At the Midnight Hour (8 page)

Liz rubbed her arms. This whole conversation was making her nervous. When she’d told Richard last night that she was going to find out his deepest darkest concerns, this certainly hadn’t been what she’d meant. Good God, and the man lived with this every day—knowing someone had killed his wife, knowing the killer was still out there.... And knowing that society had already found him guilty of the crime. No wonder he was so withdrawn.

“The diary?” She latched on to this with hope. “What do you mean by that?”

“Oh, Alycia always kept a daily diary. She liked to let everyone know about it, used to say half of Connecticut’s wealthy had their secrets recorded in those pages. That’s hard to believe, though. No one with half a brain would tell their secrets to Alycia.” Blaine shuddered overdramatically. “That would be a bit like feeding a tiny piece of raw steak to a Doberman and thinking that would satisfy it. Still, there are probably some interesting things in that book. Maybe some of them would tell us who killed her.”

Liz frowned. “Surely it can’t still be lost after five years?”

Blaine just shrugged. “Alycia was a very clever woman and she liked to keep her secrets. God knows where she put the damn thing.”

Liz found herself filled with unease. The more she learned of Richard and his ex-wife, the more uncomfortable she became. Alycia didn’t sound like a very nice woman, though Liz hated to think ill of someone she’d never met, especially someone who had died so tragically. This whole family was nothing like her own, that was for sure. Her brothers would certainly never stand in the kitchen and practically accuse one another of murder. Not even hot-tempered Garret and cool-eyed Cagney, who had enough differences between them to keep mealtimes interesting.

She didn’t like this environment at all, and she was beginning to understand why Andrew maintained such a morbid streak.

“Andy’s not that bad of a kid,” she said out loud, more to herself than to Blaine. “He just needs a little attention, that’s all. Not to mention some sunshine.”

Blaine gave her a sideways glance. “Well, you two seem to have hit it off, all right.
Andy?
How did you ever convince him to let you call him that?”

“Last I knew,” she confessed, “I still wasn’t allowed to.”

“Oh, well.” Blaine shrugged. “Don’t suppose you know if my brother’s around?”

She shook her head and smiled ruefully. “Frankly, he doesn’t tell me anything about his schedule. He seems to be slightly addicted to his work.”

“Slightly?” Blaine responded wryly. “Just slightly?”

“Has he always been like that?” Liz asked hesitantly.

“Always,” Blaine confirmed. “I think my first memory of Richard is of him taking his play mobile apart. He probably would have gotten it back together again, too, except that I swallowed one of the pieces. Tough break.”

“Was your father like that, too?” she pressed, ignoring the bit about the piece he’d swallowed. She wanted to learn as much as she could about the cold, dark man for whom she was now working.

“My father? No, not that I remember. We don’t really know why Richard is Richard. There’s a sneaking suspicion, of course, that maybe they swapped babies at the hospital. You never know.”

“Well, it seems to have paid off for him,” Liz said in his defense. And all of a sudden she felt angry toward the blond playboy in the kitchen. Richard was his brother, after all, yet Blaine seemed perfectly insensitive toward the man. It bothered her. Maybe because she wasn’t ready to dismiss Richard as an oddity quite yet. She’d seen his eyes, and heard the sharp bleakness of his voice.

She’d felt the raw hunger of his kiss.

She forced the thought away, not wanting to remember that moment. She was just feeling compassionate, she told herself. Because she did know how abnormally smart the man was—just as Andrew was exceedingly brilliant. And over the course of the past eleven days, she was beginning to see just what that meant for a child Andrew’s age. His intelligence set him apart, alienating him from both children and adults until he belonged nowhere, with no one. She wondered if it really got any easier in adulthood.

But Blaine was shrugging again, a gesture she was definitely beginning to associate with him. “Yeah. Richard’s the successful one. Me, I’m more dedicated to enjoying life. I figure, there are people out there that do nothing but work. So someone should at least do nothing but play. What do you say, nanny? Wanna play with me?”

The buzzer for the brownies went off, saving her from answering. A minute later she was pulling a small pan of rich brownies out of the oven. The wonderful scent of warm chocolate wafted through the air and she inhaled deeply, not bothering to stop the sigh that escaped her. Warm chocolate. It soothed her immediately. Chocolate was definitely the key to solving life’s problems. She inhaled deeply once more.

“Mmm. It has been much,
much
too long.”

Blaine was watching her, thinking the same thing himself, but not exactly in the same context. “Are you going to share?” he asked when he finally trusted himself to speak.

“I don’t know,” Liz said. Her eyes had cleared now, the sadness of the earlier conversation melting away under the onslaught of rich, warm chocolate. “Brownies are pretty special. Besides, Andrew helped make them, so you’ll have to ask him. Perhaps you could convince him to declare a truce.”

Blaine gave her a doubtful look. “I told you, children were never my strong suit.”

“Oh, I believe you, but I’m not letting you off the hook, either. Remember, be gentle.”

“All right, all right. I’ll go up to his room and see if he’ll at least come back down.”

“Better yet,” Liz said after a minute, “why don’t you take him up a small plate of brownies and a glass of milk. Knowing him, you’ll probably have to take a knife and a fork, as well, but who knows, maybe chocolate will soften him up.”

“And if he starts getting upset again?”

“Just call for me. I’ll be right here holding down the fort. Remember, don’t take any of the statistics personally. I think they’re just his means of defense.”

“Then I’d hate to see what his offense is like.”

She smiled at that. “Somehow, I think we’ll both wind up finding out eventually. Now, on to your mission. Stand sharp, and remember, never let him smell fear.”

“Great, now I really feel confident.”

“You’re a grown man, you can handle it.”

He managed to stall a few minutes longer, but when it became apparent that Liz was serious, and furthermore, that she was more than capable of evading his advances, he gave in gracefully and headed up the stairs. Then he went and found his friends.

It was the start of a long afternoon for all of them.

* * *

The evening, however, was hardly any better. Blaine had somehow managed to reach his brother, and using whatever sort of leverage brothers use, managed to drag Richard downstairs for dinner. When Liz first walked into the room, leading a sullen Andy behind her, she practically stopped in her tracks at the sight of Richard sitting at the table. It wasn’t only the fact that he’d never joined them for dinner during her entire stay thus far, it was how he looked at the table. The imposing room with its formal table and towering chandelier seemed to shrink with his mere presence. Sitting stiff and tall at the head seat, he looked exactly like who he was—the master of the house.

It made her feel strange, a part of her wanting to reach out and touch him, if only to verify that he was flesh and blood. She wanted to feel the warmth of his skin, the roughness of his callused palms. She wanted to know the man, not the cold master with such rigid bearing that faced her on this night.

But instead, she simply seated Andy and then herself. The table practically drowned in the ensuing silence. Blaine appeared fifteen minutes later with three friends in tow, interrupting their soup course and hardly taking notice. He had barely sat down, when he began to more than make up for Richard’s lack of conversation.

“Liz,” he said, by way of introduction, “This is the gang. Jillian.” A tall, elegant blonde nodded coolly. “Parris.” He appeared to be a dark-haired version of Blaine, and grinned flirtatiously at her. “And finally, Greg.” Greg was tall and thin, nodding toward her gallantly as his dark eyes glinted with quiet humor. Liz found herself smiling at all three, while Richard looked on darkly from the head of the table.

“And how long will the Gang of F—” he tripped over the word for a moment, then forced it out. “The Gang of Four be staying this time?” It had once been the Gang of Five, when Alycia had been alive.

Blaine merely looked at his brother in blatant unconcern, then turned his attention to Liz. “We all met at Princeton,” he explained, and Parris and Greg confirmed this with a nod while Jillian merely watched in reserved silence. “Generally, we like to pop in four or five times a year, just to see how my dear brother is doing, of course.”

Richard didn’t say anything, but his jaw tightened at the thinly veiled sarcasm. The tension of the room was nearly thick enough to cut with a knife.

“I understand you’re the nanny,” Parris cut in effectively. “If we promise to be good boys, will you play with us, too? Jillian just isn’t fun anymore.”

Jillian raised her eyebrows at this, but the beginnings of a smile tickled at her cool lips. Liz found herself staring. Were they all this outrageous?

“Ignore Parris,” Greg supplied easily, as if he’d read her thoughts. “After spending ten years running around with Blaine, he’s become somewhat of a handful. I don’t think they’re a good influence on each other.”

“And just who would be a good influence on them?” Jillian quizzed dryly.

“Satan,” Andrew suddenly quipped, looking at them all darkly. The conversation came to an abrupt halt.

“Andrew,” Richard began quietly, his face impassive as he cut his steak, “you don’t insult guests, no matter what you might think.”

Andrew’s eyes shot up at this unexpected reprimand, but it seemed to be highly effective. Rather than pouting, as Andrew usually did when Liz uttered such things, Andrew suddenly sat straighter and peered out at Blaine’s group with the most benign expression Liz had ever seen. She was going to have to remember this trick.

“In answer to your earlier question, brother dear,” Blaine said smoothly, “we’re not really sure how long. Jillian had a hankering to ride the horses, and you know we can’t deny her anything. Besides, there’s just not much going on this time of year. As usual, we’ll be taking care of ourselves. I’m sure it’s not a problem.”

Richard just nodded, knowing it wouldn’t have mattered even if it was a problem. Though Richard managed the estate, the house legally belonged to both him and Blaine. Blaine, with his jet-setting ways, wasn’t around much. But when he did decide to pop in, it was generally unannounced, and he and his gang always left just as abruptly. There were times that Richard thought they did it just to annoy him. They’d all been close to Alycia. While they might sit at his table, eat his food and smile, he had no doubt what really went on in their minds, particularly in Parris’s. Alycia had told Richard she’d had an affair with the man. Of course, that hadn’t been her first fling and it hadn’t been the one that had truly hurt.

His fingers tightened on his knife, but then he forced his grip to relax. He chewed mechanically, and let his mind wander to his dielectric. It was either that, or watch Liz sitting so calmly beside Andrew and remember how her lips had tasted under his own. And realize how Blaine, Parris and Greg were looking at her, as if they, too, wanted to take her lips—

He pushed his food away. He wasn’t hungry anymore. He wanted to go back to his tower, and curl his hands around his weight set instead. He suddenly had a lot of tension to burn.

Trying to ease the unsettling atmosphere, Liz spoke up, asking Richard if she and Andrew might visit his lab in the afternoon. Richard nodded curtly. Andy piped up and asked him if he liked brownies. Richard nodded again. Undaunted, Andy promised to make his father brownies. Richard nodded yet again.

Liz was almost grateful by the time the dinner ended. Blaine and his friends took off for a roaring night on the town, and though they told her she was more than welcome to join them, she waved them off on their own. They were a little beyond her small-town speed. Besides, she wanted to get her hands on Richard, if only to rebuke him for his unenthusiastic response to Andrew’s brownie offer.

Whatever was plaguing Richard, however, was enough to keep him in his lab for the rest of the night. Liz retreated to the library for her customary night reading. But this time she stayed long past midnight, waiting for the sound of footsteps. Waiting...

But he never came. She tried telling herself it was irrelevant that she had come to the library merely to read and relax after her rather intense day. But that didn’t explain why the pages she’d been reading blurred suspiciously after the midnight hour came and went. That didn’t explain why at each small creak and groan of the house, her pulse jumped, her senses focused intensely on the sound. But only silence filled the house, and save for her own solitary presence, emptiness filled the library. At one, she finally gave up her vigil, and returning the book, damped the fire and retired.

Even then, sleep was a long time coming.

* * *

“Liz. Liz, wake
up.
”

“Hmm?” She made a noble effort to bat the hand away, but it managed to persist.

“Liz. Liz, you have to get up
now,
” the young voice insisted.

With a small sigh, she peeled open an eye. The room was pitch-black, but just faintly she could make out the form of one Andrew Keaton, complete with round glasses and a bathrobe.

“What time is it?” She yawned, her eyes still trying to penetrate the darkness.

“Four twenty-two.”

“In the morning?”

He nodded.

She sat up sharply. “Is everything all right?” she asked quickly.

Once more he nodded, causing her to sink back with a relieved but tired groan.

“Go away, Andy,” she told him and snuggled back down in her bed. “I don’t work before at least seven.”