Sound of Secrets (22 page)

"Yeah?"

"I called her hotel room the other night, put a handkerchief over the receiver and told her to leave Secret Sound. And I did it because I don’t want her hanging around Gray."
Tyler didn’t tell her that he disapproved more of her pursuit of Gray than her childish prank. "That wasn’t a nice thing to do."

Karen gave the table a resounding smack. "Damn right it wasn’t. I’m trying to tell you I’m not a nice person. You can get it out of your thick skull that I’m some sort of saint just because I donated twenty thousand dollars to your community center."

"Wait a minute." Tyler’s brows drew together. When he’d visited the newspaper’s community relations department and Cindy Lou had presented him with the cashier’s check, he’d been under the impression it was a compilation of donations. "You donated the entire twenty thousand?"

"It sounds like a lot, I know. But believe me, with my divorce settlement, I can afford it."

Tyler had to think about what Karen’s revelation meant, but now wasn’t the time. She was upset and his foremost concern was to calm her down. He didn’t think she was drunk. He pushed the half-f gin-and-tonic away from her anyway. She didn’t even seem to notice.

"You don’t want to know how much I spend at the beauty shop in a week. Or how much I drop in Palm Beach when I shop. You'd be amazed at the numbers."

"The only thing that amazes me," he said, taking her hand again, "is that you think you need to make yourself beautiful. You already are, Karen. You’d be beautiful dressed in a paper sack."

"Really?" she asked. For the first time since he’d sat down in the booth, she didn’t sound sure of herself.

He gave her hand a gentle squeeze. "Really."

Karen pressed her lips together before she spoke. "That’s the nicest thing anybody’s ever said to me."

"That’s because you’ve been hanging around the wrong men." Tyler threw a few bills on the table and stood up, giving a small tug to the hand he still held. "Come on. I’ll drive you home."

"But I drove myself here."

"Then I’ll ride with you to your place."
"That doesn’t make sense. What will you do about your car?"

"Secret Sound isn’t so big that I can’t walk back and get it, now is it?"

Karen let Tyler lead her out of the booth. She should probably mount more of a protest except she wasn’t in the mood to make a scene. She was already embarrassed that she’d let herself get mesmerized by his earnest, hazel eyes and blabbed all those inner thoughts to him. Anyone would have thought he was her analyst.

The worst part was that she couldn’t say it was the liquor doing the talking. She’d tossed back a few, sure, but she was disgustingly lucid. She wondered if it were too late to start acting drunk now. Considering how high her heels were, she could certainly manage to stagger.

"Bitch."

The epithet came from Stoney Gillick, who'd come into the bar about an hour ago. She'd kept a wary eye on him at first, then forgot him while she dealt with her own misery.

Gillick sat alone at a table guzzling beer. Word had spread about his wife Mary pulling a gun on him and threatening to blow him to Timbuktu for all the times he’d beat her. Most people were only sorry she hadn’t done it.

Karen, for her part, didn’t derive any satisfaction about being proved right in her refusal to print a retraction on Mandy’s domestic-abuse story. Mere days after he’d threatened to sue the
Sun
for calling him a wife beater, he’d proven he was one.

Unfortunately, Mary Gillick was the one still paying. Because she’d threatened him with a gun, she was in jail, while Gillick was out on bail.

Karen prepared to move past Gillick. Tyler stopped suddenly and she plowed into him. He turned and she caught a look at his profile. His features, usually so congenial, had gone hard.

"Who said that?" Tyler all but growled.

Silence greeted his question, and Karen’s radar went on high alert. Trouble was coming. She could feel it. She gave Tyler’s solid shoulder a nudge. "Just ignore it," she pleaded.

"I heard somebody disparage this lady," Tyler said with flint in his voice. "Is the person who did that man enough to admit it?"

Again, silence greeted his question. Karen expected Tyler, of the easygoing smile and personality, to let it go. She even took his hand and tugged. It didn’t do any good. Tyler turned and zeroed in on Gillick. The other man sat hunched over his beer, staring into it.

"Did you say it?" Tyler asked.

"What’s it to you if I did?" Gillick muttered, not looking up.

"I’ll tell you what." Tyler moved with a speed Karen didn’t associate with him, hauling Gillick out of his chair by his shirt front until their faces were inches apart. "If you ever call this lady a name again, I’ll beat the tar out of you. Then you can see how it feels being on the receiving end of a fist."

"You're lucky I don't bash in your brains," Gillick muttered.

"Oh, yeah? Why don't you take a swing at me and try it? I'd love to have an excuse to hit you."

Karen stared at Tyler, shocked. For as long as she’d known him, he’d never been in a fight. She’d never even heard him raise his voice, and here he was steely-eyed, as mad as hell and a punch away from a bar fight.

"Tyler," Karen laid a hand on his arm and tried to shake him out of his mad trance. His biceps felt like iron. Karen shivered at the thought of all that power unleashed. "Let him go, Ty, and let’s get out of here."

She thought, for a moment, that he would ignore her. Tension bunched the muscles in his biceps, which she’d never dreamed were that impressive. His jaw was stern, his mouth grim.

Tyler's frightening transformation, however, had the desired effect on Gillick. The smaller man’s knees visibly shook, and Karen expected him to shout "uncle" at any moment.

"Ty," Karen prompted again.

With an exclamation of disgust, Tyler thrust the trembling man away from him. "If you mess with this lady again," he growled, "I’ll make you sorry. That’s a promise, Stoney."

Karen didn’t protest when Tyler took her keys and drove her home in her own car. Her brain was so busy trying to process what had happened back at the bar that they reached her driveway without her saying a word.

The security lights blazed, allowing her to make out Tyler's expression when he shut off the engine. He looked as cool and composed as he always did, as though she’d imagined the last half hour. Her imagination wasn't that good.

"What happened back there?" she asked.

Tyler shrugged his wide shoulders and gave her a look of guileless innocence. "I guess you could say I almost gave Stoney Gillick what he had coming."

"You mean you almost got into a bar fight. That doesn’t make sense, Tyler. Didn’t your high school class vote you most congenial?"

"Only because most of my classmates were mean as snakes."

"Don’t joke, Tyler. Not about this." She searched his face and surprised herself by reaching out and touching him. The slight stubble on his jaw felt erotic against her sensitive fingertips. His mouth softened, drawing her attention to lips that curved with a sensual slant. "I thought he was going to hit you."

"Nah." He fixed her with that hot, hot stare she could no longer escape. "He was too scared. Men like Stoney Gillick are too cowardly to hit anybody who can hit back."

"You would have gotten in a fight for me?" she asked, and he nodded. Something inside her softened and expanded. "Being a staunch feminist who can take care of herself, I know I’m supposed to be angry about that. And if anybody ever asks me about it, I’ll say I was angry." She lowered her voice. "But nobody’s ever been willing to get into a fight for me before."

He captured her hand and brought it to his mouth. Heat and warmth spread like a forest fire from his lips through her body. He lifted his eyes, and the greenish-gold light in them blazed.

"You haven’t been paying attention, Karen," he rasped. "I’d do darn near anything for you."

Tyler had rolled down the windows on the short drive from the Dew Drop Inn, and the night air wafting through the car felt cool against her skin. All her senses were screamingly alive. She could smell the salt on the breeze, hear the calls of the night birds and taste desire on her lips. Her vision was reduced to a startlingly clear image of his face, which now seemed as dear as it was familiar.

"I’m thinking about kissing you," Tyler said, a corner of his mouth lifting in contrast to the seriousness that was still in his eyes, "and I’d be much obliged if you wouldn’t slap me or throw something at me when it’s over."

"I’ll do worse than that if you don't just come on over here and do it," Karen said.

Tyler didn’t need any more encouragement to slide closer to her and cradle the back of her head with his palm, bringing her mouth flush against his.

Desire crackled between them, electrifying the kiss with potent, undeniable passion. She offered all of her mouth to him, and he took it, exploring the softness of her lips and then plunging inside to discover all there was to know about her.

Their tongues mated in a fashion that was fierce and primal, sweeping Karen on a fast-moving tide she didn’t want to stop. Her hands tangled in his hair, traced the strong ridges of his back and ran over his shoulders. His hands were equally busy, finally dipping to her soft, full breasts when his mouth dropped to her neck. He groaned against the skin there, sending shivers along her entire body.

"I knew you weren’t wearing a bra," he rasped. "I’ve been thinking about touching you all night."

"Then do it." Karen arched her back. Her nipples strained against the material of her red dress. It was a relief when he found the zipper in her dress and tugged. He impatiently pushed the material off her shoulders, freeing her breasts to his gaze.

"I knew you’d be beautiful. I didn't know you'd be this beautiful," he said with what sounded like awe.

His mouth dipped, his tongue licking her nipples so that pleasure spiraled inside her. Dimly Karen thought that it had never been like this for her. Never had the passion been so swift and all-consuming. He was doing such wonderful things with his tongue that she couldn’t form thoughts any more coherent than that.

When his mouth came back up to hers, she wrapped one of her legs around his thigh, bringing his erection against the part of her that ached for him. She rubbed against him, already feeling the welcoming dampness as he thrust his tongue inside her mouth in the way she wanted him to do with his body.

He broke off the kiss abruptly and spoke urgently against her mouth. "Invite me in."

The import of what he asked penetrated Karen’s heightened senses. She shook her head. "I don’t want to wait. Let’s do it here, in the car."

She tried to drag his mouth back to hers. He wouldn't budge. "Invite me in," he said again.

Karen shut her eyes in frustration. She should have known it would come to this. She wanted him as much as she wanted to breathe, but bringing him into her bed would grant him rights she couldn’t give.

"I can’t."

He disentangled his body from hers and set her away from him, leaving emptiness where there had been joy. She felt his absence like a physical ache.

"Then we can't do this," he said.

She couldn't believe this was happening. "What?"

"I won’t make love to you in a car, Karen." His expression was determined, but she read strain in his face and the coiled hardness of his body. "When we do this, we’re going to do it right. I won’t make it easy for you to shrug this all off tomorrow as a mistake."

"Are you turning me down?" Karen’s voice rose on the question.

"If all you’re offering is a quick roll in the car, then yeah, I am. I want to make love to you in your bed where you can’t get up in the middle of the night and leave."

"Then you want too much," Karen retorted. Anger every bit as potent as the passion they’d shared rose up in her. "I’m not getting involved with you, Tyler Shaw."

"Then why are you half-naked with me in the front seat of your car at one in the morning?" he asked quietly. "I’d say you already were involved with me."

Remembering her state of undress, Karen tugged her dress up to cover herself. She couldn’t do up her zipper because her hands shook too hard. Tyler made no move to help, staring at her with that unwavering gaze.

"Don’t flatter yourself." She pulled the keys out of the ignition and wrenched the car door open. "This shouldn’t have happened at all. We both know you’re not the man I want."

She’d said the words to hurt him, but his stricken look didn’t give her any satisfaction. She didn’t bother to shut the door as she fled up the sidewalk to her house, holding her dress so it wouldn’t fall from her shoulders.

She wouldn’t let herself think, even for a moment, that she was letting the best thing that ever happened to her slip through her fingers.

Cara gave up trying to fall asleep, switched on her bedside lamp and sat up. She pushed the hair out of her face while her mind played back Karen Rhett’s birthday party.

The problem was that, although she was quite sure something of significance had happened, Cara couldn’t pinpoint what it was. She’d had the impression all evening she'd missed something even as she talked and laughed and met so many genuinely nice people she started to revise her impression of Secret Sound.

She’d asked a fair number of them about Skippy Rhett. Nobody had told her anything she didn’t already know. She wasn’t especially disappointed about that, because she’d extracted a promise from Gray’s father to track down the whereabouts of the town’s former police chief. Bergie even thought he had an address and telephone number of the office.

Bergie's son had been less forthcoming.

Cara tapped her chin thoughtfully, almost sure her misgivings about tonight’s party involved Gray. Not that she had anything to complain about. Since their torrid embrace the night before, he had been the perfect gentleman. Despite his promise to pursue what was between them, he hadn’t given her so much as a smoldering look.

Maybe that was what was wrong.

Something so serious troubled him that he hadn’t even acted on their undeniable attraction. He’d been talking to Karen Rhett moments before abruptly announcing he was ready to leave, and Cara wondered now if he suspected Karen of causing the accidents. She’d have to remember to ask Gray what kind of car Karen drove.