Night Fires

by Sandra Marton

  . ‘Gabrielle, goddammit,’ he said, pulling her arm up, twisting it behind her back so that she cried out. ‘Are you crazy?’

  No, she thought. Maybe she had been, but not now. ‘Let go of me, damn you!’

  He pulled her arm higher. Pain shot from her wrist to her shoulder.

  ‘You heard what Townsend said. Vitale ’

  ‘Did you think I’d make it easy for you?’ She was panting now, her hair fallen over her face in disarray, and she tossed it back. ‘Well, I’m not. I’m not going to just…’

  He hauled her against him, pinning her arms to her side with his embrace. She could feel the hard, angry beat of his heart. His jaw jutted forward as he pushed his face to hers.

  ‘What will it take to make you listen to reason? I don’t care what kind of sugar-daddy Vitale’s been to you. He wants you dead tonight.’

  Gabrielle twisted wildly against him. ‘What kind of man are you, James? How could you agree to do this?’

  He laughed. ‘A damn good question, baby. It was my idea. Can you believe that? I volunteered.’

  ‘Volunteered?’ she whispered.

  ‘I told Townsend I’d keep you alive, and I will—even if you’re too pig-headed to believe your “uncle” has decided to pull the plug.’

  Gabrielle went still in his arms. I told Townsend I’d keep you alive…

  Townsend, the federal prosecutor?

  ‘Do you hear me, Gabrielle?’

  I told Townsend I’d keep you alive, and I will…

  James wasn’t a criminal, he’d told Townsend he’d keep her alive.

  Who was he, then?

  Nothing made sense, she thought, staring at him. His face was carved in steel, his eyes unreadable.

  ‘Are you going to behave?’ he asked.

  She swallowed, then nodded. His hands fell away from her and he stepped back.

  ‘Stay here, be quiet as a mouse. Whatever happens, don’t leave this room.’

  ‘James. You have to tell me who ’

  ‘Do you hear me? I don’t give a damn if the house starts to fall down around your ears, Gabrielle. You don’t open that door once it closes after me. Have you got it?’

  She looked from him to the dark hallway. Fear turned her blood to water as the reality of what was happening settled on her. Someone was coming to kill her.

  And James was going to stop him, he was going out there to face a killer, he was going to risk his life.

  ‘No.’ Her voice sounded unnaturally loud. ‘James, don’t. Please.’

  There was a sound from the rear of the house, tinkling glass and then a soft thud. Gabrielle’s eyes grew wide; she opened her mouth but James shook his head.

  He put his lips against her ear.

  ‘Remember,’ he breathed, ‘quiet as a mouse.’

  ‘Where are you ?’

  He put his hand over her mouth. ‘Later,’ he whispered.

  She sighed his name against his skin. He made a sound in the back of his throat and then he pulled her to him. His mouth fell on hers with a bruising passion—and then he was gone.

  She stared at the door as it closed after him. Stay here, he’d said, but how could she, when somewhere in the darkness a killer waited?

  A killer.

  Tony Vitale had sent someone to end her life. Gabrielle sank onto the edge of the bed.

  Scenes from her life flashed before her. Her father, kind and loving. ‘Uncle’ Tony, generous to a fault. One a chauffeur, the other a union official— so she’d believed.

  Had they been something different? Had it all been a sham?

  And the past days, with James. Had it all been nothing but a lie?

  She sprang up, every nerve-end alert, as she heard the sounds of scuffling in the hall. Flesh thudded against flesh; someone grunted in pain. Gabrielle ran across the room and leaned against the closed door, hands spread against the wood, feeling the shuddering blows as if they were being struck against her own body.

  James’s name was a silent cry on her lips. Stay here, he’d said, but she couldn’t. She had to know what was happening in the hall. Suppose he needed her help? Suppose… ?

  Something thudded heavily against the door, then slid to the floor.

  Silence fell over the house.

  A moan broke from her lips.

  She could feel her heart stop, then begin to gallop like a runaway horse and she fell back as the door opened…

  James stepped into the room and she sobbed his name and ran into his open arms.

  The lights came on, pushing away the darkness.

  “Oh, James,” she whispered, as she looked up into his face.

  It was bloodied, but more than that had changed. There was a glittering coldness in his eyes..

  ‘You’re hurt,’ she said.

  Slowly, he let go of her.

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Your cheek is cut. You’re bleeding.’

  He touched his hand to his face. His fingers came away crimson. He stared at them blindly, then shrugged and wiped his hand on his shirt.

  ‘It’s nothing. A couple of stitches pulled open, that’s all.’ He looked at her again, then shouldered past her to the bed and sank down on it. ‘The police are on their way.’

  She nodded. There were sirens slashing the night—she had not really heard them until he mentioned it, but now she realised she’d been listening to their wail in the distance for the past few seconds.

  ‘It took them long enough,’ she said slowly, her eyes searching his face.

  James leaned back against the headboard. ‘You know the old saying.’ He gave her a quick smile. ‘There’s never a cop around when you want one.’

  Gabrielle looked into the hall. A man was lying sprawled on the floor. He was enormous. A shudder went through her when she saw the knife lying beside him.

  ‘Is he… ? Did you… ?’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said tonelessly, ‘he’s dead.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Maybe you want to go take a look at him. He might be someone you know.’

  Her face paled. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Come on, it’s not hard to figure. I doubt if Vitale could get outside talent to do this job. Since he was indicted, nobody wants to touch him.’ He jerked his head towards the hall, but his eyes didn’t leave hers. ‘That guy may turn out to be an old friend.’

  Gabrielle swallowed. ‘I don’t think that’s very funny,’ she said. Her voice quavered, and she swallowed again. ‘If it’s true, if Vitale sent him…’

  He laughed. ‘If? If? What the hell does it take to convince you, lady?’

  Didn’t he understand? She was beginning to know the truth—perhaps she’d always known it, deep in her heart.

  But admitting it to herself was painful. Vitale had been the only family she’d known. And her father—the pain of accepting the truth about him was more than she could bear.

  ‘James,’ she said, holding her hand out to him, ‘try to see it through my eyes. Please.’

  His voice was flat. ‘That’s just what I’m doing, Gabrielle. Seeing it through your eyes, hearing it through your words…’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘All that stuff on the phone with Townsend…’’

  ‘What stuff’ she said in bewilderment.

  His hand cut through the air in impatience. ‘Come on, don’t play coy. I heard you, remember?’ His voice mimicked hers cruelly. ‘“He isn’t like that. I know him.” His mouth twisted. ‘How long are you going to go on kidding yourself?’

  Was that why he was so angry? The frantic conversation with the federal prosecutor came back to her in bits and pieces; she remembered the things she’d said,

  and she knew how they might have sounded, but she’d been talking about James, not Vitale,

  She’d said those things when she still thought James was…

  How could she tell him that? How could she tell him she’d thought he’d been sent to kill her?

  ‘It’s—it’s hard to explain,’ sh
e said slowly.

  James’s eyes bored into hers. ‘Try.’

  She opened her mouth, then shut it. She barely understood it herself. She had fallen in love with him, then feared him, but her doubts about him had fallen away in his arms. She had known James could not be evil.

  And then that middle-of-the-night call…

  It had been disorientating. There’d been no time to think or reason, there’d only been time to react.

  ‘I’m waiting,’ James said coldly. ‘Why don’t you just try telling me the truth?’ A muscle bunched in his jaw. ‘Or is that beyond you?’

  Gabrielle’s chin lifted. What right had he to talk to her like this? She’d done nothing to warrant it except trust him, even in the face of the warning she’d thought Townsend had been trying to give her.

  ‘If you want to talk about “truth”,’ she said softly, her eyes on his, ‘we ought to talk about you, don’t you think?’

  James rose to his feet. ‘My turn, hmm?’ The muscle in his jaw jumped again. ‘All right. But you’re not going to like it.’

  Her heart softened. ‘You just saved my life,’ she said. ‘Nothing you could say can diminish that.’

  He stared at her for a moment, then stuffed his hands into his pockets and walked across the room. At the door, he turned and faced her.

  ‘My name is James Forrester and I live in Washington. That much you already know.’

  She waited for him to speak again, but he remained silent, and finally she ran her tongue lightly oyer her dry lips.

  ‘We didn’t meet by accident, did we?’

  James bent his head, his eyes, refusing to meet hers. ‘No,’ he said after a moment. ‘I’d been in New Orleans for weeks, watching you. You’d walked away from protective custody, but I—we knew you wouldn’t be safe. I—we decided someone had to make sure nothing happened to you.’

  She nodded. She’d figured as much by now. Was he an agent? A police officer, perhaps, from up north? Whatever he was, she could accept it. She loved him.

  ‘Are you with the police department?’

  James shook his head. ‘No.’

  ‘Then you’re an investigator.’

  He shook his head again. ‘I’m an attorney.’ His jaw shot forward belligerently. ‘A federal attorney.’ There was a silence, and then he cleared his throat. ‘I work in Townsend’s office.’

  The admission stunned her. ‘You work in…’ She put her hand to her mouth. ‘Were you—were you involved in—in… ?’

  He nodded. ‘Yes.’ He took a deep breath. ‘You might as well know the worst. I’m the guy who put together the dossier on your old man.’

  ‘No.’ Her whisper echoed in the room.

  ‘Yes,’ His voice was flat. ‘And then I came up with the idea of putting the screws on you after he got sick.’

  ‘No,’ she said again, her eyes widening in horror. Not James. It couldn’t have been James. Her eyes lifted to his. ‘Then why—if you’re an attorney, why did you come to New Orleans? Why did they send you?’

  ‘They didn’t. I told you, I volunteered.’ His mouth twisted. ‘There was no other way. The cops had no legal right to hold you. Neither did my office. So I took a leave of absence…’

  The horror of it was beginning to seep through. James was responsible for the web that had ensnared her, not Townsend. It had been James all along.

  She held up her hands. ‘I don’t want to hear any more,’ she whispered. ‘Please.’

  ‘Damn you, Gabrielle!’ He reached out and caught her by the wrists, his fingers clamping hard on the fragile bones. ‘I was only doing my job. You were a name in a file, a snapshot clipped to a fact sheet.’ He moved towards her, his face drawn with anguish. ‘I didn’t plan on falling in love with you, but I did. It was why I came after you. I told myself it was because I was responsible, but it was more than that…’

  James was saying things, she knew that, but she wasn’t really listening. All she could think of was how she’d hated Townsend and now…

  ‘You did this,’ she said, ‘not Townsend. It was you all the time.’

  His arms closed around her. ‘Gabrielle.’ His voice was urgent. ‘We’ll put all of this behind us.’ She shook her head and he cursed softly. ‘Look at me, dammit!’

  Her head rose slowly and she looked into his eyes. This was the man who had made her see the truth about her father, this was the man who’d destroyed her life— the man she’d fallen in love with.

  ‘Gabrielle. We can forget everything. You and Vitale. Me and Townsend…’

  Forget. Could she? Face the past squarely, James had said, so you can put it behind you.

  They’d done that tonight, but somehow it wasn’t behind them. It had only deepened the uncertainty that lay ahead.

  ‘I—I don’t know if I can,’ she whispered, her voice breaking.

  Brakes squealed outside; flashing lights lit the house with an eerie glow, and suddenly there was a banging at the door.

  ‘Police!’

  James cupped her face in his hands. ‘Gabrielle,’ he said in a fierce whisper, and then he kissed her. When he drew back, he looked deep into her eyes. ‘I love you,’ he said. ‘Do you understand?’

  There was a heavy blow on the front door, the sound of splintering wood, and then the house was filled with policemen.

  ‘Gabrielle?’

  James was still watching her, waiting for her to answer, and suddenly she knew he was right.

  Her father had believed in some fierce, time-worn code she didn’t understand. Her love for him would never change, but that part of her life was over.

  The future lay ahead, and it was the future that mattered. James loved her, and nothing else was important.

  Tears of happiness rose in her eyes. ‘James,’ she whispered.

  ‘Are you people OK?’

  James and Gabrielle fell apart. A man in plain clothes, a gold and enamel badge pinned to his jacket, stood beside them, and a sea of blue uniforms stretched away behind him.

  James nodded. ‘We’re fine, Officer. I’m James Forrester. This is Gabrielle Chiari. And that man in the hall…’

  The detective nodded. ‘Yeah, yeah, I’ve been on the horn with Washington.’ He looked from Gabrielle to James. ‘You’re gonna have to come to the station, Forrester. We’ll need a statement.’

  James nodded. ‘Fine. But Miss Chiari ’

  ‘She stays here. Don’t worry, I already got the word from Washington. Two of my people will stay with her.’

  James looked at Gabrielle. She gave him a smile meant for him, alone. What he wanted to hear, what she wanted to tell him, couldn’t be said in a room filled with strangers.

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ she said softly.

  He touched her cheek, and then he was gone.

  She awoke groggily, every muscle stiff and aching. The phone was ringing; she groaned as she uncurled from the living-room couch and made her way through the still-dark house to the kitchen.

  What time was it, anyway? she thought, pushing her hand through her hair. She must have dozed off while she was reading. James wasn’t back yet—she wouldn’t sleep soundly until she was safe in his arms. Not that she was in any danger: there was a policeman outside the front door, another at the back.

  But she had never, in all her life, felt as secure and as loved as she had with James beside her. And he would be beside her forever, she thought with a little smile; he loved her and she loved him. She would tell him that the moment she saw him. She would tell him that now.

  ‘James?’ she whispered, smiling into the phone as she put it to her ear.

  ‘Hello, Gabriella.’

  She froze. Gabriella. No one had ever called her that except—except…

  ‘Gabriella.’ Tony Vitale’s voice wheezed softly. She closed her eyes, picturing him chewing on one of the black cigars he favoured. ‘Aren’t you going to say hello to Uncle Tony?’

  ‘What—what do you ?’ She stopped, drew a shaky

  breath, then b
egan again. ‘Why are you calling me?’

  He laughed. ‘Why shouldn’t an uncle say hello to his favourite niece, Gabriella?’

  Bile rose in her throat. ‘You—you’re not my uncle,’ she said. ‘And you—you tried to—you sent someone to…’

  ‘You see, cara mia’l You see what’s happened? Now you believe the terrible things you are told about me, hmm? That liar, Forrester…’

  Gabrielle sank into a chair. ‘James isn’t a liar. You are. You—you’re everything they said you were.’

  ‘Gabriella.’ The husky voice was harsh. ‘I have a proposition to make you. Are you listening?’

  ‘A proposition?’

  ‘Yes. What your lawyer friend would call a quid pro quo.’

  James. He kept referring to James. What did he know about him?

  ‘I regret what almost happened tonight, Gabriella.’ Vitale’s voice dropped to a wheezing whisper. ‘It was an unfortunate mistake.’

  She sprang to her feet. ‘A mistake?’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘It was a mistake, all right. I’m going to come back to New York.And I’m going to testify.’

  Vitale laughed. ‘Yes, cara mia, you will come back. But not to testify.’ He paused, and she could almost see the smile moving across his sallow face. ‘You will come back and marry me, Gabriella.’

  Hysterical laughter burst from her throat. ‘I’ll what?

  Marry you? I’d sooner be dead. I- ’

  ‘What of your precious Mr Forrester, Gabriella? Would you sooner he be dead?’

  Her heart stopped beating. ‘What?’

  Vitale’s voice was cold. ‘You will return to New York. You will wear my furs, my jewels, you will face the world as my wife. And you will convince everyone that you do it proudly.’

  ‘You’re insane!’

  ‘The fool I sent bungled his job, Gabriella. Another incident would be far too obvious. The risk would be too great.’ His voice became a purr. ‘If your performance pleases me, I will let Forrester live. Otherwise…’

  Gabrielle’s legs turned to jelly. ‘What have you done to him?.’

  Vitale laughed. The laughter became a wheeze, and he coughed heavily before he spoke again. ‘Nothing yet but the future holds such promise. . A mechanism

  under the hood of his car. An accident on his way to the office. A sudden encounter on a crowded street…’