To the Edge (23 page)

Now that last bastion of disapproval was gone.

And it was more than enough reason to send her to bed.

Alone.

Jillian scowled at Rachael, who sat directly to her left at their table at the Four Seasons where the two of them met every Tuesday for lunch. Only today a few more players had joined the party.

To Jillian's right Lydia busily consulted her day planner and looked a bit frazzled. Beside Lydia, Nolan sat in all his bodyguard glory, and to his right, Jillian's father, face dark, quizzed Nolan about his beefed-up security measures.

"Wipe your lip, sweetie," Jillian suggested behind her napkin to Rachael, the low drone of the men's conversation covering her comment. "You're about to drool in your pate."

Rachael grinned, her gaze never leaving Nolan's face. I'm sorry. It's just... well, no wonder you're all a-dither."

"Dither? Where do you get these words?" she hissed under her breath. "And I'm not all
a-dither."

"Right. And he's certainly not Hector."

No,
Jillian agreed, and actually felt a little twinge of regret. Garrett wasn't Hector. If he was, she wouldn't be wondering what had gotten into her last night—besides the fact that she'd drunk too much wine and now had the headache to prove it. The alcohol had also short-circuited her internal wiring and killed a few brain cells. What else could explain what had happened at her dining room table? What else could account for the fact that she couldn't look at the man
now
and not wonder how hot things would have gotten if he hadn't called a halt to it.

Well, he was cool as a damn cucumber today. You'd never know to look at him that she'd had the equivalent of a nuclear meltdown in his lap. A lap that, by all indications, had been totally onboard with the course they'd set with a kiss the likes of which she'd never experienced in her entire life.

She lifted her water glass, sipped, watching him covertly over the lip.

It was nice to know she wasn't the only one caught off-balance by Garrett's physical appeal. Rachael's response validated Jillian's. Pheromones seemed to ooze from his every pore and no female was immune to them. Even Lydia was rattled around him, although Jillian suspected that had more to do with a substantiated wariness than sex appeal.

It was also nice to see a little life flicker in Rachael's eyes when she watched Garrett. Jillian couldn't help but worry about her friend. Rachael had pretty much checked out last year after the divorce. Brian's infidelities and the callous way he'd flaunted them had taken a toll on her confidence, Jillian would like to personally deck Brian for that. Rachael had fallen into an abyss for a long time. While her work with the Palm Beach society scene and the charities they supported had nudged her back toward recovery, she'd lost her spark.

Garrett seemed to have ignited it. Another sign of recovery. Rachael might be getting some of her confidence back. She was a beautiful woman with her pixie brown eyes. glossy black hair, and a body still as slim and sleek as a model's.

The clatter of crystal and Lydia's dismayed "Oh, damn. I'm sorry" wrenched Jillian's head to her right to see Lydia dabbing frantically at the tablecloth, desperate to sop up the, spill.

"It's only water," Rachael said gently when she saw how upset Lydia was. "It's not a big deal."

The younger woman stood, working desperately over the soggy tablecloth. "I can't believe I did that. It was so clumsy."

"Water," Jillian reminded her, stilling Lydia's trembling hands by covering them with her own. "Relax, sweetie."

On a shaky breath, Lydia settled herself. Cut a nervous gaze toward Garrett, then forced a smile for Jillian. "Right. OK then. Did I get you wet?"

"Dry as a desert. Now sit and we'll get someone to replace your napkin."

Across the table, Nolan scowled between Lydia and Rachael while her father resumed their one-on-one conversation.

"Are you OK?" Jillian asked quietly, concerned about Lydia, whom she'd asked to accompany them to lunch so they could discuss tonight's feature story in the car on the way over. "You seem a little on-edge."

Lydia flushed red and shook her head. "This business with you ... and whoever is threatening you. I don't know. I guess it's just got me a little rattled."

She watched Lydia's face as she shifted her gaze from her hands to the men and back to her hands again.

"Well, it's got us all rattled," Jillian admitted.

While she tried to ignore the potential danger, while she was
determined
to ignore it, there was no chance of completely pushing it from her mind. It was always there, lurking in the background like a thief prowling the night, disrupting her sleep, stealing her peace of mind. And, evidently, the peace of mind of her young assistant.

"Would you mind terribly if I took off?" Lydia asked.

Nolan's head came up at that, Mr. Suspicious-of-everything-in-the world. Jillian shook her head and turned back to Lydia. "But you didn't finish your lunch."

"I know. But I've got a final in a little less than an hour and I need to do a quick review. Frankly, I don't feel much like eating anyway," she finally confessed with another darting glance Garrett's way.

Poor kid,
Jillian thought. Working, studying, worrying— bearing up to Garrett's bullying. No wonder she was so fidgety.

"Here. Take a cab." Jillian dug into her purse for a twenty. "No, I want you to take it," she persisted when Lydia shook her head. "If I hadn't insisted you come along with us today, you wouldn't need the cab fare. You don't have time to argue. Just go. And ace it, OK?"

Lydia grinned shyly and pocketed the twenty. "Not much tope of that, but with a little luck I'll do OK."

With a little luck they'd all do OK, Jillian thought. When she caught Nolan's gaze, inexplicably soft on her face, however, she wasn't so sure she'd be OK after all.

After days of brooding disdain—both jaundiced and judgmental—she could have sworn she saw approval on his face. It shouldn't have affected her. So why did it feel as if an entire squadron of butterflies lifted off in her stomach?

"So, Mr. Garrett, are you native to the area?" Rachael Hanover asked with one of the many smiles Nolan had been trying to interpret since Jillian had introduced them roughly an hour ago.

"If the area you're referring to is Florida, yes."

It was the first time the socialite had addressed him directly since Jillian had introduced them. Not that there hadn't been a lot of silent communication on Rachael's part. Christ. He'd felt like a piece of prime beef laid out on a butcher block every time she'd flashed her sly smile and flirty brown eyes his way. It wasn't that she was overtly sexual. In fact, he wasn't sure it was sexual at all.

She
was
sizing him up, though. For what, he hadn't yet decided. Rich women. Game playing. The two went hand in hand. At least, his first impression of Rachael Hanover was that she was all about playing games.

Was he a native?
she'd asked. They both knew that while the populations of Palm Beach and West Palm were separated by a thin spit of water, an ocean separated them in social and financial status.

Maybe that was her point—to remind him he was rubbing elbows with the hierarchy. To put him in his place? Or to illustrate that he fit in just fine?

Who the hell knew? What he did know was that for I woman who was supposed to be such a good friend of Jillian's she'd seemed a lot more concerned about getting his attention than she was about expressing concern over Jillian's situation.

"Jillian tells me that the two of you go way back," he said, deciding to do a little fishing of his own when Kincaid excused himself to use the restroom.

"Mutt and Jeff," Rachael said with a quick smile. "What she did I did—well, at least I tried to do. Our Jillie was quite the star when we were kids."

"Like you weren't?" Jillian said with a laugh.

Rachael waved that notion away. "Drive doesn't make up for talent, and I fell short in that department."

"Rachael, that's ridiculous," Jillian insisted. "You were good at everything you set your mind to."

"Not good enough. I didn't make the cut, but Jillian made the Olympic team when we were fifteen; did she tell you that?" Rachael asked, lifting her water goblet to her mouth and sipping.

"You'd have made it, too, if you hadn't sprained your ankle the week before try-outs."

"She's too kind," Rachael confided with a smile. "I didn't have a prayer. Just like I could never top her grades or beat her out for the lead when our Thespian Club put on a play."

"Now you're being just plain silly," Jillian sputtered.

"Did she tell you that we even competed for boyfriends?" Rachael laughed at Jillian's horrified look. "Jillian and my ex—may he someday burn in hell—were an item the better part of our third year at college."

"But Brian married
you,"
Jillian pointed out.

Rachael rolled her eyes. "Don't remind me. I was going to be the next F. Scott Fitzgerald," she said with a self-deprecating smile, "but I gave it up for Brian. Gotta look out for
those rebound romances."

There it was, Nolan thought as he listened to Rachael self-denigrate and Jillian build her back up. The "thing" he hadn't been able to put his finger on. The "something" about Rachael a just didn't ring true. For all her posturing otherwise, he'd lay odds she harbored a shitload of resentment toward Jillian.

Kincaid returned to the table then and ended their conversation. But after lunch, as Nolan and Jillian rode across town in the KGLO news van to meet with Jillian's amnesiac. Nolan told himself that if lunch with the old man hadn't gotten him back on-track, then his gut reaction to Jillian's friend Rachael Hanover should have.

He watched Jillian across the seat from him, 100 percent! concentration on her notes and the questions she would ask during the upcoming interview. Swiping a hand across his jaw, he decided not to bother mentioning his unease about Rachael. He already knew what Jillian's reaction would be anyway. She'd lay into him about unfounded suspicions, clock his IQ in the low double digits for even thinking something so asinine, and no doubt order him to leave poor, fragile Rachael alone.

He watched the traffic roll by out the window, drumming his fingers on his knee. Between their luncheon conversation and a little creative reading between the lines, he now saw the two women's relationship from Rachael's perspective and it didn't seem quite as hunky-dory as Jillian's.

For instance, at what point does an also-ran turn bitter? At what point does second banana decide on a little retribution? Especially one who was emotionally unstable.

To Nolan, from Rachael's perspective, when Jillian dumped Brian Hanover and he turned to Rachael it stacked up something like:
Finally, I got something she wants. I'm number one. ..at least in Hanover's eyes.

And now Brian Hanover had "done her wrong" in a very public and very humiliating way. Maybe Rachael blame Jillian for the breakup. Maybe she blamed Jillian for a lot of things that had gone wrong in her life. And maybe he'd better bump Ethan and Dallas about the report he'd requested on Rachael Hanover to see if there might be some merit to
his suspicions.

Hell, at this point, anyone looked good for their
 
bad guy—including Lydia of the limpid eyes and flutter fingers. And he was checking all possibilities.

"Here we are," Jillian said as the van pulled up in front of a seedy-looking motel on Blue Heron.

Nolan stepped out onto the street and got a good look at the disrepair and general decay of the area. "Nice digs."

Jillian marched ahead of him toward the motel's front door. "Word to the wise: if you need to sit down once we get 'in his room, make sure it's on a hard chair, no upholstery. I don't want you bringing any tag-alongs back to my place."

He held the door open for Jake and Ramon, the cameraman and the soundman, who lugged their equipment like good soldiers. A roach dropped to the floor at his feet when the door slammed behind them.

"From the Four Seasons to the Roach Motel in under an hour. Dear me. I'm liable to get culture shock."

If Garrett expected her to laugh, he was going to be disappointed. Jillian had other things on her mind.

As they walked the corridor on threadbare carpet to room 414, which John Smith rented by the week, she remembered the first time she'd met with him. Never in her life had she encountered such despair.

"The Forgotten Man."

The title she'd chosen for her piece on him didn't begin to tell the story. This would be their third meeting ... and she wasn't sure if she could ever accurately relate what she felt when she confronted this man.

Rachael had accused her of letting him become something of an obsession. In a way, she supposed he was. To her way of thinking, however, it was more of an obsessive commitment to tell John's story. In the beginning, she was reluctant to admit, even to herself, that the man's horrible circumstances had touched something inside her. As a journalist, she was supposed to remain removed and objective.

When she'd first approached him, it had been all about the story. All about the news.