He’d been bent out of shape ever since Tam’s phone call. He wanted her to tell Tony about Tam’s calls, about the danger Tam said she was in. He wanted her to leave the investigation and go hole up somewhere until the Gingerbread Man was caught. He wanted her to abandon her entire career and find an alternative use for her medical degree that did not involve serial killers.
And he wanted her not to get involved with Tony. That one he hadn’t said in so many words, but she didn’t have any trouble interpreting the increasingly grim set to his mouth, or the antagonistic glint in his eyes, as she and Tony had talked more and more exclusively to each other over dinner, while Kaminsky and Buzz did the same. Then, when the others had been leaving and Tony had asked her if she wanted to stay on for coffee and dessert, and she had agreed without so much as a glance thrown at the frowning ghost sprawled in a chair across the table from her, Michael had started to radiate hostility like rays from the sun.
She’d felt that hostility all but scorching her as over dessert she and Tony had completely abandoned shop talk and he’d told her self-deprecating stories about his days as a college football player that made her laugh. Then when she had excused herself to go to the restroom and Michael had (of course) followed her, her back had practically blistered from the heat.
“The bathroom is off-limits,” she had warned Michael out of the side of her mouth as she reached the ladies’ room door, in an effort to avoid the discussion (fight) she had a pretty good idea was coming.
So much for that. At least he’d had the decency to wait until (she assumed) he’d heard the buzzing of the air dryer that had told him she was drying her hands.
The dress wasn’t helping.
The thing was, she was wearing one. It was a sundress, a beautiful deep red print, with a thin strap over each shoulder and smocking that kept it snug to the waist and a floaty, tea-length skirt. She’d bought it in the hotel’s upscale gift shop, when the four (five) of them had come in from walking Hampton’s sidewalks as, straight off the plane, they had followed the route Jenna said she’d taken before being grabbed. Evening had fallen as they went inside each of the establishments Jenna would have passed, and examined the spot where the abduction had occurred, but the temperature stayed in the nineties, and the humidity was thick. By the time they returned to the car and drove to the hotel, besides being cross from listening to Michael without being able to answer back, Charlie had been hot and sweaty and heartily regretting the way she was dressed. Her sleeveless silk blouse had been clinging unpleasantly to her skin and her lightweight slacks felt like they were heavy wool and plastered to her legs. No surprise: she’d packed work clothes, but what she had failed to consider was that her work clothes had been chosen with an indoor, air-conditioned office in mind. They weren’t suitable for being outdoors in so much heat and humidity.
So when she had seen the pretty, lightweight summer ensembles in the hotel gift shop, she’d left the men to check in and, with Kaminsky following on her heels, headed for the clothes. If anything, Kaminsky in her fitted suit was even more inappropriately dressed for what they’d just been doing and were planning on continuing to do the next day than Charlie was. They had a brief meeting of the (female) minds and Kaminsky, too, had indulged in some shopping.
The result was that Kaminsky had worn a sleek, knee-length (she told Charlie with a wry twist of her mouth that she couldn’t go longer because of her height) black linen shift with a nifty little short-sleeved bolero to hide her shoulder holster, plus her own stilettos, which she refused to forsake, while Charlie had worn the sundress, and a pair of embellished sandals with delicate kitten heels that she’d purchased to go with the dress.
Having of necessity followed her into the gift shop, Michael in typical male fashion had displayed little interest as she had rifled through the clothing. So when she’d emerged from the bathroom of her hotel room to find him draped over one of the two wing chairs on the other side of the single king bed, desultorily watching TV, the night sky black behind him through the opened curtains and the room itself softly lit by the floor lamp between the chairs, his eyes had widened in surprise as he glanced her way.
“You look beautiful,” he said. Fresh from her shower, with her hair twisted into a cool updo that left a few tendrils loose to curl around her face and neck, and her makeup subtle but there (it had all but melted away earlier), she felt so much better that she smiled at him, which, because she’d been hot and cross and tired of him telling her what she needed to do, she hadn’t done for a while.
“Thank you,” she said.
He stood up and came toward her, his gaze sliding over her before lingering on her nearly bare shoulders. “All this for Dudley?”
Her brows twitched together. “All this because the dining room closed at nine, so we’ll be eating outside by the pool, and it’s hot out there.” She reached for his watch, which she’d left beside her purse on the console table that ran along the wall opposite the beds, and slid it onto her arm. Then she picked up her purse and turned to head for the door.
“Listen to what you just said: you’ll be eating outside by the pool. You know it’s night, right? That makes the pool dark water. For that matter, this hotel’s on the beach. The ocean is right there. More dark water.”
Already having had the same thought and conquered it, and aggravated at having all that latent fear stirred up again, she turned around to glare at him. “If I stay in the room and run a bath, and turn the light out in the bathroom, the tub will be full of dark water, too.”
His lips thinned. “The difference is, there’s not likely to be a serial killer who knows your name in the bathroom with you.”
“No, he’ll be right outside the door,” she retorted.
“Oh, ha ha.” From his expression, he clearly didn’t find that amusing. “Your friend the voodoo priestess says you’re in danger. You say the voodoo priestess is generally right on. How stupid is it to stay here in harm’s way when it would be the easiest thing in the world to stay in your room tonight, hop a plane tomorrow, and fly somewhere safe?”
Charlie sighed. “That’s the problem, don’t you see? There isn’t anywhere safe. I’m as liable to be running into danger as I am to be running away from it. Tam says I’m in danger near dark water. If you think about it, there’s dark water everywhere. For my money, the reason I’m in danger near dark water is almost certainly because there’s a serial killer out there who knows my name. Therefore, the way to make me safe is to catch the serial killer. And at a guess, I’d say I’m safer surrounded by three armed FBI agents than I would be on my own.”
Their eyes met.
You’d be with me,
his said, and hers replied,
You can’t protect me,
and his narrowed and his mouth tightened in angry acknowledgment.
“You’re scaring me to death here, all right?” His words were abrupt. His face was tight. “At least tell Dudley about what the damned woman said so he’s on his guard, would you please?”
“Fine,” she snapped, annoyed at herself because it touched her that he would disregard the rivalry she knew he felt with Tony to try to make sure she was protected. “I’m scared, too, you know. I’m always scared, all the time. I live with this constant, low-grade fear and have since my friend was killed and I found out what kind of evil exists in the world. What Tam said simply cranked it up a couple of notches. But what I’ve learned over the years is that the only thing to do when you’re scared is stay cool and keep moving ahead.”
Even as the words left her mouth, Charlie realized it was the first time in her adult life that she had ever admitted to anyone that she was afraid. Fear had been her constant companion for as long as she could remember; she had learned to hide it, to deny it, to hold her head high in the face of it and carry on.
But she had never admitted to it out loud until right now—to him.
Her ghost.
And what did that say about the state of her heart where he was concerned?
“Charlie.” His eyes darkened and slid to her mouth, and she knew he wanted to kiss her. And she knew that if there had been any way, any possible way to make that happen, she would have walked straight into his arms and slid her own around his neck and kissed him until kissing wasn’t enough. And then she would have gone to bed with him.
Because that’s what she was burning to do.
Just thinking about it made her go all soft and shivery inside.
Her face must have given her away, because his eyes blazed at her. Suddenly passion beat in the air between them, as tangible as the pounding of her heart.
A knock at the door broke the spell.
“That’ll be Tony,” she said, and saw his eyes flare.
She was still aching for Michael when she turned and opened the door to find Tony standing there.
“Why, Dr. Stone,” Tony greeted her on a note of surprised pleasure, doing an exaggerated double-take as she stepped out into the bright light of the hallway and he took in her in her dress. He wasn’t his usual FBI agent-correct self, either, having lost the coat and tie and rolled the sleeves of his white dress shirt up to his elbows. The tail end of his shirt was out, too, and she presumed that was to hide his gun.
“Why, Special Agent Bartoli,” she echoed on the same note, giving him a copy of the exaggerated once-over he had given her, and he laughed and caught her hand and brought it to his mouth and kissed it. The brush of his lips on her skin was warm, and pleasant, and the casual grace of the gesture made her heart hurt a little.
Because it served to underline the fact that she was never going to have that with the man (?) she really wanted. The simple pleasures of casual physical contact were never going to happen between her and Michael.
But, she decided as she smiled at Tony and he tucked his hand around her arm—it felt warm and strongly masculine against her skin, and she was suddenly acutely conscious of it—and they started walking side by side toward the elevator where Kaminsky in her new dress and Buzz in rolled-up shirtsleeves were waiting, she wasn’t going to let her heart get broken. Having it break over a dead man would be stupid. Because it wouldn’t change a thing: he would still be unavailable for the life she wanted—he would still be dead.
There was a phrase from a song her mother used to listen to:
love the one you’re with.
She liked Tony a whole lot. She found him attractive, sexy. His kisses turned her on.
Tony she could kiss. Tony she could have sex with. Tony she could even, eventually, if things worked out, make a life with.
Stupid she wasn’t. She knew enough to choose the possible over the impossible.
So that’s what she made up her mind to do.
They joined Kaminsky and Buzz at the elevators just in time for Charlie to overhear Kaminsky saying to Buzz, “So where’d you go last night?” to which Buzz replied with a startled, “What?” while Kaminsky pinned him with a censorious look and answered, “I was in the room next door, remember? I heard you go out,” before they both shut up as Charlie and Tony reached them. Charlie had the fleeting thought that Kaminsky’s oversleeping that morning was thus explained: she’d obviously stayed awake listening for Buzz to return from wherever he’d gone. Which meant that the situation between them was getting interesting. Charlie realized that she hadn’t been paying much attention to them, which wasn’t surprising: she had her own (way complicated) situation going on, after all.
The elevator came, and the four (five) of them piled in.
When they emerged on the ground floor to head across the cavernous, marble-floored lobby and through the big glass doors into the covered outdoor walkway beyond, it was full night. A ruffle of strategically placed potted palm trees blocked the patio from view. Soft romantic music filled the air, along with the sounds of conversation and laughter from their fellow late diners. The moon was a tipsy crescent high in the sky and thousands of stars twinkled like tiny rhinestones set into midnight velvet. A few steps down took them to the wide patio with its wrought iron tables and chairs. It was enclosed on two sides by smaller buildings connected to the hotel, but the front was open. The surrounding landscaping was lush and fragrant, and the flickering lights from dozens of jewel-toned hurricane lanterns glowing on the tables and on tall, willowy stands around the perimeter added a magical beauty. It was still hot outside, but the humidity was made bearable by a slight, salt-scented breeze blowing in off the ocean. In the distance, across a stretch of pale, barely seen beach, Charlie glimpsed the roll of whitecaps on the gleaming black water. Much closer at hand, down a path that led from the patio to the beach, the hotel’s grottolike pool still accommodated a few die-hard swimmers. Dark water, Charlie thought, and felt a cold finger of fear slide down her spine. Her step faltered for a second—but really, what was there to do, run back to her room and stay there until Tam gave her the all clear? Saying, “At least stay away from the damned water” in a goaded tone, Michael moved in close beside her, placing his big body between her and the pool and the sea, but it was Tony’s hand that slid around her arm again. It was Tony’s touch she felt, Tony who was solid and warm and as physically present as she was. Refusing to even glance at Michael, Charlie deliberately leaned into Tony a little, just enough so that their bodies brushed, and looked up at him and smiled.
Over dinner, Charlie concentrated on the man she could have, and pretended the one she couldn’t have wasn’t there. Because in a world that didn’t absolutely suck, he wouldn’t have been, and she could have fallen in love with Tony without any damned infernal interference.