Kathleen O'Brien - The Stranger

“Of course I didn’t. I went there to check out McClintock. I had just found out about him. My father—”

Tyler paused. It had been several years now since he’d learned the truth, but it still caught him by surprise to think that Jim Balfour was merely his adopted father. It still disappointed him, too. Jim Balfour was a great man, quiet and introverted, but more decent and loyal than anyone Tyler had ever met. Anderson McClintock, on the other hand, had been something completely different. Fiery, self-indulgent, opinionated, arrogant. The classic rich SOB.

He started over. “The man I considered my father, Jim Balfour, decided that I ought to know. My mother had just died. She was the one who had been determined to keep it all a secret. I think she was ashamed. She and Anderson hadn’t ever married.” He forked another clump of grass. “Although, when I did my research, I discovered that she was probably the only woman in Virginia he didn’t marry.”

Merle smiled. “That’s overstating it, but not by much.”

“Whatever. So I went to Heyday to get a look at the guy. I didn’t announce myself, obviously. I wanted anonymity, in case I—”

“Hated him?”

Tyler chuckled softly. “Now that’s an overstatement. You can’t hate a total stranger. And frankly I don’t waste energy hating anybody. I like to keep things simple, that’s all. The whole thing—second father, second family, second set of entanglements—sounded far too complicated. I thought it quite likely I wouldn’t want to get involved.”

Merle had an infuriatingly unconvinced expression on his face, as if he didn’t believe a word Tyler was saying. Well, too bad. Ten years ago Tyler had learned to keep a safe distance from messy emotional situations, and once he learned a lesson, he never forgot it.

“Must have come as a shock, then,” Merle observed dryly, “when Anderson put you in his will. Inheriting almost a full third of Heyday, just like his other sons. Your brothers, who were, of course, just as shocked as you were, I’m sure. Kind of hard to keep your distance from that.”

Tyler put his napkin on the table and gave up all pretence of eating. “Look, Merle, I don’t mean to be rude, but maybe we should get to the point. You didn’t come here to talk about the complexities of life as Anderson McClintock’s secret baby.”

Merle tilted his head. “No. You’re right. I didn’t.”

“So let me tell you what I think this is all about. You obviously heard I’m writing a book on the Heyday Eight. You knew I’d be interested—more than interested—to learn there are new developments in that situation. A blackmailer operating nearly three years after the girls were put out of business is definitely great copy.”

Merle smiled wryly. “I hadn’t thought of it quite like that, but—” He nodded. “Yes. I was hoping your curiosity would be piqued. I’m checkmated here, Tyler. If I don’t pay him, he’ll smear me, I’ll be ruined, and the police won’t ever expose him. They won’t even have enough incentive to try very hard. But you might. Naming the blackmailer. Having an arrest. That would make even better copy, right?”

“Right.”

Merle sighed heavily, as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. “Then you’ll find out who this guy is? You’ll come back to Heyday?”

Come back to Heyday.

Tyler thought of the silly little city, where everything, even the co-ed prostitutes, had a circus theme. He thought of the old bastard Anderson McClintock, now dead, who had run the city like a feudal overlord. He thought of his brothers, Kieran and Bryce, whom Tyler had met, but had deliberately avoided getting close to.

Obviously, now that he’d committed to writing this book, he was going to have to return to Heyday sooner or later. He was a good reporter, and he wouldn’t leave all those stones unturned.

But he remembered the Heyday residents, who hated his guts. He particularly remembered Mallory Rackham Platt, the sexy young woman who had run the Ringmaster Café, where the girls had concocted the Heyday Eight and had gathered to make their dates and count their profits.

Mallory, who had let Tyler spend so many hours there, chatting her up and complimenting her coffee, never guessing that he was gathering notes for his exposé.

Mallory, beautiful and ridiculously naive, unaware of what was going on under her nose. Mallory, whose husband had been one of the Heyday Eight’s best customers. Mallory, who had tossed a plate of French fries, complete with ketchup, into Tyler’s face when she found out who he really was.

Mallory, who for some strange reason was the only person in ten years to put Tyler’s disciplined objectivity and emotional distance in jeopardy.

“All right,” he said, ignoring the wriggle of doubt. “I’ll come back to Heyday.”

MINDY RACKHAM’S turquoise bikini was the most fantastic article of clothing she had ever owned. She had maxed out her MasterCard to buy it. She had almost been able to hear Mallory’s shocked disapproval as she signed the charge slip.

But the minute she saw Freddy’s face, she knew it had all been worth it.

“Wow,” he said as he wrapped his arms around her. “You’re absolute dynamite today, lady. You’ve just guaranteed Dad the vote of every male under ninety.”

She nuzzled into his shoulder happily. He was wearing his own swim trunks, and his strong, bronze, beautifully shaped torso was pretty marvelous, too. He might have been a statue of a god, except that his skin was velvety warm from the sun.

His curly blond hair was wet, dangling adorably into his forehead, and he smelled of suntan oil and cocktails. Of course, he’d already been at this party for hours. She’d had to work half a day, so she’d had to arrive alone.

That was one of the main reasons she’d indulged in this designer swimsuit and cover-up. She knew she was probably the only nine-to-five working gal here. Every other female was either the wife of a rich man, or the daughter of one—or a self-made woman who wouldn’t stoop to punching clocks or filing papers.

If the women here had jobs, they were high-powered positions with glassy offices, six-figure salaries and secretaries of their own. They were public-relations specialists and college professors and museum curators. They were speechwriters, magazine editors, airline pilots and congresswomen.

Mindy Rackham, low-level secretary at the corporate offices of a snack-cracker company, already felt inferior enough without having to arrive at this elite affair looking shabby and off-the-rack.

Freddy kissed the top of her head, and a honeyed calm slid down, from the contact point of his lips all the way to her pink-painted toes. Much better. With Frederick Earnshaw’s arms around her, how could any woman feel insecure? She could already feel the jealous eyes of the other women boring a hole into her bare back.

Everyone knew Freddy was the hunkiest guy in Richmond. And the sweetest. And the richest.

He could have had any girl he wanted. So why on earth, they whispered to each other, had he chosen little Mindy Rackham, a nobody from nowhere? From Heyday, which was actually even worse. When Freddy introduced her to people, they always seemed surprised that she could speak in complete sentences and didn’t have hayseeds falling from her hair.

The truth was, she didn’t understand it herself. Which was why she dreamed every night that Freddy took back his ring, and every morning awakened, heart pounding, with tears in her eyes, thanking God that it had only been a nightmare.

“Come on, honey, let’s get you a Coke, and there’s somebody I want you to meet.”

Freddy put his warm hand against the small of her back and guided her toward the others. The Olympic-size pool was as turquoise as her bikini, and shimmered under the beautiful afternoon sun. The people who stood around it were tall and elegant, murmuring to one another in low, laughing tones, making a collective sound that Mindy had come to associate with money.