Sandra Brown - Low Pressure

“Detective Moody might have disagreed.”

Surely he would have wanted to know how manipulative Susan was and that it was she who had initiated the encounter with Strickland.

“Over there, in the blue shirt, standing next to the oaf with the long mustache. I think they’re brothers. Be sure you tell the right one. God forbid that drooling cretin comes over here instead.”

“I’m not going to tell them anything.”

“Steven…”

“If you’re so hot to dance with him, go ask him yourself and leave me the fuck alone.”

“Steven sa-id fu-uck. Steven sa-id fu-uck.”

Her taunting singsong had made him feverish with anger. But she knew that, and she used it.

“Of course you only say the word, you don’t do the deed. Because you’re scared.” Leaning close and putting her lips directly to his ear, she whispered, “But I know you want to. I know you want to with me. I know you want to right now.”

When he tried to move away, she blocked his path. “You go tell that guy I want to dance with him, or I’ll tell Olivia and Daddy that you got jealous of Dent and came into my room while I was naked and tried to rape me.”

“Rape you? That’s a laugh.”

“Who do you think they’ll believe?” She gave him a look that said she was capable of finessing it any way she wanted, and he knew she could.

Burning with hatred of her, he had approached Allen Strickland on her behalf.

As though reading his mind, his mother said gently, “That boy had been ogling her all day, Steven. He and that brother of his. Sooner or later Allen would have worked up his courage and asked her to dance without any help from you.”

“Possibly. But the fact remains that he did have my help.”

“Please don’t dwell on it and upset yourself. Although I know it’s difficult to put that day out of your mind when you can’t get away from Bellamy’s book. It’s everywhere. Even here in the hospital’s gift shop.”

“The horse has left the barn, Mother.”

“Yes, but I thought that when she stopped the publicity, things would die down. Instead we’re on the front page of that wretched tabloid again. Dent Carter has insinuated himself back into our lives, Bellamy is like a woman obsessed, and I can’t help but feel that this mysterious mission she’s on for Howard has something to do with it.”

Steven jumped in before she could work herself into another crying jag. “Mother, the only times in your marriage that Howard has done something behind your back was when he was shopping for a fabulous gift or planning an extravagant trip. If he sent Bellamy on a secret mission, it’s to do something that will spare you further heartache.”

“My heart already aches, Steven.”

“Cancer is cruel.”

“So is the irony.”

“Irony?”

“Howard and I have had a near-perfect life together. It was marred by a single tragic event. Yet now, when our time together is about to end and we should be reliving blissful times, it’s Susan’s murder that’s at the forefront of everyone’s mind.” Her voice cracked. “And why?”

Quietly Steven said, “ Low Pressure. ”

The state senator’s plane was already on the tarmac when Dent and Bellamy arrived at the airfield.

Gall took one look at Dent’s battered face and scowled. “Who the hell did that?”

“It doesn’t hurt.”

“Not what I asked.”

“I’m going to call Olivia. Excuse me.” Bellamy went into the hangar and took out her cell phone.

Dent motioned toward the airplane. “Decent of him to make it available to us. Last night and today.”

“I told you, he wants you to get used to it. He called early this morning, wanting to know how you liked her. Says he hopes you’ll become so enamored with flying it you’ll go to work for him.” He clamped down on his cigar. “ ’Course if he could see you now, he might change his mind.”

“Not now, Gall.”

Dent bypassed him as he made his way into the hangar and went over to his own airplane. “How’re the repairs coming?”

“Replacement parts are ordered. Some were promised by the end of the week. Others will take longer to get.”

Dent gave the wing of his airplane a pat, then went over to the computer table and sat down. “Have you checked out the airport in Marshall?”

“Its got two runways. One’s five thousand feet. Plenty long enough.”

As he and Bellamy left Haymaker’s house, Dent had placed a call to Gall, asking him if the senator’s airplane was still available and, if so, to get it ready for flight. He’d also asked him to look into the county-owned airport in east Texas, three hundred miles from Austin.

While he methodically went through his preflight routine, Bellamy was pacing the concrete floor of the hangar, her cell phone to her ear. He wondered who she was talking to. Her conversations with Olivia never lasted that long.

After filing his flight plan, he signaled to Bellamy that they were good to go. She ended her call and went into the hangar’s restroom, although the head on the two-million-dollar airplane was much nicer. She’d probably be too modest to use it during flight, though.

Dent, hoping to smooth things over with Gall after being so brusque with him earlier, approached the workbench where the older man was tinkering with a piece of machinery. “Thanks for helping out on such short notice.”

Gall just looked at him, waiting for an explanation for the sudden trip, which Dent felt he deserved.

“From Marshall, we’re driving on to Caddo Lake. It’s near—”

“I know where it’s at.” Gall gave his cigar an agitated workout. “Going fishing?”

“In a manner of speaking. Detective Moody, now retired, lives on the lake. He’s agreed to see us. And I don’t want any flack from you about it.”

Gall stopped chomping his cigar, removed it from his mouth, and pitched it toward a trash can, which he missed by a foot. “Flack,” he said with disgust. “How ’bout me giving you some common sense? Something you seem to have a shortage of these days. In fact, you haven’t acted like you have a lick of it since you got attached to that lady, who belongs to a family that damn near ruined your life. You show up this morning looking like Rocky. You’re on your way to see a man who you once vowed to kill. You’re packing. And I’m not supposed to give you flack?”

“How’d you know I was carrying a piece?”

“I didn’t. Till now. Jesus! You’re taking a pistol to a meeting with Moody?”

“Will you calm down? I’m not going to shoot him. We’re just going to talk to the man. He’s no threat to me anymore. He’s old, in bad health, reportedly on his last leg.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I have my sources.”

“He’s got his sources,” he muttered. He hitched his chin toward the wounds on Dent’s face. “Who beat you up?”

“The redneck I warned you about.” He gave Gall an abbreviated account of the attack.

“Did he cut you bad?”

“It’s okay.”

“You see a doctor?”

“Bellamy took care of it.”

“Oh, and she’s qualified to do that, I guess.”

“It wasn’t that bad, Gall. I swear.”

“You report it to the police?”

Dent shook his head. “We were afraid it would make the news. Bad enough that Van Durbin staked out my apartment last night, and he didn’t even know about the knife fight.”

“Van Durbin see her there with you?”

“He got pictures.”