The Unusual Suspects
Betty wedged her cell phone between her shoulder and ear as she double-checked all the files she wanted to bring into the office for her first day. "Are you standing near a window? Don't! Guns can fire through windows."
"I'm not near any windows," Daniel promised. He lounged in the breakfast room of his childhood home, where he'd been staying ("hiding out" didn't sound very dignified, he thought) since the revelation that someone was trying to kill him. The security system at the Meade mansion was state of the art, something he appreciated more after a couple of attempts on his life. What he didn't appreciate was being trapped inside, day after day after day. MODE was mostly getting edited via email. "Stop worrying about me, okay? This is your big day!"
"Believe me, I remember. But if I don't worry about you, then I might start worrying about me." Betty quickly glanced at her reflection in the mirror: soft yellow dress, green cardigan, plaid bag. Hair sleek and bouncy. Perfect. "I'd rather be concerned about you and walk into my first day at NYRB calm and confident. Do you feel safe? Are you freaking out over there?"
"Only from boredom." He glanced up to nod thanks to the cook who deposited a fluffy Belgian waffle in front of him, piled high with strawberries, on a fine china plate. "It's like a prison in here." From the next room, Daniel could see Yoga giving him a look, but he felt like there were definite parallels she just wasn't grasping at the moment.
"I'm sure the police will get to the bottom of it soon," she promised. "Then you'll be free again."
"But I'd rather be free today. Then I could see you off to your first day at work. Pack your lunch for you." Daniel cradled the phone against his face as though it were her hand. "Make sure you had your milk money."
Betty knew her smile would shine through in her voice. "That sounds – beyond sweet. You know, I could come by afterwards, tell you all about my day."
"Don't even think about it," he said, suddenly as firm as she'd ever heard him. "You came way too close to getting hurt last time. It's not worth the risk."
"I want to see you."
"And I want to see you, but not nearly as much as I want you to stay safe."
Betty sighed. Daniel's overprotective nature was as frustrating as it was endearing. "Well, the police had better get a move on finding whoever did this. I miss you."
"Miss you too."
For a moment, there was silence – not exactly comfortable, but nonetheless full of promise. She thought the wave of nervousness she felt was a lot like that of a small child looking at a Christmas tree piled high with presents that couldn't be opened just yet.
I think about you all the time, Betty imagined saying. I worry about you and wish I could hold you and I wonder what happened in my brain to turn you from my friend into this man I adore.
I can't sleep at night for wanting you, Daniel imagined saying. It's like everything I do is just killing time until I can finally be with you. My entire life is this one long countdown until I kiss you at last.
But the pause in conversation only stretched out longer.
"Okay," Betty finally said as she headed for the door. "I'm going out. Wish me luck."
"I would if you needed it. You don't. You're going to knock 'em dead." Daniel paused. "Too soon after the shooting?"
"Kinda." She couldn't help grinning anyway.
"What I mean is – you're the most brilliant, beautiful, fantastic woman that's ever walked into that office. They're going to know that the second you come through the door, because these guys are all smarter than me. It won't take them nearly as long to figure that out."
Her cheeks flushed, her heart to full for her to share with him as she ran downstairs, Betty said only, "You're getting smarter all the time."
He laughed, and once again she thought of Christmas morning.
oooooo
Some people thought money solved anything. Tyler had once been one of those people, he mused, until money actually came his way.
Turned out having money made a whole lot of things much harder.
Take, for instance, sobriety. He'd managed to quit drinking while working as a bartender – not exactly a cakewalk – but he'd done it because he had to. Tyler went off the rails when he drank; going off the rails meant not showing up for work; not showing up for work meant no paychecks; no paychecks meant no paying the rent, which meant eviction notices. He liked living indoors. Hello, willpower.
But how could you hit bottom when all that money was in the way, cushioning your fall? He wasn't even paying rent, just living in his mother's palatial home. Sometimes, late at night in a restaurant, when he was dutifully sipping club soda while Marc and Amanda quaffed cocktails and strategized ways for Marc to flirt with some guy named Cliff – that was when Tyler started thinking about how he could buy any bottle of wine in the house, the finest whiskeys, the most exclusive champagnes. He didn't have to scrape through his jacket pockets and see if he had money for a cab; there was a town car that showed up anytime he hit the speed dial on his cell. And if he acted out the way he sometimes had – well, bail would be easier to make than before.
Yeah, being rich made it harder to be sober. So far, Tyler thought he'd only remained on the straight and narrow because of two things: The terrifying memory of having pulled a gun on his own mother, and the bizarre miracle that was Amanda Tanen Sommers.
He sat up in her bed that morning, watching her sleep. He'd helped her drift off last night by tickling her back and telling her she was pretty – his idea of a good time. She reminded him of the kitten he'd had as a boy, with the way her playful, spoiled nature didn't quite conceal the love and loyalty beneath the surface. Tyler gazed down at her and wished that adoring her could be enough to make him happy.
But it wasn't.
Her alarm went off the same time it usually did; Amanda swatted at it in annoyance before frowning up at him. "Tell me it's not Monday."
"Sorry, it is."
"Today I have to do a photo shoot with luggage." She propped up on her elbows, golden curls all askew. "How am I supposed to make luggage look hot? They're boxes. Boxes with handles. None of that is hot. I don't even know what Daniel's thinking. Maybe he went stir crazy since he's, like, under siege."
Tyler brushed her hair from her forehead. "Listen, I've been thinking about something."
"I could tell. You didn't make cinnamon rolls." Amanda's lower lip stuck out in a pout, but the concern in her eyes was clear. "What's up?"
The words stuck in his throat, but he had to tell someone eventually, and there was nobody better to hear it than her. "I want to talk to my father."
Amanda sat upright. "You mean your DNA, blood test, bio father. Your Cal Hartley father."
Tyler nodded.
She bit her lower lip before saying, "Are you sure? He's kind of an ass-munch."
"So I've heard. But it doesn't matter. He's still my father."
Amanda folded her arms over her knees. She remained silent long enough that he knew she was carefully considering her next words … which, in Amanda's case, meant she was considering them, period. Normally there wasn't much of an editor between her brain and her mouth. It was one of the best things about her. But it also made him listen more closely now. "I knew Fey Sommers a little. She never said anything special to me. I mean, I'm not sure she ever looked at me."
"She has to have looked at you. You were her daughter, Amanda. It wasn't coincidence that you ended up at MODE."
"I know that, but – she never let me see her looking. Which is about as bad." Her voice gentled as she said, "Still, I'm so glad I met her. It would've been a zillion times worse if I hadn't."
"Which is your way of saying you'll help me talk to – Mr. Hartley." What else could Tyler call him?
Amanda said, "It's also my way of saying that this stuff doesn't always go well. Sometimes it's really crappy."
"I need this." It wasn't about staying sober, at least not exactly; it was about finding out who he was. As long as he hadn't looked his birth father in the face, Tyler felt as if some critical element of that was missing. And with money piling up all around him, cushioning every blow and concealing every view, self-knowledge was more important than ever.
"I know you need it. So we'll get it for you." Amanda folded her arms around him, as if she could grab all the good things in the world for them both, just that easily. If anybody could do it, it would be her.
oooooo
"My," said the receptionist behind chunky black glasses frames that made Betty's look subtle. "How – colorful."
"Thanks!" Betty already realized that wasn't necessarily a compliment.
Where MODE's offices were accented with "rumba orange" and peopled with staffers as slender and bright as butterflies, NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS seemed to be very, very committed to beige. Also gray. Black and white were favored too. But mostly beige and gray.
Instead of the Tube, there was an ordinary corridor with vintage framed covers at poster size and endless bookshelves piled high with publisher ARCs. Old frayed Persian rugs topped the thinner office carpet in places, but even these were mostly camel-colored. Even the buzz of conversation around the office was muted, almost hushed, and people walked slower on their way through the halls. At 26, Betty had been near the median age of a MODE staffer; already she could tell she was probably the youngest person here, maybe by a decade.
So what, Betty told herself. You've been a fish out of water before. Heck, you've never been IN water. You're like – a lungfish. Or something. You know how to do this!
But this was supposed to be my fishtank …
Then Jackson Noble stepped out, and it became much easier to smile. He had interviewed her for the job – he was a handsome man in a sort of overripe frat boy way, with dark blond hair shot through with silver at the temples and a strong jaw and good build that nonetheless was slightly padded with the aftereffects of good wine. His shirt was a daring-for-this-place navy blue. "Betty! I see HR's processed you in record time. You're in time for the monthly pitch meeting."
"Sounds great." Though she'd expected to have a few days to get her feet under her before having to pitch ideas, she'd prepared something just in case.
See? Betty told herself. This is going to be your fishtank after all. Even if you are the only one who wears colors. That just makes you the tropical fish! Consider Nemo found.
And she felt really good until about five minutes into the meeting.
"Obviously you want to delve into the question of how Bishop's poetry has been edited," Jackson said to a gray-clad staffer who nodded and jotted notes in a forbiddingly thick file; at NYRB, people did more research on their pitches than some doctoral candidates did for their theses. "That's critical. But I want to see more appreciation of the poetry itself."
The staffer nodded. "I particularly want to examine the psychology of how she deals with liminal spaces."
People murmured agreement. Betty wanted a thesaurus.
"So, Jodie's replacement has come to save us – from Jodie, anyway – " As Jackson said it, people chuckled, and the mood suddenly felt more like MODE than it had before. Not in a good way. "I realize we're throwing you into the deep end, Betty, but do you have anything to suggest?"
"Yes," Betty said. "I want to write about drag."
(You could take the girl out of MODE, but …)
For the next five minutes, she went through the latest scholarly and pop works on drag queens, the mainstreaming of drag culture, and how the fashion industry was embracing that influence more openly than ever before. Familiar with NYRB's format, she was careful to bring in at least five recently released books that could serve as sources and inspiration for the article. It was sharp. It was edgy for NYRB, but not beyond the pale. It drew on her most recent work experience to build a bridge to her new publication. It was a good pitch, and she was proud of it.
But when she finished, nobody said anything for a long moment.
"I like it," Jackson finally said, "but it's not quite there yet."
Betty pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose. "Oh. I see. Do you feel like it's not – focused enough on any one publication, or – "
"It's not that. It's just … you're doing a great job of telling me what people are saying about drag these days." Jackson took off his glasses and chewed thoughtfully on the earpiece for a moment. People really didn't worry about their image here. "A great NYRB article, though – that tells us what people aren't saying."
"I need to report on what's not being said," Betty repeated.
He grinned. "I knew you'd get it. Bring it back to me in a few days, okay?"
She didn't get it.
But he took her to lunch afterward, which was pleasant and filled with harmless office gossip, and Betty resolved to find her way out of the quandary. Best of all was looking down at her phone as she walked back to her new office to see a text from Daniel: How's it going, superstar?
My first pitch meeting was kind of terrifying. But I survived.
Of course you blew them away.
Not quite. They want me to talk about what isn't being said.
Huh?
IKR?
Huh again?
I know, right? That's what IKR stands for.
Oh! Got it.
Betty had to smile. Daniel could take an extra couple minutes to catch on sometimes. But then, that was true of her too, at least in this place …
And then she thought of one possible interpretation of "what's not being said."
It didn't apply to her article pitch in the slightest.
oooooo
Yoga's cell phone rang, playing "I Kissed A Girl" by Katy Perry. She answered it, "For the last time, Fish, I'm being careful."
"He's a dangerous man," Claire said. "Are you sure I shouldn't come with you?"
"Hell, no. This is your son we're talking about. You're not going to stay cool. And cool is what we need here. Trust me on this."
"But someone could go with you. Tyler, perhaps. Let me call him."
"Too late. I see him. He's gonna see me soon. Better not to give him extra time to get ready. I like the element of surprise."
"The police could handle this."
"First of all, so far as I can tell, the police aren't doing shit, and second of all, this is the same law-enforcement agency that thinks I died in a prison escape four years ago. You want that brain trust protecting Daniel?"
Claire sighed. "Fine. Let him have it."
"I intend to," Yoga said, before snapping off her phone and crossing Strawberry Fields to face Connor Owens.
He sat on one of the nearby benches, staring down at the sunflower-styled mosaic that read only IMAGINE. Although he couldn't have recognized her, he nonetheless looked up as she came close; this was a wary man.
"Interesting to find you here," she said. "Most violent criminals I've known weren't big Beatles fans. I tend toward the Rolling Stones, myself."
"Who the hell are you?"
"A friend of the Meade family. Which is bad news for you, by the way."
Connor leaned back on the bench, spreading his arms wide across the top. He was one confident mofo; she'd give him that. Handsome, too, if you went for guys. "Have they given up on wheedling the DA to rescind my parole? Are you here to break my fingers instead?"
"Could if I wanted to."
"I'm tougher than I look."
Yoga replied, "I'm exactly as tough as I look."
Connor's eyes narrowed as he looked up at her. "You're a die-hard bitch, aren't you?" Then his face split in a grin. "I like that in a woman."
Now that they understood each other, Yoga thought, they could get down to business. "You heard about the helicopter accident a few weeks back."
"Couldn't have missed it."
"Might not have been an accident."
"Ah. So someone else thinks it might have been me." Connor took a sip from his bottle of water. All around them, tourists snapped photos of the mural; one aging hippie lady dropped flower petals onto it, obscuring the letters in IMAGINE until it became only IMAGE. "In other words, someone else is wrong."
"You've got a hate on for Daniel Meade."
"You think I'm the only one? Talking to everyone he's screwed over in this city – or simply screwed – it's going to take you a while."
"You're the only convict."
"In other words, I'm the one with the most to lose by attempting to kill him. The obvious first suspect. The easiest to jail. I'd have to be idiotic to try something like that, and I assure you, I am no fool."
That much, Yoga could believe. "Your temper could get the better of you."
"I prefer colder kinds of revenge."
"You don't think you've had your revenge already?"
Connor seemed to consider that for a while, staring up at the skyline framing the west edge of the park. Finally he said, "I'm a 36-year-old man with an Ivy League education and a brilliant c.v. that ends abruptly with my conviction on an embezzlement charge. My career is sunk, which means I get to spend my days hanging out in Central Park, trying to act as though I'm on the world's longest lunch break. The girl I intended to marry is buried under a tombstone with Daniel's last name on it. My future is blank except for the love of a woman who's got to notice, sooner or later, that I'm nothing but a weight around her neck. There's no such thing as proper revenge for that. And these days I'm learning how little I care for futility."
"So you say you're not going after Daniel because it wouldn't do you a damn bit of good." Yoga folded her arms. "Any reason why I should believe you?"
"Not one in the world. But keep digging. You'll find someone else who's angry with Daniel Meade." Connor winked at her. "I'm sure of that."
oooooo
Daniel was bored out of his skull.
Editing only filled so many hours a day. Without the meetings, the lunches with designers, the model casting sessions, or Wilhelmina's verbal traps, his work went fairly smoothly. This meant he had to explore every other thing he could do in his house.
One week in, and already he had:
-read one of his mother's books, THE SHELL SEEKERS, which was mostly about an old lady in England but had flashbacks to when she'd been young and in love during World War II. She'd dressed eccentrically and been disapproved of for her warm nature and disregard of propriety, so he imagined Betty in the starring role. This was more rewarding before the male love interest, whom he had made Daniel-shaped, died tragically.
-gotten back in the groove in terms of his push-ups and sit-ups, because he'd let things get a little slack in the year since Molly's death and he wanted to be able to bring the big guns out for Betty.
-watched, commented on and favorited all of DJ's skateboarding videos on YouTube, as well as vids featuring the antics of many small, cute animals, some of which he emailed to Betty.
-found his and Alex's old toybox, which included a model plane kit they'd never opened up, which he began building. Daniel figured it would be something to show Betty … via iPhone photo, of course.
He breathed out in frustration as he carefully used tweezers to affix a decal on the tail. The fact was, it didn't matter what he came up with to do at his mother's house. The only thing he wanted to be doing right now was spending time with Betty, and that was the one thing he couldn't do, for her own safety. Talking to her on the phone wasn't the same. They were on the verge of something – something amazing – and he'd never done well with anticipation. The waiting was bugging him much more than the fact that somebody apparently wanted him dead.
Which was maybe not the ideal set of priorities. Daniel realized that. But there it was.
Maybe nobody was actually trying to kill him. The police hadn't proved anything, after all. Helicopters could crash for no reason. Random drive-by shootings weren't as common in New York City as they'd been in the 1980s, but they weren't impossible. And nothing had happened to him in days now, right? The killer must have given up, if there was even a killer to start with.
After a few minutes of consideration, Daniel had more or less talked himself into believing that nobody was really trying to hurt him. However, he knew talking Betty into this would be a lot harder.
Just as he smoothed the model plane's decal out to perfection, his phone rang. "Hey, there you are," he said, getting up from his project to flop down on his childhood bed. "How was it?"
"Petrifying. My first pitch was kind of … off."
She described what the issue was, though it didn't make much sense to Daniel. "How are you supposed to write an entire article about what people aren't saying?"
"I have to think about that," Betty said. "I mean, I started thinking about it, and I came up with something."
"Okay, pitch me." Daniel slid his free arm under his head, ready and willing to play the part of an NYRB editor.
"It's not about the magazine. It's about us." Her words rushed out, a bubbling brook that flowed over him. "Daniel, we've been talking about everything in the world for the past month except what's going on with you and me. I mean, we talked about it a little, but only a little, and even less now that we're not able to do anything but talk. Doesn't it seem like talking would lead to, well, more talking?"
"I … guess?" He tried to follow this, thought he had it, and frowned. "Betty – there's so much I want to say to you, but over the phone – for the first time – I don't know."
Betty sighed. "Believe me, I understand. But you and I have been trying to find the ideal time to talk for a while now. Ideal times – they're hard to come by. Maybe we should look at this period where we can only talk on the phone as an opportunity, you know? Let's say what needs to be said."
That made good sense. Daniel's spirits brightened. "Okay. Yeah. Definitely."
"Right?"
"Right!" A long silence followed.
And got longer.
And longer.
Finally he said, "You go first."
"Daniel."
"It's awkward! Just – plunging in like that. Things were so much easier when you could get somebody to check a box on a note. Do you like me? Yes. No."
"That was junior high."
"Still!"
"I know. I tell you what. We'll trade questions. Back and forth. Just to get started. Okay?"
At that moment, the only question Daniel could come up with was What are you wearing?, but he'd just have to think of something else. "Sure. Okay."
"Well – when did this change for you? How you felt about me." Betty's voice was thinner – almost tight – and Daniel realized suddenly how nervous she was. Almost frightened. "We've been friends for so long, and it's not like I was pining over you all this time. And I know you weren't pining over me all those years you were shagging supermodels."
"Hilda's wedding. That was when it changed."
"Wow. That was a really definite answer."
"I remember it like it was yesterday." Daniel smiled softly as he thought about it. "You remember how I freaked out about you taking Henry as your date, right? That was, uh, extreme. And I didn't get why I'd acted that way, until Hilda gave her wedding toast. When she said that protecting someone no matter what was love – said she'd married her best friend – I just looked across the room at you and it hit me, like, wham."
"Oh, my God. I never dreamed –"
"I wasn't ready to say anything yet. Obviously. But man, when I walked up and asked you to dance – my heart was going about a thousand miles an hour in my chest."
Betty giggled, a sound he'd cherished before but warmed him even more now. "That's not what I thought you were going to say."
"What did you think I'd say?
"That it was the night I got my braces off."
"Huh? No." Daniel considered this as he rolled onto one side. "I mean, I did end up thinking about your smile a lot after, but – still oblivious."
"The wedding. Hilda's toast. Okay." He could hear her happiness, and it was almost as good as seeing it. Daniel could just imagine her, curling up on her sofa, kicking off her shoes, beaming at what he'd just said. "You know, a couple of their wedding pictures show us dancing. I'm never going to look at those the same way again."
"I want to see those too. Listen – before I told you – you sounded kind of nervous."
"Well, I was. I really didn't want you to say it was about the braces."
He propped up on the bed. "Wait. You seriously thought I might have wanted to go out with you just because you got your braces off?"
"It makes a difference," she said simply.
"Not to me." That was something he hadn't known was true before now, but the very fact that it had never occurred to him before struck Daniel as proof that it was so. "What about you? When did you realize you were – you know – " They were at a weird phase in their relationship, at least with terminology. "That you didn't just see me as a friend?"
"The day you showed me your new apartment, and we split that cookie."
Never in a thousand years would Daniel have guessed this. "The one dollar cookie from the deli?"
"Uh-huh."
All he could think of to say was, "That must have been a great cookie." Was it chocolate chip or oatmeal? He needed to know these things!
"Silly, it wasn't about the cookie. You had been so awesome coming through for me the past few weeks before that, and when you helped me take care of Papi that weekend – I don't know. I guess I was realizing how important you've always been to me. But it was something about the way you looked at me when we broke that cookie between us. That was what made me think, you know. Oh." Betty's words made Daniel's ego swell like the sails of a ship in the breeze, until she blithely added, "I'd never been attracted to you before that."
The breeze stopped. The sails sagged flat. "… never?"
"Nope. Well. Maybe one time."
He sat up on the bed, feeling more enthusiastic already. "Tell me about the one time."
Her voice turned up at the edges when she was feeling mischievous – like crepe paper crinkled around a present, he thought. "Do you remember that night after the whole Sofia mess when you and I went out and sang karaoke and all of that?"
"Of course I do. That was the first time for me, too."
"The first time you sang karaoke?"
"No. I mean, yes, but the first time I realized I could be attracted to you. I wasn't anywhere near doing anything about it, but I just remember thinking, you know – this is a woman. A woman worth having."
"Really?" Betty laughed in delight. "Wow, I didn't get nearly that far."
"But I thought you said – "
"Yeah, but when we were actually on the bridge, I was just like, Daniel's a nicer guy than most people realize. The other part - it was that morning, when I finally got home and went to sleep. I had this dream about you."
Whatever ego bruising might have resulted from the revelation about the bridge was instantly erased. "Tell me."
"It wasn't much. We were in the office alone, late, like we often were, and you just – " Her words softened, warming Daniel to the core. "You walked up to me and kind of, I don't know, backed me against the wall. Not in a scary way. In a good way. I remembering thinking in the dream that this should feel strange, but it didn't. It was amazing. Then you leaned down and bit me – not too hard. Right where the neck meets the shoulder. Just hard enough for me to feel it. I woke up so – well, so turned on, I could hardly breathe."
Daniel knew how that felt. He was feeling it right now. Why was that so maddeningly erotic, the thought of gently biting her just there? "That is … crazy hot."
"I could hardly look at you the next morning," Betty confessed. "But I told myself the dream was probably symbolic or something."
He started laughing, and she did too, and he had to admit – there was something to this thing where you said whatever you hadn't been saying before.
oooooo
Yoga had to admit that Connor Owens had been right about one thing: There were a whole lot of people who had reasons to dislike Daniel Meade.
"Daniel and I get along a lot better these days," Wilhelmina said as she examined her French manicure for any potential chips or scratches. Her nails were perfect, of course. They didn't dare be otherwise. "Ask anyone."
"You've spent most of the last four years trying to throw him out of his job," Yoga pointed out. "Ask anyone."
Wilhelmina shrugged. "I've made my peace with it. Someday, I'll strike out on my own. Someday soon, I think. If MODE is so precious to Daniel, let him have it."
Yoga folded her arms as she reclined in the fancy-shmancy leather chair in Wilhelmina's office. Damn, magazine people had it nice. Not as nice as financiers, which was why she was glad she'd chosen to scam them instead – but nice. "You spend a whole lot of time with a guy who's got a bigger problem with Daniel than you ever did."
That got a reaction even more vehement than the one Yoga had been hoping for. Wilhelmina leaned across the desk, her lilac suit bunching at the shoulders to reveal that this woman was as much linebacker as supermodel, at least when she was angry. "Leave Connor out of this. He's assured me he won't bother the Meades again, and I believe him."
"You had to ask him, though. And who knows – maybe you thought the best way to make sure Connor didn't hurt Daniel was to make sure he didn't have the chance."
"You think like the convict you are," Wilhelmina snapped. "Listen, sister, you think I outmaneuvered Anna Wintour by being a pushover? Think again."
"Don't 'sister' me," Yoga said. "We'll talk about this some other time."
Some of the suspects were people Yoga was curious to see for – other reasons.
"Let me get this straight," Cal Hartley said, across a boardroom desk bigger than some beds. "You're a … private investigator?"
"I prefer to call myself a friend of the family." This nicely got around Yoga having to mention that she didn't have a license. "It's no secret that there's bad blood between you and the Meades."
"Claire and I used to get along quite nicely," Cal retorted. "Trust me, my wife's never gonna let me forget that."
He said it so smoothly that Yoga realized he couldn't have had any clue how that would affect her. This self-satisfied douchebag had once run a number around her Fish. More than once. Fish had the dude's baby, who turned out to be a nice-looking, good kind of guy like Tyler. And still Hartley treated her like crap. Who could do that to a lady like Claire Meade? From the first time they met – in their cell, where Fish had stolen one of Yoga's Virginia Slims and the resulting fistfight had somehow, within minutes, turned into a conversation about how occasionally you just had to torch some bitch's car and that was all there was to it – Yoga had felt like it was obvious that Fish deserved better than most people. Not worse. Not what this tool had given her.
Well, if he'd turned Fish off men for life, Yoga figured she owed the guy a favor. She wasn't going to do it for him today.
"You've accused the Meades of lying about the fact that Tyler Hamill's your kid," Yoga said. "You gave Daniel Meade in particular all kinds of shit. At the HOT FLASH soiree, you made it damn clear you wanted them to back off for good about you being the baby daddy. Sure you didn't decide to take that into your own hands?"
"Yes, I'm the kind of moron who angrily confronts people in public before I try to kill them," Cal snapped. "If you're not going to give me credit for enough morality to not murder people in cold blood, at least give me enough credit to act on advice of my legal counsel."
"You're stupid enough to walk away from Fish, you're stupid enough for anything."
The man's scowl deepened. "Why are you talking about fish?"
"Never mind," Yoga sighed, rising to leave before he threw her out. Ever since her jailbreak, she'd come to especially value leaving on her own terms.
Some suspects, at least, could be eliminated immediately.
"I realize that, in the public imagination, I stand for all the girls Daniel Meade ever treated badly." Sofia Reyes strolled easily down the street outside the Meade Publications building, slipping on her sunglasses as Yoga did the same. "But I never had any personal reason to dislike Daniel. He's the one who has reason to hate me, not the other way around."
"Can't be easy, though. Working for your ex. Particularly an ex who hates your guts."
"Daniel's always behaved very maturely about that. I misjudged him, really. He's a decent man. But – I did what I had to do. My magazine rose to prominence because of that stunt, and we're still one of the company's main moneymakers." Sofia shrugged. "We've all moved on."
Sounded about right.
But someone, somewhere, had been done wrong by Daniel Meade, or believed he had, anyway. And that person had definitely not moved on.
That person wouldn't move on until Daniel was dead.
oooooo
Betty's neck had cramped up a long time ago, so she now had her Bluetooth earpiece on as she made her dinner waffles, the better to keep their conversation rolling.
"Waffles for dinner?" Daniel said.
"Hey, I've got Tae Kwon Do later. I have to do some carb loading." Betty paused. "Wait, did I just defend my food choices? I try not to do that."
"Didn't mean to set you up for it. That just sounds – well, it sounds good, actually."
"You had a waffle for breakfast."
"Can't have too many waffles."
"Point taken." Betty smeared a bit of butter atop her waffles, the knife scraping against the crusty surface. "So, tell me more about this thing on the bridge. Where you figured out I was a 'woman worth having.'"
Daniel's voice gentled as he said, "You were just so – freaking adorable that night. Wait. That's not poetic, is it? Freaking."
She had to laugh. "You don't have to be poetic. Just honest."
"Okay. Well, you were freaking adorable. Showing up at the restaurant like that, and sharing your wine with me at karaoke – that was kind of the hot move, actually. Not that I was evolved enough to realize I ought to work with that yet. But I did think, us drinking out of the same glass – kinda sexy."
"Dork. You just left yours on the table."
"Otherwise, you wouldn't have given me a sip?"
"I would now," she said, only realizing after she'd said it that the whole thing sounded like a bit of a double entendre. Then again – they were talking about romance, right? About maybe being in a relationship together. Flirting. Sooner or later, that led to sex.
And sex was a lot easier to do than to talk about.
But hadn't she told Daniel that they needed to be open and honest with each other? Wasn't this period of enforced physical separation best used to bring them closer together emotionally? Didn't she need to get used to talking about this with him eventually? If they were going to do it, she had to at least be able to say it.
"So," she said, toying nervously with her fork, "about sex."
The sound that followed was sort of like when air got in the plumbing and made the faucet explode. "Jesus," Daniel coughed, sputtering. "You had to say that right when I drank a mouthful of club soda."
"Sorry."
"No, it's okay! That is – a good topic. I like that topic. I just, uh, got club soda on the counter. And the fridge. Maybe the ceiling."
Betty's grin stretched her mouth even wider. "I mean, I don't want us to rush things …"
"No rushing. Definitely no rushing."
"…but we have known each other for almost four years, which certainly goes way past rushing it …"
"Certainly. Absolutely."
"You're going to agree with anything I say about this, aren't you?"
"Uh-huh."
"Well, stop it."
"But what if I really do agree?"
As she cut a slice of waffle, she said, "Just tell me what you're feeling." She heard a soft chiming in the background. "What's that?"
"The doorbell," Daniel said, his voice oddly distant.
Then Betty realized why he sounded so strange. He was staying at the Meade mansion for his own safety – which meant any guests he didn't know about had to be uninvited. "Don't answer it. Tyler can get it, or your mom."
"They're both out. Yoga too. And Yoga's definitely the one I'd send." The door chimed again. "Listen – it's probably one of Mom's society friends. Or a delivery. Or Amanda, looking for Tyler, if they're not together."
"You have to be careful!" Betty insisted. "Someone's trying to kill you."
"Are they? It's not like we have total proof that the crash wasn't an accident, and the shooting really could've been a drive-by. And it's been days now without anybody making a move, including me." He sighed in apparent frustration. "Plus I'm sick of being cooped up in this house instead of being with you."
This was why you didn't talk about sex on the phone! It made men frustrated, and then they did stupid things. "You stay put, Daniel."
"Okay, okay. I'm gonna check the door, though. Because this is ridiculous."
"Daniel!" Betty put one hand over her mouth as she heard his feet against the marble floor of the foyer, and the opening of the door. A moment of silence followed, which made her heart beat even faster.
But that was nothing compared to the terror that struck her as she heard the voice of Connor Owens: "What, no hug?"
Continued tomorrow -
