by Lisa Gardner
He was afraid he knew what she was trying to prove, and it made him feel worse.
Now she arched a brow at his growling tone and shrugged. “Sorry, Agent, but I'm pleading the Fifth.”
“Melanie—”
“What do you think? Does this outfit work for me? Very Texan, you know. Younger too. I think Russell Lee would be proud.”
“Enough, Mel. You're taking this too far.”
“On the contrary, I don't think I'm taking this far enough.”
“You are not some piece of trash! You are not this . . . this chick.”
“Oh, then, who am I, David? Just who am I?” She stormed away. He grabbed her arm.
“You've been dreaming again,” he stated bluntly. “The nightmares, right?”
“Maybe I have, maybe I haven't. Maybe it's simply that I've never been to Texas before and yet everything in this damn state looks familiar.”
“Melanie, you're falling apart.”
“Yeah, well, what do you care?” She jerked her arm free and skewered him with a withering glance. “Why are you here, David? Suffering a change of heart? Well, let me do you a favor—too late.”
“Dammit, you're wanted for questioning regarding the death of William Sheffield.”
“Are you arresting me?”
“I'm questioning you!”
“Then let me get out the thumbscrews.”
“What will it take to set things right? You want sorry? I'm sorry. You want remorse. Hey, I can do remorse. But figure it out, because I am trying to help you, and you need help! Your father has already gone on record as saying that William dumped you, that you haven't been yourself lately, and that you pulled the trigger out of spite. You shot a man and your own father has hung you out to dry. This is serious.”
She flinched. Her overly made up face finally stilled, but not before David caught the bleakness in her eyes. She turned away and sat down on the edge of the bed, the black miniskirt hitching up to the tops of her thighs.
“Well,” she said finally with forced nonchalance. “Easy come, easy go.”
“Bullshit. I don't believe Harper. Neither does your mom or your brother. You have allies, Melanie. You do.”
“So you found Brian?”
“Yeah. He's sorry he missed your call.”
“Is he?” She spoke wistfully, then caught herself and fisted her hands on her lap. “What about my mother? How is she doing?”
“She's shaken but managing. And your brother did clear her. We don't believe she or Brian harmed Meagan.”
“Which just leaves dear old Dad. You know the men in my life. . . .”
“He doesn't have an alibi,” David said. “He may have engineered Meagan's death so he could collect the million-dollar life insurance. He definitely needed the money.”
“If he did it, he didn't do it alone. He would never approach a man like Russell Lee Holmes. Jamie had to have helped him.”
“I'm getting the impression that Harper and Jamie come as a package.”
Melanie smiled thinly. Then her shoulders slumped and he could practically hear her unspoken thoughts. Two of the men who meant the most in her life plotting the kidnapping and death of a little girl. Who did the planning? Who did the murder? How much could a four-year-old child plead? How much had she screamed—or had she never seen it coming?
“William said my family was an illusion,” Melanie murmured after a minute. “My straitlaced father has been operating on healthy people for profit, my mother is a lush, and my brother is gay. And I'm their patsy, he said. Their audience of one because I always believe whatever they show me. I'm not loved, I'm just stupid.”
“William's an ass.”
Melanie remained unconvinced. “You knew about the surgeries, didn't you, David? You were in my house not because you were investigating William, but because you were investigating my father. White collar crime. The ‘case' you would never discuss with Detective Jax or Agent Quincy. And I never put it together. I was stupid for you too.”
“It wasn't that cold—”
“Of course it was! For God's sake, don't continue to treat me like an idiot. For once in my goddamn miserable life, I want to hear the whole truth. Why is it so hard for anyone to tell me the truth?”
David fisted his hands. His own temper was sparking, and now he found himself saying more crisply than he intended, “Fine. You want the truth? Here you go. We have reason to believe William and Harper were selecting healthy patients and injecting them with beta blockers to make them appear to need pacemakers. It garnered your father up to forty grand a month, and your father loves money. Hell, he probably murdered his own kid for a million, so what's a simple surgical procedure for six thousand a pop? Can we prove it? No. We have no proof. We'd hoped to catch William red-handed in the hospital and squeeze it from him. But then you shot him, so . . .” He shrugged.
Melanie bolted off the bed, stalking toward him, her eyes narrowed dangerously.
“You mean I made your life messy, Agent? Added some complications, screwed your plan? Welcome to the club, David. Welcome to the goddamn club!”
She jabbed a finger in his chest. He winced. But then he saw the tears gathering in her eyes. He stared at her bruised cheek, her swollen lip, her shaking hands, and everything in him gave way.
“I'm sorry,” he found himself saying hoarsely. “I'm sorry, Mel, I'm sorry.”
He took her in his arms despite her protests. She kicked at him.
“I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”
He held her closer. “I know. Shh, I know.”
She started to sob, the grief and anger racking her frame. David pressed her against his chest. She smeared blue eye shadow and black mascara all over his white shirt. He held her tighter, but it wasn't enough. He had hurt her. He had not been the man his father had raised him to be, and this time around he couldn't blame it on his medical condition. He'd played it safe when Melanie had deserved more.
When he had wanted to give her more.
Suddenly her head angled up. Her hands dug into the back of his head as she dragged him down. There was nothing passive about the kiss. Melanie was upset and angry. She turned on him violently, seeking an outlet for her rage. He went along with it. Hell, he found himself responding to it, and then they were tearing at each other's clothes like savages.
He ripped her T-shirt off and pushed her onto the bed. Her hands grabbed his belt, cracking leather as she ripped it from the pant loops. He just managed to get the back of her skirt unzipped before she'd hooked her thumb inside the waistband of his briefs and pushed them down around his ankles.
Then she was slithering out of her skirt and sprawling on the bed in her simple cotton underwear. The sight of it grounded him, brought him back to reason.
“Easy,” he whispered. “Easy.”
He feathered back her hair, stroked her cheek, trying to get her writhing body to relax.
“I'm sorry,” he whispered again. “I'm sorry.” He ran his fingers down the delicate curve of her jaw to the vulnerable hollow at the base of her throat. Her pulse pounded against his thumb. He kissed her collarbone, felt her shiver a little. His lips came lower, his cheek brushing the high, firm swell of her breast. He waited a heartbeat. She moaned softly, almost a sigh. He drew in her nipple deeply and sucked hard.
She shivered. Then she tightened her legs around his waist and he went tumbling off the cliff of reason.
He kissed her breast, her waist, her navel. His hand slipped between her thighs, stroking her folds, feeling her dampen for him. She was so passionate, so responsive, and it had been a long time for him. He was torn between taking her right that instant and making the moment last.
He managed to pull away long enough to root around the floor for his wallet. He always traveled with a condom, the eternal optimist.
When he rose back up, foil package triumphantly in hand, he had a clear view of her, her slender body sprawled on the dark blue comforter, breasts high and pink-tipped, skin all crea
m and rose. Makeup was smeared across her face, but he could see her beneath it, her lips parted, her eyes heavy-lidded with passion.
“Look at me,” he demanded hoarsely. “This isn't just some fling, Mel. Once this is over, I'm not ever going away.”
He smoothed on the condom, his gaze still on her face, and entered her in one fierce thrust.
She cried out.
“Melanie. Sweet Melanie.”
Her gaze darkened. “No,” she muttered, then gasped as he began to rock. “Not Melanie. Not anyone.”
“You're wrong. You're Melanie, sweet, loving Melanie. My Melanie.”
He thrust harder. Her teeth sank into her lower lip. He could feel her body tense. Then he got to see the small moment of wonder as her climax broke and brought fresh sheen to her face. She was lovely.
“David . . .”
The traffic roared and rushed beyond the curtains. He closed his ears to the sound and followed her over the brink.
MINUTES LATER HE rolled off her. Not wanting to completely break contact, he spooned her body against his. Her head rested on his arm, her gaze focused on the far wall. He was struck once more by her tiny size, the delicate shape of her arm, the long, graceful line of her back. She hardly made a dent against his own darker, larger form. He thought of her having had to take on William Sheffield, and he wished the man were still alive just so he could kill him.
Now Melanie was retreating, mentally withdrawing. He wondered if she was remembering William too. Maybe the way he'd cheated on her, or maybe the look on his face right before he struck her. Or maybe she was thinking of Harper, of the man she'd grown up calling Dad whom she knew now as, at the very least, a cold-blooded felon, if not a child murderer. Then there was Russell Lee Holmes, the genetic dad, who'd also killed little girls as a hobby.
“I'm not going back to Boston,” she said abruptly. “I can't yet. There are answers here. I have to know what they are.”
His fingers stilled just above her elbow, his hand settling on her arm, cupping it lightly. “If you agree to stay in my custody,” he said after a minute, “I may be able to buy us both some time. We can work on this together, see what we find.”
“We made love.”
“Yes.”
“You're an agent. I thought they had rules about such things.”
“There are rules. I've crossed the line.”
“What will they do?”
“I don't know. I might get written up. I might lose my job. It's possible.”
She rolled over, looking at him with a fierceness that hit him hard. “Regrets, then? Tell me, I want to know.”
He said honestly, “No regrets, Mel. For you, not ever.”
She whispered: “I'm ripped up, David. There aren't enough pieces left to make a whole. I'm so frightened of what I'm going to find. I'm angry and I'm scared and I . . . I can't believe what William did. I can't believe Harper hates me this much. I can't believe I loved them all and I didn't know them at all. I feel so completely, utterly empty, and I don't even care.”
“It's going to get better, Melanie. It will.”
“I don't even know myself anymore. Why I do the things I do or say the things I say? I want to buy a gun. I used to hate guns. What is happening to me?”
“It's going to work out, Mel,” he tried again. “I'm going to help you.”
“David, I don't believe you.”
He had to nod. The words hurt, but she had the right. He drew her back into his arms. At least she didn't protest.
After a moment he said against the top of her head, “Why don't you rest now, Melanie. You've been the strong one through this. Now it's my turn.”
She seemed to nod against his chest and they drifted off to silence together, then sleep. When David awoke, Melanie was untangling herself from his arms and crawling out of bed.
“I need to shower,” she said. “I have an appointment.”
“With whom?”
She gave him a small smile and strode toward the bathroom. “Russell Lee Holmes.”
THIRTY-ONE
W HEN THEY PILED into David's car, a thunderstorm was rolling across the sky. Clouds teemed and broiled, blacking out the sun and settling an eerie heaviness over the city. They drove in silence for fifteen minutes, watching the horizon crackle with lightning while the air conditioner blasted their cheeks.
David pulled over at the Captain Joe Byrd Cemetery. “The sky looks like it's going to go.”
“It's only water.” She got out of the car and headed straight into the graveyard.
The cemetery didn't have a fence. Some flowers had been planted at the perimeter, now leaning over and panting from the heat. The rest of the cemetery was filled with rows of white crosses marching steadily backward. They rolled back as far as she could see, the last dozen rows so wind-scarred, the dates and prisoner numbers had completely eroded. Those were surrounded by hard-packed ground and thick, old grass. Then there were the front rows, the fresh new graves with the black earth still mounded from recent filling.
The sky cracked, the first fat raindrop splashing on Melanie's nose as an owl hooted and lightning danced across the sky.
“We'd better hurry,” David called above the growing wind, his dark suit glued to his lanky frame. “The storm's almost overhead.”
“We have to look for the prisoner number,” she called back to him, and rattled off the information.
Lightning cracked again, so close they felt its charge zip through the air. The wind was whipping up now. The owl hooted again, agitated and uncomfortable. Then thunder boomed. More lightning. Melanie could feel the static electricity raising the hair on her arms, rippling up her spine, accelerating her heart. She began to feel panic. The rain hit her face. She was breathing too hard. She could feel the thunder still echoing in her belly, and suddenly she felt like a little girl lost in a sea of white death, trying to find her father.
David was suddenly at her side. He took one look at her face and ordered her head down between her knees. He grabbed her hands and gripped them tight. “You're having an anxiety attack. Calm down.”
The sky abruptly gave up. It burst like a giant water balloon and deluged them in a sheet of rain.
David led her over to the grave he'd found. She stood beside him in front of the white cross. Prisoner number and date. That was it.
Melanie thought she should feel something. She wanted to feel something. This was her father's grave, her real father. Please let it mean something to her, give her some sense of closure.
She felt hollow. The marker meant nothing to her. Neither did the dead man who'd once been her father. These were abstract concepts that couldn't begin to compete with the real, vibrant, warm memories of Harper, Patricia, and Brian Stokes. David had been right, she did have a family and she missed them and she loved them. No going forward, it seemed, and no going back.
David put his arm around her shoulders. He led her back to the car through the stinging sheets of rain and held open the door for her. Then he removed his jacket, and tucked it around Melanie's shivering shoulders. Then he fastened her seat belt.
When he pulled back to close the door, his gaze was liquid gold. Understanding, she thought. Simple understanding.
“He is not what you're about, Melanie,” he said. “You can spend your time in prison museums and graveyards if you want, but you are not the legacy of Russell Lee Holmes.”
He shut the door, and she watched him cross rapidly in front of the car to the driver's side.
He knew her, she realized, even when she had stopped knowing herself. He did have enough faith for both of them.
And then she thought, I want to go home.
She turned away so David wouldn't see her tears.
LATER DAVID HELPED her shower and crawl into bed, tucking the covers around her shoulders. She was too exhausted to fight him, falling almost immediately to sleep with her head buried against the feather pillow.
David got out the phone and prepared to do more work.
Their clothes were strewn all over the room, damp puddles reminding him of the choices he'd made. His suit mingled with her T-shirt, his loafers rolling over her sandals.
His FBI shield next to her makeup on the blue Formica counter.
Chenney picked up the other end of the phone line just as Melanie began to mutter in her sleep. David turned his back to her for more privacy and searched for a neutral tone of voice.
“Hey, rookie. What's the status?”
Silence over the line. Then a long, hard sigh. That told David enough.
“Lairmore didn't buy it, did he?” he said.
“I think he's gonna write you up,” Chenney confirmed. “It's going in your files. Jesus, Riggs, you're not exactly the most popular guy around here at the moment.”
“I went after a suspect in a murder case. I wouldn't think that would be such a breach in protocol.”
“Oh, yeah, Riggs. You flew across the country without backup, discussion with your supervisor, or any solid leads. And the Bureau has such a reputation for loving cowboys. Did you sleep through the academy, or what?”
David managed a ghost of a smile. For so long he'd been convinced he hated his job. Now that he was tossing it away, however . . .
“Things blow over,” he said at last. “Just give me an update.”
“You need to come back, Riggs, I'm serious.”
“I have a lead. I've traced Melanie Stokes to the William P. Hobby airport and a rental car agency. It's not a goose chase, Chenney. I'll leave Lairmore a report.”
“Then let me come out there and help you.”
“You don't want to come here.”
Another small silence as comprehension dawned. “Shit. Riggs—”
“Just give me the update, Chenney.”
Chenney exhaled in fury. David waited.
“Fine. Here's where we're at, but if Lairmore drills you too hard—”
