A Triple Thriller Fest (33 page)

“I’ll do something all right,” he said, taking her face in his hands and kissing her boldly.

“Ummm, that’s not exactly the political solution I had in mind, Mr. Assemblyman, but it
was
innovative.” She laughed. “But really, what’s the legislature going to do? Surely they can’t sit by and just watch anymore.”

“They’ll, or maybe I should say,
we’ll,
be forced to openly declare either our support or opposition and take some official action. I have an appointment with the Speaker of the House tomorrow,” Dan said.

Nicole sat upright, suddenly interested in this development. “About what?”

“I don’t really know, but some of the other freshmen have been called in for introductions and committee assignments. I came in six months late in the special election, so I’m really the junior man on the totem pole. I’ll know tomorrow.”

“Well,” Nicole replied, playing with Dan’s ear, “As long as nothing can be accomplished tonight, what’s the rest of that action you were contemplating a moment ago?”

“I was trying to determine the flavor of this red stuff on your lips,” he replied, kissing her again, continuing their playfull mood. The kiss grew longer, deeper and more intense. In moments, they were aware that play time had ended. Nicole drew back a few inches, raising her eyes to meet Dan’s, the unspoken question foremost. Dan held her gaze for several seconds, then whispered her name and pulled her closer, kissing her more softly, his fingers working the buttons of her blouse.

* * *

Dan left Nicole’s apartment about five-thirty the following morning, beginning the ninety-minute drive to his condo in Davis. Nicole had roused before he left, but did not leave her room as he prepared to depart. He returned and kissed her again, softly, and stroked her face as he left.

As he drove, Dan reflected on their growing relationship. They had both proceeded cautiously. Last night had been the first admission of the depth of their feelings. In the light of day, rapidly approaching from the east as he drove toward Sacramento, Dan wrestled with the wisdom of his action. Following their dinner date in San Francisco, he had waited three or four days before calling to invite her out again, and then after several dates, he had invited her to the Rumsey Almond Festival. Each time he had enjoyed their time together, but often had gone home feeling vaguely guilty about his growing attraction, thinking about Susan.

It had been more than two years since Susan’s death, and in that time, Dan had briefly dated a couple of other women. He had broken off with both of them because of a sense that he was somehow being untrue to Susan’s memory, though intellectually he knew that wasn’t the case. Susan would have wanted him to go on with his life. He knew that. If she were sitting next to him in the car at this very moment, and could advise him, she would urge him to move ahead. He knew that, but his hesitancy still surfaced. It was awkward being with other women because he tended to compare them to Susan, and no one—no one before Nicole—had come out very well in the comparison.

It had been different with Agent Nicole Bentley from the start. Perhaps, he had thought, it was because he first saw her in a professional, not personal, light. While he was with the fascinating FBI agent, Dan had been able to put his memories aside. Nicole was bright and witty—to say nothing of being very attractive. But what was most engaging about her was the way she concentrated on Dan whenever they were together. She had a way of looking at him that made it seem as though nothing else around them mattered. On their third date, Dan had picked up some tickets for a popular musical playing in San Francisco, and they planned to have dinner beforehand at an Italian restaurant on Fisherman’s Wharf. After meeting Nicole near the terminus of the cable car on Market Street, they rode the car through Chinatown to the docks.

They had especially enjoyed the clattering ride together. The cable car driver had been one of those garrulous types who enlisted all his passengers in the running dialogue he had with himself and the motorists with whom he competed for the right of way on the steep, narrow streets.

The dinner had been fabulous, and after the table was cleared, Dan and Nicole lingered, sharing latte and experiences from their pasts and completely losing track of time. When they finally took notice of the hour, they had already missed the curtain and decided to bag the play.

They walked instead down to Ghiardelli Square and spent an hour wandering through the shops, ending up in a bookstore where Dan made a little game of asking the young female clerk if she had heard anything about the new novel by Dan Rawlings. She hadn’t read the book, she said, but in an effort to make a sale, she also said she had heard it was fabulous.

“Really?” Dan asked. “Have you sold any other copies?”

“Well, it just came out, so I haven’t, like, actually sold any yet. Would you like to get one?”

Dan thumbed the pages of
Voices in My Blood.
“I don’t know,” he said. “It doesn’t have any pictures, and it’s, like,
awfully
long.”

Nicole stood behind the clerk, watching the little interchange, holding a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter.

By the time they caught the cable car back into town and the BART train back to Walnut Creek, it was well past midnight. Standing with Nicole in the foyer of her apartment building, Dan had taken the theater tickets out of his pocket.

“Well, I had a great time, even if we didn’t make it to the play,” he said, looking around for a trash receptacle.

Before he could throw the tickets away, Nicole reached for his hand. “How about letting me keep one?” she asked.

“Why?”

“I like to save mementos of special times in my life,” she said.

They stood there looking at each other for a moment. “Am I a special moment?” he asked.

Nicole gazed steadily into his eyes and he had suddenly felt a little lightheaded. When she stepped forward and kissed him, he experienced another wave of emotion. Nicole’s mouth was warm and moist, and keeping his arms down to his side, Dan leaned forward and tenderly explored her lips. They stood there like that, kissing, until another couple entered the lobby and passed through into the landscaped courtyard beyond.

Taking a deep breath and then exhaling, Dan playacted a more formal tone and said, “May I call you again, Ms. Bentley?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Rawlings. What exactly are your intentions?”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“Well, what are
your
intentions?” he rebutted.

“I asked first,” she said.

“So you did. Then, what do you
think
are my intentions?”

They’d bantered for several minutes before he kissed her again. Even now, driving toward Davis, Dan chuckled again as he recalled the humor of their exchange. Nicole had held his gaze for several moments, then said without smiling, “I don’t know what kind of a girl you take me for, Mr. Rawlings, but if you think you can ply me with dinner and then stand on my doorstep and kiss me whenever you feel like it …” She paused, showing just the hint of a smile, “… you may be right.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

Dan had broken into a self-conscious grin. “When do I get to come inside?”

“In due time. You are going to be rich, aren’t you?”

“I’m looking forward to it,” he said.

“Coming inside?”

“No. Being rich,” he parried, smiling.

They began to laugh, enjoying the verbal jousting. After a moment, Dan reached for Nicole and drew her into an embrace. They stood holding each other for a long moment. Dan was instantly overcome with desire for this woman, and he stroked her back while inhaling her fragrance. After a time, he pulled back, kissed her lightly on the lips, and whispered goodnight.

Driving home from Walnut Creek that night, he had reflected on the remarkable evening, breaking into an involuntary grin as he thought about this warm, passionate woman. Now, last night had completed their transition. For the first time since his wife’s death, Dan had not felt guilty being with another woman. Since that first night of emotion, through the passion they had shared only hours ago, they had grown closer, although neither of them had made any verbal commitments. The words “I love you” had not entered their vocabulary, and Dan sensed that despite Nicole’s earliest comments about not liking the games people played, each of them was waiting for the other to make the first serious move.

* * *

The next morning, Dan arose early, dressed, and left his condo, headed for his still unorganized legislative office—a dusty, bare dungeon in the basement of the capitol building, reserved for freshman legislators. Arriving at his office before his secretary, Dan listened to the messages on the phone recorder, rewinding when he heard the voice of Speaker Huntington’s secretary advising him of a change of location for the morning meeting to be held in the governor’s office. He listened to the message a second, and then a third time before he accepted that he was actually going to the governor’s office.

By the time Dan arrived in the governor’s suite at nine-thirty, he had considered and rejected a dozen possible scenarios as to why the Speaker of the House had changed the meeting to the governor’s office.

“Good morning, Mr. Rawlings,” the governor’s secretary said.

“And good morning to you, Mrs. Hansen. How do you keep track of all the new people?”

“Spies, Mr. Rawlings, spies. And the picture on your book,” she grinned, tapping the copy on her desk. “Would you like some coffee?”

“Yes, thank you. Crème and sugar.”

She poured his coffee and laid a Danish on the tray before placing it next to him on the sideboard. “Mr. Rawlings, would you be so kind as to autograph my copy of your book?”

Dan smiled. “It would be an honor, Mrs. Hansen. To whom should I … ?”

“To Victoria, please. I’m about halfway through,” she said. “Perhaps I shouldn’t ask, Mr. Rawlings, but is it true that Jedediah Rumsey had a fistfight with one of our early governors?”

Handing back the autographed book, Dan laughed. “Fiction, Mrs. Hansen. But then again,” he teased, “quite often, fiction is only a mild embellishment of the truth, isn’t it?”

James Huntington, Speaker of the Assembly, entered the foyer as Mrs. Hansen was accepting the book from Dan. She immediately assumed a more formal demeanor.

“Good morning, Mr. Speaker,” she addressed him. “May I offer you some coffee?”

“That would be fine, Mrs. Hansen, thank you.” Turning toward Dan, Speaker Huntington offered his hand. “Welcome to the legislature, Mr. Rawlings. I hear your book sales are going well.” He nodded toward Mrs. Hansen’s copy.

“Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, quite well, I’m told. Thanks, of course, to people like Mrs. Hansen,” Dan said, smiling at her.

Huntington accepted his coffee and remained standing. “Governor in yet, Mrs. Hansen?”

“I believe he was in before six this morning, Mr. Speaker. I’ll just see if he’s ready for you.”

Mrs. Hansen entered the office, returning momentarily with Governor Walter Dewhirst.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” he greeted. “Shall we commence?”

Dan hesitated, allowing Huntington to enter first and then following him into the suite, his first time to enter the governor’s office.

“Seems General Del Valle was correct,” Huntington said to the governor.

“Oh, you mean last night’s newscast. Yes, he had it right. And now it’s … well, there’s no way around it, James—they’ve openly declared war on the federal government,” the governor said, shaking his head. “We’re not going to get through this easily. These criminally minded militia groups are growing bolder, day by day.”

“I believe you’re right, Governor,” Huntington said, taking one of the big, leather chairs and motioning for Dan to be seated also.

Governor Dewhirst leaned against the front of his desk, sliding one hip up to take a partial seat on the edge. “If we don’t take the lead on this, we’ll find ourselves scurrying about like rats on a sinking ship.”

“That’s probably not a bad comparison, Walt. But after twenty-eight years in this House, I’ll be hog-tied if I’ll stand idly by and watch it go down without a fight. If we have to proceed with this national ‘divorce,’ we need to get control of it before it controls us. Seriously, Walt, if we spend all our energy opposing it and it happens, we could find ourselves up the creek. We need to be ready to govern.”

“Exactly what I was thinking.” Dewhirst leaned forward and looked straight at Huntington. “James,” he said, “can I count on cooperation, absent all partisan tap-dancing? Can we join hands and get this job done?”

Huntington looked at the governor, then jerked his thumb toward Rawlings.

“That’s why I’m here, Governor. I suggested Rawlings, didn’t I—notwithstanding his
Republican
affiliation,” the speaker said, smiling, “with no dancing or tit-for-tat party nonsense?”

Governor Dewhirst smiled, leaning back to sit upright against his desk. “That you did, James.” He shifted his gaze toward Dan. “And, Mr. Rawlings, have you fathomed all of this so far?”

Dan maintained a stoic face, glancing first at Huntington and then back at the governor. “It’s way over my head, Governor, but it seems I’m part of a compromise.”

“No, not a compromise, son.” Dewhirst rose and returned to his chair behind the desk. “Not a compromise. What shall we call it, James, an ‘accommodation,’ or perhaps more accurately, part of our opening strategy? Son, most new legislators entering these hallowed halls are allowed to park in the garage, use the private corridors and the private toilets, take the reserved elevators, and, of course, eat in the ‘members only’ dining area. But beyond that, they are courteously advised to keep their mouths shut and learn. You, my young friend, are going to be thrust into the breech immediately.”

The governor studied Dan’s face for his reaction, then glanced to see the small smile playing across Huntington’s face.

“I can almost read your thoughts, Mr. Rawlings.” the governor continued.
“‘It sounds like I have no choice,’
you’re thinking. Well, you’re absolutely right. The Speaker and I have decided that we need your services at this particular time, and we’ve determined your legislative assignments. The people of Yolo County, in their infinite wisdom, have seen fit to send you here, and we intend to see they get their money’s worth. No ifs, ands, or buts—just get in the boat and make waves,” he said with a broad smile, leaning back in his chair and waiting for a reaction. Huntington remained silent, but his smile had broadened at the brusque method used by the governor to deliver their decision, arrived at the previous afternoon. “So, what say ye, Mr. Rawlings, freshman republican from Yolo County?”