by Anne Stuart
Her hand was too close to the edge of those navy-blue briefs. All she had to do was stretch her fingers and she’d touch them. All he had to do was exert the smallest amount of pressure. She couldn’t move, wouldn’t move. But she found herself perversely hoping that he would.
“There’s a line in an old blues song,” he said, his voice a husky rasp in the darkness. “If you don’t want my peaches, honey, don’t shake my tree.” And he released her, waiting.
She pulled her hand away as if burned, unable to miss noticing that what lay beneath the navy-blue briefs had grown. She’d done that, and the thought both fascinated and terrified her.
Sam made a frustrated sound in the back of his throat and rolled over on his stomach. “Go back to sleep,” he growled.
She didn’t move. She didn’t want to sleep. She wanted to move across the seemingly vast expanse of bed between them and put her arms around him. She wanted to press her face against his broad, strong back; she wanted his heavy body pressing down on her, blocking out the terrifying world. She wanted comfort and oblivion. But he wanted too much in return. And not enough.
She pulled the striped sheet up to her chin. She should offer to share it with him, but she wasn’t going to say a word. She wasn’t going to touch him, and she certainly wasn’t going to share her covers with him. She should get off the bed and go sleep in the living room, but she knew she wasn’t going to do that, either. He might be waiting for her to make the first move, but he’d have to wait for an eternity. And she knew Sam well enough to know that his patience had definite limits. If he wanted her, he’d have to come to her. He couldn’t force her to come to him.
She didn’t want to dream, so of course she did. Not about the two interchangeable blond women, thank heavens. Not about blood and death. She dreamed about sex. She dreamed about Sam’s hands on her skin; she dreamed about flushed responses and burning needs that threatened to suffuse her entire body. She dreamed about his long, hairy legs entwined with hers; she dreamed about his flat stomach pressed against her. She dreamed about desire spinning out of control, and she awoke with a convulsion and a cry, to find she was alone in the bed, damp and shaking.
It was after ten in the morning. Sam was gone, and this time he hadn’t left her any coffee. This time she didn’t turn on the television—even the video channels had occasional news reports, and she didn’t want to listen to a pack of lies while they ran Shari Derringer’s smiling face across the large flat screen.
She made her own coffee, ate cold spareribs and egg rolls, and wandered around the apartment, missing him. Trying to remind herself that she was mad at him.
The phone rang several times, but she obeyed orders and didn’t go anywhere near it. She hoped Sam remembered that he’d told her not to touch it. She hoped he realized it would be impossible to get in touch with her. What would happen if he was in an accident? She’d heard stories of faithful dogs starving to death while their beloved master floated in a coma. She was already getting a little tired of obeying Sam’s autocratic orders. If he didn’t come back tonight she was out of there.
She didn’t even bother trying to braid her hair; she just let it hang in a tangled mane down her back. The first thing she was going to do when this mess was resolved was get it all cut off. She felt like a butterfly, emerging from her cocoon, and she wanted to shed both the weight of her hair and the weight of her guilt as she emerged in the light. She also seemed to be more than mildly interested in shedding the weight of her outmoded virginity, but at least a small portion of self-preservation had remained so far. She wondered when that, too, would disappear.
It was midafternoon when she heard the knock on the door. She’d succumbed to the television, taking refuge in soap operas, and the peremptory knocking on the door made her jump. She was halfway there, ready to unfasten the chains, when she realized that hadn’t been Sam’s prearranged knock. Someone else was outside the apartment door.
She stopped where she was, immobilized. Unfortunately she’d turned the television up too loud—whoever was out there wouldn’t believe the apartment was deserted.
The knock came again, sharp and insistent. She tried to remember the downstairs security arrangements when they’d arrived a century and a half ago. If she remembered correctly they’d been reassuringly stringent. Whoever had gotten as far as Sam’s seventh-floor apartment was either very determined or very lucky. Neither alternative was reassuring.
“Miss Hardy?” a voice called through the thick wood-and-metal door. It was a smooth voice, with a faintly Southern accent, and Elizabeth told herself it was no one to fear. No one knew she was there unless Sam had told them. Therefore, whoever was out there must be someone she could trust.
She still didn’t say anything. Self-preservation had become a strongly ingrained habit, and she waited, waited for more reassurance from the man on the other side of the door. “Miss Hardy,” he said. “Elizabeth. I need to talk to Sam. I know he’s not there right now, but he said he’d meet me here at three. He said you’d let me in.”
She still didn’t say anything. Sam had told her to let no one in—he wouldn’t have sent someone there to meet him.
Of course, he hadn’t been getting much sleep, either. Maybe he’d had no choice but to make this arrangement, and maybe he’d tried to call her and warn her, and of course she hadn’t answered the phone. Just as she hadn’t answered the door.
“Look, Elizabeth,” the man said. “I couldn’t have gotten this far if it wasn’t okay. I just need to get in there to wait for Sam. It’s dangerous for me in the hallway. He told me to tell you it was okay. For Phil’s sake.”
Phil’s name, Phil’s memory, was like a punch in the stomach. Sam would have known it would affect her this way—he couldn’t have chosen a better password. She moved toward the door on leaden feet, guilt and sorrow overwhelming her.
She still had enough common sense to keep the chain on the door when she opened it. The man on the other side was short, round and balding, with a faint resemblance to Truman Capote. No one who looked like Truman Capote could possibly be dangerous, but Elizabeth decided she still had to be careful.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“One of Sam’s co-workers,” he said. “He’s decided to trust me, much as he hates to. Here’s my ID.” He handed a wallet through the door, open to his official identification, complete with photo. The spook, Elizabeth thought. FBI incarnate. She’d hoped she would go through her life without ever having to meet an FBI agent, but life had changed.
She handed the wallet back. “All right, Mr. Kempton,” she said. “I believe you’re who you say you are. I still don’t want to let you in. Why don’t you go out and wait in your car? It’s almost three anyway. You can see when Sam arrives.”
“Lady!” The man’s voice lost any claim to Southern charm, and he sounded faintly, normally exasperated. “If you think Sam is going to waltz in the front door you’re out of your mind. There are people watching this place. I didn’t come in the front door, either, and I sure as hell am not going to go back out and provide target practice for a bunch of crazies. Let me in, damn it, or my blood will be on your hands.”
She’d had Phil’s blood on her hands. Literally. She was suddenly very, very cold, and she told herself it was the guilt. Before she could think again she slid the bolt back and opened the door.
There was a faint film of sweat on his lined forehead, and he seemed genuinely relieved that she’d let him in. He let his small, observant eyes seep over her, but there was no undue curiosity in his gaze. “Miss Hardy,” he said, “you are one tough customer. Got any coffee?”
She wouldn’t have thought an FBI agent would be so unprepossessing. He was shorter than she was, and a good deal rounder, and his pale pink hands looked soft and useless. Maybe looks were deceiving. “I suppose so,” she said, trying to muster a certain amount of graciousness, unable to rid herself of a nagging worry. Sam had told her not to let anyone in, and she’d gone and done it. And n
ot just anyone. He’d told her that he hated having Kempton breathe down his neck. Now the man had encroached on his home territory, and Elizabeth could only hope he wasn’t lying. And that letting him in hadn’t been the worst mistake of her life.
Despite Sam’s doubts, she knew her government couldn’t sanction innocent people being threatened, coerced, hurt, much less murdered. If Agent Kempton was lying, the worst he could be doing would be trying to ferret out information from her. And there simply wasn’t that much she could tell anyone, apart from her dreams.
She made him instant coffee, taking the last cup of the real stuff for herself. She could see him through the kitchen doorway, wandering around the living room, not touching, not sitting, just taking everything in. She watched him, knowing she had no doubt at all that he was who he said he was. Knowing that, she was frightened anyway.
“Thanks,” he said, accepting the coffee with a shy smile. “You like Washington better than Colorado?”
She kept her face bland. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen much besides the airport and this apartment.” She didn’t volunteer the information that she’d lived here before Alan died. If Kempton was as efficient as he should be, he’d already know that.
Apparently he didn’t. “It’s a great little town,” he said. “If you can stomach the politics.” He took a sip of the coffee and beamed at her. “Just the way I like it. How’d you guess?”
Stupid, stupid, stupid, Elizabeth berated herself. She smiled into the little man’s beady eyes, distrusting him, suddenly frightened of him. “I’m psychic,” she said, and he laughed.
“Have you known Sam long?” he inquired in the most casual of voices, wandering away from her to look out the window. She almost warned him not to touch the blinds, but something kept her silent. She watched as he poked through the narrow shades. Watched as he did it three times in quick succession.
She shivered. “The heat in these new buildings is rotten, isn’t it?” she said, hoping he’d agree, hoping her sudden chill was the fault of the heating system.
He turned and looked at her in surprise. “Feels pretty warm to me,” he said, setting his half-drunk coffee down on the glass-topped coffee table.
She was going to have to touch him. She knew that, and still she balked. There was no way she was going to know if she was trapped in Sam Oliver’s apartment with a killer if she didn’t touch him, and there was no way she could bring herself to do it.
It wouldn’t matter. If he was a killer she wouldn’t be able to escape. The door was once again triple locked—by the time she got the chains and locks unfastened he would have finished her. She might as well pretend nothing was wrong and let him do it when she wasn’t expecting it.
Except that she couldn’t do that, either. A few months ago she could have accepted her death with equanimity. Not anymore. Like it or not, she’d come alive in the past few days. She couldn’t give that up without a fight.
“More coffee?” she inquired, draining hers.
“This is fine,” Kempton said. “Why don’t you have a seat? I wanted to ask you a few questions.”
“I’d rather wait until Sam comes home.”
His friendly smile faded slightly. “Suit yourself,” he said, putting his hand in his pocket as he sank down on the uncomfortable sofa. She knew what was in that pocket. Not the knife that had brutalized Phil, that had murdered Mary Nelson and the others. It was a gun, with a silencer. And he was biding his time.
She was crazy. “I’m going to have some more coffee,” she said, walking very carefully back toward the kitchen, all the time acutely aware of what a perfect target her narrow back would make. The soap operas were noisy; the remote control was near his small, plump hands. All he had to do was turn back to the video channel, turn up the volume and shoot. No one would ever hear a thing.
When she reached the kitchen, out of his sight, she put her hands on the counter and took a deep, shaking breath. She must be crazy! He was harmless; she was imagining all sorts of ridiculous bloody scenarios. He wasn’t going to hurt her; he just wanted to pump her for information, and she’d been fool enough to let him in and give him that chance. He could even take her in for questioning, or put her in protective custody, she supposed. At least, she didn’t know enough to stop him if he decided to do just that.
She had to touch him. She’d turned to head back to the living room to do just that, when she heard the sounds of rock coming in place of “The Days of Loving.” And he’d turned up the volume.
She had very little time. Sam existed on convenience food and takeout pizza—she’d already discovered that he didn’t have a decent knife in the entire place. He’d left his gun for her, but it was in the bedroom, out of reach. Once she stepped out of the kitchen she was going to be in deep trouble.
Except that she wasn’t safe in the kitchen. She could feel his approach, even if she couldn’t see him. He’d gotten tired of waiting for her; he was coming after her.
The cast-iron frying pan was still sitting on the stove. She moved swiftly, without thinking, picking it up and swinging it in an arc as Kempton stepped through the kitchen door.
He went down in a limp heap, blocking the doorway. Her sweating, trembling hands still clutched the heavy frying pan, and she could still feel the sickening impact as she’d crashed it against his head.
What if she was wrong? What if he’d come to say he’d like another cup of coffee after all? What if she’d killed an innocent man?
She could hear someone singing in the background, and she almost laughed hysterically. She fought back the urge, moving closer to the unmoving body blocking the kitchen door. She touched him with one shaking hand, but he didn’t move. The sense of evil was wrapped thickly around both of them, like toxic gas, but she didn’t know whether it was her own evil, from killing an innocent man. Shifting the heavy frying pan into her right hand, she started to turn the poor man over.
He moved swiftly, shifting around and aiming the gun directly at her throat as his eyes blazed with fury. It was already too late. Without thinking she’d swung the frying pan again, and the gun went skittering across the floor as he crumpled beneath its lethal force.
She hadn’t expected there to be blood, she thought, standing there, the frying pan held limply in her hand. She let it drop, knowing without question that she’d have no more need for it. Stepping over the dead body, she stumbled down the hallway and into the bathroom. There, collapsing on the floor, she began to vomit.
She’d lost track of time when she heard Sam at the door. She couldn’t get up and let him in. To do so would mean passing the body in the hallway, and that was one thing she couldn’t do. She’d wait in the bathroom until hell froze over before she went anywhere near what was left of FBI agent Kempton.
She could hear Sam calling her name through the opening allowed by the chain. She should answer, and she tried, but her voice only came out in a weak croak. She tried to rise, bracing herself on the toilet seat, but her body collapsed beneath her, and she leaned back against the wall, panting. He’d have to find some other way to get in.
She heard the splintering of the wood with vague satisfaction. He must have ripped the latch out of the door frame. He was calling her name, and there was a satisfying desperation in his voice, one that almost sounded like love. She tried to answer, but he was making so much noise that he couldn’t hear her. And then all was silent.
He must have found Kempton, she thought distantly. Maybe now he could hear her
She managed a small croak of sound, but it was enough. Sam filled the bathroom door, looking huge and terrible as he stared down at her. “Are you all right?” he demanded. “Did he hurt you?”
“No,” she whispered. “Yes. I mean, I’m all right. I’m just . . . a little shaky.”
He closed the bathroom door behind him, shutting out the smell and feel of death, and moved toward her. “Who killed him?”
She needed him to touch her, to hold her, but she didn’t know how to ask. A
nd then she found she didn’t have to because he pulled her up from her cramped position on the tile floor and into his arms, holding her tight.
“I killed him,” she said, her face pressed against the rough texture of his scratchy cool jacket.
His hands were soothing, comforting and everything she ever needed. “Good,” he said. And for the first time the horror and pain began to recede.
Chapter 13
SAM WAS EFFICIENT—frighteningly, blessedly efficient. He left her in the bathroom long enough to close the door from the bedroom into the hall, hiding the ugly sight of Kempton’s blood-soaked body, before returning, scooping her up and carrying her to the wide, soft bed. He set her down carefully, one hand still touching her, as he reached for the telephone, punching one of the preset buttons.
She hadn’t expected to get comfort from his touch. For the past week she’d shied away from his nearness, simultaneously drawn and repelled by the effect he had on her. She had grown accustomed to the spiraling tendrils of desire, something she’d never experienced before, when he touched her. She’d also grown to accept the sudden, shocking flashes of blood and death and danger, clearer, more disturbing, than ever before. But she wouldn’t have thought just the slight pressure of his arm against hers would send warmth and serenity flowing through her, pushing away the horror and death.
“It’s me,” he said into the phone, his voice deep and abrupt. “Yeah, I know. I’ve got a package for you to dispose of.” He waited a moment, and whoever was on the end spoke too softly for Elizabeth to hear. “No bullets. Head trauma. Lots of blood. Maybe an hour . . . ?” He cast a questioning look at Elizabeth, who nodded, feeling queasy again. “Been dead an hour. No, not me, man. A friend.”
A friend, Elizabeth thought. He hadn’t been able to call himself that last night. But he was her friend today, her savior, and she trusted him to rescue her from this horrible mess. She didn’t know for sure how it had happened, how she’d gotten from her safe little house in the Colorado woods to a blood-soaked apartment in Washington. And she didn’t know how she’d escape. She only knew that Sam, her friend, would take care of it.
