Sound of Secrets (19 page)

As if he sensed he were being watched, Curtis Rhett’s head finally turned. He smiled, lifting his severe features.

"Gray, my boy!" he exclaimed. "Have you been standing there long? You should have interrupted me. I’m trying to get this story in shape for tomorrow’s paper, but, just between you and me, it’s a major head scrambler. I’ll have to give the reporter a lesson about the inverted triangle. I bet even you know what I’m talking about, Gray. You lead with the most pertinent fact. I’ve been staring at this story for fifteen minutes, and I’ve yet to find such an animal."

The managing editor was being his usual intense self, squarely focused on what he could do to improve the quality of the Secret Sound Sun. At another time, Gray might have smiled. Today, he didn’t. He couldn’t.

"Do you have time to talk, Curtis?"

"For you, I always have time," Curtis answered.

Gray pulled the door shut on the off chance that some other workaholic might arrive. He took the seat opposite Curtis's desk. The other man frowned.

"What’s this all about, Gray? You’re scaring me. Did somebody die?"

Gray thought of little Skippy, dead for three decades. Yes, somebody had died. "Somebody tried to run down Cara Donnelly last night with a car," he said and watched Curtis for a reaction.

"The out-of-town reporter?" Curtis looked shocked. "Is she okay?"

"She's fine."

"Do you know who did it?"

"I know it’s somebody who drives a big, dark car."

"That’s not much to go on. Why, that even describes what I drive." When Gray didn’t answer, comprehension washed over Curtis's face like a tide. "Wait a minute. You can’t possibly be implying
I
had anything to do with it."

Something wrenched at Gray’s gut. He didn’t want to be here, in this office, with this man, implying anything of the sort. He kept his face impassive. "You tell me."

"I should tell you to go to hell, but I’ve known you long enough to realize you must have a good reason for being here.”

"Cara’s been asking a lot of questions about how Skippy Rhett died." Gray watched the managing editor carefully. "Somebody’s willing to go to great lengths to prevent her from finding out the answers."

Curtis shook his head, and he truly looked as though he didn’t have a clue what Gray was getting at. "You’ve lost me, Gray. Why wouldn’t I want her to discover what happened to my nephew? I’ve wondered what happened to him for years."

Gray prepared to answer, but found the words stuck in his throat. He swallowed and tried again. "You wouldn’t want her to find out if you were the one who kidnapped him."

Curtis stared at him open-mouthed. Then he laughed, a brittle, unbelieving snort. "Did you just accuse me of kidnapping my own nephew?" The look on Gray’s face must have given him the answer. Curtis got up, pacing to the door and back to Gray’s chair as though he couldn’t contain himself. "Where on earth did you get such a ridiculous idea?"

"From your daughter."

"From Suzy?" Curtis looked as though somebody had dropped from the sky a bomb that was hurtling toward him. Gray felt like it missed and hit him instead.

"She suspected you kidnapped Skippy and held him for ransom to right a wrong. She never believed for a second you wanted him to die. She was sure you were ready to return Skippy unharmed when he got out of your car and ran onto the street. When she was dying, she made me promise to protect your secret."

"Protect me?" The tail end of Curtis's question rose like the helium in a balloon. "You’re saying my daughter thought I was responsible for my nephew’s death? Because of money, yet? And you believe this, too?"

"I believe," Gray said carefully, "that you felt slighted when your father left the newspaper to your brother, especially because you knew Reginald had no interest in newspapers. I believe you might have done something to get what was rightfully yours."

"And you also believe I could have kidnapped my nephew, let him run into the street to get killed by a car and covered it up for thirty years until some stranger came to town and asked questions that made me nervous enough to try to kill her? Is that what you’re saying?"

Gray thought of what Cara had told him about the car veering from its path at the last moment, as though the driver might have wanted to scare instead of hurt her.

"I don’t believe you’d ever deliberately try to kill anybody, Curtis," he said truthfully.

"How
loyal
of you." Sarcasm weighed down Curtis's voice. He retreated behind his desk and measured Gray with the hard stare he used on reporters who hadn’t lived up to his expectations. This was the first time he had looked at Gray that way. "If you’re asking me, as my son-in-law, whether I had anything to do with my nephew’s kidnapping or the attempt on that reporter’s life, my answer is no.

"If you want to talk to me in an official capacity, you can do it through my lawyer. That’s Tuck Frasier. His office is on Beach Drive. And now this interview is over."

Gray’s heart was so heavy, he had a hard time standing up. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected from this conversation with Curtis, but he hadn’t anticipated the other man bringing up a lawyer. As though he had something to hide.

He walked to the door but found he didn’t want to leave things as they were, with this wide chasm between him and a man who had always treated him like a son. He turned around. Curtis was once again staring at the computer screen, seemingly oblivious to his presence.

Gray opened his mouth to say something, perhaps to apologize, but the words stuck in his throat. How could he apologize when he still suspected?

Curtis may have denied his involvement. The fact remained that he was a bitter man who had been slighted by his father in the worst possible way. Curtis wasn’t the kind of man who failed to retaliate against a slight.

He didn’t want to believe Curtis had kidnapped Skippy, but he could believe it. He could even rationalize Curtis's obvious shock at his charges. Whereas Curtis could have been devastated that his beloved Suzy had suspected him, he also could have been stunned that she had guessed the truth.

Gray turned and silently walked out of the office.

"I still don’t understand how you got Karen Rhett to agree to see us," Cara said as Gray held the car door open for her in the driveway of the sprawling stucco-and-glass showpiece that was the Rhett family home. "She wouldn’t give me the time of day in her office.”

"All I did was ask," Gray said, and Cara remembered the gorgeous bunch of hibiscus on Karen’s desk. Karen had practically gloated when she’d revealed Gray had sent them.

"I’m surprised she lives with her parents. She doesn’t seem the type."

Gray gave a short laugh. "She isn’t. She moved in almost a year ago when her marriage was crumbling and stayed. I think it’s because getting a place of her own would seem too permanent. I don’t think Karen imagines herself living indefinitely in Secret Sound as features editor at the Sun."

"Why not? Isn’t she good at it?"

"According to Curtis and my dad, she’s great at it. But she doesn't know that."

"I wouldn’t think somebody like her would lack self-confidence."

"That’s because you don’t know her," Gray answered, springing quickly to the other woman’s defense. "Karen can be abrupt, but underneath it all, she’s a good person."

Cara refrained from telling him she doubted that. Other than informing her he'd checked the hotel phone records and determined the threatening call had been made from a pay phone, he'd been so uncommunicative she was just glad he was talking to her again.

When she’d pulled the door of the guest house open that morning, she’d been half hoping for and half dreading the darkly passionate man who had very reluctantly taken no for an answer the night before. A solemn-faced Gray had greeted her, asking how he could help in her quest for information about Skippy.

That should have pleased her. It
did
please her. Without Gray, she wouldn’t be standing here at the foot of the Rhett mansion, on the verge of getting answers.

Last night, he'd asked her not to leave the garage apartment until he'd taken care of something. Had that something involved meeting with the person he suspected of trying to kill her?

"You shouldn’t tell Karen you think you’ve seen her brother’s ghost," Gray said, redirecting her thoughts. "That might not go over too well."

"I don’t
think
I’ve seen him," Cara corrected with a certainty that stunned even her. "I
have
seen him."

A balmy breeze washed over Cara as they reached the foot of the sidewalk. She lifted her head to look at the property and all she could do was stare.

On today’s market, she figured the house was worth a couple million dollars, easy. She’d gathered from the drive over that most of the town’s prime real estate was located on the finger of water that shared the town's name. None was as impressive as the Rhett’s property.

The house had a red-tile roof, a three-car garage, lush tropical landscaping and an entranceway so grand it boasted chrome-and-glass panels alongside the most beautiful door she had ever seen. Intricately designed wooden inlays decorated a door of the palest birch that, as its focus, had a diamond-shaped stained-glass window shot through with luminous color.

Even the shape of the doorbell was unusual. Instead of the usual circle, it was formed like a palm tree. Gray rang the palm tree. Within seconds Karen Rhett appeared in the doorway, looking sassy and outrageous in a short white skirt and lacy tank top that provided minimal coverage.

"Gray," she cooed, positioning her body in a come-hither stance and closing her eyes halfway so they appeared heavy-lidded and sensuous. They narrowed further when she noticed Gray wasn’t alone. Suddenly Cara knew how he had gotten Karen to agree to talk to her. He hadn’t told her she was coming along.

"How nice to see you again," Karen said, pasting on a false smile. "It’s Sarah, right? Sarah Connor?"

"Cara Donnelly," Gray supplied, seemingly oblivious to the enmity Karen didn't try very hard to conceal. "We both wanted to talk to you."

"By all means, come in." Karen moved to the side and swept her hand in a grand gesture. The interior of the house was as stunning as the exterior, with gleaming tile floors and skylights shining through the cathedral ceilings. The furniture in the foyer alone, an ornate sculpture of a leaping dolphin and a heavy jade hall table, probably cost as much as Cara made in a year.

She and Gray followed Karen through the house to an airy family room with a pair of creamy loveseats flanked by a matching armchair. It was the view, however, that stole Cara’s breath. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked a tear-shaped pool. Beyond that, Secret Sound lined the entire back of the house. The sun reflected off the blue, blue water, and a flashy motor boat sped through the corridor, leaving a splashy wake behind.

Cara had learned the sound got its name because its mouth was so narrow it was easy for the early settlers to miss from the ocean. The sound was no longer a secret. It had, however, remained exclusive. The newspaper business, Cara thought, must have been very, very good to Karen’s father.

"When are your parents getting home?" Gray asked as he settled into the armchair. He’d barely looked out the windows. Cara wondered with a pang if that was because he took the view for granted because he was used to visiting this house and this woman.

"Not for another month or so. Mother doesn’t like to stay away more than three months at a time, although I swear Father would never come home if it weren’t for her."

Cara dragged her mind away from Gray and considered what Karen had said. It made her wonder how much input Reginald Rhett had in operating the paper or whether, as she suspected, he left the running to his hard-working brother while he was off traveling the world.

Karen sat on one of the loveseats, dangling a sandal off the toe of a well-shaped foot. She'd had her toenails, like her long fingernails, painted hot pink. Passion pink.

Cara looked away from the other woman. Her gaze fell on the bouquet of showy red flowers that had graced Karen’s office a few days before.

"I see you rescued the flowers and brought them home," she said.

Karen shrugged. "Yeah, well, I’m not going into the office again until Monday morning, and I didn’t want to leave them there to die."

"What are they?" Gray asked. "Azaleas?"

"Hibiscus," Cara answered as she sat down in the vacant loveseat. Why would Gray ask what kind of flowers they were if he had sent them? The answer came to her, and she swung her gaze to Karen.

Busted
, Karen thought as she felt the warm rush of color start at her neck and creep onto her face. She cursed the silly sentiment that had rebelled at the idea of the flowers sitting forlorn and forgotten on her office desk all weekend.

She recrossed slim legs, trying to draw his attention so he wouldn’t notice the interplay between her and the reporter. She needn’t have bothered. He was absorbed in watching Cara. She frowned.

"I’d be happy to answer any of your questions, Gray." Karen smiled at him. "But I don’t think I can help your friend with her little article. I’ve already told Sarah..."

"Her name’s Cara." Again, it was Gray who corrected her. Cara sent him a grateful smile and Gray acknowledged it with a slight lifting of his brows, as though they were on such intimate terms words weren’t necessary.

"Oh, sorry." Karen shot a look at Cara before deliberately returning her attention to Gray. "I mean I’ve already told
Cara
I don’t have much to add. I’m a greenhorn in the newspaper world. My opinion means about as much as Sarah’s does. Oh, sorry again. I meant Cara."

She was probably overdoing it with the name business. Karen didn’t care. Throughout her entire life, she had come in second to somebody. It hurt her pride that she was obviously losing the Gray DeBerg sweepstakes, too.

"Actually, we don't want to talk newspapers," Gray said. "We want to talk about your brother."

"My brother?" Nothing he could have said could have surprised her more. "Why would you want to talk about Skippy?"