Resurgence (39 page)
“It wasn’t tampered with, it was freakin’
destroyed
. I’m saying that someone deliberately got rid of it. Washed it away with a commercial cleaning product.”
Full comprehension takes a while. “Jesus, Jesus . . .
Jesus
,” he then says, sits all the way up and yanks a corner of the sheet over himself. “Are you sure? How did you hear about this?”
“Yes, I’m sure. I heard about it directly from David this morning when he asked me to pass the written report of the aborted test on to Laurel. I’ll dare say he enjoyed filling me in, if you get what I mean.”
“I do. Where is he now?”
“Rome, ironing out some labor problem. He gave me the envelope at the airport this morning just before he left.”
Nate gets out of bed. “Listen to me please,” he says and begins dressing. “First of all . . . David may still enjoy making me look bad, but he’s no amateur and he’s no fool. He would never resort to a stunt like this. Way beneath him and way too much to lose if he was caught. Second of all, he has absolutely nothing to gain. With Laurel in the equation, David will never be a serious contender for—”
“Never mind all that. I wasn’t accusing David of doing the actual tampering.”
“Then who
are
you accusing? Laurel? Do you think she had her brothers clean up after themselves before anything could be proven?”
“I’m accusing the Jakeway creep, you ninny! I think he found out you were asking around, went back to cover his tracks and—”
“Wait just a minute. Hold on there!”
“No! Nothing says the Floss woman didn’t tell Jakeway you were looking for him. Didn’t you describe her as eager to babble on about anything to anybody? Isn’t that so?”
“It is, but she didn’t even know my name.”
“Your name wouldn’t have mattered. Didn’t matter
who
was interested in his whereabouts and what he was up to, only that
someone
was interested.”
“You’re relying too much on probability . . . chance . . . happenstance.”
“No more than you were only a few weeks ago.”
“I won’t argue that. A few weeks ago I was as borderline bat-shit about this effort as you are now, but I was made to see the futility of the effort and what it was doing to me. So that’s why I can consider it extremely unlikely Hoople Jakeway—if that’s who he really is—went to the trouble of disinfecting Laurel’s attic.”
“But how can you be so sure?”
“I
can’t
. But I can’t let it rule me. And I don’t want it ruling you either. Didn’t we agree before you left New York last time that we weren’t going to play detective anymore? I thought when Laurel threw up the roadblock, that was
it
—despite your handwritten note to the contrary. I thought when you returned to London we’d resigned ourselves to live with the things we can’t control.”
“I’m not. Resigned, I mean. I can’t be. Not when something like this happens. Not when it’s so . . . so
obvious
. And the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that’s
exactly
what happened. For whatever reason, Jakeway showed up at Laurel’s house sometime after you were last there, Mrs. Floss intercepted him, told him about you and that spurred him to action. That has to explain it. It simply must. And you know what? If the medical examiner hadn’t ruled Mrs. Floss’s death an accident, I could start wondering if Jakeway had something to do with—”
“Please do not! This
has
to stop. It’s over with, Amanda. It’s a dead issue. As Laurel once implored the press about Aurora, I’m asking you to leave it buried. Okay?
Okay
?”
“I’m . . . I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. And I couldn’t help it when I was hard on Laurel for running to David to make it all better and tricking Colin into accepting around-the-clock bodyguards and looking the other way so she won’t see the threat and . . . and pretty much spoiled the surprise reunion with her family even though she was the one who made it impossible for me to get them seated in the hotel restaurant before she went in and then I had to go confirm baggage distribution so I didn’t have the chance to make amends . . . omigod, I forgot
my
baggage. Godness
Agnes
, can you believe I left my own bags sitting there after I made sure everyone else had theirs?”
“Yeah, I can because that’s what this sudden relapse has done to you—screwed with everything you’re best at.”
He turns away to avoid the wide-eyed little-girl contrition he knows will be in her gaze; he feels like the worst kind of patronizing s.o.b. when he advises her to take a nice long soak in the tub while he goes to get her bags.
“Can’t I call and have them sent over?” she says.
“That could take too long. I’ll go, I don’t mind.”
I don’t mind at all, he thinks during the short elevator ride and sees nothing but opportunity when he reaches the lobby.
Call it a vote in Amanda’s favor, a testimonial to the beliefs he just berated her for; call it a recanting of everything he just avowed; call it the second impulse of the day that has him prickling with anticipation when he heads for the outside doors.
Call it a flashback of hallucinogenic proportions when he stops short of the doors, backtracks to the chair where he waited earlier, and sits down with the intention of outlasting this wrongheaded urge that’s gripping him.
He vividly relives a trip to Jersey when indecisiveness was his closest companion with ambivalence set to become his main character trait. Has he learned nothing? Has he made any progress at all? He questions himself the way he did that day, and to expand on a theme, questions why he now thinks a showdown with Colin would make a difference when nothing else has worked so far. What makes him think Colin can ever be shaken out of his selfish complacency?
Reference to the taboo subject of Aurora’s actual means of decapitation might not even do the trick. And if it did accomplish anything, what then? What more could be done that’s not already being done? How many bodyguards are enough? Are there ever enough?
Giving no outward sign of the debate waging within, he stays put a little longer—until he’s sure beyond a shadow of a doubt that when he goes for Amanda’s bags he won’t be going for anything else.
At dinner, Laurel remains distracted by the nagging need to know exactly what went on in her New Jersey attic, who is responsible, and what it portends. Distraction becomes obsession, need becomes urge; she can think of little else.
The small talk that got her through lunch and a long afternoon with Colin and her siblings, fails her now. She’s a marginal participant when the same group, plus Rachel, raves on and on about the present venue.
True, the view from a window table at the fabled restaurant on the second level of the Eiffel Tower is something to rave about—especially at sunset—if the viewer’s field of vision isn’t overcast with uneasiness.
Her taste buds are affected too. Now it’s not just the wine she imagines is caustic; the entire tasting menu is suspect—from tiny purple artichokes and roasted prawns to citrus sorbet and delicate peach-colored macarons.
As gloaming yields to darkness, all eyes are on the controlled explosion of light from below. This could be an attenuated fireworks display with spectator response accordingly toned down to mimed expressions.
She displays near-genuine awe at the spectacle and laughs with Emily, who claims to have discovered why Paris is called the “City of Light”—that, or be considered a killjoy.
The choice table is theirs for the evening. They can linger longer, but Laurel is eager to leave before Colin is recognized, if that hasn’t already happened. The other diners strike her as tourists on best behavior and who knows how long that behavior will last. Especially with wine flowing the way it is.
Colin may be having the same thought when he abruptly settles the bill and leads the way to the exit.
Although their group is alone in the private elevator for restaurant patrons, the ride down doesn’t last long enough to afford any real relief. And when they reach street level, they could all be targets while waiting a few short minutes for Bemus and Tom Jensen to arrive.
Within the relative safety of a chauffeur-driven stretch limousine, no one objects when she asks if they can postpone the next planned event. Unless they had a bateau mouche to themselves, there’s no way she could withstand a river cruise in her present state of mind. Not with all the opportunities a boat provides for ambush. She’d feel no less trapped than she did at dinner.
When they reach the nearby St. Germain district and the hotel, her brothers and Emily aren’t ready to call it a night. No big surprise there. She wouldn’t be either, if all she had on her mind was absorbing as much of Paris as possible in a few day’s time.
In giving her blessing and admonishing them to be cautious in all things, she stops just short of telling them to look both ways when crossing streets and revealing herself as the hopelessly unreconstructed mother hen she is.
While Colin tells Rachel and the bodyguards a longwinded goodnight in the lobby, Laurel hurries on ahead to relieve the professional child minder Amanda thought to have on standby.
Simon is sleeping soundly when she kisses his forehead and straightens the bedclothes; Anthony may be playing possum when she does the same for him. Colin comes in as she’s descending the spiral staircase from the loft portion of the duplex suite.
“Let’s have it, then,” Colin says without warning.
“Have what? The boys are fine—
très bon
, as the sitter put it.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. I want to know what’s got into you.” He moves to the foot of the staircase and scowls up at her.
“Nothing,” she says and stays where she is, several steps from the bottom.
“I wouldn’t call this—this numbness, this tuned out thing of yours nothing.”
“I guess the tour’s finally caught up with me.”
“Don’t give me that. On the plane this morning you were chief trouper. You were up for anathing. Then, at the hotel, all the sparkle went out. I wanna know why. I wanna know what the bloody hell happened between the time we got here and the time you were met with the surprise. I think I fucking
deserve
to know what it was that pissed in the champagne at lunch and cast a pall over a special dinner that was arranged for over a month ago.”
“You’re imagining things.”
“No I’m not.”
It’s
nothing
. I’m in overload, that’s all. Being in Paris, the excitement of being with my family and—”
“And that’s supposed to account for your lackluster reaction to any of it?”
“I’m
sorry
. Everything’s been lovely. Incredibly so. And you’ve been so incredibly thoughtful and generous . . . what can I say? I can never thank you enough.”
“Yeh you can. You can thank me by explaining what’s going on.”
“I’d rather not.”
“There! You see? You’ve just admitted something is—”
“But it’s
nothing
, as I keep telling you. I’ll work it out on my own.”
“I do
not
fancy a row with you, but that’s what’s coming if you don’t fill me in straightaway!”
“Very well! Have it your way!” She dashes down the remaining steps and confronts him head-on. “Earlier, when we arrived here today, Amanda gave me fresh information that relates to your safety and I reacted badly. There, are you happy now?”
He backs off in disgust. “I thought we were done with that rubbish after the faked bodyguard demand magically appeared on my desk one day. I thought—”
“You
knew
it was fake?” She follows him across the room.
“How thick do you think I am?” He whirls on her. “Did you actually think I wouldn’t ring the promoters to verify?”
“If you knew it was falsified why’d you go along with it?”
“Because I love you!”
The words hang there like they’re contained in a cartoon balloon. She wasn’t expecting anything that noble and can’t think of a suitable reply—one that won’t cheapen the statement or come across as trite. Or vainglorious.
“I’m . . . sorry,” she says after too long a pause.
“That I love you?”
“Of course not! I’m sorry I spoiled—”
“I’ll hear your sorrys later. After I hear what new bullshit you’ve been fed by our little Amanda.”
“Before you condemn Amanda altogether, you should know she was only the messenger, she was only delivering information from David.”
“Nice change from Nate, that, but what’s David got to do with it?”
“That day . . . in London . . . I didn’t just confer with David about final arrangements for Mrs. Floss, I spoke with him about the other news Amanda considered urgent when she called with word of Mrs. Floss’s death.”
“News you didn’t get round to sharing with me.”
“That’s correct. Knowing you’d react as you are now—scornful, dismissive—I saw no point. And I knew David would go out of his way to discredit these very disturbing claims made by Nate and Amanda . . . to calm my fears.”