U. S. Marshall: Night's Landing Part 8

She thought a moment. "I had a candy bar at lunch."

"No wonder you're wobbly. Your blood sugar must be in the cellar." He nodded toward the steps back up to Fifth Avenue. "Let's go."

"Deputy Winter-"

"You can call me Nate."

"Okay." She made herself smile. "It's still hard for me to think of my brother as Deputy Dunnemore. When I think of marshals, I tend to think of Bat Masterson and Wyatt Earp."

One corner of his mouth twitched, but he said nothing as he led her up to Fifth Avenue, then back along Central Park South to the Avenue of the Americas and a hotel with a sprawling ground-floor bar that looked out on the street. They sat at a small round table near a window. He ordered a beer, and she ordered a beer and a quesadilla, wondering if she'd have pegged him as a federal agent if she were just meeting him.

More likely as someone here to rob the place, she thought.

Maybe if he were in a suit.

"You okay?" he asked.

She checked her thoughts. "Yes, fine. Thank you."

He settled back in his cushioned chair, his so-blue eyes narrowed. Although he gave off an air of nonchalance, nothing about him was relaxed. "I can see why your brother wants to get rid of you. You don't belong here."

"I was hoping you hadn't overheard that."

She scooped up a handful of peanuts and tiny pretzels from a small bowl their waitress had dropped off and noticed the strain in his face, the shadows under his eyes. He'd been out there yesterday. Getting shot, trying to save a colleague. He wouldn't have known if the sniper meant to mow down everyone within his sights.

"Rob's just scared and frustrated," she went on. "It can't be easy for him to lie in that hospital bed, hurting, unable to chase after whoever shot him."

"He wouldn't be able to chase after the shooter, regardless. It's not his job."

"Or yours?"

His gaze settled on her. "That's right."

The man had zero sense of humor, at least right now-or humor wasn't something he used to defuse his own anxiety. Or anyone else's. Like hers. "Rob and I are twins."

"So I hear. Fraternal twins, obviously. He doesn't wear sweater sets."

There. A touch of humor. It threw Sarah, especially when he looked at her in her twinset the way he did. "We're very close. I'm sure he's just projecting his own feelings onto me. I think that's what I just did in the park. I could imagine him out there yesterday-it was so real. On some subconscious level, Rob wants to be safe in Night's Landing himself, so he wants me to be there."

"He's worried about you."

"Projection. He's dealing with his own fears by worrying that I could be the shooter's next victim."

"I've learned to pay attention to my instincts."

"I'm not talking about instincts." She decided she should just stop talking, trying to explain. Nate was a concrete thinker. Give him the facts, skip the bulls.h.i.t, the loosey-goosey bond between fraternal twins, brother and sister. "I'm sure instincts are fine when they're not clouded by medications, surgery and blood loss."

Their beers arrived, and Nate took a sip of his, eyeing her. "There's nothing else?"

She didn't touch her beer. "What do you mean?"

"There's no reason for Rob to be worried about you?"

"No, of course not. Is this a friendly drink or an interrogation?"

His smile caught her completely, totally off guard. "Neither."

She felt the heat rush to her cheeks.

"I promised your brother we'd look after you," he added.

"Oh."

Their waiter brought her quesadilla. Nate nodded to her. "You should eat some of that before you belt down your drink."

"What about you? Aren't you on pain medication? I didn't think it mixed with alcohol-"

"I'm on Tylenol."

Sarah lifted a triangle of the hot quesadilla, realizing something about him made her feel so self-conscious. He'd seen her in weak moments twice in one day. It was a thing with her, she knew-she didn't like men seeing her when she was vulnerable, thinking they had to take over her life because she was small and blond and book-smart. And impulsive, she thought. It was impulsiveness that had taken her to Central Park and put her in the position where she was having a beer and a quesadilla with this man.

She noticed that the sleeves of his flannel shirt were rolled up to his elbows. He had taut muscles in his forearms. She a.s.sumed he was armed but couldn't see his weapon under his shirt. She'd never gotten used to the idea of her brother walking around armed. What was it he carried? A Glock, she thought.

She pulled herself from her thoughts. "Rob's just freaked out by what happened," she said. "Don't try to read anything into his concerns."

"Right, Deputy Dunnemore. I'll remember that."

There was a slight edge to his words. She swallowed her bite of quesadilla. "I don't mean to tell you how to do your job."

"Forget it. I've been in a bad mood all day." He paused, the incisive gaze settling on her again. "Sorry if I'm making you feel uncomfortable."

She licked her lips. "I have a feeling you make most people feel uncomfortable."

He winked at her. "You look as if you can handle it."

She took another triangle of quesadilla, the hot cheese oozing out onto the plate. She realized how hungry she was. "Aren't you hungry? You're welcome to a piece-"

"Beer's fine. You're an archaeologist?"

"Historical archaeologist." She was aware of him watching her and wondered if he could see the strain of the past two days on her. Did she look drawn and tense? But she hadn't been shot, she reminded herself. She'd had bad news. There was a difference. But, once more, she forced herself not to let her thoughts drift too far astray, not to let Nate Winter have that kind of an effect on her. "It means I deal in the historical period-people and societies that left behind some sort of historical evidence. Letters, diaries, books and so on. Historical archaeology is an interdisciplinary field. It incorporates archaeology, anthropology, history, folklore-the idea is to try to piece together what everyday life was like in the past."

He took a drink of his beer, in a tall, slender gla.s.s. "You don't dig up bones?"

"I can. I'm more likely to dig up a family dump-what we'd call the material remains of a site. We put them together with any written record and oral history." She smiled, aware of her southern accent amid her fast-paced urban surroundings. "It's rather like quilting. There are all these pieces that make up a fascinating whole."

"You could go on forever, couldn't you?"

"I almost have, haven't I?"

"No. I'm not bored." He held up his gla.s.s. "Helps to have a beer. I understand you've spent most of your career working on President Poe's childhood home."

That brought her up short. "Rob told you?"

He shook his head. "Juliet. She checked you out."

Taken aback, Sarah abandoned her quesadilla. What she'd thought was a casual, friendly conversation about what she did for a living was obviously something else entirely. She wondered if Nate Winter allowed himself casual, friendly conversations or if he was all work, all the time.

Then again, they were just a few blocks from where he'd been shot a little more than twenty-four hours ago. Under the circ.u.mstances, she could cut him some slack.

And herself, she thought. She didn't have to get everything right, not today.

"I suppose that's to be expected," she said, trying to hide how upset she was. "He wasn't president when I became interested in the Poe House. He wasn't even the governor of Tennessee. I was in high school. Leola and Violet Poe, the sisters who raised him, were our neighbors and very dear friends."

"They're the ones who found Wes Poe on their doorstep?"

Suddenly Sarah could picture them in their rockers as elderly women, reminiscing, wandering from one topic to another and back again as they talked about neighbors, family, friends, people they'd met on the river-and, always, their fight to keep and raise the infant boy they'd found one Sunday morning on their porch overlooking the c.u.mberland River.

Now he was the president. It was the sort of story Americans loved. Some were already placing it alongside George Washington's cherry tree and Abe Lincoln's log cabin.

"He was in an apple basket," Sarah said. "Dr. Jimmy-Jimmy Hankins, Leola and Violet's doctor-said he wasn't more than two days old."

"Do you have a theory about who his mother was?"

"Theories, rumors and hints are easy to come by."

She laid on her southern accent, although she wasn't sure why. To mark her territory to this hard-nosed New Englander? To give weight to her own claim to the topic of the Poe sisters? It had consumed her for so long. But she knew she had to let go. She wasn't Wes Poe's biographer-she'd hardly touched on his life. It was the Poe house, the Poe family, the site itself and its development along the river that had excited her. Wes was a neighbor and a friend. He was complicated, driven, ambitious and compa.s.sionate. And, now, he was the president-not exactly an "ordinary" person.

Nate seemed, finally, to sense her ambivalence and changed the subject. "Rob said you two grew up in D.C. more than you did in Tennessee."

"We went to school in Washington. Home is Night's Landing."

He smiled. "Do you speak seven languages like your brother does?"

She shook her head, her unexpected tension easing. "French and a little Spanish. Rob's always had a gift for languages."

"You and your family weren't prepared for him to become a marshal, were you?"

"I didn't even realize marshals were still around."

His eyes sparked with unexpected humor. "Thought we went out with Bat Masterson and Wyatt Earp?"

"I still don't know exactly what you all do."

He swallowed more of his beer. "Some days neither do I. How's the quesadilla?"

She hadn't touched another bite. "It's good. Have some."

"My family left me with a refrigerator full of food."

"Parents, brothers, sisters?"

"An uncle, two sisters and two brothers-in-law. No parents. They got killed hiking in a storm on Cold Ridge when I was seven."

"You're the oldest?"

"My sisters were five and three."

"So they don't really remember, and you do."

His eyes were distant. "You're quick, Sarah. Most people don't get that right away."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean-"

"No need to be sorry."

She thought he meant it. "Sometimes I can be too impulsive. It's been known to get me into trouble."

"You don't look like a troublemaker."

She laughed. "That's why it surprises people when I do something I shouldn't." She stared at the rest of her quesadilla, no longer hungry. "My parents are still in Amsterdam. It's not that easy for my father to travel these days. Flying to New York and back to Amsterdam again would be hard on him. And, no," she added, "I'm not making excuses for him or my mother. It's just the reality we all have to deal with."

"Does he advise the president?"

"As a friend, if asked."

"He was an a.s.sistant secretary of state-"

"For about five minutes for an administration that was not John Wesley Poe's."

"They get along?"

"Very much so." She sat back, studying the man across from her. "Special Agent Collins asked me many of these same questions, you know."

Nate surprised her again by smiling. "But he was asking them because he's conducting an investigation. I'm asking because I'm curious."

"I think you're looking for distractions."

"Maybe. I've worked with your brother for four months. I didn't have a clue he was pals with the president. I need a little time to adjust."

Sarah doubted he'd needed more than a half second to adjust, but she didn't call him on it.

"Rob visited your folks in Amsterdam a few weeks ago. Were you there?"

She thought of the man in the park and felt her stomach tighten, even as she reminded herself it had to be a case of mistaken ident.i.ty. "I flew in from Scotland. We don't get that many opportunities to be together as a family."

"I've never been to Amsterdam." Nate finished the last of his beer. "What's it like?"

"Narrow streets, a mix of old and new buildings, crowded, fascinating, more diverse than you might think. Lots of bicycles. The ca.n.a.ls are beautiful-we all did a ca.n.a.l tour."