Blue Clouds (29 page)

Feeling a pang of regret at the realization, Seth reached over and pulled Pippa from the chair. Wrapping her in his arms, he held her until she stopped shaking. She didn't weep, oddly enough, just rested her head against his shoulder and let him hold her. He supposed that was weakness enough for a woman like Pippa. All these weeks, she'd been smiling and tending his tempers and loving his son, and she'd been hiding this black devastation from them all.

“All right, I'll put someone on looking for this jerk,” Seth heard himself telling her. He didn't want any freaking maniacs sneaking around the place. “I don't want you leaving the grounds unless you've got me or Doug with you. You're not to open any of the mail. Doug knows how to handle that. Have you ever thought of taking self-defense courses? I can teach you some basics.”

Her fingers dug into his shirt. He could almost feel her gathering the strength to push away from him. He didn't want her to move. He kind of liked pretending he was the big strong male who would protect the helpless little female. He didn't get that chance very often. Most of the time, he felt like fishbait with women. But she would hate the feeling of helplessness. He understood that much. He'd been there too often himself.

She took a deep breath and stepped back. Boldly, she met his eyes. “I'd better leave. I can't take the chance that Billy might hurt Chad.”

The blow hurt worse than Seth had thought possible.

“You're not going anywhere. Chad needs you here, and I won't let you hurt him by deserting him now. I'll decide what's best for my son. I'll expect you in the exercise room after lunch, when he takes his nap. If there's any chance of that chickenshit coming near you, I'll show you how to kick his nuts into orbit. I promise you, he won't ever hurt you again.”

Amazingly, Pippa seemed agreeable. He'd expected rebellion. He'd expected her to tell him to go to hell. Instead, color returned to her cheeks, a sparkle appeared in her eyes, and she nodded with a grin of relief on her delectable lips. He could almost see her imagination grinding out the image of kicking Billy the Cop where it hurt.

What she didn't know was that he'd do it first. And a damned sight harder than a hundred-pound weakling could manage.

“Hell; Wyatt, I'll have to hire three more agents if you put me on any more cases. You want to list your priorities, here?”

Dirk scuffled through the debris beyond the yellow police tape, knocking aside larger chunks to examine smaller pieces. He leaned over to snag a shard of paper, examined it, and shoved it into his pocket.

“They're all top priority. Don't think I don't know you've probably got half a dozen divorce cases and who knows what else you're playing with on the side. Drop them. Get on these. Who's to say there isn't some connection?” Seth clenched his fists as he watched his private investigator shuffling through the remains of his office. His privacy had been invaded to hell and back. What did it matter that one more stranger poked through the shattered pieces of the only haven he'd known? “If I wasn't drunk the night of the accident, then it could very well have been caused by someone trying to kill me.”

Dirk's sharp blade of a nose came up, but it was the piercing gaze of his dark eyes that had caused Seth to hire him in the first place. Dirk could look right through a man and see the crawling worms in his innards.

“Seems like they waited a mighty long time to finish the job,” Dirk drawled. “Got any thoughts on why?”

Actually, he'd had very few coherent thoughts lately. When he wasn't worrying over Chad, cursing his deadline, and imagining a certain red-haired witch sprawled across his bed, his mind checked out. A self-defense mechanism of some sort, Seth figured. He didn't want to imagine who would want to kill him. The memory of Pippa's wild idea about poisoned candy suddenly replayed across his mind's eye.

Dirk caught whatever tic gave the thought away. “Spill it, Wyatt. If you want me to do my job, I've got to know it all.”

Seth explained about Durwood's reaction to the gift box of candy. Dirk nodded but didn't take notes. As Seth finished, Dirk leaned back against the desk. “Looks to me like the same people keep popping up here. The same ones who put the bomb on the desk could have put the candy there. Let me talk to your assistant.”

“No.” Seth paced the outer office, beyond the fallen door where he wouldn't kick debris and dust. “Leave her out of this. Just find her renegade boyfriend and nail him to the wall.”

“He could be out fishing somewhere and know nothing about nothing.” Dirk watched him. “I already pegged you as a wimp with women. She bats her pretty lashes, and you defend her until death. Send her down here and let me at her. For all you know, she planted the bomb.”

Dirk was right. Pippa was the cuckoo in his nest, as he'd admitted earlier. But he wouldn't believe her guilty of anything but faulty judgment. Hell, he knew all about that himself. At least Natalie didn't go around cutting the throats of cats and wrecking his cars.

Wrecking his cars
. Surely not Natalie? No, that wouldn't make sense. She would have known Chad was in the car the day of the accident. She wouldn't have hurt Chad. Natalie might be a bitch, but she'd never been a bad mother, not in an evil sense, anyway. She'd just always been wrapped too tight around herself.

“After that crack, I ought to let you at her,” Seth muttered. “But I want to be there for the performance.”

Dirk scowled, which made the beak of his nose more distinctive. “She's not likely to talk while waving her fanny in your face.”

Raising a wicked eyebrow, Seth leaned over and punched the intercom on Pippa's desk. She would be working in her makeshift office in Chad's room. When she answered, he ordered her down to his office.

“I've almost beat Chad's score on Monster House. Can't it wait?” Her impatience rang loud and clear through the machine.

Leaning against the desk, Seth watched his private investigator's expression with sardonic amusement. He hit the intercom again. “Now, Pippa,” he commanded in his most authoritative tone, the one that had his CEOs leaping through hoops.

“You're mad because I've beaten your score,” the feminine voice taunted before the intercom clicked off.

Seth crossed his arms and lifted his eyebrows. “Any more wisecracks before she gets down here?”

“Run like hell,” Dirk remarked as he sorted through the varying pieces of debris he'd picked up from Seth's floor.

“Wimp,” Seth returned as the impatient
click-clack
of Pippa's shoes hit the stairs.

She burst into the room, her thick bob bouncing against the pink of her cheeks as her inquisitive gaze darted from him to Dirk. She didn't have an extensive wardrobe, Seth had already noted, and today she wore the green dress with that annoying halter top she insisted on buttoning to the neck. Seth admired the pale curve of her shoulders and tried to recall how she looked without the protective covering of her clothes. The memory was hazy. He needed to do something about that.

“You called?” she asked with a slightly wry tone that should have annoyed the devil out of him. Instead, he welcomed the acid as he glanced in Dirk's direction.

His P.I. was still piecing together scraps of paper on the console and had scarcely noticed Pippa's entrance. Stupid man. Maybe he ought to look into hiring someone else. Anyone who didn't notice Pippa Cochran had to be blind.

“Mr. Ridgewood has a few questions for you,” Seth replied without inflection.

Pippa's eyes widened, but she entered the room without hesitation. Seth noticed with interest that she chose to lean against the desk, next to him. One glance at the situation and she'd already sided with him. He didn't have the arrogance to think she sought his protection. Not Pippa. She'd just chosen an adversarial stance against Dirk.

“Is he from the police?” she asked.

“Dirk's my hired investigator. You can tell him anything.”

“Hired investigator?” Interest danced in her eyes as she inspected Dirk. “Does he hire you often?”

“Often enough,” Dirk replied bleakly, looking up from his puzzle. His eyebrows lifted with the first indication of surprise he'd expressed since entering.

Obviously, Pippa wasn't precisely what Dirk had expected. Had he thought she would be another long-legged, tanned, blond California beauty like Tracey?

“Do you think you're more likely to find the bomber than the police?” Pippa continued her interrogation.

“I'm privy to more information than the police,” Dirk answered stiffly. “Now, if you would just answer a few questions for me...”

“Oh, well, if you really want to hear answers, we'd better find someplace more comfortable. Would you like some tea? I've taught Nana how to make a mean pot of iced tea, just the way my mama made it.”

Seth watched in fascination as Pippa led his hard-nosed detective by that selfsame nose. She had Dirk ensconced in a rattan chair by the swimming pool, sipping iced tea, before either of them knew what hit them.

“Wimp,” Seth murmured contentedly as he lounged in his chair, sipping tea and watching Pippa rearrange the sun umbrella to her satisfaction.

Dirk grunted and glared at his gently clinking glass. “I don't even like this stuff. How do you stand it?”

“The tea or the manipulation?” Seth asked with amusement. “Want to ask her if she planted that bomb?”

“Hell, from what I can tell, she's more capable of it than all those other losers you've got me investigating. Maybe you ought to hire
her
for this job.”

Pippa slipped into the chair on the opposite side of the round glass table. “Did Seth tell you about the candy? George couldn't analyze it, so he sent it to a lab. We haven't received the results yet.”

Seth laughed aloud. Dirk glowered.

“Are you gonna let me do my job, or you want to do it for me?” Dirk demanded.

“I don't have time,” Pippa replied blithely. “I have to get back to Chad. Shall I call George and tell him you're stopping by to pick up the rest of the candy? I assume you know someone who can get faster results. Do you have any idea why anyone would want to kill Seth?”

Seth watched as Dirk eventually reclaimed control of the conversation. Pippa's replies to his questions were succinct, intelligent, and blunt. At Dirk's insinuation that she might be involved, she didn't pout, cry, or throw things. She cut him off at the knees, turned the question around, and shoved it down Dirk's throat. Seth admired the performance. He still wanted to hold her and kiss away those red spots of anger on her cheeks, as if she might need the reassurance.

“I think you've said enough, Dirk,” Seth finally intruded. “We have every reason to believe Pippa is in as much danger as I am, if not more. Fortunately, we know precisely who would want to harm her. Pippa isn't as inclined toward making enemies as I am.”

Dirk unfolded his lean form from the patio chair. He nodded his acknowledgment in Pippa's direction. “If you'll call your pharmacist friend, Miss Cochran, I'll stop by and pick up that candy.”

“You'll let us know what you find out,” Pippa responded, reaching for the cordless phone.

Seth noticed she didn't ask but ordered Dirk, as if he were her employee. To hell with administrative assistant. The hospital should have made her CEO. She'd have slapped the place back into line soon enough. Maybe he ought to put her in charge of running his printing companies.

She wouldn't take the position, Seth realized. Her heart was in nursing. Pippa would rather run herself ragged over a little boy than hop on a plane in a power suit and negotiate billion-dollar deals. He'd never met anyone like that before. The country would fall apart if everyone thought like Pippa Cochran.

Of course, considering the state of the country, that might not be such a bad thing.

Seth sipped his tea and waited as Pippa showed Dirk out. He had the ominous notion that she would return shortly with a thundercloud over her head.

Idly, he wondered why—with all his wealth—he couldn't hire meekly obedient yes-men.

“
That
was a particularly nasty specimen,” Pippa announced as soon as she returned and sagged into the lounge chair.

Not completely a thundercloud but close, Seth reflected as he sipped his tea and ignored her opening volley. He might actually be coming close to understanding one woman in this world. Of course, this one woman had a nature as open as the valley beyond his window. He'd have to be pretty simple-minded not to notice the storm brewing.

“I've been thinking about what you told me about Mikey,” he replied irrelevantly.

That brought her up straight.

“Have your friends taken him to the best specialists? Perhaps there's some new treatment....”

Her eyes narrowed and Seth could see the lightning flicker.

“Did you think I'd let them go anywhere but the best? I've been researching this disease and—”

Seth waved his hand and cut off the coming diatribe. “All right, I had to ask. You yelled at me for not taking Chad to specialists. Now, play the part of psychologist. How difficult will it be for Chad if he grows up to be friends with Mikey and has to watch him slowly die before he ever has a chance to live?”