Malice. Lisa Jackson
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know, before you’d already mentally packed your bags to take off for La La Land.”
“I told you, if you don’t want me to go, just say the word.”
She hesitated, then leaned forward. “No, Rick. I want you to go. As happy as we’ve been, and we have been happy, there’s always been that little bit of doubt on my part. And guilt on yours. Look, if Jennifer were still alive we might not be together. So now we get to find out just how strong our marriage is.”
“I think it’s damned strong.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“But you can’t commit to a child.”
“I have a child.” He was about to say more but saw by the darkening of her eyes that he’d wounded her. Instead he reached across the table to take her hand. “This just isn’t the time.”
She pulled her fingers from his. “But it is for me, Bentz,” she said, her jaw jutting a bit. “It’s really now or never.”
He considered giving in. After all, she’d make a wonderful mother, he knew that. And so what if he was so old he’d qualify for Social Security when the kid graduated from high school? People did it all the time. He slid his jaw to the side. “I’ll think about it.”
She grabbed her purse and pushed away from the table. “Then think fast.”
CHAPTER 5
She should have told him.
She shouldn’t have chickened out.
Olivia stepped out of the shower and toweled off. Steam covered the window in the bathroom and she cracked it a bit, all the while second-guessing herself. Bentz had left earlier in the morning and even now was winging his way to Los Angeles.
She never should have let him go without mentioning the baby. But the thought of being that woman, a clinging female who would use any excuse, even her unborn child, to try to keep a man from doing what he wanted stuck in Olivia’s craw. She didn’t believe in reining in someone she loved. It just didn’t make sense. She wasn’t into using guilt to hang on to him, and he’d certainly made it clear how he felt about becoming a father again.
It wasn’t as if she’d intentionally gone behind his back and gotten pregnant. There’d been no trick involved; she simply wasn’t taking any measures to prevent pregnancy. He knew she wasn’t on the pill. Though Rick usually took care of birth control himself, there had been a few times he hadn’t bothered with a condom, several instances where passion had overruled sanity. And, Olivia thought, brushing her teeth and seeing her reflection in the foggy mirror, she was thrilled to have this new life inside her, having been worried that, given their ages, it might be difficult to conceive.
Nonetheless, she hadn’t used the baby as a means to stop him from going on his damned quest to L.A.
She spat, leaned her face under the faucet, rinsed her mouth, and straightened. The woman standing in the misty reflection stared back at her and silently accused her of being a coward. Guilty. But she’d kept mum for good reason. She had wanted to avoid a fight, and couldn’t bear to witness the disappointment—even resentment—in his eyes. She didn’t believe he’d suggest abortion, but she couldn’t begin to deal with the idea of terminating her pregnancy.
“And I thought you were a straight shooter,” she said aloud to her own watery image. “Aren’t you the one who never backs down? What the hell happened to you?”
She let her hands fall to her flat belly.
A baby…a life that right now was growing inside her.
And her husband didn’t even know she was pregnant. Didn’t want to know.
“Jerk,” she muttered under her breath. “Good riddance.” She pulled a comb through her hair, wrapped a towel around her body, then opened the door and nearly tripped over the dog. Hairy S had camped out in the hall in front of the bathroom. “Not smart,” she said to the dog and petted his furry head. “But don’t worry about it; there’s a lot of stupidity going around in this house these days. A lot. You’re not the Lone Ranger.”
Hairy thumped his tail against the floor, then followed her to the bedroom, where she dressed and tried not to think about the fact that her husband was nearly a continent away, chasing demons who had haunted him for twelve long years.
The flight was uneventful.
Once, after dozing, Bentz thought he smelled gardenias. He took a long look around the cabin of the 727, eyeing all the passengers, half expecting Jennifer to be calmly seated near the window, reading a book. She would, of course, upon feeling his gaze upon her, look up and smile with that sexy little grin that had always gotten to him. Without saying a word she would tell him that she knew he’d follow her.
It didn’t happen.
No one on the plane remotely resembled his first wife…ex-wife he reminded himself. Ex. They had been divorced, though living together, at the time of her death. But those arrangements had been about to end. Because she hadn’t been able to give up her lover.
The plane touched down at LAX with a soft bump as the back wheels hit the tarmac, then even less of a jar as the wheel under the nose of the plane found the pavement. As the 727 taxied to the gate, most of the passengers were already turning on cell phones, unbuckling their seat belts, and shifting the luggage at their feet. After spending the entire trip with her nose in a book, the woman in the seat next to Bentz swung a purse the size of Guatemala onto her lap and scrounged for her cell frantically. Touchdown propelled her into frenzied mode and she hastily dug through her huge purse. Bentz barely avoided being knocked over by the bag as he pulled his computer from beneath the seat in front of him and she located her phone and clicked it on, immediately making a call.
He couldn’t help but overhear her conversation, a one-sided affair in which she was trashing her ex’s latest girlfriend.
Fortunately, the plane emptied fairly quickly.
On the way to baggage claim Bentz called Olivia and left a message that he’d landed safely. He found his one bag, then rented a small SUV with a G.P.S. already installed. He’d done it all without using his cane and, though his hip ached, he ignored the pain and threw the damned walking stick that he’d brought along into the backseat.
As he exited the rental lot in the Ford Escape, he slipped a pair of sunglasses onto the bridge of his nose. The scenery was familiar, the tightness in his chest new. Years ago he’d left L.A. with a bad taste in his mouth; now all those old feelings came back at him in a rush. Guilt over Jennifer’s suicide, remorse over the death of a twelve-year-old kid with a toy pistol, gnawing frustration that he would have been able to solve the Caldwell twins’ double homicide if he’d been at the top of his game, and the fog of too many numbing shots of whiskey.
He’d been a mess. Jack Daniel’s had become his best friend and that friendship had damaged every other relationship. It had also compromised his job performance and his ability to see clearly.
Though officially he’d quit the LAPD, the pressure to resign had been palpable, the tension in the department thicker than the smog that blanketed the city. Even his remaining friends, the few coworkers who “had his back,” had been relieved to see him leave. His departure had been better for all concerned. Especially him.
Except that he’d left some unfinished business behind.
It had been years since he’d been in Southern California, and though the area had changed, the royal palm trees and space-age arches of the Encounters restaurant at LAX were reminders of a time he’d tried hard to forget.
As he maneuvered onto the freeway he couldn’t see the surrounding hills through the layer of smog that hovered over the area. He fiddled with the air conditioning to combat the rising temperature as buildings rose ghostlike through the shimmering heat waves. By instinct he headed toward his old neighborhood, which wasn’t too far from Culver