“You got everything you need here?”
Regina looked up at the question. The blonde with the bouffant hairstyle who stood poised in front of her table wasn’t her waitress. That she was addressing her was a mystery, then, nearly as much of one as why her smile was so friendly. Voice abrupt, Regina answered, “Yes. Why?”
“They’re taking care of you. That’s good.”
She must mean the coffee-shop staff. By Regina’s standards, the service was so snail-like she had a strong urge to snap her fingers, grousing, “Come on, come on.” But it was a pleasant enough place in a homey, unpretentious fashion, with crisp red gingham curtains at the windows and matching geraniums on the sills. Her waitress had been kind, even motherly; the coffee was ambrosial and exactly the right temperature, and refills were frequent and free. More than that, Regina had no place to go after breakfast. She had also realized after the first half hour that it was not her waitress’s fault the words “leisurely breakfast” were, in Regina’s experience, a contradiction in terms.
“I’m fine,” she answered, and even managed a polite smile.
“You have any problem, you just let me know. I’m Betsy North, and I own the place, for my sins. Say, didn’t I see you yesterday with Sugar Kane?”
“Who?”
The woman looked quizzical. “Kane Benedict, you know. He’s a great guy, isn’t he?”
“Oh.”
Regina lifted her coffee cup, using it as a refuge from the other woman’s encroaching curiosity. Sugar Kane. She’d heard nicknames were common in the South, but couldn’t quite make this one match the man she’d met.
Betsy North chuckled and she put a hand on her ample hip. “Didn’t know about that, huh? You gonna ask me how he got it?”
It was the last thing Regina was inclined to do. She wasn’t used to instant camaraderie with strangers. The motel owner seemed a likable enough person, but she wasn’t sure how to take her. Lowering her coffee again, she began, “I really don’t—”
“Guessed already, I expect.” The woman laughed, a rich, bawdy sound without the least self-consciousness. “Sweet as sin—with all the consequences, that’s our Kane.”
“Really,” Regina commented, though it was difficult to keep the wry interest from her voice.
“Yeah, he’s quite a guy. Good as gold, but you never can tell what he’ll do next. Runs in the family, you might say. I should know, since I was a Benedict before I married. You wouldn’t understand what that means, not being from around here. From up north, ain’t you?”
“As a matter of fact—”
“New York, right? There’s the accent, of course, but you got the look, like the lawyers who’ve been crawling all over the place on account of Crompton’s Funeral Home. Say, you’re not one of them, are you?”
Regina shook her head in answer. She might have brushed Betsy North off with a few well-chosen words had it not suddenly occurred to her she might learn something from her. “The look?”
“Kind of gray-faced and uptight and dressed in dark clothes, as if they don’t see the sun more than once in a month of Sundays, never have any fun, and all shop at the same place.” Her eyes widened, and she added hastily, “Not that you don’t look nice, you do. I mean, that hair makes you a standout, no matter what you put on. But I see a resemblance.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Regina said dryly. She considered the tailored brown-knit dress she wore with a wide leather belt as sophisticated without being severe. It was possible to see, however, that it might not appear that way to a woman dressed in terra-cotta jeans, a shirt printed in desert-sunset colors, and with silver earrings set with rhodochrosite stones dangling from her earlobes. She went on innocently, “But these lawyers. What have they to do with Mr. Crompton?”
“Plenty,” the woman answered with emphasis. Her lips thinned an instant before she launched into a tale of how a big Northeast funeral service conglomerate had been knocking off small funeral homes across the South, that was until they made the mistake of tackling Sugar Kane’s grandfather.
“Mistake?” Regina murmured by way of encouragement.
“I’ll say. Made Kane madder than hell, as you can imagine. He filed a whole blizzard of injunctions and whatnot, then topped it off with a whopping lawsuit that stopped the guy who owns this Berry Association in his tracks. Showed him there were folks in this town who didn’t care for his shady business practices. The very idea—canceling the private, funeral home–owned burial policies for old ladies so they have to depend on their kids to foot the bill when they die instead of the insurance they’ve been paying on most of their lives. Makes me so mad I could spit, and I’m not the only one. Yes, sir, Berry found out right quick that nobody here cares two bits for his money and power, not when it comes to right and wrong.”
“So it’s Kane, rather than his grandfather, who is pushing the suit?”
“Oh, I don’t know as I’d say that, exactly. I think Mr. Lewis looks on it as a matter of honor not to take this lying down. But Kane’s the man Berry and his raft of high-powered lawyers will have to beat in district court when push shortly comes to shove.”
“You think he has a chance, then?”
“You got me.” Betsy North shrugged, then her lips tightened. “All I know is, I’d sure hate to see Mr. Lewis done out of what belongs to him.”
“He seems like a nice man.”
“One from the old school, a real gentleman. Done a lot for this town over the years—scholarships, civic stuff, donating land for things like the nondenominational church and the new middle school. Why, I could tell you—But you don’t want to hear all that.”
“You’re related to him, too?”
The woman’s rich chuckle broke out again. “You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But no such thing. So, you gonna be around here long?”
Regina wasn’t sure how to reply to that, even if she wanted to try. While she was making up her mind, a deep, masculine voice answered, “She’ll stay as long as we can keep her.”
Betsy spun toward the man approaching from the doorway behind her. “Damn you, Kane, what do you mean slipping up on me like that?”
“Not you,” he said with a lazy smile, “but your customer.” To Regina, he said a quiet good-morning, adding, “Mind if I join you?”
She waved briefly at the chair across the table. Perhaps he could give her some idea of when his grandfather would see her again.
A speculative look came into Betsy’s eyes as she watched Kane slide into the seat. She offered to bring him coffee. When he declined, she said with wry humor, “Fine, then. I can tell when I’m not wanted. I’ll check on you guys later.”
As she moved away, Kane said, “So has Betsy been after your life story?”
“We hadn’t got that far,” Regina answered. The words were more abrupt than she intended. He was every bit as disturbing as she’d thought the day before, though casually dressed this morning in a knit shirt and pressed chinos. With his presence, the coffee shop seemed to take on new life: the sunshine through the windows was brighter, the decor livelier, the smells of coffee, bacon and maple syrup overlaid by frying onion actually becoming appetizing.
“Don’t let it get to you,” he recommended. “She doesn’t mean anything by it.”
“I’m aware of that.”
A muscle tightened beside his jaw at her tone, but he let the subject drop. With a brief but intent glance at the bruise that still marked her temple, he asked, “How’s the head?”
“All right.” She sipped at the coffee she still held, but it was cold. She set the cup in its saucer with a clatter and pushed it aside.
“No pain or nausea?”
His polite concern made her feel a little ungracious. She unbent enough to say, “I had a headache, but took something for it when I went to bed. It was gone this morning.”
He nodded. “What do you plan to do for the day, then?”
“Go back out to Hallowed Ground to talk to your grandfather, of course. I have a job to finish.”
“I could drive you, maybe after lunch.”
She gave him a direct look. “That won’t be necessary.”
“It’s the least I can do. Besides, I’d feel terrible if you blacked out and ran off the road or something.” He propped an elbow on the table, watching her closely.
“I won’t do that, I assure you.”
“I’d rather not take the chance. If something happened, I’d feel it was my fault.”
She shook back her hair, her gaze cool. “Afraid I’d sue you?”
His laugh was a brief sound that made a chill slither down her spine. “Hardly. Not with the best lawyer in town ready to spring to my defense.”
“Yourself?” Disdain shaded her voice.
“My partner,” he corrected with a hint of steel in the words, then went on without pausing, “Why don’t you want me to drive you? What are you afraid of?”
“Fear doesn’t enter into it.” Her dislike for such a shopworn trick was plain in her voice.
“Doesn’t it? I wasn’t speaking in a physical sense, you know, though I easily might, considering the way you reacted yesterday. I think you’re afraid I’ll find out what you’re really after.”
Alarm rose inside Regina, but she forced it down again. “I can see why you’re a lawyer. If one argument doesn’t work, you automatically look for another.”
He sat back with a brooding look on his handsome features. “Why are you so defensive? I’m trying to make up for my mistake yesterday in a practical manner. Apparently, you aren’t going to let me.”
The obvious rejoinder, a crushing rejection, rose to her lips. She almost voiced it, but something in his level blue gaze prevented her. She felt as if she were being tested, and that made her wary. After a moment, she said, “It’s nothing to do with you. I just prefer my independence.”
“At the expense of safety?”
“My safety is my own affair.”
He watched her a long moment, then rolled his shoulders as if shrugging off a burden. Finally, he said, “You’re right. I should have told you straight out that my grandfather isn’t available this morning.”
With a frown, she said, “That’s what all this is about?”
“Afraid so. Pops is a man of definite habits. He goes to bed every night after he watches the news and doesn’t get up until after nine. He drinks two cups of black coffee and has a breakfast of hot biscuits and ham or sausage while reading the paper between nine and nine-thirty, showers and shaves between nine-thirty and ten, and instructs his cook about dinner, an important ritual, between ten and ten-fifteen. He’s in his office from ten-thirty until twelve-thirty, at which time, promptly, he leaves for lunch. On Tuesday, which means today, he has a standing appointment for soup and a salad with a lady friend, Miss Elise. All this means it will be two o’clock at the earliest before he makes it back to Hallowed Ground again to meet you.”
“Good grief!” she exclaimed before she could stop herself. “How does he ever get anything done?”
“You’d be surprised how much he manages to accomplish. But the point is, you can’t see him this morning. Since that leaves you at loose ends, I suggest you let me show you around.”
“Show me around?”
“You should see something while you’re here besides the Baton Rouge airport and this motel. We’ll have lunch somewhere. Afterward, I’ll take you out to Pops’s house.”
“Your working day being every bit as relaxed as your grandfather’s?” she suggested with more than a trace of skepticism.
“My day being entirely at your disposal.” His smile was brief.
She should turn him down flat; that was perfectly obvious. The problem was that he made it all sound so reasonable. On top of that, she knew the plan he’d outlined offered an excellent opportunity to find out more about Lewis Crompton and the lawsuit. Who better to ask than the grandson representing him in court?
She hesitated, then gave a nod. “Fine.”
“You’ll go?” His face mirrored his surprise at her sudden agreement.
“I said so, didn’t I?”
He stood and stepped around to hold her chair for her. “Then let’s do it.”
A late-model pickup, pine green and polished to a mirror gloss, waited outside the coffee shop. Kane moved a little ahead of her to open the passenger door. She paused, sending him a quick, questioning glance. He had been driving a sedan the afternoon before.
“The roads can be pretty rough where we’re going,” he said.
In some peculiar fashion, the truck seemed to suit him better, she thought. It had nothing to do with being a redneck. Rather, the big, glossy vehicle with its latent power was a better match for the leashed strength beneath his controlled facade as a lawyer. It was ready for anything they might come across, and so was he.
Regina climbed up to the leather bucket seat. Kane shut the door, then walked around and slid into the driver’s side. With his hand on the key, he turned his head to look at her. Seconds ticked past. There was something so intent, so steadfastly appraising about his expression that she grew uncomfortable. The impulse to smile, to see if his well-formed mouth would curve in answer hovered in her mind.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he muttered, looking away through the windshield. He cranked the engine, then put the truck in gear. His movements were stiff and there was a grim set to his mouth, as if whatever had crossed his mind had been less than comfortable.
They drove through town, straight down Main Street and past the old Greek Revival courthouse with its pediment-topped portico supported by columns, its wide steps, flagpole sporting a limp Stars and Stripes, and weathered bronze statue of a Civil War soldier half-hidden among the drooping limbs of a big live oak. It was a pleasant enough little town, but sleepy and a bit sad to Regina’s eyes. Several stores around the courthouse square were closed, and the low-budget gift shops, beauty salons, and specialty dress boutiques that were left looked as if one customer at a time was the most they could handle.
The way out of town was lined with garages, barbecue joints, and run-down flea markets. Beyond these was a stretch of bungalows and ranch-style houses with plaster elves and pink plastic flamingos in the front yards. Washing flapped on clotheslines in the back, while children’s toys littered the porches and fishing boats squatted under open carports. These gave way to fenced fields where vines twined around the posts and rose above them like nests of writhing green snakes. The black alluvial soil was striped with rows of dark green seedlings stretching arrow straight and as far as the eye could see.
The crop was cotton, Kane told her, then went on to explain the long and exacting cotton planting season. He also pointed out pin oaks and red oaks, tupelos and maples and a half-dozen other kinds of trees growing in the woods that separated the wide areas of fields and overhanging the road like enormous green canopies. The deep timbre of his voice was soothing in its lilting cadence and easy, drawling grace. Regina relaxed by such slow, lulling degrees under its influence that she almost missed his quiet attack.
“I’d rather talk about you than trees and cotton. Where did you learn so much about old jewelry? Did you have some kind of training?”
“I studied gemology with the Gemological Institute of America,” she answered, sitting up straight, “but it was something of an inherited passion.”
“You mean you got your start with a collection handed down in your family?”
That was what he was supposed to think, what Regina allowed most people to think, though she never said it in so many words. “Something like that.”
Actually, Regina had conceived her passion for the antique pieces while hanging around a pawnshop after school. The elderly man who ran it, Abe Levine, had been the very embodiment of the word “venerable.” He’d always had time for her, putting down his book or his violin with a warm smile when she came into the shop. An endless source of knowledge about all things, he seemed to enjoy taking beautiful old pieces from the cases for her to see, relating their stories, telling her about values and where stones came from, about how to tell the real from the fake. He had given her the amber pendant she always wore, her first antique. She had lied to Kane about his being a relative, but she was sure Abe wouldn’t have minded. Anyway, he was the closest thing to a grandfather she’d ever known.
During the long days spent in his shop, he’d fired her imagination with tales about fortunes in portable jewels shown to him by actresses down on their luck or showgirls who had taken to heart the theory that diamonds were a girl’s best friend. He knew the histories of fabulous pieces smuggled out of Russia before and after the Bolshevik revolution, or from Germany during World War II, also the tragic backgrounds of more simple pieces from those times. It was Abe who had put her in touch with the circle of buyers and sellers of old jewelry, who had helped her earn her first commission, urged her to accept her first assignment to value and sell an estate collection. Though she had also studied and learned on her own, visiting museums, reading countless books, never missing an opportunity to compare and value, she owed that gentle old man so much, including her independence.
Abe had never cared for her cousin Gervis. The feeling was mutual; Gervis had shed no tears when Regina’s mentor died.
Odd, but Lewis Crompton reminded her of Abe, now she thought of it.
“For someone who handles jewelry for a living, you don’t wear a lot of it, do you?” His glance lingered an instant on her hands that were bare of jewelry of any kind.
She felt heat rise in her face, something that didn’t happen too often, or hadn’t until she came south. She seldom wore rings because they drew attention to her nails, which she wore extra short to keep herself from biting them. “No, not while traveling,” she answered shortly. “It’s too valuable to risk having it stolen.”
He arched a brow. “But you must travel with other people’s collections all the time.”
“For which I’m bonded, of course. But I wasn’t speaking of monetary value alone.” She folded her arms, tucking her hands out of sight, and hoped the gesture wasn’t an obvious cover-up.
“Funny,” he said, his smile quizzical yet sharp. “You don’t strike me as the sentimental type.”
“We all have our little quirks.” Turning from his probing gaze, she stared out the window. Kane, it seemed, was even more intent on getting information from her than she was on questioning him. There was grim humor in the idea, but somehow she wasn’t laughing.
It was incredibly difficult, she found, not to answer his queries in full, if only to keep his attention focused on her. Something about his rich voice, the expressions that flickered in his eyes, gave the perception that he cared about what he was hearing. It was, no doubt, a valuable attribute for a lawyer.
After a time, he turned off the blacktop road they were traveling and bumped over a sandy track with potholes large enough to swallow a taxicab. Regina opened her mouth to ask where he thought he was taking her, but the truck tire fell into a pothole with a bounce that made her bite her tongue. By the time the pain subsided enough for her to talk, she caught the glint of a large body of water through the trees.
“Horseshoe Lake,” Kane said as he brought the truck to a stop.
She sat for long moments, looking out over the water that sparkled under the sun as if millions of fairy lights were concealed beneath the surface. Trees hung with gray streamers of Spanish moss lined the shore and also straggled into the lake as though going wading. More edged the surrounding horizon like dark lace. The water was the color of strong tea, and cloud puffs drifting in the sky overhead were reflected on the opaque surface with a surround of blue. It was quiet, so quiet the only sounds were the wind in the trees, birdcalls, and the soft, regular slap of breeze-driven waves at the water’s edge.
Regina opened the truck door and got out. Watching where she was stepping on the damp ground with its dew-laden grass, she moved toward the water’s edge. Behind her, the other door slammed as Kane followed.
“It looks murky,” Regina said when he came to stand at her shoulder, “like something primeval might rise up out of the depths.”
“Dripping muddy slime and water lilies?” he asked, slanting a smile down at her. “You’ve seen too many swamp-thing movies. But there is a swamp beyond the lake, several thousand acres of marsh and snaking waterways where you can get lost and might never be found again.”
“You’ve been there? In the swamp, I mean?”
“Played there every summer as a kid.”
“Why on earth would you do that?” She barely concealed a shudder.
“The fun of it. Something to do. A cousin and I pooled our money and bought a secondhand aluminum boat and an old outboard motor. Sometimes Luke and I were gone for days at a time.”
Glancing at him, she tried to feature the boyhood he described. It was so different from anything she had known that he might have been talking about life on another planet. At the same time, she didn’t doubt what he’d said. In the bright daylight that exposed the strong bones of his face and crescent-shaped scar beside his mouth, he appeared rugged and capable of anything he cared to tackle. He was also rather imposing.
In an effort to regain her equilibrium, she said, “I imagine the police didn’t think it much fun when they had to call out the search-and-rescue teams.”
“Never happened. Luke and I always found our way home again.”
“And your parents didn’t mind?”
“My parents were dead, and my aunt Vivian who took care of me seemed to think knocking around in the swamp was better than a lot of things I could’ve been doing. Luke’s folks never worried much about anything until something happened, but especially not about the backcountry—he has a real sixth sense where it’s concerned. Nobody knows it better.”
“Not even you?” she asked dryly.
Kane smiled without rancor. “I don’t hold a candle to Luke. His ancestors have lived around the lake for centuries, even when it was still an oxbow turn in the Mississippi River. He has a Native American branch to his family tree from a long way back. Tunica and Natchez.”
“Seriously?”
“It isn’t that unusual around here.”
Again, she had to fight that sense of being in foreign territory. The lifestyle he described and the close relationship with his cousin were unknown quantities. They were also appealing, however, perhaps because of their strangeness.
As she tried to picture it, she said, “This cousin lived nearby?”
“Just down the road. Still does, for that matter.”
Surprise for her interest lurked in his dark blue gaze. Noting it, Regina felt wariness trickle down her spine. Turning back to the lake, she said, “I believe your grandfather said something yesterday about this being part of the Mississippi River at one time. Is that right?”
“Before it changed course, carved itself a new channel,” he agreed after a second. “All that was so long ago the openings to the horseshoe have silted up, forming this curving body of water, creating a lake with no access to the river. It’s not an unusual phenomenon. There’s another one like it above north of here called Old River, and one below known as False River, as well as others. We’re a bit different because of the swamp that’s caused by a creek—or actually another small river—that was blocked off from the Mississippi, so spread out into a wide area of marshland. It drains into the lake eventually, so helps keep the water fresh.”
Regina nodded her understanding, though she had only the vaguest idea of what he was describing. It was so peaceful here with the warm sun dazzling her eyes, the moist breeze caressing her face and whispering in the trees overhead. The leaves, the grass, vines and low-growing shrubs, the water plants at her feet, were all such a vivid green that the light around her seemed stained with the vibrant hue. She could almost feel the tension draining from her pores, being replaced by a tenuous, almost furtive, peace.
The day seemed to slow to an easy, swaying rhythm. The impression was so insidious yet so alien that she couldn’t help thinking how different everything was from the noisy, close, grime-coated streets she had left in New York, couldn’t help considering how different she might have been if she had always known such natural magic.
Just then, a great blue heron that Regina had not noticed until that moment lifted from its still stance at the shadowy water’s edge and sailed away with its wide wings almost skimming the water. She shaded her eyes with one hand as she followed its effortless flight.
Suddenly, her throat ached with the pressing uplift of some deep, emotional shift inside her. The day was so sublime. The huge bird was incredibly beautiful with the sun shining silver-blue on its plumage. At the same time, the heron was free, dependent on its own strength, without obligations, duties, or impossible dilemmas to cloud its mind and keep it lying sleepless, staring into the night. All it cared about was food and safety from the storms. And, possibly, comfort and security for its young.
“Had enough?”
She started, swinging around with her eyes wide and the blood rushing to her head. Amazingly, she had almost forgotten Kane was there. Forgotten, in his quiet, easy companionship, that he was watching her, judging her.
“Are you all right?” he asked, stepping closer to catch her elbow in swift support.
She gasped and gave a shaky laugh. “Oh, yes. I was just…a thousand miles away.”
“You’re sure?” His gaze touched and lingered on the bruise at her temple, half-hidden by her hair.
“I’m…fine. Really.”
He searched her face for an instant longer before he nodded. “Time to go, then.”
She agreed, and turned with him toward the truck. Still, he didn’t release her, and the touch of his fingers seemed to burn, branding her flesh. His manner was protective, almost bordering on possessive.
She drew away, breaking his hold. Perhaps something was wrong with her head after all, for the gesture required a conscious effort.
It was some moments later, after they had reached the blacktop again and were barreling along past a series of big houses set back under ancient, spreading oaks, that Kane spoke again. “I need to stop by my place for a minute while we’re so close, if you don’t mind. I was reading a brief last night and left it on the table beside the bed. Picking it up now will save me a trip later.”
The words were casual and matter-of-fact, the request perfectly polite. Regardless, Regina tensed. She had heard that kind of excuse before. She hadn’t appreciated it then, did so even less now.
What on earth made Kane Benedict think she might be so gullible, much less so accommodating? It must be because she had come with him so easily, because she had not thought to let anyone know where she was going.
What was she going to do? Should she risk insulting him with her accusations, or wait and see if it really was the cheap trick she suspected? Would it be better to make her position clear in no uncertain terms, or might that only warn him that she was going to be difficult?
She felt sick. It was hard to believe Lewis Crompton’s grandson would try this, in spite of the incident in the coffin yesterday. It was so isolated out here, so far away from everything she considered safe and civilized. No passersby, no telephones, no police. She had no weapon, no way, short of tooth and nail, of fighting back.
The most devastating question, then, was the one with the most doubtful answer. Was there any way on earth she could stop whatever he had in mind?