Dangerous to Know (3 page)

They’re already astride their ponies and doing well. Say you’ll come and ride with us, Vivienne, say you’ll come and stay at the horse farm.

Your mother’s a fine equestrienne, as you well know. She wants you to ride as proficiently as she does. You mustn’t be afraid of horses. I will teach you how to ride myself. You’ll be safe with me.”

He was correct in that, I did feel safe with him, and he did teach me to ride well, showing much more patience and understanding than my mother. And I loved him all the more for that.

A long time later, many years later, I realized he had been trying to make us into a family, that he had wanted my mother for himself.

For always. But how could she have been his forever? She was married to William Delaney, and he had gone missing far across the ocean.

Until she got a divorce she could never remarry. Not Sebastian. Not anyone.

Still, Sebastian had tried to blend us into a tight-knit little circle, and in certain ways he succeeded.

That afternoon, staring up at him, I had only been able to nod mutely as he talked about horses, tried to reassure me about learning to ride. I was rendered speechless by this man, totally mesmerized by him.

I was under his spell.

And I was forever after, for that matter.

It was Belinda who broke into my memories and my golden dreams, who scattered my beloved ghosts to the far corners of Gran Rosalie’s garden.

“Vivienne, Vivienne!” she called as she hurried down the path, waving frantically. “It’s the New York Times. They’re on the phone.”

I leaped to my feet on hearing this and raced toward her. We met in the middle of the lawn. “The New York Times?” I repeated, searching her face, my heart sinking.

“Yes, they’ve gotten wind of it … wind of Sebastian’s death.

They seem to know that the police were called in, that the circumstances are suspicious. Etcetera, etcetera. Anyway, the reporter wants to have a word with you.”

The mere thought of tomorrow’s headlines around the world sent a chill surging through me. And of course there would be headlines.

A famous man had died, a man of conscience and compassion …

the world’s greatest philanthropist. And he might have been murdered.

I shrivelled inside at the mere thought of those headlines. The press would turn his life upside down and inside out. No one, nothing, would be sacrosanct.

“The reporter wants to talk to you, Vivienne,” Belinda said more urgently, taking hold of my arm. “He’s waiting.”

“Oh God,” I groaned. “Why me?”

“Why me?” I repeated later that evening, staring up at Jack.

“Why did you elect me to be the spokesperson for this family?”

He had just arrived for supper a few minutes ago, and we were in my small den at the rear of the house, a room he preferred: It was intimate , warm, with its red brocaded walls and old Persian carpet.

He hovered in front of me, his back to the fire, his hands in his pockets.

Returning my stare, seemingly at a loss, he did not answer. Then shaking his head in a thoughtful way, he started to speak, stopped, frowned, and pursed his lips.

“Well, Vivienne,” he said at last, “I’m not sure why.” He shook his head again. “Liar,” he said emphatically. “I’m a liar. And a coward.

That’s why I sicced the Times on you. I didn’t want to talk to them myself.”

“But you’re the head of the family now. I’m not,” I protested.

“And you’re a journalist. A respected journalist. You know better how to deal with the dreaded press than I do.”

“Luciana could have spoken to them. She’s Sebastian’s daughter.”

“You’re his ex-wife,” he shot back.

“Oh, Jack, please.”

“Okay, okay. Look, she’s been out of it all day, ever since we got here. She can barely speak to me, never mind the New York Times.

You know how fragile she is. The least little thing upsets her.”

“It always has. I never even expected her for supper tonight, even though she accepted. I knew she wouldn’t come,” I retorted. When we -were children growing up together, Luciana had usually been the one to hang back, to drop out, to claim tiredness, even sickness, when she didn’t wish to do something, or if she was faced with a difficult situation. But fragile she wasn’t. I knew that for a fact. She was strong. And tough. Not that Luciana ever let anyone know this.

Dissembling came to her readily and with great ease; she was a facile liar, an expert spinner of tall tales. Her father once told me she was the cleverest liar he had ever known.

“How about a drink?” Jack said, cutting into my thoughts about his half sister.

“Of course!” I exclaimed, jumping up. “How rude of me. What would you like? Your usual scotch? Or a glass of wine?”

“Scotch, please, Viv.”

I went to the antique Georgian table near the door, which held a few bottles of liquor and a bucket of ice. I fixed his scotch, a vodka on the rocks for myself, and carried them back to the fireplace.

Handing him his glass, I sat down.

He muttered his thanks, took a great gulp of the amber-colored alcohol, and stood nursing it in both hands, ruminating.

“It’s been a terrible day,” I said. “The worst day in a long time. I still can’t quite accept the fact that Sebastian’s dead. I keep expecting him to walk in any minute.”

Jack made no comment, merely sipped his drink and rocked back and forth on his heels.

I regarded him over the rim of my glass, thinking how unsympathetic and without emotion he was. I experienced a little spurt of anger. Jack could be so cold, cold as an iceberg. At this moment I hated him, as I had sometimes hated him as a child. His father had been found dead this morning, and in the most peculiar circumstances.

Yet he was behaving as if nothing had happened. And he certainly wasn’t showing any signs of grief. It struck me as being most unnatural, even though father and son had never really been close. I had been distressed for the entire day, fighting tears, engulfed by sadness. I mourned Sebastian, and I would go on mourning him for a long time.

Suddenly, without preamble, Jack said, “They took the body.”

Startled by this announcement, I gaped at him. “You mean the police took the body away?”

“Yep,” he answered laconically.

“To Farmington? For the autopsy?”

“You got it.”

“I really can’t stand you when you’re like this!” I exclaimed, and I was surprised at the harshness of my voice.

“Like what, sugar?”

“For God’s sake, come off it, you know what I mean. So cold and hard and detached. Half of it’s pretense anyway. You can’t fool me.

I’ve known you for the best part of your life and mine.”

He shrugged indifferently, drained his glass, went and poured him self another drink. Walking back to the fireside, he continued, “That detective, Kennelly, told me we’ll get the body back tomorrow.”

“So quickly?”

He nodded. “Apparently the Chief Medical Examiner will do the autopsy first thing tomorrow morning. He’ll take out tissue and organs, plus blood and urine samples, and”

Shuddering, I shouted, “Stop it! You’re talking about Sebastian!

Your father. Don’t you have any respect for him? Any respect for the dead?”

He gave me an odd look but made no comment.

I said, “If you have no feelings for him, so be it. But just remember this, I do. I will not permit you to speak of him in such a heartless, cold-blooded way.”

Ignoring my remarks, Jack said, “We can have the funeral later this week.”

“In Cornwall,” I murmured, trying to adopt a softer tone. “He once told me he wanted to be buried in Cornwall.”

“What about a memorial service, Viv? Should we have one? If so, where? More importantly, when?” He grimaced. “As soon as possible.

I have to get back to France.”

Though he was infuriating me again, I held myself still.

Exercising great control, I responded calmly, “In New York. I think that would be the best place, certainly the most appropriate.”

“Where?”

“At the Church of St. John the Divine,” I suggested. “What do you think?”

“Whatever you say.” Jack flopped down in the chair near the fire place and regarded me for the longest moment, a speculative look entering his eyes.

“Oh, no,” I said, catching on at once. “Oh no, no, Jack! You’re not going to talk me into arranging the funeral and the memorial.

That’s for you to do. You and Luciana.”

“You’ll help, though. Won’t you?”

I nodded. “But you’re not going to shrug off your responsibilities, as you have so many times in the past,” I warned. “I won’t allow you to do that. You are the head of the Locke family, now that Sebastian’s dead, and the sooner you understand this the better.

There’s the Locke Foundation to run, for one thing, and you’ll have to pick up the torch he dropped when he died.”

*“What do you mean?” he asked quickly, sharply, his eyes instantly riveted on mine. “What torch?”

“The charity work, Jack. You’ll have to Ca’ On where he left off.

You’ll have to tend to the sick and the poor of the world, those who are suffering, just as he did. Thousands are depending on you.”

“Oh, no! No way, sugar. If you think I’m going to hand out money like a drunken sailor, then you’re crazy. As crazy and as foolish as he was.”

“This family’s got so much money it doesn’t know what to do with it!” I cried, furious with him.

“I’m not going to follow in Sebastian’s footsteps, trailing half way round the world and back, dispensing largesse to the great unwashed. So forget it, Viv, and don’t bring it up again.”

“You’ll have to run the Locke Foundation,” I reminded him. “As the only son and their that’s not only your inheritance but your responsibility

.”

“Okay, okay, so I’ll run it. Long distance. From France. But I ain’t no savior, out to cure the world of its ills. And illnesses.

Just remember that. My father was a mad man.”

“Sebastian did a great deal of good, and don’t you ever forget that.”

Slowly, he shook his head. “It’s odd. It really is.”

“What is?”

“The way you adore him still after all these years. And after all the things he did to you.”

“I don’t know what you mean by that. He treated me very well.

Always.”

“Better than the other wives I’ve got to admit. He liked you.”

“Liked me! He loved me. Sebastian loved me from the very first day we met, when I was twelve-“

“Dirty old man.”

“Shut up! Furthermore, he continued to love me after we split up.”

“He never loved anyone,” Jack announced swiftly, scathingly, giving me a pitying look. “Not me. Not my mother. Not Luciana. Not her mother.

Not your mother. Not his other two wives. Not even you, sugar.”

“Stop calling me sugar. It’s disgusting. And he did love me.”

“I told you, he wasn’t capable of loving. He couldn’t love anyone if his life depended on it. It wasn’t in him. Sebastian Locke was a monster .”

“He was not! And I know he loved me, do you understand that? I know he did,” I answered heatedly, swallowing my anger, clinging to my composure.

“If you say so,” he muttered, giving in to me, which he frequently did.

Averting his head, he stared into the fire, a morose look settling on his face.

As I sat watching him, thinking how sad it was he was so wrong about his father, thinking how little Jack had known about him, it occurred to me that he bore a strong resemblance to Sebastian tonight.

Their profiles were the same; Jack had inherited his father’s strong jawline and aquiline nose, as well as his fine head of dark hair. But his eyes were a faded, watery blue, not the bright cornflower hue his father’s had been. As for their characters and personalities, they were as dissimilar as any two men could be.

The moroseness stayed with Jack throughout supper. He ate sparingly, drank a lot, and said little.

At one moment I reached out and touched his hand, and remarked softly, in my most conciliatory voice, “I’m sorry I shrieked at you.”

He did not answer.

Honestly, I am. Don’t be like this, Jack.”

Like what?”

Mute. Unresponsive. And infuriatingly mule headed.”

He stared at me, then he smiled.

When Jack smiled his face lit up, and he was engaging, almost irresistible to me. That was the way it had always been. I smiled back, my affection for him once more in tact. “It’s just that I can’t bear it when you’re nasty about Sebastian.”

“We see him differently, you and I,” he mumbled, swigging more of my hest red wine, the Mouton Rothschild which Sebastian had sent me last year.

He continued, “You’ve always been … agog about him … so so adoring and worshipful. Look, I don’t wear the same kind of rosecolored glasses, Viv.” -“You adored him too, when you were little.”

“That’s what you think. But it’s not true.”

Oh Jack, don’t lie to me. This is Vivienne you’re talking to .

good old Viv, your best friend.”

He threw back his head and laughed. “Jesus, don’t you ever let up?

When it comes to persistence, you’re like a dog with a bone.”

“Only when we’re discussing Sebastian Locke,” I countered.

“Well, one thing is certain, your loyalty is commendable, sugar.”

“Thanks. And stop calling me sugar in that awful tone of voice.

You know I hate it. You do it just to get my goat.”

He grinned, reached out and squeezed my hand. “mice?”

“‘Ihice,” I agreed and as quickly as I had when we were children.

We spoke about other matters for a short while after this. About Fance, Provence to be exact, and our respective homes there, houses which Sebastian had given us at different times. Although I did not dare remind him of this. It was obvious to me that he was as unrelenting about his father in death as he had been during his lifetime. Jack had never given Sebastian the benefit of the doubt, nor apparently did he intend to do so now. When it was too late, anyway.

It was when we returned to the den to have coffee that Jack suddenly started to talk about the circumstances of Sebastian’s death once again.

Settled in an arm chair, with his coffee and cognac on a small side table next to him, he said, “The police had me check through his things.