fatal Attraction. She didn’t take it well when I stopped seeing her. She’s been calling, leaving crazy messages. And the other day she was out here when I got home, all dewy-eyed and apologetic. When I didn’t bite, she got nasty. Keyed my car on the way out.”

  “You still have any of her messages on your machine?”

  “No. My strategy was to ignore her so she’d go away.” He looked in through the deck door and the light of battle came back into his eyes. “Didn’t work. She’s going to pay for this.”

  “You know what she drives?”

  “Sure.”

  “We’ll check with the neighbors, see if anyone saw her or her car in the area today. You give the cops her address and let them go have a talk with her.”

  “Talk’s not what I have in mind.”

  “The best thing for you to do is stay clear. I know you’re pissed, Noah,” he continued when Noah whirled around. “And we can have her charged with breaking and entering, destruction of property, malicious mischief, and all manner of things if we can prove she did this.”

  “Prove it, my ass. Who else? I knew she did it the minute I walked in.”

  “Knowing and proving are different things. Could be she’ll admit to it under a little pressure. But for now, you let the cops take the report, do their job, and you steer clear. Don’t talk to her.” Worry clouded Frank’s eyes at the battle light gleaming in his son’s. “Has she ever gotten physically violent with you?”

  “Jesus, I outweigh her by sixty pounds.” He sat again, then looked up quickly. “I never touched her that way. The last time she was here, she went at me and I hauled her out the door.”

  Frank worked up a smile. “You sure can pick ’em.”

  “I’m giving celibacy a try for a while.” With a sigh, Noah picked up his beer again. “Women are too much trouble. A couple of hours ago I got hit on by a TV star old enough to be my mother, and for a minute, it didn’t seem like such a bad idea.”

  “Your appointment in Burbank,” Frank said, primarily to keep Noah’s mind off his problem for a little while.

  “Yeah, Lydia Loring, she looks damn good.” He rubbed the bottle of beer between both hands. “I’m interviewing people connected to Sam Tann
er and Julie MacBride. I’ve been to San Quentin. I’ve talked to Tanner twice.”

  Frank puffed out his cheeks. “What do you want me to say?”

  “Nothing.” Disappointment was just one more weight in his gut. “But I’m hoping you’ll cooperate, talk to me about the case, your investigation. I can’t write the whole story, do justice to it, without your end. Sam Tanner has brain cancer. He has less than a year to live.”

  Frank lowered his eyes to his beer. “Some things come around,” he murmured. “They take their own sweet time, but they come around.”

  “Don’t you want to know?” Noah waited until Frank looked up again. “You never forgot this case, never really let go of it, or the people in it. He confessed, he recanted, then he shut up for twenty years. Only three people know what happened that night, and only two of them are still alive. One’s dying.”

  “And one was four years old, Noah. For pity’s sake.”

  “Yeah, and her testimony damned him. Tanner will talk to me. I’ll convince Olivia MacBride to talk to me. But you’re the one who strings them together. Are you going to talk to me?”

  “He’s still looking for glory. At the end, he’s still looking for glory, and he’ll twist what he tells you so that he gets it. The MacBride family deserves better.”

  “I thought I deserved your respect. But I guess we don’t always get what we deserve.” He got to his feet. “The cops’re here.”

  “Noah.” Frank stood, touched a hand to his son’s arm. “Let’s table this until we get what’s going on here with you straightened out. Then we’ll talk again.”

  “Fine.”

  “Noah.” Frank tightened his grip, accepted the look of anger in his son’s eyes. “Let’s get through one problem at a time.” He nodded toward the living area. “This is a pretty big one.”

  “Sure.” Noah resisted the nasty urge to shrug the hand away. “One problem at a time.”

  It was one tedious routine followed by another. Telling his story to the police, answering their questions, watching them look over what was left of his things was only the first. He called his insurance company, reported the loss, dealt with the curiosity of the neighbors who wandered down.