Night Whispers

by Judith McNaught

  Sloan expressed her sacrilegious disregard of such frivolous accomplishments by rolling her eyes and lifting her shoulders in a Gallic shrug—a gesture that was somehow so prim, and so unexpectedly cute, that Paul had to choke back a startled laugh. “Then there’s Edith,” he said, mentioning the last surviving member of the family. “She’ll be in Palm Beach, too.”

  “Edith?” Sloan repeated.

  “Your great-grandmother on your father’s side,” Paul explained, and bluntly added, “She’s a ninety-five-year-old dragon with a quick temper who terrorizes and intimidates anyone who crosses her path. She’s also a notorious cheapskate. She’s worth about fifty million dollars, but she reportedly throws a fit if more than one lamp is lit in a room.”

  “She sounds delightful,” Sloan said dryly; then she had to fight down the uneasy awareness of her own frugality— Sara had called her a miser just last week, and her own mother lamented that Sloan hated to part with money. But then, Sara and Kimberly were both hopeless spendthrifts, Sloan reminded herself bracingly. She, on the other hand, lived on a tight budget because she’d learned the necessity of it in childhood and because her salary as a police detective left her very little money to spare. If she had plenty of money, she’d certainly spend it. Well, some of it.

  Satisfied that he’d relieved a little of her anxiety with his best-case scenario, Paul left her pretty much to her own thoughts after that, but as they neared the Palm Beach exit off the highway, he knew he had to bring her back to reality. After his efforts to make her relatives seem human and possibly likable, he now had to remind her that her father was a criminal suspect and her role was to spy on him. “Your father’s house is about ten minutes from here,” he said. “Earlier, I gave you my best-case scenario. I’m afraid we have to prepare now for a worst-case scenario. Let’s go over our stories again, so we can do our jobs.”

  She turned in her seat, giving her full attention to him. “Okay, go ahead.”

  “We’re going to tell them we met in Fort Lauderdale five months ago, when I was attending an insurance seminar there,” he explained, reminding her of the personal details about himself that they might expect her to know. “My father’s name is Clifford; my mother’s name was Joan. She died several years ago. I was an only child; I grew up in Chicago and graduated from Loyola University. I still live in Chicago and work for Worldwide Underwriters Inc. You and I haven’t been able to spend much time together because we live so far apart, and that’s why it was so important to us to spend these two weeks together.” He flipped on the turn indicator and changed lanes, preparing to take the next Palm Beach exit. “Clear so far?”

  Sloan nodded. They’d discussed all this on Presidents’ Day, but now her curiosity was piqued. “Is any of that true?”

  “No,” he said in a flat tone that discouraged any further effort to inquire into his real personal life. “My cover is in place, and it will hold up if Reynolds decides to check me out, but I doubt we’ll need it. Once your family realizes we haven’t known each other long or spent a lot of time together, they won’t get suspicious when you don’t know everything about me. They won’t be particularly interested in me anyway, so they won’t ask many questions. I’ll be there to come up with answers when they’re needed. If I’m not around, say whatever you want but remember to fill me in later. Now, let’s go over your background. Have you decided on a suitable career for yourself?”

  “Yes.”

  They’d both agreed that it would be foolish to tell Carter Reynolds that Sloan was a police detective. According to Paul’s San Francisco informant, Reynolds hadn’t known anything whatsoever about Sloan when he called Kimberly to get her phone number, and there was no reason to think he’d learned anything at all when he called her at work. Paul was still elated about that. “I can’t get over how lucky we were that your mother didn’t have a chance to tell him anything about you the day he called her.”

  “Luck didn’t have anything to do with it. My mother was dying to tell him all about me, but he didn’t give her the chance because he’s heartless and rude. He hasn’t called her in thirty years because he doesn’t care how she feels or what she thinks. When he finally did call her, he told her he didn’t have time to talk, he only had time to get my phone number. As soon as she gave him my direct number at work, he told her he’d call her again sometime when he was less rushed, and he hung up!”

  “I see your point.”

  Sloan didn’t mean to dampen his spirits. “You got your lucky break later, when he called me,” she said with a smile. “I’ve quizzed Sara without her realizing it, and she says she remembers exactly how Captain Ingersoll answered my phone and exactly what he said to Carter. Nothing Ingersoll said would have alerted my father that he’d called the police station or that I’m a cop. That was lucky.”

  “I was due for a lucky break in this case,” Paul said wryly. “Now tell me what career you picked out for yourself.”

  “In college, I majored in marine biology and then mathematics before I switched to law enforcement, but you said you wanted me to pick a career that Reynolds will regard as frivolous or innocuous. A career in science or mathematics doesn’t qualify, and I don’t have enough knowledge in either of those fields to pull it off. I was still trying to think of a solution last week while I was waiting for Sara to finish talking to a client—and that’s when it hit me—the perfect career.”

  “Don’t keep me in suspense; what is it?”

  “For the next two weeks, I’m an interior designer.”

  “You’re right.” He laughed. “It’s just what I had in mind. Do you know enough about it to pull it off?”

  “I know enough about it to bluff.” For years, she’d listened to Sara rhapsodizing over furnishings and accessories, and Sloan was reasonably certain she’d absorbed enough jargon and information to fake her way through a few superficial conversations with Carter Reynolds, who would surely find the subject boring, anyway.

  “There’s one more thing we need to discuss,” he said, his voice taking on an implacable quality. “I want to be absolutely certain you’re clear on your role in Palm Beach and on the legalities involved if you deviate one inch from it.”

  Sloan realized exactly where he was going, but she was curious to hear his logic anyway.

  “Legally, your father is entitled to a reasonable expectation of privacy in his own home. Because you’re going there at my request, you are technically working for the FBI. Since the FBI does not have a search warrant, any evidence you or I discover will be thrown out of court unless it was in plain view and in a place he allows us to be. You may pass along information to me, but you cannot search for it. Am I making this clear? I don’t want you to so much as open a drawer unless someone asked you to get something out of it.”

  Sloan suppressed a smile at the fact that Paul felt the need to explain what was elementary legal information. “Actually, I learned a little about this on an episode of Law and Order.”

  He relaxed a little, but his tone remained emphatic. “As to conversations you might overhear, the same rules apply. Make sure you’re somewhere you’re allowed to be, and that you had a legitimate reason to be there. It would also help if you happened to be in plain sight of someone at the time. As to telephones, there’s to be no eavesdropping on extensions. We’re going to play this completely by the book. Got it?”

  Sloan nodded. “Got it. The thing is, no matter how scrupulous we are, his lawyers will shower motions to suppress on the court like pamphlets.”

  “Your job is to make certain you haven’t done anything to make a judge feel inclined to grant them. The point to remember is that our primary reason for being here is not to look for evidence. I’m here to keep an eye on him. He spends a lot of time in Palm Beach during the year. I want to know what he does while he’s here, where he goes, and who he meets. You’re here because it’s the only way I could get in and because you may be able to pass along helpful information that you come across. You aren’t he
re to look for that information.”

  “I understand.”

  Satisfied, Paul tried to think of something more lighthearted to discuss, and after a moment, he brought up the topic they’d been on before this. “I think passing yourself off as an interior decorator is an inspired choice. Reynolds won’t feel threatened in any way. It’s perfect.”

  Sloan nodded, but as the time for her masquerade approached, the idea of faking a career, particularly Sara’s, didn’t feel perfect at all to Sloan. She was going into unknown territory where she was going to have to interact with lofty strangers, and in hiding her true career, they were not only eliminating a major topic of safe conversation, they were erasing her life.

  “Sloan?” Paul prodded as he turned onto a wide boulevard lined with imposing oceanfront mansions. “Are you having second thoughts about being able to pass yourself off as an interior decorator?”

  “Interior designer,” she corrected him with a sigh. “No, I’ll be all right. It’s all a matter of taste anyway; so if I make some sort of blunder, they’ll just assume I don’t have any taste.”

  “That works for me,” he announced cheerfully, annoyingly pleased by the possibility that she might actually disgrace herself in such a way. “After all,” he explained, “the more Reynolds underestimates you, the more likely he’ll be to let his guard down. Feel free to seem inept, gullible, and even foolish whenever possible. He’ll go for it.”

  “What makes you think he’d believe I’m any of those things?”

  “Because, according to our information, that’s approximately how he remembers your mother,” Paul said, choosing his words carefully. He didn’t want to tell her that Reynolds had actually referred to Kimberly as “a nitwit,” “a hopeless Pollyanna,” and “the quintessential dumb blonde.”

  “I just know I’m going to hate that man.” Drawing a long, calming breath, Sloan said, “What does his opinion of my mother have to do with what he’ll believe about me?”

  Paul gave her a wry smile. “You look like her.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Well, you do,” he said flatly. “Reynolds will think so, too, and he’ll naturally assume you are as”—he paused to choose the least offensive of the words Reynolds had used to describe Sloan’s mother—“as gullible as she was.”

  Sloan had the alarming impression that he’d already arrived at some decision about all this, but that he was easing her toward it because she wasn’t going to like it.

  “I gather you’d like me to reinforce his misconception about my mother’s and my intellect, is that right?”

  “If you can.”

  “And since you knew I was probably going to hate this idea, you decided to save it until we were practically in his driveway.”

  “Exactly,” he said unashamedly.

  Sloan leaned her head against the headrest, closed her eyes, and indulged in a rare moment of self-pity. “Oh, great. This is just great.”

  “Look, Sloan, you’ve come here to do a job, not make Reynolds admire you, right?”

  Sloan swallowed. “Right,” she sighed, but mentally she cringed as the next two weeks unfolded in her imagination.

  He flipped on his turn signal as they approached a palatial Mediterranean-style villa with a flagstone driveway and huge iron gates blocking the entry at the street.

  “One last thing before we go in there. I know it’s going to be hard, but you must hide your hostility from Reynolds. He’s no fool, and he has to believe you want a reconciliation. Can you hide your feelings about him?”

  Sloan nodded. “I’ve been practicing.”

  “How do you practice a thing like that?” he asked dryly as he turned into the driveway.

  “I stand in front of the mirror and think about something awful he’s done; then I practice smiling until I actually look happy about it.”

  Paul laughed aloud and covered her hand in a brief, encouraging squeeze; then he pulled up to the gates. He lowered his side window and reached out to press a button on a brass box mounted on a pedestal beside the car door; then he paused and looked at Sloan. “Smile for the camera,” he instructed with a meaningful nod toward the tiny, glass-covered hole in the metal box on the pedestal.

  He pressed the button on the box.

  “Yes?” a male voice spoke.

  “Sloan Reynolds and Paul Richardson,” he said.

  The gates parted in the center and swung open.

  14

  Whenever Sloan had imagined this moment, she’d pictured her father opening the door and greeting her personally, so now she braced herself to look pleasant but noncommittal. Her effort was successful but entirely wasted on the tall, fair-haired butler who actually opened the door and who managed to seem almost as pleasant and even more noncommittal than she. “Good afternoon, Miss Reynolds. Good afternoon, Mr. Richardson,” he intoned in a deep voice that bore faint traces of a Nordic accent. “The family is expecting you. Please follow me.”

  He led them down a wide, tiled hallway with archways on both sides that opened into numerous spacious rooms, all of them furnished in European antiques. At the end of the hall, a door opened suddenly, and Sloan had her first look at her father as he strode forward to greet her himself. Since he’d had a heart attack, and since he’d been so anxious for an opportunity to make amends, she naturally expected him to appear remorseful and haggard, but the man striding toward her was lithe, tanned, and very handsome. “Sloan!” he said, stopping in front of her and holding out his hand.

  Sloan automatically held out her hand for what she presumed would be a handshake, but he covered her hand with both of his and kept it. “My God, you look so much like your mother that it’s almost eerie,” he said with a warm smile; then he added with simple sincerity, “Thank you for coming.”

  Sloan’s entire body was shaking with nervous tension, but somehow her voice sounded steady and normal. “This is my friend, Paul Richardson.”

  The two men shook hands; then Carter’s gaze returned to her. “For some reason,” he admitted ruefully, “I assumed the friend you were bringing with you was female. Nordstrom had two guest rooms made ready, but—”

  “That will be fine,” Sloan said swiftly.

  His smile warmed even more, and Sloan had the impression that her father was pleased that she wasn’t so brazen that she wished to share a bedroom in his home with her “boyfriend.” She wasn’t quite certain how he managed to communicate that to her, and she had to remind herself that she didn’t care what he thought. “Nordstrom will take care of your luggage,” he said. “Now, come along with me. Your sister and your great-grandmother are in the solarium.”

  As they started forward, a slender man of about thirty-five with thinning hair and wire-rimmed glasses walked out of a room near the main staircase carrying a sheaf of papers that he was reading. Carter stopped him and introduced him to Sloan and Paul as Gary Dishler. “Gary is my assistant,” Carter explained. “Whatever you need while you’re here, just ask Gary if I’m not here.”

  With a pleasant smile and a manner as informal as the open-collared shirt he was wearing, Gary shook hands with both of them. “Please don’t hesitate to call on me for any reason,” he said. “I’m sort of a jack-of-all-trades.”

  The solarium was a huge, octagonal glass room at the back of the house, filled with full-size trees, tropical plants, and a little Asian bridge that crossed a miniature stream. Wicker settees with plump pillows were arranged in groupings beside pots filled with exotic blooms and beneath trellises covered in flowering vines. Near the footbridge, surrounded by towering trees and white orchids, two women watched the trio approach, and Sloan braced herself for a meeting that felt as odd as the setting in which it was taking place.

  Paris’s newspaper pictures had not done her justice, Sloan realized as she approached her glamorous sister. With her ivory skin, large brown eyes, and dark and glossy shoulder-length hair, Paris was the epitome of stylish elegance in a jade linen dress with a narrow skirt, wi
de sleeves, and tight cuffs decorated with bright gold buttons at the wrist. Still and silent, her hands folded loosely in her lap atop what appeared to be a sketchbook, she gazed at Sloan without betraying any emotion whatsoever.

  Annoyed with her own attack of nervousness, Sloan concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. Since she couldn’t look as blasé as her sister, she focused instead on the ancient, thin woman seated beside her. Paul had described Edith Reynolds as a dragon, but Sloan thought she looked more like a frail hawk. Dressed in a stark black dress with a thick pearl choker at her throat, the old woman had a narrow patrician face, white skin as pale as her pearls, white eyebrows, and white hair pulled back into a severe chignon. Her light blue eyes were the only spot of color on her entire being, but they were as sharp and intense as twin laser beams as they focused on each and every feature of Sloan’s face.

  There was nothing frail about her voice either when she cut Carter off at the beginning of his attempted introduction. “Our identities must be obvious to her, Carter,” she snapped. She transferred her glare to Sloan as if daring her to contradict that; then she said brusquely, “I am your great-grandmother, this is your sister, and you are Sloan.”

  Since her attitude verged on rudeness, Sloan decided to reply with nothing more than a silent nod of agreement, which caused the old woman to look a little taken aback. She switched her attention to Paul and attacked him instead. “Who are you?” she demanded.

  This time, common courtesy required Sloan to speak. “This is my friend Paul Richardson,” she said evenly; then she glanced at her father, who seemed to be completely unconcerned by the old woman’s bizarre attitude. “I did make it clear that I was bringing a friend,” she told the white-haired woman.