His heart began to thud, his throat to close. As his vision blurred he blinked, saw someone. He tried to call out, but his voice was a croak. He tried to pull his body from the pool, but his hands, his arms were already numb. He lost his grip, hit his jaw on the edge.
He felt no pain.
Gasping, he struggled to keep his head above water. He choked, and flailed, ordered himself to float. Just to float until he could think again.
“I’ll help you,” his killer said. And with the long pole of the pool net reached out. Pressing it lightly on his shoulder, pushed him down, held him down with no real effort at all.
Until his struggles stopped.
Eve stepped out of the shower feeling reborn. She’d been off her stride, she admitted, off her feed, and just plain off for a few days. But that was done.
She was grateful only a few people knew she’d let herself obsess over and get turned inside out about some smug, manipulative blonde. Magdelana Percell, she promised herself as the warm air of the drying tube swirled, was officially history.
She snagged a robe and decided she was hungry enough to eat what Roarke called a full Irish. Once she had that and some coffee under her belt, she was heading straight down to Central.
She was going back to the beginning of the Foster investigation with her mind clear. Maybe the personal blur had caused her to miss something.
She stepped out, and Roarke was there, sipping coffee, scanning the last of the financials while the cat bumped his head against Roarke’s arm. As if to say, “Aren’t you going to eat? Where’s breakfast?”
“You feed that lard-ass yet?” she asked.
“I did, yes, though he’ll call me a liar. I, however, was waiting for you.”
“I guess I could choke something down. Some eggs and whatever.”
“You need some whatever.” He rose, cutting her off before she reached her closet, and gave her ass a deliberate squeeze. “You’ve lost a couple pounds in the last few days.”
“Maybe.”
“My gauge has pinpoint accuracy when it comes to you.” He kissed her between the eyes. “A full Irish is in order, I’m thinking.”
“That’s plenty of whatever.” She went to her closet with a smile on her face. It was good to be back in synch.
“If I’m clear and you can manage it,” she began as she grabbed clothes, “maybe we could bop by Mavis and Leonardo’s. I can tag her later, see if they’re up for it.”
“Suits me.” He switched to the morning news before going to the AutoChef. “A teddy bear, was it?”
“Peabody said. Or something in that realm.”
“I think we both might leave that one up to Caro. No doubt she’ll know just the thing. Just let either her or me know if I should come down to Central or meet you at their place.”
She was strapping on her weapon harness when he turned. “It’s a pity you couldn’t have appeared on Nadine’s show like that. The shirtsleeves, the weapon at your side. Sexy and dangerous.”
Eve only snorted, then sat to put on her boots.
He crossed over to set down their plates, and after one steely warning look at Galahad, pulled Eve to her feet. “Sexy,” he repeated, “dangerous. And mine.”
“Better back off, ace. I’m armed.”
“Just the way I like you. What do you say we do the obvious and clichéd for Valentine’s Day? A romantic dinner for two, a great deal of champagne, dancing, and incredible amounts of inventive sex.”
“I might be available for that.”When the hell was Valentine’s Day again?
He laughed, reading her perfectly. “The fourteenth, my sentimental fool. Which would be the day after tomorrow. If work interferes, we’ll just have a very late dinner for two, and so forth.”
“You’re on.” And because it just felt right, she laid her head on his shoulder.
She missed the first sentence or two the chirpy on-air reporter said. Even when Roarke’s name was announced-and her own-she might have let it slip.
But he stiffened against her so she focused on the screen. The air inside her body simply evaporated, and left her hollow.
He stood with Magdelana, stood close, looking down at her. Just the barest hint of a smile on his face. A face Magdelana held intimately in her hands.
“…identified by our sources as European socialite Magdelana Percell, recently divorced from Georges Fayette, a wealthy French entrepreneur. It appears Ms. Percell has an eye for wealthy men as she was seen lunching with Roarke only days ago at the exclusive Sisters Three restaurant here in New York. According to our sources, the pair enjoyed seasonal salads and a great deal of intimate conversation. We wonder if Lieutenant Eve Dallas, one of New York’s top cops, and Roarke’s wife of the last year and a half, is investigating.”
“Fuck me,” Roarke muttered. “What bloody bullshit. I’m sorry they-”
He stopped whatever he was going to say as she was pulling very slowly, very deliberately away from him. And he saw her face. It was sheet white, her eyes dark and shocked against the utter pallor.
“Christ Jesus, Eve, you can’t-”
“I have to go to work.” The words jumped so in her throat, in her head, she wasn’t sure they came out in the right order.
“Bollocks to that. Toall of this. I did nothing, and you should know it-damn it, you should know without me saying it. I walked her out of the building. She came to see me, and I gave her less than ten minutes before I showed her the door. I felt small doing so, if you must know, but I’d rather hurt her feelings than cause you a moment of unhappiness.”
She spoke as slowly and deliberately as she’d moved. “I need you to back off.”
“Fuck that! Fuck it, Eve. Am I to be tried and condemned because some moron had a vid-cam at the right moment? A moment when a woman I once cared for said good-bye? Do you think I’d have embarrassed you, or myself come to that, in this way?”
“You did, you did embarrass both of us this way. But that’s not important, that’s not the point.”
“Damn if I’ll apologize for helping a woman into her car on a public street in the middle of the bleeding day.” He dragged his hand through his hair in a gesture she recognized, even now, as absolute frustration. “You’re too smart for this. You know there are people who love nothing more than to spread dirt about people like us. And you would accuse me-”
“I haven’t accused you.”
“Oh, aye, you have, of all manner of things.” Frustration turned on a dime to rage and insult. “And you do it without a word. I’d rather have the words as hard as they might be than that look on your face. It’s killing me. Let’s have this out then, once and for all, and be bloody well done with it.”
“No. No. I don’t want to be here right now.” Carefully, she picked up her jacket. “I don’t want to be with you right now. Because I can’t fight right now. I can’t think. I’ve got nothing. So you’ll win, if that’s what you need, because I’ve got nothing.”
“This isn’t about winning.” The utter misery on her face, in her voice, drowned the temper. “What I need is to know you believe me. That you trust me. That you know me.”
The tears were coming; she wouldn’t be able to hold them back much longer. She put on her jacket. “We’ll get into it later.”
“That one thing, Eve,” he said as she turned away. “Answer that one thing. Do you believe I’d betray you with her?”
She drew in what little she had and turned to face him. “No. No, I don’t believe you’d betray me with her. I don’t believe you’d cheat on me. But I’m afraid, and I’m sick in my heart that you might look at her, then at me. And regret.”
He took a step toward her. “Eve.”
“If you don’t let me go now, this will never be right.”
She made it out of the room, down the stairs. She heard Summerset say her name, and kept moving. Get out, was all she could think. Get away.
“You need your coat.” As she yanked at the door, Summerset draped it over her shoulders. “It’s very cold. Eve.” He spoke her given name quietly, and nearly shattered her last line of defense. “Will you let her use you both this way?”