Homecoming (14 page)
Will,
Don’t bother envying me the trip to Hawaii. I was met at the airport with an asbestos suit instead of a lei and was whisked off in the Muau Loi Mansion Inn SUV to the site of a minor volcanic eruption instead of to a luau. I wasn’t even offered a thermos of coffee. Turns out that the problem isn’t very serious, though, and I’m hoping to be back in SF in a few days.
I don’t really understand why my request for a loan was turned down. I thought Mansion Enterprises employees qualified for automatic loans, to be deducted from salary. Actually, that was one of the reasons I signed on with Mansion Enterprises.
Russ
EMAIL FROM: [email protected]
Hi Russ,
Your email was the first thing I found when I checked my laptop this morning. I still envy you. You might be out on a lava flow, but it’s still a lava flow in
Hawaii
.
I’m really sorry about the loan refusal but orders came from the forty-second floor, and for your information, there is no official Mansion Enterprises policy on personal loans to employees. It’s completely discretional.
Shall I pencil in next Tuesday’s squash court or not?
Will
Federica woke up lying on something warm, hard and lumpy.
What was warm, hard and lumpy?
She opened her eyes and found Jack’s brilliant blue eyes looking at her—well, one blue eye and one black-and-blue eye—and realized what the lump under her stomach was.
Last night shot through her mind and she flushed a bright red.
If it weren’t for the ferocious bolt of heat jolting through her as Jack shifted under her, she would have been convinced that last night had happened to someone else entirely. Someone warm and sensuous, a woman skilled in the art of lovemaking with all the right instincts in all the right places. Certainly not
her
, Federica Mansion, heiress to an empire and to the coldest genes this side of Jupiter.
But it must have been her last night, because though there was a bit of fog in terms of memory, and a number of details about last night were hazy, her body knew exactly what it had done. She ached in a number of delicious, intimate places.
Jack smiled. “Good morning.” He was so close she could feel his warm breath on her cheek.
“Good morning.” Federica was about to make some inane, polite comment—
did you sleep well last night?
—but luckily he ran his hands slowly up the side of her thighs and cupped her bottom, shifting her until she was vitally aware that
he
was having a
very
good morning.
By now, Federica knew what that kind of thing from Jack did to her mind. It destroyed it. Before her thoughts went up entirely in smoke, she cupped her hand around his jaw and brought his face back from where he’d been gently nipping her neck. His jaw was warm and bristly and felt perfect. The perfect jaw. The perfect early-morning bristle.
“I…Jack—stop that,” she said breathlessly, when he started exploring her ear with tongue and lips. “I want you to know, Jack—” Federica shivered when he ran one hand up her bare back, slowly over her shoulder and neck, threading his fingers through her hair, holding her head still for an earth-shattering kiss. Early-morning kisses like that should be illegal. No one on Earth would get any work done ever if they all were on the receiving end of morning kisses like that.
“Jack,” she sighed.
“Mmmm?”
Federica pulled back and looked him straight in the eyes. Gorgeous, bright blue eyes, with laughter lines starring them. He was a good-looking man, but that wasn’t why Federica found herself staring at him with a lump in her throat. She remembered last night with a pang. Nothing that perfect could ever last, and she knew that what she wanted more than anything in the world was to be with Jack Sutter, as often and for as long as was humanly possible. She had never felt this close to another human being in her life. He had slipped into her heart just as surely as he had slipped into her body.
“I want you to know, Jack,” she said earnestly, “that last night was wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.”
“Yeah, I know.” Jack nuzzled the soft skin under her chin. “I was there, too, remember?”
“To die for,” she murmured.
“Oh, yeah?” Jack pulled back and looked up at her with interest. “To die for? I had big plans for this morning. I wanted to make up for last night. I got a little…frantic last night, and I wanted to make it up to you.” He caressed her rib cage, and Federica’s eyelids drooped. “But you’ve given me a better idea.” He nibbled delicately at her earlobe and cupped her breast. Every bone in Federica’s body melted. “A long, slow, lingering death…”
EMAIL FROM: [email protected]
Will,
I’ve had three showers today and I still can’t get the cinders out of my hair. Working on an active volcano is no joke. But the situation is under control.
I won’t pretend I’m not disappointed at my loan application being turned down. But maybe
you’d
like to lend me the money, and make a big profit in the bargain. I’ll let you in on a sure thing. It’s very exciting and top secret and I’ll give you the details only in person because security is very tight.
I’ll only say two words—
genetic engineering
. Sound good? I can let you in on the ground floor of a deal which will keep you in squash courts ’til the end of time, but I’m a little strapped for capital, which is why I wanted the loan. Think about it.
White
EMAIL FROM: [email protected]
Dear Russell,
I’m glad you’re having fun.
Sorry to pass on your wonderful “sure thing”, White, but any more of your “sure things” and I can kiss that condo in Marin County goodbye.
You remember those Indonesian bonds you had me buy three days before the tsunami? And the banana futures a week before the coup d’etat? You’re jinxed, White, and the sooner you realize that, the better.
The court is booked for Tuesday. If you don’t make it, Martinez from Catering will take your place.
Will
“Here’s the stuff I want from Shelby.” Wyatt sat behind his desk and skimmed a manila envelope across the dusty, scarred surface.
“Right.” Jack tore open the envelope and scanned the list of questions to be asked of the U.S. Marshal’s office in Shelby while foraging one-handedly in Wyatt’s refrigerator.
Gun caliber. Point of entry. Tread mark classifications. Liquid incendiary agents. Car bombs. Wyatt was working again.
Jack grinned and pulled out a bottle of beer.
Wyatt watched him empty half a bottle. “Help yourself to some beer, why don’t you, Jack?”
“Don’t mind if I do.” Jack emptied the rest of the bottle and shifted some papers on Wyatt’s desk. The Los Angeles Police Department organization chart fell to the ground. He picked it up, looked at it curiously, placed it on top of the Mellon Law Manual and shoved the entire pile to one side so he could stack his heels on the desk.
“And make yourself comfortable while you’re at it.”
“Thanks.” Jack settled deeper in the chair, grateful that Wyatt’s Scandinavian period was over. While Wyatt had been in it, his house had been full of chairs you knelt in rather than sat on. Now he was in his Americana phase and the chairs were dark, leather and comfortable. “So how did the date with Mary Jane go?”
“Sue Ellen.”
“Whatever.”
“It went.” Wyatt grimaced. “So did I.”
“What happened?”
Wyatt fiddled with a paperweight, then put it down when he saw Jack watching him with a small half-smile. He held still a moment, then, uncontrollably, started drumming his fingers.
“I don’t know, it was just so—she was—” He stopped drumming and ran a hand through his long, sun-bleached hair. “She talked about mall crawling, and her mom’s latest boyfriend. She raved about Ashton Kutcher’s new movie. You’ll be happy to know that there is a new nail polish color called ‘Hot Nights’.” Wyatt sighed. “The fun’s going out of the game, bro, and I don’t know what to do about it.”
“Well,” Jack pointed out reasonably as he popped the top of another beer, “that’s what you get when you date girls younger than your Harley-Davidson.”
“Is it? I mean, she had a great body and was hinting that her new bedspread matched the nail polish, but I just…I don’t know. Right in the middle of the date, I started thinking about deadlines, and did Norman remember to pay my quarterly estimate and then…all of a sudden I found myself leaving Sue Ellen back at her doorstep. What’s happening? What’s missing?”
Jack remembered meeting Sue Ellen briefly at a county fair where she’d been elected Miss Alfalfa. The girl had seemed nice enough, but a few sandwiches shy of a picnic.
“I think it’s called intelligence, Wyatt,” Jack said kindly. “You might want to try it in your dates some time.”
“But you date an intelligent woman, and then you start getting serious, and then she’s got a ring on her finger and you’ve got a noose around your neck and it’s all over.”
“I’m not too sure there’s such a direct connection between going out with an intelligent woman and death,” Jack said thoughtfully.
“There is. And anyway, I already did.”
Jack was thumbing through a coroner’s manual with interest, grateful that it was out of purely academic interest. Carson’s Bluff citizens were more civilized than most people. “Did what?”
“Date a smart woman.”
“Oh yeah?” Jack looked up from a particularly gruesome photograph. “When? Who?”
“You remember when I was researching bank fraud last September?”
Jack nodded. It had turned out to be one of Wyatt’s best efforts.
“Well, I got a lot of inside information from the Morton Savings & Loan officer.”
“So?” Jack frowned as he peered into the empty can. He debated briefly about popping another one, then decided against it. The road down to Shelby was winding and steep and he wanted to make it back—in one piece—before nightfall.
He had things to do tonight.
“Well, the officer was a she. Sort of.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Well, I mean she looked like a woman and dressed like a woman, but she thought like a barracuda and was so tough she used
aftershave
. She gave me some wonderful tips on how banks work, then spent the rest of the time outlining how she was going to be an executive vice president in ten years’ time. Brrrr.” Wyatt shivered. “Am I glad I’m not in her line of fire. She actually talked about ‘taking out’ the competition and sending her colleagues out to catch ‘friendly fire’. I don’t need a businesswoman, thank you very much. And all the smart ones are in business nowadays.”
“Not all businesswomen are barracudas,” Jack said thoughtfully, remembering.
“Well your wife sure was.”
“Oh, yeah.” Jack stared dejectedly into the empty can, upended it over his mouth to catch a few drops, then crushed it. “I forgot. But she wasn’t really a businesswoman. Not really.”
“No, she was just greedy.” Wyatt looked craftily at Jack. “But you say all businesswomen aren’t like her? How do you know?”
“I just know,” Jack said, annoyed, hoping Wyatt would leave it at that.
He should have known better.
“Yeah?” Wyatt leaned forward, looking at his brother with interest. “Did you score then? Come on, tell all. What’s Federica like?”
Jack glared at Wyatt. “That’s not a subject open for discussion,” he said stiffly.
Wyatt was unfazed. He slapped the desktop. “Hot damn! I knew it! Come on, bro. You can’t hold back. This from the guy who told me Karen Hackensacker’s bra size in high school? You even told me all about how Samantha liked to—”
“I’m not talking about it.” Jack sat up and folded his arms and met Wyatt’s gaze steadily. “And that’s that.”
Wyatt looked carefully at his brother, and dropped his bantering tone. “Federica’s bad news for you Jack,” he said, suddenly serious. “You know that, don’t you?”
“I know,” Jack said, equally seriously.
He couldn’t think about Federica and what he was starting to feel for her, and all the ramifications. He needed to change the subject. Fast.
“So,” he said, tilting his chair back and linking his hands behind his head. “You decided to kill off the blonde yet?”
Chapter Nine
Don of a New Age.
Federica looked up, bemused, at the hand-painted wooden sign, depicting a lotus blossom and the slogan, “Take a look and buy a book.”
Lilly put a hand at Federica’s back and ushered her in through a portal shaped like a Chinese pagoda.
The bookshop was overwhelming, but charming. Delicate rice fans vied for wall space with African masks and Native American spirit catchers. Potted plants covered every surface not already covered with books. Books were piled everywhere. Not just ranged along the shelves lining the walls, but stacked on every available inch of space. There was a faint scent of incense overlaying every booklover’s favorite odor—the dusty, papery smell of books.
