Private Dancer (9 page)

Now, completely packed and waiting for the airport shuttle to pick her up, she hovered in her living room, fixated on the two small and rather silly material things she treasured most in the world: the “Bless This Mess” corkboard hanging above the wall phone that her mother had given her before she died, and the heart-shaped goldfish bowl where her only house pet swam contentedly, unaware that he was about to be abandoned.

“You’re going on a Caribbean cruise, Bev,” she whispered aloud. “Stop shaking.”

Bev’s devils of self-doubt had gone on a rampage the previous night, waking her up in the small hours of the morning and taking her prisoner until dawn. Like gremlins, they hid in the dark corners of her mind and sprang out at her when she was most vulnerable, keeping her awake all night, tormenting her with her own childhood fears of the unknown. Since her divorce they’d visited her often, reminding her of her failure, plaguing her with a newer, deeper sense of inadequacy.

For five years she and Paul had tried to conceive a child to no avail. They experimented with everything— charting her cycle, using herbs, vitamins, even fertility drugs. Tests showed there were no physical problems with either of them, but nothing ever happened.

Though Paul had never accused her directly, she knew he blamed her for their childlessness. It hurt, but she forgave him, knowing his frustration was as great as hers. Eventually she began to believe him and shouldered the blame entirely. That was when the feelings of inadequacy began. The day he left her, her world had collapsed around her, and she had retreated into a protective shell.

And now, this morning the sight of her own packed bags filled her with dread. Except to go to her dad’s place and the detective agency, she hadn’t been outside a sixty-mile radius of her own home in over two years. Until a month ago, she rarely left the house at all unless it was for necessities. Harve was right about the state of her isolation, she realized. She really had become a recluse since her divorce. And yet here she was, heading for the Caribbean to catch a con man. How had she gotten herself into this situation?

Perhaps Harve’s resistance to her joining Brewster’s had made her think of detective work as glamorous and exciting, filled with the allure of forbidden fruit. But that fascination couldn’t explain her current predicament. She’d never acted on her impulses before. She’d never been that impetuous. Staring down at her locked hands, she thought about the nerve-racking excitement of the past few days, and the memories drove a painful shudder up her spine.

It was him, of course. Sam Nichols was the catalyst for her strange behavior. He’d triggered something dormant in her, a flame she’d thought long dead. He’d struck sparks. He’d caught her kindling pride on fire. And she’d fought back, rising to his challenges. She’d even won the last match.

Only now her nemesis was gone ... and the flame had been extinguished by fear. They were all gone, she realized, in one way or another. Her husband, her father, Sam Nichols. She was truly on her own.

Warding off the icy stirrings of panic, Bev walked to the heart-shaped bowl that sat on her bookshelf. “Take it easy, Moby Dick,” she said, tapping the glass. Her goldfish rushed to the source of the noise as though he expected to be fed. Bev sprinkled some extra flakes in the bowl, and as he darted to the surface, she dipped her hand into the water. “I hope Tina remembers to feed you.”

He swirled around her finger, a streak of neon orange, and Bev felt her anxieties lessen. She’d bought Moby shortly after Paul left on the theory that a goldfish would be a safe companion for a woman in her state of mind. It had made an odd kind of logic then. She’d been afraid of what would happen with a cuddlier house pet, a snuggly kitten or a sad-eyed dog. She might have poured out all her pent-up love and longing. She might have become too attached. After years of wanting a child and having her husband leave her because she couldn’t seem to get pregnant, Bev was afraid to get too attached to anything.

A horn sounded outside, and Bev knew it was the shuttle. It was ridiculous, but she didn’t want to leave. She was afraid of what might happen to her so far away from home. She was afraid of what would happen to Moby if Tina forgot to feed him.

The horn blared again and she picked up her bags.

Sam Nichols drained the last beer in the six-pack, crushed the can in his hand, and tossed it onto the small mountain of aluminum collecting in the corner of his living room. “Garbage art,” he said, pleased with himself as he considered the stack. “When it hits the ceiling, I’ll hold a one-man show.”

He crouched to stuff the rest of his gear into his duffel bag. It was the only luggage he planned to take, and he could already see Bev Brewster’s disapproving glance when he showed up in chinos and a crewneck T-shirt. She probably expected him to wear flowered shirts, bermuda shorts, and put on one of those monkey suits for dinner.

“Why do women love it when a man’s miserable?” he wondered aloud, easing the delicate surveillance equipment he’d just purchased into a separate zipper compartment. If a guy liked wearing jeans, they weren’t happy until he was strangling to death in a starched collar and tie.

Sam had his own theories about men and women, including the deeply held belief that life had dealt women the ace hand where love and sex were concerned. A guy didn’t have a chance in that high-stakes card game. Women made the rules, and they knew when to draw, when to stand pat, and when to bluff. A smart player wouldn’t even sit down at the table. But hell, when were men ever smart when it came to sex? If a man wanted a woman bad enough, his glands took over. His muscles got hard, his brains got soft, and pretty soon he was playing her game—no-prisoners poker. Poor sucker knew he’d end up compromising his soul to have her. But he played anyway.

Sam gripped the duffel by its strap and heaved up, grimacing as he swung it over his shoulder. His right side was giving him grief today. Machine-gun fire did a heavy number on the human body, shattering bones, grinding muscles into hamburger meat. It had been five years, and he still didn’t have the full use of his right shoulder and arm.

Luckily, his Mustang convertible was right where he’d left it the night before, parked across the street from the small El Monte apartment complex where he’d lived the past couple of years. The ragtop was a favorite among the neighborhood juvenile delinquents, who ripped it off regularly and went joyriding. Sam generally found the car a block or two away, wherever they dropped it off when the thrill was gone, but he’d never bothered to report the kids. He’d been raised on these graffiti-strewn streets. He knew the kind of families they came from, the chaos they lived in.

A hot wind whipped at Sam’s dark hair and the neon-white spring sunshine nearly blinded him as he pulled onto the Long Beach Freeway, heading for L.A. International. His thoughts had returned to the female of the species several moments earlier, only he’d narrowed his focus down to one specific woman—Harve Brewster’s daughter.

Life had dealt that one a wild card.

He smiled and hit the gas, dropping the car into third and pulling out from behind a meandering truck. Bev Brewster wasn’t beautiful or sexy in any obvious way. At first glance it was hard to imagine a man losing his head over her, but she had a secret weapon guaranteed to twist a man’s vitals into knots. Touch her and she went off like a bomb.

He laughed softly and switched on the radio, looking for a station that still worked. All that frightened, breathless passion was irresistible in a woman. She’d acted as though no man had ever set her on a countertop before, as though no man had ever been between her legs.

He felt a sharp tug of pleasure in the pit of his stomach. He was going to have to watch his step with little Ms. Lace Collar. And not only because she was Harve Brewster’s daughter. She was the type who sat down at the poker table and walked away with the whole pot. Beginner’s luck.

The bon voyage party was still in full swing as Bev walked out onto the cruise ship’s sun deck. She paused at the edge of the celebration and gave herself a quick once-over to make sure she wasn’t exposing anything she shouldn’t in Tina’s strapless floral-print sarong. It was a Frederick’s of Hollywood special with a built-in bra and push-up pads that made Bev feel as though she ought to be auditioning for a Las Vegas chorus line. She had never looked more voluptuous.

Slingbacks were mandatory for the “West Indies look,” according to Tina. Bev was having trouble with her sea legs in the unaccustomed style, but she figured if she stuck by the rail and observed for a while, the odds of embarrassing herself with a fashion faux pas would be significantly lessened.

The party was a lively affair, with darting waiters dressed in lemon-yellow calypso shirts and a nine-piece steel-drum band playing in the shade of thatched umbrellas. The music’s vibrant beat and shimmering metallic tones gave off waves of sensuality, inviting the laughing crowd to sway to its rhythms. Overhead, paper lanterns swung lazily in the trade winds like rainbow-colored necklaces.

Bev leaned against the railing, aware of the soft crash of waves behind her as the ship plowed through the water. The
Island Princess
had pulled out of Fort Lauderdale an hour ago, and now they were steaming toward the turquoise waters of St. Maarten. The cruise’s itinerary featured ten islands, including some of the more remote and unspoiled Caribbean cays. If Bev hadn’t been flirting with a panic attack, she might have been looking forward to it.

A waiter came by with a tray of frothy pink concoctions, and though Bev was sorely tempted, she refused. She’d paid a visit to the ship’s doctor immediately after boarding and had a seasick patch applied as a precaution. She was already beginning to feel the side effects of the medicine—a touch of wooziness, a dry mouth—so she’d decided to avoid alcohol.

She began to circle the festivities slowly, staying at the periphery as she scanned the crowd for Arthur Blankenship. Lydia’s description had made him sound rather average—medium height and build, brown eyes, prematurely silver hair—but Bev knew she was looking for a ladies’ man.

The tables she passed were heaped with exotic hors d’oeuvres and platters of tropical fruit, but it was a punch bowl full to the brim with lemonade that caught Bev’s eye. Curlicues of lime floated in the icy, pale yellow liquid.

She dipped herself a cupful. The drink was slightly tart and very refreshing. More like grapefruit juice than lemonade, she decided, but delicious. And she was absolutely parched. A moment later she’d drunk the first cup, poured herself a refill, and turned back to the crowd with a renewed sense of purpose. Even the knot of anxiety in her chest had unraveled a little. Now, where was Arthur Blankenship?

Bev found her quarry a short time later on the starboard side of the sun deck. The silver-haired, silver-tongued devil who had chiseled Lydia Covington out of
mucho dinero
was dancing with a redhead in a clingy denim bustier and miniskirt. So he’d traded Lydia for a high school dropout, Bev thought, loathing the con man on sight. The young woman was probably a temporary diversion. She didn’t appear to have either the sophistication or the money that a pro like Arthur would automatically seek out.

Bev shook her head, letting her hair tumble around her face as she calculated her next move. She felt oddly warm and flushed, even a little giddy. Was it the seasick medicine making her feel so strange? she wondered, glancing at her nearly empty punch glass. The knot in her chest was coming undone like loose shoestrings. Under almost any other circumstances, she would have wilted at the prospect of a nubile younger rival, but some impulse was stirring inside her, urging her on.

She glanced at her saronged body and thanked the gods of lingerie for pushup pads. Her neighbor’s fashion sense was to be applauded, she decided. Tina had promised the outfit would give her confidence. This must have been what she meant.

The steel-drum band launched into a faster number and Arthur and the redhead left the dance floor to stand by the railing. They were directly across the deck, and as they turned to gaze at the water, Bev decided to stroll their way.

She felt a flicker of vertigo as she set down her punch glass, and blamed it on her shoes. It wasn’t until she was halfway across the dance floor that she realized something was truly out of kilter. Her hands fluttered in an odd dance as she hesitated, trying to correct the unsteadiness she felt. Reggae music blared in her ears and dancers swirled around her. And then the cruise ship itself seemed to roll beneath her feet.

She thrust out her arms to balance herself. “What’s happening?” she said breathlessly. “Is this hurricane season?”

The dancers seemed totally oblivious to her plight. A passing waiter ducked out of her way, leaving her to her own desperately dizzy devices. Another wave of vertigo caught her as the deck undulated beneath her feet. She started for a deck chair to anchor herself, but couldn’t reach it.

“Help,” she breathed, her arms flying out. Any movement on her part seemed to make it worse. She dipped and swayed like a belly dancer, her upper body going one way, her lower body the other. The other dancers still hadn’t noticed her, but the spectators had. They were watching her as if
she
were the entertainment.

A heavyset man standing ringside flashed her a thumbs-up. “Show ’em how, lady,” he called out.

Bev tried to shake her head, but it only made her dizzier. To her horror, the man began to dance toward her, shimmying his shoulders. “But I’m not dancing,” she said as he dipped and bopped and boogied in her direction.

“Sure you are, gorgeous.” He pulled her into his arms with a snap of his wrist. “With me.”

Bev clung to him, terrified he was going to spin or dip or do something that would put them both in the hospital. “Over there?” She pointed toward Arthur and the redhead. “Could you dance me that way?”

Bev’s heart sank as he locked his hips to hers and tossed his head like a bullfighter. Who did he think he was? Patrick Swayze in
Dirty Dancing
? She tried to push away from him, but he caught her by the hand and whipped her back into his arms as though it were part of their routine. And then he began to spin her toward the railing.