Twist of Fate (36 page)

Hannah looked up at him uneasily, her mind beginning to focus on other things now that she was calming down. “What made you come down here, Gideon? Why did you follow me?”

His gaze was very steady. “You know the answer to that.”

“You'd figured out that Vicky and Drake were dangerous?”

“No. I didn't start thinking in those terms until after I'd already decided to follow you to Santa Inez. I didn't want you down here on your own, brooding in your aunt's house, poring over those journals with her ghost hovering around you.”

“That's a pretty melodramatic image.”

“Sometimes when I get nervous about you I get melodramatic.”

Hannah drew a deep breath. “Does having me spend the rest of the summer in Tucson mean so much to you, Gideon?”

“We're talking about more than a few weeks and you know it.”

“Are we?”

He got to his feet and moved slowly toward the chair across from the sofa. “Please don't be evasive, Hannah. We know each other too well for those kinds of games.”

“I'm not sure we do, and I'm not playing games, Gideon. I came down here to decide some very important things in my life. What happened tonight with the Armitages doesn't change anything. I still have to make some decisions.”

“You don't have to make them here.”

“Yes, I do have to make them here. I was right to come back to the cottage. This is where I need to be while I work it out.”

“Work what out, for God's sake?” Gideon's face was hard now, his eyes remote and too brilliant. He was locked in another battle and he knew it.

“For one thing, I have to decide whether to do the book about my aunt.”

“You don't have to be here to decide that.”

Hannah's mouth lifted wryly. “I told you, you don't understand.”

“Explain it to me,” he challenged.

“I can't.” It was the truth. She didn't know how to put into words what she knew writing the book about Elizabeth Nord would do for her and how it would change the direction of her life. Gideon would be furious if he realized that what he wanted was in jeopardy simply because of the Nord journals. He was dangerous when he was furious.

Gideon leaned forward intently, his elbows on his knees. “The real reason you ran down here was to get out of my reach, wasn't it?”

She hesitated. “That was part of it, I guess.”

“It didn't work.”

“No.”

“So stop running, Hannah. Come back to Tucson with me.”

“No.”

“Christ, Hannah, why are you being so damned stubborn?”

“Because I need time to think. I came down here to do exactly that and I intend to finish what I started. You'll have to go back to Tucson alone, Gideon, because I can't think as clearly as I should when you're around. I've told you that several times.”

“Doesn't the fact that you can't think clearly around me tell you anything?”

“It tells me I need to be alone for a while.” The necklace burned on her throat and Hannah automatically lifted her fingers to touch it. “I have to make my own decisions.”

“You're involved with me. Your decisions affect me. Can't you understand that?” He watched her toy with the necklace and frustrated malevolence flashed briefly in his eyes. “Come back to Tucson with me and I'll replace that stupid thing with a diamond.”

Hannah stared at him and then burst out laughing. “Oh, Gideon,” she said, recovering slowly, “you know that was a dumb thing to say.”

He sighed. “I know. I'm desperate. Besides, you'd look lousy in diamonds. They wouldn't go with the safari clothes.”

“I'm afraid not.”

“Hannah, please don't fight me on this.”

“I have to have time. I'm going to stay down here and contemplate a great many things while you go back to Tucson.”

He watched her in silence, knowing she meant every word. “How long?”

“How long will it take me to decide? I don't know.”

“It's not that damn Nord book you're going to think about. It's us.”

She thought about it. “Yes, in a way.” But it was all tied up with the book.

“Not ‘in a way.' It's definitely us you'll be thinking about.”

“Yes.”

“Hannah, let me stay.”

“You've got a business to run.”

He swore softly. “I'm not sure I do. By now Ballantine has probably hired away my staff and fed my reputation to the other corporate sharks in the sea.”

“Ballantine can't crush you, no matter what he does. You're too strong, Gideon. He could succeed in wiping you out financially and still not crush you. Don't you see, Gideon? That's the real reason you can afford to step back from a fight with him. He could never do to you what you did to his father. There is something inside you that would never be defeated. It's got nothing to do with your business or your reputation. It's much more fundamental than that. One of these days Hugh Ballantine will probably realize it and call off the war. He's too smart to beat his head against a stone wall forever.”

“I don't give a damn about Hugh Ballantine at the moment. You're the one who's driving me over the edge. I don't want to leave you down here by yourself.”

“You have no choice,” she said simply.

He looked at her and knew she spoke the truth. “Damn it to hell.”

 

G
IDEON DELAYED
the inevitable as long as possible. He paid a few more visits to the island police clearing up details and making sure the Seattle authorities were notified. He insisted on taking Hannah back to the doctor for another examination of her leg. He bought groceries. He cleaned up Hannah's kitchen. But in the end there were no more excuses. The next day he left Santa Inez Island. He drove himself to the airport feeling frustrated, angry and, deep inside, fearful. He had rarely known real fear in his life.

There was something going on in Hannah's stubborn, proud head that he simply didn't understand. It was so completely female that it seemed alien. He wanted to stand his ground and fight, but for the first time in his life he didn't have the vaguest idea of how to combat the enemy. So he left, knowing that for the moment he had no choice. He would have to take his chances.

Hannah felt a wave of sadness tinged with relief as she watched Gideon's car disappear out of the cottage drive. Slowly, leaning heavily on the cane again, she made her way back into the house. This was the only way. There had been no choice.

The rest of the day passed slowly. She spent the time resting her leg, sipping iced tea and trying not to think about anything at all. The thinking could wait until tomorrow.

The next morning dawned with the promise of stifling heat. Hannah put on a pair of olive green walking shorts and a short-sleeved camp shirt. When she walked out into the living room the first things she saw were the journals.

They waited for her. They always seemed to be waiting for her. No matter which way she turned the journals were there, beckoning, insisting, and promising.

Writing the book would change everything. She would be choosing a path that would consume her in some ways, endow her with power in others. But it would be a path that would not allow anyone else as strong as Gideon to get too close. She would walk it alone, the same way her aunt had.

Elizabeth Nord had traveled her path willingly enough, Hannah thought. In fact Nord had gloried in it. Hannah could revel in it also. All she had to do was write the book. Her life would never be the same.

But neither would it be if she chose to go to Gideon. Her life would be changed. His personal strength was a danger to her in some ways. He could overwhelm when he chose, and in his natural arrogance he would probably choose to do exactly that on frequent occasions. She would have her hands full loving him and at the same time holding her own around him.

Loving him.
The words tripped through her brain, startling her. She hadn't been thinking in such terms, hadn't wanted to think that way. Love was a perilous business, something a smart woman didn't risk unless she could be sure she was loved deeply in return. Nord had understood that and had stayed clear of the emotion. Gideon, too, had managed to avoid the weakening force of love. There was no guarantee that he would ever get to the point where he could love someone else completely. There was too much that was remote and private in him, too much that was hard and strong and independent.

She could be like that if she wrote the book.
The necklace was hot on her skin.
Free.
Totally, gloriously free. Never again would she become mired in the problems of other people. Never again would she allow the weaknesses of others to drag her down. Never again would compassion and empathy compromise her own personal strength. All she had to do was write the book.

Hannah stood irresolutely on the veranda, considering a walk down by the cove. She had wanted to be alone, but suddenly she was afraid to be alone. Changing her mind about the walk, she went back into the cottage and found the keys to the new jeep Gideon had rented for her.

Driving, she quickly decided, was never again going to be a totally relaxed experience for her. Two accidents in such a short period of time were enough to traumatize even an Amazon, and Hannah wasn't at all sure she was made of Amazonian material. Nevertheless she forced herself to drive back along the cliff road into town. She was not going to let herself be housebound. But she didn't look over the side when she came to the point in the road where the jeep had gone over the edge. Willpower was a good thing, but there was no sense pushing it to the limit.

In a pink stucco waterfront hotel that had been built during the Dutch colonial era Hannah found a pay phone and some privacy. She hesitated a few moments and then called her brother. He came on the line immediately, his voice sounding both relieved and anxious.

“Hannah! You're driving me bonkers this summer. I just had a call from Gideon who, by the way, sounds madder than hell. He told me what had happened. You're all right this time?”

“I'm all right. A little sore and bruised in places but I'm okay.” It was good to hear her brother's voice.

“I can hardly believe that business about the Armitages. Gideon said you got into a knockdown, drag-out fight with Vicky.”

“You were right about the pecs on that woman. She's as strong as a horse.”

“Must be hell on wheels in bed. Wonder how Drake handled her?”

“Trust a man to think of that first. Don't forget he spent a lot of time on the weight machines, too. I've got a feeling he could hold his own. While you were noticing Vicky's pectorals, I had occasion to admire Drake's biceps. Listen, Nick, I'm not calling to talk about that.”

“What are you calling about?”

“Just to hear your voice.”

He chuckled softly. “Feeling lonely down there?”

“In a way.”

“You shouldn't have sent Gideon back to Tucson.”

Hannah wrinkled her nose. “He told you about that?”

“He said your stubbornness was equalled only by your idiocy.”

“That man certainly has a way with words.”

Nick's voice softened. “Are you really okay, Hannah?”

“Yes.” It was true. She was fine. “I just have some thinking to do.”

“Because I can be down there by tomorrow if you need me.”

“Thanks, but I'm all right, really.”

“Gideon isn't.”

“No?”

“You've got him running scared.”

“I think that's overstating the case,” she said dryly.

“I don't. You forget I know the man in some ways you don't. I've seen him in action on the corporate level. I have a great deal of respect for anyone, male or female, who could terrorize him.”

“Gideon is no more terrorized than you are. He's just mad because he hasn't gotten his way.”

“Maybe that's why he's so damned nervous. He's used to getting his own way, Hannah.”

“I know. Goodbye, Nick. I'll call you when I'm ready to leave the island.”

“Take care.”

“I will.”

“I love you, sister.”

“Same here, brother.” Hannah hung up the phone feeling better.

She wandered through the narrow, twisting alleys outside the hotel, browsing in the shop windows without really noticing what she was looking at. At one point she followed a cobbled walk that led back to the courtyard where she had bought the souvenir map for Gideon. Seeing another stack of the same maps left her feeling strange. She turned away and went in search of a glass of lemonade.

By noon the day had fulfilled the promise of heat. There were damp patches under the arms of Hannah's camp shirt as she drove back to the cottage, and she wished for the first time that her aunt had installed air conditioning instead of the picturesque ceiling fans. It was hard to think in this kind of heat.