Charon's Landing (8 page)

Mercer was watching him slink back through the center set of French doors when he saw her. Her back was toward him, angled away as she spoke with last year’s Nobel Prize winner for chemistry. In the staid Washington social circuit, a revealing dress was seen as an affront to everything the city stood for. The women present, though formally dressed, still exuded an air of conservatism that precluded any ideas of sex.

But she looked as if she’d just come from a Hollywood awards show. Her dress, deeply black against her white skin, was cut so low in the back that with a little imagination, Mercer could almost visualize a shadow where the two halves of her buttocks split into tightly rounded hemispheres. The skin on her back was flawless. She was tall, but her height was not a distraction; rather it was a pedestal to admire her from. She turned and he saw her eyes.

The mineral beryl is a relatively common stone of little or no interest; in fact it’s considered a by-product of mica and feldspar mining. Yet when aluminum is present in its makeup, beryl becomes aquamarine and is considered a semiprecious stone. And when nature adds traces of chromium rather than aluminum, beryl becomes emerald, one of man’s most coveted gems. The depth of an emerald’s color is determined by the amount of chromium. Too much and the stone is dark, inky, and dead. Too little and an emerald is pale and faded. This color difference is called kelly. A perfect stone, one with depth to its color while maintaining its brilliance, is considered to have good kelly, and its value soars proportionately.

Her eyes were green. A perfect kelly green that shot through Mercer like a live wire. She looked at him for a moment, scraping her nails through short hair that was dark yet blond and auburn at the same time, held to her neat skull with just a trace of gel. Mercer felt like he was drowning.

Individually, the features of her face were perfect, softly rounded lips framing a sensual mouth that seemed just on the verge of laughter. Her cheekbones swept down the sides of her face with the grace of a gull’s wing, and her chin was strong with a slight cleft. Above her stunning eyes, her brows were wide and dark, shocking on such a delicate face but adding an undeniable magnetism. Her nose was small and gentle, very feminine.

From her high, broad forehead to her narrow throat, she was exquisite. There was no comparing her to the brassy trophy women that many of the men here called their wives. She had the looks of a fashion model, daunting and unobtainable, but he thought he noted a charm that those women didn’t possess.

She shifted her weight from one long leg to the other. Her dress clung to hips that curved from her narrow waist with unmatchable grace. The slit up the front swept aside to reveal one smooth inner thigh and, had Mercer been able to breathe, the sight would have taken his breath away. The front of her dress covered her body completely from her calves to her throat, but he noted that her unsupported breasts were small and high, the chill of the damp night forcing her nipples against the fabric.

“What can I get for you, sir?” The bartender distracted Mercer.

By the time he’d ordered a gimlet and turned back toward the French doors, she was gone. Damn.

He took his drink, absently muttering a thanks. It was then that he became aware he’d been physically aroused just by that quick glimpse of her. That hadn’t happened to him since his eighth-grade class had a twenty-one-year-old substitute for a week.

“You can put my clothes back on.”

“Excuse me?” Mercer turned and his breath jammed in his throat. She was even more beautiful up close. Her lips had an enticing pout that he unconsciously felt himself swaying toward.

“You just undressed me with your eyes, and I’d appreciate it if you put my clothing back on, Dr. Mercer.” The mischievous glint in her eyes showed that she was relishing Mercer’s discomfort. He guessed her age at early thirties, that perfect moment in a woman’s life when she retains the beauty of youth but tempers it with the knowledge of experience.

“You know who I am?” Mercer was incredulous. He was certain that he would remember her if they’d met before.

“My, how quickly they forget.” She laughed and started to walk away, her backside switching from side to side while the narrow ridge of her spine remained straight. A few paces away, she turned back. “We met yesterday morning.”

She was lost in the crowd by the time Mercer realized who she was. He had been so enraptured by her looks that he had never paid attention to her voice, throaty yet soft, alluring and… recognizable.

Mercer nearly spilled his drink as he lunged into the crowd looking for her. She had been his vocal opponent at George Washington University. He had a hard time reconciling that shabbily dressed girl with the stunning beauty who’d just walked away. What in the hell was a militant environmentalist doing at a reception hosted by one of the largest oil companies in the world?

He moved forward quickly, apologizing to guests as he brushed by in his search. Suddenly, a man turned, and they bumped nearly face to face. Both were startled by the contact. Mercer saw that the man had gone nearly white when he saw Mercer, but his color returned quickly, and his handsome face split into a broad grin.

“Mercer, I didn’t think you were going to make it.” Max Johnston seemed genuinely pleased to see Mercer at his party.

Johnston was in his early sixties but looked ten years younger; his body was thin and wiry, honed from a legendary workout routine and biannual triathlons. His face was lined and weathered from the Texas sun where he was raised, but he had acquired a veneer of Ivy League polish that masked his origins. His hair was still thick and wavy, silvered just at the temples. He grasped Mercer’s hand and pumped it vigorously.

The person Max had been speaking with drifted off.

“I had to mug a headwaiter to get his tuxedo.” Mercer smiled back. “Quite a turnout, congratulations.”

“I have a lot of hope for the Johnston Group,” Max said as if reading from a prepared speech. “The President set a challenge to get America off its oil addiction, and I think we can help.”

“Isn’t that like cutting off your nose to spite your face?” joked Mercer.

“Hardly. Petromax is so diversified that shutting off our oil imports may actually help the company. In fact, I just closed a deal to sell off our last three supertankers. No, we’re ready to help shape the future.”

“Aren’t you involved with the exploration of the Arctic Wildlife Refuge?” Despite his desire to find that woman again, Mercer found himself drawn into a conversation with his host.

“Yes, but that’s only a small part of what we’ve planned. The oil we pull from the Refuge will provide Petromax with the capital to establish itself as the leader in alternative energy technology. We’ve already started pilot programs, and our lab people are close to developing a commercial hydrogen-cracking unit using seawater as fuel. Fusion thinking has taught us that there is more energy in matter than we had ever imagined.” Johnston held up a half-full glass of champagne. “There’s more power in this glass than mankind has produced since our first fire in some cave two hundred thousand years ago, and day by day we are getting closer to getting at it.”

Mercer looked past Johnston’s shoulder and saw the woman walking toward them, her body swaying to the chamber music while her eyes remained locked with his. He sensed he was about to be in the middle of a conflict between Johnston and the environmentalist. “Uh-oh.”

Max turned, following Mercer’s line of sight and muttered, “Oh, shit.”

“You know her?”

Before Max could answer, she was with them, slipping a slim arm under Max’s in a familiar gesture. Max regarded her indulgently for a moment, then turned back to Mercer to make the introductions. Before he could speak, she piped up.

“I apologize for lying to you, Dr. Mercer.” Her smile numbed him. “We have met once before yesterday, but I doubt you’d remember. It was about ten years ago in Houston, when Petromax announced the discovery of the Edwards Plateau Oil Field. I remember that you were wearing an olive-colored suit with a black-patterned tie. You were the only man there without a cheesy cowboy hat.”

“Honey, those hats are the symbol of the greatest state in the Union.” Max turned from the girl and looked Mercer in the eye. It was a look of trepidation. “Well, then, I guess introductions aren’t really necessary, since you two know each other.”

Mercer found his voice. “I could still use a little help here.”

Max gave her a fond smile. “This is my daughter, Agatha.”

“My grandmother had to suffer through life with the name Agatha.” She stuck out her hand, which Mercer took like a pilgrim grasping a religious icon. “But I’ll be damned if I will. Please call me Aggie, Dr. Mercer.”

It was as if an elemental force passed between their hands. Mercer held onto her long after a simple introduction demanded, long after mutual attraction expected. Long after… it was only when Max delicately coughed that he reluctantly let her go. Their eyes remained locked, clear green to cloudy gray, virgin earth to stormy sky.

“I only use my professional title when I call for dinner reservations. Please drop the ‘Doctor’ and just call me Mercer. Everybody does.”

Aggie pulled back a half step. “Are you so ashamed of your accomplishments that you’re trying to hide your identity? My God, you single-handedly destroyed an entire mountain in India when you staked out the Ghudatra mines. What about your work in Australia? How many aborigines had to be relocated after the firm you worked for pegged a hundred thousand acres for an opal mine? Don’t be modest, Dr. Mercer. To some, you’re a hero. Right, Daddy?”

Max Johnston was looking uncomfortable. He glanced around, making sure that none of his well-heeled guests had heard his daughter’s outburst. It was clear he’d listened to her views so many times that he could repeat them by rote.

“That’s enough, Aggie. You promised to be my hostess tonight and not spout your drivel,” Johnston hissed. “Christ, you’re about as considerate as your mother was.”

He turned to Mercer. “Sorry about that. Let’s go get a drink.”

He put a strong arm around Mercer’s shoulder and led him away. Mercer turned his head and saw the look of utter hatred Aggie directed at her father.

“You don’t have any kids, do you?” Max asked as the bartender fixed another gimlet and refilled the host’s champagne flute.

“No. I realized young that I can barely take care of myself, so how the hell could I care for a child?”

Max smiled, relaxing slightly. “She’s my greatest joy and I’ve been proud of every one of her accomplishments, even if they were designed to get back at me. Do you know she graduated at the top of her class at grad school? She got a degree in environmental engineering, of all things. She is quite brilliant, but she wastes it on these quixotic quests. I guess she never really had to grow up. I spoiled the hell out of her. Hell, I still do, by letting her screw around with that ecological group.”

Mercer had no interest in the problems between Max and his daughter. Though he lent a patient ear, he had to make one comment. “Max, she’s a grown woman. Shouldn’t she be making her own choices?”

“If I let other people have choices, none of this would be here today.” Max waved his glass around the room. Mercer couldn’t tell if he was being flippant or serious.

“I shouldn’t burden you with this.” Max’s public persona was back. “She and I still get along on occasion. Here, have another drink.” Mercer allowed Max to put yet another gimlet in his hand. “Will you excuse me? I’ve got to go say hello to Connie Van Buren.”

Max Johnston drifted back into the crowd, leaving Mercer thankfully free again. He finished the first drink Max had given him then took a small sip from the second. He smiled to himself as he looked around the opulent room. It didn’t matter how rich a person was, common problems still reared their ugly heads.

Max Johnston wore his somewhat openly. He was a widower, his wife having succumbed to an alcohol-induced suicide wish. Mercer recalled her drinking problem when he’d first met Max in Houston. An hour into the party, Barbara Johnston was so drunk that Max had to have his chauffeur take her back to their limousine. Six years later, after countless rehab programs that the media intrusively reported, Barbara washed down a bottle of sleeping pills with a fifth of vodka. Her suicide note said, “Gone to sleep, please wake me when life is easier.” And now Max was fighting with his daughter in front of some of the most powerful people in the country.

If that was the price of success, decided Mercer, Max could have it all.

He didn’t see Aggie as he scanned the room, and felt a small measure of relief. Speaking to her now would be uncomfortable at best. Within a few minutes, he was talking with the co-chair of the Johnston Group’s scientific arm, the ugly scene of a moment earlier all but forgotten.

Half an hour later, he became aware of her perfume. He hadn’t noticed it before, it was so subtle. Mercer noted the wolflike stares from the men and the jealous glances from the women and knew Aggie Johnston was behind him. He turned around. She looked as if she’d recovered from the confrontation with her father, but he noticed a shadow behind her impossibly green eyes that hadn’t been there before. Mercer knew it was best to act as if nothing had happened rather than rattle off some platitude about relationships.

“I never got a chance to rebut your attack on my profession.”

Aggie gave Mercer a smile of thanks, a small lift of her lips that pleased him inordinately. Yet when she spoke, sarcasm edged her voice raw. “My father’s company retains four entire law firms and a whole army of public-relations experts. They make excuses faster than the rest of the company produces environmental disasters. I’m sure you can toe the party line with the rest of them.”

She paused, regarding him clinically. “Let me guess. You’ll tell me how what you do creates jobs all over the world and gives hope to starving people who are still living in the nineteenth century. Does this sound about right?”

Mercer guessed she was a typical “cause and effect” protester. If there was an effect in the world, she’d join the cause. She would no doubt belong to numerous organizations, favoring new ones as they gained popularity. Harry White derisively called these people “flavor-of-the-month liberals.” It wouldn’t matter that some of her beliefs might be diametrically opposed to others as long as they were politically correct and au courant.