Never Say Die / Presumed Guilty: Never Say Die / Presumed Guilty

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“He’s just a kid!”

“Obviously not. He could be sixteen, seventeen. Old enough to be an agent.”

“For the Vietnamese?”

“No. If he was one of theirs, why’d he vanish? Why did the police keep hounding you about him?”

She huddled on the bed, her confusion deepening. “He saved my life. And I don’t even know why.”

There it was again, that raw edge of vulnerability, shimmering in her eyes. She might be Wild Bill Maitland’s brat, but she was also a woman, and Guy was having a hard time concentrating on the problem at hand. Why was someone trying to kill her?

He was too tired to think. It was late, she was so near, and there was the bed, just waiting.

He reached up and gently stroked her face. She seemed to sense immediately what was about to happen. Even though her whole body remained stiff, she didn’t fight him. The instant their lips met, he felt a shock leap through her, through him, as though they’d both been hit by some glorious bolt of lightning. My God, he thought in surprise. You wanted this as much as I did…

He heard her murmur, “No,” against his mouth, but he knew she didn’t mean it, so he went on kissing her until he knew that if he didn’t stop right then and there, he’d do something he really didn’t want to do.

Oh, yes I do, he thought with sudden abandon. I want her more than I’ve wanted any other woman.

She put her hand against his chest and murmured another “No,” this one fainter. He would have ignored it, too, had it not been for the look in her eyes. They were wide and confused, the eyes of a woman pushed to the brink by fear and exhaustion. This wasn’t the way he wanted her. Maddening as she could be, he wanted the living, breathing, real Willy Maitland in his arms.

He released her. They sat on the bed, not speaking for a while, just looking at each other with a shared sense of quiet astonishment.

“Why—why did you do that?” she asked weakly.

“You looked like you needed a kiss.”

“Not from you.”

“From someone, then. It’s been a while since you’ve been kissed. Hasn’t it?”

She didn’t answer, and he knew he’d guessed the truth. Hell, what a waste, he thought, his gaze dropping briefly to that perfect little mouth. He managed a disinterested laugh. “That’s what I thought.”

Willy stared at his grinning face and wondered, Is it so obvious? Not only hadn’t she been kissed in a long time, she hadn’t ever been kissed like that. He knew exactly how to do it; he’d probably had years of practice with other women. For some insane reason, she found herself wondering how she compared, found herself hating every woman he’d ever kissed before her, hating even more every woman he’d kiss after her.

She flung herself down on the bed and turned her back on him. “Oh, leave me alone!” she cried. “I can’t deal with this! I can’t deal with you. I’m tired. I just want to sleep.”

He didn’t say anything. She felt him smooth her hair. It was nothing more than a brush of his fingers, but somehow, that one touch told her that he wouldn’t leave, that he’d be there all night, watching over her. He rose from the bed and switched off the lamp. She lay very still in the darkness, listening to him move around the room. She heard him check the windows, then the door, testing how firmly the chair was wedged against it. Then, apparently satisfied, he went into the bathroom, and she heard water running in the sink.

She was still awake when he came back to bed and stretched out beside her. She lay there, worrying that he’d kiss her again and hoping desperately that he would.

“Guy?” she whispered.

“Yes?”

“I’m scared.”

He reached for her through the darkness. Willingly, she let him pull her against his bare chest. He smelled of soap and safety. Yes, that’s what it was. Safety.

“It’s okay to be scared,” he whispered. “Even if you are Wild Bill Maitland’s kid.”

As if she had a choice, she thought as she lay in his arms. The sad part was, she’d never wanted to be the daughter of a legend. What she’d wanted from Wild Bill wasn’t valor or daring or the reflected glory of a hero.

What she’d wanted most of all was a father.

SIANG CROUCHED MOTIONLESS in a stinking mud puddle and stared up the road at Chantal’s building. Two hours had passed and the man was still there by the curb. Siang could see his vague form huddled in the darkness. A police agent, no doubt, and not a very good one. Was that a snore rumbling in the night? Yes, Siang thought, definitely a snore. How fortunate that surveillance was always relegated to those least able to withstand its monotony.

Siang decided to make his move.

He withdrew his knife. Noiselessly he edged out of the alley and circled around, slipping from shadow to shadow along the row of hootches. Barely five yards from his goal, he froze as the man’s snores shuddered and stopped. The shadow’s head lifted, shaking off sleep.

Siang closed in, yanked the man’s head up by the hair and slit the throat.

There was no cry, only a gurgle, and then the hiss of a last breath escaping the dead man’s lungs. Siang dragged the body around to the back of the building and rolled it into a drainage ditch. Then he slipped through an open window into Chantal’s flat.

He found her asleep. She awakened instantly as he clapped his hand over her mouth.

“You!” she ground out through his fingers. “Damn you, you got me in trouble!”

“What did you tell the police?”

“Get away from me!”

“What did you tell them?”

She batted away his hand. “I didn’t tell them anything!”

“You’re lying.”

“You think I’m stupid? You think I’d tell them I have friends in the CIA?”

He released her. As she sat up, the silky heat of her breast brushed against his arm. So the old whore still slept naked, he thought with an automatic stirring of desire.

She rose from the bed and pulled on a robe.

“Don’t turn on the lights,” he said.

“There was a man outside—a police agent. What did you do with him?”

“I took care of him.”

“And the body?”

“In the ditch out back.”

“Oh, nice, Siang. Very nice. Now they’ll blame me for that, too.” She struck a match and lit a cigarette. By the flame’s brief glow, he could see her face framed by a tangle of black hair. In the semidarkness she still looked tempting, young and soft and succulent.

The match went out. He asked, “What happened at the police station?”

She let out a slow breath. The smell of exhaled smoke filled the darkness. “They asked about my cousin. They say he’s dead. Is that true?”

“What do they know about me?”

“Is Winn really dead?”

Siang paused. “It couldn’t be helped.”

Chantal laughed. Softly at first, then with wild abandon. “She did that, did she? The American bitch? You cannot finish off even a woman? Oh, Siang, you must be slipping!”

He felt like hitting her, but he controlled the urge. Chantal was right. He must be slipping.

She began to pace the room, her movements as sure as a cat’s in the darkness. “The police are interested. Very interested. And I saw others there—Party members, I think—watching the interrogation. What have you gotten me into, Siang?”

He shrugged. “Give me a cigarette.”

She whirled on him in rage. “Get your own cigarettes! You think I have money to waste on you?”

“You’ll get the money. All you want.”

“You don’t know how much I want.”