Wow! she thought, checking him out. He was butt-naked, his dick swinging like a pendulum under his belly as he moved past her. Tight buns and legs showed he worked out all the time. He looked so young, very different from the famous Doctor Bill she remembered seeing in a starched white coat and glasses at his clinic. Probably it would give her a complex that her first good look at a naked man was her uncle.
Her heart stepped up the beat and anger took over again. That lying, cheating bastard! Just seeing him out here enjoying himself on a spring night, not a care in the world, made her so mad she wanted to throw something at him, slug him or something. He was too big; he’d catch her for sure. The thought of him catching her in the bushes made her sick. That would blow everything.
Holding the brandy bottle in one hand, he padded toward the steaming pool, put his feet in and plunked his butt down on the highest step where the water was only a few inches deep. He took a swig.
‘‘Goddamn!’’ he said, shaking his head. He took another drink.
Nikki managed to sit down in the pine needles and make a little viewing place for herself through the fronds of one of those dinosaur-era ferns that grew under the trees. Just when she was getting used to the whole scene, he started to jabber. ‘‘Not like I had any choice,’’ he said. The sound of his own voice seemed to startle him, and he looked around sharply. Like an idiot, Nikki closed her eyes. As if he wouldn’t be able to see her if her eyes were closed! The fronds rustled. Had he sensed someone spying? She couldn’t look, but in her mind he moved swiftly toward her, pulled her out of the bushes and . . . she was breathing loud enough to lead him right to her.
He mumbled something. What was that? ‘‘Nik?’’ so soft, she wasn’t sure if he said it or if she dreamed it, but the sound was so chilling she froze.
Nothing happened. His hand didn’t reach over and yank her out. She heard a splash. When she dared to open her eyes again, he was gone . . . no, he was swimming away from her, toward the deep end of the pool, where the underwater light was.
He swam to the far wall, dove down deep and came up inhaling and coughing, then dove again. Nikki pushed open the branches so she could watch. He was doing something with his hands down in the water at the deep-end wall. Nikki had been in that pool when she was little. She knew it was nine feet deep. Here he was, most likely drunk, acting crazy at the bottom of the pool. Was he trying to drown himself? Should she make a run for the house while he was down there?
No. He might come out and see her.
Kneeling, she pushed the ferns back and stared. He stayed down for almost a minute.
She was bad at waiting. Waiting gave her time to think and thinking had a way of contaminating the passing minutes with doubts. The smell of chlorine mixed like toxic gas with the smell of the fir trees, making her feel sick. None of this was supposed to happen. He shouldn’t even be home, and here he was acting so stupid!
He surfaced, took a breath, and dived again.
Swallowing the acid in her mouth, Nikki steeled herself and sneaked toward the study. He came up again, splashing, but he still had his back to her. In one hand he held a box made of metal. While he swam to the side of the pool, holding the dripping box up above the water with one hand, Nikki slipped back into the bushes.
Hauling himself out at the deep end, grunting, he set the box on the concrete deck. After he caught his breath, he sat cross-legged at the edge, twisting something on the box. The lid came off and he took something out.
What freakin’ luck! So that was where he hid his money. In the freakin’ pool!
The wind had finally eased. Now Nikki faced a new dread, the complete silence. Except for the pool pump, Uncle Bill’s harsh breathing, and the rasp of the box lid as he opened it, there was nothing except the noise of her clacking teeth and whomping heart. Not even the crickets were singing.
He was holding something wrapped in a cloth. Bills, she figured. Maybe some rare coins, since the cloth was elastic at the top, sewn like a pouch. Light filtering up from the pool pocked his face with ghoulish shadows. He looked like Jason in a slasher movie. The whole scene was like a nightmare, the pool with its blue light, the darkness closing in, Uncle Bill, squatting like an evil Buddha, drunk, fondling his secret stash . . .
After a few moments, he put the pouch back into the box, screwed the lid closed, dove into the pool, and returned it to some hiding place in the deep end. This time, he got out immediately and trotted to the study.
Shaking from the cold and scared to death he would spot her at any second, she watched him wrap a towel around himself. As he slid his feet into rubber sandals at the door to the study, the doorbell rang. Shocked by the sound, she let out a little yelp. He jerked, turning around to face her, scouring the bushes, looking directly at her! He took a step forward, scaring her so bad she practically screamed, but the doorbell rang again. Hesitating for a second, he finally went back into the house.
Tossing off her sweatshirt, Nikki ran for the pool. The water curled over her body, silky like one of her mom’s costumes, much warmer than the air. She dove. Toward the bottom, directly below the pool light, groping, she finally felt a plastic ring in the wall, just big enough to slide the tip of her finger underneath. Twisting the ring back and forth, pulling, she discovered the hiding place worked just like a drawer. Chlorine stung her eyes as she reached through the milky light, pulled out the heavy box, pushed the empty drawer closed, and shot to the surface, gulping air, trying to see through the strings of her hair.
She pulled herself out of the deep end. Holding the box, she started to run for the boat. A phone rang inside the house. Good, more to keep him busy. She got as far as the gate before she remembered. Her goddamn sweatshirt! She’d left it by the pool! Stuffing the box under the waistband of her drenched sweatpants, she ran back toward the house, staying close to the wall and away from the windows, really cold now, soaking wet. Where had she thrown it?
Through the glass, she saw Uncle Bill talking on the phone in the study, sounding happy in there, way different than when he had mumbled by the pool. With relief she realized he had no clue she was right outside lurking around in the night, watching him. Unable to resist, Nikki came a little closer and peered in.
He held the cordless phone to his ear with one hand and the towel around his waist with the other. He was smiling, talking, saying ‘‘How’s it going?’’ and ‘‘Gee, that’s great.’’ In that instant, Nikki felt the sweet rush of victory. She had done it, stolen it from under his nose. She was certain now she had what she had come to get.
Just as she was turning away, a change in her uncle’s expression brought her back to the glass. His face sagged, melting downward. His mouth dropped open and his eyes bulged. Like someone blinded by a bright light, he groped around as if hunting for some stable thing to keep him from falling down. He staggered, then fell against the desk.
‘‘No! Please God, no!’’ he shouted over and over, first into the phone, then, pressing a hand against the mouthpiece, away from it.
She watched him stare into the receiver, then drop the phone to the ground. He collapsed onto the floor and curled up and cried like a baby. Now all she could see was the back of his neck, his muscles ropy and tense as a noose. She could hear the heaving sobs.
A shadow ran in and bent toward him. Someone else was there! Well, of course someone else was there. The doorbell had rung, hadn’t it! She caught a glimpse, gasped, and slammed herself back against the cabin. A large splinter pierced the skin of her palm, but she didn’t feel it, even when blood began to flow onto the wood of the house.
Her pocket sagging with his treasure, her sweatshirt forgotten, she pressed back against the wall, paralyzed.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Perri O’Shaughnessy is the pen name for two sisters, Pamela and Mary O’Shaughnessy, who live in Hawaii and California, respectively. Pamela graduated from Harvard Law School and was a trial lawyer for sixteen years. Mary is a former editor and writer for multimedia projects. They
have jointly written Motion to Suppress, Invasion of Privacy, Obstruction of Justice, and Breach of Promise, as well as their upcoming Nina Reilly novel, Move to Strike. Readers can contact Perri O’Shaughnessy at [email protected].
ALSO BY PERRI O’SHAUGHNESSY
Motion to Suppress
Invasion of Privacy
Obstruction of Justice
Breach of Promise
Move to Strike
Writ of Execution
Unfit to Practice
Presumption of Death
Published by
Bantam Dell Publishing Group
a division of
Random House, Inc.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1999 by Mary O’Shaughnessy and Pamela O’Shaughnessy
Map illustration by Hadel Studio
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any
information storage and retrieval system, without the written
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For information address: Delacorte Press, New York, N.Y.
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eISBN: 978-0-307-42277-4
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