magic buttons with his fingers and his tongue and hit the jackpot. Clara knew what he liked. At the moment the trusty appendage he called his dick—which hadn’t been much in use for the previous several years—was already straining against the confines of his swim trunks. Arch believed that Clara made him young again, and for that he was excessively grateful. He leaned over her, heavy and hot, his chapped thin lips and peeling nose diving first into her perfumed cleavage.
He smelled of soap and shaving cream, for he didn’t even bother to use suntan lotion or sunblock. Clara closed her eyes against the insult of his ruined skin and saw behind her eyes the mountain of edema that had been her mother in those final appalling days. Lying in her hospital bed with a hugely swollen belly and legs, cadaverous arms and face, and hair falling out by the fistful, she’d bitterly predicted Clara’s own end. “You’ve never cared about anybody but yourself,” she’d shrilled. “When you die no one will care about you.” Her mother’s last words had been a curse; Clara did not grieve for her.
She did worry about Arch, though. Clara had warned him many times to see a doctor and have his skin examined, to stop sitting like this in the sun. But the Senator was a stubborn man, focused only on what interested him, and what interested him now was a foray into the damp and musky depths of her body.
Sucking on a freed nipple, he was simultaneously working his way into the crotch of her bathing suit with two fingers and moaning deep in his throat. His concentration was complete. He was indifferent to the possibility that anyone walking on the beach and pausing to look at the splendid house through the trees could see them.
Clara squeezed her eyes shut. She allowed the familiar sensations of a man’s overwhelming and reckless lust to soothe her. She let her body take over and provide him with a feast of the senses he couldn’t resist. He loved her body, the tempting contours of her breasts, her neck and shoulders, her hips and belly unblemished by the ravages of procreation or illness. He loved the expert suppleness of her female parts well-lubricated and used to pleasure, and so did she. None of it ever failed her. She was a sex queen, a goddess meant for adoration. This old Lothario groaned and panted, another middle-aged man out of control. The excitement of his ardor enflamed her from crotch to belly. She roiled at his probing of her slippery labia, demanding more than fingerplay.
“Let’s go inside,” she murmured.
An hour later, lying on the bed he had shared for so many years with his wife, Arch Candel gazed at his beloved with the devotion she had come to expect from her lovers.
“Darlin’, let’s not wait anymore. Let’s tie the knot.”
Clara pulled up the sheet. “It’s not that simple, Arch.”
“We’re two mature adults in love. What could be more simple?”
Crows screamed in the Australian pines outside. Clara shook her head. She had to be careful, real careful, now. She had a feeling Arch had her under some kind of surveillance. He was interested in that kind of thing, talked about having friends in the FBI.
“Oh, I know you’ve been married before. I know some old patient of yours died this week. In fact, I know your whole history.” Arch waved the history away.
Clara pushed some air through her nose. “How?”
“Never you mind how.”
“What do you know about me, Arch? Tell me.”
“Darlin’, don’t argue with me. I said I know your history—let’s leave it at that.”
“You had me investigated?” Silently she dared him to admit he had.
“No, darlin’, nothing big like that. I just have some sources. Wouldn’t want you to marry me for my groves, would I?”
His orange groves? Clara laughed out loud.
“Or my money.” He laced his fingers across his stomach. “So what’s bothering you? If you can’t trust me with it, who can you trust?”
She could trust
“Oh, I’m dealing with someone who used to be a nuisance and now is”—she pursed her lips—“getting dangerous.”
“Politically?”
“No, physically.” She sighed with irritation, her mood plunging again.
“Somebody threatening the hospital?”
“Not like that case out West.”
“What was that?”
“There were incidents in one of the genetics labs out there. Did you read about it?”
Arch shook his head. “No, what happened?”
“Well, it’s everybody’s nightmare in every institution—sabotages that could end in tragedy. In hospitals, it’s staff that could hurt a patient. In pharmaceutical companies it’s someone contaminating the medication. In the government it’s the fired employee who comes back with an assault weapon or a bomb. In this case it was threatening notes, a birthday cake with poisoned frosting, slashed tires.”
“Who was doing it?”
“Oh, they couldn’t prove it. They thought it was a midlevel associate who was in love with one of the women he worked with. She had slept with him once, then decided he wasn’t for her. Apparently, he didn’t take rejection well. But they never proved it was him.” Clara chewed on her lip, thoughtfully. “It was the genetics lab.”
“Clara, honey, you’re losing me here.”
“They couldn’t get him. They just couldn’t catch this guy. He was brilliant, after all. They tried everything, put in surveillance cameras everywhere, even hired a DNA expert to test the saliva on the flap of the envelopes he was using for his threatening notes.”
“How would that help?” Arch was bewildered.
“They had the DNA from the saliva. They made everybody on the staff give a saliva sample. They thought with a match, they would have cause to get rid of the guy.”
“And?”
“That’s the irony. It was a genetics lab, so the guy fooled them. He contaminated everything he touched with genetic material from a dozen different sources. The saliva on the envelopes they tested came from a dog. So they couldn’t nail him. The incidents stopped, and for all I know he’s still there.”
“How does this relate, baby? You got some genetic material you want to test?”
Clara stared at him, stunned. How could he know about the week when she got back to New York? “You know all this already?”
The Senator smiled. “No, sweetheart, you’re telling a story, I’m just trying to see where it’s heading.”
Clara watched a trio of dolphins out in the Gulf playing in the wake of two Jet Skis before replying. “For a while it was just stupid stuff—someone trying to scare me. I knew who it was. I thought he’d get tired of it.”
“Who?” Arch indicated the dolphins with a finger. “Nice, huh?”
Clara clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Somebody pretty high up. He was my supervisor when I was a resident. We had an affair.” She looked at Arch quickly.
He leaned over to scratch a mosquito bite on his thigh.
“He’s nobody now,” she added quickly.
He sat back, didn’t say anything.
“Ray got married. I got married. Hal lost his clout at the Centre when biology took over the field.”
Arch rubbed his lips with the backs of two fingers. “Who’s Ray?”
“Ray’s the patient who died this week.”
“Did you have an affair with him, too?”
“No!” Clara exploded like a flare. “He was my patient!”
“And the other guy was your supervisor. You had an affair with him.” Arch frowned. “Was he your supervisor with this particular patient? With Ray?”
Clara nodded again.
The dolphins were gone. Arch concentrated on Clara’s face. “Now, this … former patient, is there any relation between his death and your—”
“Harold?” She stared back at Arch, suddenly uncomfortable, screwed up her face. “It’s possible,” she said
