Games of the Heart (Crimson Romance) (13 page)

“But you want to get to know her better?” Cat and mouse had begun.

“Yes, I do. How about you? What do you know of her?”

I sipped the Brazilian brew of the day. “I’m just filling in, you know.” I took another sip and added, “She’s respected here in Vegas, right?”

“Depends who you ask.” He took out a notebook and jotted something I couldn’t see, then held it in a way that concealed the writing. “Who should I ask?” He frowned. “Your minister seems to know her well.”

“My minister? Pastor Bob? Why?” I knew my foot was jiggling beneath the table at the same beat as my pulse, which was far too fast. “Lots of people like her and yes, Pastor Bob seems to be part of her fan club.” Better jiggling the foot on the floor than in my mouth.

“Jane,” he said and again touched my forearm. The fingers were cold.

This wasn’t a sensual caress, but a way of telling me he was concerned. Or I could have been way off base, or I was being played as a fool. The votes came in that it was the last on the list. “Yes?” I pulled my arm away. I could feel his fingers on me and while I didn’t hate it, I was not naïve. People in all walks of life, especially journalists, use whatever talents they have to get information or to get something. Maybe this was the beginning of flirting with little old me to get whatever real facts and assorted info I had on Cheney, which was nil, in order to do whatever journalists and writers did with tidbits that could be turned into innuendos. Even rumors make good stories. Hey, look at TMZ.

“Can we talk off the record?”

“I’m a minister, Carl. I’m sworn to keep all my conversations that do not do any bodily or emotional harm to anyone off the record. So shoot.”

“I’m curious about this.”

“What is ‘this’?” Was “this” something that involved my senior pastor? He might have too many irons in the fire, which meant that he delegated a lot, even stuff that shouldn’t be, especially since I was to “captain” the dance and had only one day, excluding the weekend, to put together Vacation Bible School. But basically, everyone seemed to think Pastor Bob was an okay guy.

“You already know.” He looked at me and then down at the table.

If I were older I would have attributed the heat on my cheeks to a hot flash, or if I were younger, to girly mortification. Now I just squirmed and felt warm. “I do?” Then it dawned on me as I remember the lustful longing look Petra had given him at that dance class. She had feelings for him. Serious ones. Was she somehow using him, with her womanly charms, to find out about the PSA’s work or even to muddy the PSA’s reputation if a respected journalist did a story on the organization? Had she told Carl what she’d told me? How naïve to think I’d been her only confidant. Could he know about the scandal, pondering if breaking this story would get him a Pulitzer for scooping the crime story of the decade? Or snuggled in the arms of his ladylove?

“So you know why Petra is here in Vegas and her link with PSA? How she’s vowed to ruin the organization?” I said, watching his eyes become squinty slits, then get bigger. And bigger. Then his mouth opened. There should have been recognition in his mannerisms, rather than shock just hanging there. I stopped breathing. I don’t know how you feel about the Rapture, but at that second I wanted it. Then. Right then.

“Actually,” he said, and I could almost see him willing his hands to be steady as he brought out his notebook again and inched his chair closer to mine. “What I wanted to talk to you about can wait now.”

“What?” My fingers covered my lips, covering the trembling. “Tell me what you wanted to talk about,” I managed, with a demand that came in a whisper.

“It’s … well, it doesn’t matter now. Okay, I heard that you were heading up the ‘Dancing with Vegas Stars’ and I was assigned to do some goody-two-shoes feature on charities.” His knuckles were white, the only giveaway to any person with eyes that I’d just stepped too deep into you-know-what.

“Oh.” I was attempting to think fast. Never my forte.

He took a slug of the muck at the bottom of his cup. “Sure, I heard the rumors that the faith-based service might be involved in money-back guaranteed adoptions. What does the Cheney woman have to do with this? It’s the national level PSA, isn’t it?” Now he was whispering, but the words hurt my ears.

“Wasn’t it in the paper today?” I looked around; we were nearly alone. The baristas were busy flirting, and the few other customers were on their cells.

“Nothing on this. Tell me why Petra is involved.” His hand was on my bare forearm, clamped on. We both looked at it and then at each other.

“Then it has to be the TV news? Terrible things going on in our world.” My voice came out in a squeaking flutter.

“Not on the news.” Then he released my arm, exhaled, and put his face in his hands. I saw him sigh, a ragged one.

I couldn’t even reach for the coffee. Everything stopped. The secrets Petra had confided in me had now been blurted to a newspaper reporter, albeit the man with whom she was smitten.

“I thought there was more. Thought there was a real reason,” he said in a whisper, as if he were talking to himself. He seemed to be trying to smile, but the corners of his mouth pulled down.

“What real reason?”

“Petra doesn’t trust me. She’s involved. She’s kept this whole thing from me because she does not have faith me.” He looked straight ahead. “I know she’s stunning, smart, and worldly. I’m the guy who thinks a good time is a six-pack of beer, pretzels, and onion dip along with a football game. When I’m wild I get pizza delivered. She likes the opera and ballet. She knows about books and goes to lectures. For me, camping is a vacation. I worked three jobs to get through college, a state college, on a low-income loan, and only made it because, oh, man, I’ve tried to live this down. I’m a halfway decent bowler. Imagine going to college on a bowling scholarship. That’s below any geek status. She didn’t have to come right out and shout that she doesn’t trust me. She asked for your help, didn’t she? What’s the Bible say about actions speaking louder than words? Or is that Bruce Springsteen?”

“I offered to help Petra.”

He grabbed my arm again. I’d have to make a mental engraving to keep it away from him, and why, oh, why didn’t eligible men want to grab my arm or all of me, instead of those who were distraught.

“Listen, Pastor Jane. Tell me the truth. You’re a minister, you don’t lie, right? You wouldn’t lie to cover stuff up, would you?”

I wanted to plead temporary insanity, be dragged away muttering the ingredients to banana nut bread, because I’d just spilled the beans and the goo was so thick, it oozed into my lap. I blinked and I was still in Starbucks. “What do you need to know?”

“She’s using me, isn’t she? Digging for info on the PSA? Getting me to snoop? Hey, don’t get me wrong, Jane, I’d do it if I thought that there was dirt to dig on Cheney or the adoptions weren’t legit. But there’s nothing I have seen. Oh, you don’t need to say it. Petra’s just using me. It’s true, I can see it in your eyes. What an easy con I’ve been.”

“Carl, don’t be a brainless twit.”

“Could I be more of a jerk than I already am?” He slapped a hand on the table. “Petra was the first woman to ever look at me like she does. I’m a dork. I fall over myself when I’m with women unless I’ve got this dumb reporter’s notebook in my hands. You want to know what’s ironic? The first time I felt like this in my whole stinking life, and I had to do it with someone who saw me as a big fat sucker. I’m usually the one who uses women, but forget that. Petra flirted and I gobbled it up. Just so I’d look into the PSA.”

He started to get up, but no way was I going to let him go.

“Stop it. Drop it. Listen up.” I pulled his arm this time. Good and hard, too. He wasn’t leaving Starbucks until we straightened this out. “I’ve seen her looking at you when you were not looking at her. You can’t fake that gooey glow in her eyes. The girl likes you. So stop being a jerk on this, will you?”

“You think she does?” A glint? Anticipation to know? I had to fuel it.

“I know that look, my friend. I don’t know everything that happened to Petra or what the entire situation is — I just learned about it — but let me tell you something. I know love. I’ve been in love. I’ve seen it on the faces of couples I’ve married, seen it on the faces of those who are afraid to take that step. You cannot pretend to be in love, or the beginnings of it, as Petra is with you.”

“Why didn’t she tell me? Why did she tell
you
?” He stood, looked me up and down and not in a good way, and you know what I mean. I thought he was going to try to leave, but then he shook his head. “Get you more coffee? Anything? You ate that muffin pretty quick.”

I shook my head. Of course I ate it in three bites. Which made sense at the time since with a muffin in my mouth there was less chance of me saying more stupid things. “I’m a minister. People trust me. Here’s a news flash, Mr. Reporter. Why don’t you see if she’ll tell you her whole story, everything she told me? Don’t blurt it out over the cell phone or in a public place, but just the two of you alone. Talking. Ask her why she’s really here in Las Vegas.”

“Will this work?”

“Carl, were you raised by male wolves? Women talk, in case you were, about everything, including feelings, and if she’s to be special, you need to understand what she’s feeling right now. If that’s fear, okay. If it’s hatred, okay, too. Ask her to trust you more, or enough to share her burdens.” I sighed. “You’re a big guy. You don’t need to solve her problems, but you do have to listen.”

“Can I find out about the mission to destroy Cheney? And why she’s seeing me?”

“Try a less direct route.”

“What if she tells me it’s because I am a reporter?”

“Then you’ll know. You’ll understand her situation, and make the decision to help her or let her help herself. The truth will set you free, you know?”

“What if the truth hurts?” He put on the sunglasses.

I handed him my card with my cell number scribbled on the bottom. “If you need to talk, or if I can help, let me know.”

He nodded. Petra’s goo-goo eyes for him might just be a ploy. It had happened before. So I added one more worry to my kettle of colicky crocodiles as I headed home. I mumbled something like, “God doesn’t give us more than we can deal with,” and tried to pretend life did have happy endings. So when I turned the corner to see a half dozen squad cars in front of my condo, I felt certain I could handle it. Yeah, right.

• • •

I tried to convince myself those cop cars were not in my driveway, that they were after the neighbors with the garage band that played past midnight. Or came to visit the parents of the skateboarders who had erected a ramp in my cul-de-sac. Or that Mrs. Bates, ancient and so nasty the skateboarders feared her, had gotten locked out again.

But it’s tough to kid yourself when your front door is wide open and a uniformed officer is talking with your grandfather. Harmony sat on the curb, her arms circling her knees, which were touching her chin.

I parked across the street, since Las Vegas’s finest were hogging the drive, the middle of the street, and the curb. I was an adult, and I had to do grown-up things so I got out of the car. Besides, Gramps saw me.

I waved to him, walked to the curb, and sat next to Harmony. I opened my arms. If Harmony was bent on rejection, it’d be okay, but I wanted her to know I cared, whatever had happened.

“It’s Tuffy,” she sobbed, folding her skinny frame into my well-padded embrace.

“He’s not … ” I couldn’t get the word “dead” out. “What’s happened?”

“He’s, he’s, he’s okay,” she wailed in a slobbery stutter.

Good, the mangy mix was fine, but why were cops at my homestead? And why was Harmony, under my current protection as her temporary foster parent for the great State of Nevada, sobbing her heart out. “You’d better explain, honey.” I reached into my tote bag for a pack of tissues.

“They’re taking me to jail. They told me to sit here until a female officer comes. Oh, Pastor Jane, it’s all a big lie.”

Gee, that wasn’t a new line, as in fact I’d used it before. “I’m sure this can be straightened out,” I started to say just as a limo parked in the middle of the street, blocking the road even more. The driver, whom I knew from a Chippendale’s billboard I passed each day on the way to church, opened the door for a woman who was dressed for New York City’s Fifth Avenue instead of Calle del Rancho in Las Vegas, Nevada.

I watched as one manicured part of her body after another glided toward the two of us. I have no idea about designer labels, but the coral suit looked like silk, and her scarf fluttered in the sweltering breeze. Her hair was long and taffy colored, and diamonds the size of my thumbnails studded her ears. I’m never good at guessing ages, although that doesn’t stop me, but she had at least ten years and Botox on me.

“You are a common thief.” Was she pointing at Harmony or me? It really didn’t matter. “You are the one who stole Over the Silver Moon’s Playful Platinum and Gold. Good, the police are here. Park the car, Oscar then get the dog.”

If she was trying to be Cruella DeVille, of
101 Dalmatians
infamy, it was letter perfect, minus the Brit accent. She pointed at us. “Arrest her. I order it,” she added, shaking that finger toward the cloudless sky.

Harmony’s body was pulsating with sobs, and yet she pulled me close to whisper, speaking more words in a row, than in all the time I’d know her.

“I didn’t steal Tuffy. He’s mine. I love him, but I didn’t take him from anyone. I never lie, Pastor. Ever, even when the police came for my father. I told them where they could find him. I hated that, but I don’t lie. I found Tuffy drinking from a puddle near the homeless shelter where we serve lunch, where the church ladies go every day and I help out.”

I got up. I’d heard plenty. No one would take away that mutt, the only thing Harmony could count on in her tenuous existence. “Listen up and listen good, madam. Let’s talk with the authorities before we start shouting about arrests.” I grabbed Harmony’s hand, and we trotted toward the house. I could feel Cruella’s self-righteous breath on my back.