Eye of the Beholder (19 page)

The soaring stone palisades that dominated the Avalon landscape glowed a brilliant orange-red in the fires of the dying sun. Trask walked to the edge of the patio, braced one foot on the low rock wall, and watched the night descend.

He could not see Avalon Point from where he stood, but he knew that it was close. The natural rise of the land in front of Alexa's patio hid Cliff Drive from view, but he could hear the occasional sound of a car engine in the distance.

The screen door slid open behind him. Alexa's sandals scraped lightly on the paving stones.

“Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.” She handed him a beer. “Hope you like Southwest fusion cuisine.”

He caught the faint tang of freshly cut lime when he took the bottle from her. “Is that anything like Pacific Rim fusion cuisine?”

“I wouldn't be surprised. Except we probably use more tortillas and chilies.” She looked out over the red canyons. “You
want to tell me who gave you your warnings today?”

He took a swallow of the cold beer and considered for a moment. “One of them came from Joanna Bell.”

“No kidding?” She looked briefly startled. “I got one from her brother.”

That gave him pause. He turned his head to look at her. “You got a warning from Webster Bell, himself?”

“Uh-huh.” Alexa made a face. “Of course, I also got one from Edward Vale and Dylan Fenn, who owns the bookshop at Avalon Plaza, and another from the guy who runs the café there, Stewart Lutton.”

“What did they all tell you?”

“It pretty much came down to the same thing. Everyone thought it would be a really swell idea if I stayed clear of you.”

He studied the Mexican label on the beer bottle. “Joanna didn't like the concept of me dating you, either. But she went a little farther with her warning.”

“How much farther?”

“She told me that I should not stir up the past.”

“Well, well, well.” Alexa took a sip of the wine that she had poured for herself. “Did she give you a specific reason?”

“She implied that innocent people might get hurt.”

Alexa groaned. “I suppose her warning made you all the more certain that there are great mysteries and dire conspiracies to be uncovered in Avalon, just as you suspected.”

“If what
happened twelve years ago was just an accident,” he said softly, “why the hell would my asking questions hurt anyone or even make someone nervous?”

Alexa met his eyes. “Did it occur to you that Joanna was afraid that you might be the one who would be hurt? Everyone says she loved your father. Perhaps she's just trying to protect you.”

“From what? Finding out that Dad was responsible for his own business problems? That he was so caught up in his private fantasy that he lost his perspective? That he would have dragged Guthrie and Kenyon into a financial quagmire if he wasn't forced to sell out?” Trask tightened his grip on the beer bottle. “I already know all that.”

Alexa gazed pensively out at the desert. “Yes, I guess you do.”

Silence fell. Darkness settled around them. Trask saw lights come on in some of the windows of the neighboring homes scattered lightly across the landscape. Alexa made no move to go back indoors to check on her dinner preparations. He sensed the tension in her.

He realized he was waiting, but he was not sure why. “Am I missing something here?”

She looked down at her wine. “I hesitate to mention this because I don't want to add any more fuel to your theories.”

“They're already stoked.”

“I found out today that Webster Bell may have been seriously opposed to the idea of Joanna marrying your father.”

Trask swung around so sharply that Alexa gave a small, startled squeak and stepped back.

He searched her face. In the deepening shadows it was impossible to read her eyes. “Are you certain of that?”

“No,” she said quickly. “It was just gossip. I got it from Dylan Fenn and Stewart Lutton, the two shop owners I mentioned earlier.”

“Did they say why Bell didn't want Joanna to marry Dad?”

Alexa hesitated. “Apparently Webster was afraid that your father would have siphoned off a substantial portion of Joanna's inheritance in order to build his new resort.”

His jaw tightened. “I can't blame Bell for worrying about that possibility. In Dad's defense, all I can say is that he wouldn't have seen it as using Joanna's money. He would have called it an investment.”

“Yes, well, I guess Webster considered your father a financial risk.”

Trask swallowed more beer. “He was right.”

There was another short silence from Alexa.

“I got one other bit of old gossip out of my pals today,” she said eventually.

“You're a regular gold mine of information this evening, aren't you?”

“I'm rationalizing it by telling myself that it's in my own best interests to help you get your questions answered as quickly as possible.”

“Meaning that the sooner I'm satisfied about what happened here twelve years ago, the sooner I'll be gone?”

She looked at him, but there were too many shadows on the patio now for him to read her expression.

“The other tidbit I picked up,” she said very steadily, “is that, although Webster Bell may have opposed the
marriage because he wanted to protect Joanna, there is another possibility.”

“I'm listening.”

Alexa took an audible breath and released it slowly. “Bell apparently needed Joanna's money to help finance the expansion of his retreat. Joanna was one of his cornerstones, financially speaking.”

Trask was surprised at the jolt her words gave him. Damn. How could he have overlooked such an obvious possibility as Webster Bell?

He let the implications sink in for a long moment. They were not very palatable. Surely he hadn't been looking in the wrong direction all these years. But then, that was the problem with an obsession. It tended to blind you to other possibilities.

He searched swiftly for more angles.

“What's your strategy here, Alexa? Are you trying to point me toward Bell in the hopes that I'll forget about Guthrie and Kenyon?”

“I knew I shouldn't have said anything.” She turned her back on him and started toward the kitchen. “Have you always been this suspicious, Trask? Or is it a bad habit you've developed?”

“I was born this way.”

“I see. Well, that's as good an argument for genetic engineering as I've heard to date.”

Alexa was right about the food, Trask thought. Southwestern fusion cuisine looked a lot like Pacific Rim fusion cuisine with the addition of tortillas and chilies. He could get used to it.

They ate out on the patio. Moonlight poured
down, mingling with the flickering lights of the candles on the table. The sky was a dark, cobalt blue bowl studded with diamonds. The air was a warm caress.

Hard to imagine a more romantic setting, Trask thought. Too bad he'd screwed up earlier. Conversation had not been going well since he'd practically accused Alexa of trying to deflect his investigation.

He wondered if Alexa planned to kick him out the door immediately after dinner, or if she would offer him tea first.

He also wondered how she would react if he kissed her again. He was not particularly optimistic. Although she had not specifically brought up the subject of their encounter in the spa, he was getting the strong impression that she considered last night's lovemaking a serious mistake.

The screen door opened again. Alexa walked out of the kitchen with a pot in her hand.

Hope soared. It looked like he was going to get tea at least.

She sat down and poured the brew into two cups. “What will you do now that you've stirred your cauldron?”

“Sit back and let things boil for a while.”

Her head came up swiftly. “Are you going to just ignore the information I gave you about Bell?”

“No. I'll call Okuda in the morning—”

“Okuda?”

“Phil Okuda is the investigator I hired to do the initial background work on this thing. I'll tell him to check out the situation at the Institute twelve years ago. But my money's on Guthrie at the moment.”

She raised her brows in disbelief as she took her seat. “Just because of that little incident in the parking lot last night?”

“Little incident?”

“Granted, Guthrie went a bit over the top with the two goons. But you've got to admit, he's got a right to be annoyed. How would you feel if someone started digging around in your past, trying to find evidence that you'd committed murder?”

“He's rattled. I have a hunch that if I apply a little more pressure, he'll crumble.”

“I don't think you're approaching this situation the right way.”

“So now you're an expert?”

“I've lived in this town longer than you have. I understand how—”

A distant, muffled
whoomp
interrupted her.

They both turned to look out across the desert toward Cliff Drive.

A cold foreboding swept through Trask. He shoved his chair back. “That came from the road. Sounded like a car. I'll go take a look.”

“I'll come with you.”

He got to the edge of the patio before he saw the glow of orange flames in the distance. “Better call 911 first. And bring a flashlight, if you've got one handy.”

He vaulted the low rock wall and headed toward the fire.

She followed hard on his heels a moment later. He realized she had grabbed her cell phone.

“No, I don't know exactly what the problem is,” she said urgently into the phone. “But there are flames. A car, I think.”

Trask turned and stretched out his hand. Alexa slapped a flashlight into it. He switched it on and aimed it at the ground to light their path.

The red glow in the distance burned brighter now.

“My God,” Alexa whispered. “That's the Point.”

Trask reached the embankment above Cliff Drive and dropped to the pavement. Alexa clattered down behind him. A small shower of pebbles and loose sand cascaded onto the road.

Somewhere in the distance a siren began to wail.

They crossed the road and started toward Avalon Point. Flames flared from the rocks below.

“Stay back.” Trask went through the gaping hole in the shattered guard rail. “There could be an explosion.”

“Trask, come back. It's too late. There's nothing you can do.”

He stood at the edge of the Point and looked down into the mouth of hell. She was right.

A disorienting sensation swept over him.

For an instant past and present fused in a nightmarish glare.

This was how his father had died. This was
where
his father had died.

But it was not his father's car that lay on the rocks below Avalon Point tonight. The roaring flames provided more than enough light for Trask to see the remains of a familiar white Lincoln.

Dean Guthrie.

17
 

Alexa was staring at the ceiling of her bedroom when the phone rang hours later. She reached for the receiver, hoping that Trask would be on the other end.

“Hello?”

“The dark vortices are in flux. The energy storm grows more powerful and more dangerous with each passing moment. Death and destruction have come to Avalon. Seek cover while you still can.”

“Screw you.” Alexa slammed down the phone.

She went back to contemplating the shadows above the bed. She knew she would not sleep tonight. Every time she closed her eyes she saw the fire and the white Lincoln.

The night was warm but she shivered beneath the covers.

The nightmare came an hour before dawn. Searing flames and twisted metal were prominently featured.

The truly horrifying part was the vision of
Guthrie staring calmly at him through the blackening glass of the driver's window.

Trask awoke, cold and clammy. For a moment he could not remember where he was. He could not even recall the year.

Then he realized that the phone beside the bed was ringing. He reached for it, profoundly grateful to whoever had interrupted the dream.

The image of Guthrie's face was a figment of his imagination, he told himself. The fire had been too intense to make out anything or anyone inside the burning vehicle.

Later, when the medics had removed the body, he and Alexa had mercifully been occupied giving their statements to Chief Strood.

“This is Trask.”

“I called to see if you were getting any sleep,” Alexa said.

The dream fragments disintegrated at the sound of her voice. “Not much.” He shoved aside the covers and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. “What about you?”

“My semi-obscene caller struck again.”

“Bastard.” Trask was quiet for a moment. “What did he say?”

“Something about an energy storm and dark vortices in flux.” She paused. “Death and destruction were mentioned. I got the impression he knew about what happened at the Point tonight.”