Aaron Elkins - Unnatural Selection

A gruff “Hey, you two, knock it off there” came from a nearby niche in the walls, where Liz was having a postprandial cigarette, its end glowing red in the dark. “We’re running a G-rated consortium here. This time, anyway.”

“Hey, yourself,” Gideon growled back, leaving his arms where they were, “go find your own parapet.”

But after another lingering moment with their arms wrapped around one another they separated and resumed their slow tour of the ramparts, their fingers entwined.

“ This time?” Gideon said. “Meaning, ‘As opposed to last time’?”

Julie nodded. “It got pretty torrid around here a couple of years ago.”

“Rats,” Gideon said. “I was hoping it was just something about me that brought out the beast in Cheryl.”

“’Fraid not, the beast in Cheryl is pretty easy to bring out. But it wasn’t just Cheryl-well, it was, but the hanky-panky was really pretty general. I mean, I know this stuff happens at conferences, but that was the first time I’d ever experienced anything quite like that.”

“Not first hand, I hope.”

She squeezed his fingers. “Not a chance. Edgar was at the center of it all, and I guess I wasn’t his type. He made only one move on me that could be construed as a pass-about as subtle as Cheryl’s move on you-and then quit.” She smiled. “I suppose I should have been insulted, because I was the only one he didn’t keep after. He managed to have affairs-well, to have sex with-all three of the other women. Not that he had to try too hard.”

“In one week?”

“Well, you know, the man was brilliant, famous, moody, edgy, good-looking in a dangerous sort of way… the kind that appeals to a lot of women.”

“But not to you, I take it.”

“Ugh, no!” He was absurdly pleased by her enthusiastic shudder. “Not that I have any objection to brilliant, famous, and good-looking, but I like my men a lot bigger, and sunnier, and friendlier… and I already have me one of those.”

You sure do, Gideon thought. And just you try and get rid of him. “But I thought Villarreal was supposed to be some kind of loner, a recluse-preferred living with the bears and the wolves to being around people. Was that all hype?”

“No, as far as I know it was true. He spent a lot of the year in the wilds. When he left here he was heading straight out to the Alaskan wilderness to spend the summer all by himself, keeping tabs on a cluster of bear families-you know, tracking their eating, and mating, and migration activities. All alone with the bears, that’s what he loved.” She shook her head. “But when he was around people-women, anyway-he got very, um, shall we say, social.”

“Yeah. Well, who knows, maybe I would too, if I spent my summers all alone, watching bears have sex.”

They walked on a few steps, still hand-in-hand. “You said all three of the women,” he said. “That means Cheryl, which is not exactly a huge surprise, and Liz-which is a surprise, because I wouldn’t have pictured her going for a one-night stand-but who else was there?”

“Victor Waldo’s wife, Kathie, was here with him too, and she-”

“Ah, that’s right. You asked after her when we met him on the boat and he said they were separated, and you and Liz gave each other a couple of ‘aha’ glances.”

“Really? Was it that obvious?”

“Hey, don’t forget you’re talking to the Skeleton Detective here. Not too much gets by me. So you think they broke up on account of what went on between her and Villarreal?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. She and Victor had a real wingding when it came out. It was pretty bad. I’m surprised you didn’t hear them back in Port Angeles.”

They had taken four turns around the ramparts now, and had them all to themselves, with Liz having gone back inside, and they stopped to lean their elbows on the parapet, overlooking the lights that were beginning to twinkle on in Hugh Town.

“It started right on the first night,” Julie mused, “the night of the opening reception.”

You’d have to have been out to lunch, she told him, not to notice that Cheryl and Villarreal had begun circling each other like storks doing a mating dance, about five minutes after they’d set eyes on one another. An hour into the reception, both had disappeared for a while, not even bothering to disguise the fact that they’d left together and returned together. Afterward, their little shared giggles and glances at dinner, and even at breakfast the next day, had left little doubt about what was going on. At first Julie had been embarrassed at their behaving that way in front of Donald, but it was soon obvious that he was used to it, and it wasn’t long before Julie was used to it too.

Villarreal’s affair with Cheryl lasted all of two days, Sunday and most of Monday, after which it cooled perceptibly. By Monday evening, he and Liz were a pair, a relationship that continued for most of the week, to Liz’s transparent delight.

“She really thought he was in love with her,” Julie said, shaking her head. “She thought she’d found the man of her dreams. Liz and I were pretty close, and I could see what was going on even if she couldn’t… anybody could, really… and so I tried to calm her down a little, get her to take the long view, but, you know, when somebody is like that…” She shrugged. “And anyway, I didn’t want to rain on her parade.”

“No, of course not. Poor Liz. She’s a smart lady, but she’s honest herself, and so she can be a little gullible when it comes to other people.”

“More than a little, I’m afraid. Edgar was like some kind of predator, as if he thought we were all his private harem. She was the only one who couldn’t see it.” Another shake of her head. “She couldn’t stop talking about him.”

Until that Friday, at any rate, when it somehow came out-Julie didn’t remember how-that in addition to romancing Liz, he had been grabbing the occasional hour in the sack with Victor’s wife Kathie on the side. There had been an extremely uncomfortable scene at dinner that evening, and then later everyone had heard Victor and Kathie screaming at each other in their room. As for Liz, she’d pretty much laughed it off, keeping a stiff upper lip in public, but there had been a couple of long crying sessions with Julie, filled with guilt and self-recrimination.

“Poor kid,” Gideon said. “Edgar was really a piece of work, wasn’t he? I knew I didn’t like him just from looking at him. Now I know why. I also understand why Liz was being so nasty about him on the ship. I wondered at the time. It didn’t seem like her.”

“Well, now you know. The whole steamy, sordid story. Come on, let’s go back to the other side. I want to see the last of the sunset.”

They were too late for that. The sun was gone, and the last of the sunset-watchers were plodding home with their blankets and picnic baskets. But the darkening western sky still showed faint layers of orange and rose at the horizon, and the Western Rocks, now jagged, black silhouettes, looked like the menacing maritime-disasters-waiting-to-happen that they were.

“And what did Kozlov think of all the hanky-panky behind the scenes?” Gideon asked. “He couldn’t have been too pleased.”

“I have no idea. I know he didn’t take to Edgar; you could see it on his face. There was always a kind of negative electricity between them, but I think it was what you get when you have a couple of rival superstars. Edgar was a born prima donna, and I’m sure Vasily didn’t take kindly to playing second fiddle. I doubt if he was too awfully upset when Edgar decided not to come back.”

“So far, I haven’t met anybody who was.” He turned to look at her. “Julie, how come you never told me about any of this before? The sexcapades stuff?”