Freefall (32 page)
“Hold on a minute.” Cameron checked his side mirror and pulled out. “Been up the canyon?”
“Um, no, but …”
“We’ll do that, then.”
“Cameron, did you—”
“Wait.” He lifted his fingers from the wheel. “Just a minute.”
She stayed silent while he took a roundabout way from the neighborhood through the small town of Waimea, and stopped at the intersection of highways 50 and 550. He glanced in the rearview mirror. “We’ve got a tail.”
“Oh.” The photographer who’d followed her to Choy’s? At least he hadn’t hassled her at the party, though a telephoto could have captured plenty. “Hope he enjoys the drive.”
“It’s not a he. It’s Bette Walden.”
She sucked a breath and almost turned around. “Are you sure?”
He slid her a glance.
“What is
with
that woman?”
“She’s obviously been hired to follow you.”
Gentry frowned. “Why? And by whom?” Bette was a bloodsucking gnat. Through everything with Troy, she’d been there, insinuating, trying to force a confession, watching, waiting to catch her in the act. Only there wasn’t an act to catch. She must not have heard.
“I don’t know.” Cameron started up the canyon. Whatever he did know would obviously wait.
Gentry stared out at the semi-arid landscape—pale grasses and scrubby bushes on scrabbled, red-and-gray slopes broken by crumbly shelves of rock. Why was Bette Walden after her? Did she think the new pictures proved Troy’s old lies? If she’d bought into it, the whole thing could blow up again. Her stomach churned.
Cameron glanced over. “What do you want to do?”
“About Bette?”
He nodded.
“What are the choices?” They couldn’t exactly outrun her on the single highway creeping up Waimea Canyon.
“Let her follow us to the top and see what she wants, or take one of the trail roads off the highway. My truck’ll handle it. Her compact, maybe not.”
She hadn’t seen anything but scenic turnouts, but he would know. As they climbed, the landscape had changed from hardscrabble hills to scraggly forest. Did she want to confront or avoid Bette? She clenched her jaw, resenting the intrusion. “I’d rather choose my time, my place. I’m tired of her ambushing me.”
“Okay.” He sped up. “Hold on.”
Gentry gripped the armrest and reconsidered her answer. Avoiding Bette on the tortuous road wouldn’t matter if they rolled off the side. Thrust against the door, she wished she’d chosen Plan A.
The trees grew taller, denser, and greener as they climbed, closing them in. The temperature dropped noticeably. With a screech, Cameron swerved to the left and dove down a dirt road that had opened with almost no warning. She stifled a cry as they rumbled down, then jerked to the right onto nothing more than ruts between the trees. Jostled and bumped, she clung to the seat until he came to a stop at a small turnout on the edge of a plummeting precipice. The colorful canyon gaped below.
She clutched her stomach and expelled her breath. “Do you have a death wish?”
“Nah.” He put the truck in gear and set the brake. “Dat would be, da kine, murky water at high surf.”
She dropped her head back.
Cameron opened the windows and turned off the engine. The scent of eucalyptus wafted in from the trees overshadowing them. Cool, shady air filled the cab. He turned and rested one arm on the steering wheel and the other on the seat back, pulling his T-shirt tight across his chest. He drew his knee up and sat like the surfer dude he’d sounded; murky water at high surf.
Her heart was only starting to still. “Does Bette—”
“We’ll talk about that after. First tell me about the dragon man.”
She frowned. “What about him?”
“What happened at Choy’s?”
She sent her thoughts back to that night. “Nothing. After I called you, he left.”
“I thought he’d just come in.”
“He had. I took his picture right when he sat down. Then he cornered me in the hall—”
“Cornered you?” The intensity in his voice warned her off careless phrasing.
“He was so big, maybe he just took up the space.”
His eyes narrowed. “Tell me the truth.”
She released a slow breath. “He didn’t move when I tried to get by. He looked … determined.”
“Threatening?”
She pictured his face.
Oh yeah
. “If I wasn’t used to it, I’d wonder why some stranger took my picture.”
“Stop evading, Gentry. Did you feel endangered by this guy?”
No use finding a positive spin. “Until TJ came. Then, like I said, the man left.”
“Well, at the luau TJ filled me in on his record. Grover Malakua isn’t someone to mess with. Like the cousin TJ arrested for beating up his wife, he’s got a history of violence.”
She swallowed.
“I want you to think. Before Choy’s, had you seen him?” She’d recognized his tattoo, but …
“Close your eyes.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know him. I thought about it all night. I can’t remember seeing him anywhere else.”
He clutched her shoulder. “Close your eyes.”
A deep reluctance seized her. Her mouth went dry. What on earth?
“Gentry.” His grip softened. “Try.”
What TJ had told him was that Grover
Malakua had a record of assault and battery, drug trafficking, and vehicular manslaughter. There’d been suspicion of intent in the accident, but it couldn’t be proved. TJ had emphasized that nothing remotely connected him to Gentry. But she’d recognized the dragon. They had to have interacted at some point, and inside she knew it. He’d heard it in her voice. It was that phone call, not Davy’s baby luau, that had brought him back to the island.
As she closed her eyes, her shoulder tightened with tension. She hadn’t reacted that way the last time he led her through this exercise; she’d gone with it, picking out fragments of thought that had proved accurate. That’s what he wanted again, but he’d hit a wall. Fear?
“You knew the dragon when you saw it. You remembered it before. It’s in there, Gentry.”
Her throat worked.
“Where else did you see it? When?”
Her arms jerked. Her eyes flew open, and she drew hard, clipped breaths. “Falling. I felt like I was falling.”
“Long and slow or hard and sudden?”
“The second. There was a jolt, and I tried to catch myself.”
“A jolt? You were pushed?”
She turned, confused. “Was I?”
“I don’t know.” The first time he’d seen her, she’d been too wary to accept his ride even when he’d shown his relationship to Nica. She’d scrutinized him as though trying to recognize a threat. “Was someone else with you and your uncle?”
“No.” She frowned. “But …” She shook her head.
“Say it.”
“It’s so minute.”
“Gentry, a minute recollection saved your uncle’s life. Tell me.”
Her brow scrunched. “Branches. And a face. A face in the branches.”
“Malakua?”
“It doesn’t make sense.”
“Don’t try to make sense. Was his the face you saw?”
“I don’t know.” She sighed. “Maybe.”
But she was right. It didn’t make sense. What motive would Grover Malakua have to hurt or kill Gentry Fox? “You said your uncle found someone to recommend a trail. Was he the one?”
“Uncle Rob talked to lots of people.”
“Did you ask him about the tattoo?”
She shook her head. “He has so much to deal with already. I don’t want him worrying about me.”
“Okay.” He slid his hand behind her neck and rubbed the tension out.
She lowered her chin. “I thought you were going to tell me what happened with the pictures.”
“It’s taken care of.”
Her mouth fell open. “How?”
“Since you guessed Troy sent the note, I dug up what I could find on him.”
She groaned.
He’d slogged through every article, transcript, and blog to get the public version of the whole previous mess, then extracted from the police report a clearer picture. “Gentry.”
She turned.
“I know you.” What he’d meant was that all his digging had pointed to her innocence, and his meeting with Troy had confirmed it. He tried to rephrase that, but her eyes pooled, and maybe he’d said exactly what he meant.
“I found a more likely suspect in his mom.”
Gentry shook her head. “His mom? I’ve never even met her.”
“If you were someone else, that might matter. But you’re Gentry Fox.” How could she still not get it? “Darlene Glasier did time for embezzlement on a plea that dropped two counts of fraud. She’s filed seven lawsuits ending in nuisance settlements. She knows a mark when she sees one.”
“I don’t—”
“She sent the photos to blackmail you.”
Gentry expelled her breath. “But they’re not real.”
“Real or not, think how you reacted. Your first response was to kick me out.” The corner of his mouth pulled.
“Well …”
“I understand. You’d been sucker-punched. But based on that reaction, you’d soon be paying to keep her quiet.”
Gentry bit her lip. “She hired Bette Walden?”
Bette had delivered the pictures, but he doubted Troy’s mother could afford a PI. “That’s the piece I haven’t figured out. Might’ve been worth talking to Bette.”
“She’s just so vindictive.”
“I’ll catch up with her later. You don’t have to be part of it.” He lowered his knee from the seat. “The important thing is, I got the file. Ms. Glasier would be supremely stupid to pursue it when I’ve got evidence of her fraudulent behavior.”
She turned and stared out the side window. “Then you saw—”
“Only enough to make sure of the file.” Her discomfort touched a chord in him. He hadn’t expected modesty in a Hollywood actor. Maybe he’d bought a little of the hype. Maybe his own attraction—and that of countless others—predisposed assumptions. “Look at me.”
It took a long moment before she turned, but he wanted to be clear. “I didn’t see. I didn’t want to.” Potential had already slid in its talons. If he threw it one tidbit …
She drew a jagged breath. “So it’s over?”
“Your part. Troy’s got some issues.”
Her brow creased. “Is he okay?”
Amazing. She still cared about the kid. But that didn’t surprise him. Her search for her uncle had revealed a tenacious outward focus. If she cared about someone, she meant it. And apparently there wasn’t much that person could do to destroy it. More than her courage, strength, or beauty, that loyalty threatened to undo him.
“His mom’s giving him grief.”
Gentry dropped back in her seat.
He leaned over and caressed her shoulder. “He’ll be all right. He’s getting it.”
“Getting …”
“That you can’t manipulate people. He was hurt when you left the troupe to shoot
Steel
. In some warped way he thought he could get you back.”
She shook her head.
“When he got me the file, he said you were the only person he trusted. You’d gotten down and dirty—not the way it had come out—but role-playing his anger, his hurt, until he could laugh in its face.”
“He said that?” Hope filled her smile.
“Said he’d gotten caught up in the hype, made more of it than there was. He said he’d tell it straight if you wanted him to.”
Tears sparkled in her eyes. “I wouldn’t put him through that.”
“I didn’t think so.” He drew her close and kissed her mouth, hating what she made him feel, and wanting it. No one but Myra had ever grabbed so deep inside him, and he knew what it cost. He knew.
They hadn’t kissed since he’d stifled her ranting in the hospital, but this kiss held the pull of strained muscles, hope and fear, confusion, suspicion … triumph. They’d saved Uncle Rob’s life, and her own would be marked forever by the sight of Cameron drenched and gasping,
“I found him. He’s alive.”
Maybe it was reckless, but she knew herself better for having lost her identity. And Cameron was part of that. He’d been unwilling to leave her lost any more than she could leave Uncle Rob. Because of that and so much more, she welcomed his kiss. But he pulled back abruptly.
She searched his face. “What?”
“I shouldn’t have done that. It was presumptuous.”
A moist breeze came in the window, cooling the air between them. “That depends on why.”
He frowned, unable or unwilling to hold her gaze. “Because you’re …”
“Gentry Fox?” She had thought he knew her, but in fact he was kissing the myth. And it hurt. “I’m not a character on a screen.”
“I know you’re not.”
“It’s just easy to pretend?”
“Gentry …”
She looked away. “I thought you didn’t want the fantasy.”
“This started before, when you were Jade. That first evening you wouldn’t get into my truck. The night of the centipede. In the water under the falls …”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“All of it. Your reality is way outside mine, your ‘universe of possibilities’ infinite.” He clutched the steering wheel. “I know you won’t let this go anywhere.”
It almost sounded like a plea.
Stay up on your pedestal. Don’t be real
. “Then you’re right. It’s presumptuous.”
“It won’t happen again.”
Good. She’d rather stage-kiss Alec Warner with a camera in her face than Cameron Pierce in his truck in the woods. “Have we shaken Bette?”
“She’s probably realized she lost us, but she’ll go to the top to be sure.”
“Then let’s get back.”
He hesitated as though he wanted to say more, but she kept her gaze out the window. He started the engine and backed up with a little too much force. If he was angry, he need look no farther than himself. But it wasn’t anger that came off him in waves; it was something bleaker by far.
They took the jarring track back to the road and the road down the canyon in silence. Leaving the green forest and gray skies behind, they returned to the arid sunshine as they emerged from the canyon. Nature had captured it. Two different worlds; two different lives. Time to find closure. “I don’t want to go back to the party. Can you take me to the hospital?”
His response was void of inflection. “Okay.”
Then the silence solidified as he drove through Hanapepe and Koloa, to Lihue and Uncle Rob. When he pulled into the hospital lot, she turned. “Do you mind parking? My uncle wants to meet you.”
