Sandra Brown - Smoke Screen

“I’m wondering that myself. Do I tell them I was kidnapped? Would they believe me?”

“Doubtful. Especially not after the date-rape-drug, memory-loss account of your night with Jay.”

“One story sounds as implausible as the other, doesn’t it?” Without moving her head, she opened her eyes and cut them toward him. “I don’t suppose you would come forward and admit that you’d taken me forcibly from my home in the middle of the night?”

He shook his head.

She closed her eyes again. “I didn’t think so, but thought I’d ask anyway.”

“I had my time in the spotlight. I didn’t like it. I’m working deep in the background now.”

“So I’ll have to face the music alone.”

“Just like I did.”

“Here we go again. Poor Raley.”

That sparked his temper. “I didn’t ask for your pity.”

She sat up straight and turned toward him. “Didn’t you?”

“No!”

“Well, you sure made certain I knew about everything you’d lost. Your reputation, your job, your-”

“My what? Finish.”

“Your fiancée.”

He fixed his eyes on the road ahead. “You’re just itching to know, aren’t you?”

“I asked Delno.”

“What he’d tell you?”

“He asked me what you’d told me about her, and when I said you hadn’t told me anything, he said it looked to him like you didn’t want me to know.” She waited; he remained stubbornly silent. “Why don’t you want me to know?”

“There’s nothing to know.”

“Bullshit.”

He gave a short laugh. “That’s a word your viewers have never heard from your sweet lips.”

“What happened with her, Raley?”

“God, don’t you ever give it a rest?”

“Not until I have the whole story. All I know is that her name was Hallie.”

“It still is.”

“Lovely woman. Smart, successful, pretty.”

“All of the above.”

“How long were you engaged?”

“A little over a year.”

“You planned to get married on April twelfth.”

“But we didn’t. End of story.” He almost expected another bullshit, but she didn’t respond right away. Although his eyes remained on the road, he could feel her staring at his profile.

After several moments, she said softly, “Raley, it was a lot for her, for any woman, to…”

“Forgive?”

“Absorb. Before she could even begin to forgive you, she had to absorb the fact that you went without her to a party that promised to be wild. A recipe for trouble.”

“She urged me to go, remember? She was glad I was taking a break from the investigation.”

“She was terribly naïve.”

“Say again?”

Knowing he’d heard her, she said with asperity, “Either Hallie was naïve or you were incredibly trustworthy.”

“Maybe a bit of both.”

“Maybe. I only know I would never have said ‘excellent idea’ to my fiancé going without me to a party hosted by Jay Burgess.”

“That makes you possessive.”

“Sensible.”

“Jealous.”

“Let’s move past this, okay?”

“No, let’s stick with it. What are you like, Britt? In a relationship, I mean. Are you a clinger? Insecure and grasping? Or do you do your own thing and let the guy hang on until he gets tired and lets go?”

His attempt to redirect the conversation from his personal life to hers didn’t work. She asked, “What happened after Jay picked up Hallie at the airport?”

He rolled his shoulders as though trying to throw off a heavy mantle.

“It would help you to talk about it.”

He gave her a look. “No, it would help you.”

“I deserve that, I guess. But this is off the record.”

“Why are you so curious? Voyeurism?”

“I didn’t deserve that.”

He looked at her again, then swore under his breath. “Okay. But you’re going to be disappointed. There was no big scene, no fireworks, nothing you can dramatize on TV.”

She just looked at him expectantly.

Where to start? Taking a breath, he began. “I was still at the police station when Jay got back. He’d taken Hallie directly to her place from the airport. He told me she was upset. Very. Then he patted me on the back. ‘But she’s strong. She’ll be okay.’

“Wickham and McGowan said they had nothing further at that time; I was free to go. I left the police station and went straight to Hallie’s condo. I rang the bell, but she didn’t answer. I used my key and went inside. She was curled up in the corner of the living room sofa, hugging a pillow to her chest, crying.”

He hesitated on the threshold, but when she didn’t scream for him to get out and leave her alone, he went in and gently closed the door. Mail that had been dropped through the slot in the door during her absence still lay scattered on the floor. He stepped over it. All the shades were drawn. She hadn’t turned on any lights, so the living room was dim.

They looked at each other across the space separating them, and his heart cracked in two when he saw the misery in her streaming eyes.

This was so different from the homecoming they’d planned. He projected onto his mind’s eyes a corny reunion, like a scene from a commercial or a romantic movie, where the background goes gauzy when the lovers make eye contact. They move toward each other with breathless anticipation, and when they meet, they share a protracted kiss. Or maybe they embrace and spin together, giddy and in love.

He and Hallie had had moments like that, where they’d laughed for no other reason than the pure joy of knowing that they’d found in each other the perfect partner, or quiet times when they exchanged a look and a smile, content in a cocoon of shared silence.

He wondered if it were possible for them ever to have moments like that again. God, he hoped so. Perhaps this experience would strengthen their relationship. But first they must survive it.

He walked to the sofa and sat down. He didn’t touch her, nor she him. She continued to sob quietly. He wanted to take her in his arms, tell her how sorry he was, how much he loved her, how everything was going to be all right. He would make it all right. But he allowed her to cry, hoping this was the first step in the healing and forgiving process.

Easily half an hour elapsed, although time had no relevance. He would have sat there forever, waiting for a signal from her that it was okay to speak. Finally, she blotted her eyes and wiped her nose and looked at him. In a gravelly voice she said, “Raley?”

The question mark placed at the end of his name conveyed her profound disbelief that they must even engage in this conversation. She was waiting for an explanation. He laid his arm along the back of the sofa and looked into her face. He said the only thing he could think to say, but it came from the bottom of his soul. “Hallie, I am sorry.”

Somehow, they came together then, clutching each other, crying together. It was the first time since waking up that morning that he’d been able to let go of his own emotions. He wept for the girl who had died, for the crisis his life was in, for the terrible heartache he was causing this woman he loved.

Finally, he pulled himself together, wiped his face, clasped her hand between his. “I’m going to tell you everything. Exactly as it happened. Then if you want to hit me, or order me to leave, or-”

“Just tell me, Raley.”

So he did. He didn’t spare a single detail, even when it was difficult to speak the self-incriminating words. She deserved the absolute truth.

“I should have excused myself the moment she approached me. I should have said no thanks to the drink and left as I’d planned to. I didn’t see her and think, Hallie’s out of town. I’ll cheat. She’ll never know. Jay will keep my secret. I swear to you, Hallie, it wasn’t like that. I have no excuse except that she was hot looking, and she was being friendly, and I guess I needed the flattery.”