You Don't Know Me (6 page)

“I’m goddamn furious. I don’t know why I even come here. You can’t help me. The only thing you think about is your dick and where you’ll stick it next.”

“Now I know you’re acting,” he said softly.

“I’m outta here.” Snatching up her clutch bag, Denise headed for the door. Tension was a coiled spring inside her. Therapy. Bullshit. It was all a goddamn trap.

The walls of the corridor waved and swayed. Denise hurried blindly for the door, gulping in hot, humid, sweaty Houston air as soon as she hit the street.

She found her car by rote. Carolyn’s car. A shiny black Mercedes trimmed in gold. The damn thing could be trimmed in fur for all she cared. It was a worthless trinket paid for by sleazy perversions and false altruism.

Inside, the leather seats were slick with heat. Denise’s skin stuck like glue, squeaked when she moved. She had to get out of here and back to Los Angeles. Back to John. Back home.

She should have brought her cell phone. The one she was always losing and could never find. That’s why she’d left it in Malibu. Didn’t want anyone tracing her, didn’t want to lose the damn thing one more time.

“Shit,” she muttered, slamming the Mercedes into gear. Maybe she should drive there. Would Carolyn put out an A.P.B. on her for grand theft auto? Hell, she probably wouldn’t even notice the car was missing.

 

 

Stanbury’s Deli could have been attractive and chic if the owner gave a rat’s ass about its operation. But Jason, the manager, had full control, apparently, because Hayley had never seen the mysterious owner ever materialize. And Jason was both a bastard and a jailer, and when Hayley skidded across the semi-clean black-and-white tile floor and behind the counter, Jason sent her his coldest, meanest glare.

“Oh, hurt me some more,” Hayley muttered. “I had car trouble.”

“You don’t own a car. Why don’t you just say you got run over by a truck?”

“Okay, I got run over by a truck.”

“You really are a pain in the ass.” He snapped a towel at her, stinging her hip. “And you’re going to be out of a job soon, because I’m going to fire you.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Yes, Hayley. I am.”

She had to bite her tongue to keep from sending back a snarly retort. Jason thought he was teaching her a lesson. Well, okay, she could let him believe he was doing something good. Besides, pain that he was, he didn’t hit on her or do anything else disgustingly male beyond snapping a towel at her, so she felt relatively safe here. She didn’t want to lose this job if she didn’t have to.

“I’m sorry,” she said, mustering up her best sincerity.

He laughed without humor. “Clean up this shit-dirty floor and I’ll let you stay.”

Hayley got out the mop and swabbed away dust, dirt, tossed cigarettes, and leftover food gunk stuck to the tiles. Thirty minutes later the place looked reasonably tidy and she was filling salt and pepper shakers when her “date” strutted in.

At least, she suspected it was Mrs. Carver. The woman wore a dark blue silk blouse and white leather skirt. The skirt was short enough, and Mrs. Carver was tall enough, so that it would meet some folks at eye level. Hooker shoes completed the outfit: white alligator with at least six inches of heel and covered with rhinestones. Her hair was her own, Hayley guessed, but it had been dyed so badly it looked like yellow cotton candy. The best thing about the woman was her skin. Lined a bit, yes, but satiny nevertheless. She had to be in her thirties but the skin might fool someone who didn’t know.

Of course the whole effect was ruined by the caked-on eye shadow and black mascara and liner that emphasized a pair of slightly protruding, rather pretty, green eyes.

“Mrs. Carver?” Hayley asked.

“You got me.” She sized Hayley up with practiced ease. “You sorta look like that actress.”

“Denise Scott. I know.”

“You tryin’ to capitalize on that, honey? Let me tell ya. It don’t never work. I should know. People tell me I look like Reese Witherspoon.”

This was said straight, but for just a second Hayley almost laughed. Reese Witherspoon? Give me a break! Mrs. Carver bore a slight resemblance to Barbara Walters on a very, very bad day. Not that she couldn’t be pretty; the raw material was there. But Hayley suspected there wasn’t much of a chance for Mrs. Carver to be anything more than what she was today.

Which gave her a bad feeling. A premonition that made her feel slightly sick. Was this it for her, too? A downhill slide from Stanbury’s Deli into the depths of prostitution, drugs, and God knew what else?

The past filtered in: a black shadow dogging her heels. Hayley couldn’t prevent a sharp glance backward before she pulled on her composure once more.

“What would you like?” She gestured to the menu as Mrs. Carver slipped herself into a narrow, bloodred booth.

Shooting a sly glance Hayley’s way, she asked, “What costs the most?”

Irritated, Hayley snapped, “Read the menu and see.”

“Can I order two sandwiches?”

Leaning close to her, Hayley responded quietly, “I’m giving you a meal and fifty bucks. That’s it. You wanna do business or not?”

“I haven’t decided. Where’s the money, sweet-talker?”

With careful deliberation, Hayley pulled two twenties and a ten from the pocket of her black cords—Stanbury’s uniform. Mrs. Carver stuffed the bills into her slim, black clutch purse.

“You wanna come out Saturday night?”

The question was offered so casually, Hayley almost missed the implication. Her pulse rocketed, making her feel slightly weak. She was strong, invincible, except when it came to sex and men. She wanted to run from this situation she was setting up that would be nothing less than intolerable.

But then she saw herself receiving cheers, adulation, and awards. She pictured herself immersed in scripts and challenging scenes, working until she dropped, surrounded by people as driven and insatiably ambitious as herself. Everyone yearned to be Hayley Scott.

“Just tell me where, and I’ll be there.”

 

Rubbing her hands over her face Dinah pushed aside the hard copy of her latest article. It wasn’t due until Thursday and she didn’t feel like editing it right now.

Alone again, she poured herself another glass of wine and sat out on the beachfront deck, circling the bottom of her wine goblet across the pebbled-glass table, spreading the condensation into little droplets. She drank slowly until she was a little drunk and a little sad. Her bones felt like water and she was half-convinced that if she sank down into the squeaky cushions of Denise’s outdoor love seat she would melt.

It was at times like these—those few moments when she stopped and reflected—that she thought about, wallowed in, the ruins of her youth. She was a fraud. A total flimflam. What the hell did she know about love, anyway? Yet she wrote about it every day. Every goddamn day as if it were her driving force.

Love makes the world go ’round. All it had done for the three Scott sisters was create pain and destruction.

But then, it wasn’t really love that had motivated Thomas Daniels, although that couldn’t be said for Mama. Mama had fallen deeply, obsessively, in love, and when Thomas’s conquests had become more common knowledge than Friday night’s high school football score, Nina Scott Daniels had spent her days and nights lying on her lonely bed, lights out, claiming her despair and listlessness were all part and parcel of the trials of raising three headstrong young women.

Denise had been a handful, that was true. And Hayley’s stubborn determination could be unbearable. She, Dinah, had always harbored big dreams and planned to scale insurmountable walls. But so what? They were all normal. Healthy. Possessed of women’s own peculiar strengths and weaknesses.

Except...

Dinah gulped her wine too fast and tears came to her eyes. She coughed and coughed, then absurdly, lusted for a cigarette though in high school she’d only dabbled at smoking to look cool. Thomas Daniels. If she believed herself capable of true hate, he’d be the reason. She also suspected he was a closet pedophile, though he’d never laid a hand on her or her sisters. Anyway, he’d never touched
her,
and Denise and Hayley had both vehemently denied the charge that fateful night Dinah had been forced to bring it up.

But those glittery, lustful stares! She’d been on the receiving end of those a time or two and it was enough to freeze your blood right in your veins.
That’s
what Mama had seen and understood, and
that’s
what had sent her to the dim sanctuary of her bedroom.

Thomas had worked as a carpenter and made more than a few conquests in the privacy of his victim’s homes. He’d been a handsome man in a rough, base sort of way.

Dinah had found him particularly disgusting, and whenever she met a man with that kind of burly build, with just the right color of near black hair, with that hint of a hidden smile, a judgment on women as a whole, she was repelled.

Glen Bosworth had been Thomas Daniels’s exact opposite: aesthetically slim; sandy-haired with an appealing, studious look accentuated by a pair of wire-rimmed glasses; dry; clever; and sensitive.

And avaricious.

Dinah smiled wryly. The sun was setting, turning the water into a murky shade of iodine. It was glorious. Maybe there was more to Los Angeles than varying shades of gray, she could admit grudgingly to herself, but she still looked forward to the beauty and dry heat of Santa Fe.

She thought about her current article. Flick would like it. She was good at writing clever stories about relationships with the opposite sex, great at delivering anecdotes about failed love affairs, ones she’d sometimes experienced, but more often merely imagined. Surfacy stories. Vignettes about why
she
was mad at
him,
or why
he
went crazy when
she
did this or that.

But she never scratched beneath the surface. She was too afraid.

Still, e-mails poured in. Lonely people wanting to know how she resolved her problems. She sometimes worked with a psychologist to make certain her answers were fair and helpful. Lord knew
she
was no expert. She hadn’t the faintest idea how to make a real relationship last. If she were important enough to be researched, it might be a problem, but as it was, no one cared much about her bona fides at the
Review.

Anyway, maybe love was all an illusion. As insubstantial as dust motes. As deceptive as this silly charade she was playing for Denise’s benefit.

She looked around herself. At Denise’s house and beachfront property. If someone questioned who she was and what she was doing, would she tell them the truth?

Dinah considered. Hell, no. She could be Denise for a while. Why not? Maybe she’d incorporate it into one of her later stories: “Role Playing to Spice Up Your Sex Life.”

Oh, yeah?
She laughed aloud. Well, she could manufacture something up; she was an expert at manufacturing something up. Better than revealing the plain, boring truth.

Twenty minutes later she trundled up to the guest room. Slipping out of her clothes, she fell into bed, asleep inside of five minutes. She was so deep in slumber that later, when the tickle of air over her bare arms penetrated Dinah’s sleep-fogged brain, she incorporated it into her dream. She was on a windy beach, immersed in sunshine and idle time. Snuggling deeper into the covers, she drew the slippery satin sheets of the guest room bed up to her chin, refusing to be pulled into reality just yet.

The breeze feathered the hair at her temples—a cool, chilly breath. She couldn’t ignore it forever. Sighing, Dinah lifted one sleepy eyelid. Had she left a window open? Reluctantly raising her head, she saw the light was on in the hall.

Her heart jolted. She distinctly remembered turning it off.

Throwing back the covers, she fumbled for the switch to her bedside lamp, then bit back a scream when a huge hand clamped over her mouth.

“Don’t scream,” a very male, very low, nerve-tingling voice commanded.

She screamed anyway, a pathetic, pinched sound behind hard fingers. The smell of alcohol was heavy and rich. Oh, God. Her head swam with fear.

“I’ve tried to be fair, but you’re a bigger bitch than I even thought. You’re not going to ruin
Blackbird.
I won’t let you. So forget about that audition or so help me God, I’ll throw you out on your cute little ass right now.”

With his free hand, he switched on the lamp. Dinah gazed in wide-eyed silence at the lean, masculine face bending over her. Steely blue eyes regarded her without humor. Thin lips formed an uncompromising line. An incredibly perfect, aquiline nose looked out of place on that otherwise rugged countenance.