At least at that level, Sam could relate.
"So how do you feel about it?" she asked, and noticed that Luanda's name disappeared from the screen. She'd gotten tired of waiting and had hung up. But someone named Bart was on line three.
"I'm hurt and mad, I guess," Ned was saying. "Mad as hell. I spent two thousand bucks on that trip!"
"So you lost your money and your wife. Why do you think you got involved with the other women in the first place?" Sam asked.
The phone lines began to light up like a Christmas tree. People couldn't wait to comment on Ned's story or offer their own, asking Sam's opinion. Kay was on two, Bart on three and, oh, there was Luanda, again, on four.
Sam talked to Ned a while, explaining about the age-old double standard, then switched to Kay, a vicious woman who was ready to rake Ned and any other cheating man through the coals several times over. Sam imagined her foaming at the mouth in her rage. From there, she listened to Bart, whose girlfriend had gone with him to Tahiti and refused to come home.
The stories, anger, laughter and despair sizzled over the airwaves. Sam interrupted the calls by playing advertising bits and updating the weather with promises of news as soon as it broke, but the time sped by and she felt more at home by the minute. Fleeting thoughts of the letter and mutilated picture she'd received faded as she talked with her listeners.
She'd been at it for nearly three hours, had finished her soft drink, was on her second cup of coffee and was close to signing off when she answered a call from someone, who the computer screen displayed as John.
"This is Dr. Sam. How're you this evening?"
"Good. I'm good," a smooth male voice intoned.
"What's your name?" she asked for the viewers.
"John."
"Hi, John, what would you like to talk about?" She reached for her coffee cup.
"Confession."
"All right."
"That is what you call your show." It wasn't really a question.
"Yes, now, John, what's on your mind?"
"You know me."
"I know you? How?"
"I'm John from your past."
She played along. "I've known lots of Johns."
"I'll bet you have." Was there a hint of disapproval, or superiority in his voice? Who was this guy? Time to get on with the show.
"Do you have something you want to talk about tonight, John?"
"Sins."
She nearly dropped her cup. Her blood ran cold. The voice—the same voice on her recorder. The blanket of security she'd felt all night unraveled. "What kind of sins?" she forced out.
"Yours."
"Mine?" Who was this guy? She needed to get off the line and fast.
"People are punished for their sins."
"How?" she asked, her pulse pounding hard as she glanced at Melanie, who was shaking her head. Obviously John had asked her a different question when she'd screened the call.
"You'll see," he said. Sam signaled Melanie, hoping the girl understood that she needed to get off the line. Fast. She was certain this was the same creep who'd left the message on her personal recorder.
"Maybe I'll have to repent," she said, her nerves strung tight as she stalled for time.
"Of course you will. Confession, Samantha. Midnight confession."
Oh, God, this was the guy. "I'll take it under advisement."
"That would be wise, Sam. Because God knows what you did, and so do I."
"What I did?"
"That's right, you hot-blooded slut. We both know—"
Sam cut him off. From the corner of her eye, she saw Melanie on the other side of the glass, frantically motioning toward the clock. Only twenty seconds until her program was over. The phone lines were blinking like flash lightning. "That's all we have time for tonight," Sam said, trying to compose herself, somehow recalling her signature sign off. Her heart was pounding like a drum as she pressed a button to start the music that ended her show, the Grass Roots singing, "Midnight Confession." As the first few lines of the song faded, she said, "This is Dr. Sam, with a final word… Take care of yourself, New Orleans. Good night to you all and God bless. No matter what your troubles are today, there is always tomorrow Sweet dreams…"
She pushed the play button for a series of commercials, shoved her microphone out of the way and rolled back her chair. Stripping off her headset, she found her crutch, climbed to her feet and, nearly hyperventilating, hitched her way out of the booth.
"How'd that guy get past you?" Sam demanded, as she and Melanie entered the hallway from their separate booths.
"He lied, that's how!" Melanie's face was flushed, her jaw tight, defensive. "Now, where the hell is Tiny?" She stormed up and down the hallway. "He's got less than five minutes to set up the Lights Out show!" She searched the hallway with her eyes.
"Forget Tiny. What was the deal with that last caller?" Sam was shaking inside. Furious. Scared.
"I don't know." Melanie threw up her hands in exasperation. "He—he tripped me up. Said he had a comment about… paradise and paradise lost… I screwed up, okay? So crucify me!"
Sam cringed at Melanie's choice of words. "Let's keep all biblical references out of this!"
"It's over, okay? It won't happen again! I said 'I'm sorry'. "
"No… you didn't. And you fouled up. Those calls are supposed to be screened and…" Samantha let the sentence drop, realizing she was unleashing on her assistant for no good reason. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to calm down. "And I'm overreacting."
"Amen… oops sorry. Didn't mean to get 'biblical'. "
Melanie made air quotes with her fingers around the word, and Sam, despite her fear and anger had to chuckle.
"Forget it."
"I'll try." Melanie was still searching for Tiny as she stalked along the narrow corridor, poking her head into the rooms that were unlocked and rattling the knobs of those that weren't. "Tiny had better show up—"
"Paradise," Sam said to herself as the impact of the caller's words to Melanie hit her like the proverbial ton of bricks. She leaned heavily against the glass wall encasing the old LPs, Ramblin' Rob's shrine. "He wasn't talking about a romantic paradise… it was a reference to Milton's Paradise Lost."
"What?"
"The caller, he was referring to Milton's work. About Satan being cast out of heaven."
Melanie stopped dead in her tracks. "You think?" She lifted questioning eyebrows. "You mean like he's into old literature, or something?" Clearly she wasn't buying it.
"Yes… I'm sure. It's all about sin and redemption and punishment," Sam said, not liking the dark turn of her thoughts. Glancing down the hallway to her assistant, she decided to come clean. "This isn't the first time that guy has contacted me. There was a message left on my answering machine while I was gone."
"What?" Melanie's thoughts of locating Tiny were momentarily forgotten. "You mean when you were in Mexico?"
"Exactly."
"But… wait a minute. I thought you were unlisted— not in the phone book."
"I'm not, but there are ways around that. This is a high-tech world. Anyone can hack into computers, get records, anything from credit cards to social security number and driver's licences. It wouldn't be too tough to find a phone number if you knew what you were doing."
"Just like there are ways to get around the call screener here." Melanie's eyes clouded a bit. "I'm sorry, Sam," she finally said. "He tricked me." Shoving her hair off her shoulders, she asked, "So what have you got, your own personal nutcase? Oh, excuse me, I know that's not PC these days, but this guy sounds waaay off his rocker."
"My speciality. I'm a shrink, y'know."
Footsteps clomped closer, and Tiny rounded the corner, nearly careening into Melanie.
"Hey, watch it," she said, then skewered him with a typical Melanie glare. "We've only got a couple of minutes to start Lights Out. Where the hell were you?"
"Outside."
"Jesus, you're supposed to have the recording read
y to go."
"Don't worry." Tiny said over his shoulder. His coat was damp, and the smell of cigarette smoke followed him as he made his way to the booth Sam had just vacated. "I've got it handled."
"You're going to give me a heart attack."
"Why? You're not the station manager."
"I know, but—"
"Lay off, Melanie, I said it's under control." Tiny shot her a hard glare, and Melanie, always quick to anger, opened her mouth to say more, then added, "Fine, just do it."
Sam took that as her cue to leave. She was tired, edgy and her ankle was beginning to throb. "I'll see you both tomorrow," she said as she made her way back to the shared office, grabbed her raincoat and new purse and headed through the maze of WSLJ offices toward the bank of elevators. Her nerves were still strung tight, and she imagined that the old building with its narrow, labyrinthine hallways, musty smell, and tiny cubicles was more sinister than she remembered. "Stop it," she growled, as the elevator car landed on the first floor. "You're imagining things." At the front door she swiped her card through the automatic lock, then stepped into the humid New Orleans night.
The air was cloying, damp and sticky. Hot and oppressive. A few cars drove through the narrow streets, the smell of the river was heavy in the air, and the streetlights glistened off the fronds of the palm trees in Jackson Square. There were still people wandering the city streets, and Sam couldn't help wonder if any of them was the caller, her "own personal nutcase," a man whose smooth voice caused her blood to congeal.
Rather than try to walk with the damned cast the few blocks to the parking structure, Sam hailed a cab and, during the short ride, watched the pedestrians, who never seemed to disappear no matter what time of night it was.
One of the denizens of this city seems to have a personal vendetta against you. Why, Sam? Why does he want you. to repent? Who the hell is he? And more importantly, just how dangerous is he?
She leaned back against the seat and hoped that this was the end of it. The caller, "John," had finally made contact with her. Maybe now he'd leave her alone.
And yet as the darkened streets of the city passed, she thought of the mutilated publicity shot of herself someone had mailed to her and she knew with mind-numbing certainty that this was just the beginning.
Chapter Three
The moon was blocked by thick, night-blackened clouds. Rain slanted from the sky, and the wind kicked up, causing whitecaps to foam on the usually calm surface of Lake Pontchartrain as the summer squall passed over. Ty Wheeler's sailboat bobbed wildly at the mercy of the wind, sails billowing, deck listing over dark, opaque water. He ignored the elements along with the certainty that he was on a fool's mission—definitely in the wrong place at the wrong time. He should take down the sails and use the damned engine, but it wasn't reliable, and a part of him liked daring the fates.
The way he figured it, this was his chance, and he damned well was going to take it.
Bracing his feet on the rolling deck, he stood at the helm, legs apart, eyes squinting through the most powerful set of binoculars he could find. He focused the glasses on the back of the rambling old plantation-styled home Samantha Leeds now occupied.
Dr. Samantha Leeds, he reminded himself. P H damned D. Enough credentials to choke the proverbial horse and more than enough to allow the good doctor to hand out free advice over the airwaves. No matter who it harmed.
His jaw hardened, and he caught a hint of movement behind the filmy curtains. Then he saw her. His fingers clenched over the slick glasses as he watched, like a damned voyeur, as she walked unevenly through her house. He checked his watch. Three-fifteen in the morning.
And she was beautiful—just as she was in the publicity shots he'd seen—maybe even more so with her tousled red hair and state of undress. Dr. Leeds wore a nightshirt buttoned loosely, its hem brushing the tops of her long, tanned thighs as she walked unevenly through a room lit by Tiffany lamps and adorned with a lot of old-looking furniture— probably antiques. He caught a glimpse of the cast that encased her left foot and half her calf. He'd heard about that, too. Some kind of boating accident in Mexico.
Lips compressed, he anchored the wheel with one hip and felt rain slide down the neck of his parka. The wind had snatched off his hood and tossed his hair around his eyes, but he kept the powerful glasses trained on the house nestled deep in a copse of live oaks. Spanish moss clung to the thick branches and drifted in the wind. Ram ran down off the dormers and down the gutters. An animal—cat, from the looks of it—crept through a square of light thrown from one window. It disappeared quickly into dripping bushes flanking the raised porch.
Ty concentrated on the interior of the house—through the windows. He lost sight of Samantha for a second, then found her again, bending down, reaching forward to pick up her crutch. The nightshirt rode upward, giving him a peek at lacy white panties stretched over round, tight buttocks.
His crotch tightened. Throbbed. He ground his back teeth together, but ignored his male response just as he disregarded the warm rain stinging his face blurring the lenses of his binoculars.
He wouldn't think of her as a woman.
He needed her. He intended to lie to her. To use her. And that's all there was to it.
But, God, she was beautiful. Those legs—
She straightened suddenly, as if she sensed him watching her.
Turning, she walked to the windows and stared out, green eyes wide, red hair tousled as if she'd just gotten out of bed, skin without a hint of makeup. His pulse jumped a notch. She squinted through the glass, her eyes narrowing. Maybe she saw the silhouette of the boat, his shadow at the helm. Eerily, as if she knew what he was thinking, she met his stare with distrustful eyes and a gaze that scoured his black soul.
Wrong.
She was too far away.
The night was dark as pitch.
His imagination was running wild.
There was a slight chance she could see his running lights or the white sails, and, if so, make out the image of a man on his boat, but without binoculars there was no way she'd be able to see his features, would never recognize him, and couldn't, not for a minute, guess what he was thinking, or his intentions.
Good.
There was time enough for meeting face-to-face later. For the lies he would have to spin to get what he wanted. For a half a second, he felt a twinge of remorse, gritted his teeth. No time for second-guessing. He was committed. Period. As he watched through the glasses, she reached up and snapped the shades of her window closed, cutting off his view.
Too bad. She wasn't hard on the eyes. Far from it.
And that might pose a problem. In Ty's mind, Dr. Samantha Leeds was too pretty for her own damned good.
"… so you're sure you're okay?" David asked for the fifth time in the span of ten minutes. Holding the cordless receiver to her ear, Sam walked to the window of her bedroom and looked into the gloomy afternoon. Lake Pontchartrain was a somber gray, the waters shifting as restlessly as the clouds overhead.
"I'm fine, really." Now she wished she hadn't confided in him about the caller, but when David had phoned, she decided that he would find out soon enough anyway. It was a matter of public record, and sooner or later the news would filter across state lines. "I've talked to the police, and I'm having all the locks changed. I'll be okay. Don't worry."
"I don't like the sounds of it, Samantha." She imagined the tightening of the corners of his mouth. "Maybe you should look at this as some kind of… warning… you know, a sign that you should turn your life in a different direction."
"A sign?" she repeated, her eyes narrowing as she stared at the lake stretching from her yard to the distant shore. "As in God is trying to talk to me? You mean like the burning bush or—"
"There's no reason to get sarcastic," he cut in.
"You're right. I'm sorry." She balanced her hips on the arm of a wing chair. "I guess I'm a little edgy. I didn't sleep well."
"I'll bet."
She didn'
t mention the boat; she was certain a sailboat had been drifting just off her dock, that in the barest of light from the shore, she'd seen running lights and the reflection of giant sails with a man's contour against the backdrop. Or maybe it had been her imagination running wild…
"So where are you, again?" she asked, reaching to the nightstand and retrieving a knitting needle she'd found in the closet, part of the personal items she'd inherited from her mother. Feeling a twinge of guilt, she slipped the needle between the cast and her leg and scratched. Her doctor would probably kill her if he knew, but then he was the crusty old guy down in Mazatlán, the expatriate she'd never see again if she was lucky.
"I'm here in San Antonio, and it's a deluge. I'm standing at the window of my hotel room looking over the River Walk and it's like a wall of water—can't even see the restaurant across the river. The sky just opened up." He sighed and for a second his cell phone cut out, the connection was lost, only to return. "… wish you were here Samantha. I've got a room with a Jacuzzi and a fireplace. It could be cozy."
And it could be hell. She remembered Mexico. The way David had smothered her. The fights. He'd wanted her to move back to Houston, and when she'd refused, she'd witnessed a side of him she didn't like. His face had turned a deep scarlet and a small vein had throbbed over one eyebrow. His fists had even clenched as he'd told her that she was an idiot not to take him up on his offer. At that moment, she'd known she never would.
"I thought I made it clear how I felt," she said, watching a raindrop drizzle a zigzag course down the window. She gave up on the knitting needle and tossed it onto the bureau.
"I hoped you'd changed your mind."
"I haven't. David, it won't work. I know this sounds corny and trite, but I thought you and I, we could—"
"—just be friends," he finished for her, his voice flat.
"You don't have to put the 'just' in there. It's not like being friends isn't a good thing."
"I don't feel that way about you," he said, and she imagined his serious face. He was a good-looking man. Clean-cut. Athletic. Handsome enough to have done some print work while he was attending college, and he had the scrap-books to prove it. Women were attracted to him. Sam had been, or thought she'd been, but in the two years they'd dated some of the luster had faded, and she'd never really fallen in love. Not that there was anything specifically wrong with him. Or nothing she could name. He was handsome, intelligent, the right age, and his job with Regal Hotels was certain to make him a millionaire several times over. They just didn't click.