"As you said, we'll see." She looked up at her handsome father, at the uncertainty and confusion in his eyes, at that stern set of his jaw. She lightly laid her hand on his forearm. "Take care, Dad. You don't really think she'll try to press charges?"
"Probably not. She'll forget all about it by this afternoon. If she doesn't, the cops will treat her gently and ask me to see that she has better care."
"Dad, does Mother have money of her own?" "Yes, something in the neighborhood of four hundred thousand. It's safely invested, has been for years. She's never had to touch it. Why do you ask? Oh, I know. Your mother's been claiming I married her for her money again. Not likely, Lacey."
On a hunch, she called San Quentin from the airport. Belinda's father, her mother's first husband, Conal Francis, had been out of jail since the previous Monday. She pressed her forehead against the public phone booth. Where was Belinda's father? Was he as crazy as her father had said he was?
She called Dillon from the plane and got his answering machine. He was probably at the gym. She'd surprise him. She could see him walking through the front door all sweaty and so beautiful she'd have to try to touch all of him at once, which was great fun but impossible. Suddenly, in her mind's eye she saw him and Hannah in the shower. The jealous rage surprised her. She was breathing hard, wanting to yell, but the person seated next to her on the plane probably wouldn't understand. It was in the past. Every woman he'd ever had sex with was in the past, just as Bobby Wellman and his yellow Jaguar were in her past. That made her smile.
It was raining hard in Washington, cold, creeping down into the forties, and utterly miserable. She couldn't wait to get home. Home, she thought. It wasn't her own town house, it was Dillon's wonderful house, with the skylights that gave onto heaven. She got into the taxi at the head of the line and gave the black middle-aged driver directions.
"Bad night," the driver said, giving her a huge white-toothed smile in the rearview mirror.
"I'm hoping the night is going to be a lot better than the day was," she said.
"Pretty little gal like you, I hope it's a hot date?"
"Yes, it is," she said, grinning back. "In fact, I'm going to marry him."
"This guy get lucky or what?"
"Oh yes." She leaned back and closed her eyes. When the taxi pulled up in front of Dillon's red brick house, she was asleep. The driver got out of the cab and walked to the front door. When Savich answered, the driver gave him a big grin.
"I've got a nice little present for you, but she's all asleep in the back of my cab. I guess you're her hot date, huh? And the guy who's going to marry her?"
"She told you that, did she? That's a really good sign."
"Women always tell me everything," the driver said, walking back to the taxi.
Savich couldn't wait to get her inside the house.
"Dillon?"
"Yes, it's me. Go back to sleep, Sherlock. You're home now. But I'm not going to let you sleep very long. That all right with you?" He leaned down and kissed her nose.
"Okay," she said, and bit his earlobe.
She giggled. He thought it was the sweetest sound he'd ever heard in his life.
The phone was ringing as he laid her on the bed.
"Well damn," he said and answered it. She lay on her back, just looking over at him, listening to his deep voice, his very short answers. When he hung up the phone, she said, "Have they caught him?"
Savich just shook his head. "No, but it might be really soon. That was Jimmy Maitland. A call came through from this woman in southern Ohio claiming to have seen both Marlin and Erasmus in a restaurant off the turnpike. It sounds like it's for real. They're going to check. They'll get back to us when they know one way or the other. Nothing to do now but wait."
"Is this the first time both Erasmus and Marlin have been reported being seen together?"
He nodded as he pulled his navy blue sweater over his head. He smiled at her as he unfastened his jeans.
Sometime later, she whispered in his mouth, "Please sing to me."
His rich baritone filled the air. "You're my gateway to heaven, all tied up in a bow. Let me at your hinges and I'll oil them really slow.''
The phone rang again. He held her close as he rolled to his side. "Savich here."
"We think it's Erasmus and Marlin," said Jimmy Maitland, more excitement in his voice than Savich had heard in three months. "So it looks like they're in Ohio. I'll get back to you when I hear any more."