Heart of the Night (29 page)

“Several times.”

“The detectives?”

“Yes.”

“She isn't offering any more than she did before?”

“No.” With a breath, he went on more optimistically. “We've been watching television this morning.”

“Ah. That's something.” It was certainly more than Megan had done the day before. “Do you think she'll talk with me?”

The optimism vanished. “Uh, I don't think so, Savannah. She's not really feeling up to talking on the—wait a second.” He put a hand over the phone. For a minute his voice was too muffled for Savannah to make out the words, then he came back. “Hold on.”

Savannah held tight to the phone, then her heart gave a lurch.

“Savvy?” It was Megan, sounding pitifully frail, but talking at last.

Savannah wanted to laugh aloud. It was one of those days. “Meg! Oh, Meg, it's good to hear your voice. How are you feeling?”

“I'm sorry, Savvy.” The words were little more than a tormented whisper. “God, I'm sorry.”

“Shhh. You have nothing to apologize for.”

There was a pause, then the same wrenching murmur. “I've made a royal mess of things.”

“Are you kidding? You've been the victim of a vicious crime. You have nothing,
nothing
to apologize for.”

There was another pause. “You had such high hopes for me.”

“I still do. You'll heal, Meggie. You'll work all this out and put it behind you. I know that sounds simplistic, but life goes on. You're a fighter. You've fought things in the past, and you'll fight this, too.”

“You don't know.”

“No one does. No one knows what you've been through but someone who's been through the same thing. You'll be able to talk with some of those people, honey. There are support groups—”

“No!”

“They'll help.”

“They won't. You don't know. You just don't know—” Her voice broke off, swallowed up by a thick silence. Then Savannah heard the first slow, soft sobs.

On the one hand, the sound was wonderful. Up to that point, Megan had been unable to release the anguish she felt. Crying was critical to her recovery. It was also a painful thing to hear.

For the first time that day, Savannah felt a weight on her shoulders. “Ahhh, Meggie,” she soothed, wishing she was there, “it's okay. It's okay.”

“I just wanted—I wanted—it's your birthday.”

Tears came to Savannah's eyes. That Megan remembered the day, after all she'd been through, touched her deeply. “Another birthday. I'm beginning to wish they wouldn't come.”

“You should celebrate—not waste time—thinking of me.”

“Thinking of you is never a waste of time. You're a very special friend. You always will be.”

It was another minute of soft crying before Megan said, “I don't deserve you.”

“Nuh-uh. You've got that backwards. I don't deserve
you.
” And she meant it. Megan had always had a way of putting things in perspective for Savannah, and it was no different now. “Listen, I'm at Susan's. As soon as she's finished dressing, we're coming by the hospital to—”

“No!”

“Just to say hi?”

“No!”

“But that would make our birthday complete.”

“God, no—tell Susan—I love you both—”

“Listen, we're going up to Boston, but we could come by the hospital on the way back—”

“Savannah, it's me,” Will interrupted distractedly. More distantly, he said, “Shhh. Okay, sweetheart.” Then he came back to Savannah. “I've got to go.” He hung up the phone.

Stunned and more than a little concerned, Savannah held the dead receiver suspended in midair before finally returning it to its cradle.

“I take it she's beginning to come out of it?”

Savannah swung around to find Dianne at the door, looking perfectly settled in, as though she'd been there awhile.

Savannah didn't like Dianne Walker. She was, in her opinion, the epitome of unconscionable wealth and waste. Her life was an endless string of social engagements, and though she lent her name to numerous causes, the only one she worked actively for was her own beautification. Savannah couldn't call her Susan's friend, because friends didn't stab friends in the back, which was what Dianne had done when Susan and Dirk had split.

Why Susan allowed the woman in her house was a mystery to Savannah, but then, admittedly, Savannah was not up on the latest gossip. She would ask Susan later. In the meanwhile, she had to deal with Dianne and her eavesdropping.

“Megan will be just fine,” she said, and prayed it was true. “She's a strong woman.”

“Slightly out of her league, though, don't you think?”

“Excuse me?”

“We both know where she came from. She's had enough trouble adjusting to our kind of life without something like this happening.”

Any indulgence Savannah had felt earlier was gone. “
Something like this
would shake any one of us. Forget the fact of the kidnapping. Have you ever been raped, Dianne?”

Dianne arched an elegant brow. “I've been forced to have sex when I didn't want to, so yes, I've been raped.”

“Ever been raped by two men, repeatedly?”

“I remember an orgy in Puerto Vallarta—”

“I'm not talking about orgies. I'm talking about two men, total strangers who violently break into your home, take you to some filthy place you've never seen before, and rape you without letting you know when it will end and whether you'll be alive when it does. Have you ever experienced that, Dianne?”

“No, but I'd know how to handle it if it happened. A woman is never powerless where a man is concerned. Even submission can buy her points. And that's what it's about—points. You give me this and I'll give you that.”

“We're talking irrational, violent men here.”

“Men are men. Each has his weakness. Any man can be bought.”

“What a sick view of the world.”

One fur-draped shoulder rose and fell in a negligent shrug. “It's a realistic one.”

“No. I can guarantee that if you'd been in Megan's shoes, you'd have been as traumatized as she was.”

“I doubt that.”

Savannah stepped past her on the way to find Susan. “If I were a malicious person, Dianne, I'd wish the experience on you just to see. But I'm not that cruel.”

Dianne followed her into the hall. “And that's your weakness, Savannah. You're too good. You don't have enough of the bitch in you.”

“Thank God.”

“You do fine in your job. You don't have to be a bitch there, just a disciplined technocrat. With the law behind you, you can be firm.”

“Suse!” Savannah called from the bottom of the stairs. “Step on it, Suse!”

Dianne looked pensively up the stairs. “Susie's a little too soft, too, but she's doing better. She wasn't demanding enough with Dirk. She let him get away with hell, especially when it came to his secretary. But she's learning. She walked through the party last night like she didn't give a damn about the men there, so of course, that sparked their interest. Even Dirk was looking twice. I don't know why she left so early. She was barely tipsy.”

Tight-lipped, Savannah stared at her. “What was Dirk doing with his secretary?” For her efforts at self-control, she earned a droll look from Dianne.

“Must I spell it out? You're not
that
naive, Savannah, are you?”

“How long did it go on?”

“A year or two. When the stupid girl wrote Susan a letter, Susan couldn't ignore it any longer.” Dianne eyed her askance. “You knew about the letter, didn't you?”

She hadn't known about the letter, any more than she'd known about the secretary. She had known about Dirk's infidelity, but there had never been a name and face attached. She hurt for Susan, and hurt for herself. She wondered why Susan hadn't told her.

But she wasn't about to give Dianne the satisfaction of knowing she'd dropped a bomb. So she said in a chilly tone, “You can never tell about these things. Even a letter can be more fantasy than not.” She looked toward the top of the stairs. “Susan?”

“All set,” Susan called, appearing seconds later clipping on an earring. She was fully dressed and made up, and looked stunning.

“Sorry to run out on you this way,” Savannah told Dianne a bit airily, “but we're running a little late. We have lunch reservations at two, with a million things to do before then.” She turned to Susan. “Want me to drive?”

“No. I'll take the Jag. It needs a good outing.” Removing her fur from the closet, she draped it over her arm. “Dianne.” She hugged her lightly. “Thanks for dropping by. I'll talk with you soon.

“Sure you won't reconsider for tonight? It'll be fun.”

But Susan shook her head. “Can't. I have other plans.” The phone rang. “Why don't you walk Dianne out?” she told Savannah as she headed for the den. “I'll get that and meet you out front.” She picked up the phone. “Hello?”

“Are you all right?”

Susan shut her eyes. “Sam.”

“You were angry before.”

Her eyes popped open. “I was in a rush before, and I'm in a rush now. I told you. Savannah and I are going out for the day, and she's always prompt. You should know that. She's out front right now waiting for me.”

“Where are you going?”

“Boston.”

“Doing anything special?”

In a deliberately high and nasal voice, she said, “All those frivolous little things women like to do.”

“You don't have to be snide.”

She returned her voice to normal. “Savannah's waiting.”

“I'd like to see you tonight.”

“I've already answered that, too.” She rubbed her damp palm against her silk skirt. “I don't know when we'll be back, and if it's not too late, I've got a party to go to.”

“You went to a party last night. Don't you get tired of them?”

“Are you kidding?”

“No, I'm not kidding.”

She could hear that he wasn't. His bluntness was one of the things that made him different. She wasn't quite as bothered by it as she'd been at first. Still, she said, “Well, you should be. I happen to enjoy parties. I have a large group of friends. I enjoy spending time with them.”

“Is that before or after you've had a few drinks?”

Her hand tightened on the receiver. She wanted desperately to hang up, but something kept her from it. “Low blow, Sam.”

“Only because I care.”

She pressed a palm to her chest to ease the sudden tightness she felt there. “Look, I'm all right. It was hard for me being over at Megan's this week, and seeing her the way we found her didn't help. I was overtired when I got home. So I had a few drinks and was sick. I'm sorry you were there to see it.”

“I'm not,” he said. “You'd been through a lot. You shouldn't have been alone. I was glad to be there. It felt good.”

“Not to me. It embarrassed me. It embarrasses me every time I think of it. And every time you call, I think of it. Sammy, Savannah's waiting.”

“If you'd see me, I'd give you new things to think about.”

“Oh, God, here we go.”

“I'm serious.”

“So am I. That's a feeble line.”

“But the thought behind it is sound. I want to see you, Susan.”

“No problem. You're good at breaking and entering. Surprise me some time.” She hung up, then made a coward's dash for the door to the garage. The phone rang behind her, but she ignored it, and before long the Jaguar's purr drowned it out.

As soon as Savannah got into the car, she told Susan about her talk with Megan. Susan immediately suggested they detour into Providence before heading north. “I know you, Savannah. If we don't make sure she's all right, you'll be thinking about it all day, and I don't want to think about Megan all day. It's depressing.”

“Talk about depressing, you should have heard Dianne's theory about the kidnapping. She's convinced that Megan could have handled being raped better than she did.”

“Dianne's an imbecile.”

“What was she doing at your house?”

“I'm not really sure. She said something about how ‘cool' I was last night. She said that Malcolm O'Neill was asking about me after I left. She was probably sniffing around for little tidbits to give him. I'm sure she's trying to impress him herself.”

“She's married.”

“Since when has that stopped her? If she sets her eye on Malcolm, a wedding band won't put her off. And what better cover than acting as a courier between Malcolm and me?”

“Are you interested in him?”

“Not particularly.”

“Then what use do you have for Dianne? It amazes me that you can stand the sight of her, after what she did.”

Susan kept her eyes on the road. “She was just sticking up for her brother.”

“By publicly denouncing you as co-chair for the Sperry fund-raiser? Not that I ever had any fondness for John Sperry; he would have made a lousy senator. But you'd put in a lot of work on that, and you raised plenty of money. Far more so than Dirk, you had a right to be there, taking pride in what you'd done.”

“But you're right. Sperry would have made a lousy senator.”

“You didn't think so at the time.”

“Maybe I did but couldn't admit it. What you fail to realize, Savvy, is that sometimes people have ulterior motives for doing things. You don't actually believe that the people who organize fund-raisers for charity do it purely out of the goodness of their hearts, do you? They do it for the power it brings. They do it for the publicity, because their names go up in lights alongside that of their cause. They do it for prestige.”

“So that's why you went all out organizing a party for John Sperry? You did all that work without even believing in the man?” Savannah's gaze was steady. “I don't buy it.”