Homeport

by Nora Roberts

  “Any idea when Ryan’s getting back?”

  “Not exactly.”

  They stood for a moment, each crunching pretzels and contemplating the annoyance of sexual frustration. “Wanna go out and get drunk later?” Andrew grinned at her. “Just a little recovery humor.”

  “Ha ha.” She dug into the bag, came up with a few grains of salt, sighed. “Got any more of these?”

  • • •

  Ryan’s first stop in San Francisco was the gallery. He’d chosen the old warehouse in the waterfront district because he’d wanted a lot of space, and had decided to separate his business from the dozens of galleries downtown.

  It had worked, making Boldari’s more exclusive, unique, and allowing him to provide fledgling artists with a chance to show their work in a top-flight gallery.

  He’d decided on a casual ambiance rather than the elegance he’d created in New York. Here, paintings might be spotlighted against raw brick or wood, and sculpture often stood on rough metal columns. Wide, unframed windows provided a view of the bay and the busy tourist traffic.

  A second-floor cafe provided artists and art lovers with foamy cappuccino and lattes at tiny tables reminiscent of a sidewalk trattoria while they looked down on the main gallery, or gazed up at the third-floor studios.

  Ryan settled himself at one of the tables and grinned across at his brother Michael. “So, how’s business?”

  “Remember that metal sculpture you told me looked like a train wreck?”

  “I think my opinion was it looked like the wreck of a circus train.”

  “Yeah, that was it. We sold it yesterday for twenty thousand and change.”

  “A lot of people have more money than taste. How’s the family?”

  “See for yourself. You’re expected for dinner.”

  “I’ll be there.” He leaned back, studying his brother as Michael ordered coffee for both of them.

  “It suits you,” Ryan commented. “Marriage, family, the house in the burbs.”

  “It better, I’m in for the duration. And a good thing for you. It helps keep Mama off your ass.”

  “It doesn’t help much. I saw her yesterday. I’m supposed to tell you she needs new pictures of the kids. How is she supposed to remember what they look like if you don’t send pictures?”

  “We sent her ten pounds of pictures last month.”

  “You can deliver the next batch in person. I want you and the family to come in for the exhibit and fund-raiser at the Institute. You got the memo on that, right?”

  “Yeah, I got it.”

  “Any problem with the scheduling?”

  Michael considered as their coffee was served. “None that I can think of. We should be able to make it. The kids always love a chance to go into New York and see the family, fight with their cousins, have Papa sneak them candy. And it’ll give me a chance to see this Ph.D. Mama told us about. What’s she like?”

  “Miranda? Smart, very smart. Capable.”

  “Smart and capable?” Michael sipped his coffee, noting the way his brother’s fingers lightly tapped the table. Ryan wasn’t often given to restless or wasted motion, he thought. The smart, capable woman was on his mind—and his nerves. “Mama said she’s a looker, lots of red hair.”

  “Yeah, she’s a redhead.”

  “You usually go for blondes.” When Ryan only arched an eyebrow, Michael laughed. “Come on, Ry, spill it. What’s the story?”

  “She’s beautiful. She’s complicated. It’s complicated,” he decided, and finally realized he was tapping his fingers. “We’re doing business together on a couple of levels.”

  This time Michael’s brow lifted. “Oh really?”

  “I don’t want to get into that right now.” Missing her was like a fire in his gut. “Let’s just say we’re working together on a couple of projects, this exhibit for one. And we have a personal relationship. We’re enjoying each other. That’s all.”

  “If that were all, you wouldn’t look so worried.”

  “I’m not worried.” Or he hadn’t been until she’d sneaked into his head again. “It’s just complicated.”

  Michael made a “hmm” of agreement and decided he was going to enjoy telling his wife that Ryan was well and truly hooked on a redheaded Ph.D. from Maine. “You’ve always been able to work your way out of complications.”

  “Yeah.” Since it made him feel better to think so, Ryan nodded. “In any case, that’s only part of the reason I’m here. I’m looking for a young artist. I’ve got an address, but I thought I’d see if you knew him. Harrison Mathers? Sculptor.”

  “Mathers.” Michael’s forehead creased. “Doesn’t ring a bell right off. I can check, look through the files to see if we’ve taken any of his work.”

  “We’ll do that. I don’t know if he’s still at this address.”

  “If he’s in San Francisco and looking to sell art, we’ll find him. Have you seen his work?”

  “I believe I have,” Ryan murmured, thinking of the bronze David.

  Mathers’s last known address was a third-floor walk-up apartment on the wrong side of downtown. Light rain was falling as Ryan approached Mathers’s building. A small group of young men huddled in a doorway, their eyes scanning the street, looking for trouble.

  On the line of pitifully narrow mailboxes built into the wall of the dank foyer, Ryan saw “H. Mathers” in 3B.

  He headed up the stairs into the faint smell of urine and stale vomit.

  On the door of 3B someone had painted an excellent study of a medieval castle, complete with turrets and drawbridge. It resembled a fairy tale, a dark one, Ryan thought, when you noticed the single face in the top window gazing out in screaming horror.

  Harry, he mused, had talent and an excellent sense of his current circumstances. His home might be his castle, but he was a terrified prisoner in it.

  He knocked and waited. Almost immediately the door behind him opened. Ryan shifted to the balls of his feet, and turned.

  The woman was young, and might have been attractive if she hadn’t already dressed her face for the night’s work. It was a whore’s makeup, heavy on the lips and eyes. The eyes, under the weight of shadow and lashes, were hard as Arctic ice. Her hair was plain brown and cut short as a boy’s. He imagined she used a wig during working hours.

  Though he took all this in, as well as the lush body carelessly displayed in a short, flowered robe, his attention centered on the big, black .45 in her hand. Its muzzle was as wide as the Pacific and pointed dead-center at his chest.

  He decided it was best to keep his eyes on hers, his hands in plain view, and his explanation simple.

  “I’m not a cop. I’m not selling anything. I’m just looking for Harry.”

  “I thought you were the other guy.” Her voice was straight out of the Bronx, but didn’t make him feel any more secure.

  “Let me just say, under the circumstances, I’m glad I’m not. Could you point that cannon somewhere else?”

  She studied him another moment, then shrugged. “Yeah, sure.” She lowered it, and leaned against the doorjamb. “I didn’t like the look of the other guy. Didn’t like his attitude neither.”

  “As long as you’re holding that gun, I’ll adjust my attitude any way you like.”

  She grinned at that, a quick flash that nearly overcame the sex doll makeup. “You’re okay, Slick. What do you want with Rembrandt?”

  “A conversation.”

  “Well, he ain’t there, and ain’t been around for a few days. That’s what I told the other guy.”

  “I see. Do you know where Harry is?”

  “I mind my own business.”

  “I’m sure you do.” Ryan held one hand palm out, moved the other slowly to his wallet. He saw her lips purse in consideration as he took out a fifty. “Got a few minutes?”

  “I might. Another fifty’d buy you an hour.” But she shook her head. “Slick, you don’t look like the type who pays to party.”

  “Conversation,”
he said again, and held out the fifty.

  It only took her three seconds to reach out, nip the bill with the lethal tips of bloodred fingernails. “Okay, come on in.”

  The room held a bed, a single chair, two flea market tables, and a metal clothes rack crowded with bright, eye-catching colors and cheap fabrics. He’d been right about the wig, he noted. Two of them, a long, curly blond and a sleek raven-black, sat on plastic foam heads.

  A little desk held a dressing room mirror and a department store array of cosmetics.

  While distressingly bare, the room was tidy as an accountant’s spread sheet.

  “For fifty,” she told him, “you can have a beer.”

  “Appreciate it.” While she moved toward the two-burner stove and midget refrigerator that constituted her kitchen, Ryan stepped up to a bronze dragon that guarded one of her flimsy tables.

  “This is a very nice piece.”

  “Yeah, it’s real art. Rembrandt did it.”

  “He has talent.”

  “I guess.” She moved her shoulders, didn’t bother to tug her robe back together. He was entitled to look at the merchandise, she thought, in case he wanted to invest another fifty. “I said how I liked it, and we worked out a trade.” She smiled as she handed him a bottle of Budweiser.

  “You’re friendly with Mathers?”

  “He’s okay. Doesn’t try to scam me for freebies. Once I had a john up here who wanted to use me for a punching bag instead of a mattress. Kid comes banging on the door when he heard I was in trouble. Yelled out how he was the cops.” She snickered into her beer. “Asshole went out my window with his pants around his ankles. Rembrandt’s okay. Gets a little down, smokes a lot of grass. That’s an artist’s thing, I guess.”

  “He have many friends?”

  “Slick, nobody in this building has many friends. He’s been here a couple years now, and this is the first time I’ve seen two people come around to his door in one day.”

  “Tell me about the other guy.”

  She fingered the fifty in the pocket of her robe. “Big. Ugly face. Looked like meat to me, somebody’s arm, you know. And you could tell he liked breaking legs. Said how he wanted to buy one of Rembrandt’s statues, but that creep wasn’t no art lover. Gave me grief when I said he wasn’t around, and I didn’t know where he was.”

  She hesitated a moment, then moved her shoulders again. “He was carrying. Had a bulge under his jacket. I shut the door in his fat face, and got out my friend there.” She jerked her head toward the pie-plate-sized kitchen counter where she’d laid the .45. “You only missed him by a few minutes, that’s why I thought you was him.”

  “How big was he, the other guy?”

  “About six-four, maybe five, two-sixty easy. Gorilla arms and meat cleaver hands. Spooky eyes, like dirty ice, you know. Guy like that comes up to me on the stroll, I give him a pass.”

  “Good thinking.” The description clicked very close to the man who’d attacked Miranda. Harrison Mathers was very lucky he wasn’t home.

  “So, what do you want with Rembrandt?”

  “I’m an art dealer.” Ryan took a business card from the case in his pocket, handed it to her.

  “Classy.”

  “If you hear from Harry, or he comes back, give him that, will you? Tell him I like his work. I’d like to discuss it with him.”

  “Sure.” She rubbed a finger over the embossing, then lifted the dragon and set the card under its serpentine tail. “You know, Slick . . .” She reached out and trailed one of those scalpel-sharp nails down his shirt. “It’s cold and rainy out there. You want to . . . converse a little more, I’ll give you a discount.”

  He’d once been mildly in lust with a girl from the Bronx. The sentiment of it had him taking another fifty out of his wallet. “That’s for the help, and the beer.” He turned for the door, giving the dragon a last glance. “You get tight for money, take that to Michael at Boldari here on the waterfront. He’ll give you a good price for it.”

  “Yeah. I’ll keep that in mind. Come back anytime, Slick.” She toasted him with the beer. “I owe you a free ride.”

  Ryan walked directly across the hall, finessed the lock, and was inside Mathers’s apartment before his second fifty had been hidden away.

  The room mirrored the one he’d just been in as to size. Ryan doubted the tanks for welding metal were approved by the landlord. There were several pieces in varying stages of work. None of them showed the insight or talent of the dragon he’d given a whore for sex. His heart was in bronzes, Ryan decided when he studied the small fluid nude standing on the stained tank of the toilet.

  A self-critic, he thought. Artists could be so pathetically insecure.

  He managed to search the entire apartment in under fifteen minutes. There was a mattress on the floor with a tangle of sheets and blankets, a cigarette-scarred dresser with drawers that stuck.

  Over a dozen sketch pads, most of them filled, were stacked on the floor. Miranda had been right, Ryan mused as he flipped through, he had a good hand.

  The only things in the apartment that appeared well cared for were the art supplies, which were arranged on army-gray metal shelves and stacked in plastic milk cartons.

  The kitchen held a box of Rice Krispies, a six-pack of beer, three eggs, moldy bacon, and six packages of frozen dinners. He also found four neatly rolled joints hidden in a jar of Lipton tea bags.

  He found sixty-three cents in change and a long-forgotten Milky Way bar. There were no letters, no notes, no stash of cash. He located the final disconnect notice for the phone crumpled in the trash along with the empties for another six-pack.

  Nowhere was there a clue where Harry had gone or why, or when he intended to return.

  He’d be back, Ryan mused, giving the room one more scan. He wouldn’t abandon his art supplies or his stash of dope.

  And when he came back, he’d call the minute he had his hands on the business card. Starving artists could be temperamental, but they were also predictable. And every mother’s son or daughter of them hungered for one thing more than food.

  A patron.

  “Come home soon, Harry,” Ryan murmured, and let himself out.

  twenty-six

  M iranda stared down at the fax that had just hummed out of her machine. This one was all in caps, as if the sender was screaming the words.

  I HAVEN’T ALWAYS HATED YOU. BUT I WATCHED YOU. YEAR AFTER YEAR. DO YOU REMEMBER THE SPRING YOU GRADUATED FROM GRAD SCHOOL—WITH HONORS, OF COURSE—AND HAD AN AFFAIR WITH THE LAWYER. CREG ROWE WAS HIS NAME, AND HE BROKE IT OFF, DUMPED YOU BECAUSE YOU WERE TOO COLD AND DIDN’T PAY ENOUGH ATTENTION TO HIS NEEDS. REMEMBER THAT, MIRANDA?

  HE TOLD HIS FRIENDS YOU WERE A MEDIOCRE FUCK. I BET YOU DIDN’T KNOW THAT. WELL, NOW YOU DO.

  I WASN’T VERY FAR AWAY. NOT VERY FAR AWAY AT ALL.

  DID YOU EVER FEEL ME WATCHING YOU?

  DO YOU FEEL IT NOW?

  THERE ISN’T MUCH TIME LEFT. YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE WHAT YOU WERE TOLD. YOU SHOULD HAVE ACCEPTED THE WAY THINGS WERE. THE WAY I WANTED.

  THEM TO BE. MAYBE GIOVANNI WOULD BE ALIVE IF YOU HAD.

  DO YOU EVER THINK OF THAT?

  I DIDN’T ALWAYS HATE YOU, MIRANDA. BUT I DO NOW.

  CAN YOU FEEL MY HATE?

  YOU WILL.

  The paper trembled in her hands as she read it. There was something horribly childlike about the big block letters, the schoolyard-bully taunts. It was meant to hurt, humiliate, and frighten, she told herself. She couldn’t allow it to succeed.

  But when the buzzer on her intercom sounded, her breath caught on a gasp and her fingers clenched and crumpled the edges of the fax. Foolishly she laid it on her desk, smoothing out the creases precisely as she answered Lori’s page.