OVER HER DEAD BODY: The Bliss Legacy - Book 2 (29 page)

Erica rolled her eyes, said nothing.

Given Erica’s non-answer, Christiana looked at Paul’s bandaged hand. “And you’re hurt.”

“Another astute observation,” Erica said, rising from her chair. “Now can we get down to business?” She eyed Christiana, then tilted her head. “You look a lot like her. Same bland blondeness men seem to like so much.”

“Excuse me?” Christiana looked confused.

Erica ignored her. “Wouldn’t you say, Paul? Especially from an angle. Long neck, too.” She smiled. “Of course we’d have to see her naked to know for sure.”

“Erica!” Paul gave her a disgusted look.

“Nice,” Gus said, his tone dry. He was standing, hip propped against the kitchen counter, as far away from the tableau at the table as the kitchen allowed.

Keeley got to her feet and faced Erica. “If you’re going to be crude and cruel, Erica, pack your bag and get out of here. Otherwise—and I quote—if you can’t say something nice, keep your ugly mouth shut” She leaned closer. “Have I made myself clear?”

Erica’s face filled with heat and anger. “I don’t have to—”

Keeley raised a brow. Her own temper barely restrained, she sealed her lips into a tight line.

“Erica,” Paul said. “For God’s sake, shut up.” He looked at Christiana, who appeared frozen to her chair. “I apologize for my sister. This whole experience is just overwhelming.”

Christiana was holding her breath, had been since Erica’s words had filtered through her shock and reached her brain. Not only were these two strange people her brother and sister, it was obvious they knew who her birth mother was—or thought they did. She didn’t warm to Erica, nor Erica to her. So much for sisterly affections. She quelled the tiny shaft of disappointment, putting it down to some romanticized idea of what having a sister might mean. She’d actually hoped to like this angry woman.

“I’d like to say I understand,” she said to Paul, who was at least attempting to be pleasant. “But I don’t.” She looked at the taut-faced, sullen Erica. Paul had put his coffee down and was massaging her shoulders. “And you have the advantage over me,” she added, “because I have no clue who my mother is.”

“Lucky you,” Erica murmured.

“And all we have is a ‘clue,’” Keeley said calmly. She stood beside Gus across the kitchen. “We think we know who she is, Christiana. We’re not certain.”

Gus folded his arms across his chest but said nothing.

“Speak for yourself,
sister
.
” Erica looked up at Paul. “Get the disk.” She leered at Christiana. “One look at Icy Cream and this little mystery is solved.”

“Icy Cream,” Christiana said. “What are you talking about?” Something with a thousand legs skittered across her nape.

“We’re talking about a sex tape, a third-rate porn movie with your mommy’s naked ass—along with everything else—in the starring role.” Erica spat the words.

Christiana swallowed her response as Erica’s words sank in. Her mother wasn’t an actress, she was, she was— God, she didn’t want to think about what she was. Again, she had the insane urge to laugh.

Paul didn’t move. “I don’t think we have to deal with that right now, Erica.” He sounded stern, but looked uncertain.

Gus said, “Watching the movie will prove nothing. All you know is your father—allegedly—took off with the woman who was in it. That might make her the
evil
other woman in your books, but it doesn’t make her Christiana’s mother.”

“Bull. She’s a dead ringer.”

“So you say,” Gus said.

“So will you when you’ve seen the movie,” Erica said.

“He already has,” Paul said.

“When?”

“This morning. Couldn’t think of a reason not to show him.” He glanced at Gus. “Persuasive guy.”

Erica knit her brows and seemed to think on what Paul had said, then nodded her head. “Doesn’t matter, we can still use it.”

“No, Erica, we can’t,” he said, his tone hard. “Give it up, would you? It’s over. I should never have let your ridiculous plan get as far as it did. Mace could have killed you and the babies. Nothing’s worth that. Certainly not a failing pornography business.”

“It’s not failing, all we need is—”

“Stop!” Christiana slapped a hand on the table, then stood. She’d had enough, and she refused to be drawn into the Stark family disagreements. “I don’t care about your business. If you have a tape of my mother, I want to see it. And I want to see it now.”

All eyes turned to her. Keeley looked alarmed.

Gus’s gaze came last, his amazingly vivid eyes sliding over her as if taking her measure. “I don’t think you do,” he said, his tone soft.

“If there’s a chance this Icy Cream person is my mother, I want to know.” She wondered if that were a lie even as she said it, because right now, she wanted to run until she couldn’t breathe anymore, get as far from these people as her legs would take her. She’d already had enough of her new
family
,
and by the sound of things, the worst was yet to come. Her mother.

Christiana needed the truth, so she could process it, deal with it the best way she could.

Keeley coughed. “It’s an adult film, Christiana. And even if you’re okay with that, seeing someone who could be your mother starring in it will be painful.” She looked at Gus, who stood as still as steel beside her. “Don’t you agree, Gus?”

“Whether I agree or disagree won’t change anything.”

His non answer seemed to disturb Keeley, and she turned back to Christiana. “Why not give us time to confirm things? Then—if you still want to—you can watch it.”

“Where? On the Internet after my new sister plasters it up on a Web site?” Christiana shook her head while looking pointedly at Erica. “No. I’ll watch it now.”

Erica smiled. “Get the disk, Paul, and your laptop. It’s got a nice big screen.” She looked at Christiana, and her smile changed to a smirk. “Shall I make some popcorn?”

Paul put his hands in his pockets and cast a nervous glance at his sister, then a questioning one at Gus, who responded with a raised brow and a noncommittal twist of his lips.

Keeley was angry and didn’t try to hide it. “If you’re intent on being self-serving, unfeeling idiots, I’m taking a walk.” She glowered at Erica. “I need some fresh air.”

Christiana watched Keeley take a yellow rain slicker from a peg near the kitchen door and walk out. She’d like nothing better than to go with her. Run away. Instead she sat down and waited for Paul to go and get his laptop, her heart racing in her chest.

Keeley pushed through the rain-washed hedge to St. Ivan’s and went to the bench that sat against the back stone wall of the church. The bench overlooked the graveyard. There was some protection from the rain here, depending on which way the wind blew.

A few minutes later, Gus sat down beside her, zipped up his windbreaker, stuck his hands in his pockets, and stretched his legs out in front of him.

Where his shoulder touched hers a nice heat grew.

“You’re mad,” he said, not looking at her.

“I’m always mad,” she said. “You might as well get used to it. It comes with the hair.”

He slid her a glance, one she felt rather than saw, because her eyes were straight ahead, trying to pierce the soft sheets of rain falling on the graves, while her mind sorted through the clamor and tangles haunting Mayday House.

“Care to tell me what’s got you stoked this time around?” he asked.

“You didn’t tell me you’d seen the video.”

“I didn’t get a chance. Too many people.”

Keeley turned to him. “It was Dinah, wasn’t it?”

“Yup, and money in the bank for Hagan, because knowing Dinah, she’d do anything—pay anything—to stop that movie being seen. By anyone.” He rubbed his forehead. “As graphic sex goes, I’d say all her body parts got their fifteen minutes of fame.”

Keeley’s stomach tightened. “Now I’m sad. I like Christiana. It’s terrible to think she’ll meet her mother that way.”

“She won’t.”

Keeley gave him a questioning look, which he ignored. When he continued to sit there like one of those life-sized bronze statues you see sitting on park benches, she finally asked, “What did you do, Gus?”

He held up a disk. “I borrowed this.”

“That’s the Icy Cream movie?”

He nodded. “It’ll hold them off for a time.”

“Why not just destroy it?”

“I think you know why.”

She sighed. “It’s only a copy, and the Starks probably have a warehouse full of them—plus the original.”

“You got it.” He stuffed the disk back inside his leather jacket. “And if you’ve still got room at the Inn, I’d suggest you make up another room.”

They were staring at each other, and when Keeley could get past the stunning fact she was in love with this enigmatic man, and he with her, she said, “She’s coming, then? Dinah Marsden is coming to Mayday House?”

He nodded. “I called her after I saw the video. Figured she should be the first to know. She’ll be here tonight. So we might as well go back in and let everyone know.” He stood up, offered her his hand. “As family reunions go, this one should be a beaut.”

Mace had driven to the next town, dropped into a doc’s office, and gotten himself patched up. Thank God, that bastard back at the Jasper had used a knife. Gunshot wounds weren’t so easy to lie about.

Turned out the cut was clean, more blood than anything else, but he’d lost the tip of his ear.

Now he was holed up in some place called the Homespun Motel. Both the town and the motel were even crummier than Erinville, and his head was pounding like a son of a bitch.

He should have blown the fucker away. Him and Stark. Would have, too, but a double homicide tended to attract a cop or two—and there was too much at stake.

He’d get them both when the time was right.

His gut was on fire and it wasn’t heartburn. It was white-hot fury. Who’d have thought the skinny, sad-assed Stark had it in him? If either of the Starks had balls, he’d have put his money on Erica.

He’d been taken out by a fuckin’ feather pillow!

That twisted in his craw like a dull blade. His neck heated and he looked at the phone again.

Dolan was expecting him to call, tell him his sister had died an accidental death. He wouldn’t be happy, knowing the job wasn’t done. Add to that he was an unpredictable asshole and damned full of himself.

Which meant, for Mace, the smart thing to do was keep his little fuck-up to himself.

No way did he want Dolan hauling his ass down here and getting in the middle of things.

Mace took a couple more painkillers, put his hand to his bandaged ear, held it lightly, and got to his feet. Goddamn head felt as if his brains were ready to burst from his skull, but he had to move, had to plan his next step—and figure out what spin to put on things.

Telling Dolan he’d been neutralized by a feather pillow and sliced up by some strange guy in a cheap motel room wouldn’t do much for his rep. His finding out Mace had gone through with his milk-the-Starks plan wouldn’t help, either, considering Dolan was against it in the first place. If he got wind of it, figured in the risks to the main operation, he’d freak.

Maybe dredge up enough guts to hire another guy.

One to take him out.

Mace pulled down a few slats on the blind, peered out into the rain-slicked parking lot, and for a few seconds watched the blur and splash of traffic on the busy street. Lousy day. If this kept up, there’d be one black night ahead. Good cover.

He let the blind slats clatter closed, put his hands on his lean hips, and stared at nothing.

He did not want Dolan James to freak.

Time to visit that crappy old house. He touched his aching ear again and growled. “Get this fuckin’ job over with.”

As the day wore on, Erica couldn’t settle down, so she paced. If she didn’t weigh a thousand pounds, and wasn’t so burned out worrying about the business, she’d … hell, she didn’t know what she’d do, and that was the problem. They were going down—

Paul, her, Starrier Productions, all of them—and she had no idea what to do about it.

Damned Internet, damned banks, damn loan sharks …

And damn Gus Hammond for being an arrogant son of a bitch. He might be hot to look at, but he was ruining her life. He had no right to take the disk, none at all, but she guessed when you were sleeping with the boss, you got to do whatever the hell you wanted.

Like bringing in the whore who’d messed up their lives in the first place and shoving her in Paul’s and her faces.

Paul didn’t seem to mind Gus taking the disk, or arranging for that hag to come here, seemed relieved, in fact. He’d muttered some crap about finally getting everything out in the open, then went to his bedroom, complaining his hand hurt. She hadn’t seen him all day.

Her stomach knotted when she thought again how near she’d come to losing him.
Thank God, he was okay. She didn’t know what she’d do without him.

Not that he wasn’t as soppy as ever, even about the bitch Christiana. “Kind of neat,” he’d said, “having a new relative.”

Erica didn’t think so. She didn’t need more family; she needed cold, hard cash. Not a sister who looked as soft as her brother. Miss Christiana Fordham. Jesus, what a la-te-dah name!

“Can we talk?”

Erica turned toward the door—think of the devil. At the sight of Christiana, her irritation grew tenfold. “Can’t imagine what about.”

Christiana walked in and joined her where she stood at the second-floor window. Together they looked down at the yard and driveway, dominated by the wet gleam of Gus’s Jag and Keeley’s rusted pickup truck.

Christiana spoke first. “We’re sisters, Erica. Nothing will change that.”

“Half-sisters,” she corrected with a snap. “And who the hell knows
that
for sure? Your mother was a whore, a second-rate porn star who knew how to give good head. She probably slept with a hundred guys. Hell, there’s three of them on that disk Hammond stole from us.” She watched the woman’s face, waiting for her to cut and run.

What she did was swallow and say, “I’m sorry you’re so upset. But I’m glad Gus took the disk. When I thought about it more, I decided I don’t need to see it as much as I need to meet my mother, get the truth of things. As for whether or not we’re sisters, if it comes down to it, any good medical lab will settle that question. But for now based on what Mary Weaver said—”