Wrongfully Accused

by Ana Barrons

  Kate led the way down a wide corridor beyond the staircase, past Drew’s office and a game room, toward the back of the house. When they reached the sunroom, with its wicker furniture, overhead fan and Oriental carpets, Archer moved to the center and turned in a slow circle. He smiled, revealing even white teeth and a dimple on one cheek. “This is perfect,” he said, and pointed to a series of framed watercolors of the same spot in the Pennsylvania woods in each season. “Those are yours, aren’t they? They’re incredible.”

  “Thank you,” she said, warmed by the praise.

  “Do you spend a lot of time in this room?”

  “Not lately,” she said.

  “You should,” he said, and went about setting up his massage table. “Go ahead and take off your clothes. I’ll have everything ready in a few minutes.”

  Well, this is awkward. She didn’t move, and after a moment Archer looked up and smiled gently. “Don’t worry, sweetie, you’re not exactly my type, if you know what I mean.”

  Ah ha. She pretended to be disappointed. “And here I thought Michael had sent me a hot guy to run his hands all over me and leave me with a smile on my—” She stopped short. The guy was a complete stranger. “Oh, I didn’t—”

  Archer threw his head back and laughed, a deep, rumbling sound. “He’d have to send someone else for that,” he said. “Although my masterful hands will fix most of what ails you, I promise.”

  Five minutes later Kate was lying naked on her stomach on a padded massage table, loving the feel of warm aromatic oil being rubbed into her skin by a man who knew exactly what he was doing. “I’ll give you an hour to cut that out.” She groaned. Archer laughed, making her smile. “I definitely owe Michael one. This is the best thing that’s happened to me since...” Since when? She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt this good.

  “That’s the idea,” Archer said.

  “If you were straight I’d have to insist that you marry me,” she said, knowing she’d get a laugh out of him. He didn’t disappoint her. When was the last time she’d felt so relaxed with a man?

  Then she realized what she’d said.

  “God, I must sound so callous to you.”

  Archer’s hands didn’t cease for moment. “Not at all,” he said. “I knew it was a joke. The lighter you can keep your spirits now the more quickly you’ll heal.”

  She was silent for several minutes while Archer worked his magic on her tight muscles. It was as though by working the muscles her body expelled the sadness and the anger, the guilt and the regrets. When he got down to her feet she sighed so deeply he chuckled.

  “Feels good, doesn’t it?” he said.

  “It feels amazing,” she said.

  “Better than sex, with none of the emotional crap. Let’s flip you over.”

  She rolled on to her back and gazed up at him. He was standing behind her rubbing oil between his palms, so his face was upside down. A fluffy white towel covered her torso. “I didn’t ask Michael. Do you do this for a living?”

  “Not anymore,” he said. “Now I only do it for friends.”

  “But you didn’t know me from Adam.”

  He smiled as he applied the oil to her shoulders and began to knead. “True, but Michael and I are very close, and from what he told me about you I knew I’d want to be your friend.”

  “What did he tell you?”

  “Oh, lots of things,” he said. “For one that you’re incredibly talented artistically, which I have now seen with my own eyes. You really are amazing, Kate.”

  “Thank you.”

  “And he admired your integrity. Your views on social injustice, for example, were not exactly popular in your husband’s circles, but you didn’t back down from speaking your mind. Privately or publicly.”

  Her gut loosened a little bit. “That’s awfully nice to hear,” she said. “I think it’s safe to say that most of Drew’s colleagues didn’t appreciate my candor.” Joy, for example.

  “And at the risk of bringing up a sore topic,” he said. “I saw the news footage of you rolling your eyes when your husband was talking about his Global Intel bill and how the Founding Fathers... What did he say? They didn’t anticipate that the Bill of Rights would get in the way of doing what needed to be done?”

  “That pretty much sums it up.”

  “Well, if it’s any comfort, I was rolling my eyes too. And I remember thinking, wow, what an honest reaction. All those years of living with a politician and being on public display didn’t turn Kate Franklin into a Stepford wife.”

  His words were a gift. “Thanks. I know should have been more discreet, but I’ve never been good at hiding my feelings, and I had no idea there were cameras pointed at me.”

  “The media wanted a juicy news story and they got it at your expense.” He poured more oil into his hands and rubbed them together, then pressed his heated palms above her knee and pushed upward. She groaned and let the delicious pressure penetrate her muscles and ease the pain in her heart.

  She smiled. “I’m so glad Michael sent you to me.”

  He massaged her for a while in silence, and Kate’s thoughts moved from Drew to Gabe, to Joy, to her father, to Steve. To Gabe. As though she were looking down from a distance at her own body and mind, she watched to see which thoughts brought the most pain. It was thoughts of Gabe that deepened the ache the most. She let out a long, drawn out sigh.

  “Always a good sound,” Archer said, his deep voice somehow comforting. “It means the pain is moving through you and out.

  “There’s a lot of it,” she said quietly.

  “Tell me about him,” Archer said, rubbing oiled hands up and down the front of her calves to her knees.

  Kate said nothing while she processed the meaning of his question. “You mean...Drew?”

  “Only if you want to,” he said. “Talking about the source of the pain helps to move it out of the body.”

  She considered this. “It sounds like you mean Drew was the source of the pain, rather than his death.”

  “Was he?” Archer asked quietly.

  A surge of grief swamped her, forcing tears to her eyes. “Yes,” she whispered. “Some of it.” The part that wasn’t caused by Gabe.

  “Don’t fight the tears, Kate. They’re cleansing, like the massage. You have a deep lake of pain residing here.” He placed his fist just below her heart. “If you’re going to heal you have to empty that lake.”

  The tears spilled freely down her cheeks. “How do I empty it?” she croaked. “It’s so deep. So old.”

  “Talk about him. How did he treat you?”

  She sniffled. No one had ever asked her that. “Honestly? Like I was invisible.”

  “Ah,” he said. “That hurts more than anything.”

  “My...my father...” The lump in her throat kept her from speaking. Archer cradled her head in one hand and laid the other palm very gently over her throat and rubbed it in a circle. The heat and soothing scent helped more than she could have imagined.

  “Your father didn’t see you,” Archer stated. “And I’m going to make an educated guess that both of your husbands put their own needs first. As though yours were unimportant.”

  She nodded, her tears salty on her lips. How was it possible that a man she’d just met could read her so well?

  “It’s easier to grieve for a partner you were very close to,” Archer went on. “One who was devoted to you. The loss is harder, but the grieving process itself is cleaner, I guess you’d say.” He laid her head back down on the table, raised one arm over her head and ran his hands up and down the underside of her upper arm. “I sense that you’re having a tough time grieving for your husband.”

  “You’re very intuitive,” she said, when she could speak. When he didn’t respond she asked, “Have you lost someone close to you, Archer? A partner?”

  “Yes,” he said, but his tone said he wasn’t ready to discuss it. Kate assumed the wound was still too fresh and didn’t push.

  “W
as your husband away a lot?” he asked.

  She sighed. “Over the past couple of years I barely saw him.”

  Archer moved her arm to her belly and pulled the other one over her head. “What did he do when he was home? Work?”

  “Mostly,” she said. Then it occurred to her to ask, “Did you ever meet him?”

  Archer hesitated. “A couple of times.”

  “Did you like him?”

  “Michael was devoted to him,” Archer said.

  Kate arched her head back so she could see his face. His expression was harder than she’d seen it since he arrived. If he’d been wearing that expression when he first came to the door she probably wouldn’t have let him in. Still, she didn’t feel threatened by Archer. If anything, she felt as though maybe, just maybe, here was someone who understood.

  “You didn’t like him at all,” she said.

  For several moments Archer said nothing. Finally he sighed. “I’ll be honest with you. I found him extremely arrogant. But I barely knew the man, and he was your husband so I’ll leave it at that. I’m sorry if I hurt you by—”

  “No,” she said. “Please. It’s good to have someone to talk to about him. My husband was far from perfect, but then, aren’t we all?”

  He held her head in one hand and began massaging her scalp with the other. “Did you love him, Kate?” he asked. “And I don’t mean in the sense that he was your husband so of course you loved him. I had a brother I was supposed to love and I loathed him.”

  She swallowed. “I worked at loving him.”

  “Ah.”

  She tipped her head back and met his gaze. “You want to know if I was madly, passionately in love with him.”

  “Only if you want to tell me.”

  She smiled. “For some odd reason I do, even though I’ve known you for... what? Maybe half an hour?”

  He smiled back. “Forty minutes, give or take.”

  “I was in love like that once,” she said quietly, eyes closed, letting Archer’s hands soothe her brain, almost as though he held it in the palm of his hand. “I was terribly hurt. More hurt than I’ve ever told anyone before.”

  “Hurt like your soul shrivels up inside you and all that’s left is a desert of burning hot pain,” Archer said.

  God love this man, this stranger. “Yes,” she whispered. “Like that. I met Drew while I was dragging myself through that desert.”

  “Ah,” Archer said simply. “Suddenly there was an oasis, with palm trees and all the fresh water you could drink.”

  “Exactly.”

  “But it was a mirage.”

  She nodded slowly. “That mirage got me through the desert, and for a long time I refused to see it for what it was.”

  “When did you figure it out?”

  She gave him a wry smile. “The whole thing? Just now.”

  “Then the massage has done you more good than I intended,” he said with a smile in his voice. “A good massage every few days and you’ll be at the top of your game next time.”

  She rolled her head from side to side. “No next time. I’m done.”

  “I know what you mean,” he said. “I’ve said that myself a time or two, but the next thing I know I’m out there looking for love.”

  They chatted like old friends for the next half hour, until Archer was packed up and ready to go. Kate walked him to the door, but he stopped her from opening it.

  “I know why the reporters are here,” he said. “But you haven’t said a word about it.”

  “I don’t know what to say, except that I don’t know of anyone who hated Drew or any of the other congressmen enough to murder them.”

  He tilted his head and studied her. “Is that what you think it’s about? Hatred?”

  “I honestly don’t know what it’s about,” she said. “I can’t wrap my brain around it.”

  Archer laid a hand on her shoulder. “Promise me you’ll be very careful. Don’t give them any fodder for their witch hunt.”

  She blinked. “How can anyone honestly believe I had something to do with this? I was married to the man for God’s sake.”

  Archer looked pained. “Oh, honey, after all you’ve been through, you still think people are basically good, don’t you? That they tell the truth and try not to hurt other people.”

  “Well, maybe I do,” she said, feeling a bit defensive.

  “And that makes you the perfect prey.” He squeezed her shoulder. “Beware, Kate. They’ll leap out of the dark places and tear you to shreds. Take it from one who knows.”

  As he left, Kate wondered just how much her new friend knew about the dark places.

  Chapter Seven

  Jeremy was quiet when Gabe picked him up at Lindsay’s house, which worked well considering the mood Gabe had been in since his visit with Kate earlier in the week. He’d been trying to put her out of his mind all afternoon, snapping the heads off anyone who came near him. Even Scott Bailey, his former partner and best friend on the force, had given him wide berth.

  When they parked the car near the pizza place they usually went to during the week, he turned to his son. “What’s up, Jeremy? You’ve barely said a word since you got in the car.”

  “I heard Mom talking to Richard about Aunt Kate.”

  His ex-wife was not known for her discretion around Jeremy, especially when she was talking to her husband. Even though the divorce agreement had specified that neither of them make disparaging comments about the other, he knew Jeremy picked up on his mother’s attitude whenever his name came up. “What did she say about...Aunt Kate.”

  “You know the airplane that blew up?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, the terrorists didn’t do it. So now Aunt Kate’s picture’s in the paper, and it was on TV today.”

  “Is that right?” Gabe replied absently. He’d seen the clusterfuck in front of her house on the four o’clock news. He’d almost felt sorry for Kate when that doofus stuck the microphone in front of her face and asked her whether it was true that her first husband had also died a violent death. She’d stared at the guy, and the cameras had panned in close, watching her reaction. Just like he had when he went to her house, idiot that he was.

  “Mom said Aunt Kate shouldn’t come to my birthday party because the reporters would follow her.”

  For once Lindsay had come up with an idea he agreed with. “Well, you know, Jeremy, that’s not such a—”

  “But I told her I don’t care,” Jeremy said. “I hardly ever get to see her, and I want her to come. It wouldn’t be the same without her.”

  “I thought you still saw her some weekends when you’re not with me,” Gabe said.

  Jeremy picked at a hole in his jeans. “Not as many,” he said. “Richard likes to take his kids on hikes up Sugarloaf Mountain, and Mom wants me to go with them.”

  Gabe hated the idea of another man spending weekend time with his son. Not that he was always free to do stuff like go hiking, but still. “Why do you have to go?”

  “So we can bond,” Jeremy said, disgusted. “I can’t stand those little brats. They’re there like every weekend, and now they’re coming more during the week. They follow me around and touch my stuff. And Mom says I have to learn to share better. They drive me crazy.”

  Gabe opened the car door and got out. They’d parked a couple of blocks from Listrani’s on MacArthur Boulevard, and now they walked slowly up the sidewalk. “What do you do when you’re with your aunt?” Now why did he ask that? He never asked about Kate.

  Jeremy grinned. “Cool stuff.”

  “Like what?”

  “Why don’t you like her?” The words burst out of his mouth, like they’d been lying in wait for the right opening—which Gabe had just given him.

  Shit. “It’s personal.”

  “It’s about Uncle Steven, right? She was married to him.”

  Uncle Steven. As though he’d known him. Jeremy had been a baby when Steve died, and had never met the brilliant, sensitive young man
who had looked up to his older brother and used him as a sounding board for his ideas, knowing Gabe would be excited for him, would encourage him and tell him to go for it, whatever it was. He could picture him now—Steve, gesturing with his hands, his green eyes on fire as he talked about his newest app, his idea for a better platform or a new operating system—

  He swallowed hard against the stab of loss. “I really don’t want to talk about that.”

  Jeremy stopped walking. “Why not? I want to know what happened.”

  Deep breath. “He was in a car accident.”

  “Yeah, but Mom said he had a big fight with Aunt Kate and that’s why he got in the accident.”

  “Your Mom should keep her—” He stopped before he said big fat mouth shut. “Kate and I just don’t get along, okay? That’s all there is to it.”

  “My friends think she’s pretty,” Jeremy said. “Don’t you?”

  Fuck, yes. “Not really,” he said.

  “Then how come you stare at her?”

  Gabe turned to his son, startled. “What?”

  “You stare at her.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Yeah, you do. Every time you’re both at Grandma’s house, you stare at her and don’t say anything, and she acts like you’re not there. It’s weird.”

  This kid was way too observant for his own good. “Yeah, well, sometimes adults have issues that kids can’t really understand,” Gabe said.

  “Richard said maybe Aunt Kate paid somebody to blow up the plane.”

  Something cold spread through Gabe’s gut. Hearing it from his son’s mouth, the idea that Kate would conspire to take out an aircraft and fake a call from al Qaeda sounded completely insane. Christ, was he going crazy? He’d predicted that kind of reaction from people—been excited about it, because if it were true it would mean he’d been right to hold Kate accountable for Steve’s death all these years.

  “That would mean Aunt Kate’s a criminal,” Jeremy went on. “And that’s so stupid.”

  Gabe was struck by how similar the stubborn set of Jeremy’s jaw was to Steve’s. His family had always said Jeremy looked more like Steve than Gabe. Wink wink, poke poke. But Steve would never have betrayed him that way. He’d been passionate about two things—computers and Kate—and that was all he’d ever wanted.