Fire Brand

“No. I’m staying with a friend.”

She felt something possessive stir in her and hoped that he wouldn’t be able to see the sudden freezing of her features. A friend. A female friend? She knew that Bowie was no innocent, but until now she’d never wondered about his private life. What if he had a woman here in Phoenix...?

“I went to school with him, and we were in the same company for six months in Vietnam, until he was rotated out.”

“Oh.” She couldn’t think of anything to add to that. He was giving her a strange look already. “Well, good night, and thanks for the ride,” she said with relief as she stepped out and shut the car door.

Gaby hurried to her apartment. She noticed Bowie didn’t leave until she’d opened her door and gone inside. Through the curtains she saw the Scorpio finally pull away.

She didn’t move from the window for several minutes. Tonight had been a bad mistake. Going out with Bowie, for any reason, was going to have to be avoided from now on. He made her feel vulnerable, and that was the one thing she couldn’t afford to be. Especially not with Bowie.

CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_28e80bbb-dac8-508f-b77b-c90865c4d183)

IN BETWEEN WORRYING about Aggie and trying to come to grips with her sudden attraction to Bowie, Gaby spent her weekend going shopping and to a movie. By the time Monday morning rolled around, her eyes were dark-shadowed and she was ready for the diversion of work.

As she plodded through rush-hour traffic, her mind was busy with the speech she was going to make to Johnny Blake about her two-week vacation. It wasn’t really a bad time to take one—news was slow. And if she could sell him on covering the story developing in Lassiter, he might see it as a working holiday and be more receptive to it. Lassiter was southeast of Tucson, and out of Phoenix’s reporting area, but it would certainly make state news if things got hot enough. She could tell Johnny that, anyway. He liked a story that got picked up by the wire services. It made the paper look good.

Gaby thought that she might even enjoy spending some time at Casa Río. But whether or not Aggie was going to welcome her presence was anybody’s guess. How was she going to explain her sudden need for a vacation this time of year?

The other drawback was proximity to Bowie. The night before, she’d seen him in a totally new light. She couldn’t forget the touch of his big fingers around hers, or the way he’d suddenly come close to her at Mary’s engagement party as they’d gone between the parked cars. Her entire body had rippled with delicious feeling, and that frightened her. She didn’t really want to risk letting Bowie come close.

When she got to the office, Johnny was on the phone, murmuring into the receiver while he looked at her with a blank, preoccupied stare.

“That’s right,” he said. “That’s right. Look, why don’t you stick around there for another thirty minutes and see if you can’t get one of the jurors to one side. We need some idea of what’s going on. Don’t compromise their integrity—just see if you can get a handle on how the deliberations are going, okay? Good man!”

He hung up with a grimace. “Well, that’s as good as it’s going to get today, I suppose. I don’t know how we’re going to manage anything passable about the Highman case unless we can coax a juror into talking.”

“Try a juror’s wife,” she suggested with a grin.

He chuckled. “No wonder I keep you on, Cane.” He nodded. “You’ve got a devious mind.”

“Shrewd sounds better. Johnny, can I go home for two weeks? Before you speak,” she added, holding up a hand when he looked as if he might explode, “I’ve got an angle. I need a vacation. But there’s a big agricultural outfit called Biological Agri-market—Bio-Ag—trying to buy up land around Lassiter for some huge truck farming operation. It would have a favorable impact on the local economy, but its water usage and destruction of historic landmarks make it pretty controversial. There have already been a couple of death threats. I could sort of get a handle on things and have my vacation at the same time. What do you think? It could be statewide news,” she added quickly. “We’d scoop all the Tucson papers. We might even get picked up on the wires.”

He was thinking now, his lips pursed. “Statewide, huh?”

“That’s right.”

His small eyes narrowed. “Is anybody we know involved in this, Cane?” he probed.

She laughed. “Bowie. He’s going to fight it tooth and nail.”

“In that case, pack your bags. I still remember when he took on that cut-rate construction company project that cost two lives. Anything he does makes news these days. He’s a troublesome...” He cleared his throat. “Sorry.”

“He isn’t family,” she said, and was suddenly glad that he wasn’t. A picture of his hard, handsome features floated unwanted into her mind and she found herself feeling much too eager to go back to Casa Río.

“Yes. I keep forgetting that,” he murmured, watching her warm color. “Well, Cane, you have a nice vacation. Don’t forget to finish up your assignments today. You can leave first thing in the morning.”

“Yes, sir!” She grinned. “Thanks, boss.”

“Don’t thank me.” He held up a hand and smiled modestly. “I am but a poor, humble editor, doing his best to save democracy for future generations. Four score and seven...”

“You might write down that speech on the back of an envelope,” she suggested as she went out the door of his office. “Who knows? You could go down in history.”

He sighed. “Only if I changed my last name to Lincoln. Go to work!”

“You bet!”

The political interview was one she’d been angling toward for weeks. An older state representative—one of sixty representatives in the State House—had been accused of taking kickbacks on a highway project he’d supported. The charge didn’t quite ring true to Gaby, who knew the politician. He had a reputation for honesty that was nothing short of fanaticism.

What made the interview so special was that Gaby was the only member of the press that Representative Guerano would talk to.

“Where’s Wilson?” the white-haired legislator asked, darting quick glances around as they sat in the comparative security of his office in the state capitol building. “Is he disguised as a lamp?”

Gaby laughed. Her wild journalistic colleague had that kind of reputation, and it was really a pity that he worked for a rival paper. “Despite Wilson’s knack for turning up in odd places, he could only know about this meeting from me, and I don’t consort with the opposition.”

Representative Guerano chuckled deeply. “Good for you. Okay. What do you want to know, young lady?”

“Who’s after you and why, of course,” she replied with a twinkle in her olive eyes. “I don’t believe for a minute that you’ve taken money from anybody.”

He smiled gently. “God bless you for that blind trust. As it happens, you’re right. But I only have suspicions, no hard evidence. And I’m hardly in a position to start throwing stones.”

“Tell you what,” she said, leaning forward. “You tell me who, when, and why, and I’ll tell Johnny Blake. We’ve got an investigative reporter on our staff who can dig blood out of turnips.”

His tired blue eyes brightened. “Think so?”

“I do, indeed. Meanwhile, you give me a nice interview and I’ll print both sides of the controversy, just the way a good journalist should.”

“Isn’t this sticking your neck out?” he asked curiously.

She shook her head. “It’s good journalism. We like to print the whole truth. Sometimes we can only print half. But we never give up until we get to the bottom of scandals. That’s the only way to do it, to be fair to everyone involved.”

He nodded. “I can understand that. But meanwhile, a lot of damage has been done to my reputation.” He leaned back, looking every day of his sixty years. “You don’t know what a living hell it is to be at the center of a scandal, young lady. My family’s suffered much more than I have, but even if I’m cleared, the implication is still there. My career is finished, either way.”

Gaby was getting cold chills, because she had a pretty good idea of what a scandal could do to even ordinary people, much less people in the public eye. Her background, if it were ever revealed, could do untold damage to the McCaydes.

She snapped herself back to the present. “All I can promise you is that I’ll do a good story and that Johnny will put it in a prominent place. If you deny the charges and we can print your side of it, some people may listen.”

“If you mean that, about an investigation, I’ll give you all the help I can, and so will my staff.”

She nodded. “I can promise you that we’ll give it our best shot.”

“Then, let’s get to it. Ask whatever you like.”

It was a good piece—one of the best Gaby had ever done. And once it was in print, it would be a good time to leave the area for a while, until the heat died down. She never ran from trouble, but sometimes it was advantageous to walk around it.

Johnny Blake was delighted. He took the few unverifiable bits of information he’d been given and handed them over to Lang, the paper’s investigative reporter. Like a bulldog with a bone to chew, the veteran journalist went straight to work. Lang had contacts that none of the other reporters did. His stock of sources read like a Who’s Who of organized crime, but he always got what he needed, with enough printable sources to support the story. Other papers had tried to lure him away with everything from company cars to incredible salaries, and one of the television networks had even dangled an anchor spot at him. Lang just plugged away at his desk, amused at his notoriety, and never gave it a second thought. Gaby liked him. He was an old renegade, with a shady past and plenty of grit and style. He might not be society, but he was a reporter’s reporter. He’d clear Guerano, and Johnny Blake would have his big story for the month. The only casualty might be Guerano himself, because it was hard to undo a public accusation. With the best will in the world, the dirt stuck.

That night as Gaby packed she worried about encroaching on Aggie’s privacy, about interfering. She really was concerned, and knew she was just going to have to risk irritating her. The next morning she put two suitcases in her little white VW convertible, left her plants with a neighbor to water, and set out for Casa Río.