Elizabeth Lowell: A Woman Without Lies

Angel’s head came up. “What are you two talking about?” she demanded.

Derry looked back at Angel. He squinted, trying to focus through the effects of the pill.

“Taking Hawk… around,” Derry managed. “I… can’t.”

Angel looked up at Hawk, surprise clear in the eyes that were too large for her face.

“Do you know what Derry’s talking about?” Angel asked, worried.

Through the pain pill’s haze, Derry heard Angel’s words fade in and out of his consciousness. He knew that he had to make her understand how important it was that she help Hawk, but his tongue just wouldn’t form the words.

Suddenly Derry realized how much of his strength had drained away, how weak he had become. He began to fight the effects of the pill, something close to panic in his body and voice.

“Angie?”

Angel felt the bunching of Derry’s muscles beneath her hand. She spoke quickly, remembering her own feeling of helplessness in the hospital three years ago, the shots that whirled her down into darkness, taking away even the power to scream.

Except in her mind. She had screamed there, endlessly, caught in barbiturate chains.

“Don’t fight the pill,” Angel said urgently. “Do you hear me, Derry? Don’t fight it. Let go, Derry. Let go. It’s all right.”

“Can’t… Hawk.”

“I’ll take care of Hawk,” Angel said instantly. “Let go, Derry. I’m here.”

She stroked Derry’s forehead and his cheek, focusing only on him, willing him to be calm.

“It’s all right now,” Angel said quietly, her voice like a benediction. “Sleep, Derry. I’m here.”

Derry’s eyes focused on Angel for an instant. He took a ragged breath, nodded slowly, and stopped struggling.

Only then did Angel realize that Hawk had come to her side, helping her by holding Derry’s shoulders in a powerful vise. Without Hawk, she wouldn’t have been able to contain Derry’s struggle to sit up.

“Thank you,” Angel said to Hawk, her voice soft. “Derry will be all right now. He just had a bad moment when he realized that the pill was stronger than he was. The helplessness is frightening.”

Angel’s fingers clenched as she remembered three years ago – pain and helplessness and rage.

Hawk saw. Without stopping to think, he took her hand between his and gently pried her fingers open. He stroked her fingers, surprised by their chill.

“Derry is as strong as he is charming,” Hawk said, warming Angel’s hands between his. “He’ll be fine.”

With an effort, Angel forced her hands to relax. The heat of Hawk’s skin was almost shocking.

She looked up suddenly and found herself reflected in the hard clarity of Hawk’s eyes. Reflected and… measured. His eyes were not nearly so soothing as the slow rhythm of his hands rubbing warmth into hers.

Suddenly Angel felt wholly vulnerable, as though she were naked and an ice-tipped wind was sweeping down out of the dark sky to claim her.

Angel eased her hands free of Hawk’s. She returned to stroking Derry’s hair, but this time the soothing contact was more for herself than for him.

Silently Hawk watched, following every movement of Angel’s hands, her eyes, the last of the sunlight sliding like a caress over her pale hair. And most of all he watched the slow rise and fall of her breasts beneath midnight silk.

The fact that Hawk wanted Angel didn’t surprise him. The fact that he had wanted to comfort her did.

The sooner I get her into bed, the better. I’ve never seen an actress who portrays both strength and vulnerability so easily.

So convincingly.

Only in bed will the act fall apart, freeing me from her soft fascination and lies.

“What was Derry talking about?” Angel asked after a few minutes of silence.

“You mean the grand tour?” asked Hawk.

Without looking away from Derry, Angel nodded her head in agreement. The motions sent strands of her hair whispering over each other.

Hawk wanted to wrap a curling tendril around his finger and then slowly release it, letting the silk and radiance of Angel’s hair caress the sensitive skin between his fingers.

“I’ve never spent any time in the Pacific Northwest,” Hawk said. “Frankly, I don’t know a damn thing about the countryside. Before I build an enclave of exclusive homes, I want to be sure that I have more to offer buyers than high-priced houses and an expensive resort complex.”

Angel waited, her hands still, her fingers relaxed due to an act of will that made her ache. The thought of selling Eagle Head made her want to cry or scream or plead with Hawk not to buy.

Yet selling Eagle Head was the only way Derry could afford the eight years of advanced education and training that being a surgeon would require.

Angel would not stand in the way of that. No matter how much she loved Eagle Head, she loved Derry more.

“That’s where you come in,” Hawk said, his voice as expressionless as his eyes. “You’re my tour guide.”

“What?” Angel asked, not quite believing she had heard Hawk correctly.

“The way Derry is now, he would have a hell of a time getting in and out of a car, much less a boat,” Hawk said, his voice matter-of-fact.

Angel’s hand stilled.

“Beach walking would be impossible,” Hawk continued. “Especially down these cliff trails.”

Angel said nothing.

“Derry said you could do it,” Hawk said, watching her closely. “In fact, he said you were a better fisherman than he was. Better at clamming, too. He said you could cook like a European chef and knew all the best places to be for a hundred miles in all directions.”

“He exaggerates.”

Hawk shrugged. “It’s up to you.”

Angel looked only at Derry.

Then, coolly, Hawk added, “You do understand that I won’t buy a pig in a poke. No tour, no sale. Sorry, but that’s the way life is. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

Hawk watched the realization sink into Angel. No tour. No sale.

And no money for her twenty-five percent of the land.

Derry had told Hawk about that – Angel and a quarter of Eagle Head. Hawk assumed that it was payment for services rendered. How else could Angel afford to laze away three months of the year and her holidays, too?

Somebody had to pay for the privilege of Angel’s company. A quarter interest in Eagle Head wasn’t bad wages for three years of “work.”

Angel didn’t see Hawk’s cynical appraisal of her. She was watching Derry, seeing the shadows of pain and sleeplessness beneath his tanned skin. Derry looked very young, but she knew that he wasn’t. Not really.

No one who had lived through the wreck three years ago would ever be young again. Inexperienced, yes. Young, no.

Angel sighed.

Derry must like Hawk very much to promise him me as a tour guide, Angel thought unhappily.

Derry, too, must have sensed the loneliness beneath Hawk’s proud surface. As lonely as a hawk riding a cold wind. And as compelling.

Power and grace and darkness, eyes that see all the way through to the core.

Angel’s hand hesitated over Derry’s hair, then resumed stroking him almost absently.

There’s no real reason not to show Hawk the leisure possibilities of the Pacific Northwest. I would spend my summer roaming the Vancouver Island and the Inside Passage anyway.

It’s hardly too much to ask that I take Hawk along, and in so doing help Derry fulfill a dream.

Angel looked up at Hawk, not surprised to find that he had been watching her. She met his hard, enigmatic eyes without flinching.

“How long will you need me?” Angel asked calmly.

A corner of Hawk’s mouth turned down in a cynical curve. Not more than a night or two, I’ll bet.