Patricia Potter (34 page)

She took the compact. “Thank you,” she said. “I didn’t know it was gone until this morning. It was a gift.”

“Then I’m delighted to return it,” he said.

“Would you like to come in?” she asked. “There’s some lemonade.” Then she bit her lip. He looked far too sophisticated for lemonade.

“I would be most grateful,” he said. “I’m not used to your warm temperatures.”

She held the door open, and he entered, seeming not at all out of place. He was medium tall, several inches under Kelly’s rangy height, but well-built and impeccably dressed in a casual suit. He spoke excellent English but there was a definite foreign accent.

“You’re from…”

“Germany,” he said. “I’ll be here several weeks for an economic conference.”

It was, she knew, a modest statement. The papers had been full of reports about the upcoming meeting. Even the president, it was said, might visit briefly. She smiled, and she knew it was the first unforced smile since she’d learned of her father’s death. “And you took time to bring me the compact. It’s very kind of you.”

He grinned. “It was entirely my fault, after all, and it was the least I could do.”

Lisa was surprised. He must be very important if he was a member of the conference, although he looked rather young and attractive for an economist. She had only glanced over news of the meeting, and she knew few details. Now she wished she had paid more attention. Yet he seemed very easy to talk to.

“Excuse me,” she said. “I’ll get the lemonade.” She went into the kitchen, her pulse fluttering with unaccustomed awareness. Andy, who had regarded the newcomer with suspicion, followed at her heels.

She hesitated there, resting her palms on the counter. She didn’t understand her somewhat shaky reaction to the visitor. She pushed back a strand of her hair and wished she’d put lipstick on this morning, but now it was too late. It would be obvious if she did so now.

Lisa quickly poured two glasses of lemonade, which her mother had made yesterday.

She slowly went back in the other room, and found him looking out of the screened porch from which the ocean was barely visible over the dunes.

He took the lemonade with a smile and tasted it appreciatively. “Excellent,” he said. “You’ll have to tell me how to make it.”

“Lemonade?” He looked as if he would be more comfortable sipping something exotic.

He laughed. “You’ll never know how refreshing it would be after days of stuffy meetings.”

“Is that what you do?”

“I’m afraid so. I just finished several months of them and now I have weeks more.”

“What do you do exactly?” she asked.

“I advise my government on the economic impact of prospective new laws or policies.”

“In Germany?”

“In West Germany,” he corrected. “But I’m also involved in predicting the impact of government actions of our trading partners. For instance, how the tightening of your money supply will affect the value of our deutsche mark.”

Lisa felt well out of her depth, but curiously it wasn’t Mr. Weimer who made her feel that way. He talked to her like an equal, and his glance made her feel attractive, even in her old blouse and shorts.

It was as if he understood her uncertainty. “I envy you,” he said. “Your lovely seaside home.”

He
was envying
her.
He had traveled throughout the world, he had probably met with heads of states and made decisions that influenced thousands, maybe millions, of people. Her father would like him. Her father…

The pain came rolling back, the emptiness. For a few moments she’d forgotten he would never like anyone again.

Kurt Weimer was watching her. “Forgive me for prying,” he said gently, “but you looked unhappy last night, and again, just now. Is there anything I can do?”

His sympathy rocked what little composure she had. “My father…died just recently.”

He moved to her and tactfully put a hand on her arm. “I know how you must feel,” he said in a low voice. “My father died when I was a boy. I still…think about him.”

“Mr. Weimer…”

“Please call me Kurt. Now we have sadness in common.”

“I still can’t believe it,” Lisa whispered. “I expect him to come home and grin at me and call me his sweetheart.”

“And the young man with you last night…”

“My friend.”

“Nothing more?”

Was he? Lisa wasn’t exactly sure. She’d always felt safe with Kelly, just as she had with her father. They had fun together and laughed together and liked most of the same things, things like stray dogs and hot chili peppers and roasted marshmallows. She knew him so well. She always knew what to expect from Kelly. There was no pounding excitement or shivers of anticipation.

“No,” she said.

“Then perhaps you’d allow me to take you to dinner?”

Lisa stared at him in surprise. She knew she was relatively pretty, though she never thought of herself as anything more. Her mother’s coloring was much more vivid, striking, and she’d envied that.
You always want what you can’t have.
How many times had her mother told her that? And when you get it, you want something else you can’t have. It was one of her mother’s favorite warnings.

But while Lisa always had plenty of dates and invitations, had broken hearts and had her heart broken, they’d all, with the exception of Kelly, been boys near her age. Kurt Weimer had to be in his mid-thirties at least, suave and sophisticated and probably accustomed to sleek, confident women.

He smiled disarmingly at her confusion. “I promise to be a gentleman.”

“Yes,” she said in a surprisingly calm voice despite a thumping heart. “I would like that.” She heard the front door open and her mother entered, stopping suddenly as she saw the man in the house.

Her mother looked from her to the visitor, who had risen from the sofa where he was sitting next to Lisa, and then back again.

Lisa stumbled over the introduction, wishing her mother had been gone just a little longer. “Mother, this is Kurt Weimer. He’s at the Cloister for the International Economic Conference that’s been in the paper. I…lost my compact last night, and he was kind enough to bring it by.”

Her mother stood stiff and straight, her entire body visibly tensing as she heard the German name.

“Mother?”

Her mother stood there in unwelcoming silence, and Lisa suffered acute embarrassment.

“Mother?” she tried again, a trace of puzzlement in her voice.

Meara smiled bleakly. “Thank you, Mr. Weimer That compact meant a lot to my daughter. Are…you going to be here long?”

“Several weeks,” he said easily, ignoring her distress. “Your daughter has just made it a much more pleasant trip by agreeing to have dinner with me.”

Meara’s eyes, sharp and wary, went to Lisa. She had badly wanted something to distract Lisa from her grief. But a German? Recollections of another German painfully returned. Recollections and sharp agonizing memories assaulted her like electrical shocks.

He looked nothing like Michael. Yet there was something in his face, something familiar that pricked at her consciousness. She looked at Lisa’s eyes, bright for the first time in days, and at the visitor, who was standing easily and politely in the middle of the room. She saw something flicker in his eyes, something knowing, and she felt odd, frightened. As if evil had entered the room.

No! She chided herself. Imagination. That was all. Imagination heightened by the turmoil and tragedy of the past few weeks. If he was one of the visiting economists, he must be eminently respectable, above any reproach. She had never been prejudiced. Since the war, she had met other Germans and had never reacted like this. Was it because of the way he looked at her daughter?

Whatever it was, she couldn’t quiet the sudden fear which ran through her.

“I would think you’d be too busy for that,” she finally managed ungraciously.

Lisa stared at her. Her mother was never, ever rude, no matter how provoked. It was one of the things that had always annoyed her, that control that was polite, even warm, but never intimate.

But the cold reply didn’t appear to bother Kurt. “It often gets lonely in a new country,” he said, “and your daughter has been very kind.” He waited expectantly as if the statement had been a question.

Meara didn’t know how to respond. She couldn’t very well object. Lisa was old enough to make her own decisions, and Meara was afraid any obvious opposition would only serve to make the man more attractive. And he was, she had to admit, attractive enough already with his courtly continental manners and accent. She didn’t have to be told how effective European charm could be.

She saw a wary secretivenesss in his eyes. A secretiveness that she remembered from years before. Yet there was also a difference between the two men, between this German and the one she had loved years ago. She wished she knew what it was, for even at the end, even when she discovered that Michael had lied to her and betrayed her, even then she hadn’t felt the revulsion she felt now. She probably should have. But while she’d hated, she’d never felt this hard, cold chill.

He won’t be here long, she told herself. He’ll be busy most of the time. And Kelly’s here.

She forced a smile. “I have some work to do.”

“And I must be going,” Kurt Weimer said. “It’s been a pleasure, Mrs. Evans.” His smile widened as he turned to Lisa. “Thank you for the lemonade. Should I come for you at eight?”

Lisa hesitated. “I’m not really very good company right now.”

“You’re perfect company.” Kurt assured her. “And I’ll bring you home early.”

“All right,” she replied. “Eight o’clock.”

He bowed slightly. “I look forward to it.”

Meara watched him leave, before turning to Lisa. “What about Kelly?”

“Kelly’s a friend,” Lisa said shortly.

Meara sighed. She liked Kelly very much, but again she knew pleading his case would only have the opposite effect. But as she’d told herself seconds earlier, this man would be here only a few weeks.

Once more, a kind of premonition took hold of her. A few weeks. A life could so easily be changed in a few weeks.

Chapter Eighteen

C
HRIS WATCHED
W
EIMER LEAVE
.

There was little resemblance to the Weimer he’d known. Hans had been heavier built, his hair darker, and his walk swaggering, except in his role of gardener. There was no swagger in this man, though there was a hint of arrogance.

So he’d been right to be worried. He felt no satisfaction in it. He had hoped he was wrong, that Weimer’s visit to the coast had only been coincidence.

There was no longer any doubt.

It had been all he could do to stay in the car and not barge in. But the fact that Weimer had openly parked a very distinctive Mercedes in the driveway, visible to all the neighbors and a large number of walkers and bicylers, told him that there was no immediate danger to the occupants of the house. Whatever else he was, Weimer was not stupid. But still, it took all Chris’s control, and he didn’t relax until he saw Weimer leave.

Chris started the car; he had already stayed here too long. He drove back to his rented house and went inside, opening himself a soda. He needed no alcohol to cloud his thoughts.

He could go to the police. Revealing the truth had always been an option. But who would believe him? No one knew what had happened that night except him; no one knew Hans’s real identity, only the name of the gardener; and he had no idea how much Sanders Evans had revealed of that night or how much he had protected Meara.

Kurt Weimer was a highly respected German government official. His suspected Odessa connections were only that. Suspected. Rumored. And even those suspicions were circulated only among a very small group of men; certainly they were not known by the German Federal Republic.

If Chris went to the police, he would have to reveal his own identity. The consequence to himself no longer mattered. He would readily go to jail if it would protect Meara and his daughter. What did matter was that the whole story would emerge, including Meara’s small role and possibly even Lisa’s parentage. He couldn’t do that to them, not to either of them.

Now that he knew that Kurt was planning something, he could protect them. He was sure of it. The detective agency he’d used through the years also specialized in protection and security, and he had the money to provide whatever was needed. Yet Meara must know. No one could be protected completely without their cooperation.

Painfully, he knew he had run out of options. He had to tell Meara of the danger, tell her that the nightmare that started twenty-one years ago was continuing, that because of him she and her daughter were in deadly danger. How in the hell was he going to do that? Dear God, how?

Chris knew what to look for now, a slender woman with red hair and a ragged, clownish-looking dog. He watched the beach from his porch all afternoon, knowing somehow that she would be there. He finally saw them that evening as the tide crept up. The time was after seven, when most of the tourists were eating, and the beach was nearly empty.