Part 27 (1/2)

In the foyer we stared at each other, wondering if we could or should go back to the people we were before tonight, when the lies and the contradictions didn't strike so deeply.

He brushed his lips against mine, reminded me to lock the door, and was gone. I was abruptly surrounded by silence again. But if stillness can vary, be different, less oppressive, less threatening, this one was. Was that all it took? Great s.e.x?

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX.

It was ten o'clock the next morning when I awoke. Stretching, I heard Mother's voice. I sat up. She was on TV, seducing Jack Nicholson on a sofa. Jack was wry, my mother was serious, her blond hair cascading around her bare shoulders and soft cleavage.

”Enough,” I said.

She didn't hear me. She was busy earning her one and only Oscar. I turned off the TV.

Dressed in jeans, a black sweater, and suede driving shoes, I went into the kitchen and put the coffee on. While it perked I checked my cell to see if Celia had called. She hadn't. I left a message asking her to call me, that it was important. Then I found the number of St. John's Hospital and asked to speak to Ryan. He had a collapsed lung and an ego to match. It was his depleted confidence that worried me the most. Men such as Ryan are like birthday balloons, fun, but they popped easily. Promising I would see him soon, I hung up.

Now slathering marmalade on toast and sipping coffee, I wondered why I was so adamant that Celia was innocent. It was more than she was my friend and that I didn't want to be deceived by her. Then I realized it was hearing her scream over the phone and the terror I'd felt. And the next morning seeing her bruised face. I'd forgotten to tell Heath about that. My body grew alert at the thought of him.

Smiling, I forced myself to concentrate on Celia. The only thing I didn't understand was how she knew she was in danger from Parson. If only she'd answer her phone. Why didn't she? Had Parson's men found her? I stood up. Was she hurt or in trouble?

I went into my bedroom, found her house key, put it in my pocket, and left.

The fog had come in and settled like a wet gray rag over the coast. Running down the beach, I tried to outpace the ebb and flow of the tide, hoping I would find something, anything, in her house that could tell me where she'd gone.

As I ran up onto Celia's deck, I saw that the drapes were drawn across her French doors. I tried the handle. It was locked. Using her key I unlocked it, pushed aside the curtains, and stepped in.

It took me a moment to make sense of the chaos. All her possessions had been thrown onto the floor, smashed. Drawers hung open, contents scattered. Lamps lay on their sides and sofa cus.h.i.+ons were ripped open. Goose down had settled over the room like a blanket. Fear shot through me as I realized I might not be alone in the house.

I picked up the oldest prop in the world, a fireplace poker, and moved toward her bedroom, peering in. The linens had been ripped off the bed, nightstands tipped over, and paintings torn from the walls.

Tightening my grip on the poker, I edged sideways to the open closet door and paused, waiting for any sound or movement that might emanate from it. Not hearing any, I crept in.

Celia's closet was the size of a small boutique. Her clothes had been pulled off the hanger rods and thrown onto the floor, creating a tangled pile of clas.h.i.+ng bold colors. The red-framed full-length mirror was shattered. Had Parson's men done all this damage? But why break the mirror? I couldn't believe his thugs cared much about their reflections. I stared at my mirrored face, fractured by the cracked gla.s.s, and wondered who did care. Who hated their own image so much that they had to ruin it?

I went into the kitchen and abruptly stopped. Ben Zaitlin, his profile to me, was standing there staring intently at the door that led to the garage as if he were in a trance.

”Ben?”

He jerked his shoulders, startled back to reality. ”Diana. I was looking for Celia. She's not here.” His black hair was uncombed and he was unshaven. Dark circles shadowed his creaseless eyes.

”Did you do this?” I gestured with the poker toward the living-room entrance. Then I put it down on the table but still within reach.

”What?” He blinked his long lashes and rubbed his face as if trying to wake himself up.

”The destruction of Celia's ...”

”Perfect life?” He shrugged. ”Yes. I was p.i.s.sed off, I guess.”

”How did you get in?”

”Stole Robert's key.” He slumped against the sink counter, hands stuffed in his cargo pants pockets, head hanging. He wore a black polo s.h.i.+rt, and flip-flops on his strong wide feet. ”I've been up all night. No sleep. The police want to see me in about an hour.” He lifted his wrist to look at his watch and saw he wasn't wearing one. ”Guess I left it at home.” He raised his eyes to meet mine. ”Do you know where Celia went?”

”No. But she had to leave.”

”She didn't tell me.”

”Why would she?”

”Because she's my alibi. That's why I came here, to make sure she would back me up.”

”And because she wasn't here, you trashed her house?”

”I told you I was p.i.s.sed off,” he snapped, like a truculent teenager.

”Why do the police want to talk with you?”

”They saw me on The Den security tape talking to Jenny Parson the night she was murdered.”

”I thought you didn't know Jenny.”

”You could never know her. But we shared the same ... disgust. We hated the same people. But in different ways.”

My stomach tightened. ”What people?

He fell silent staring at the Sub-Zero refrigerator. Pus.h.i.+ng his hair from his forehead he finally said, ”The people we were blackmailing.”

”Ben.” I sat down at the table, smelling the soft aroma of its polished old wood.

”Jenny felt this rush of power. I just felt a kinda revenge. But then I was sick of all their old naked bodies. Sick of their needs. Sick of her, sick of me.” He tossed his head back defiantly. ”Aren't you going to ask me how Ben Zaitlin, who has whatever he wants, could do such a thing? Aren't you going to say I'm disappointed in you, Ben?”

”No.”

His expression softened, and he looked even younger than his twenty-one years. ”No, you wouldn't, would you? You're the sanest person in this f.u.c.king town.”

”Not saying much, is it?”

For a moment I thought he was going cry, but he quickly turned toward the sink, flipped the faucet on, and threw water on his face. He tore off a section of paper towel from its wrought-iron holder and dried himself. Wadding it up, he threw it into the sink.

He swung around to face me. ”Those people we blackmailed were just like my parents, only concerned about what they needed at the moment. Jenny said that we were feeding the beasts. Some of them were even at my birthday party.” He smirked like a frat boy talking about a prank. ”They sucked up to me because I'm Robert's son. They'd asked me what projects he had lined up, as if I could do something for them. And they didn't know I was the one taping them, making them pay. I stayed in the shadows just like a cinematographer on a set.”

”Not quite.”

”s.h.i.+t. It wasn't even good p.o.r.n. It was pathetic. Zackary Logan was the only one true to himself. He knew who he was. A pimp. Even Jenny in her own sick way was trying to please her father or be like him. I never knew who I was ... except that I had always been used. And I hate it!” His cheeks flushed and he looked at the garage door again.

I kept my voice calm. ”You said you came here to see whether Celia would back up your alibi. Why wouldn't she?”