Amaryllis

Amaryllis eyed the elaborate waterfall of steps that led to the heavily carved front doors. This was Lucas's home. She had never envisioned him living in such a fantastical creation. And yet, in some strange manner, it suited him. He was a man apart, and his residence was definitely apart from the ordinary, too.

'How do you find the time to take care of this place?' Amaryllis asked.

He smiled fleetingly. 'I don't. I pay people to do it. A team of gardeners handles the outside, and I have a staff of housekeepers who come in during the day.'

Amaryllis blushed at her naïveté. 'I keep forgetting you're rich.' She cleared her throat. 'I'm surprised someone hasn't tried to get you to open the house and grounds for guided tours.'

'The Preservation Society made a stab at it. You know what those folks are like. Anything over fifty years old is an historical monument to them. I told them that if the bottom ever fell out of the jelly-ice business. I'd contact them and we'd talk about paid tours then.'

Silence fell.

'I should go home,' Amaryllis finally said. 'I have to do some thinking.'

'About Gifford Osterley?'

She froze. 'You saw his name on the calendar?'

'I grew up in a jungle, remember?' His smile held little humor. In the shadows his eyes gleamed with watchful speculation. 'I was trained to be observant at an early age.'

'Naturally.' She couldn't think of anything to say.

Lucas opened the leer's door. 'Come inside, Amaryllis. I think we'd better talk.'

'I don't know why his name was on Professor Landreth's calendar.' Amaryllis paced back and forth across the high-ceilinged, old-fashioned living room. 'I can't even come up with a likely explanation. According to my friends in the department, Gifford and Landreth had a major confrontation a couple of months ago. Gifford handed in his resignation because of it. Lucas, there are so many questions.'

'Here.' Lucas thrust a small glass into her hand. 'Drink this.'

Amaryllis frowned at the dark, intensely aromatic liqueur. 'What is it?'

'Moontree brandy.'

She hastily clutched the glass with both hands. 'Good heavens, that must have cost a fortune.'

Lucas's mouth curved faintly. 'Don't worry, I save it for special occasions.'

'Oh.' She sniffed cautiously at the exotic brandy. 'Well, thank you. You really shouldn't have.'

Moontree brandy was a near-legendary liqueur, so far as Amaryllis was concerned. Certainly no one back home in Lower Bellevue ever had a bottle of it stashed in a cupboard. The production of the brandy was extremely limited be- cause the tree produced fruit only on the rare occasions when both Chelan and Yakima were in total eclipse.

The botanists had not yet been able to explain the exact nature of the synergistic reaction between the eclipsed moons and the tree. All attempts to grow the moontree under controlled conditions had failed.

'Sip slowly,' Lucas advised. 'The stuff has a kick.'

'So I've heard.' Amaryllis took a tiny taste--and promptly gasped for breath as a fierce rush of heat filled her mouth. The heady warmth was immediately followed by an equally luscious sweetness.

Lucas leaned back against a table and crossed one ankle over the other. 'Like it?'

'It's... interesting.' Amaryllis resumed her pacing.

'You're going to talk to Osterley, aren't you?'

Amaryllis stopped in front of the window. She looked out into the eerie garden. 'Yes.'

'I don't suppose it will do any good to tell you that I don't think that's a real bright idea.'

'I have to talk to him, Lucas.'

'Why?'

'Because he may have been the last person Professor Landreth spoke with before he died.'

There was a clink as Lucas set his brandy glass down on the table. He crossed the room and came to stand behind Amaryllis. 'This has gone far enough. Stay out of it. It's not your job to investigate Landreth's death.'

'I can't stop now,' she whispered. 'Ever since I sensed that prism working with Sheffield, I've had a nasty feeling about this whole situation. Call it prism intuition.'

'I prefer to call it a lack of common sense. I've said it once, and I know it probably won't do any good, but I'll say it again. Talk to the cops if you really believe that Landreth's accident needs more investigation.'

'I can't go to the police until I have something substantial to give them.'

He put his hands on her shoulders and turned her around to face him. 'Are you sure there isn't another reason why you don't want to talk to the authorities?'

'What are you implying?'

'I think you want answers. But I'm beginning to wonder if you're afraid of what you'll discover. Are you worried that someone you know might be involved in this?'

'Do you really think that I'd avoid going to the authorities in order to protect someone?'

'If you cared about that person, yes.' Lucas framed her face with his hands. His thumbs moved along the line of her jaw. 'I think your sense of loyalty is even stronger than your sense of professional responsibility.'

'This is not your problem, Lucas.'

'The hell it isn't.' He covered her mouth with his own before she could protest.

The following morning Amaryllis was ushered into Gifford's plush offices. At the sight of her, he rose politely from behind his desk.

'Hello, Amaryllis. This is a pleasant surprise. What brings you to Unique Prisms? Looking for a job?'

'No. This is a private matter.'

'Interesting.' Gifford motioned toward a chair. 'Please, sit down.'

'Thank you.' Amaryllis studied him covertly as she took the chair.

She had always considered Gifford a handsome man, and nothing had changed in his physical appearance during the past six months. But for some reason, he no longer seemed nearly as attractive as he once had. There was an aura of weakness about his well-chiseled features, a languid, self- indulgent quality that she had not been conscious of when she worked at the university.

Perhaps she had been too much in awe of his research accomplishments in the old days, she reflected. Next to Professor Landreth, Gifford had been the most esteemed scholar in the entire department. No one could dispute his academic abilities.

His eyes were a riveting shade of blue. He had taken to wearing his light brown hair in the Western Islands style. It was tied at the nape of his neck with a strip of black ribbon. Amaryllis was beginning to think that Lucas was the only man in New Seattle who didn't wear his hair in the new fashion.

She had to admit that Gifford was in excellent shape, perhaps even leaner than when she had last seen him. She wondered if he still played golf-tennis on a regular basis. She glanced at his well-manicured hands and noticed that they also appeared soft. The only calluses Gifford had ever known were the ones he got from his golf-tennis racket.

My, she was getting picky these days, she thought wryly. There was a time when she would have found his hands attractive.

The biggest difference in his appearance was his attire. Gone was the slouchy jacket, the denim trousers, and the running shoes that were de rigueur among faculty members at the university. Today Gifford was a model of executive style in a silver gray suit and a pale gray shirt. A red bow tie added just the right note of whimsical, rakish elegance.

Amaryllis smiled. 'You're dressing better these days, Gifford.'

'I can afford it.'

Amaryllis glanced around at her surroundings. The office complemented the man. A pale gray carpet and sleek black furnishings comprised a suitable backdrop to the power suit. Red flowers in a red vase provided an exclamation point to the room. The dramatic effect was not unlike that of the red bow tie on Gifford's silver gray suit.

'Congratulations.' Amaryllis settled into the expensive office chair. 'I take it business is good?'

'Very good.' Gifford chuckled as he resumed his seat. 'I don't miss academia, that's for sure. Should have left the faculty years ago. Don't know why I waited so long. What can I do for you, Amaryllis?'

'I'll come straight to the point. Did you see Professor Landreth the day of his death?'