The Last Honest Woman (2 page)

There would be no fast ride here, where the snow and mud had mixed itself into a slushy mire. The air was cold and heavy with damp, but she felt a sense of anticipation. Things were changing, and wasn't that all anyone could ask? They kept to a fast walk, with both of them straining for what always seemed just out of reach. Freedom.

Perhaps agreeing to be interviewed for this book would bring some portion of it. She could only hope. But the doubts she'd lived with ever since the arrangements had been made still hovered. What was right, what was wrong, what were the consequences? She'd have to assume the responsibility, no matter what occurred.

She rode over the land she loved yet never quite considered her own.

The snow was melting in the pasture. In another month, she thought, the foals could play on the new grass. She'd plant hay and oats, and this year—maybe this year—her books would inch over into the black.

Chuck would never have worried. He'd never thought about tomorrow, only about the next moment. The next car race. She knew why he'd bought the land in rural Virginia. Perhaps she'd always known. But at the time she'd been able to take his gesture of guilt as a gesture of hope. Her ability to find and hold on to thin threads of hope had gotten her through the last eight years.

Chuck had bought the land, then had spent only a few scattered weeks on it. He'd been too restless to sit and watch the grass grow. Restless, careless and selfish, that was Chuck. She'd known that before she'd married him. Perhaps that was why she'd married him. She couldn't claim he'd ever pretended to be anything else. It was simply that she'd looked and seen what she'd wanted to see. He'd swept into her life like the comet he was and, blinded with fascination, she'd followed.

The eighteen-year-old Abigail O'Hurley had been stunned and thrilled at being romanced by the dramatic Chuck Rockwell. His name had been front-page news as he'd raced his way through the Grand Prix circuit. His name had been in bold type on the scandal sheets as he'd raced his way through the hearts of women. The young Abigail hadn't read the tabloids.

He'd spun her into his life in Miami, charmed and dazzled her. He'd offered excitement. Excitement and a freedom from responsibilities. She'd been married before she'd been able to catch her breath.

Though a light drizzle was falling now, Abby stopped her horse. She didn't mind the rain that dampened her face and jacket. It added another quality she'd needed that morning. Isolation. A coward's way, she knew, but she'd never thought herself brave. What she had done—what she would continue to do—was survive.

The land curved gently, patched with snow, misted with a fog that hovered over it. When Judd pawed the ground impatiently, she patted his neck until he was quiet again. It was so beautiful. She'd been to Monte Carlo, to London and Paris and Bonn, but after nearly five years of day-to-day living and dawn-to-dusk working, she still thought this was the most beautiful sight in the world.

The rain splattered down, promising to make the dirt roads that crisscrossed her land all but unmanageable. If the temperatures dropped that night, the rain would freeze and leave a slick and dangerous sheen of ice over the snow. But it was beautiful. She owed Chuck for this. And for so much more.

He'd been her husband. Now she was his widow. Before he'd burned himself out he'd singed her badly, but he'd left her two of the most important things in her life: her sons.

It was for them she'd finally agreed to let the writer come. She'd dodged offers from publishers for more than four years. That hadn't stopped an unauthorized biography of Chuck Rockwell or the stories that still appealed from time to time in the papers. After months of soul-searching, Abby had finally come to the conclusion that if she worked with a writer, a good writer, she would have some control over the final product. When it was done, her sons would have something of their father.

Dylan Crosby was a very good writer. Abby knew that was as much a disadvantage as an advantage. He'd poke into areas she was determined to keep off-limits. She wanted him to. When he did, she'd answer in her way, and she'd finally dose that chapter of her life.

She would have to be clever. With a shake of her head she ducked to her horse and sent him moving again. The trouble was, she'd never been the clever one. Chantel had been that. Her older sister—older by two and a half minutes—had always been able to plan and manipulate and make things happen.

Then there was Maddy, her other sister, younger by two minutes and ten seconds. Maddy was the outgoing one, the one who could usually make her own way through sheer drive and will.

But she was Abby, the middle triplet The quiet one. The responsible one. The dependable one. Those titles still made her wince.

Her problem now wasn't a label that had been pinned on her before she could walk. Her problem now was

Dylan Crosby, former investigative reporter turned biographer. In his twenties he'd unearthed a Mafia connection that had eventually crumbled one of the largest mob families on the East Coast. Before he'd turned thirty he'd unhinged the career of a senator with an unreported Swiss bank account and aspirations to higher office. Now she had to handle him.

And she would. After all, he would be on her turf, under her roof. She would feed him information. The secrets she wanted kept secret were locked in her own head and her own heart. She alone had the key.

If she'd learned nothing else as the middle daughter of a pair of road-roving entertainers, she'd learned how to act. To get what she wanted, all she had to do was give Dylan Crosby one hell of a show.

Never tell the whole truth, girl. Nobody wants to hear it.
That's what her father would have said. And that, Abby told herself with a smile, was what she'd keep reminding herself of over the next few months.

A bit reluctant to leave the open road and the ram, Abby turned her horse and headed back. It was almost time to begin.

Dylan cursed the rain and reached out the window again to wipe at the windshield with an already-drenched rag. The wiper on his side was working only in spurts. The one on the other side had quit altogether. Icy rain soaked through his coat sleeve as he held the wheel with one hand and cleared his vision with the other. He'd been mad to buy a twenty-five-year-old car, classic or not. The '62 Vette looked like a dream and ran like a nightmare.

It probably hadn't been too smart to drive down from New York in February either, but he'd wanted the freedom of having his own car—such as it was. At least the snow he'd run into in Delaware had turned to rain as he'd driven south. But he cursed the rain again as it pelted through the open window and down his collar.

It could be worse, he told himself. He couldn't think of precisely how; but it probably could. After all, he was finally going to sink his teeth into a project he'd been trying to make gel for three years. Apparently Abigail O'Hurley Rockwell had decided she'd squeezed the publisher for all she could get.

A pretty sharp lady, he figured. She'd snagged one of the hottest and wealthiest race car drivers on the circuit. And she'd hardly been more than a kid. Before she'd reached nineteen she'd been wearing mink and diamonds and rolling dice in places like Monte Carlo. It was never much strain to spend someone else's money. His ex-wife had shown him that in a mercifully brief eighteen-month union.

Women were, after all, born with guile. They were fashioned to masquerade as helpless, vulnerable creatures. Until they had their hooks in you. To shake free, you had to bleed a little. Then if you were smart, you took a hard look at the scars from time to time to remind yourself how life really worked.

Dylan struggled with the map beside him, held it in front while steering with his elbows, then swore again. Yes, that had been his turn. He'd just missed it. With a quick glance up and down the stretch of rain-fogged road, he spun into a U-turn. The wipers might be pitiful, but the Vette knew how to move.

He couldn't imagine the Chuck Rockwell he'd followed and admired choosing to settle in the backwoods of Virginia. Maybe the little woman had talked him into buying it as some sort of hideaway. She'd certainly been hibernating there for the past few years.

Just what kind of woman was she? In order to write a thorough biography of the man, he had to understand the woman. She'd stuck with Rockwell like glue for nearly the first full year on the circuit, then she'd all but disappeared. Maybe the smell of gas and smoking tires had annoyed her. She hadn't been in the stands for her husband's victories or his defeats. Most importantly, she hadn't been there when he'd run his last race. The one that had killed him. From the information Dylan had, she'd finally shown up at the funeral three days later but had hardly spoken a word. She hadn't shed a tear.

She'd married a gold mine and turned a blind eye to his infidelities. Money was the only answer. Now, as his widow, she was in the position of never having to lift a finger. Not bad for a former singer who'd never made it past hotel lounges and second-rate clubs.

He had to slow the Vette to a crawl to make it down the slushy, rut-filled lane marked by a battered mailbox with Rockwell painted on the side.

Obviously she didn't believe in spending much money on maintenance. Dylan wiped his window again and set his teeth against each jarring bump. When he heard his muffler scrape, he stopped cursing the rain and started cursing Abigail. The way he saw it, she had a closetful of silk and fur but wouldn't shell out for minimal road repair.

When he saw the house, he perked up a bit. It wasn't the imposing, oppressive plantation house he'd been expecting. It was charming and homey, right down to the rocker on the front porch. The shutters on the windows were painted Colonial blue, providing a nice contrast to the white frame. A deck with a double railing skirted the second floor. Though he could see the house needed a new paint job, it didn't look run-down, just lived-in. There was smoke trailing up from the chimney and a bike with training wheels leaning on its kick-stand under the overhang of the roof. The sound of a dog's deep-throated barking completed the scene.

He'd often thought of finding a place just like this for himself. A place away from crowds and noise where he could concentrate on writing. It reminded him of the home he'd had as a child, where security bad gone hand in hand with hard work.

When his muffler scraped the road again, he was no longer charmed. Dylan pulled up behind a pickup truck and a compact station wagon and shut off his engine. Dropping his rag on the floor mat, he rolled up his window and had started to open the door when a mass of wet fur leaped on it.

The dog was enormous. Maybe it had meant to give a friendly greeting, but in its current bedraggled state, the animal didn't look too pleasant. As Dylan gauged its size against that of a small hippo the dog scraped two muddy paws down his window and barked. "Sigmund!"

Both Dylan and the dog looked toward the house, where a woman stood near the porch steps. So this was Abigail, he mused. He'd seen enough pictures of her over the years to recognize her instantly. The fresh-faced ingenue in the pits at Rockwell's races. The stunning socialite in London and Chicago. The cool, composed widow by her husband's grave. Yet she wasn't precisely what he'd expected.

Her hair, a honey blond, fell across her forehead in wispy bangs and skimmed her shoulders. She looked very slender, and very comfortable in jeans and boots and a bulky sweater that bagged at her hips. Her face was pale and delicate through the rain. He couldn't see the color of her eyes, but he could see her mouth, full and unpainted as she called to the dog again.

"Sigmund, get down now."

The dog let out a last halfhearted bark and obeyed. Cautious, Dylan opened the door and stepped out. "Mrs. Rockwell?"

"Yes. Sony about the dog. He doesn't bite. Very often."

"There's good news," Dylan muttered, and popped his trunk.

As he pulled out his bags, Abby stood where she was while her nerves tightened. He was a stranger, and she was letting him into her home, into her life. Maybe she should stop it now, right now before he'd taken another step.

Then he turned, bags in hand, and looked at her. Rain streamed from his hair. It was dark, darker now wet and plastered around his face. Not a kind face, she thought immediately as she rubbed her palms on her thighs. There was too much living in it, too much knowledge, for kindness. A woman had to be crazy to let a man like that into her life. Then she saw that his clothes were drenched and his shoes already coated with mud.

"Looks like you could use some coffee."

"Yeah." He gave the dog a last look as it sniffed around his ankles. "Your lane's a mess."

"I know." She gave him a small, apologetic smile as she noted that his car had fared no better than he. "It's been a hard winter."

He didn't step forward. With the rain pelting between them, he stood watching her. Summing her up, Abby decided, and she thrust her nervous hands in her pockets. She'd committed herself, and she wouldn't get what she wanted if she allowed herself to be a coward now.

"Come inside." She went to the door to wait for him.

Her eyes looked dark, a soft green, and if he hadn't known better he'd have said they were frightened. The delicacy he'd seen at a distance became more apparent at close range. She had elegant cheekbones and a slightly pointed chin that gave her face a triangular piquant look. Her skin was pale, her lashes dark. Dylan decided she was either a magician with cosmetics or wasn't wearing any. She smelled of rain and wood-smoke.

Pausing at the door, Dylan pried off his shoes. "I don't think you want me tramping around the place in those."

"I appreciate it." He stepped easily into her house in his stockinged feet while she stood with her hand on the knob feeling desperate and awkward. "Why don't you just leave your things there for now and come into the kitchen? It's warm; you can dry out."

"Fine." He found the inside of the house as unexpected as he'd found the exterior. The floors were worn, their shine a bit dull. He saw on a table by the staircase a crude papier-mâché flower that appeared to have been made by a child. As they walked, Abby bent down to pick two little plastic men in space regalia and continued without breaking rhythm.