Passion
Authors: Marilyn Pappano
He came a step closer, then another, until he was right behind her—not touching her, but close enough for her to hear his
slow, measured breathing. Close enough to make her tremble.
He wasn’t subtle, or shy. With confidence he rested one hand on her shoulder and slid the other inside her vest. Later she
would feel guilty, Teryl acknowledged, but at the moment the sensations were exquisite and only heightened by the fact that
they were standing on the sidewalk where anyone might pass, where anyone might see them.
Pushing her hair away, he pressed his mouth to her ear and murmured, “Unbutton your blouse for me, Teryl. Let me touch you.”
Her hands trembled. This was crazy, wrong—reckless as hell—but it felt incredibly right…
PRAISE FOR “EXTRAORDINARILY TALENTED”* MARILYN PAPPANO AND HER RECENT CONTEMPORARY NOVEL,
IN SINFUL HARMONY
“EVOCATIVE… COMPELLING… EARTHY… AS STEAMY AS A LOUISIANA NIGHT IN AUGUST.”
—
Rendezvous
“WONDERFUL AND THOUGHT-PROVOKING READING.”
—*
Romantic Times
A
LSO BY
M
ARILYN
P
APPANO
In Sinful Harmony
Published by
W
ARNER
B
OOKS
WARNER BOOKS EDITION
Copyright © 1996 by Marilyn Pappano
All rights reserved.
Warner Books, Inc.
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10017
Visit our website at
www.HachetteBookGroup.com
www.twitter.com/grandcentralpub
First eBook Edition: October 2009
ISBN: 978-0-446-56872-2
Contents
H
is arm throbbing from the stitches the doctor had put in, John Smith stood in front of his house—or what was left of it—and
watched the sheriff and his two deputies walk in a slow circle around it. The fire was out, except for occasional hot spots
that still flared, but the heat remained, radiating from the rubble and the ash. It would be tomorrow, the sheriff had decreed,
before the debris would be cool enough to allow his men to conduct an investigation, but no doubt, some sort of incendiary
device had been used.
No doubt, John drily agreed. Explosions didn’t just create themselves out of nothing, and there
was
the gasoline smell that permeated everything. He’d never kept gasoline around the house. He had no gas-powered generator,
no yard to require a lawn mower or weed whacker. The only gasoline legitimately on the grounds was inside his truck’s fuel
tank. No doubt someone had brought his own supply and had used it to destroy his home.
Leaning back against the truck, he shifted his gaze from the three men to the house. Shattered glass covered the ground, and
oily lumps—part of the roof—still smoldered, sending a thin smoke into the air. The only thing that remained relatively intact
was the foundation, and even that was split by great cracks. Virtually everything he owned
had been destroyed by the explosions or consumed by the ensuing flames. The three bombs had done their job well.
Bombs.
Jesus, someone had blown up his house. Having lived through the blasts and staring now at the evidence in front of him, he
still found it impossible to believe. Not many people in the county even knew there was a house up here—the sheriff hadn’t
known; his deputies hadn’t—and the few who did know were the closest thing to neighbors that he had. What reason could one
of them have for destroying his house?
Maybe it had simply been malicious mischief—nothing personal against him, just circumstance, location, and chance. But almost
immediately he discounted the possibility. He could accept a break-in at an isolated house if the intention was robbery. Terrorizing
whoever lived there was also possible. But building bombs? Going to the trouble to gather whatever materials were necessary
and carting them up into the middle of nowhere? It seemed like a lot of work when a five-gallon can of gasoline and a match
would give much the same satisfaction to a pyromaniac.
Maybe the motive had been more sinister. More personal. Maybe someone had wanted to destroy the very things John had come
back from Denver for: the evidence of his dual identity. The proof of his career. The paperwork that legally documented who
and what he was.
Maybe someone had wanted to be certain that they destroyed him.
Muttering a curse, he remembered the headline he’d read this morning in the hotel.
Reclusive author comes out of hiding.
Each newspaper had had its own version of the publishing world’s big news. It was those stories that had sent him straight
back home, those stories that had him packing his bags for a trip down South only seconds before the first explosion.
But the stories were a mistake or maybe part of a publicist’s game plan to sell more books. They couldn’t be connected to
this. No one in his publisher’s or his agent’s office
knew where he lived; the only address they’d ever had for him was the post office box ninety miles away in Denver. The post
office box to which, he’d discovered yesterday, they weren’t sending mail anymore.
Simon Tremont to step out of the shadows.
What if the stories weren’t a mistake or publicity hype? What if…
The idea forming in his mind was ludicrous, so ludicrous that he refused for a moment to bring the words and thoughts together
in a coherent body. But they kept gathering, kept echoing, until finally he was forced to face them. What if it wasn’t a mistake?
What if Candace Baker, his editor at Morgan-Wilkes, truly did have the latest Simon Tremont manuscript sitting on her desk?
What if Simon Tremont really was coming out of hiding?
It was impossible. Simon Tremont couldn’t come out of hiding for the simple reason that Simon Tremont didn’t exist. It was
merely the name John had chosen to hide behind, a name he’d made up, much the same way he’d made up names for his characters.
There was no Tremont, no new manuscript.
But Candace had said on the phone that there was a book. She’d said
Resurrection
was the best book Tremont had ever written.
Only he hadn’t written it.
Thrills and chills in New Orleans: Simon Tremont speaks
.
In spite of the heat from the still-smoldering house, he felt a few chills of his own as he remembered the headline. What
he was thinking was so crazy, so implausible, so extraordinary, that even he, who had earned a living the last eleven years
making the implausible seem quite plausible… even
he
couldn’t begin to believe this tale.
But the facts were inescapable. Someone had blown up his house. Someone had written his book. Someone answering to the name
of Simon Tremont was scheduled to give an interview in New Orleans next week.
The conclusions, however outrageous, were also inescapable. Someone had taken his name. Someone bright,
cunning, and devious, someone talented, tormented, and dangerous as hell, had… Jesus, he was crazy to even think it, but he
had to.
Someone had stolen his life.
T
eryl Weaver was disappointed.
She knew it was silly. Just because Simon Tremont had been her favorite author since his very first book had come out was
no reason to expect so much from him. And, really, exactly what was it that she had thought he would be?
He was everything that befitted the master of the psychological thriller—dark, brooding, extremely bright, extremely driven.
There was an air of mystery about him, a feeling of unpredictability, a sense that this was no common man. He was handsome
enough to fuel more than a few female fantasies, with streaky blondish brown hair and a brown gaze so direct that it could
bore a hole through steel, and yet he seemed the sort of man other men could relate to. Whether the matter at hand was politics,
business, women, or sports, he looked as if he could hold his own.
She couldn’t even put her finger on what it was about him that bothered her—the lack of connection, maybe. After years of
admiring and idolizing his work, she had expected to admire and idolize the man. She had come to New Orleans to meet him assuming
that she already
knew
him, and she had been wrong. She didn’t know Simon Tremont at all, and what she had learned about him in this morning’s meeting,
she hadn’t anticipated.
With a sigh, she glanced at her watch. The interview they
had come here for was set to begin in an hour. Simon and Sheila Callan, the New York publicist who was coaching him and smoothing
his way, had left for the studio nearly an hour ago in a long, white limo. Teryl could come along whenever she was ready,
Sheila had informed her, or she could skip the interview entirely and go sight-seeing. Her implication had been clear: Teryl’s
presence wasn’t necessary, even if Simon had requested it.
Bless his heart for that request, she thought as she rummaged through her suitcase. She had long wanted to visit New Orleans,
and the first Tremont book set in the city years ago had served to sweeten that desire. Still, no one had been more surprised
than she when he had suggested that she make this trip. After all, she was just his agent’s assistant; until his arrival this
morning, their contact had been infrequent and limited to a few phone conversations. But, whatever his reasons, suggest it
he had, and because he was the sort of client every agent dreamed of representing—because he was the client who had single-handedly
made the Robertson Literary Agency such a success—Rebecca Robertson had given in.
In the depths of her suitcase, Teryl found a belt, held it to her waist, and checked in the mirror, then tossed it aside.
She should have unpacked when she’d arrived last night, should have set everything out in a neat, orderly fashion, but of
course, she hadn’t. She’d taken two minutes to hang up her clothes so the worst of the wrinkles would fall out and then she’d
been out the door for a quick tour. Her forty-eight hours in New Orleans were too precious to waste with such things as neatness
and order.
The belt she was seeking was in the corner of the suitcase, wrapped around a small vinyl cosmetics case. The case and its
contents—a gag gift from her best friend—made her pause in spite of her rush, and they brought her a smile. It was a New Orleans
survival kit, D.J. had told her. There was a small plastic case of aspirin for the headaches that came from drinking too much.
A pack of Band-Aids for sore feet from walking too much. A sewing kit for letting out the seams in her clothes after eating
too much. And, tucked in
the corner, tied together with a lavender ribbon, four plastic-encased condoms. For getting lucky, D.J. had said with a wicked
grin.