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The bedroom on the second floor next door to Lisa Livia’s was larger than the housekeeper’s room, with a door to the back veranda and a good view of the Blood River, a door that also made it more vulnerable to attack from the outside, but anything was better than downstairs. Agnes needed to sleep someplace she’d never been shot at, and Shane figured that ruled out the first floor at Two Rivers completely.
“The bathroom’s here,” Agnes said, opening a door off the bedroom. “The other door’s off the hall, but we can lock it and then it’s like a private bath?—”
“Right,” Shane said, watching her carefully. “Why don’t you just relax?”
“Sure,” she said.
“You’ll be safe in here. I’ll make sure of it.”
Agnes nodded, but it wasn’t a very certain nod. Shane went over and ran his hand up her neck and entwined his fingers in her hair, pulling her to his chest. “It will all work out.”
“You sure?” she murmured into his shirt as her arms went around him.
“I promise.” The words were out before Shane realized he said them, and once they were out there, he felt the weight of them. He couldn’t remember the last time he had promised anyone anything. It had always been a job. Shane took a deep breath and Agnes pulled her head back and looked up at him.
“You all right?”
Shane nodded, afraid to speak. Who knew what would come out of his mouth next?
Agnes pulled away and walked over to the door to the veranda and opened it. Shane followed her outside. The only sound was the lap of water on the beach and the creak of the floating dock bobbing in the water. Even the flamingos were quiet.
“I was always safe here,” she said, her voice tight “I mean, I was alone, but it was Keyes. Everybody knew there was nothing to steal. Everybody knew I was Joey’s friend. There was no reason for anybody to hurt me and a lot of reasons for people not to, so I was safe. I was alone but I was ...”
She stopped, and he knew she was trying not to cry. He shifted his hands, wrapping his arms around her body, pulling her in tight.
“You’re not alone,” he said, and kissed her on the neck. She shivered, but not from fear, he thought. He hoped. “Come to bed,” he whispered into her ear and she nodded and then turned in his arms, and he knew what she was going to say. “I’ll sleep out here. You’ll be fine inside.”
“No,” she said. “I won’t be fine inside unless you’re in there, too. I know it’s just for tonight, but please stay with me.”
What if it’s for more than tonight? he thought, but he wasn’t sure about that, either, so he followed her back through the French doors and watched while she undressed, not ripping off her clothes in a rage this time but letting them drop as if she were too tired to do anything but let gravity take them, her round body lush in the moonlight, and he reminded himself that she needed comfort and sleep, not sex, even as he thought about taking her in every way possible as she climbed into the big guest bed by the glass doors. Then she patted the bed beside her, not bothering to cover her breasts as she leaned forward to him, and he stripped and joined her, the weight of his body in the bed tipping her to him so that he caught all her softness against him, trying to remember to be thoughtful and understanding instead of rolling her on her back. But she whispered, “Make me forget tonight for a while,” and he moved his hands down her curves, tasted her again as she moved hot beneath him in the quiet dark. He felt needed above all else, and knew it was more than just lust or even fear as he fell into her warmth and wetness, her body’s slide against him. And then even that thought faded as he lost himself in his need for her.
And when they’d both shuddered and come, he held her as she slipped into sleep, quiet next to him, no nightmares, and he watched the clouds in the night sky scuttle by and thought, This is a better room, and then he spooned himself against her and fell asleep, too.
THURSDAY
Cranky Agnes column #92
“Eating for Your Beating Heart”
There are very few recipes that couldn’t be improved by the addition of three-quarters of a pound of butter and a cup of heavy cream, but this is cold comfort when you’re laid out like a slab of beef in intensive care, listening to the blood pound in your ears as you seriously consider going toward the light. Think before you eat, people: Food should be the life of you, not the death of you.
At eight thirty the next morning, Shane cradled a cup of Agnes’s good coffee in Carpenter’s van as his partner looked at the mug shot on the computer screen and then at the real mug on the body on the floor of his van lying in the unzipped body bag and said, “He looks better dead.”
They were parked away from the house. Carpenter had come back to eat the omelets Agnes had made for them, complimenting her on the food to the point where Shane thought he’d have to add to the body count. Agnes had smiled through all of it in spite of the bruise on her jaw. That was another thing he loved about her: Sex made her cheerful as all hell.
The bruise on her jaw made him want to kill the guy all over again, though. He’d have to settle for making the moron who’d sent the guy sorry he’d ever been born.
He heard another vehicle pull up, and he glanced out the small one-way bulletproof window and saw Joey’s pickup. He opened the back door and gestured, and the old man came over and hopped in, pausing when he saw the body wrapped in thick black plastic on the middle of the floor. Shane slammed the door shut.
“Who the fuck is that?” Joey demanded.
“The guy who came to whack Agnes last night,” Shane said. “The second one. The first was night before last, some guy named Macy.”
“What the fuck?” Joey exploded.
“Good question,” Shane said. “What we got here, Joey, is a food chain of hitmen, and I need to know who got the original contract and who let it. And I need to know it fast, before some pro shows up here instead of these amateurs. So you got any idea who would try to have Agnes hit?”
Carpenter was typing on his computer, but Shane knew he was listening to everything.
