Target (18 page)

“S
he's avoiding us,” Aurelie said of Delia. “I'm not imagining that, am I?”

“No,” Nick said. “And her timing couldn't be worse.”

“You mean time's running out, don't you?” Aurelie said, walking beside him through Place Lafource, heading for the conservatory and the pool area beyond.

Nick had to be tired. Aurelie's eyes felt gritty and she couldn't get Sarah, or the hours of talk the three of them had shared, out of her head. After that, the night had been short before Nick returned to pick her up again. She was grateful Sarah had opted to sleep in rather than face another potential confrontation with Delia first thing this morning.

“Keep your voice down,” Nick said. They stepped into the misty, palm-filled conservatory.

Aurelie's irritation got away from her. “It is down. He didn't give me the hour, but by my figuring, we've got three days and two nights before that rotten man figures out another way to get at one of us.”

“Where the hell is she?” Nick asked. In daylight, the pool was clearly visible from the windows. “Sabine said she'd gone out there. I don't see any chairs. I don't see Delia.”

“Did you hear what I said?” Aurelie asked.

Nick leaned on a copper window frame. “Yes, I heard. And I shouldn't feel mad at you, but I feel mad at everyone, including you. Nothing's moving fast enough, and it's got to. I'm not waiting around for other people to act anymore.”

His phone rang and he looked at the readout before excusing himself and walking away through the palms.

Aurelie listened. Why should he think she'd shut her ears just because he signaled the call was private?

The “Yes, yes, thanks. I got your message. Thanks for getting back to me again. Okay, see you then,” didn't give any clues about either the caller or the reason for the call. Funny how she'd almost stopped factoring in the ordinary matters of life. She expected any conversation to be significant.

Nick came back. He looked at her intently, so much so that she almost turned away. “Quit worrying,” he told her. “And I don't mean I think you can shut everything off, but victims are just that. You're no victim. Not one of us is a victim.”

“I know,” she said. “But wouldn't it be great if all of this would just go away?”

“No,” he said. “My mother was murdered. That doesn't get to go away. Plus, it can't suddenly be a coincidence that unwanted company arrived in Pointe Judah not even three weeks after the grave was found.”

“I'm sorry, Nick.”

“No, I am.” He looked at her face, then did a quick study of her feet and back. “Even when you're tired you look great. I resent not being able to concentrate on you.”

Aurelie took in a shaky breath. “Don't say that.”

“Why not? It's true.” The corners of his mouth turned up and she got a shadowed blue stare. “I knew a long time ago that I wouldn't be able to keep on pretending with you. Thank God I don't have to anymore. You know how I feel, and you know what I'm thinking right now, just looking at you.”

She ought to be slicker than she was, more ready with a comeback, but anything she said would probably give her away. Wanting him consumed her.

“Don't you have anything to say?” he asked softly. “How long are you going to make me wait?”

“Wait?”

“Before we can stop playing brother and sister.”

If she could look at him without wanting to kiss him, it would help. Learning to dislike him would be even better. But everything about Nick made her ache with longing.

“Aurelie?”

“You're going too fast for me,” she said.

“Sixteen, almost seventeen years is fast?”

She wouldn't tell him, but it felt as if they'd always been together. This was a scary time, being afraid to let things happen with them when they'd already gone too far to turn back.

Seeing Sarah look at Nick as she had in the night had buckled Aurelie's confidence in being able to cope with the situation. She and Nick hadn't discussed it, but he must know, he must have felt Sarah's reactions to him. And if she had seen the moment when Sarah wondered what he was doing at Aurelie's apartment when he had supposedly gone home, then so had he. Any suspicion had been neatly snuffed out when Nick explained the events of the night, but Aurelie didn't want to repeat the experience.

“Are you working today?” he asked.

“Yes. I'm looking forward to it. It gets too busy for me to think about anything but making sure merchandise that still belongs to us stays in the store.”

“Shoplifting?”

“Not a lot, but enough.”

“What time do you get off?”

Nick's unflinching look made it impossible for her to concentrate on avoiding the question.

“Around six,” she said.

“I'll pick you up.”

“Nick—”

“How many times have you been running since you got back?”

She frowned. “I…haven't. It's been busy, Nick.”

“We'll run late this afternoon. It'll be good for both of us. We'll have to take it easy because of—” He waved a hand toward her. “I don't want you to do more than you should.”

She could fight him now or fight him later. Later sounded better.

Early sun through a window caught the face on his black watch. His forearms were strongly muscled, his hands broad and capable in appearance. Nick's skin had a permanent tan, and his presence felt solid, rugged. He was a physically big man but his very presence took up a lot of space. Aurelie smiled at him and he raised an eyebrow in question.

“I was thinking you don't change a lot,” she said, caught off guard. “You're bigger, stronger, more mature…maybe even smarter, although you must have been brilliant all along. You used to tell us you were.” She had to grin. “But you're comfortable with yourself. You were confident even when I first knew you and I like that.”

“Thanks. I think,” he said. But he returned her smile. “Hmm. You don't change, either. And you're more mature, I guess. I'm not ready to commit myself on the other stuff.”

She'd have to think about that—later. “So, what do we do about Delia? She isn't out there but she must have told Sabine to say she was.”

“Which means she's definitely avoiding us,” Nick said. “Which means we're definitely going to track her down.”

He opened a door and stepped outside. Aurelie followed. A walk past rose beds and well-tended shrubs led straight to the pool where a white marble wall surrounded turquoise water. A disturbing fountain, a Minotaur wound about with sinuous snakes, gushed water in the center, and urns built into the wall spilled flowers in full bloom.

The only human in sight was Ed Webb, who waved and went back to cleaning the pool.

“This is a waste of time,” Nick said. “The cabana's all closed up, too.”

Delia liked the doors in the low stone pool building to stand open so diaphanous curtains the color of the water could billow. Shocking-purple bougainvillea loaded the tile roof and made an unreal contrast to the white walls.

“Just a minute,” Aurelie said. She sprinted away from Nick and around the pool to the nearest cabana door, which she opened. A look inside proved her hunch. Delia's auburn hair showed above the back of a white wicker chaise.

Chairs, sofas and chaises stood in groups. Showers and changing rooms occupied a twin wing of the cabana.

Aurelie stuck her head back through the door and waved at Nick. She beckoned for him to come.

“You found me,” Delia said, not turning around. “I knew it was too much to hope you wouldn't.”

“Hi, Delia,” Aurelie said. Nick arrived and she rolled her eyes at him. “Nick and I make a special trip to spend time with you and look what we get. You try not to see us.”

Nick closed the door behind them and put a hand on Aurelie's shoulder to steer her across the long room. “Hey, Delia. Did you have breakfast yet?”

“Hours ago,” she said, raising an arm straight up and wiggling her fingers at them. “I'm not trying to avoid you. Even iron ladies need refuge from time to time.”

Sticking close together, Nick and Aurelie skirted the chaise and pulled up chairs. “We've got some questions for you,” Nick said and Aurelie heard how he hurried the words out.

A simple pink blouse and jeans were unusual garb for Delia. Her makeup was as ever—perfect—and her hair glorious. “I didn't think you were coming to tell me how much you love me,” she said. “I've got a question or two of my own.”

Delia chuckled, and her serious expression was transformed—only to dissolve into horror. “My God, Aurelie. Your face. Your face! What's happened?”

“I was attacked by a man. Last night outside this house.”

Delia's hands fluttered. “Why didn't I know this before now? Oh, my poor girl.”

“I'm going to be all right,” Aurelie said. “It's superficial, but—”

“But we need to fill you in,” Nick said and told her the entire story, including everything that had been said to Matt. “I think we'll all feel better now,” he finished.

“Yes,” Delia said, subdued. “I'm glad they insisted on the doctor, Aurelie. I suppose you've already had to give up the briefcase, Nick. Did you get a chance to look at whatever Baily was experimenting with?”

Nick gave her a half smile. Growing up with the highly competitive Boards would have taught Delia the art of quick recovery and early attack. “I looked,” he said. “Simple stuff really and she wasn't very far along with it. Remember the formula we decided we'd call WB Forever Forty?”

Aurelie looked blank.

“An old idea,” Nick said to her. “A bit like the stuff you can use on cracked china to fill in the crazes, only this fills in skin lines. We think our product is going to be very successful. Apparently, Baily was taking it apart so she could put it back together. I assume under another label and with a few tweaks.”

“Like filling in china cracks?” Aurelie said, wrinkling her nose. “You're kidding? What happens when the person moves her face?”

Nick rested a hand on top of his head and grinned at her. “The skin doesn't fall apart again, if that's what you're thinking. The formula works well.”

“It's Nick's baby,” Delia said speculatively. “I wonder if that made it even more appealing for Baily to rip off.”

Aurelie felt sorry for Nick. “Sounds to me as if she knew a good thing when she saw it and it wouldn't have mattered who invented it.”

“Thank you for that,” Nick said. She touched him in so many ways, big and little. And even if she thought she didn't, she showed she cared about him.

Delia didn't seem convinced. “If she was stealing for someone else, it could have had something to do with her death.”

“You're looking for escape hatches,” Nick said, knowing just how she felt. “I've told Matt Boudreaux about it and it's duly noted.”

“WB Forever Forty?” Aurelie gave him one of her puzzled squints. “That's what you're going to call it? It's awful.”

“The idea—” he told her patiently “—and we weren't serious about the name—was that for the older women the thought of never looking a day over forty would be appealing.

“Delia, let's get back to the main topic. I know I haven't pushed you on this, but I've got to now. With the letter my mother sent for me, there was one for you, as well. That wasn't with mine in the safe, was it?”

Delia's high cheekbones flamed. She shook her head, no, lowered her eyelashes and gave a shuddering sigh. “I should have taken the three of you out of the country back then. I could have married that man with a villa outside Rome—he just about had his own army, you know—and you'd have had private tutors. I could have run the business from there and none of this would ever have become an issue.”

Nick looked at Aurelie. She leaned forward in her chair and said, “You hated the Roman and so did we. You said he wanted your money, I remember that clearly.”

“Rubbish,” Delia said. “He had plenty of money.”

“Could we get our feet back on earth?” Nick said. “You can't hide three people forever. Concentrate on the letter. You didn't say what was in it but you must have read it. Mom asked you some things, didn't she? Like whether or not you could take in three kids you'd never seen before?”

“I would have done anything she asked of me,” Delia said. “She had a horrible time of it but she never felt sorry for herself.”

Nick's gut contracted. “You said you'd tell me about her life when the time was right. You still haven't done that. But…” He couldn't allow himself to be diverted again. “We need that letter to you from my mother. With the other one missing, it's all we've got and there could be a clue in it.” And he wanted to read it anyway, to see his mother's writing and imagine what she'd been thinking when she sent them off that evening.