Slow Heat in Heaven

by Sandra Brown

  "I know you're not stupid, Mr. Boudreaux."

  "Then how can you expect us to ship you timber for nothing?"

  "You'll get your money, Ms. Crandall. I get my timber. All my timber."

  "We can't operate that way."

  Endicott spread his hands wide and smiled pleasantly. "Then we've got no deal."

  Schyler glanced at Cash. He was staring at Endicott over his tented fingers as though he wanted to pulverize him beneath his boot like any other cockroach. His solution to this dilemma was likely to be violent. With as much com­posure as she could garner, Schyler turned back to Endi­cott. "May I ask why you're placing this restriction on us?"

  "Certainly. You don't always deliver the goods."

  "I beg your pardon."

  "I didn't—"

  "He didn't stutter," Cash supplied in a tight voice.

  Endicott smiled at him, but his smile wavered beneath Cash's steady stare. "Crandall Logging took us for several thousand dollars. My old man advanced you money on an order, but we never received the last shipment. That's why we haven't done business with you folks the last coupla years."

  Schyler drew herself up straight. "I assure you, Mr. En­dicott, that there must have been an oversight or a book­keeping mistake. My father's reputation as an ethical and honest businessman has stood for decades. If Crandall was advanced a check—"

  "It was. And it came back endorsed and cashed.

  "By my father?"

  "Yep."

  "I don't understand." She was at a loss. Cotton was competitive. He believed in free enterprise and capitalizing on every business opportunity. But he played by the rules. He wasn't dishonest. He didn't have to be. "Why didn't you inquire as to why—"

  "Don't you think I did?" Knuckle pop, knuckle pop. "All our letters and threatening notices went unanswered."

  "Why didn't you file suit?"

  "Because my daddy has a sentimental streak." Joe Jr. shrugged. "He always said ol' Cotton Crandall was one of the best contractors in southwest Loosiana. He'd been doing business with him for a long time. He said to let it drop, so I let it drop. Against my better judgment."

  "Well I don't intend to let it drop," Schyler informed him firmly. "I'm going to dig until I get to the bottom of it and am able to offer you a full explanation. In the mean­time, your refusal to pay us on each shipment is unrealis­tic. How are we supposed to pay our operating expenses?"

  Resting his linked hands on top of his head, he said, "That's not my problem, is it?"

  "So we won't receive any money until the last shipment is delivered?"

  "Right down to the pulp wood."

  "Nobody does business like that." Cash almost came out of his chair, like a testy animal whose leash had just snapped.

  "I don't. . . usually." Endicott made a half turn in his swivel chair to look through the wall of glass behind him. It overlooked the railroad yard where logs were unloaded before being run through the paper mill. "But I've got to cover my own ass. I want the shipments to be delivered on a specified schedule, but I won't give Crandall one red cent until the whole order has been filled." He spun his chair around. "Comprende, y'all?"

  Schyler looked helplessly toward Cash. He looked at her, then back at Endicott. "I need a smoke." He came to his feet abruptly. "Schyler?" He extended a hand down to her. She took it. He helped her out of her chair and they headed for the door.

  "Hey, do we have a deal or not? You're taking up my valuable time here. What am I supposed to do while you're out smoking?" Endicott demanded.

  "Relax, Junior," Cash said. "Take a nap. Take a leak. We'll be right back."

  He slammed the door behind them. The secretary looked up reprovingly. She was ignored as they went through the reception area. The long hallway opened into various of­fices. At the end of it there was a large window and a seating area. It was there that Cash escorted Schyler. He shook a cigarette out of the pack in his breast shirt pocket. Schyler watched him light it. He angrily exhaled toward the skylight overhead.

  "Well?" she asked. "What do you think?"

  "I think I'd like to put my heel to his nuts and send him and that rolling chair straight through that glass wall."

  "What should I tell him?"

  "To eat shit and die."

  "Cash! I'm serious."

  "So am I." When he saw her retiring expression, he said, "Okay, okay, I'll get serious."

  "Do you know anything about us welshing on a deal?"

  "I guess you think I'm the company crook."

  "I wasn't making an accusation. I just asked you a straight question."

  He took a long drag on the cigarette, then unmercifully ground it out in the nearest ashtray. "No, I don't know anything about why that shipment wasn't delivered, or let­ters going unanswered, etcetera, etcetera. Want to strip search me?"

  Sighing, she rubbed her temples. After slowly counting to ten, she appealed to him for advice. "Should I accept his terms? And don't tell me what you think I want to hear. What do you think I should do?"

  "What are your alternatives?"

  "To go back home and start making calls. That's back­tracking, of course. It took me days to set up this appoint­ment. I really haven't got time to start over from scratch."

  "There are plenty other markets, Schyler."

  "I know, but none on this scale. I could fill a small order here, another one there like I've been doing. We'd work ourselves to death and it would still be piecemeal, just barely enough to meet payroll and stay open. This one order could pay off the bank note and give us comfortable operating capital for months."

  "Then I guess you have your answer."

  "What if we deliver all the timber, but he doesn't pay us the full amount?"

  "He wouldn't dare. We'd have it in writing. Besides," Cash added, cracking his own knuckles in imitation of Joe Jr., "he values his life."

  "Can we fill the order?"

  "Let me do some quick figuring." He sat down on the edge of a small sofa and reached for a magazine lying on the spindly coffee table. Using its back cover as his scratch sheet, he did some quick calculations. "We've got six rigs hauling every day. That's not including any independents we pull in. At five thousand board feet per load, that's—"

  "Thirty thousand board feet."

  "Times three loads per day." He glanced up at her. "We can ship ninety thousand board feet each day, in addition to what we buy from independents."

  "He's ordering over two million. We've got under a month before the loan comes due."

  "Say thirty days."

  "It's less than that, Cash."

  "So we'll work some overtime."

  "What about the weather?"

  "We'll be really screwed if it rains."

  "Oh, Lord."

  He rechecked his figures. "We can do it, Schyler," he said.

  "Are you sure?"

  "I'm sure."

  "By the deadline?"

  "Yes."

  "I'm placing a lot of trust in you."

  He stared at her for a long moment. "I know."

  His expression and his soft, almost sad, tone of voice disconcerted her. For a moment she was distracted by them. Then she asked him, "If I weren't here, if you had to do this alone, if you were responsible for this decision, what would you do?"

  He stood up, moved to the window, and stared out. He slid his hands into his pockets, a gesture that parted his unbuttoned sport coat. His dress slacks fit his seat as well as the jeans he always wore. His shoes looked new, as though he might have bought them especially for this busi­ness appointment. That was endearing. Schyler was touched.

  He turned around slowly. "I hate kissing anybody's ass, particularly a guy like that." He jutted his chin toward the executive office at the other end of the hall. "I'd be tempted to tell him to shove it. I guess it would come down to how badly I wanted or needed the deal. How important is it to you?"

  Suddenly she remembered the expression on Cotton's face when he'd looked up at her from the gurne
y and asked, "Why did you destroy my grandchild?" She would never forget that as long as she lived. Cotton's faith in her, his love, had been shattered. She needed to restore it com­pletely.

  "It's very important, Cash," she said huskily. "Not just to me. But to Cotton. To Belle Terre. Its future is at stake. I'll do anything, sacrifice anything, even my pride, for Belle Terre. Can you understand that?"

  A muscle in his cheek twitched. "Oui, I can understand that."

  "Then shall we go back in and sign Joe Jr.'s contract?"

  "I'm right behind you."

  Ken Howell collapsed on top of his wife the second after his climax. When he regained his breath, he raised his head and dusted kisses along her hairline. "That was great. Was it good for you?"

  She pushed him off her and rolled to the side of the bed. She thrust her arms into a peignoir. "Did you ask Schyler that every time you made love to her?"

  His face, already flushed from intercourse, turned a deeper red. "With Schyler, I didn't have to ask."

  Tricia cast him a glance over her shoulder. "Touché." Her mules slapped against her bare heels as she walked into the bathroom. Over the sound of running water, she called out to him, "Are you still in love with her?"

  Ken padded naked to the bathroom. He stood in the doorway and waited until Tricia finished brushing her teeth. "Do you care?"

  She straightened and blotted her mouth on a towel, watching him in the mirror over the sink. "Yes, I think I do."

  "Only because you don't want her to have something that you can't."

  She shrugged and dropped the sheer robe. "Probably."

  "At lease you're honest."

  Tricia turned on the shower. Reaching in to test the water temperature, she swiveled her head around and looked at him over her smooth shoulder. He was morosely staring at the tile floor. "I haven't always been."

  He raised his head. "What, honest? Yes, I know."

  For a moment husband and wife stared at each other across the bathroom that was rapidly filling up with steam. Their expressions were tinged with regret, maybe remorse, but neither kidded himself for long. Neither was righteous and never would be.

  "When did you know?"

  "That there never was a baby?" he asked. Tricia nodded. He pushed back his tousled hair. "I don't know, maybe from the beginning."

  "But you still married me."

  "I didn't see an easier way out of the mess. It was more expedient and less trouble to go along with your lie."

  "You would rather be stuck with me than to beg Schyler's forgiveness for screwing me."

  "I never claimed any medals for heroism,"

  "What about those cats?"

  He looked at her quizzically. The question was seem­ingly out of context. "Disposing of them made me sick to my stomach."

  "Don't play dense, Ken. Did you do it?"

  "Of course not. Did you?"

  "Of course not."

  Neither was convinced of the other's innocence. Tricia stepped into the shower but didn't close the door. "You've got to stop her, you know."

  "I'm trying," Ken said defensively.

  "Try harder. She's in East Texas today negotiating a deal that will get Crandall Logging out of hock. We'll have a harder time convincing Cotton to sell if everything is sol­vent."

  Ken gazed at his reflexion in the mirror, running a hand over his stubbled jaw, not liking what he saw. He was be­ginning to look jowly, old, soft, dissipated. He looked use­less.

  "Cash Boudreaux bears watching, too," Tricia said from the shower. "I understand that he and Schyler are thick as thieves."

  "He works for her, that's all. She depends on him to manage the loggers."

  Tricia's laugh echoed loudly in the shower when she shut off the water. "How naive you are, Ken. Or are you burying your head in the sand? You don't want to believe that they're lovers."

  "Who says?"

  "Everybody." She wrapped herself in a bath sheet and began applying baby oil to her wet limbs. "Any woman Cash's shadow falls on eventually goes to bed with him. If he wants her, that is. Those who have been with him say that he's the best lover they've ever had. They say his cock's a good ten inches."

  Ken frowned at her as he stepped into the shower and twisted the taps wide open. "Female bullshit. Is that all you and your cronies talk about? Men and the size of their cocks?"

  "No more than men talk about tits and ass."

  "That's a male prerogative."

  "Not anymore, baby," she chortled.

  Ken shook his head in disgust, then thrust it beneath the needle spray. Tricia finished drying and sailed the towel in the general direction of the hamper in the corner.

  She left the bathroom, confident in the knowledge that what she wanted, she went after, and usually got. If Ken couldn't or wouldn't keep up with her, he would be left behind. That would be all right, too.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  "Having Chateaubriand and asparagus tips for lunch was decadent."

  Cash indulgently propelled Schyler toward her parked car. She was comically tipsy. They'd stopped at the steak-house to have a celebratory, late lunch. When they discov­ered that it didn't open until four, they had decided to wait, passing the time by milling around the parklike setting on the edges of a national forest. Even though the contract they had obtained from Endicott had a definite drawback, it had boosted their spirits.

  The meal had been delicious, the portions generous to a fault. They had demanded and gotten the royal treatment, being the only customers in the place at that early hour. Schyler had ordered champagne to toast their success. Cash figured the two bottles she had bought probably de­pleted the restaurant's wine cellar of its stock. There wasn't much call for champagne in a restaurant that catered mostly to upper-crust tourists and local regulars.

  One bottle had washed down their steak dinners. Schyler was affectionately clutching the other to her breasts now as she sashayed toward the car.

  "Let's roll down the windows and drive real fast," she said excitedly.

  Her eyes were more animated than Cash had ever seen them. They sparkled with amber lights. Champagne was good for Schyler Crandall's soul. She had shed her snooty air along with her inhibitions. She wasn't the boss lady. She wasn't the reigning princess of Belle Terre. She was one hundred percent pure woman. And one hundred per­cent of his body knew it. Her effect on him was being felt from the top of his head to the soles of his new shoes, which were almost as tight as she was.

  "Okay, but I'll do the driving." Smiling to himself, he opened the car door for her and stood aside as she got in. "Why don't you take off your jacket?"

  "Good idea." She set the bottle of champagne beside her on the seat and shrugged out of the linen jacket. Leaning forward, she shimmied her shoulders to get the sleeves off. Her breasts swayed beneath her blouse.

  His penis took notice.

  He laid her discarded jacket in the back seat along with his. As he went around the car, he whipped off the necktie and unbuttoned the first few buttons of his shirt. By the time he steered the car out onto the highway, Schyler's alligator heels were lying on their sides on die carpeted floorboard and her head was lolling against the seat. One foot was tucked up under her opposite thigh. Her knees were widely spread. It wasn't indecent. Her skirt was bunched between them.

  What Cash was thinking was decidedly indecent.

  "Such an odious man," she said around a wide yawn that would have mortified Macy Laurent. Schyler didn't even attempt to cover it.

  Two of her jaw teeth had fillings, he noticed. He had never been in a dentist's chair until he went into the army. It hadn't mattered because he'd been blessed with good teeth. Neglecting semiannual checkups would have been unheard of in the mansion at Belle Terre.

  "Who's odious? Me?" he asked.

  Her head remained on the seat, but she turned it to look at him. A placid little smile was curving her lips upward. She had eaten off her lipstick. He liked her lips better without it. She had a real bedroom mou
th, suitable for kissing, suitable for lots of things.

  "No, not you. Joe Endicott, Jr."

  "He's a prick."

  She giggled. "Crude but true." For a moment she studied him. "How come when you say bad words they don't sound bad?"

  "Don't they?"

  "No," she replied, puzzled. "Just like Cotton. He cusses something terrible. Always has. Some of the first words I learned to say were swear words I'd overheard him using. Mama nagged him to clean up his language all the time." She yawned again. "I never thought bad language sounded bad coming from Cotton."

  "Is the wind too strong?"

  Her breasts rose on a deep, supremely lazy breath. They strained against her linen blouse, which by now had lost its starch. It looked touchable. Cash ached to feel her. He couldn't understand why he didn't, why he didn't just reach across the short distance and cover one of those soft mounds with his hand, pinch up one of her nipples with his fingertips. He had never exercised caution with a woman before. What he saw and wanted, he took. He usually got away with it, too.

  "No, the wind feels wonderful," Schyler sighed. Her eyes slid closed. "Wake me up when we get to Heaven." She giggled again and began to sing, "When I get to Heaven, gonna put on my shoes, gonna walk all over God's Heaven." Her smile was winsome. "Veda used to rock me in the chairs on the veranda and sing that spiri­tual."

  Cash thought she'd fallen asleep, but after a moment she said, "Silly name for a town, isn't it? Heaven. I love it and I hate it, know what I mean?"

  He took her question seriously. "Oui."

  "It's like this mole I have on my hip. It's ugly. I don't like it, but . . . but it's a part of me. It wouldn't do any good to have it removed because every time I looked at that spot, I'd be reminded of that mole anyway. That's how I feel about Heaven and Belle Terre. I can leave, go to the other side of the world, but they're always there. With me." Her eyes popped open. "Am I drunk?"

  He couldn't keep from laughing at her alarmed expres­sion. "If you're sober enough to wonder, then you're not too far gone." "Oh, good, good." Her eyes closed again. "It was deli­cious champagne, wasn't it?" She dragged her tongue over her lower Sip.

  Cash shifted the swollen flesh in his trousers to a mote comfortable position. "Oui, delicieux."