Page 66 of Killer Body

“It’s never idiotic to appeal to someone’s greatest need.”

The way he said it chilled her, made her study his face, the angular thrust of his jaw. For that moment, the sunlight washing over his features, he looked like a stranger.

He slowed for the turnoff.

“I don’t suppose you’d like to stop for lunch?”

She’d like to slap that knowing smile from his face. But they were a team; they’d been a team a long time. And he looked like himself again.

“No. I think I’d like to get home. We can grab a bite later.”

With that they moved from one stretch of freeway to another, on their way to home and a world where “later” never came.

Rochelle opened the glove compartment again, reached for the first aid kit.

Lucas

He had vices, but vanity wasn’t one of them. He’d seen too much of it when he was competing. His pride in his home bordered on vanity, however. Now, for the first time since his divorce, he viewed this haven he had created for himself with critical eyes.

Would Rikki think it overdone? Would she scoff silently at a thirty-two-year-old man living in a town house big enough for a family? He’d opened the curtains, and the views of the city, the ocean and the islands looked like a living photograph on a wall of glass.

Although he’d considered safe music, he decided to go balls out, as Bobby W would say, and play the CDs he loved. Instead of soft jazz or elevator music, Lyle Lovett, the poet laureate of root music put to a big band beat, sang “If I Had a Boat.” After that one, he had Iris DeMent, and then, if Rikki survived those two, it would be Rod Stewart singing love standards, and then another sweet Lyle.

Doorbell, damn. Too late to worry about the room or the music. He had to just let her in and hope for the best.

He studied Rikki’s face as she stepped inside, but he couldn’t evaluate her impression of his home. She must have run up the four flights of stairs. Her short reddish-blond hair had been ruffled like little feathers by the breeze, and her chest rose and fell slightly. The large blue eyes reflected no emotion whatsoever. Up close, her similarity to Julie Larimore and even Lisa ended. There was an arrogance to her that they lacked. But it wasn’t arrogance she was trying to conceal right now. No. Then he knew what it was. She’d been crying, and not longbefore. Let her know he’d figured that one out and he’d be finished before he started.

“You could have taken the elevator.”

“How do you know I didn’t?”

“That flush of health, as Bobby would say. You work out?” He could tell by her body, the way she moved, that she did. He just wanted to see how she would answer.

“Sometimes.” She crossed her arms across her chest as if trying to conceal as much of herself as possible from him. “We have a gym at the newspaper.”

She wore jeans, low cut, with a white shirt where most women would show skin beneath the long-sleeved black sweater she’d layered over it. Was she dressing modestly in response to her cousin’s death and the whole Killer Body image? As they stood, looking at, no, evaluating each other, he wondered how she really dressed when she wasn’t making a statement.

“Come on in, have a seat. Bobby will be right down. He’s making a phone call.” He didn’t add that Bobby W was responding to an emergency message from Rochelle McArthur, who would not leave him alone.

Rikki sat on the edge of the black leather chair. He took the sofa, across from the view, and watched her look around the room, the bookcases behind him, the layered ebony coffee table that his housekeeper had spread out into five tiers and topped with an oblong pewter dish.

“Very nice.” She glanced over at the view, then back to him. “Killer Body must have been good to you.”

“Bobby has. He’s a generous man. I was doing an internship at theTimeswhen I met him on an interview. I guess the timing was right.” He glanced up the sweep of stairs, wondering what was keeping him. “We shared the same values.”

“Was that before or after his son died?”

She spoke quickly, attacking with her question, then searching his face as he answered.

“You did your homework.”

“Part of it.”

“I never met Greg. Bobby has a strong nepotism policy. He figures anything that applies to his staff members applies to him.”

“And his son died in ninety-nine?”

“In an automobile accident, as you obviously know. I’m happy to discuss it with you, but I’d rather not do it now. It’s really hard on Bobby W.”