“Okay,” I said. “Don’t you think you ought to go back to your own room?”
“I don’t want to if Diane isn’t there.”
“If she just went for a swim she’ll be in before long. You could get into bed and leave the light on for her.”
Aimee’s eyes shied about the room. “Could I stay here a little while?”
“It wouldn’t be a good idea. I was just going to bed myself.”
Aimee hesitated a few moments, then slid off the bed.
“I’ll walk you upstairs,” I said. I took her hand and we went upstairs together. I thought about Aimee. When she was with me in the room, there had been the softest touch of something reaching out from her, a gentle tendril searching for an anchoring place. There was something very fragile about her, obscurely appealing.
In her room she got primly into bed and thanked me. Then she said, “I didn’t bring teddy.”
“What?”
“My teddy,” she said with sleepy patience. “I must have dropped him downstairs in the hall.”
“I’ll get it,” I said. I went back downstairs and searched until I found the stuffed animal. I picked it up and returned to the room. As I entered I saw that the bathroom light was on and the door open. Aimee was asleep.
Diane appeared suddenly in the doorway of the bath, drying her breasts with a towel. When she saw me she froze momentarily. Then she said, “Pete?” I couldn’t see the expression in her eyes.
“Yeah,” I said drily. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. She was even better than I had imagined that first night on the beach. And with the bathroom light behind her there was nothing I couldn’t see.
She watched me silently for a moment, making no effort to conceal herself with the towel.
“Why don’t you come closer?” she said. She released the towel and kicked it away with one foot. She hadn’t moved, continued to face me squarely.
I walked toward her, tossing the teddy bear on her bed. I could see her eyes glistening now, the gleam of teeth behind parted lips.
As I reached out for her she switched off the light behind her, leaving us in darkness. Her hands caught my wrists, pulling me to her. She made love to me with lips, tongue, hard-tipped breasts, movements of her thighs, driving me to the verge of insanity. When she took her lips away from mine I tasted blood. There was a pressure inside me that had my ears ringing.
“All right,” I said, thickly, “let’s finish it.”
“It is finished,” she said almost dreamily. “That’s all, Pete. You can go now.” She released me and stepped back, shutting and locking the bathroom door before I got to her.
I said something under my breath, wanted to put my shoulder against the door and drag her out of there. But I remembered the sleeping child, and the nasty little scene Diane had made with Owen Barr. I took a deep breath and went back to my room. It was a long time before I could get to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-four
The drinking started early next day, and by two o’clock the patio was jammed with those taking after-lunch refreshment. When I came outside Owen Barr was hitting the stuff hard, or so it seemed. Maxine drank nothing. He lounged in the sun in a pair of plaid shorts, wearing the most pleasant expression he had in stock. Things were going smoothly for Stan. The first conference had evidently cleared the way. There would be other conferences with lawyers on each side, some outside help from the hierarchy. But Stan was on his way.
Gerry sat beside him, wearing a fetching bit of swim suit that wouldn’t have bandaged a sore thumb. She did Stan’s drinking for him and they held hands. Owen Barr kept away from her, but now and then looked bitterly in Maxine’s direction. When his glass was empty he held it out negligently and a houseboy would whisk it away and reinforce the ice with a jolt.
Charley Rinke and his wife played Canasta at a little table under a canopy of pink umbrella. Neither showed any interest in the game. Their fingers sorted the cards mechanically. Evelyn Rinke wore a big pair of sunglasses that masked any expression, but her complexion was sickly.
On the little dock that stuck out into the bay, Aimee, Diane and Macy waited while Rudy gassed up a sleek new speedboat. Rudy was wearing swimming trunks and seemed chipper, though he still limped painfully. Macy held tight to Aimee’s hand, probably not pleased at the prospect of bumping along the bay in the speedboat. Aimee was bundled in an orange lifejacket.
There was little conversation, either on the patio or on the dock. Even Aimee seemed to feel the undercurrent of tension, and chattered very little.
I shook my head at a tray of highballs offered by one of the help and walked toward the terrace. Taggart leaned against the rock wall surrounding the patio, wearing shorts and a T shirt over an impressive display of muscles. He glanced at me for a long moment when I went by.
On the patio behind me somebody lurched out of one of the chairs so that it skidded metallically on the paving. I looked back. Owen Barr closed in on me, grinning drunkenly. He had a half empty glass in one hand.
“Mal’ry,” he said slurringly. “Ol’ Pete Mal’ry. Ain’t you goin’ to have a drink, buddy?” He put a heavy arm around my shoulders as he caught up to me, leaned against me so I had to stop or let him fall.
“Here,” he said, extending the glass he held. “Y’take mine. Y’have my li’l drinky, Pete, an’ I’ll get another one.” He spoke loudly, breathing in my face. There wasn’t much of an alcoholic smell. I frowned.
He leaned his reddened face toward my ear, turned his face toward the bay. “I’ll be so terrible off-fended if you don’t have one drink with me, buddy.” In another voice, low and quiet, he said urgently, “I’ve got to talk to you, Pete. Later. I can’t say any more. I’m being watched. Come to my room.” He burst into rasping drunken laughter.
I pushed him away from me. “Watch what you’re doing,” I said. “You spilled some on me. Get the hell out of here. If I want a drink I’ll go get one.”
He looked injured. He stood holding the glass in a tilted position in the palm of his hand, and his mouth sagged foolishly. I looked quickly at the people on the patio. No one was paying any attention to us.
“Well, I was — jus’ tryin’ to be helpful. Tha’s all I was doin’, Pete.” He shrugged and weaved back to the patio, slumped in a chair, looked at nobody. I went on down to the dock.
Rudy had capped the big red gas can and set it on the dock. He climbed into the driver’s seat now, started the motor. Aimee jiggled on one foot and then the other, impatient to go. Diane watched without interest.
The motor missed a couple of times. Rudy kneaded the accelerator. The flesh on his white back trembled loosely as he turned the wheel experimentally. The motor idled. He looked back over his shoulder at us.
“Better let me run it out into the bay and get the kinks out,” he said to Macy. “She hasn’t been used for a long time.” Macy waved him away. He seemed preoccupied. Aimee looked up at him unhappily but said nothing.
Diane glanced at Macy. He told her to let go the lines.
“You might as well ride along,” she said.
“I’ll wait till Rudy loosens it up,” Macy said. “Untie him.”
Diane kneeled and freed the rope, tossed it into the stern of the speedboat. Rudy eased away from the dock, upping speed gradually.
“I’ll swing around and pick you all up in a minute,” he yelled back over his shoulder. The front of the speedboat bucked out of the water, kicked spray high. Two hundred feet from the dock Rudy began to lop. As he did so the gleaming speedboat blew apart without warning. There was a flat booming noise, a geyser of water mixed with splinters of the hull and the roll of dirty smoke. It happened with the quickness of a magician’s sleight-of-hand trick. While the pieces of boat rained into the water and the echo of the blast rolled across the bay we were shocked still. I thought I saw Rudy hurled from the wreckage but I wasn’t sure. I watched the boil of soapy foam at the spot where the boat had exploded. Then I went into the water, diving off the dock, seeing in passing the shocked sick face of Diane, hearing Aimee’s open-mouthed cry as she realized something had gone wrong but wasn’t quite sure how bad it was.