His Wedding Date (The Second Chance Love Series, Book 2) (13 page)

"Hi," he said as he got out and opened the car door for her, catching her totally unaware of the dangers in such a move.

Her body brushed past his ever so lightly as she got into the car, the feel of him bringing to mind every detail of the night before last and the treacherous morning after.

Shelly tried not to let Brian see how much it bothered her to have him touch her in this small way, even as she vowed to remember not to give him another opportunity to help her in and out of a car.

"Hi," she finally managed to say.

He got in behind the wheel. She was fooling with the unfamiliar seat belt, trying to get it fastened, so she didn't see the hand that came up to her face, the fingers curling around her chin to turn it gently toward him. "How's the head?"

"Still hurts," she said as he took the opportunity to study her more closely than she would have liked.

"It looks like hell," he said, one finger tracing the outline of the bruise, one she hadn't been able to cover, even with a ton of makeup.

Shelly made herself endure this small touch without letting her breath catch in her throat. It was a good test for her, she decided. How much could she stand? She'd need to know her limits if she was going to get through the next few weeks, maybe even months, before she could line up a new job.

"You sleep okay?" he asked, finally taking his hand away.

"Like the dead," she lied, then changed the subject. "Did you talk to Charlie?"

"I couldn't get him yesterday," Brian said, starting the car and pulling into the almost empty street. "But I left a message on his machine and asked him to meet us at the office, early. Maybe we can clear this up before everybody else gets there."

Shelly nodded. She still found it hard to believe that anyone would deliberately try to hurt Charlie Williams.

The man had been like a substitute father to her ever since she'd come to work for him when she'd graduated from engineering school. He and his wife, Marion, had lost their daughter in an automobile accident when she was a teenager, and if she'd lived, she and Shelly would have been nearly the same age.

Charlie hadn't just given Shelly a job. He and his wife had unofficially adopted her. They'd been lonely, and Shelly, in a strange town and starting a new job, had been lonely, too. She trusted Charlie. She'd never doubted him, until that strange conversation she'd had with him last week about the even stranger phone call she'd gotten at the office.

She hadn't told Brian about it the day before because she hadn't wanted to talk to him about anything at that point. He'd been upset enough that she hadn't told him about the mysterious phone call. Plus, she'd been working for Charlie a lot longer than Brian had. She knew him better. He was a good man. She was certain of that.

Still, she'd talked to him about the odd phone call last week. Charlie had insisted nothing strange or mysterious was going on at the firm and she had no cause to worry. He was sure the call was just a prank.

But now that she thought back on the conversation, she felt instinctively something was wrong. She didn't think Charlie had ever lied to her before. She had trouble believing it now.

Maybe he'd honestly thought the call was nothing. Maybe he'd wished it were. Maybe there was someone he needed to talk to, to make sure it was nothing. Shelly didn't know.

But it was too much of a coincidence that she'd been warned of danger, and days later the company plane had been tampered with and had crashed.

Which meant Charlie knew something.

And she feared he'd lied to her about it.

* * *

Charlie Williams got to the office around seven, and he looked bad.

He wasn't a handsome man. He was short, rounded and balding, with a kind face and an affection for smelly cigars.

He pulled one out as he settled himself into the big leather chair behind his desk. He wouldn't light it in the office, but he would do everything except smoke it.

"You all right?" he asked gruffly, looking at the big bruise on Shelly's face.

She nodded, examining his face, as well. He looked worse than he had three and a half years ago, when he'd finally given in and put his wife, who suffered from early on-set Alzheimer's, in a nursing home. He seemed to wither up and shrink inside himself, had seemed almost frail for a while. Shelly thought he looked that way again now.

"What happened?" Charlie asked, looking to Brian to explain.

"We were almost to Tallahassee when the engine sputtered and then went out. We're lucky to be alive."

Charlie shook his head. He fidgeted in his seat and tapped the end of the cigar on the surface of the desk. "What went wrong?"

"I don't know. The FAA inspector's focusing on some sort of problem with the oil line, maybe the oil supply, though he's not sure if he'll be able to say for sure what happened. The oil case was broken when they hauled the plane out of the river, so whatever was in there is mixed with river water now."

"The gauge?" Charlie asked, a man of few words.

"It didn't show anything until the engine quit," Brian said.

"That's it?"

"That's all I know, except that the mechanic told the FAA inspector he thinks someone tampered with it. He thinks someone tried to kill us." Brian seemed to be deliberately challenging Charlie, and Shelly wondered why Brian was being so harsh about it, until she looked back to her boss.

Charlie, a man with a ruddy complexion, was nearly white, and he refused to meet her eyes.

Shelly felt a nasty chill work its way down her spine. Her brain was telling her something her heart was having trouble accepting. She couldn't believe Charlie would ever knowingly put her in danger, and yet, from the way he was reacting now, she'd swear that he knew what this plane crash was about.

"This inspector—he hasn't actually seen the plane yet, right?" Charlie asked.

"Not when I talked to him," Brian admitted. "The FAA's taking custody of the plane today. But after talking to the mechanic, that's the FAA guy's gut reaction, and he's been in the business for fifteen years."

Charlie didn't say anything for the longest time. He just fidgeted with his cigar.

Shelly looked from one man to the other as tension swirled between them. She trusted them both. She'd known them both for years, and she didn't like being caught between the two of them like this.

"You know why this happened," Brian said, breaking the stalemate.

"No," Charlie said, too quickly.

"You have a damned good idea."

Charlie hedged for all he was worth, but Brian wouldn't have it.

"It's your plane, and you were supposed to be in it today," Brian said. "I know you rent the thing out, to help defray the expenses of owning it, but I checked the schedule before I asked to borrow it. No one was scheduled to be in that plane in the last week except you. This had to be aimed at you, not us."

"Oh, come on," Charlie said, rallying now. "This sounds like something out of a bad TV movie. Why would anybody want to kill me?"

"I don't know," Brian said.

But you do.

Shelly could almost hear him say it aloud.

* * *

"He was lying," Brian said once they'd closed themselves up in his office.

"I can't believe that," Shelly said, sitting down in the chair opposite his desk. "Why would he lie to us?"

"You tell me. You've worked for him a lot longer than I have."

"I don't know."

"Business trouble?" he suggested.

"Not now. Not that I know of. He was having a lot of problems five or six years ago from what I've heard from some of the other people in the office."

"Why?" Brian asked, all business.

Shelly would gladly discuss business with him all day, or anything else as long as they kept away from anything remotely personal.

"Mostly because he was spending so much time away from the office," she explained. "His wife was ill, with Alzheimer's. He tried for a long time to take care of her at home, but it got to be too much for him and too dangerous for her. She needed someone watching over her twenty-four hours a day, for her own safety, and Charlie couldn't manage that and run a business."

Shelly could easily see how the firm could have been in trouble then. It was a small office, and it was too much Charlie's baby to get along without him for long. He'd been in business in this town forever. He had the connections that brought in business. Those people also tended to want his personal touch on the jobs they gave him.

She was sure it had been rough around here without him, but she thought the business was coming out of that now.

"So what did he do?" Brian asked.

"He put Marion in a nursing home, and once he got her settled, he didn't do much of anything but work. He turned the business back around."

"Well," Brian said, "if the business is sound, what about his personal life? Gambling? Drinking? Drugs? Women?"

Shelly shook her head to all four. "He's a good man, Brian. You know that."

"I think he is, but something's going on here. You saw how he was in there."

Yes, she had, and it had her more worried about Charlie than scared for herself. The man meant a great deal to her. He was a mentor, as well as a good friend.

"He seemed so scared," she said.

"He ought to be. Somebody's trying to kill him, and they missed and almost got us instead."

"Do you really believe that?" Shelly said.

"I'm careful up there. I checked that plane myself before we took off. It was fine."

"So what could have happened?"

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out. I want to know why our boss has started lying to us, too," Brian said. "Think about it, Shel. What kind of trouble could he be in?"

She could only shake her head. She dreaded telling Brian what else she knew, but now, after seeing Charlie deny everything, she felt she had to tell Brian. She was scared of what had already happened, what might happen next.

"None of this makes any sense to me," she told him, "but there's something about that phone call I got last week... "

"The one you told me about?"

"Yes... I think I know the man. I'm almost sure I've heard his voice before."

"You didn't tell me that part."

No, she hadn't.

Because he'd started trying to get her to talk about their night together in the hotel in Tallahassee, and then she hadn't wanted to talk to him at all.

Shelly decided it was best to avoid that issue altogether, so she just continued. "Something else... he knew me. He knew my voice. That's what scared me so much about it—that he knew me."

Brian swore softly for a minute, then turned back to her. "It was Monday morning, when you almost hit me over the head with the paperweight? Wasn't it?"

"Yes."

"I was right there, and you didn't tell me about it?"

"I thought it was just a silly prank. I mean, it was ridiculous—some vague warning about danger in this office. I know these people, Brian. I've worked with them for years. They're good people."

"Maybe so, but people make mistakes. They do stupid things, and then they try to cover up their mistakes. You don't know what any of them could have done or who could be after them," he said. "It's a crazy world out there, Shel. Just look at the evening news."

"I know," she admitted.

"You should have told me," he said, seeming hurt by the fact that she hadn't. "You should have trusted me."

"I do."

"Even after this weekend?"

Shelly turned away, hopefully too quickly for him to see the color flooding her cheeks. She had to get used to this. That night would always be there between them, and she was going to have to deal with it. "Of course I trust you."

She heard him moving around in the too-narrow space, saw him coming around the side of the desk to sit on the edge near where she sat.

"Shelly—"

"It was nothing, Brian. Absolutely nothing. Can't we just forget about it?"

"Can you?"

It was her turn to swear, and she hoped he hadn't been reading her lips right then. No, she couldn't forget about it. She wouldn't for a long time to come. But she was going to put it behind her and get on with her life. She'd made a promise to herself that she intended to keep.

"I did tell someone about the phone call," she said, shifting the conversation to something she knew could hold his attention. "I told Charlie."

"What did he say?"

Shelly tried to remember his exact words, but couldn't. "Just that he didn't know what the guy could have been talking about."

"What else?" Brian demanded. "What else aren't you telling me? Because I can tell there's something about it that's bothering you."

"I'm not sure I believed him," Shelly said. "Not now and not then."

Chapter 8