Hot Blooded (11 page)

“Sorry,” he said, still working on the engine. “Got a problem here. Thought I could make it home, but…oh, damn.” He slanted her a self-deprecating grin, then turned his attention to the engine. “This darned thing decided to give up the ghost.”

“Can I help?”

He stared at her from behind dark glasses anchored over a slightly crooked nose. “You a mechanic?”

“I have been on a boat before.”

He considered, looked her over once again. “Sure, come aboard. But it’s not just the engine. The damned keel’s been giving me trouble, and the sails are ripped. I shouldn’t have taken her out today.” Frustration lined his forehead where thick, coffee-colored hair caught in the breeze. He straightened and slapped the boom with an open palm. “I knew better.”

Barefooted, she climbed carefully onto the deck, wincing just a bit when she put all her weight on her bad ankle. “I’m Samantha,” she said. “Samantha Leeds.”

“Ty Wheeler. I live right around that point.” He gestured to the small jetty of land, then squatted near the engine and fiddled with a wire or two. Satisfied, he tried the ignition. It ground. The engine sputtered. Wound down pitifully. Ty swore under his breath. “Look, it’s no use. Probably the fuel line. I need to run to the house and grab some more tools.” He swiped the sweat from his forehead and scowled up at the boat. “She’s not mine, not yet. I’m just trying her out.” He shook his head. “Now I know why she’s such a bargain.
Bright Angel,
my ass. More like
Satan’s Revenge.
Maybe I’ll rename her if I decide to buy.”

Sam didn’t move a muscle. She couldn’t breathe for a second and told herself she was overreacting. It was a coincidence he’d mentioned Satan, that was all. So she was skimming
through the pages of
Paradise Lost,
so what? There was nothing to it.
Nothing.

He checked his watch, then the lowering sun. “Do you mind if I leave her here? I’ll run down and get my tools. I live just down the street, about half a mile.” He checked his watch and frowned. “Damn it all.” Glancing up at her again, he said, “I really thought I could make it back to my dock, but she”—he glared at the engine—“had other ideas. I’ll try to get back today, but, it might be tomorrow. I’ve got to be somewhere in an hour.”

“I suppose that would be okay,” Sam said, and before she could second-guess herself he was out of the boat, dog at his heels, marching toward the house.

Shading her eyes, she watched as he crossed the broad expanse of lawn, passed under one of the shade trees, rounded the porch and headed for the gate near the front of the house, as if he’d known exactly where it was.

Though that wasn’t such a big leap. The gate had to be on one side of the house or the other. He had a 50 percent chance of figuring it out. He’d just gotten lucky.

She settled into her deck chair again and opened the book, but she couldn’t concentrate and soon she heard Hannibal barking madly, then thought she heard a car pull into the drive over the rise of the wind. Slamming the book shut, she got up too quickly, felt a pain in her left ankle and muttered to herself at her own stupidity.

By the time she reached the back porch, she heard the soft peal of her doorbell and she flew through the rooms yelling, “I’m coming.” At the door she looked through the peephole and saw a tall, barrel-chested man wearing a tan jacket. His hands were jammed into his pockets and he was chewing gum as if his life depended on it. Sam opened the door as far as the chain lock would allow.

“What can I do for you?”

“Samantha Leeds?”

“Yes.”

“Rick Bentz, New Orleans Police Department.” He flipped open a black wallet that displayed his badge and ID. Gray eyes drilled into hers. “You filed a report down at the station. This is a follow-up call.”

Everything looked in order, the picture on his ID matched the face staring sternly at her, so Sam unlocked the chain and opened the door. Bentz walked in, and Sam sensed the man was keyed up. “Let’s go over what happened,” he suggested. “We can start with”—he glanced down at his notes—“the call you got at the station and, it says here you got a threatening letter here at the house. You called the local police about it.”

“And the message left on my machine while I was on vacation. This way.” She guided him into the den, handed him a copy of the letter and marred photograph, then changed tapes in her answering machine. “These are both copies. The originals are with the Cambrai police.”

“Good.”

Sam played the message that had haunted her for nearly a week.

Bentz listened hard as he stared at the publicity photo with her eyes cut out.

“I know what you did, and you’re not going to get away with it. You’re going to have to pay for your sins.”
The voice she’d become so familiar with oozed through the room, filling the corners, sliding behind the curtains, scraping her mind.

“What sins?” Bentz asked, and a glimmer of interest sparked in his eyes as he scanned the room, taking stock, she supposed, of her small library and equipment.

“I don’t know.” Sam was honest. “I can’t figure it out.”

“And the calls to the radio station, they were about the same topic—sin?” he asked, his gaze moving over the desk
and bookcase as if he were studying her den to get a better picture of who she was.

“Yes. He, um, he called himself John, told me that he knew me, that he was, and I quote, ‘my John.’ When I said I knew lots of them, he insinuated that I’d been with a lot of men and he, um, he called me a slut. I cut him off.”

“Have you ever dated or been involved with a John?”

“I’ve thought about that,” she said. “Sure. It’s a common enough name. I think I went out with John Petri in high school and a guy named John…oh, God, I don’t remember his last name in college but that’s about it. Neither one of them were more than a couple of dates and nothing happened. I was a kid, and so were they.”

“Okay, so go on. He called again?”

“Yes. The other night…it’s on tape, but it was after the show. He called in and Tiny, he’s the technician that was setting up for the next prerecorded show, took the call. The caller asked for me, said he was my ‘John’ and that he hadn’t called in earlier during the show because he’d been busy and that what had happened was my fault.”

“What had happened?”

“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “It was eerie and sounded sinister, but then I was jumpy. I thought I might come home and find my house burned down or ransacked or something, but…everything here was as I left it.”

“You’re sure it was the same guy who called here?”

“Positive. But my number’s unlisted.”

Bentz scowled down at the photo as he leaned against a corner of her desk. “This is a publicity shot. Right? There were dozens of “em made. Handed out.”

“Yeah.” She nodded.

“And this is a copy from one of those.”

She swallowed hard. “I…I assume that he must have an original.”

“Why do you think he cut out your eyes?” he asked, his eyes thinning.

“To scare the hell out of me,” she said, “and, for the record, it’s working.”

“Did he ever mention your eyes or something you saw when he called?”

“No…not that I remember.”

“I’ll need a copy of the tapes from your program.”

“I’ll get them to you.”

“I’ll get the original letter, picture and message tape from Cambrai.”

“Fine.”

“But you don’t mind if I take these until I see the originals?”

“No.”

Carefully he placed the letter, envelope and picture in a plastic bag, then asked if he could look through the house. What he was looking for, she wasn’t certain, but she gave him the tour and they ended up in the living room as dusk was beginning to settle outside. She turned on the Tiffany lamp near the window and listened to the sound of crickets and mosquitoes as he sat on the couch and she took a chair on the other side of the coffee table. The paddle fan turned slowly overhead.

“Just tell me what happened, from the beginning,” Bentz said as he placed a pocket recorder on the glass top of the table.

“I already told the officer at the station.”

“I know, but I’d like to hear it firsthand.”

“Fine. Okay. Well.” She rubbed her hands over her knees. “It all started when I got back from Mexico…” She launched into her tale, told him about losing her ID in the boating accident in Mexico, again explained about the letter she received, the threatening call on her answering machine and the phone calls to the station. She mentioned that she’d
thought someone had been watching her house, then dismissed it as a case of nerves. All the while Bentz wrote in a small notepad and recorded what she was saying.

“You ever get threats like this before?”

“Nothing so personal,” she said. “There are always crank calls. It comes with the territory, but most of them are screened. Once in a while somebody gets through.”

“Do you know anyone who would want to hurt you, or just scare you?”

“No,” she said, though David’s image flashed through her mind.

“What about your family?”

“I don’t have much,” she admitted. “My father’s a retired insurance broker and lives in LA in the house where I grew up. My mother passed away and my brother…well, he disappeared a long time ago. About ten years, just around the time Mom died. I…I, uh, haven’t heard from him in years. For all I know, he could be dead, too.” She linked her fingers and felt the same deep sadness she always did when she thought of Peter. As children they’d been close, as adolescents, they’d drifted farther and farther apart and as adults they’d had nothing in common.

“Names?”

“What? Oh, Dad’s is Bill, er, William Matheson and my brother is Peter, Peter William. My dad doesn’t have a middle name.”

“Address?”

She gave it to him from memory and explained that she had friends scattered all over the country, and a couple of cousins in the Bay Area near San Mateo. Other than that, she had no family to speak of.

“You were married?”

Sam nodded. “Yes. It was a long time ago.”

He lifted his eyebrows, encouraging her to continue. “I was a freshman at Tulane University when I met Jeremy.”

“Jeremy Leeds?”

“Dr.
Jeremy Leeds. He was a professor. My professor. He taught, er, teaches philosophy.” And she’d been a fool to fall for him, a naive girl who’d been enamored by an unconventional teacher—handsome, a rogue, one with a brilliant mind and a sexy smile.

“He’s still there? At Tulane?” Bentz asked, looking up from his notes.

“As far as I know.” She met the questions in the detective’s eyes. “Jeremy and I don’t talk. Haven’t for years. We didn’t have children, and he remarried soon after our divorce. Other than that, I don’t know anything about him.”

“But you live in the same town,” Bentz pointed out.

“City. New Orleans is pretty big, and I left for a while. Lived in Houston.”

“Were you married then?”

“Yes, but the marriage was falling apart. I thought it might just be a separation, but it turned out differently. I stayed. We split up.” She glanced out the window, didn’t want to think about those years.

“You haven’t married since?”

“No.” She shook her head and leaned back against the cushions. Glancing at the clock near the archway leading to the kitchen, she realized Ty had left over an hour earlier. He’d said he might be back today or tomorrow. She crossed her fingers and hoped he’d be delayed because she didn’t really know how she could explain him to the policeman.

“Been involved with anyone lately?” Bentz was asking, and Sam was brought back to the inquisition.

Here we go,
she thought, and realized that one of the reasons she hadn’t wanted to contact the police was because she didn’t want to involve David. “Not currently, no, but I have had a few boyfriends since I was married.”

“Anyone named John?”

“Just the ones I told you about. Years ago. No one since.”

He scratched another note as Charon wandered into the dining room from the kitchen, a black shadow that hid beneath the table and peered through the legs of the chairs.

“The cat belongs to you?”

“Yes. Three years now.”

“And the boat?” He looked through the open French doors and past the few trees to the dock where Ty’s sloop was moored, the masts visible in the gathering darkness.

“No. That’s a friend’s…well, actually a neighbor’s.” She explained, and the cop stopped writing, just stared at her as if she’d announced she’d just flown in from Jupiter.

“So he’s a stranger?”

“Well, yes, but…He said he’d come back for the boat later today or possibly tomorrow. He just lives down the street and had some trouble with the sails and his engine.”

Bentz frowned. Lines creased his forehead. “Listen, let me give you some advice, okay? Lock your doors, use your alarm system, don’t go out alone and don’t acquaint yourself with strangers. Even neighbors.” He ran stiff fingers through his hair, pushing brown curls off his forehead. He seemed about to say more, as if he intended to give her a lecture, then thought better of it. “Okay, you get the picture. Now, do you have anyone who would consider you an enemy?”

“‘Enemy’ is a pretty harsh term.”

He shrugged.

“The only person I can think of is Trish LaBelle, and I wouldn’t call her an enemy, more of a rival. She works over at WNAB, hosts a show similar to mine. There’s been talk of some kind of feud between us, but generally we just avoid each other when we’re at the same social or charity function. I wouldn’t really call her an enemy, and I don’t think she’s behind anything like this. In fact, it wouldn’t make much sense because though the calls scare the hell out of me, they increase ratings. Listeners are intrigued with it. It’s the same
mentality as a crowd gathering around a building that’s on fire, or other motorists rubbernecking at an accident scene.”

“So you’re thinking that it would make more sense for someone at the station to be behind it, to try and boost ratings?”

“No way! That’s…that’s sick. Who would terrorize an employee to improve the listenership?”

“You tell me.”

“It’s not what I was thinking. It just makes more sense than blaming Trish.”