After Midnight (17 page)

Her heart thumping in slow anticipation, she descended the companionway stairs. The galley was as neat as the last time she’d come aboard. Only a roll of tinfoil and the shrimp peels cluttering the stainless steel sink gave evidence that Steve had prepared his evening meal here before going topside to cook it. As before, his laptop computer sat on the drop-down mahogany table. Her heart gave a painful thump as she passed it.

The stateroom beyond the galley wasn’t much larger than the bathroom in Jess’s condo, but cleverly fitted compartments that kept his belongings neatly stowed. Like the galley, the stateroom was almost Spartan in its austere neatness. No keys or loose change cluttered the wood surfaces. No discarded uniform items lay tossed across the bed.

The only personal items were two framed photographs. One obviously depicted his family – father, mother, three siblings, including a teen-aged Steve. The second showed two police officers, one black, one white, arms hooked over each others’ shoulders. Jess’s gaze lingered on the photos for some moments before she pulled out a drawer in search of a replacement for her uniform slacks and blouse. She settled for a faded maroon T-shirt with APD stenciled in black letters across the front and back. The T-shirt hung to mid-thigh and wrapped her in the scent of Tide and sun. After liberally spraying her arms and legs with the can of mosquito repellant she found on a shelf, she padded barefoot back through the galley.

They ate with their feet propped on the back rail, scooping spoonfuls of the spicy concoction of shrimp, onions, and rice from wooden bowls, savoring the heat building inside and out. They said little, she and Steve. There was little they could say without stirring dark waters best left untouched.

Slowly, the hot, muggy darkness wrapped around them. The jazz CDs that had been playing when Jess arrived finished and the deep-throated bullfrogs took over. Cocking her head, she listened to the chorus of night sounds.

“It’s so quiet out here,” she murmured, “even with all that noise.”

“That’s one of the reasons I like living here.”

“Is it? What are the others?”

“The mobility. The absence of anything even remotely resembling a yard to mow. The freedom to strip down and dive in whenever I want to.”

“You swim here?” She eyed the bayou doubtfully. “Aren’t you worried about snakes or alligators crawling around in the weeds beneath the surface?”

“I have the channel dredged every couple years to keep the it clear and deep enough for the boat.” Reaching for her bowl, he dropped it beside his on the deck. “Want to give the bay another try, Jess?”

“The last time I went in these waters,” she reminded him with a grimace, “I almost didn’t come out.”

“This time I’m going in with you.”

That might have offered her some comfort if it hadn’t hit too close to home.

Pushing out of his chair, he snagged her hand and gave it a tug. “Ever made love in the water, Jess?”

“Not in saltwater, and not…”

“This end of the bay is river-fed fresh water.” Ignoring her protest, he pulled her to her feet. “Cool and clean and soft as silk.”

His palms planed her hips, raising little goose bumps as he skimmed the T-shirt up and over her head. Bending, he grazed her bare shoulder. The scrape of his teeth raised more shivers, more heat.

“So are you,” he murmured against her skin. “Soft as silk and a moveable feast for the mosquitoes. We’d better go in before they eat you alive.”

He cut into the water with barely a splash and bobbed to the surface some yards away. Ripples undulated across the water, so seductive, so deadly.

Jess stood at the rail, her stomach clenching at the sinuous movement. She remembered all too vividly how the dark beast below had held in its maw until she’d fought free of her submerged Mustang and clawed to the surface. Remembered, too, how she’d swum to a bridge abutment and clung to the cold steel for what felt like hours until rescue arrived.

The terror of that night tried to sink its teeth into her once more. The husky promise in Steve’s voice when he urged her to take the plunge had her setting her jaw. Shimmying out of her bra and bikini panties, she followed him over the rail.

He was right. The bayou was cool and clean and so welcoming Jess soon buried the horror of her last excursion into these waters under a thick layer of pleasure.

The silvery wash of moonlight on the dark surface helped. So did Steve’s adroit maneuvering as he kicked out of his trunks and caught Jess just as she surfaced. They curved together, joined at chest and hip, gliding like dolphins through the night. His hands and mouth worked their magic, his body bouyed hers.

Their splashing echoed in the sudden, startled silence. Their ragged breathing grew almost as loud as the bullfrogs’ now stilled chorus. With the water kissing her breasts and Steve hungry at her mouth and throat, Jess wrapped her legs around his waist and tried to take him into her. He seated himself, thrust hard, and sent them both under.

When they surfaced, Jess spit out the mouthful of bay she’d nearly swallowed. “I thought you said you knew how to do this.”

“I did,” he admitted, “in my younger, considerably more athletic days.”

“I wish you’d shared that particular piece of information with me before you lured me in.”

She squirmed, attempting to tread water without sacrificing the smooth, delicious friction of his flesh inside hers. She succeeded only in pushing them both down into the depths. They broke the surface again, gasping.

“I don’t think this is going to work!”

“Sure it is.”

Keeping her body locked against his, he rolled onto his side and swam toward the boat. Each time he contracted his muscles for another sissor kick, he withdrew an inch or two. With every smooth lunge forward, he shot in again. By the time he grabbed one of the mooring lines and anchored them both, Jess had forgotten her terror of the bay, forgotten her session with the JAG this afternoon, forgotten everything but the feel of Steve’s body inside hers.

The following Monday morning, the Daily News broke the story linking Whittier and four other unnamed local residents to an alleged assault of a waitress at the Blue Crab twenty-five years ago. The same story identified Jess as Helen Yount’s daughter and speculated with chilling detachment on the real reason behind her visit to Whittier the afternoon he died. The reporter also hinted that authorities were reassessing the findings in the recent deaths of two more of the men involved in the supposed incident at the Blue Crab.

Jess had expected the stories, had expected as well the curious glances and rumors that buzzed like dogflies around the Supply Squadron Monday morning. The civilian attorney she consulted later that afternoon advised her not to acknowledge or address them in any way.

She couldn’t avoid addressing one issue, however. Calling in her deputy, she laid out the problem.

“Did you read the paper this morning?”

“Yes.” His face grave, Al Munroe fingered his silver Harley Davidson belt buckle. “Did the reporter have that story about an attack on your mother right?”

“As far as I know.”

“Hard to believe something like that could happen ‘round here.”

“Bill Petrie was one of the five men who attacked her, Al.”

“Awww, hell. You sure about that?”

“I got his name along with the others from a police source.”

“I’ve worked with Billy Jack for a lot of years,” Munroe said, shaking his head. “He and his wife used to come to dinner before my Luanne took sick.”

“I have to move him,” Jess said flatly. “I can’t have him in the squadron.”

“Shouldn’t you discuss this with him first? He’s back from leave.”

She fully intended to talk to him, but not about the transfer.

“Even if we both agreed to let the past die,” she told Monroe, “every performance evaluation or merit pay raise Petrie comes up for would raise doubts. I’m going work a detail to another unit as soon as possible.”

It was the wisest course. The only course. To protect herself, Jess had to get the fuels superintendent out of her squadron. The fact that she was protecting Petrie as well left a bitter taste in her mouth.

After a series of phone calls, Jess discovered a transfer would take longer than she’d anticipated. Her counterpart at Hurlburt was on temporary duty in the Balkans and not expected back for another two weeks. Since he was the only one with the authority to accept a civilian of Bill Petrie’s rank, the move was put on hold until his return.

Nor could Civilian Personnel find a fit for Petrie elsewhere on Eglin itself. His background and experience was all fuels. He was too specialized to place in any other field. The best Jess could do was a two-week detail to a quality assurance team chartered by Colonel Hamilton to look at ways to improve customer service within the logistics complex.

Jess called Petrie into her office early Tuesday morning to personally deliver the news of his move. With Al Monroe there to act as a witness, she let the man sweat for long, tense moments before breaking the charged silence.

“I assume you saw the story in the paper yesterday?”

The civilian nodded, his face grim. He didn’t look as though he’d spent his leave in restful pursuits. Like Jess, he had dark circles shadowing his eyes. The skin stretched tight over his cheekbones appeared almost a pale gray in contrast to his shock of coal black hair.

“On the advice of my attorney,” Jess said evenly, “I’m not going to discuss the details of the story with you except to say I have information indicating you participated in the reported assault against my mother.”

“On the advice of my attorney,” he got out raggedly, “I have no comment.”

Well, now she knew how he’d occupied his time during the past week.

“To avoid the potential for conflict of interest, I’m detailing you effective today to Colonel Hamilton’s quality assurance team. I’ll work out a permanent arrangement later.”

His throat worked. Above the open collar of his shirt, his Adam’s apple bobbed convulsively. “We’ve got a mess on our hands. I’m… I’m needed here.”

More than she was, he seemed to imply.

“Lieutenant Ourek is placing Sergeant Babcock in charge of recovery operations,” Jess informed him with a dart of savage satisfaction. Her decision to give Babcock a last chance had already paid off in spades.

“Ed’s a good man,” Petrie said gruffly, “but purging those underground pipelines and emptying the storage tank of the polluted fuel is a huge job, something none of us have ever done before.”

Under other circumstances, she might have given him some credit for his concern about the mission. The best Jess could do at the moment was bite back the reminder that he’d authorized the deviation to the sedimentation levels in the first place.

“I appreciate the magnitude of the task,” she said flatly. “We’ll get it done.”

He looked to Al Monroe, whether for assistance or sympathy she neither knew nor cared.

“You’ll report to the LGX office this afternoon. That’s all, Mr. Petrie.”

The polite form of address almost choked her, but she managed to keep her expression blank and her hands still until both Petrie and Al Monroe turned to leave.

“Close the door, please,” she instructed her deputy.

The moment it snicked shut, Jess curled her hands into claws and gave herself up to the fury she’d kept so rigidly in check.

The bastard! He was there, with the other four that night at the Blue Crab. If Jess had harbored the least doubt before, she didn’t now. She’d seen the guilt in his eyes, had heard it in his voice.

She wasn’t done with Billy Jack Petrie. She knew it. He knew it. She’d made sure he’d seen that in her eyes.

Shoving Petrie into a separate compartment in her mind, Jess spent the rest of the day bird-dogging her request to headquarters for additional R-11s and coordinating the emergency contract to haul off the contaminated fuel. The Defense Fuels Center would award the contract, but Ed Babcock, Lieutenant Ourek, and Jess all helped hammer out the requirements.

Her head was pounding by the time she pulled into her driveway just after eight that evening. She lifted a hand, intending to hit the garage opener, when she caught a glimpse of a green and tan police cruiser a dozen or so yards away. Her hand stilled. She needed only a glance to identify the logo on the side panel.

Shifting the Expedition into park, she left it idling and walked the dozen yards. The uniformed deputy sheriff at the wheel climbed out at her approach. Tall and ramrod straight, he greeted her politely.

“Evening, colonel.”

“Good evening. Were you waiting for me?”

“No, ma’am. Just doing a drive-by.”

His glance was guarded under the brim of his gray straw Smoky the Bear hat. He’d recognized her, obviously, or had connected the name on her fatigues to the newspaper stories.

“Do patrols from the Walton County sheriff’s department routinely drive through this development?”

“No, ma’am,” he said again. “Not routinely.”

Letting out a slow breath, Jess nodded. More questions tumbled through her mind as she walked back to her car, but only one man could provide the answers.

Steve arrived at Jess’s condo an hour later. She hadn’t called him. She hadn’t needed to. His deputy had notified him of her arrival…and of their brief exchange.

He read the storm warnings the moment she opened the door, but she waited until he’d set the paper bag he carried on the coffee table in the living room and claimed the easy chair before issuing an icy demand for an explanation.

“Am I under surveillance?”

“Not by my department.”

“Then how do you categorize these ‘drive-bys?’”

“As what they are, periodic drive-bys. They started the night you went off the bridge,” he added in answer to her look of patent disbelief. “I wasn’t satisfied your vehicle was rammed by a drunk driver, Jess. I’m still not satisfied.”

Her eyes widened. While she processed his blunt announcement, Steve kneaded the knotted muscles at back of his neck. Christ, he was tired. He’d had a bitch of a day, and the call from the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Department hadn’t improved matters. He still had several hours of paperwork waiting for him at his office, but he’d wanted to deliver both his news and the contents of the brown paper bag person.

It didn’t take Jess long to grasp what he’d come to tell her.

“You hinted to the media that it might have been Whittier who shoved my car off the bridge. Have the lab in Tallahassee matched the paint scrapings from my Mustang to Whittier’s Cadillac?”

“No.”

That would have been too easy, Steve thought wearily. Too neat.

“The lab matched them to a Buick Regal, gold dust in color. As it happens, an elderly Panama City couple reported theirs stolen the same day you went into the bay.”

Shagging a hand through her hair, she sorted the implications. “The possibility a stolen vehicle shoved my car through the guard rail doesn’t prove the hit and run was anything but accidental.”

“No, it doesn’t, but I’m betting we’ll find that gold Regal under fifty feet of water one of these days, neatly and very deliberately wiped clean of all prints.”

“’One of these days’ doesn’t exactly do it for me, sheriff.”

“Me, either. That’s why I brought you this.”

Leaning forward, he unfolded the brown paper bag and slid out a padded leather gun case. The zipper snicked open to reveal a gleaming automatic.

“It’s a 9mm Baretta.”

“Standard issue for the U.S. military,” she murmured.

“That’s why I brought it. Are you familiar with it?”

“I carried one for six months in the Balkans.”

“Did you fire it?”

“At something other than a paper target? Yes. Once.”

“Good.”

He extracted a spare clip from the bag, along with a box of bullets. Folding her arms, Jess observed him slide the clip in, chamber a round, and lay the Baretta carefully on the coffee table.

“I wonder what your friend at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement would say if he knew I was armed and dangerous again.”

“He knows. He also knows my people are doing periodic drive-bys. Hazlett thinks both are a good idea.”

The implication that she didn’t top the FDLE detective’s top ten list criminals sent a spear of relief through Jess.

Steve caught her sigh. Rising, he skirted the coffee table trailed the back of his hand down her cheek. “We’re not out of the woods yet.”

“I know.”

“Did you talk to a civilian attorney?”

“Yes. He advised me to notify him of any and all contacts by the police.”

His mouth curved in a wry grin. “You should think about it next time you open your door to a cop.”

“I also talked to Bill Petrie.”

His knuckles stilled their lazy path. “When?”

“This afternoon. In my office. With my deputy…”

“Dammit, Jess!”

“With my deputy present to act as a witness,” she finished. “I told Petrie I was moving him out of the squadron. He wasn’t happy about it.”

“Oh, great. Nothing like handing out another reason to shove you off a bridge!”

“I had to move him. You know that. Professionally, the situation was untenable for both of us.”

“And personally?”

“He was one of them, Steve.” She tipped her chin, her eyes flashing. “He didn’t brag about it like Whittier did. On the advice of his lawyer, he didn’t say anything at all, but he was one of them. I saw it in his face.”

“So what?”

She reared back. “Excuse me?”

“So what if he was one of them? I can’t change what happened and I can’t charge him with a rape that happened twenty-five years ago, even if there was any evidence to prove it actually occurred.”

“Then why is he running so scared?” she shot back. “Why did he take off a whole week, and go see a lawyer before he came back to work? Why was he shaking in his boots the day I walked into his office and found him staring at McConnell’s picture in the paper? And why the hell did Ron Clark say my name just before he killed himself? What did he think I could do that would drive him to suicide?”

The razor-edged frustration in her voice stabbed into Steve like one of the vicious switchblades he used to take off the punks on Atlanta’s street. More than any impassioned plea of innocence, that angry convinced him Jessica Blackwell had no direct hand in the realtor’s death.

“I don’t know the answers,” he said in response to her barrage of angry questions. “I’m missing something. I’ve been missing it right from the start, but I’m damned if I can figure out how or why. Just keep the .38 handy. And for God’s sake, call 911 if anything – anything! – looks, sounds, or smells wrong to you.”

“I will.”

“Better yet…” He hooked an arm around her waist, wanting to see her reaction, needing to feel the tremor that rippled along her spine. “Call me.”

The frustration went out of her, edged aside by a different need, every bit as sharp and compelling.

“I can’t, Steve. I won’t. I’ve told you before, I don’t want to drag you into this mess any deeper than I already have.”

“Yeah, well, seems I remember telling you that it’s too late. I’m already in over my head, and I’m not looking for a way out.”

She made an inarticulate sound, lost when his mouth covered hers, but he didn’t have any trouble deciphering the urgent fit of her hips against his.

Their joining was hard and swift, with little foreplay and no skilled weaving through layers of sensual pleasure. As if they both sensed the need to take what they could, while they could.

When Jess dragged on her clothes and walked with him to the door a half-hour later, she felt as though he’d left the imprint of his body on every square inch of hers. His scent was on her skin, his stubborn determination to risk his career on her mind. She caught him at the open door and drew him back for another, almost desperate kiss.

“It’s okay,” he told her softly when she couldn’t say the words that went with the kiss. “We’ll figure this all out, Jess.”