Slow Burn (16 page)

“You don't have any right to judge them.”

“Whatever gave them the right to judge me?”

She ignored his question and said, “They won't let you stay, you know. You're not the kind of person they like to see me hanging around with.”

“You're all grown-up now, Spencer. Don't you choose your own friends yet?” he queried.

“What makes you think I'd ever consider you a friend?”

“All right. Then I'm the enemy you like to fuck once a decade.”

She gritted her teeth hard, felt her body tightening.

“Don't you ever go away?” she demanded.

“Yeah, Spencer, I do go away,” he said softly. He was staring straight ahead, features tense. “I went to the army once. Saw the Middle East. Ended up in Europe. I went away, and I stayed away. And even when I came back and joined my best friend on the police force, I did my best to keep out of your life. I think I did a damn good job of it, but then, the scars I carried all those years might have made it a little easier. Then Danny died—and you decided to play Miss Marple. So, yes, I will go away. But not until this is over.”

“And when will that be?” Spencer asked on a soft breath.

“I guess when Danny's killer is caught.”

“That could be a long time. No one has managed to turn up anything yet.”

“But that's changing now, Sherlock. Remember, you've already landed Delia in jail.”

“Which someone might have the grace to be happy about.”

“Lots of people are happy about it. And lots of people know you're suddenly determined to delve into their lives because of Danny. Maybe you're the catalyst we need to stir things up, Spencer. But if that's true, it means you're in danger.”

“So you're going to follow me. Even to my parents' home. Because of Sly.”

“You're perceptive tonight.”

She started to rise, but his hand pressed hers down on the armrest. “Spencer, this is an airplane. You can't run away from me here.”

“Are you sure you have a first-class ticket?”

“It's the damnedest thing. They'll sell a first-class ticket to anyone. Even an alien.”

She turned her back on him, slamming a hand against the small pillow she had been given. “Pity,” she said succinctly.

She could almost feel him stiffening. His pulse would be ticking in his throat. Only his tension would give any indication of his anger as his eyes darkened to near black.

“¡Arpis!”
he said softly.

She clenched her teeth and leaned her head back, closing her eyes. Once, a long time ago, she'd learned a lot about his world. She'd studied Castro and Cuba, and she'd made a point of learning about his father. She'd learned to like Cuban food, and she'd learned a lot of Cuban words.

That one, loosely translated, meant bitch.

You don't understand! she wanted to cry out. But she didn't understand herself, so there was nothing to say.

The past had never really ended for them. And Danny still came between them, almost as if he had a seat right there between them.

She could feel the heat emanating from David. Could smell his scent. Without meaning to, she remembered when he had touched her, how he had made her forget the world.

How much she had once loved him. How passionately. Even now, he could make her forget….

Forget Danny.

She had to find his killer. She had to. If she didn't, she would never feel that Danny had forgiven her.

God! If she could only get away.

But David was right. They were in an airplane, thirty thousand feet above the ground.

There was nowhere for her to go.

T
o Spencer's amazement, she managed to sleep through most of the flight. Thank God for champagne.

She also managed to miss dinner. By the time they landed, she was starving. She exited with David right behind her, making no attempt to help her with her overnight bag or jacket. He followed her step for step, and he was right behind her when they reached the car rental desk.

“Do I have to rent my own to follow you? Or are you going to let me share yours? Either way, Sly gets the bill.”

She cast him an irritated glance and signed the agreement.

“Will there be any other drivers?” the pretty young agent asked.

“No,” Spencer said.

“Yes,” David told her, opening his wallet and setting his license next to Spencer's.

Her head was really beginning to pound, and her stomach was growling. She had to get out of there.

“Two drivers, then?” the clerk said.

“Whatever,” Spencer said, trying to keep her voice level and noting that the woman gave David a glance sympathizing with him for having such a nasty traveling companion. She also noticed that David flashed a handsome smile in return.

Spencer started out to the courtesy shuttle. David fell in behind her, looking around.

“You've never been to Boston before?” she asked him.

He shook his head. “New York, Chicago, London, Madrid, Paris, Rome—but never Boston.”

The shuttle dropped them off in a few minutes and Spencer found herself reaching across another counter for the keys. David followed her to the car, automatically approaching the driver's side and reaching for the keys.

“Excuse me, I'm letting you share my car. I'm not letting you drive.”

“Spencer, do we have to argue over every—”

“No! It's my car.”

“It's a rental car!”

“It's
my
rental car. And we're in a town I know and you don't. Plus you know nothing about Boston drivers. The only thing a New York cabbie fears is a Boston driver.”

“I'm sure they'd be thrilled to hear your low opinion of them.”

“I didn't say they were bad drivers, just aggressive.”

“Yeah? Well I can be pretty damned aggressive, too. Now give me the keys.”

She could see that it would be pointless to keep arguing, so she dropped the keys in front of him. She walked around to the passenger side and slammed her way in while he bent to retrieve the keys.

He took the driver's seat, then switched on the ignition.

The traffic around Logan airport could be a killer, especially on a Friday night. David managed to thread his way through it as if he'd lived in the area for the past fifty years.

“Straight to Newport?”

“Yes!” she snapped, then hesitated. “No,” she amended. She was starving.

“Hungry?” he taunted. “Ah, yes. You did miss that great steak on the plane. I imagine you know all the posh places in town. I won't mind if you take me to one.”

“I do know some incredible places,” she said sweetly.

She gave him the directions to Boston's Hard Rock Cafe, and when they got there, she leaped out of the car while he was still staring at the door. The valet came around to take the car, and David climbed out, casting her an evil glare as the sound of the music blasted him.

She saw the look he gave her and hurried in. The music was exceptionally loud, and there was a long line. But, as luck would have it, they were a party of two, and those waiting were all groups of four or more. They were seated immediately, the perky hostess assuring them in a loud shout that they were incredibly fortunate.

Spencer wondered what she was doing. She had a splitting headache. The Hard Rock could be fun. She loved to walk around and study the rock memorabilia.

But not when her head was splitting. Like now. She'd brought David here because she knew he was tired and aggravated, as well, and probably wishing that no matter what he owed Sly, he hadn't agreed to watch over her. Unfortunately, she was going to be as sorry as he was.

But above all, she was starving. She ordered coffee and a grilled chicken salad. He ordered coffee—obviously, one of them
had
eaten on the plane.

The music did seem painfully loud. And the Friday-night date crowd was out. Execs in suits, sweet young things in very short skirts. David didn't even try to talk. He sat back, sipping coffee, idly observing the action.

She hadn't wanted to talk, but because he wasn't making conversation, she suddenly found herself asking a question.

“Your usual Friday night?”

He shrugged. She realized suddenly that she didn't know anything about his life. When Danny had been alive, even when she'd been avoiding David, she'd been dying to know what was going on in his life. But Danny had tried not to talk about David, and she had never dared to ask. She was irritated to realize just how hungry she was for the details of his life, and how jealous she still could become where he was concerned. Absurd. Surely she hadn't imagined that he'd spent his life alone? Not a man like David.

She should just shut up. But she couldn't. “What do you do these days?” she asked him. “When you're not following someone like a bloodhound.”

He shrugged. “It depends.”

“On what?”

“Who I'm with.”

She sipped her coffee, trying not to blink. He leaned toward her suddenly to be sure she could hear him over the music.

“Why don't you just come right out and ask me about my sex life, Spencer?”

She managed not to exhibit a single spark of reaction. “I do have the right to be just a bit concerned.”

“Oh?”

She felt her cheeks reddening despite her best effort to stay cool. “We weren't exactly careful when we…” Oh, come on, Spencer! she silently taunted herself. She was a big girl now. But she couldn't seem to find quite the way to describe what they had done. “Made love” sounded nice, but somehow it didn't quite fit the bill. Cruder words might fit, but she didn't feel like spitting them out, either. Or maybe she did.

In the end, no words came at all.

He stared at her for a long moment without replying, but he didn't need to hear more, and finally he said, “You don't need to worry about disease, Spencer. You done yet?”

“What?”

“Are you done with your dinner? I've got a headache, and I'm tired of shouting.”

“Well you could have woken me so I could have dinner on the plane.”

“With the mood you were in? I don't think so, Mrs. Huntington. And you could have chosen another place to eat this particular evening.”

She arched a brow. “You don't love rock ‘n' roll anymore?”

“Sure I do. Just not tonight. Can we get the check and go?”

The check had come already. Spencer had slipped it beneath her plate. Now she pulled it out to read it.

“Give me the damned check.”

“Why?”

“Because I'm a chauvinist or whatever else you want to call me. Just give me the damned thing!”

Surprising herself, she did. They exited the restaurant in silence. By the time the valet brought the car, it was nearly midnight.

“You know, I am the one who knows the way,” Spencer said.

“Get in the car, Spencer. Please!” The last was added as she glared at him. She climbed in.

The Friday-night traffic was thin. Spencer sat tensely for the first part of the drive; then her eyes began to close. Finally she leaned her head back and dozed.

The next thing she knew, she was being shaken awake. She opened her eyes to find herself lying on David's lap. She was comfortable there. A fleeting heartbeat of nostalgia assailed her. Yes, she was comfortable with the scent of him, the feel of him, the texture of his trousers. The hardness of him.

She sat up quickly, blinking.

They were at the gate to her parents' home, not far from the mansions that were open to the public, the Breakers, Rosewood and the others. She supposed that her parents' home might well rank among the most beautiful in the area. It had been built in 1900 and enhanced ever since. It was absurdly large for two people, but until the snows fell each year, her parents lived here alone, except for their staff.

“This it?” David asked.

She nodded. “How did you know?” She was still half-asleep. Disoriented.

“Sly gave me the address. Not that you can really find an address around here. I asked at the gas station down the street for the Montgomery house.”

“Oh.”

“How do you get in—without getting arrested?”

She flipped her straying hair from her face and pointed to a call box. “Hit the button.”

“It's pretty late.”

“My mom is a night owl.”

He didn't comment but hit the button. Spencer had to lean over him to talk.

“Yes?” a cautious, masculine voice said.

“Henri, it's Spencer. Can you open the gates, please?”

“Yes, Mrs. Huntington. Right away.”

David looked questioningly at her. “Henri?”

“The butler.”

“And he's a night owl, too?”

“Probably not. But he's very well paid.” The gates slid open. “Let's go,” Spencer said.

They drove along a winding lane. The house sat on an acre, with ten thousand square feet of living space. There were massive Greek columns in the front, and a huge bricked drive. David stopped in front of the columns. “We may need a few hundred more people to keep an eye on you in this place.”

She cast him a malicious glare. “Right. The butler might attack me.”

“Could be. I don't know the butler. What do you think?”

“I think Sly is wasting his money.”

David ignored that. “What do I do with the car?”

“Leave it. The chauffeur will take care of it in the morning.”

The foyer was several hundred feet square, David thought, entering. The chandelier above his head was probably worth enough to feed half the homeless in Dade County for a year. To the left stretched a huge ballroom, to his right, a library larger than several of the public libraries he had been in.

Dead center was a marble and wrought-iron stairway that curved elegantly to a balconied second story. They were barely through the front door before Spencer's mother, in a flowing negligee and matching robe, made her appearance, her husband, in a velvet smoking jacket, following right behind. David felt as if he had stepped into a prime-time soap opera.

“Spencer!” Mary Louise Montgomery threw her arms around her daughter, delighted to greet her. Then she looked over Spencer's shoulder and saw him standing there in the foyer, waiting.

“David!” she gasped, and her tone was quite different, though she struggled valiantly to retain some semblance of a smile.

He'd seen Spencer's parent's at Danny's funeral, of course. They had all been polite and cordial to one another—what else could people do when they were burying a guy like Danny? And when they had to consider Spencer's grief.

But now…

Mary Louise kept struggling with her composure, pulling away from her daughter to look at him. “Spencer, you've—you've brought David with you.”

“Not on purpose, Mrs. Montgomery,” David said, stepping in with their overnight bags. “I'm on guard duty,” he said flatly.

“What's he talking about?” Joe Montgomery demanded, stepping forward. He pulled Spencer from his wife's hold, giving her a long hug but staring at David over her shoulder.

“Nothing, Dad.”

Spencer swung around and stared hard at David. He shrugged, his look clearly telling her that he'd assumed she would rather have her parents know that Sly considered her to be in danger, rather than let them think she had brought him along for a fun weekend.

“David, what's going on, please?” Joe asked in a low voice.

David shrugged again, a little sorry for his rashness. He didn't particularly like or respect Joe Montgomery, but there was a lot of Sly in the man, especially the way he looked, tall, dignified, lean. David didn't think it was so much Joe who held the grudge against him. Spencer's mother had simply decided that David wasn't right for Spencer, and Joe had just gone along with what she thought was best for their only child.

“Nothing much, really. Sly is a little concerned because a few things seem to be heating up in the investigation into Danny's death. He asked me to keep an eye on Spencer.”

“Even here?” Spencer's mother demanded a little indignantly.

“Sly is a cautious man.”

“You know,” Spencer cut in, “it's really very late. I'm absolutely certain there's a guest room available for David, and I'm exhausted. We can talk all this out in the morning. I'm going to bed.”