reason could come close to justifying the agony he’d put her through. She’d planned the moment—what she’d wear, how she’d toss her head with indignant disdain, how she’d reduce him to shamed attrition. Her chance had come and gone with a whimper instead of a roar.
And now she had to decide how to treat this return of the prodigal lover under less than ideal circumstances. The scripted meeting was unfolding without a hitch, but it wasn’t at her direction. This time, she had more at stake than bruised pride and shattered dreams. Lives were at stake, if a madman’s words could be believed. That was just the wake-up slap back to reality she needed to look at Taggert McGee and really see him as he was, instead of through the eyes of a needy teenager.
He wasn’t that lean, wiry boy surrounded by shyness and a natural, easy grace. He wasn’t the all-star running back or the all-city catcher who dreamed of going to college on a sports scholarship. He wasn’t the boy with the engaging gentleness to his manner that belied his aggressive pursuits of sports, hunting and boxing. He wasn’t the same person who wooed her with his love of poetry and solitude rather than the acid rock and radical causes of the era. This wasn’t the Taggert McGee who, at eighteen, had stood with duffel bag in hand, his fair hair buzzed down to the scalp, his handsome features gaunt, his mild, deep-set blue eyes fierce with turmoil as the bus pulled in behind him. She hadn’t known then that that emotional image would have to last her for more than thirty years.
He’d been eighteen, her first love, and he’d broken her heart like none before or after.
This was no boy going off to war come to say his last farewells. This specter from the past, wearing loose cargo jeans and a battered brown leather bomber jacket over plaid flannel, had none of that lost look of innocence. He was all contained authority, intense confidence and unapologetic masculinity with his thinning hair and ice-blue, vise-grip gaze that told her nothing. He’d aged well, like Scotch whiskey, acquiring a mellow depth and complexity she found confusingly enticing. And beneath the controlled veneer, the casual attire, the nonthreatening receding hairline, he positively sparked with an electrifying sex appeal.
Or was that just her hormones inappropriately indulging in one last riotous adrenaline-induced hurrah?
What frustrated her, what made her testy, was his total imperviousness to his effect on her.
“Can I get you something to drink?”
She glanced up, surprised to see the beverage cart in the aisle. “Coffee, please.” With a chaser of that fine Scotch would be nice.
She started to reach for her cup, then balked when Tag reached for it at the same time. She eased back to let him perform the perfunctory courtesy of passing the hot coffee over to her.
Lord, he smelled delicious. Like cedar chips and spruce boughs. She forced herself not to inhale, to look straight ahead as she sipped the welcome heat that burned and calmed all at the same time.
For heaven’s sake, she was no kid to be swept away by a sinewy smile and great bone structure. She’d been married to the same man for more than thirty years, had borne three children and was a grandmother.
And even if she was feeling suddenly as randy as a debutante, she wouldn’t choose this man to indulge her late-life passions with. He was poison to her system, a danger to her emotional health. It took her thirty years to recover from the unsettling lurch in which he’d left her. She wouldn’t risk that loss of equilibrium again.
And next to her, Tag was thinking much the same thing.
Get a grip, McGee. She’s not that little pep-club president anymore. She’s a woman who’s known her share of love and loss, and she’s definitely written you off in the latter category.
He’d sit back and enjoy the ride. He’d listen to Chet’s spiel, whatever it might be, thank him, but no thanks, wish Barbara well and be on his way by nightfall. He didn’t know what Chet was up to and didn’t want to find out. With the twisted way his friend’s mind worked, it could be anything from a simple reunion to a plunge into deadly intrigue. And he wanted no part of it. Not anymore. And not with Barbara at his side. He had the return ticket in his jacket. He could get as far as the bridge before exhaustion claimed him. He could disappear back into that safety zone of anonymity he’d made for himself. And maybe he’d sleep without dreams.
There was nothing for him here. Like the old saying went, he couldn’t go home again.
And he definitely couldn’t imagine going home to the palace where Barbara and Robert D’Angelo had lived.
He took the envelope from Chet Allen out of his coat pocket and carefully unfolded it so he could remove the single clipping. It was a sparse teaser of a story concerning the suspected suicide of a popular district attorney that turned out to be murder. A complex scheme of drug trafficking involving the equally high visibility of a councilwoman running for the same political seat. The story to follow on page three had not been included. Purposefully, Tag assumed, to pique his curiosity and bring him here, to these economy class seats.
The photo accompanying the story was of Robert and Barbara meeting and greeting in front of their home. Grimly, Tag assessed the outward trappings of the life Barbara had led. The stately elegance of the Tudor suited her. He could imagine her socializing at the door with her genuine smile and gracious manner. He could picture Rob beside her, everyone’s favorite host. The perfect couple living the all-American dream.
So why was Rob D’Angelo dead and Barbara here beside him?
He never would have believed suicide. Robert D’Angelo was the most focused and determined individual he’d ever known. Upper middle class striving for millionaire and all the perks that went with it. That was Rob. He’d always known exactly what he wanted and he got it all, everything…and everyone. He’d been a top student, a model citizen, a good friend, and Tag didn’t begrudge him any of it, not even Barbara. He was the one fathers wanted their daughters to date, the one people were eager to trust, the one most likely to succeed. But he hadn’t gotten to keep his fame and fortune for long.
“Who killed him?”
Barbara didn’t seem surprised by the sudden question. She apparently had been waiting for it, preparing for it, if her deadpan answer was any indication.
“Chet Allen.”
Tag couldn’t have been more shocked if she’d named the pope as the perpetrator.
“Chet? Chet killed Rob?” His mind couldn’t contain that knowledge. There had to be some mistake.
The three of them, the Three Musketeers Barbara had called them. All so different, yet held so tightly together by bonds of friendship since grade school. Since before social status mattered. He could envision them together on any number of teen escapades, from scoring illegal alcohol for a party to harmless pranks conceived by Rob and executed to perfection by Chet. The planner, the doer and the dreamer. That had been the three of them. The three of them, all in love with the same girl.
“I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it. Your friend Allen is one sick, dangerous man. Robert underestimated him and now he’s dead. He would have gotten away with it, too, except for one thing. He underestimated my daughter. And her new husband. They caught him and they brought him to justice, but justice let them down.”
“He walked.”
“Like a ghost. Or at least, that’s what he plans. You don’t sound surprised.”
“Let me guess who did the paperwork with a federal seal of approval.”
They both were silent for a moment, sharing their unspoken opinion of the various agencies that had employed Allen. And McGee.
“Where is he now?”
“Not as far away as I’d hoped he’d be. You know Chet. You know how he thinks, how he reacts.”
She glanced at him and then away, the gesture furtive, compelling. Needy. Expectant. His instincts quivered on alert. His tone grew as thin and deadly as a trip wire.