Revenant Rising (76 page)

Authors: M. M. Mayle

Tags: #Fiction, #Thrillers

BOOK: Revenant Rising

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She’s got that look about her again, that non-look where absolutely anything can happen. “Of
course
I’m going with you, adorable nitwit. That
is
what you want, isn’t it?”

“Jesus . . . Laurel . . .
baby
. . . you have to
ask
?” He has to swallow hard to get round the lump in his throat, then he’s beset by a swarm of negatives. “But . . . but what of your work, your family, your home, your . . . You can’t just blow everything off and walk away.”

“You’re my only current work, so that’s not an issue. As for family . . . I’ve accepted that nothing more can be done for my father . . . that he’s lost to me forever. You were there for that, you saw me tell him goodbye. And you were there when I effectively cut my brothers and sister loose. They don’t need me any more, at least not in ways that can’t be handled by a phone call or a transfer of funds.

“You know,” she says, drumming the pencil on the tabletop in that old familiar way, “I think I should mention that you witnessed those occasions at
your
insistence, not mine, and I think I should emphasize that I made those decisions
before
I allowed your influence to touch me. But that’s not true of my decision to resign from the firm and give up the practice of law.”

“Say
what
?”

“Yesterday, when I cleaned out my desk at work and left the letter of resignation for David, it was clearly your influence I was feeling—even though I didn’t know it at the time. It was only later when Nate spoke of becoming unrecognizable to himself that I remembered you’d said something similar about me and I realized—”

“Shit! I should’ve known. You were with
Nate
when I couldn’t find you. The one place you
knew
I wouldn’t look.”

“Yes, I was, and he set me straight. He told me what he’d done, showed me the evidence, and revealed that he was already planning to resign when you forced the issue. So I absolutely understand what happened there and why it happened, and I’m going to try very hard to understand about David. But I can’t promise I’ll ever feel comfortable about him being your manager.”

“You won’t have to. I wouldn’t be comfortable with him as my manager, either, something I was tryin’ to tell you when you stopped listening yesterday. And now that you and I are actually together, I’m not even dead certain I want to keep him on as solicitor.”

“Isn’t that a little extreme?”

“Maybe. Maybe when we’re not all on the same island I’ll feel differently.”

“How would you feel if we were all on the same plane and the tradeoff was relative privacy among people you know and a flight schedule that conforms to your needs?”

“Not certain I follow.”

She crumples the page of airline notations and takes up the phone. “We both seem to have forgotten that Rayce and his cast of characters—including David—are leaving tonight on the Rajah Records plane to prepare for the European tour. Maybe they have room for us.”

“Bloody
brilliant
, you are. What day next week would
I
have remembered that? And it’s not like both Jeet Singh and David didn’t offer to ferry me across when I signed the interim deal with Rajah—with me rejecting the offer because I felt like they were crowding me. What in hell was I thinking?”

“You were thinking that you were about to break with Nate and didn’t want anyone else breathing down your neck.” She punches in a number. “Do you want to talk to David or shall I?”

He takes the phone and observes the usual protocols without producing detectable surprise at his whereabouts. When asked if the offer is still good and told that two seats are needed and Laurel will be occupying one of them, David is at his imperturbable best, framing responses that conceal any areas of ignorance and contain only the information requested.

“Got it,” Colin says, “If we do
not
hear from you within the hour—and it’s highly unlikely we will—we’re good to go and will deliver ourselves to the Franklin Aviation terminal at JFK no later than eight tonight.”

Laurel smiles and extends a jubilant high-five. The sparkle of her engagement ring reminds him he still hasn’t given her the other trinket she picked out on that red-letter day. He reaches beneath the table overhang for the duffle bag left on the next chair over and comes up empty-handed. A moment of worry passes when he sees that the bag is on the second chair over, where it must have been jostled during all the excitement earlier. He hurriedly opens it and takes out the glass owl, relieved to see that it’s still whole. He takes out the videocassette as well, even though its value has been downgraded from Rosetta Stone to mere love token.

She’s delighted with the owl that she thought he’d bought for himself and intrigued to know what’s on the videocassette he won’t let her watch till the donkeywork of moving her to England is begun.

“Where do you keep your travel gear?” he says.

“You’re looking at it.” She indicates the plastic garbage bags and pair of dilapidated roller bags littering the kitchen.

“Surely you jest.”

“Only a little. There are a couple more old suitcases in the attic, but I’d be ashamed to—”

“Looks to me like you recently checked out of a five-star hotel with a matched set of rubbish bags, so let’s not waste time talkin’ about ashamed.

Point me to the attic, and let’s get on with it . . . Oh, and there’s the squirrel business to see to.”

“The attic access is inside the cedar closet near the top of—never mind, I’ll show you the way. I need to get a few things from one of the garment bags in the cedar closet.”

Table of Contents

FIVE: Afternoon, March 25, 1987

SIX: Morning, March 30, 1987

SEVEN: Early morning, March 30, 1987

EIGHT: Early afternoon, March 30, 1987

NINE: Evening, March 30, 1987

TEN: Early morning, March 31, 1987