Authors: Billie Green
Chapter Seventeen
What are you talking about?"
Amanda bit her lip at the terse question. The closed expression was on his face once more. Somehow she got the idea he was bracing himself for pain.
"I've seen him before," she blurted out. "I was under a bridge at Greenleigh looking for a... well, it doesn't matter what I was looking for. I was hidden, and I heard him talking to Ted about a patient. I thought there was something familiar about him, but I couldn't place him. I remember that just after that I started thinking about you, but I just didn't connect it. I mean, you don't look that much alike, do you?" she asked anxiously.
He didn't respond at once, but a look she had never seen before came into his eyes as he passed one hand over his face.
Oh, God, she drought. Please don't let him be disillusioned again. "Maybe it doesn't mean anything," she said, disbelieving her own words as she clasped his arm in both hands. "Maybe he flew in and out so quickly he only had time for a short meeting with the doctor to find out how you were doing."
He glanced at her, his face hard. "He came all the way from Italy and didn't have time to see me?"
"No, but wait, Daniel," she said urgently, feeling the tenseness of his muscles beneath her fingers. "There could be an explanation for that. When I first met you... I didn't want to know you." With her eyes, she begged him to understand. "I was uncomfortable because of your condition. Some people are like that. Maybe he wanted to remember you the way you were."
He inhaled slowly, roughly. "We'll just have to find out, won't we?"
When he moved into the trees to the side of the property, she followed helplessly. The backyard was open with a huge swimming pool directly in the center. Daniel walked across the patio, skirting umbrellaed tables and wrought-iron chairs.
She didn't catch him until he had reached one of the back doors. "Wait, Daniel," she whispered urgently, pulling at his arm. He turned slightly to look down at her. "What are you going to do when you get inside? Do you think he'll just say, 'Hi, Daniel, and by the way I'm the one who paid Sutherland'? He can deny the whole thing and...and—" her lip quivered "—what if Ted's in there? They could do it to you again."
He stared at her for a moment, then shook his head as if to clear it. "I can handle Kyle. I know when Kyle's lying. I could always tell. He could fool Lena all the time and Dad some of the time, but he could never fool me."
Twisting the knob, he began to push the door open.
"And Ted?" she asked. "Can you handle him, too?"
The fire that flared in his eyes before he turned back to open the door scared her. He didn't care if Ted was inside. In fact, now she knew he wanted him to be there.
Then he stopped, pulling the door toward him until it was open only a crack.
Beside him, Amanda saw through the curtains why he had stopped. Inside she could hear a phone ringing, and Kyle strode toward it. If he looked in their direction he wouldn't have been able to miss them, but Darnel didn't back away. He stood where he was and listened.
"Sutherland, damn it, where are your men?" Kyle said angrily. "You said they would be here by now. I have no idea when Dan will show up. Yes, yes, all the servants have gone." He paused. "That's easy for you to say. You aren't taking a chance on being here alone with him. I want someone here and I want them now."
Again he paused to listen, and this time he picked up a cushion and hurled it across the room in anger. Amanda glanced at Daniel, almost afraid to see his face. But there was no pain there; it looked completely void of emotion. It hurt her more than she ever could have imagined.
"Yes," Kyle said tightly after a moment. "Yes, I understand. Wait.. .what are you going to do with the girl... no, never mind. I don't want to know. Just be sure you take care of her. And remember that your hide is up for grabs the same as mine."
Kyle had just replaced the phone when Daniel pushed open the door and walked in.
The younger man swung around sharply, and a multitude of expressions played across his face. The first and most easily recognized was fear.
"Dan! You old son of a bitch. Where did you spring from?" he said, running a shaking hand across his brow. He moved toward Daniel, then something in his brother's face stopped him.
"What's wrong?" he said, glancing from Daniel to Amanda uneasily.
"That's what we'd like to know," Daniel said quietly. "Who was on the phone, Kyle?"
Kyle glanced at the phone, wetting his lips nervously. "Nothing important," he said, laughing. "I can never get away from business. But that doesn't matter. Are you going to tell me why you walked in here looking like the face of doom?"
Daniel shrugged his shoulders as though they ached. Then he turned away and walked to the window. "I know what you did, Kyle," he said wearily. "Now I simply want to know why."
"I don't know what—"
Daniel swung around to face him. "Amanda witnessed one of your meetings with Sutherland at Greenleigh."
Kyle's gaze slid over Amanda as she stood silently by the door. "And you believe her? You really are crazy. She must really be something to get you to turn on your own brother."
For a split second, Daniel's green eyes flamed, his nostrils flaring. Then the fire burned off, leaving coldly banked anger. "I heard your phone call, Kyle. Every word. You can't pretend anymore."
Kyle shoved his hands into his pockets. "I told you—I didn't do anything." His gaze skittered around the room, resting on everything except his brother. "You're sick, Dan. Dr. Sutherland says you've gone into remission. But I worry about this attitude of yours. It may be a symptom of—"
"Why, Kyle?"
The younger man turned his back on them and strode a few paces away, his movements stiff. "Damn it, you need your medicine. You might end up worse off than ever. We've got to get you—"
"Stop it, Kyle," Daniel said, the words low and sad.
A shudder shook Kyle, then he slumped into an armchair. "Oh, God," he muttered hoarsely. "Oh, my God."
"Tell me," Daniel said.
"You're so god-awful perfect, Dan." The emotion in his voice verged on hysteria. "What do you know about reality? You took the brass ring. And what did
I get? Italy. The whole damn thing went wrong, right from the start. You have no idea...you can't begin to imagine what it was like. As soon as I got to Rome the problems started. Phil-Ital was filled with incompetents and naive fools." He ran a shaking hand over his face. "If they.. .if they didn't screw up, they were stabbing me in the back. For eight years—eight years—I held it together by sheer willpower. Then willpower wasn't enough. I know some powerful people in Italy," he said, pride entering his voice as he glanced up. "But then even the... the other interests I have in Europe weren't enough to keep it going. The law was cracking down. And I knew when the Italian government started snooping around I had to do something." He threw Daniel a defiant look. "Damn it, you couldn't expect me to just tamely go off to some stinking hellhole of a prison. They lose people in those places."
Daniel leaned against the wall, his eyes closed for a long time. Evidently he understood the garbled explanation, for he asked no questions. Finally he opened his eyes and looked at his brother. "Why didn't you come to me in the beginning? I would have helped you."
Kyle laughed shortly. "Just like you always did? So you could look at me in that icy, patronizing way while you cleaned up my mess? Damn it, for once I wanted to come out on top. For once I wanted to be the winner. Besides," he said, his voice sneering, "I needed more than you could afford to give me. I needed it all."
Daniel slowly lowered his gaze. "So you decided to rob me not only of my company, but of the rest of my life?" he asked calmly.
"No!" The word was explosive. "I never intended for you to die."
Standing beside the door, Amanda didn't say anything. But she knew he was lying. No matter what she had said to Daniel, she knew from his conversation with Ted that Kyle had been waiting for the two-year period to end.
Daniel laughed, a harsh, ugly sound. "That was kind of you, brother. You only intended for me to be a vegetable. To be locked away for the rest of my life."
"No, no," he protested. "Only for a little while, while I straightened things out. I didn't expect—"
"You didn't expect to see me alive and kicking butt," Daniel said, his smile sardonic. "Face it, Kyle. For once in your life, face what you did. There was no way out for you. If you had let them release me from Greenleigh, I would have found out what you had done to the company."
Kyle dropped his gaze to stare at his hands. It was obvious that he had given up. He didn't deny Daniel's accusation because he knew he couldn't.
Daniel began to pace before his brother like a trial lawyer giving his closing argument to the jury. "What's fair, Kyle?" he asked pleasantly. "An eye for an eye is fair, don't you think? I think if you were locked away for the rest of your life—or at least as much of it as California law allows—if you were robbed of your dignity, your freedom of choice—yes, that's fair."
"No, Dan, no," Kyle whispered desperately, staring at his brother with wide eyes. "For God's sake, man, I'm your brother."
Daniel threw back his head and laughed. For several terrible seconds it echoed through the room. Then, shaking his head, he said, "That goes both ways, you know. Fraternal devotion didn't seem to hamper you to a noticeable degree. No, Kyle, you chose to forget, and so will I."
Amanda had watched the whole thing in silence, but now she stepped forward. She couldn't let this continue. Dan's face showed anger and even hatred. What it didn't show was the pain she knew he was feeling, the deep betrayal, the shattering of the love he had once had for his brother.
If she let him carry this through, if she said nothing and he caused his brother to be put into prison, it would ruin Daniel. He would bury his emotions even deeper inside him. Danny would disappear completely, and Daniel would be the worse for it. Happiness and contentment would slide even farther from his grasp.
"Daniel," she said quietly.
He turned away from Kyle, his eyes momentarily confused as though he had forgotten she was in the room.
"You can't do it," she said, holding his gaze.
He frowned, examining her face. "Why are you worried about Kyle?" he asked sharply.
"I don't care if Kyle rots in hell," she said calmly. "I'm worried about you. You can't do this without harming yourself."
"I can damn well try," he said tightly.
She shook her head, touching his arm. "No, you can't. I'm not guessing or speculating about this. I know it as sure as I'm standing here. You'll never be able to live with yourself. You'll remember your father and you'll remember Lena, and guilt will eat you alive."
Turning away from her, he walked to the window. The silence drew out as he stared at the sky. At once he relaxed and turned back to face her. "You're right. I can't do it. Not to Kyle."
He walked to the telephone his brother had used earlier. "But I can do it to Sutherland."
As Daniel talked to the district attorney, an old friend, Amanda watched Kyle slip out of the room, unsure of whether Daniel noticed or not.
She shouldn't have wondered. When the door closed behind the younger man, Daniel slumped slightly. Replacing the phone, Daniel turned back to Amanda.
"Sean will have men here before Sutherland's crew gets here," he said, then ran a hand through his hair as he glanced around the room, almost as though he were at a loss. "I guess you'll be glad when things get back to normal," he said.
Normal, she thought, feeling strangely drained. She didn't think she would recognize normal anymore, but she nodded. "Yes, I guess so. I've... I've got a lot to do. Another job. An apartment. Getting my furniture out of storage." Her voice trailed away. "And you," she said. "You'll be able to get back to Phil-ton."
He simply stared at her for a moment, then he said bluntly, "I'd like to see you again, Amanda. I've never desired a woman the way I desire you. I know at first you resented the physical attraction between us, but now you seem to have accepted it. There's no need for it to stop."
She felt the trembling begin in her stomach and spread outward as she listened to what he was saying. Desire? Physical attraction? Now that he said the words aloud she knew that it would never be enough for her. Now at the end, she knew at last what she wanted from Daniel.
She shook her head. "I don't think so, Daniel," she whispered, avoiding his eyes. "I'm not mistress material."
It was a long time before he spoke, and then his voice was slow and dull. "No, you're not."
Shoving his hands into his pockets, he turned away from her. "You don't have to stay for the rest, Amanda," he said, and now he sounded supremely casual. "It's all over now."
She felt the blood drain from her face as she stood frozen in time. She felt cut loose from her lifeline.
It was all over, she repeated silently. She knew it would come. It had been an inevitability from the time she woke to find him staring down at her that first day in the cabin. So why wasn't she better prepared for it? Why did she feel tetherless?
She glanced up to find Daniel watching her closely, as he had always watched her. She moistened her lips, raising a hand to her hair to smooth it back. "Yes, I guess it is," she murmured.