Dark Paradise (22 page)

"Motive," he said with an elegant shrug. "Rules of evidence. You ought

to be familiar with the procedure. Morton lacked motive-"

"But not opportunity, probably not means, certainly not suspicious

behavior. Do you have any idea where he went?"

His brows came together in a look that seemed more confused than

curious. "Why are you trying to make more of this than what it was?
 
It

was an accident; they happen." She felt his gaze on her for several

moments, probing while she stared down into her coffee. She thought she

could feel questions in it, in him, but all he said when he spoke again

was "It was an accident, luv. Let it go.

"Play something for us, will you?" he said, tilting her guitar toward her

so that she had to take it or let it fall.

"Lucy told us you have an extraordinary voice."

Relieved to let the topic go, Marilee slid her chair back and took up

the old guitar, testing strings, fiddling with the tuning pegs. "I was

supposed to be a cellist," she said. "My sister Lisbeth plays the

violin; Annaliese, the flute. Mother thought it would impress her

friends if we could play as a trio for charity functions."

"What happened?" Kevin asked.

Her mouth twisted at the memory in a soft combination of a smile and a

frown. "My instructor said my bow work was reminiscent of a hacksaw on a

chain-link fence. I started skipping the lessons in favor of hanging out

with an aging hippie who ran a health food store down the block. He used

to jam with the Grateful Dead." She arched a dark brow as she settled

her fingers on the strings. "Mother was unimpressed when she found out,

but . . . so it goes . . ."

She strummed a chord, appreciating as always the perfect resonance of

the old guitar; then she began picking out a gentle, familiar rhythm and

joined in with the melody in her low, rich voice. The song was about the

rain and the end of a relationship, a woman contemplating what she's

lost and moving on with her life; a song about the rhythm of the blues.

She never gave a thought to how strongly it reflected her own life. It

simply came out as honest as the truth. The emotions and impressions

twined together inside her and rolled out in a voice as dark and sweet

as the coffee they had drunk.

When she finished she sat there for a moment, lost, unaware of the

silence that had descended all around the room. A ripple of applause

snapped her back. She rolled her eyes a little, feeling sheepish, and

raised her hand in acknowledgment, trying to wave the bar patrons back

to their conversations.

Kevin looked astonished, enormously pleased with her, which Marilee

wrote off as his natural state. He had that excited-puppy air about him,

a sense of youthful naivete that had nothing to do with age. Drew's

scrutiny was more weighty; she tried to shrug it off, reaching for her

coffee cup, wishing for a cigarette.

"Lucy was right," Kevin declared. "You were wasting yourself on

lawyers."

"Yeah, well, you don't know the half of that," she said dryly, taking a

sip.

"You deserve an audience," Drew said. "We'd love to have you play here

as long as you're staying. We have a trio that plays on weekends. Do say

you'll join them."

Marilee made a face. "I don't horn in on other musicians. Maybe I'll talk

with them."

"You already have," he said, green eyes shining. "I'm the piano man."

They shared a laugh, and Marilee marveled at how good it felt, how good

she felt, sharing this time with these new friends. Sacramento and Brad

Enright and her family suddenly seemed years in the past, half a world

behind her.

"I hope that won't be the last we hear from you, Marilee."

Evan Bryce smiled down on her like a long-lost friend.

Marilee bent her mouth into a polite social smile and murmured something

appropriately humble. She had taken an instant dislike to him, in part

because of his connection to Lucy's death. The rest was intangible. She

didn't question it. Her instincts regarding human nature had been

sharpened to a fine point in her years of legal work.

She seldom wasted time questioning those instincts.

Something about his I'm-your-best-friend act just didn't ring true.

He looked much as he had the first time she had met him - the same

high-heeled boots, the same skin-tight jeans that advertised his gender

in no uncertain terms, the same expensive-looking belt that was

constructed of hand-tooled leather and bone ferrules that looked as if

they had been "salvaged" from the breastplate of a Cheyenne warrior. He

had traded his denim work shirt for a fine linen poet's shirt with

billowing sleeves. Half the buttons were left undone in a look that was

calculatedly careless. She got the impression that the bare chest and

pants were overcompensation for something - probably his height or lack

thereof.

"I hear you've suddenly become a property owner in our little paradise,"

he said, hooking a thumb in the pocket of his jeans. A chuckle tumbled

out of him at her surprise. "The curse of the small town, I'm afraid.

News travels at an alarming rate. Of course, I've kept an ear to the

ground, so to speak. Lucy's property borders mine."

"Yes, I know." That's why she's dead. She bit the words back, too well

schooled in social niceties to be so blunt. Besides, in all fairness, he

hadn't been the idiot with the rifle.

"Does this mean you'll be joining our community?" he asked, looking too

hopeful to be believed. "Or will you sell?"

"It's too soon to say."

"Of course," he murmured, tipping his head in concession. "Well, if you

would like a tour of the property or the area, don't hesitate to ask.

I'd be more than happy to squire you."

"Thanks."

"It's a lovely property. Lucy was very comfortably ensconced there. Did

she ever happen to tell you how she came to own it?"

There was an odd sharpness in his gaze. Marilee wasn't sure whether he

was asking an idle question or waiting to see if she passed some secret

test. She answered the only way she could.

"She told me she saw it while she was vacationing here. Then she came

into some money and decided to buy it."

If there were more to the story - and Marilee was certain there was - she

didn't know it. She wondered if Bryce did.

He gave nothing away with his expression. The light from the fire glowed

against his high forehead. He dropped his lashes to half mast. "Lucy was

very lucky . . . and very clever."

"We all know how clever Lucy was," Drew said, drawing Bryce's scrutiny.

"Yes," he said, pulling the word into extra syllables.

"Too clever for her own good at times."

A strange tension held the moment in its grip. Then Bryce turned back to

Marilee with the grin firmly in place.

"I hope we'll get a chance to hear you sing again, Marilee. You're very

talented."

"Thanks."

He said his good-byes and went back to the entourage at his own table.

Kevin glared down into his coffee cup, his jaw set. Drew rubbed a finger

along his lower lip, his eyes hooded. He glanced up at her, looking

almost sinister in the flickering shadows of the firelight.

"He'd dearly love to have that land," he said softly.

"So would J.D. Rafferty, for that matter. Not that a hundred-odd acres

will make much of an impression on Bryce's holdings. Rumor has it he's

up to eighty thousand acres."

"God."

"Yes." He cut a glance across the room. Bryce was laughing as one of his

guests raised a glass in a toast.

Samantha Rafferty sat to his right in the chair usually occupied by

Bryce's cousin, Sharon Russell. Samantha laughed as well, though her

head was ducked down, as if she didn't want anyone to see that she

hadn't gotten the joke. Drew frowned. "He collects land like some people

collect stamps." He had his own suspicion that land wasn't all Evan

Bryce collected, but he kept that to himself and made a mental note to

have a private chat with Samantha the next time she came in to work.

"Interesting man," Marilee murmured.

Kevin shoved his chair back from the table, his head down. "Excuse me,"

he mumbled. "I have work to do."

With clumsy hands he gathered the papers he had brought in with him and

left.

Drew sighed and rubbed his left temple.

Marilee felt suddenly as if she were intruding on something very

private. She slid the guitar from her lap and rose. "Thanks for the

coffee. I think I'll turn in. I want to get up early. Wouldn't want to

miss that sunrise."

Drew forced a smile, but it vanished when he caught of her wrist. "Watch

yourself with Bryce, luv," he murmured. "Lucy enjoyed playing with

snakes, but then, she had fangs of her own. I wouldn't want to see you

hurt."

"Hurt how?
 
Literally?"

"Just be careful."

He rose then too, and left by the same back door Kevin had taken,

leaving Marilee standing by the fire, her eyes on Evan Bryce as he

effortlessly charmed the young woman beside him, her thoughts on the

serpent in the Garden of Eden.

"You had a good time tonight, Samantha?"

Samantha smiled shyly at the man strolling beside her up the cracked

sidewalk to her empty house. Bryce had insisted on following her home to

make certain she was all right. His beautiful cousin waited for him in

the Mercedes convertible parked at the curb behind Samantha's old junket

of a Camero.

"Yeah," she said, shrugging as if to discount the pleasure. "It was a

lot of fun."

"Everyone enjoyed having you there. You're a breath of fresh air, so . .

. untainted by the world."

"Naive, you mean."

"Not in a way meant to insult you. You're young and beautiful and full

of promise, with so much ahead of you."

Like another night spent in an empty bed. Like a future full of days

waiting tables at the Moose. The thoughts weighed her down like stones

as she climbed the sagging steps to her front porch.

Bryce took her hands and turned her to face him when she would have

reached for the door handle. His expression was earnest and fatherly - or

what she had always imagined fatherly should be. Certainly her father

had never shown this kind of interest in her. He'd never shown an

interest in any of his children, had treated them as if they were

nothing more than half a dozen stray dogs that seemed constantly

underfoot.

"Don't let this broken heart close you off, honey," Bryce advised. "Your

husband is a fool. If he fell off the earth tomorrow, the world would go

on turning, you would still have a life, and, I dare say, it would be a

better one. You have so much within yourself you have yet to discover

and explore, so much potential. Don't snuff it out."

Tears sprang to Samantha's eyes. Why couldn't Will be the one telling

her how wonderful she was?
 
Because he obviously didn't see in her what

Bryce saw. If he had, he wouldn't have gone looking for that elusive

something in other women.

"Hey, no tears, now," Bryce murmured, reaching up to brush one from her

cheek. "You've cried enough. When is your next day off?"

"The day after tomorrow."

"Perfect," he said, smiling. "You'll come out to the ranch and spend the

day. Go swimming, go riding, be with people who appreciate you."

She started to protest, but he didn't listen. He squeezed her hands and

leaned forward to brush a paternal kiss against her cheek.