U. S. Marshall: Night's Landing Part 25

"It stuck out in your mind or you wouldn't have remembered the man who approached you. I've been to museums. I'm trained to remember faces, and I doubt I'd remember anyone who stopped and chatted with me for a few seconds, especially not three weeks later."

Sarah stormed down the hall to the kitchen. "Maybe he was good-looking. Maybe that's why I remember him."

She ripped open the freezer, grabbed a frozen dish marked "squash ca.s.serole" and slammed it onto the counter, swearing under her breath, her chest tight with anger and a kind of fear she'd never known-as if people were out to kill her, kill her brother, kill her parents. But that was insane.

Nate was standing in the kitchen door. She pushed past him, not even looking at him. "Help yourself. I'm not hungry."

He didn't stop her from walking down the hall and heading upstairs.

He didn't say a word. Nothing.

She shut the door to her room.

Five o'clock. Hours left before she could go to bed, but she was exhausted-and feeling guilty, because she knew she'd picked a fight with him in order to keep herself from thinking about her mother and what she was hiding.

It was terribly like her mother to have secrets. The Quinlan side of the family were all big on secrets. They treated them as currency.

Sarah tore open her bedroom door and stormed back into the hall, but all the fury had gone out of her. She hung over the stair railing. "I'm going to take a bath. I'm sorry I'm not better company."

No response.

"And I'm sorry I almost ripped your arm off."

"My arm's fine."

He was behind her. She turned around so fast she almost lost her balance. Her heart was pounding-it was as if all her nerve endings were raw, exposed, responding to him in a thousand different ways. She pushed her hair back with one hand and gave a self-conscious laugh. "I think Wyatt Earp could do that, couldn't he? Materialize out of thin air."

"I think that was Captain Kirk."

"I'll cooperate," she blurted. "So will my mother. You know that, don't you? It's just unnerving to think that we might have any connection to a shooting that almost killed Rob-you-"

"Later."

"But if you've got a bee up your nose-"

He wrapped both arms around her and lifted her off the floor, kissing her, tasting of bourbon and a kind of intensity she'd never known. He carried her back into her room. "I want to feel the breeze off the river while we make love."

"Nate-"

"You and I both have a million things to think about. Let's think about all of them later."

He laid her down on her bed. She could, indeed, feel the breeze off the river. "I've neglected this part of my life," she whispered.

"You don't have to anymore. Neither do I."

"But you-"

"There's s.e.x," he said, "and there's lovemaking. I want to make love to you."

"Why?"

He smiled. "No more questions."

He stripped off his shirt-she could see that his arm had bled slightly through the bandage, but he didn't seem to notice. His pants came next, and it was obvious he'd been antic.i.p.ating this moment for at least a few minutes. But, instead of rushing, he said, "I want to take my time with you." And he slid in next to her, taking her hands when she started to lift her shirt. "Allow me."

"As you wish."

"And you?" he asked, raising her shirt. "What do you wish?"

He touched his thumbs to her nipples through her bra, and she couldn't answer. Slowly, without any obvious sense of urgency, he lifted her bra and exposed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s to the cold breeze and the wet heat of his tongue. He took his time easing off her top, smoothing his hands and tongue over her throat, between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, down her abdomen. He caught his fingers in the waistband of her pants and took them and her underpants off at the same time, exposing her to the same slow, erotic play of hands, teeth and tongue.

"I wish..." She couldn't breathe, couldn't talk. "I wish this could go on forever."

With his fingers still on her, inside her, he took her hand and placed it on him. He was hot, throbbing. He thrust himself against her palm, a promise of what was to come. But she couldn't last another second and moved under him, and he pulled back his hand, then entered her, pushing in hard and deep, his eyes locking with hers. "How long do you mean by forever?"

He took her to the precipice, then fell back again, over and over, until she couldn't speak, couldn't think, could only feel her own blinding need for release. When it came, he stayed with her, spun into a freefall with her, tumbling, picking up speed, but she kept pace with him until his own release overcame him. Afterward, completely spent, she wrapped herself around him so that she could feel the entire length of his body, the taut muscles, the hot skin as the chilly wind blew across them. He was real. So very real. She hadn't imagined one second of what had just happened.

"A Yankee marshal," she whispered, not sure if he could hear her, and smiled. "Dear G.o.d."

She could easily fall in love with him.

She might have already.

And there wasn't a d.a.m.n thing she could do about it, any more than she could stop the river outside her doors from flowing-not that she would if she could.

Finally he stirred. "What's in squash ca.s.serole?"

"Summer squash, Ritz crackers, onions, cheese and b.u.t.ter." She sat up, untangling her hair with her fingers. "Lots of b.u.t.ter."

He threw his legs over the edge of her bed. "Another of Granny Dunnemore's recipes?"

Sarah nodded. "One of my favorites."

He grinned at her. "They're all your favorites."

He pulled on his pants and stood up, and when he turned to her, he winced and gave a mock shudder. "I wish I'd seen that before I carried you in here."

She followed his gaze and realized that it was fixed on the picture of her and John Wesley Poe at her college graduation, in front of a table of strawberries and champagne. "He was running for governor then. My parents were out of the country-my father was serving as a special envoy to Indonesia during hard times."

"There are always hard times somewhere."

"I told them it was okay for them not to come."

"You had Wes Poe," Nate said.

"Yes." She pretended not to hear the note of criticism in his voice. "And Rob. He came, too."

"Did your parents make it to his graduation?"

She shook her head. "We had a grand party afterward here at Night's Landing. We've learned to seize the moment, make up for lost time when we're together." She collected her clothes and held them close to her. "Why don't I get dressed and make us some homemade biscuits to go with the squash ca.s.serole?"

He pulled on his shirt. "I thought you weren't hungry."

She threw a pillow at him and remembered his injured arm too d.a.m.n late again, but he caught the pillow with his right hand and tossed it back at her. And in another minute, they were making love again, all thought of biscuits and squash ca.s.serole, of loving but neglectful parents-of the family friend who was now in the White House-vanished, which was, Sarah thought, just what Nate had intended.

"Leola and Violet used to tell a story about a Huck-Finn-type boy who lived on the river," Sarah said as she led the way to the Poe house, the river on one side of the narrow trail, the thick woods on the other. It was after dinner, the sun low in the sky, but she had a restless energy that Nate, as tired as he was, understood. "They said he camped in the caves. I'm not sure when it was. I never asked. It's one of a thousand questions I wish I could go back and ask them."

They were on a section of trail that wound over the top of a near-vertical limestone bluff. One wrong step, and he'd be in the water. The river was quiet, no waves, no boats. "What'd he do, live off the land?"

"They claimed he'd fish, catch frogs and snakes. They liked frog's legs themselves. I think Wes did, too." Sarah paused atop the bluff and caught her breath. "I never developed a taste for them."

Nate smiled next to her. "I've never eaten frog and have no plans to start. What about snake?"

"Oh, no. I'm not eating snake. Leola and Violet claimed they tried it once, when they were little girls." She breathed out. "Hard to believe that was before World War One."

Nate saw that talking about the Poe sisters and her friendship with the president relaxed her. He regretted having pushed hard earlier with his questions, but he'd never been a patient man. A patient lover, sometimes. This afternoon. His doctor probably wouldn't be pleased with him, but, on the other hand, he felt fine. "Isn't there a story about the president and a snake? I don't remember the details. It came out during the campaign."

She shuddered. "I don't know how anyone stands a political campaign. I really don't."

"Do you know the story?"

She glanced at him, her eyes cool, their color matching the churning gray sky. "I was there."

In spite of her seriousness, he smiled. "After this morning, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. You and your snakes."

"Wes-President Poe-came to Night's Landing not long after he and his wife had lost their fourth and last baby. A little girl, stillborn. They knew there wouldn't be more. I was still in high school. Almost seventeen."

Nate tried to picture her at almost seventeen. Pretty, intense, dragging her video camera down the river to interview her two elderly neighbors. And direct. She'd have been direct, too.

"I was walking back from the Poe house along this same path, not that far from here. It was a sticky summer day, oppressively hot." Her accent seemed more p.r.o.nounced. "Wes was standing below me on a narrow, treacherous ledge that leads to a cave just above the water."

"He was there alone?"

"Ev stayed in Nashville. She was out of the hospital-her mother was with her. I've always thought Wes just needed some time to himself. He was grief-stricken-"

"Do you think he meant to jump that day?"

She shook her head but didn't seem shocked by the question. "It was just such a hard time. Wes prides himself on getting things done, making things happen. But some things you just can't control. I just think he wanted to be here, on the river."

"Who saw the snake first?"

"He did. It must have come from the cave. I've seen them out on the ledge, sunning themselves."

"Water moccasins?"

"Oh, yes."

Nate remembered some of the story now. "He saved someone's life, didn't he? Yours? Isn't that the story?"

"That's the story."

She continued along the trail. When they reached the Poe house, she led the way through the tall gra.s.s to the road, then down to the fishing camp and the cabin Conroy Fontaine had rented.

He was sitting out on a rusted lawn chair, chatting with an old man with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, and he squinted up at Sarah, then at Nate. "Evening. Sarah, your prune cake was fantastic. I almost sneaked into your house in the middle of the night to steal me another piece, but then I decided that probably wasn't such a good idea." He grinned lazily. "You did your granny proud."

"Thanks. I'm glad you enjoyed it."

"Let me introduce you to my friend Hiram Jones. Hiram, this here is Sarah Dunnemore and her friend, Deputy U.S. Marshal Nate Winter."

Sarah mumbled something about being pleased to meet him. Nate just nodded, and the old guy rolled back in his lawn chair and blew out a lungful of smoke. "I knew Leola and Violet back in the war. Used to come out here to fish. They was real ladies."

Conroy gave Sarah a pointed look. "Hiram was here not long after they found President Poe on the doorstep."

"He wasn't president then," Sarah said, a little sharply. "He was just a baby."

"Cute little fella," the old man said.

Sarah sighed. "You don't let up, do you, Conroy?"

"No, ma'am. I don't give up, either. Anything I can do for you? How's your brother today?"

"He's doing well, thanks. I wanted you to know I spoke to Ethan, and he apologizes. He said he stopped by earlier to apologize to you in person, but you weren't around."

"Out for my run, probably. Water over the dam." He laid on the charm. "Tell him apology accepted."

Sarah thanked him, but he didn't invite her in-and she didn't invite him back to her place to eat the last of the fried apricot pies. The old man puffed on his cigarette.

"It's not a serious interview," Sarah said to Nate on the way back out to the road. "Conroy doesn't have a notepad or a tape recorder."

Nate made a face. "I think you'd have to be a serious journalist to have a serious interview."

"At least he's pleasant."

"Too bad he didn't invite you in for a little nip of something. I'd love to see his notes for his book."

She cut a look at him. "You don't think he's legitimate?"

"I don't think anything one way or the other."

"My opinion? Ethan's right. Much as I hate to say it, Conroy's a bottom-feeder, positioning himself to be in the right place at the right time for a bombsh.e.l.l." She squared her shoulders and picked up her pace. "But my family doesn't have anything to hide, about ourselves or anyone else."

Nate hung back, watching her walk down the road with sudden energy. Caves, snakes, frogs, a baby on a doorstep, an historic house, an old fishing camp, a well-respected diplomat, the president of the United States-if he wanted secrets and lies to drop into his lap, Nate thought, he'd park himself in Night's Landing, just as Conroy Fontaine had done.

Twenty-Six.