She couldn’t explain her post-midnight raid on Max’s place, except that she wasn’t happy with their recent interactions, or lack of same. It was time to face the music and dance, like the song said. Or not. Either way, she’d know what the future held.
The horse knew the way, although that was from another fairy tale, the one where grandmothers’ houses still lurked down rural lanes.
The Miata’s hundred-some horses took her to Max’s neighborhood, all the houses decently dark. It was just past eleven P.M.
She parked three doors away and watched her back as she approached the familiar front door.
What she would do if he wasn’t home, she didn’t know. She also wasn’t sure he would be home. Max was up to something he wasn’t telling her about. She hoped it was something she could live with if she found out what.
No huntsmen seemed to be lurking in the vicinity, a good sign.
She rang the bell. Boldly. How else can you ring a doorbell at eleven P.M.?
When the door swung open, Granny was nowhere in sight. Just Max in his usual black, looking surprised, then pleased, then … worried.
“Temple.” He immediately grasped the purpose of the basket. “On a mission of mercy. To me. I could use it. Come in.”
“I’m not disturbing you—?”
“Oh, you are, but in the nicest of ways.”
He led her into the living room where a talk show she seldom stayed up long enough to see dominated a wide plasma TV screen.
“That’s new.” She pointed to the screen.
“This is newer.” He dredged the blue velvet one-shouldered maillot swimming suit from her basket. It was 50 percent spandex and looked just big enough for a Barbie doll. “You want to hit the spa?”
“Sort of the idea.”
“I could use it myself but … there are reasons. Why don’t I just open the wine. You can get warmed up in all that hot water?”
Actually, she was getting pretty warmed up without the aid of a hot tub.
She changed into her suit in the guest bathroom, then brought the basket out to the deck where an underwater Blue Hawaii light lit the bubbling hot water from below.
Heavenly!
Temple hadn’t realized how worried she’d been about her impromptu expedition to Max’s turf until she slipped under the hot water. Aaaah. Who would have thought the young woman had so much tension in her?
Two bubbles of glassware appeared on the drink indentations built into the spa’s side. Red wine, gleaming like Burmese rubies. Max sat on the hot tub lip.
He tugged at her one blue velvet shoulder strap. “Can velvet get wet?”
“Modem miracle, spandex for water babies.”
He chuckled and offered her a cracker with cheese from her CARE basket.
“I wasn’t sure you’d still be up,” she said.
He gave that remark the long pause any inadvertent double entendre deserved.
She laughed and sipped room-temperature wine, which felt cool compared to the hot tub.
“I’m glad you came,” he replied soberly, in kind.
“We seem to have been passing like ships in the night lately.”
“Agreed.” Max sipped from his wineglass, then spoke. Soberly. “I’m working up a new act. It’s secret. That’s why I’ve been so distracted. So absent.”
“Ummm.” She put her wet arms up to clasp his still-clothed ones, cables of steel. “No wonder you feel like Superman. That’s wonderful! Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I don’t know when I’ll be ready to make it public. Maybe not for … months. It takes—”
“Discipline. Zen mania. Max! This is great news. I thought—”
“What?”
“That you’d lost interest in … things.”
“In magic, or you? Never you. Am I now breaking my thirty-five-year-old back to make waves in the magic game? Yes. Guilty. I can’t say when my new apprenticeship will end. I have to make a spectacular comeback.”
“Of course. I’m so glad. I thought you’d given up on magic.”
“No.”
“Well then.” Temple snuggled down into the churning water. The aquatic blue light reminded her of something? The Blue Light special at Kmart? “I have to tell you. I may be AWOL myself for, oh, a couple weeks or so.”
“So long? Really?”
She nodded, her chin dipping into a froth of bubbles.
“I have to … go home. Minnesota. My dad. A minor cardiac thing. A stent? Anyway, they want me there.”
“Of course.” He kissed the top of her head. “I hope your father is all right. I’ll miss you,” he said.
What a liar she was! She didn’t deserve sympathy! At least Max wouldn’t worry about her.
“I’m sorry, Temple.” His voice vibrated somewhere above her head but she felt it in her heart. “Things will be better later, won’t they?”
“Absolutely. And now … they’re just perfect.”
“Just perfect.” He pulled away to lift his wineglass as her fingers curled around the stem of hers. They drank ruby velvet.
“Get in,” she said. “You don’t need a suit.”
“Can’t. I’ve got a midnight appointment.”
“With whom?” She hadn’t meant to sound sharp, she was just surprised.
Max trailed a hand in the warm, bubbling water. It ran up her arm. “I’m working out in secret. Using the Caped Conjuror’s home setup while he’s dazzling the second-show set at the New Millennium. I can’t stay.”
“But—”
“But there’s no reason you can’t stay here and enjoy the spa. The door will lock automatically on your way out.”
“I didn’t come here just to enjoy the bubbles.”
“I know. And do you think I’ll enjoy several hours of working out twenty-five feet above a terrazzo floor on bungee cords?”
“Max! It sounds—”
“Dangerous? Yes, what I’m doing is dangerous, Temple.” His blue eyes looked opaque, black against the night’s own darkness.
“But spectacular.”
Max laughed. “If you mean I could make a spectacle of myself… . Comebacks are hell, Temple. You have to give up a lot, including your dignity. And a private life.” He bent down to kiss her. Her fingerprints made darker blots on his black sleeves.
“Rain check? Ciao.”
It almost never rained in Vegas but when it did, it was a gully washer.
Temple floated in the spa’s programmed turmoil, feeling her internal boiling point mounting.
Odd. The blue lagoon waters now reminded her of something less pleasant than tropical nights: Lieutenant C. R. Molina’s sharp, ever-watchful laser-blue eyes.
But no one they knew was here. Now. Temple let the water roll her over as she turned to watch Max’s back disappear into his house on his way out.
Magicians did that. Disappeared. For a living. Sometimes lovers did that too.
Bitter disappointment made Temple rain two teardrops into the sizzling spa water. They instantly eddied away, lost in the sea of foaming warmth. Temple knew better than to feel rejected, but she did, dammit.
Selfish Temple! She knew how hard Max worked at both of his professions. Now, at last, he was reclaiming the public persona of magician instead of being consumed by the invisible cloak of spy. Times were more perilous worldwide than they’d ever been and Max had been out there, was still out there, trying to prevent disaster.
A game little woman would stand behind her man, even when he wasn’t there. Especially when he wasn’t there.
Still … Her hand slapped the water. This time droplets jumped up at her eyes, stinging them into blinking.
Blink. And Max had been gone without explanation. Blink. Lieutenant Molina had come asking brutal questions, painting the missing Max as a likely murderer. Blink. Enter Matt Devine, ex-priest, new neighbor, always there to help or tempt through no fault of his own.
Love and fidelity were great … when a couple actually spent time together now and then. But Temple was no longer feeling loved, even if she was, and Matt—God, Max! Wake up and smell the latte!—was finally outgrowing all those years of celibacy and coming on to her with Intent to Commit Relationship.