Mischief 24/7 (17 page)

“I don’t think so, no,” Jade said, looking at the two, who had stopped just outside the open gate in the fence and were staring at them like local ex-heavyweight champion Joe Frazier staring down Muhammad Ali before their famous Thriller in Manila. She looked around the playground one last time. “Poor Terrell. What a horrible place to die. Oh, damn, there goes my cell phone.”

“Walk and talk, Jade, walk and talk,” Court said, taking her by the elbow as she opened her cell, waving to the two tough guys as he steered her back toward the car.

“Yes, this is she,” Jade said, and a moment later she was squeezing Court’s arm. “Yes… yes, I can do that. Of course.” She grinned up at Court as he opened the passenger door for her. “I agree, it is important. When? I’ll see you then, and you can save that for when we meet. Goodbye, Mr. Brainard.”

Court heard her last words as she climbed into the passenger seat and looked at her quizzically. “Mr. Brainard? Which one, father or son?”

“Son,” Jade said, looking rather smug. She waited until he was behind the wheel before adding, “He wants me to come to the rally tonight, about a half hour early, so we can talk about what happened at the airport.”

“Oh, he does, does he?” Court checked the rearview mirror and saw Ernesto heaving a sigh of relief as they pulled away from the curb. But then he caught a glimpse of orange-red hair and long, too-thin legs, and watched as Ernesto’s mother crossed the narrow street behind them, hurrying toward the warehouse. The two goons went to stop her, but she held up several bills and they let her go inside.

Great. Now he’d aided and abetted an addict.
Life in the fast lane,
Court thought with an inner grimace—he’d about had enough of it, thank you.

Court quickly turned at the next corner. Ernesto didn’t need to see what had happened. “I wonder,” he said, saying the first thing that came to mind, “how do you suppose our friendly neighborhood mayoral candidate happened to know your new cell number?”

“All right, I called his office a couple of times,
trying to convince him to see me. So sue me. I didn’t try to go there without you, did I?”

“Yet,” Court reminded her. “You didn’t try to go there without me
yet.
And you won’t. When and where do we meet him?”

“He invited me, not you, you know,” Jade said, but then sighed. “But I want you there. And Jess. And Matt. I’m not stupid. The man’s a murderer. He sounded so sincere, like always, telling me that Philadelphia needs him. That he’s not perfect and he knows now that I know that, but that he’s no murderer. Yeah, right.”

“But you’ll admit he sounded sincere.”

“Oh, big deal, Court,” Jade said, pushing at her hair, which had tangled around her face in the breeze that might be carrying a thunderstorm with it later that night. “He sounds sincere when he says he’s going to fix all the bridges and give the police and fire and EMS departments raises and better health care—all without raising taxes. Not that he ever says
how
he’s going to do any of that. He’s a politician, Court. I don’t think any of them know how to tell the truth, but some of them sure can lie convincingly.”

“That’s how they get elected,” Court agreed. “Where to now, since I seem to be cast in the role of chauffeur today.”

“Back to Sam’s, I guess. We meet with Joshua Brainard at seven, by the way. I need some time to prepare. But first,” she said as she turned in the seat, to look back at Ernesto, “are you hungry, Ernesto? I am. I always eat when I’m nervous.”

Court hid a smile. Yes, he’d noticed that.

A
S SHE TOOK
another bite of grilled salmon, Jade watched the other woman eat. Or watched the other woman
pretend
to eat, because Savannah Harper might be doing a pretty impressive job of pushing food around her plate, but she wasn’t really eating anything. Jade was pretty sure the woman, who had already complained that the selection of “decent couture gowns in size zero was always so limited,” rarely ate at all.

While Jade couldn’t seem to
stop
eating. Probably—definitely—because she felt more like a fish out of water in this country-club setting than did the salmon on her plate. When Savannah had asked her who designed her gown, Jade hadn’t been able to answer her, because she didn’t know. She hadn’t seen any reason to look at the label, because she probably wouldn’t have recognized the name, anyway. Savannah had spent a good five minutes marveling over that lack of interest, pointing out other women in the dining room and the designer labels they wore.

Jade had taken refuge in what was on her
plate, only smiling when she thought it was time to smile, and nodding when she couldn’t smile. Now she felt so full she was afraid she might burst out of her simple black silk gown, which probably cost more than she earned in a year—the extra clothing Court had ordered sent up to the penthouse had all arrived minus price tags.

She deliberately put down her fork and folded her hands in her lap and pretended an interest in the New Year’s Eve decorations hanging from the chandelier above their table.

“How are you doing?” Court asked her, leaning close to whisper the words in her ear. “I’m sorry I was ignoring you. Buzz and I had some catching up to do about business matters I promise not to bore you with. Is she getting to you? Don’t worry. As you can see, Savannah doesn’t bite
. Anything.”

Jade bit back a nervous giggle. Court had told her about their dinner partners on the way to the country club: Buzz, CFO of Becket Hotels, and Savannah, the trophy wife, younger than Buzz by nearly thirty years, and as “sharp as a sack of doorknobs.”

“At least she talks, which is more than I’m doing. I’m sorry, Court. I’m still having trouble figuring out how I even
got
here.”

He reached over and squeezed her hand. “We flew, we changed in borrowed rooms at the airport, and then we drove, and we arrived just
before the fruit cocktail at our place settings got too warm. Remember now?”

While Savannah prattled on to a similarly young, emaciated woman who had stopped at their table, and the plump, balding Buzz wrestled with the lobster on his plate—it looked like he might be losing—Jade took the chance to say, “No, I remember the
how.
It’s the
why
I’m still working on. The plane, this
gown, this place.
What am I doing here?”

“Being spontaneous?” Court suggested, a gleam in his eye she probably didn’t want to ask him about at the moment. “We’re about to begin a new year, Jade. I wanted to begin mine with you. I might have rethought dropping in here at the club, but we can leave soon. I’ve seen these parties before, too many times. In another hour they’ll all be drinking so much no one will notice we’ve left.”

Maybe not, but Savannah Hunter was noticing her again now, both her and her pretty blond friend, who kept looking across the large round table at Jade, whispering to Savannah, looking at Jade again.

“Here it comes. They want to know who I am,” Jade said. “Where we met. All that.”

“So? Tell them,” Court said, oblivious, it would seem, to the pointed glances that had been heading her way ever since they’d walked into the country-club dining room.

“Yes, that would be good. I’m a private investigator and we met when I was playing a high
priced hooker in order to serve a man with a subpoena—oh, but only after I had body-slammed the guy. That should go over big.”

“You’re ashamed of what you do? Then don’t tell them. Be a woman of mystery.”

“No.” She shot him a dirty look. “And don’t do that. Don’t use reverse psychology on me so I say what you want me to say.”

“Was I doing that? What is it you think I want you to say?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know, Court. I don’t know you that well. Can’t we just leave? Please? I just want to be with you.”

He looked at her for a long moment, long enough for her toes to curl against the bottoms of her strappy silver heels, and then recited a number to her, repeated it slowly. “My cell phone number. Should I say it again?”

“No, I’ve got it. But—”

“You have your cell phone?”

“Yes, in my purse. It’s about the only thing that fits in there. What are you thinking?”

“Excuse yourself, go to the women’s room—it’s just through those doors behind us—and then you’ll see a flight of stairs down the hall on the right, I think. Call me, wait until I pick up, then close your phone and come back here. We’ll be out of here in five minutes, and at my house in twenty. Any longer than that, and I may suffer permanent damage after hearing you say you just want to be with me.”

Jade smiled, slowly, enjoying the hungry look in his eyes. “You’re an evil man, Court Becket. No wonder I like you.”

Five minutes and thirty seconds later, to be precise, the excuse of an emergency at the Becket Hampton Roads Hotel behind them—invented by Court as he spoke into a dead cell phone—they were on their way to his family home.

Court had untied the black tuxedo bow tie and opened the collar of his starched white shirt as he drove, and the full moon of the crisp winter night made it easy for Jade to watch his profile as he steered along a winding strip of asphalt in the otherwise dark night. He was so achingly good-looking.

And he wanted her.

Did he have any idea how that made her feel?

This perfect man. Handsome. Intelligent. Successful, accomplished.

Wanted
her.

Why?

“Court…?”Jade said as he slowed the car and turned in between two thick fieldstone pillars onto another curving roadway, this one constructed of brick pavers she could see outlined in the headlights.

“Almost there,” he said, turning to smile at her.

She didn’t know what to say. “Do… do, um… do you live alone?”

He smiled at her again. “Yes, I do. I sent the wife and kiddies to Florida for the holidays.”

“That isn’t what I meant. Let me rephrase that. Does anyone else live in your house with you? How’s that?”

“My housekeeper, but she has her own quarters over the garages. I am one lonely man rattling around in a house built to contain a family. A large family.” He took one hand off the wheel and laid it on Jade’s thigh. “So, how soon do you want to start filling some of those bedrooms?”

“You keep doing that, Court. Teasing me like that, scaring me like that. Please don’t. We’re already moving much too quickly. Your life is so different from mine. We’ve got nothing in common except…”

Court stopped the car and put the transmission into Park. “Wild animal attraction?” he suggested as he opened the door, and Jade turned her face away from the illumination of the dome light. “Don’t knock it, Jade. It’s working so far.”

It was useless, trying to talk to him. Hadn’t he seen how out of place she was just a few minutes ago at the country club? She had no conversation for people like that, and they might as well have all been speaking another language. Stocks and bonds and pork futures? Margin calls? Botox injections and mini lifts? Doggy day care and couture showings in someplace called Bryant Park?

The only
real
conversation she’d had in the two hours they’d been there had been with the Woman’s locker-room attendant, who had helped
her find her way back downstairs to the dining room.

So why was she here? She had to be out of her mind!

The passenger door opened and Jade could do nothing but allow Court to help her out of the car. She looked up at the immense porch that stretched from one end of the house to the other—from one horizon to the other, it seemed—its Greek Revival roof held up by at least ten round white columns, each at least four feet in diameter. Huge, black, wrought-iron carriage lights hung from chains all along the porch, so that the facade of the house, also white, made her feel as if she was stepping from night into day.

“It’s…it’s a plantation house,” she said, still holding Court’s hand as they ascended the wide, shallow steps to the porch and the fan-lit front door. “I’ve seen pictures, and they’re all really beautiful, but the reality is so much
more.”

“My ancestor had a flair, I guess you could say. Personally, I think that since he was the new kid on the block, as it were, here in old Virginny, Ainsley Becket wanted to make a statement. You know. I’m here, I’m staying, and there’s nothing you can do about it but smile and get with the program,” Court told her as he fished in his pocket for a key and opened the door, motioning for her to precede him into the well-lit foyer.

“I doubt anyone missed the point. Is the White House this big?”

“I don’t think so, no, at least not as originally built. We’ve installed more plumbing, electricity, moved the kitchen inside. But for the most part, this is the same house Ainsley Becket built when he and his second wife purchased this land in 1816, although his wife’s family resided in Virginia for a long time before Ainsley showed up. We talk about our roots a lot, here in Virginia. I’ve got the added cachet of having an honest-to-God pirate as the first-generation Becket in Hampton Roads. Take a look around while I go get our suitcases.”

Jade was barely listening to him. The foyer had been grand enough, with its black and white marble tiles, the crystal chandelier that had to weigh at least half a ton, the freestanding curved staircase to an open balcony, the bits and pieces of grandeur that all looked worthy of a museum. Her entire family home could probably have fit inside that foyer, with room to spare for Rockne’s doghouse.

Straight ahead, the wide hallway ran beneath the curving staircase, and Jade could see what looked to be a wall of French doors a million miles away, leading out into the night. From somewhere in her head she pulled the information that plantation houses were built this way for cross-ventilation in the warm summer months.

Not that she’d ever see this house again, winter or summer.

But the room Court found her in a minute later had made her forget that unnerving thought. It was
huge,
and filled with so many treasures Jade didn’t know where to look first. “You
live
like this? Where do you
sit?
You don’t sit on any of these beautiful chairs or couches, do you? It would be… it would be sacrilege.”