While the Fire Rages (2 page)

“Damn all women.”

Even as he muttered the oath Brett knew he didn’t mean it. There were women and then there were women. Most assuredly he would never damn Micki or his brother Eric’s lovely wife. But there were others, like his former playmate—in no way had she ever been a real
wife
to him—and the woman whose presence he’d escaped moments ago.

What in blazing hell were you thinking?

The admonition was not self-directed. In his mind he flung the question at possibly the one and only man he’d hesitate in verbalizing it to: his brother, the formidable Wolfgang.

Damn you, Wolf, you had it all! Brett, folding his long length behind the wheel, mentally chastised the idol who had suddenly developed feet of clay. You had Micki, and two beautiful children, and the good life, and you risked it all—and for what?

Brett shook his head in wonder as he inserted the key into the ignition. With his inner eye he envisioned in depth the object of his censure, that slashing grin softening the chiseled planes of his face, his eyes glittering silver, the formally formidable lone Wolf.

Do you love her, big brother? Or were you merely playing king stud?

Twisting the key with unnecessary force, Brett growled, “Get it in gear!” He was not referring to the car, which had quickly purred to life without a complaint.

Driving along the nearly deserted streets instilled in Brett a vaguely eerie sensation. It was as if the warning had gone out to evacuate and everybody had heard it but him.

Brett smiled at the whimsical thought. Actually, he rather liked the desolate look of the summer resort town in mid-November. He did not like the oddly abandoned look of his brother’s large white-brick ranch house.

Separating the proper key from the others on his gold ring, Brett loped along the flagstone walk to the wide door. Before he had a chance to put the key to use the door was opened by Wolf’s housekeeper

“Well, hello, Mrs. Jorgeson.” Brett’s smile was easy; he liked
this
woman. “I didn’t expect to see you here today.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Renninger.” Gertrude Jorgeson’s return smile revealed a mutual regard. “I’m putting up the last of the tomatoes.”

“In what way?” Brett’s frown conveyed his ignorance of the hows and whys of putting up anything.

“Into sauce and stewed tomatoes.” Gertrude smiled through eyes grown wise from sixty-one years of observing life. “Your brother and your sister-in-law love stewed tomatoes.”

“I see.” Brett’s tone was noncommittal. He personally hated stewed tomatoes. “Well, I won’t get in your way. I’ll be in Wolf’s study.”

“All right.” Gertrude smiled again. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“No. Thank you.”Brett grinned. “I think I’ll help myself to the Scotch.”

“As you like.” The small, well-rounded woman turned back toward the kitchen. “Call me if there is anything I can help you with.”

In the study, Brett went directly to the liquor cabinet set into one wall between well-stocked bookshelves. After measuring a good two inches of the expensive whisky into a short, squat glass, he splashed in a token amount of seltzer water, then, sipping at the liquid appreciatively, he glanced around the comfortable room.

The earth-tone colors, the functional yet luxurious furnishings, the oversized desk, stamped the room as Wolf’s domain. However, there were small signs indicating the domain had been invaded.

A smile softened Brett’s finely molded lips as his eyes paused on a large, brazenly red fire engine parked neatly in one corner. He had witnessed his nephew tearing through the house on the riding toy with the same panache Wolf displayed behind the wheel of his equally brazen red Ferrari.

His thought banished the soft smile. The Ferrari was gone, totally demolished in the accident. It was several seconds before a twinge of pain in his jaw brought Brett out of his reverie to the realization of his tightly clenched teeth.

Damn, it was only a car! A car can be replaced. He would gladly write out his own personal check for a half dozen Ferraris if only Wolf...

Literally shaking himself out of his introspection, Brett moved purposefully to the desk. It had grown completely dark beyond the window behind him before he pushed the padded leather covered chair back and stood up.

The plot sickens.

Raking long, bony fingers through thick strands of slightly wavy hair, he grimaced sourly at the innocent-looking envelope on the desktop. The tightness in his stomach bore out his appraisal of the play unfolding in his mind.

Raising eyes gone steely gray with anger, Brett ran his gaze slowly around the room, seeing everything, seeing nothing, the document neatly folded inside the long, buff-colored envelope imprinted on his inner vision.

Does she love him?

Damn it! Whether or not Jo Lawrence was in love with Wolf should not be his uppermost consideration! Micki was the one who would suffer from this.
If
she found out.

Lids narrowing over eyes now icy with calculation, he sliced his gaze back to the desk. He had discovered the damned thing inside the locked top drawer of the desk, which, as he was in possession of Wolf’s keyring, he’d opened without the slightest compunction.

As expected, he’d found everything pertaining to the company in perfect order. It was that one long envelope that had shaken him.

It was his job to make sure Micki did not find out.

“Damn!”

His very long, deceptively lean looking frame taut with frustration and anger, Brett snatched the empty whisky glass and walked out of the room with his habitual long stride.

He rinsed the glass under steaming hot water and placed it in the draining rack beside the sink, his mind examining the ways in which to handle this new, unsavory development.

He strode back into his brother’s study, his eyes, cold as the North Atlantic, fastening on the cause of his anger.

Crossing to the desk, he extended a hand to pluck the envelope up, then, turning abruptly, he walked out of the room. After activating the computerized alarm system to secure the house for the night, he left the house and loped to the low sports car shimmering like liquid silver in the moonlight.

The weightless document lay heavy in Brett’s breast pocket as he backed the vehicle out of the driveway. Instead of making the turn that would take him back to the center of town, he spun the leather-covered wheel and headed toward the bay.

Now, in early evening, the streets were even more deserted than they’d been when he left the motel. The uncanny sensation of being the only living being in a dark, abandoned ghost town was even more pronounced.

Parking at the base of a street that dead-ended at the bay, Brett uncoiled his considerable length from behind the wheel and strolled to stand on the wide, oily-looking wood pilings.

The moonlight struck a glittering path across the ever-shifting water, dancing in time to the muted swish as wavelets wound themselves around the spindly legs supporting long, narrow docking piers. Empty now, the berthing slips had a forsaken look that would vanish with the return of spring and the water craft of all sizes, both motorized and those with the tall masts.

To the lone man, standing with hands thrust deep into the pockets of hand-tailored pants, the scene was more conducive to contemplation than depression.

Because of the frantic mental state his sister-in-law had been in, Brett had found it relatively easy to convince Micki of Wolf’s fidelity.

Without shame or misgiving, he had lied through his teeth.

The memory was strong, fanning the anger seething in him to a full, outraged blaze.

* * * *

“I must know,” Micki had whispered brokenly. “Brett, please, you must find out if it’s true.”

Suspicion aroused is not guilt proven. Brett would have preferred living with the doubt.

“To what purpose now, honey?” he’d soothed, attempting to dissuade her, knowing too well the hell in facing the truth. “You’ve been through so much, and you’ve got to get through a lot more. Why put yourself through the agony of—”

“You don’t understand,” she’d interrupted fiercely, grasping his hand tightly. “I don’t want to know for myself.” Her lids dropped over eyes sparkling like blue jewels from their glaze of tears, and she swallowed with obvious difficulty. “I’d just as soon
not
know, but you have got to go to New York and find out if it’s true.”

“You’re right, I don’t understand,” Brett exploded, if softly. “If you would rather not know, then, dammit, why...?”

“For
him!”
Again she’d not let him finish. “I think—I thought I knew him, and the man I thought I knew would not enter lightly into infidelity. He must love her very much.”

Brett had actually felt the pain that had scored her face. In that instant the rage had been born deep inside him.

“Go to New York, Brett.” Micki’s eyes pleaded as effectively as her quivering voice. “And, if you find it’s true, bring her back with you.”

“What!” Mindful of the other patrons scattered around the dimly lighted lounge, Brett had managed to keep his tone low, but it was all the more intense for the incredulity lacing it.

“If”—a spasm fleetingly distorted her lovely features and she bit her lips before correcting herself harshly—
“when
he comes around, he will need the strength of the woman he loves.”

Her slender hand grasping his tightened, oval nails digging into his palm. Brett felt the pain, not in his hand but in his heart. The rage spread fiery fingers into his mind with her next impassioned words.

“I hate it, Brett. I hate the very thought of it.” Two tears escaped their blinking bounds to slide slowly down her cheeks. “But I want him to live. Oh, dear God, I want him to live, and I will use anyone, suffer
anything,
if it will help him.” Staring directly into his eyes, she’d begged, “Don’t think of me, Brett, think of him. Go to New York.”

Of course he’d given in to her. How could he not? The affection and respect he’d felt for her from the beginning blossomed into pure filial love. He would do anything, perform any task she charged him with.

After escorting her to her room, he had gone to his own long enough to pick up a few things. One of those things was the phone, over which he informed his mother of his intentions—but not his motives. Another of those things was Wolf’s briefcase, which he’d taken possession of on arrival but not as yet opened.

During the short flight from Boston to New York, he’d perused the contents of Wolf’s case. Most of the papers inside were directly related to the reason Wolf had gone to Boston in the first place—that of the feasibility of renovating a rather run-down, old hotel into modern condominiums and the company’s acquisition of same if the resultant figures proved out that feasibility.

One slim folder stood out glaringly in its difference.

The data confined between the covers of the cream-colored folder had come from the personnel manager directly to Wolf. One quick glance over the four sheets of pristine white paper and Brett had a crawling suspicion he was closer to knowing the answer to Micki’s question.

During the cab ride from Kennedy to Wolf’s spacious apartment with its panoramic view of Central Park, Brett came very close to hating the formerly adored one.

It had been a long day. In truth, it had been three very long days, each one riddled with fear as Brett, his mother, Eric, and Micki, so brave, so vulnerable, waited, waited, waited.

Brett had been tired, and disillusioned, and bitter, yet, before dropping onto Wolf’s over-oversized bed, he had more thoroughly studied the four sheets of paper. Each paper contained a detailed account of the professional performance of four company employees—three men and one woman.

The information had been gathered, at Wolf’s request, for the purpose of choosing a replacement for a retiring senior executive of the East Coast branch of Renninger Corporation.

The lone female under consideration for the coveted position was JoAnne Lawrence.

The following morning, feeling charged with restless energy after days spent in the confines of hospital waiting rooms and corridors, Brett politely declined the apartment doorman’s respectful offer of a cab.

Had he wanted to ride, there would have been no need to do it in the back of a world-famous—infamous?—New York City cab. All that would have been required were a few words spoken into a telephone and a limousine, plush, comfortable, fitted out to the nines, would have been waiting at the curb for him. When the occasion warranted, Brett was not averse to using his name, position, power, or wealth. This particular morning, Mr. Renninger chose to walk.

His brother’s briefcase firmly in hand, he strode off, appearing, at least to the casual glance, much like hundreds of other young executives en route to the city’s amalgam of offices. The more discerning eye would have noted the supple leather of handmade shoes, the fine material of perfectly tailored charcoal gray suit, the real silk of pearl gray shirt. The discerning female eye would appreciate the long, toned torso, the thick crop of sun-streaked, loose waves caressing a beautifully sculpted head, features so sharply etched as to appear austere in their masculine beauty, lips that promised heaven in their pleasure, hell in their disfavor. At the moment the tightness of those lips proclaimed extreme disfavor with someone.

Brett’s strides ate up the sidewalk. Seeming so self-absorbed as to be aware of nothing around him, he was, in fact, fully conscious of everything within the radius of his near-perfect vision. Eyes dull steel, flat in contemplation of what may await at destination’s end, he strode on, his mind alive with his sister-in-law’s charge:

“Go to New York, Brett, and, if you find it’s true, bring her back with you.”

Now, as he approached the tall glass-and-steel building that housed the offices of East Coast Region—Renninger Corporation, his mind repeated the same silent reply as the night before.

No way in hell!

Stepping out of the elevator at the twenty-third floor, Brett walked briskly down the carpeted hall to the office of the personnel manager. When he walked out of the office, fifteen minutes later, the retiring senior executive’s replacement had been chosen. The choice was not a female.