Liar's Moon

by Heather Graham

The headlines were worse than she had expected. “Jesse’s Girl Makes Shocking Appearance In Leif’s Arms!”

  She emitted some kind of oath and continued to scan the paper, feeling her temper soar ever higher. Speculation went on and on, the consensus being that she and Leif had been very heavily involved for some time.

  She threw the paper at him. “You son of a—”

  “Watch it, Tracy—my six-year-old is between us!” Leif snapped back heatedly.

  “That’s right—what kind of a father are you?”

  “Well, there’s the hot—where’s the heavy?” Jamie queried.

  “I must confess,” Liz said. “I’m completely confused.”

  “Oh—they’re pretending to have an affair again.”

  “Again?” Liz demanded, shocked.

  “Jamie—you have a mouth like a bullhorn!” Tracy railed, really furious with him.

  “Hey—” Jamie protested,

  “Tracy—” Leif began.

  “Get out of here! All of you!” Tracy demanded.

  No one moved; Leif reached for her and she wasn’t about to let him touch her, so she flew out of bed—and slammed herself into the bathroom.

  She didn’t know how long she just sat in there on the commode, fuming, swearing to herself—occasionally slamming a fist against the tile wall. Then she decided to take a cold shower, praying the water would cool her off enough so that she could behave rationally.

  She stayed in the water a long time; she still felt flushed and hot when she came out. She wrapped herself in one of the hotel’s huge white towels, brushed her teeth and her hair—-and then realized that she hadn’t brought anything into the bathroom with her to dress. It wouldn’t matter—she was certain that her unwelcome visitors would have departed by then. Leif wouldn’t remain in her room—he would have taken Blake out of there by then.

  She slammed out of the door—only to instantly discover that she was wrong. Blake was gone, but Leif wasn’t.

  Tracy took a deep, deep breath, clutching the towel tightly behind her back. “Leif, get the hell out of here,” she said as calmly and disgustedly as she could manage.

  He was leaning against the foot of her bed, resting comfortably on an elbow. His hair was tousled and he looked completely comfortable and unaffected by her demand.

  “Tracy, first off,” he warned her, and she realized that there was a very real and slow-simmering fury held in leash by the control of his tone, “don’t you ever hit on me where Blake is concerned.”

  “Hit on you! I don’t want anything to do with either—”

  “Secondly, little girl, you were the one to loop Jamie in on this. What happened to that impassioned speech about what was done to your father? That you have to know?”

  “I don’t see where you are doing me any good in the least, Leif. I may not have a plan, but yours sucks egg yolks. And I really don’t want to discuss it here and now.”

  He inclined his head slightly, then moved with a slow-and-easy, controlled motion to unwind himself from the bed and onto his feet. He walked over to her, no smile on his face just speculation in his eyes. Shivers instantly began to cascade all over her; she felt more than naked, more than vulnerable.

  He stopped before her, placing his hands upon her still damp shoulders. She started to shake away his touch, but grit her teeth instead. Because at her movement, the towel began to drop.

  “Tracy,” he told her very softly, “come hell or high water, we are going to go through with this!”

  “With this?” she cried out passionately. “With what? We’re not getting anywhere! All you’re doing is planning a big party! What do you think is going to happen? All of a sudden someone is going to leap to their feet and yell, ‘Hey! It was me! I paid to have Jesse Kuger murdered because—’? All you’ve done, Leif, is made a mess of my life—”

  “I didn’t do that for you, Tracy. You did it all by yourself.”

  “Oh, you are a hopeless case! I still don’t know that you didn’t kill him. You claim you were best friends. I saw the fight that you two had; it was vicious and it could have been lethal and—”

  “And it was all over the fact that you sashayed stark naked into my bedroom and my bed like a little slut just—”

  His words broke off because she slapped him. He touched his cheek, eyes narrowing, then his grip came to her shoulders once again, lifting her to her toes, knocking her against him—minus the towel, alas, because she lost her hold and it fell to the floor.

  Tracy gasped in a great breath of horror.

  Leif broke off completely, and for several seconds they just stood there, frozen.

  Frozen—and burning, Leif thought, swallowing quickly, locking his jaw. Oh, God. This wasn’t fair. Tracy. Tracy, in all her glory. So beautiful. The same. Matured. Slim and yet curved.

  Naked.

  And he could remember, oh, he could remember. So clearly that he could retrace each pattern his fingers had ever traversed over her. The silk of her hair, the satin of her skin, the full curve of her breasts, the tautness of her nipples…

  The love in her eyes. The laughter. The beauty that had been—before the fall. He’d loved her.

  He was still in love with her. Fascinated, enchanted. It was her beauty; it was herself. But a man, he told himself for at least the thousandth time, couldn’t stay in love for seven long years.

  But if he hadn’t, this moment he had fallen all over again. She was his. He’d entered her, she’d entered him. And he had never, never escaped, and right now, it would seem the most natural thing in the world to reach out and hold her, let his trembling fingers curve over the fullness of her breasts, play upon the rose crests until they tautened at his touch and she sighed that soft whisper of hers that was like an enticement all in itself…

  She’d probably jump out of the window before she let him touch her again, he reminded himself bitterly.

  And he was forgetting his whole damn point of being here, and if he didn’t move, if he didn’t speak quickly, he’d make a complete fool out of himself.

  He jerked a little convulsively, digging his fingers into her shoulders, forcing his eyes to meet and remain with hers, as if nothing, nothing had ever happened.

  What an idiot! If she felt the pulse of his body…

  He started up again, halfway shouting.

  “Tracy! That is the truths and you know it as well as I do! God alone knows what else you’re trying to hide! I didn’t kill your father—and so help me, you know that! Tracy, damn you, don’t fight me on this—help me!”

  She gasped for breath; she knew that she was a lobster-ish shade of red, and she could feel all the power and heat of his body against her nudity like a torch. She discovered that she could only gasp his name, pressing nearly hysterically against his chest so that he might set her down upon her own feet once again.

  “Leif—”

  It was then that her door went flying open once again. And it wasn’t that she was really exposed to anyone else —Leif’s body shielded her slim form. It was just the way they looked—his body shielding her totally naked one.

  “Whoops—sorry!”

  She never saw him—she only knew that it had been Tiger’s voice. The door slammed again, and he was gone.

  “Let me go!” Tracy strangled out.

  He released her, watching her with sudden amusement easing his fury away, and he very unhurriedly went to the floor for the towel and bluntly surveyed the length of her while he too slowly handed it back.

  “You do the most convenient things,” he told her pleasantly.

  “Convenient!” she started to shrill, fumbling to cover herself with the towel.

  “Completely,” he said agreeably. He turned around, apparently ready at last to vacate her room.

  “Leif!”

  He turned again, arching a brow. “Is that an invitation to stay?”

  “No! But I’m telling you now—you’re trying to hang my family, and I will not let you! Maybe I don’t believe that y
ou would have killed my father—but neither did they.”

  “Your grandfather is a totally unscrupulous man, Tracy,” he said softly. “And I just might prove that to you. Are you so afraid that I’m right?”

  “No. I’m afraid that you’re after something else, Leif. Oh, yes, maybe you do hope to discover who wanted my father killed. But there’s more here, too, Leif—”

  “Maybe there is, Tracy.”

  “What?” she shrieked.

  He shook his head. “The only way you get to know is by playing along, Tracy. And maybe, just maybe, you know already. And maybe that’s why you’re running scared.”

  “Scared of what?”

  He shook his head again. “I don’t trust you yet either, Tracy. Not completely. Don’t forget—I did know you as a lying little con artist.”

  “Damn you—”

  “Tracy, get dressed, will you? This is beginning to remind me very uncomfortably of another place and time in history. You were a con artist, but a very beautiful one. Passionate and seductive, and entirely convincing.”

  “Leif! Damn you, I won’t—”

  The door slammed on her words; she was alone at last.

  “I won’t play your game!” she breathed furiously in his wake. “I won’t, Leif, I won’t!”

  She walked over to her door and locked it, thinking that she would never be around any of them without a locked door again.

  “Rude! Didn’t any of them ever learn any manners!” she muttered out loud.

  She went to the closet then, quickly deciding on a sweater dress. She staunchly decided that she was going to get dressed—and take the first flight out of Kennedy, no matter where it was going.

  But even as she slipped her shoes on, she knew that no determination could take her away now. Leif was after something, and she had to know what.

  She sighed softly.

  She also had the strangest feeling that if she tried to run, Leif would come after her—and find her this time, no matter where she went. She was part of something that she didn’t understand. She was bait for him, too.

  Why? What were they trying to lure out into the open? Would she survive the promised explosion? Worse still, she thought, shivering, would she survive another bout with Leif?

  CHAPTER SIX

  They were all in Jamie and Leif’s suite—Tiger and Sam, Liz and Blake, and, of course, Jamie and Leif. Tracy entered the room in a slow, simmering boil, wondering if she wouldn’t just erupt and tell them that they should all go to hell.

  But no one really noticed her when she came in other than to smile and say good morning and offer her a cup of coffee. They were all sitting around the breakfast table, sipping coffee, and reading various papers with reviews on Jamie’s performance.

  Tracy slid into the remaining seat—between Leif and Blake—and accepted the coffee that Sam poured for her.

  Leif chuckled softly. “Hey, Jamie, L. Bordon out of Toronto says that you’re a ‘genius.’ How does that sit?”

  “Quite nicely, thanks,” Jamie said, grinning, in return.

  Tiger gave him a little buff on the back of the head. “Don’t go and become an egotist on us. Ted Bailey of the Chicago paper says that you need to learn some control. Work on that—huh?”

  Sam chuckled. “Most of these papers are saying that Jamie’s great—but they’re more into this romance thing between Leif and Tracy.”

  There is no romance thing! Tracy wanted to scream. But before she got the words out, Leif turned to her with the most startling facsimile of a tender grin and reached over to massage her nape. “I knew you didn’t really want it, Tracy, but what difference does it make, huh? None, really.”

  She almost slapped his hand away—but Blake spoke up before she could do so, asking wistfully, “Does a ‘romance thing’ mean that I can ask her to cut my waffle for me?”

  “Oh, Blake, I’m sorry,” Leif said instantly. “I didn’t realize you were struggling there, son.”

  Tracy did snap out then, but not in the way she intended to at all.

  “I can cut waffles!”

  The whole table stared at her, of course. Jamie, with the silliest grin that made her want to slap him; Tiger, she noted, with a knowing smile. And she began to wish that a giant pterodactyl would swoop down and carry them all away.

  She didn’t get much of a chance to say anything to Leif; he threw his paper down as she was cutting Blake’s food and said something about packing a few remaining things. Tiger and Sam exited to their own rooms for their things, and Tracy was left with only Blake, her brother, and Liz.

  And Liz was still staring at her.

  She smiled sheepishly and awkwardly when Tracy caught her gaze and pretended to be interested in folding her napkin. “I don’t suppose that the traffic will be too heavy today. And we’ll be getting an early start.” She looked up at Tracy again. “Have you ever seen Leif’s house in Connecticut, Tracy?”

  “Yes,” Tracy murmured, wishing she could deny it.

  Blake gave her a wonderful smile. “You’ve been to my house?” He asked her, excited.

  “Uh—briefly, a long time ago.” She smiled at Blake, but felt acutely uncomfortable. Liz suggested that, since he had finished his waffles, he run back to Tracy’s room and pick up his things so that they could get going on the road.

  As soon as Blake disappeared, Tracy folded her hands on the table and looked pointedly at Liz. “There’s nothing going on, Liz. Well, that’s a lie. Your brother is after something, and I’m not sure what. I did know him years ago—very, very briefly—and things were an absolute disaster. That’s all there is to it.”

  Liz shook her head ruefully. “It’s none of my business.”

  Tracy smiled grimly and shrugged. “It was a rather well-kept secret, until recently.” She gave Jamie a look that was meant to sizzle, but he was undauntable.

  “Tracy—you’re the one making the big deal out of things.”

  Liz folded her napkin again. “And all three of you think that somebody else was in on Jesse’s murder, right?” she asked.

  “Uh—yes,” Tracy admitted. “You knew that?”

  “I know my brother.”

  Jamie pushed his chair in. “I guess I’d better get a few things packed, too.”

  Liz shivered when he was gone and leaned closer to Tracy. “Tracy, as I said, it’s none of my business, but I can see that you’re upset. Still, I think that you should go along with Leif. If someone did conspire to kill your father, you and Jamie could be in danger, too.”

  Tracy took a deep breath and shook her head, touched by the concern in Liz’s silver eyes.

  “Leif is after my family, Liz. He’s trying to hang one of them—in more ways than one.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  Tracy laughed. “I don’t know really. I just know that he’s suspicious about something and that he intends to use me to get to the bottom of it. That isn’t terribly fair.”

  “Whoever promised fair?” Liz sighed. “Tracy, for your safety, play along. A young woman alone is easy game.”

  “Oh, I’m wonderfully easy game! For Leif,” Tracy muttered bitterly. “I don’t even know what he’s up to!”

  Liz poured herself more coffee and laughed. “All the more reason you should go along with him! You know Leif.”

  “No—I don’t.”

  “Well, I’ll give you a hint. Fight him, and he growls and fights back like a lion. Say a few soft words, and he’s a kitten. Go along with him and you’ll get him to talk to you.”

  Tracy lowered her lashes and sipped her coffee. She wasn’t sure she could manage even a few soft words for Leif at this point. But thirty minutes later, when they were all ready to leave, Tracy remembered Liz’s words. She’d been about to insist that she would ride with Liz and Blake when Leif asked the bellhop to pack Tracy’s things in his trunk.

  She didn’t protest; she smiled sweetly and demurely slid into the passenger seat of his silver Jaguar.

  Tiger and S
am, ahead of them in the souped-up Mercedes, waved that they were starting. Liz and Blake crawled into her powder-blue Rolls and waved, too. Leif turned his key in the ignition. They weren’t really planning on following one another; they would just start off together and meet when they stopped for coffee at a little place just outside of Mystic.

  Tracy was silent as they started off. She slid comfortably back in the very plush seat and pulled the rim of her red and gray felt hat low over her eyes. She sensed that he was watching her—waiting for her to tear into him. She merely smiled, because it was nice to have him be the tense one for a change. She didn’t intend to say a thing; he could wait the entire trip.

  “Tracy?”

  “What?” She made an elaborate point of yawning.

  “Listen, what I’m doing—”

  “You’re just going to do anyway, whether I agree with you or not. You just go ahead, Leif. Could you turn on the radio, please?”

  “I’ve got tapes. What do you want to hear?”

  “Anything but the Limelights,” she said sweetly, closing her eyes once again.

  He didn’t reply, but opened the glove compartment and pulled out a tape. She was somewhat surprised that he managed so smoothly, since the Jaguar was a four on the floor, and the car didn’t miss a beat. The tape was a set of Croce ballads, soft and easy.

  Tracy kept her eyes closed, determining to feign sleep. Liz had been right, she decided with amusement. Leif was all set to go to battle. Well, she wasn’t going to take up arms—not now.

  But “feigning” sleep wasn’t such a wonderful idea. Once they were out of the city, the traffic was light on the highway. Leif drove competently and smoothly. The air was on and the windows were up and the music was like a cushion against her thoughts. She really did fall asleep.

  When she woke up, it was to discover herself in a rather precarious position. She frowned as she opened her eyes because she couldn’t see much of anything—her hair was tangled all over her face. She blinked and tugged at the wayward tresses and realized that the car was still and Leif was talking and her head was on his lap and her fingers were curled over his thigh. His hand was lightly resting on her head and he was telling Jamie that she had conked out as soon as they reached the bridge.