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“I never wrote such a thing!” Amber protested.
Beth frowned, feeling a new chill seep into her spine.
“Then Kim must have done it.”
“No,” Amber insisted. “All we did was write back to Keith on e-mail.”
“Beth, it’s time you reported this. Officially,” Ashley said firmly.
“You’re going to call the police about Kim and me?” Amber asked, stunned and horrified.
“No, honey…there’s been more than that,” Beth murmured. She looked around uneasily. There was no one around who might be listening to their conversation, she was certain. There was a group of children playing with a ball nearby, and a few members of the women’s charities committee busily discussing their next fund-raiser.
She was startled to see that Maria Lopez was there again. She was elegant in a one-piece black bathing suit, straw hat and sunglasses, down at the other end of the pool. She couldn’t possibly hear anything they were saying.
She looked down toward the docks, shading her eyes. A number of the boats were out. She saw Ben, assembling his scuba gear—he meant to go down and clean the hull. As he gave his attention to his tank, a woman hopped to the dock from the deck of a boat farther down.
Amanda.
Dammit, didn’t she have any other place to go? From being an occasional visitor to the club, she’d turned into a regular—a very unwelcome one, from Beth’s point of view.
As Beth watched, Amanda approached Ben, lightly touching his shoulder.
Ben looked up and smiled.
Beth looked quickly away, but Amber had seen the direction of her gaze. She groaned. “Can we get her arrested?” she asked Ashley.
“Flirting isn’t illegal,” Ashley told her.
“Simply being that woman should be illegal,” Beth said dryly.
“Beth…” Ashley persisted.
“All right, all right,” Beth said. “But…let’s get through the afternoon. Let Ben clean his boat. And I’m telling you, no one’s going to be able to do anything.”
THAT EVENING ASHLEY BROUGHT Amber to Nick’s with her. Jake, Ben and Beth went to the station, where Beth filled out a formal report. Ben was a nervous wreck—and extremely angry with his sister. Beth continued to remind him that he was among those who had kept telling her that she was paranoid. Luckily, with Jake there, they couldn’t fight too openly. Both he and Lieutenant Gorsky—the lead officer on the pirating case—tried to remain casual and calming as the two argued.
They left in a state of stiff tension. But it was done. Ben’s house would remain under surveillance, and it had been suggested that Beth move in with her brother for the time being.
Great. He was barely speaking to her.
But since their lives might well be at stake, Beth agreed. She knew that the department didn’t have the manpower to protect them all as they tried to get through their daily lives. At least, because of Jake and Ashley, extra protection, in the form of off-duty cops, would be afforded to them.
Still, the night was pure misery. Amber was confused, and her father warned her firmly that she wasn’t to make a single move alone. Beth tried to be reassuring, but she had to reiterate her brother’s words to her niece.
On Monday morning she drove Amber to school, glad to see the officer following them all the way.
He didn’t follow her to the club. He was staying downtown, where he would be keeping an eye on the school throughout the day, so Beth was careful as she continued to work. At the club, she noted that the security guard was not alone.
She was nervous, wondering if anyone was inside the club itself or wandering the grounds to keep an eye on things. Midmorning, Commodore Berry came in and sat down gravely. He told her that he’d been contacted by the police and there was going to be at least one officer on duty inside the club or on the property at all times, keeping an eye on things. Since there were known pirates working in the area, he was grateful to have the assistance.
Beth wondered if he blamed her for involving the club. It didn’t seem, however, that he ever realized it had anything to do with her. There were so many exceptional yachts berthed there that he seemed to think that was what made them a potential target.
The rest of the day passed uneventfully. She made calls to confirm arrangements for the Summer Sizzler, contacting delivery services and the florist, and talked to the chef and the staff. She called Eduardo Shea’s office, and he assured her that he had not forgotten, and told her that he would be in with Mauricio and Maria later during the week.
That afternoon a police tech came to inspect her computer. She went down to the cafeteria to allow him time to work on his own. The club was strangely quiet. There was no sign of any of the Masons.
The tech was a nice guy, encouraging in his expertise. He was convinced no one had hacked her computer from the outside. The sabotage had been performed right in her office.
Chilling information. Whoever had given her the warning had been at her desk, in her chair.
She left early to pick up Amber. The policeman followed them home. She waved goodbye a few minutes later, after he had inspected the house and she had locked the door behind him.
She spent the evening practicing scenes with Amber.
That night Ben kept his distance, and she found herself growing angrier with her brother. None of this was her fault, though he was behaving as if it were.
Tuesday was more or less a repeat of Monday. She felt the growing strain of the situation.
Wednesday was better. When she went down to lunch, she was startled to run into Eduardo Shea in the dining room.
“Mr. Shea,” she said happily. “You’re here.”
“Miss Anderson, your party is this Friday night. I told you I would see you here.”
“Yes, of course.”
“Ah, there’s Mauricio.”
A handsome young man with dark hair and arresting green eyes approached, and Eduardo introduced him to Beth. A few minutes later Maria Lopez arrived in a stunning gown. Short, sequined, it fit her to a T.
“Where will the performance be held?” Eduardo asked.
“There will be a dance floor on the patio. It’s being delivered Friday morning,” Beth told them.
“That’s not good,” Eduardo said.
“Oh?”
“They should have more time to practice their number on the actual site,” Eduardo said.
“Oh,” Beth murmured. “I’m…I don’t think we can close off the area until then,” she told them unhappily.
“It will be fine, Eduardo,” Maria said. She smiled at Beth. “But for now, where may we rehearse?”
“The meeting room,” Beth suggested. It was actually part of the dining room, but it could be closed off for committee luncheons and was sometimes rented out to corporations for special functions.
It also had a hardwood floor.
Eduardo wasn’t pleased, but he seemed resigned. Disdainful, but resigned.
Beth managed to get Eduardo to allow her to attend the rehearsal. At first she simply watched the two dances in wonder. It seemed unbelievable that anyone could move their hips as fast as Maria did. On the dance floor, she was ageless. Her face glowed; her elegance was visible in every movement.
“Incredible,” Beth murmured.
“Come on. I’ll teach you,” Eduardo said.
“Oh, no, no,” Beth protested.
But she found herself standing up with him anyway. “It’s all in the timing,” he told her. The music was playing again. Mauricio came up to partner her under Eduardo’s direction, while Maria stepped behind her to show her how to move her hips. She grew flushed and happy as she began to get the timing, so involved that, to her amazement, she forgot the current circumstances of her life.
Forgot that she had first thought of this because she’d wanted to meet Eduardo Shea, suspecting that he might somehow have been involved in the Monocos’ disappearance. To her absolute amazement, she was having fun.
Until Amanda Mason arrived.
Amanda greeted Eduardo with enthusiasm, kissed Mauricio, and did the continental kiss-on-both-cheeks thing with Maria Lopez. At that point Beth excused herself and returned to her office. She was startled when she reached her door to turn around and discover that she had been followed.
By Amanda.
The woman stood there, chin high, hands on her hips—looking much taller than her actual stature—staring at Beth belligerently. “Why do you do that to me all the time?” Amanda demanded.
“Why do I do what?” Beth demanded.
“I walk into a room, and you leave.”
Beth stared at her, stunned. Then she replied honestly, “Let’s see. Maybe because you treat me as if I were a servant or a lesser being of some kind?”
“I do not,” Amanda protested.
“You do, too.”
“If I do, it’s only because of the way you act toward me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Let’s see. You don’t do anything overt. That nose of yours just goes in the air a little, and you look at me as if I were…the trash of the century.”
Beth could barely believe the conversation.
“Amanda—” She broke off, shaking her head, not at all sure what to say. “Maybe it’s the way you behave.”
“And that would be…?”
“I don’t know! As if the world was your toy, as if men were there for your amusement, whether they’re married, engaged or…taken.”
“You’re jealous.”
“No, Amanda, I’m not jealous.”
She expected anger, some kind of scathing retort. But Amanda just stared at her. “Am I that bad, really?”
Beth sighed. “I don’t know, Amanda. Maybe it’s me, too. I don’t know.”
She didn’t know what she expected then. Certainly not the frown that furrowed Amanda’s brow. “I…I’ll try to be…” She paused, looking for a word. “Better.”
Then she walked down the hallway, and Beth went into her office and sat down, stunned.
KEITH WAITED IN THE Palm Beach deli. At ten o’clock, Laurie Green walked in, just as she had promised. She saw him at the table, and a smile lit her face. “Keith!”
She rushed over and hugged him fiercely. He hugged her back, then disentangled himself carefully. She had lost her parents when the plane had gone down, and she herself had nearly perished in the muck soup of the Everglades. She had experienced agony and grief, but from the beginning, she had been grateful for her own life. Once on the verge of death, her sandy skin and light hair spoke of her health and well-being.
Slightly embarrassed by her show of emotion, he managed to get her seated opposite him. “So everything’s going okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “I graduate from Nova University next spring.”
“That’s great. I’m delighted to hear it.”
She waved her left hand in front of him, showing him the diamond on her finger. “And I’m getting married in the fall.”
“That’s absolutely wonderful,” he said sincerely.
Then she smiled. “That’s not why you called me.”
“No.”
“What’s up? You know that I’ll help you any way I can.”
“I know that, and thanks…. Do you know if your folks were friends with a couple named Ted and Molly Monoco?”
The smiled left her face. “Have they been found?” she asked.
He shook his head. “So it’s true, they were friends of your folks?”
She nodded. “I didn’t know them that well. My parents decided to take dance lessons for some event they were going to. Ted owned the studio they went to, and they got friendly. They were nice. Are nice. I hope. I don’t know what to think.”
Keith nodded. “Did you ever meet a man named Manny Ortega?”
“Oh!” she exclaimed, her cheeks reddening. “I gave him your number. I told him I’d gotten it a long time ago, that it might not be good. Did I do something wrong? I’d forgotten all about it.”
“No, no, it’s fine.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. So you know Manny?”
“Yes, he was a friend of the Monocos. I went to a couple of dance parties with my parents, and he was there, playing with the band. I was sticking out like a sore thumb, and he was nice to me. I can’t say that I’ve seen him in…well, in years. But when he called me, saying that Ted hadn’t called in and he’d mentioned something about your name, well…I’m sorry. I didn’t hesitate to give him the number.”
“It’s fine. I just had to make sure,” Keith told her. “So tell me about this guy you’re about to marry.”
