Tempting Fate - Caine - MacGregors 2 Part 12

"Ginnie's a hardheaded girl," Agatha said with a sigh. "Spoiled. We all spoiled her. And she has a mean temper, explodes easily without thinking of the consequences. But she's not cold-blooded," Agatha added with another level look. "She would not, could not systematically plan to kill." "In order to prove that," Caine returned, "the first thing I have to establish is why she had a gun when she went to confront her husband."

"The girl wouldn't step out of the door without that pistol." With a sound of disgust, Agatha shifted against the pillows. "Ugly little thing. I'd ask her what the h.e.l.l she thought she was going to do with it and she'd laugh. 'Aunt Aggie,' she'd say, 'if anyone tries to mug me, they're in for a surprise.' " Agatha let out another impatient sound. "Stupid girl had to glitter-diamonds, emeralds. She'd think nothing of walking in the Back Bay or dashing around Manhattan, dripping with jewelry-as long as she had that d.a.m.n pistol."

"You often saw her with the pistol in her possession?"

"I might be staying with her for a few days, stop by her room before we went out somewhere. I'd see her put the thing in her bag. Once at a party I saw it there when she went in her purse for a compact. I gave her h.e.l.l about it," Agatha added. "For all the good it did."

"Then you'd swear in court, under oath, that Virginia Day habitually carried a twenty-two pistol in her possession? And that on numerous occasions you saw her with the gun and discussed it with her?"

"Honey, I'd lie in h.e.l.l's face for her." Agatha gave him a thin, icy smile.

"Never could stand that two-timing jerk she married."

"Mrs. Grant-"

"Relax," she told him with something like a cackle. "In this case I can swear to it without risking my mortal soul. If Ginnie hadn't had the pistol with her that night, I'd have wondered what was going on."

"Good." Caine allowed himself to relax. "And we might keep it just between you and me about lying in h.e.l.l's face?"

"You got it." She sent him a crafty smile then, letting her eyes scan his face. "I don't suppose you and Ginnie..." "I'm her defense attorney," Caine countered as he rose. Reaching out, he grasped Agatha's surprisingly strong hand. "Thank you, Mrs. Grant."

"If I were forty years younger and on trial for murder," Agatha said slowly, "you'd be a h.e.l.l of a lot more than my defense attorney."

Flashing her a grin, Caine brought her hand to his lips. "Don't kill anyone, Agatha. I find you very hard to resist."

Pleased, she let out a l.u.s.ty laugh that followed him down the corridor.

Caine found Diana where he had left her, a law book balanced on one knee, a legal pad on the other. She was busy writing, apparently not affected by the inconvenience. Without speaking, he took a chair and waited for her to finish. He always enjoyed watching her this way- when she was absorbed with what she was doing and cut off from her surroundings. No guards now, he thought. He'd wanted to help her accomplish that, just as much as he'd wanted to make love with her.

Now that she was well on her way to the first, he realized he couldn't afford to do the second.

There were too many undercurrents in her, he decided. Undercurrents had a habit of pulling in the unwary. Perhaps it had been the sudden realization the evening before that he could conquer her, with time, with care, that made him now too cautious to attempt it. It was time to put their relationship on one balanced level and leave it there. For her sake?

he wondered ruefully. Or for his own?

When Diana stopped writing ten minutes later, she closed the book and started to stretch her shoulders before she spotted Caine. "Oh, when did you get back?"

"Only a few minutes ago. You know, not everyone is able to block out their surroundings and work the way you do." "One of my more basic skills," Diana claimed, slipping everything back into her briefcase. "I developed it out of necessity when I wanted to tune out my aunt. How did it go?"

"Perfectly." Caine rose, picking up Diana's coat to help her into it. "Just how much trouble did you have with your aunt, Diana?"

Immediately she tensed up, closed up. He saw it and wondered if his princess in the tower idea had been closer to the mark than he'd realized.

"My aunt?" Her voice was cool and emotionless.

"Yes. How much trouble did you have?"

"She was fond of phrases like 'a lady never wears diamonds before five.'"

"A great deal, obviously," Caine murmured as he picked up his own jacket. "I wonder if I was a little rough on you in Atlantic City."

Surprised, Diana stared up at him as they walked toward the elevator.

"There's no need to apologize." But her body was still on guard, her voice still on edge. "What brought that on?"

"I was thinking about Agatha." Caine pushed the b.u.t.ton for the lobby.

"She doesn't particularly approve of her niece, but she loves her. It shows." He released a lock of hair that was caught in Diana's collar. "I'm beginning to think it was just the opposite in your case."

"Aunt Adelaide approved of what she thought she'd made me." With a shrug, Diana stepped out of the elevator. "It was enough. As for love, she never loved me-but then again, she never pretended to, either. I can't fault her for that."

"Why the h.e.l.l not?" he demanded, angry all at once with the clarity of the picture her limited words drew. She gave him a steady look that clearly told him he was too close. "You can't blame someone for their emotions, or for the lack of them." When she turned away, it was a signal that the conversation was ended. Unable to stop himself, he grabbed her arm. Where she was cool again, he was heating.

"Yes, you can," he countered. "You d.a.m.n well can."

"Leave it, Caine. I did." When he started to object, she turned again, then stopped. "Oh, my G.o.d, look!" Diana stared through the gla.s.s doors.

Still frowning at her words, Caine glanced over. Snow was falling fast and thick, already blanketing the ground. "So much for the weather forecast," Caine muttered. "This was supposed to hold off until tonight."

Diana drew on her gloves. "The drive back to Boston's going to be very interesting. And very slow," she added as they stepped outside into the full force of the storm.

"With any luck we'll be heading out of it." Caine took a firm grip on her arm as they walked across the parking lot. As he finished the statement, they looked toward the sky simultaneously. At Diana's arched brow look, he shrugged. Both of them were already covered with snow. "We could go back to the hospital and wait it out."

"Not unless you don't want to risk driving in it."

Caine looked toward the road as they stopped by the car. "We'll see how it goes."

For the first twenty minutes, they drove through the storm with relative ease. Caine was a good driver, and the car hugged the road confidently.

Diana watched the snow hurtle down, building quickly on the roadside, coating naked trees. The farther south they got, the more the wind picked up, so that snow covered the windshield as quickly as the wipers cleared it. Catching her breath, Diana saw the car in front of them fishtail and skid into the center lane before the driver regained control. "It's pretty bad," she murmured, casting Caine a look.

"It's not good." He kept the speed slow and even, with his eyes narrowed in concentration on the road ahead. With every mile, the visibility became shorter and the road slicker. He'd lived in New England long enough to know the makings of a blizzard when he saw one. It was falling too thick and fast. Caine was aware now that rather than heading out of the storm, they were heading into it. On the other side of the median strip, two cars slid into each other and stopped. Both he and Diana remained silent for the next twenty miles.

They'd reached the halfway point between Boston and Salem in nearly twice the time it had taken them to make the entire trip earlier. The light was failing, and when he turned on the headlights, the snow danced crazily in the beams. There were drifts of over a foot of snow on the side of the road, with more coming. An abandoned car sat crookedly where it had skidded off and stalled. Diana began to wish she'd taken Caine's suggestion of staying in the hospital more seriously.

A car pa.s.sed them on the right, at a dangerous speed that had it sliding toward the Jag's front fender. Diana smothered a gasp as Caine swore ripely, forced to brake, then fight a skid. He was still cursing as he brought the car under control and took the first turnoff . "It's suicide to travel that road in this."

Diana merely nodded, busy trying to swallow her heart again.

"We'll stop off at the first hotel we come to, get a couple of rooms and wait until morning." He took his eyes off the road long enough to look at her. "You all right?"

Diana let out a deep breath. "Ask me again when I'm not praying."

Caine gave quick chuckle, then narrowed his eyes as the bluish glare of a neon light shone mistily through the snow. "I think we're in luck." The last slash of the "M" in Motel had gone out, but the rest of the neon was garishly visible. "Ah, a notel," Diana said with a grin. "What better shelter from a storm?"

Caine glanced at the single-story compound before he pulled the car to a halt. "We won't get deluxe accommodations in this section."

"Will we have a roof?"

"Probably."

"That's good enough." She had to use both hands to push open the door against the wind. Standing outside, Diana sank to her knees, took a deep breath and burst out laughing.

"What's so funny?" Caine demanded as he began to pull her toward a tiny building marked "Office."

"Nothing, nothing!" she shouted back. "It just feels wonderful now."

"You should have told me you were frightened." He tightened his arm around her waist as the wind shoved both of them back two steps.

Diana lifted her face to the full fury of snow. "I would have when I'd rah out of my repertoire of prayers."

The door jingled stridently as Caine shoved it open. The cold, clean smell of snow was immediately blocked out by the scent of cheap tobacco and stale beer. Behind a laminated counter, a grizzled man lifted his eyes from a magazine he was reading. "Yeah?"

"We need a couple of rooms for the night." One glance told Caine it was the sort of establishment that normally rented them by the hour.

Amused, he reminded himself beggars couldn't be choosers.

"Only got one." The clerk lit a kitchen match with his thumbnail and eyed Diana. "Blizzard's good for business." Diana looked at Caine, then back out the gla.s.s door behind him. He was leaving it up to her, she realized as a little nerve jumped at the base of her neck. She remembered that last long skid. "We'll take it"

The clerk dug under the counter for a key. "That'll be twenty-two fifty,"

he told Caine, still holding the key. "Cash, in advance."

"Any place to get some food around here?" Caine asked as he counted out bills.

"Diner next door. Open'til two. Your room's out and to the left. Number twenty-seven. Checkout at ten, or you owe another night's rent. Room's got free TV and pay movies."

Caine lifted a brow as he exchanged money for the key. "Thank you."

"Friendly sort," Diana commented as they fought their way toward number 27. "You did mention food?"

"Hungry?" Caine checked the number on a peeling gray-painted door.

"I'm starving. I hadn't realized it until..." Diana's voice trailed off as her eyes widened in astonishment.

The room, what there was of it, was mostly bed. One bed, she noted, but even that didn't alarm her in her present state. The walls were a sizzling pink to match the wild-pink-and-purple sunburst pattern of the bedspread. There was one chair and an excuse for a table, both painted in glaring white. The rug, though worn and thin, picked up the purple tint all the way to the door of what Diana a.s.sumed was the bath. And on the ceiling over the bed was a round, dusty mirror.

"Well, it isn't the Ritz," Caine said dryly, struggling not to burst out laughing at her dazed expression. He set both their briefcases on top of a white plastic-topped dresser. "But it does have a roof." "Hmm." Diana gave the mirror a last dubious look. Perhaps it was best not to think about that for the moment. "It's freezing in here." Turning, she saw that the drapes unfortunately matched the bedspread.

Catching her expression, Caine couldn't hold back the grin. "It's a room that's at its best in the dark. I'll see if I can get the heater working."

Ignoring what she considered his odd humor, Diana sat gingerly on the edge of the bed. The only bed, she reminded herself. The only room, the only hotel. "One might think you were enjoying this whole fiasco."

"Who, me?" Caine gave the heater a quick kick that sent it roaring into life. Enjoying wasn't the word he'd have picked. Even the thought of spending the night with her in this laughable room had the knot back in his stomach. For the next few hours, he'd have to concentrate on pretending he was her big brother again if he was going to remember his resolution not to touch her. "I'll go pick something up at the diner," he continued when Diana only stared at him. "There's no use both of us going out in this again. Want anything special?"

"Quick and edible." Remembering the storm he had driven through, she unbent enough to smile at him. If he was going to accept the situation with a shrug, then so would she. "Thanks. I owe you eleven dollars and a quarter."

"I'll bill you," he promised, then leaned over to give her a brief kiss before he went out.

Alone, Diana glanced around the room again. It wasn't so bad, really, she told herself... if you kept your eyes half-closed. And the heater was certainly working great guns now. She slipped out of her coat and looked for a closet. It seemed the room didn't run to such extravagances.

Draping the coat over the dresser, Diana unzipped her boots.

The idea of a hot bath was appealing, but the prospect of undressing just to dress again had her vetoing the notion. She'd compensate by stretching out on the bed until Caine came back with dinner. Maybe some television, she thought idly, then noticed a black box attached to the side of the set. On closer examination, Diana noted it was some kind of timer fed by quarters. The pay movies, she remembered, and decided to try her luck. It might be wise to have a movie marathon; that way it'd be easier to remember they were both lawyers-a word without gender-rooming together through circ.u.mstances. She glanced over her shoulder at the bed again and felt a little bead of tension work its way up her spine. Resolutely, she turned away.

A search through her wallet found her three quarters, and what would amount to forty-five minutes of whatever movie was playing. Following the instructions printed on the box, Diana turned the set to the proper channel, fed in the quarters and twisted a k.n.o.b not unlike one on a parking meter. She turned and went to the bed, stretched out in the center and gave a sigh of pure appreciation.

It was while she was busy arranging the pillows behind her head that the movement on the set caught her eye. After a cla.s.sic double-take, she simply stared, open-mouthed. When the initial shock wore off, Diana lay back and laughed until her sides ached.

Good G.o.d, she thought as she hauled herself off the bed again, of all the motels in Ma.s.sachusetts, they had to find one with pink walls and blue movies. Diana was just hitting the off switch when Caine walked back in.

"Do you know what kind of movies you get for a quarter on this machine?" she demanded before he'd shut the door behind him.

He shook himself like a dog, scattering snow. "Yes. Did you need some change?"

"Very cute." Though she tried, she couldn't keep her lips from curving.

"I just wasted seventy-five cents. I wouldn't be a bit surprised to have the vice squad banging on the door." "In this weather?" Caine countered and set two white bags down on the little table.

"Is that dinner I smell?"

"So to speak. I got quick, I won't guarantee edible." He pulled out two wrapped hamburgers. "You go first."

"Young attorney poisoned in notel," Diana murmured as she unwrapped one of the sandwiches.

"There's fries, too." He peeked into the bag. "I think they're fries.

Anyway, I got some wine for now and coffee for later." He took out two capped foam cups and set them aside before he drew out a bottle. "The best I can say is that it's red."

"Oh, I don't know." Diana bit into the hamburger, taking the bottle in her free hand. "This was a great week. Does this place run to gla.s.ses, or do we swig straight from the bottle?"

"I'll check in the bathroom. No sudden stomach pains?" he asked as he went.

"No." She decided to risk the fries. "I don't suppose the storm's letting up?"

"If anything, it's worse." Caine came back with two plastic gla.s.ses.

"Word over at the diner is more than a foot before morning."

Diana sat on the edge of the bed and took the offered gla.s.s. "I suppose we could watch the news," she mused with a glance at the set. "If you can get the news on that thing."

Laughing, Caine sat down and unwrapped his hamburger. "Poor Diana, what a shock that must have been." "I'm not a prude," she said primly. "It was simply unexpected." She took a sip of wine, grimaced and sipped again. "It's really not too bad."

"Best in the house," Caine told her. "A buck fifty-nine a bottle."

"In that case I'll sip more slowly. Caine, there is one small detail we should discuss."

He took a swallow of wine. He'd known it was coming. While he'd trudged through the storm, he'd decided exactly how to handle it. "I'm not sleeping on the floor."