helped her locate him in the dark water.
“Hello,” said Jane. Maybe two voices would complicate her directional fix on Pete. She studied the silhouette as it took its first step toward her. The towel was wrapped around the waist like a skirt, but there could easily be a gun tucked in back. Then she saw a second silhouette step from the entrance, and for a half second she was sure. She took in a breath to prepare to move, but the two shapes stepped into the dim swatch of light from the lamp at the same time.
She could tell from their bodies that neither was a young girl—not seventeen or eighteen. The curve of hip and thigh and breast were too pronounced. She could see their faces now, and they were both mildly attractive, but to determine age she needed to see them in bright light, where the texture of the skin would show mileage. The thinner one with red hair stuck her toe in the water near Jane’s face. “Oh, good. It’s really warm,” she said. She whisked the towel off and tossed it on the deck. Jane was satisfied that this one was not armed. The green two- piece bathing suit would not have hidden a razor blade.
The second one took off her towel and knelt to touch the water with her fingers. “You’re right. It’s perfect. Just like a bath.” She was wearing a suit that Jane guessed had probably come from the same store, but on this one it looked even more obvious, almost indecent. She was shorter and blond, with big white breasts that seemed painfully confined by the top, and when she stood to dive in, Jane saw the lower part of the suit as a blue line bisecting a heart-shaped flash of white buttocks.
The blond one surfaced near Pete. “I hope you don’t mind our coming in with you. We saw you from our room, and it just looked so good …”
“Not at all,” said Pete. “We’re glad to have you. This way we don’t have to wonder if we’re crazy, because you are too.”
“I’m Pam,” she said. Jane could hear something in the woman’s voice. Then she decided it just sounded tense because she was treading water and in the effort her throat muscles had tightened. “And this is Carol.”
Jane tried to analyze her unpleasant feeling. It was the way bodyguards must feel when their charges decided to go into a crowd. The bodyguard’s adrenaline flowed, her muscles contracted for action, and then the threat turned into a mere distraction.
Pete said, “I’m Jim Holstra. This is … Mary. She’s my sister.” Jane’s distracted thoughts suddenly crystalized. He was using her own words.
“Oh, really?” said Carol. She half-turned toward Jane and smiled faintly. “You two must get along pretty well, to travel together.”
Jane had no direction of escape from this conversation. Was he doing what she thought he was doing? The distraction had blossomed into an annoyance. “Yes,” she said.
Her mind was prickling with irritation. They were gently closing doors on her. She reminded herself that whoever they were, they weren’t killers. They were making it obvious that they were intrigued by Pete. If anyone asked later if they’d seen him, they could hardly forget, but what could they say? She couldn’t take them seriously as a threat to Pete’s safety. She could not think of a reason why they seemed so threatening to her.
The one with the red hair glided out into the deep water and bent at the hips. Her bottom broke the surface and then her feet, and she disappeared in the direction of Pete and the blonde. Jane had to fight some inner resistance to bring the names back. The blonde was Pam; the redhead Carol. In a few seconds Carol emerged again, beside Pete. For a minute the three held on to the tile in the deep, shadowy end of the pool. She couldn’t hear what they said. Then Pete floated out into the center.
Jane saw the copper head slip very close to the yellow head, cup a hand, and whisper something. The blonde gave a little squeal, and they started whispering again, then giggled like two unappealing children in a conspiracy. Then they began to swim slowly on either side of Pete. She stared at the two of them, and found herself thinking, Wait until he gets them under the light.
She was horrified at her thought. She was acting as though she were jealous. For the first time she was glad he had offered himself so she had gotten the opportunity to turn him down and acquit herself of that charge. Why was she suddenly feeling angry? The anger didn’t seem entirely real. It occurred to her that it might be her mind’s way of protecting her from something else, and she could even identify what that something was. It was regret at the loss of something that never could have been, something that would have been beautiful, but was now being transformed into something tawdry. Why did she call it tawdry?
She moved to the top of the steps and she realized that she had been unconsciously moving away, to escape the place where this was happening. She shivered when the air touched her skin. She stopped. If she left, went back to the room, these two almost certainly weren’t going to try to kill Pete Hatcher. But if she weren’t present to control the situation, they might ask him questions he was not prepared to answer, or even attract attention that would get him killed.
She felt the urge to hear what they were saying. She slipped back into the water and drifted toward them. Suddenly there was splashing. Pete was out of the pool walking toward the hotel room. He opened the door and disappeared. Jane looked after him in confusion.
The two women suddenly appeared on both sides of her, heading for the steps. “Your brother is really something.” Pam laughed. Jane altered it: little turned-up nose, pink all over—Spam.
“Yes,” said Jane. “He’s a lot of fun.” She loathed them.
“Aren’t you coming?” asked the other one, turning to the side to wring out the long copper hair. She seemed hopeful.
“Coming where?”
“To our place, for a drink.”
“Your place?” asked Jane. She let her feet touch and began to walk along between them.
“Yeah,” said Spam. “We’ve got a little suite, and we’ve got supplies.”
Jane’s head began to ache, but she hid her distaste at the idea. It was after one in the morning. If these two got tipsy and festive, they could be loud enough to get Pete arrested. Then there would be fingerprints, public records for the killers to find. “Sure,” said Jane. “We’ll stop by for one drink.”
She saw the look that passed between Carol and Pam. They were not pleased.
Jane was still twenty feet from the door of the hotel room when it opened and Pete stepped out wearing a dry pair of jeans and a T-shirt, carrying some glasses. He walked to a room two doors from theirs and waited while Carol unlocked it. She considered calling to him, but it would have to be loud if she wanted him to hear it. She tried to catch his eye, but he was looking down, as though he were staring at the lock.
The two women were busy pretending they didn’t know he was looking at them, and they seemed to enjoy the task, giving little shimmy-shivers they could blame on the cold, then tiptoeing into the room ahead of him.
Jane stepped into her room. She stripped off the wet suit quickly in the bathroom and hung it in the shower. She glanced at her own naked body in the mirror and caught herself making the comparison that seemed inevitable at this strange instant in her life. It made her feel a little better: she was not the hag she was feeling like. She was pretty.
She stepped into a pair of jeans and pulled a sweatshirt over her head. At the door she stopped, stood absolutely still, and took a breath. Why am I doing this? Because if I sit in this room alone, I could wake up alone and wish I had kept him from getting himself killed.
She blew out the breath, closed the door behind her, and walked to the women’s room. The light was on, so she was sure it was the right one. She knocked. The door opened a crack, and she pushed it cautiously to come inside. The connecting door to the next room was open, and a dim light was on in there too. Carol, the copper- haired one, emerged from the next room still in her bathing suit, set two glasses of brown liquor and bubbles on the table, and headed into the bathroom. She stopped in front of the mirror and began to blow-dry her hair with a loud dryer. She yelled over it, “Where are you two from?”
Jane picked up the drink that was closest to her and walked to the doorway of the bathroom. “More important, where are Jim and Pam now?”
Carol clicked off the dryer and began brushing her hair, an amused little smile on her face. “Didn’t they come in there?” Then she stopped brushing. “Why, that little …”
Jane turned toward the open connecting door and Carol stepped to her side. “If you can’t see them, do you really want to go next door looking for them?”
“Probably not.” She took an experimental sip of her drink. It was warm and sweet, like bug repellent.
“Are you really his sister?”
