A Score to Settle Page 15

  Almost as if it was planned, everyone in the room looked away and went back to their hushed conversations. Even Celeste spoke in an undertone. And Jamie was left standing there like an idiot.

  Her mouth was as dry as a musty old book. She grabbed the drink Daniel had abandoned and downed several swallows. But nothing—not even Claude’s special drink—was going to wash away this scene from her mind. Ever.

  She’d drained the glass before it registered that the stuff tasted awful. But then, she’d thought expensive Scotch was awful, too. She had no taste, apparently.

  She should just leave. But instead she wandered out the back door onto the patio, where a number of heaters kept the area comfortable. The crowd parted, giving her a wide berth. Beyond the patio on the vast grounds was a snow machine creating a winter wonderland and…yes, a horse-drawn sleigh filled mostly with screaming kids.

  “I’ll escort you off the estate now.” Jillian had appeared out of nowhere, looking as if she could hardly contain her glee.

  Jamie felt the pressure building behind her eyes. She wanted to cry, but she wouldn’t do it here in front of all these people. Especially not in front of Jillian. So she imagined she was one of Daniel’s ice sculptures, her feelings frozen inside a block of ice.

  “I’ll need my coat,” she said curtly.

  Jillian herded her through the house and back to the foyer. “I’ll get your coat. Stay right there.”

  Jamie felt as if she’d been flattened by a steamroller. Even if a relationship with Daniel was impossible, she hadn’t wanted to lose his respect. She should have been honest with him from the very beginning. But a good lawyer didn’t show all her cards until necessary.

  Standing alone, forlorn, she began to shiver. Her teeth were chattering. Was it that cold? She felt light-headed, and her eyes started to swim.

  She’d drunk only a half glass of champagne and those few gulps of the cranberry concoction, which was supposedly nonalcoholic. Such a small amount of alcohol wouldn’t cause any noticeable impairment. Could strong emotion cause physiological symptoms?

  Jillian returned and thrust Jamie’s tweed coat at her. “Where’s your valet ticket?”

  “In m-my p-pocket, I th-think.” It took her three tries to shove her arm through her coat sleeve.

  Jillian put her hands on her hips. “Are you a drunk on top of everything else?” Abruptly her combative attitude changed to one of concern. “Do I need to call you a cab?”

  Jamie couldn’t seem to formulate a coherent answer. The surrealistic ice sculptures began to spin around her like some crazy North Pole carousel. Then the floor tipped and the lights went out.

  “DON’T YOU THINK you were a little hard on her?”

  Daniel had retreated to his library, which was off-limits to the partygoers. He sat at his carved oak bar, rescued from a London pub that had been slated for destruction, nursing a Scotch that he didn’t really want.

  The person interrogating him was Ford Hyatt, who had followed him in here. If Ford hadn’t been his most trusted investigator, he would have kicked him out.

  “Her father sent me to death row.”

  “Her father was a prosecutor doing his job. He was set up, given phony evidence just like Jamie was.”

  “The man was a monster with no heart.”

  “So, maybe he was. Jamie had no control over what her father did.”

  “She should have told me. It was an important fact, given the nature of our business together. Now it will look like she had an ax to grind—that she wanted to somehow prove her father did the right thing. She’s no longer impartial. We won’t be able to call her to testify.”

  “She was never impartial. But let’s just say you’re right. She did you wrong by keeping the facts of her parentage from you. Did you have to publicly humiliate her? You might have succeeded in putting her down, but your behavior didn’t reflect well on you. Very few of those people in there really know you. For some of them, this is their first real contact with you. And you showed them a ranting maniac.”

  “I’ll send out a memo, apologizing for my behavior.”

  Ford shook his head and poured himself some Wild Turkey.

  “It’s not like you. There’s something going on with you and Jamie McNair besides a business relationship.”

  “What have you heard?”

  “Nothing. But I know what I see. You wanted to hurt her, and that’s not like you.”

  “Maybe you don’t know me as well as you think. There are people out there I sincerely would like to hurt.”

  “But is Jamie really one of them? Or did you unload on her because you can’t do anything to a man who’s in his grave?”

  Now that the adrenaline from his confrontation with Jamie was dissipating, Daniel could think more clearly. Maybe he’d gone overboard. He should have at least asked her why she hadn’t told him about her father. And he should have talked to her in private.

  He pulled a paper napkin out of his pocket and brought it to his nose. Faint traces of a lipstick scent teased him. He’d been carrying it around with him like a security blanket ever since he’d wiped Jamie’s lipstick from his face the day they flew to Wichita Falls. It reminded him of everything he’d just thrown away.

  “I didn’t intend to do what I did,” he said at last. “It’s just that when I saw her, a lot of old buried feelings came surging to the surface.”

  He’d lost control. And he didn’t like that one bit.

  “Jamie gave me hope,” he continued. “She made me want to rejoin the human race, to be a better person than I’ve been in the past. I trusted her, and you know that doesn’t come easy for me.”

  “So you have feelings for her.”

  “I did. But now I see how impossible the situation is. She’s a prosecutor. And it’s not just her job, it’s her heritage. She chose her profession because she wanted to be just like Daddy. She told me that much.”

  Ford shrugged and took a gulp of his drink. “You’re forgetting, it’s not her job anymore.”

  “What do you mean?” Daniel asked sharply.

  “You didn’t know? I thought Raleigh would have told you.”

  Damn. He had a message from Raleigh on his phone, but with Jillian pestering him every five minutes about some damn detail having to do with the party, he’d neglected to call her back. “What happened?”

  The phone on the bar rang, but Daniel ignored it.

  “Jamie’s no longer with the prosecutor’s office,” Ford informed him. “She’s gone, as of two days ago. Raleigh tried to call her—she had a question pertaining to the Gables case, some small thing—and she was told Jamie no longer worked there.”

  “And Jamie didn’t let me know?” Had she been fired, or had she resigned? “If I’d known she lost her job I might not have…” Oh, who was he kidding? He hadn’t planned his strategy based on anything other than raw, unfettered emotion.

  It was a bad way to run his life. Everything good that had happened to him—including getting pardoned by the governor—had involved a cool head and logical, organized actions.

  “I should talk to her. Apologize—at least for the way I dressed her down in a social situation.”

  “It’s gonna have to be a mighty big apology.”

  Just then someone banged insistently on the door. “Daniel, are you in there?”

  Jillian again. Would the woman not leave him alone?

  Ford went to the door and opened it. “What is it, Jillian? This isn’t a good time to disturb him.”

  Jillian pushed past Ford into the room. “Daniel. Jamie just collapsed in the foyer.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  DANIEL’S VISION CLOSED in until all he could see was a pinprick of light. Jamie, passed out?

  “I’ve called for an ambulance,” Jillian continued, “but I thought you should know.”

  In a fraction of a second, Daniel’s vision cleared and he was off his bar stool and striding for the door, heart pumping furiously.

  His habi
tual mistrust forced him to ask, “Any chance she’s faking?”

  “I thought so at first. But when she fell she hit her head on the floor and she’s bleeding everywhere. She’s definitely unconscious.”

  A crowd of his guests had assembled in the foyer, murmuring in hushed voices. But they parted like the Red Sea as Daniel moved through them.

  Jamie lay on the floor, arms and limbs at odd angles. His first thought was to go to her, draw her into his arms and breathe life and vitality into her like some mythical Prince Charming. But she was no sleeping beauty, under a magic spell, and he was sure as hell no Prince Charming.

  Randall was there. Thank God. Randall had all kinds of CPR certification.

  Daniel went down to one knee.

  “Careful of the blood, sir,” Randall said.

  Daniel didn’t care about any damn blood. “How is she?”

  “Breathing, but unresponsive. Her pulse is slow.”

  Daniel lightly slapped her cheek. “Jamie, honey, wake up.” If he could see some response from her, a flutter of eyelash, even, he would feel better.

  He took her hand in his. “Jamie, if you can hear me, squeeze my hand.”

  There! He’d felt it, just the slightest tension in her fingers.

  “You’re going to be okay, Jamie,” he said all in a rush, somehow feeling responsible for her condition. Maybe he’d only verbally assaulted her, and normally chewing someone out with words didn’t produce unconsciousness, but he couldn’t help feeling the two were connected.

  Now her eyelashes did flutter. She could definitely hear him.

  “Help’s on the way. Hang in there. Please, Jamie, try to hold on, okay? I’m sorry for losing my temper with you. It was the wrong thing to do.” God, he didn’t want those harsh words to be the last exchange between them.

  What had he been thinking? He cared about Jamie. Yes, she’d done something he didn’t like, and if she were an employee he would be justified in abruptly terminating her.

  But she wasn’t his employee. He’d come to see her as a friend—no, clearly more than a friend, since he’d made love to her. When someone you cared about did something you didn’t care for, the appropriate thing to do was talk about it, not cut them out of your life in the cruelest way possible.

  The paramedics arrived. As they checked Jamie’s vital signs, one of them asked questions and Jillian was there to answer them, since she was the one who’d witnessed Jamie’s collapse.

  “Did she have too much to drink?”

  “She was only here a few minutes, and she didn’t seem tipsy until right before it happened,” Jillian said.

  “Is she diabetic?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “She’s not diabetic,” Daniel supplied. “At least, I’ve never seen her take insulin. She hasn’t mentioned any health problems.”

  “On any medications?”

  “Not that I know of, but…truthfully, I don’t know that much about her.” She’d hidden her parentage from him. What else might she be hiding? She hadn’t shared a lot of personal information with him.

  “Has her next of kin been notified?”

  “I don’t think she has any family,” Daniel said.

  “A friend, then. Someone should go to the hospital with her.”

  Daniel wanted to go with her. He didn’t want her to wake up alone in a strange place with no one at her side. But he didn’t trust himself in that environment. What if he freaked out, like he did at the prison? That wouldn’t help Jamie at all.

  “Want us to go with her?” Ford asked, his fiancée, Robyn, by his side.

  “Would you mind?”

  “Of course we’ll go,” Robyn said. “I’ll get our coats.”

  “Whatever she needs—make sure she has it,” Daniel said to Ford. “I’ll take financial responsibility.”

  “We’ll make sure she gets the best of care.”

  “And tell her…tell her I’m sorry.”

  “You should tell her yourself.”

  “I can’t go to a hospital.” Too many unpleasant memories. He’d spent way too much time in hospitals after he’d gotten out of prison—first, to restore his own health. Then, watching his parents die.

  “You could,” Ford said. “Sometimes, Daniel, I think you use your unfortunate past as an excuse so you don’t have to do anything the least bit tough or uncomfortable.”

  Wow. Nobody ever talked to him like that.

  Ford shrugged, looking a big guilty. “There, I said it.”

  Daniel tried one last time to cling to his philosophy. “You don’t think I’ve earned the right to live life on my own terms?”

  “I guess if you’ve got the resources to do that…but you didn’t corner the market on unpleasant circumstances. Raleigh witnessed her husband die in a terrible car accident. Robyn…” He lowered his voice. “Hell, Robyn lost eight years of her son’s life to kidnappers. But she never felt sorry for herself.”

  Robyn returned with their coats. The paramedics had loaded Jamie onto a stretcher, and Daniel managed to touch her hand one last time before she was wheeled away.

  Ford and Robyn followed the stretcher out the door.

  He didn’t feel sorry for himself, damn it. He did what he had to do, that was all.

  JAMIE’S HEAD WEIGHED at least two hundred pounds, and someone was whacking at it repeatedly with a machete. Her throat felt raw, and the rest of her didn’t feel much better.

  Worst hangover on earth?

  But she hadn’t had that much to drink at Daniel’s party…

  Daniel. He’d found out about her father. She remembered that much, at least, and the terrible fight they’d had. But after that, events were hazy.

  Had she gotten drunk? That wasn’t like her. She’d never been the type to drink excessively, not even in college.

  She forced her eyes open a crack, saw bright fluorescent lights, and that was when the panic hit. She wasn’t at home, in her own bed.

  Her eyes flew open and she gave a strange, hoarse little shriek as she tried to sit up, but a hand on her shoulder stopped her.

  “Easy, it’s okay, Jamie. You’re safe.”

  Jamie’s bleary eyes focused on the person leaning over her bed. A woman…

  “I’m Robyn Hyatt. My husband works at Project Justice, and we were at the party.”

  Jamie must have looked at her blankly.

  “You were at Daniel’s house and you passed out suddenly. You hit your head. You were taken to Johnson-Perrone Medical Center.”

  “I…I don’t remember.” Her voice was strangely raspy. She remembered Jillian wanting to eject her from the party, and then…nothing. “Why are you here?” The question came out sounding ungrateful, so she quickly revised it. “I mean, thank you for being here… Oh. You’re here to…to talk me out of suing Daniel? Don’t worry, I’m not the lawsuit-happy type.”

  “It’s not that,” Robyn said emphatically. “Daniel was very worried about you. In fact, he wanted to come here himself, but…well, you know Daniel doesn’t get out much.”

  Daniel, worried? “He didn’t seem too worried about me when he chewed me out in front of a zillion people. He hates me.”

  “That’s not true. If you could have seen him when he learned you’d fallen ill…”

  “Whatever.” Jamie didn’t want to discuss Daniel with Robyn or anyone else. Her feelings felt as raw as her throat. “Why is my throat so sore?”

  “I don’t know. They won’t tell me anything, since I’m not family.”

  Jamie opened her eyes again and looked around, taking in a few more details. “I’m in the E.R.” She had an IV in one arm and various straps, patches and clamps on and around her, probably measuring her vital signs.

  “Yes.”

  “Get me a doctor, then. Please.” She didn’t intend to be rude to Robyn. It was kind of her to come to the hospital and watch over her. Or maybe she was just following Daniel’s orders. But this situation wasn’t Robyn’s fault.

  “Yes, of
course.”

  As Robyn left the cubicle, Jamie again tried to remember getting sick. But her last memory was of Jillian, announcing she would escort Jamie off the premises.

  A woman in a white coat entered the cubicle. She had a round, cherubic face and a sweet smile. “Ah, you’ve come back to us.”

  “Are you my doctor?” Jamie asked, to be sure.

  The woman came forward and took Jamie’s hand. “I’m Dr. Novak. You gave us a scare. How do you feel?”

  “On a scale of one to ten? A negative five. What happened to me?”

  “You don’t remember?”

  “Not a thing.”

  “Do you remember taking any pills?”

  “I don’t remember what the paramedics or doctors did—”

  “I mean, before you passed out.”

  Jamie shook her head. “No idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Ms. McNair, you had enough barbiturates and alcohol in your blood to take down a rhinoceros.”

  Barbiturates?

  “Secobarbital Sodium, to be exact. You might know it as Immenoctal, Novosecobarb, Seconal. Mixed with alcohol it can be deadly—”

  “No. I don’t take pills.”

  “No one is going to blame you or punish you,” the doctor said gently. “You’ve been under a tremendous amount of stress. You lost your job, you had an argument with your boyfriend—”

  Jamie jerked her hand away from the doctor’s grip. “Look, let’s get one thing straight. I don’t know who you’ve been talking to, but I do not, and never have, taken any kind of tranquilizer or sleeping pills or whatever the hell you’re talking about, with or without alcohol.”

  The doctor looked at her with cloying sympathy, and Jamie wanted to smack her.

  “You think I tried to kill myself?”

  “When a patient presents themselves with that amount of prescription tranqs in their blood, along with alcohol, it’s usually not an accident.”

  “Not an accident…” Oh, God. Could someone have drugged her? Stuck her with a syringe, put the drugs in her drink? She didn’t remember what happened.

  At least she knew what the sore throat was about. They’d probably pumped her stomach.