Читать книгу The Prince Next Door - Sue Civil-Brown - Страница 9

THE MAN IN THE CONDO next door was up to no good.

Serena Gregory, M.D., dermatologist-on-vacation, peered through the fish-eye lens in her door and watched a distinctly criminal-looking weasel pass by. Then she heard the door of the condo next to hers open and close.

No good at all. Putting her hands on her hips, she cocked her blond head to one side, her blue eyes narrowing with thought.

The balcony, she decided. Maybe she could hear something from the balcony.

Stepping out through the sliding glass door, she paused as the persistent breeze caught her hair and whipped it across her face. With impatient fingers she combed it out of the way and looked out across the sparkling expanse of the late-afternoon Gulf of Mexico. Eleven stories up, she was well above the tourists below.

This view, and the privacy afforded by this eagle’s eye height, had been her primary reason for purchasing this condo.

Now that man had moved in next door, probably bringing the underworld with him.

Her eyes narrowed again, and she moved toward the concrete wall that separated her balcony from his. Maybe she would hear something.

After all, what else did she have to do? It was her vacation. Her job was usually boringly humdrum, removing minor imperfections from bodies and faces so that everyone could look luminously plasticized, punctuated by serious cases like melanoma. Vacations were her time to cut loose.

Unfortunately, the Federal Government had interfered with her two-week, clothing-and-commonsense-optional cruise. They had impounded the ship, claiming that the owners hadn’t paid taxes. She knew better, of course. The Feds were just afraid that someone might have a good time out there on the Caribbean.

But the man who had moved in next door only three weeks ago had caught her attention. He looked entirely too urbane and suave for the local island culture, even in expensive condos like these. As far as she could tell, he had no visible means of support, he came and went at all hours, and he never so much as socialized with anyone else at the complex. A cool nod, a faint smile.

He might as well have introduced himself as Bond, James Bond. The thought made her snicker quietly to herself. The man actually wore ascots with his blue blazers and khaki slacks. Ascots! Too much for Florida.

And now that weaselly looking man had come by twice today. If he didn’t look like the underworld on the hoof, then Serena didn’t know what the underworld looked like.

Which was entirely possible, she admitted, as she realized she’d forgotten to put sun block on her overly sensitive skin. Sighing, she went back inside and got a tube of SPF 50. No basal cell carcinomas for her. No melanoma. No early aging.

Just gobs and gobs of SPF 50, until no matter how she rubbed, she felt sticky over every exposed inch.

As a result, she was a very young-looking thirty-five, albeit a sticky one.

That’s when she realized that with the wind blowing like this, she wouldn’t be able to hear anything from next door unless it turned into a major argument.

Drat.

What she needed was an excuse to be outside her front door. Like most structures in Florida, there was no enclosed hallway, only a covered balcony running along the street side of the building, and exterior elevator shafts. Hence, her condo window ledges held flower boxes full of geraniums.

Excellent excuse to be outside and thus observe the squirrelly crook when he reappeared.

Almost—just almost—she stopped herself. She was being silly and overimaginative. She knew it. But this was her vacation, darn it, and she was going nuts for lack of adventure, all because some IRS agents had chosen this week to seize the cruise ship. What alternative did that leave her? Another trip to Orlando to stand in lines forty-five-minutes long to take rides she’d already taken? Sitting on the beach below where she could sun and bathe at any time of year?

That wasn’t a vacation.

A vacation was a time to cut loose and get into trouble of some kind.

But she did pause. Maybe she should just get a flight to Aruba and go play Texas Hold ’Em. She could get into some serious trouble doing that. Trouble of the financial kind. No matter how often she played—and if she never saw Tunica again, it would be too soon—she was still the sucker at the table.

What harm could it do to tend her geraniums, though? None. Absolutely none.

So she got out her gardening gloves, her shears and a bottle of premixed fertilizer. She’d fertilized the plants last week. At this rate she was going to have geraniums taking over the world. She’d need to call the army to put them back in their place.

The thought made her giggle, easing some of her irritation at the IRS, who were already robbing her blind, so why had they stolen her cruise, as well?

And why was she letting irritation ruin her vacation?

Implements in hand, she stepped outside and surveyed her window boxes. No sound came from the condo next door. Pity. But maybe that would change.

The plants were actually doing quite well. She wondered how long she could legitimately spend out here snipping off three yellowed leaves and six dying flower heads. Fifteen minutes?

She was just reaching out to trim the first leaf when the elevator door twenty feet away slid open, and her nemesis neighbor stepped out, dressed as always for London rather than Florida. She glanced at him, received the usual cool nod and gave him one in return.

He did go a little farther this time, though. His gaze raked over her in a way that left her feeling naked, rather than clad in a tank top and shorts. Typical man.

Feeling her cheeks heat, she looked away…and snipped a perfectly good leaf off her plant. She almost winced, imagining the cry of outrage from the geranium.

Looking out the corner of her eye, she watched her neighbor walk up to his door and pull his keys out of his pocket. She felt a twinge of nasty pleasure as she realized he was looking a little wilted. So he wasn’t impervious to the climate.

Then, for reasons she would never know, she blurted, “There’s someone in your unit. I hope you were expecting him.”

He paused and turned to look at her. “There is?”

“Yes.”

A frown creased his handsome face. “How…odd.”

“You weren’t expecting someone?” She straightened, facing him, thinking that now here was an adventure at last. “Should I call the police?”

He didn’t even hesitate. “I’ll look into it first. Thank you for the warning.” Then he unlocked the door and disappeared inside.

So he was a criminal! Anyone else would have wanted the police. No one else would have gone in there alone. Drug dealer? No, too urbane looking. Cat burglar?

Oooh, she liked that idea. Like David Niven in The Pink Panther, or Cary Grant in It Takes a Thief. Smooth. Cultured. Daring. Dangerous. Yummy.

She was standing there, debating just what kind of crook she might have next door when a familiar voice caught her attention from behind.

“Hi, Serena.”

She whirled around, startled, and saw another neighbor, a young woman, barely grown up, named Ariel. “Shh,” she said, holding her gloved finger to her lips.

Oops. Making ptooey sounds, she tried to spit dirt from her sunscreen-sticky lips. It didn’t work. She tried to rub the dirt off with her forearm, only to notice—one moment too late—that her forearm had also been sporting a dappling of semiadhered potting soil. Which had now made its way to her face. An attempt with the other forearm had the same effect, with the result that she was sure her appearance now resembled Sylvester Stallone in First Blood.

Ariel proceeded to tiptoe toward her. “What’s up?” she asked in a stage whisper.

Ariel had the clearest, greenest eyes Serena had ever seen. They held depths of mystery in them that no woman so young, no girl-woman, ought to have. And yet they could still be as clear as dewdrops. She also had two servings of imp in her personality, which is why they got along so great together.

“I’ll tell you later. Right now I want to listen.”

Ariel nodded, as always ready to fall in with the scheme. For the next few minutes, they edged closer to the door, Ariel all the while trying to wipe flecks of soil from Serena’s face. Sidestep. Wipe. Sidestep. Wipe. Marcel Marceau would have wept.

A few minutes later the door of the neighbor’s unit opened up, and the weaselly man stepped out, bumping Ariel’s elbow in midwipe, causing her hand to skid across Serena’s face like an ice skater after an all-night bender.

Turning, he said through the open door, “Just remember. We have your mother!”

Then he stomped away toward the elevator in what Serena could only think was a perfect imitation of high dudgeon.

Serena stared after him for a moment, then caught Ariel’s glance. Her eyes slid to the still-open door. Of course.

“You’ve a bit of dirt on your face,” James-David-Cary-Bond-Niven-Grant said, as smoothly as if he were commenting on an expected afternoon thunderstorm.

Then he stepped back into his unit and closed the door, leaving both Serena and Ariel agape. Ariel paused for a moment, pursed her lips like Spassky pondering a chess move, and finally spoke.

“Ice cream?”

THIS REQUIRED A PLAN. And plans required ice cream. Conveniently, there was a quart of Godiva in the freezer, whispering her name. Serena scrubbed off potting soil and sunscreen—how had it gotten there? she wondered—while Ariel ladled out obscenely large bowls of frozen chocolate sweetness and fat. She also added chocolate syrup, in case the ice cream wasn’t sinful enough on its own.

Serena liked that idea—serious plans called for serious calories—and rooted around for whipped cream and a jar of maraschino cherries. And the shaker of chocolate sprinkles. And the ground cashews. In for a penny, in for ten pounds.

Five minutes later the two of them were sitting cross-legged on the living room’s plushly carpeted floor, one on each side of the coffee table. The first mouthful of ice cream carried enough chocolate that Serena figured she wouldn’t have PMS for the next year.

When the mouthful had melted into a frigid memory, Serena spoke. “Okay. Let’s talk about the creep next door.”

Ariel lifted both of her eyebrows. “About Mr. Maxwell?”

Serena felt her jaw drop. “You know him?”

“Well, not exactly.” Ariel scooped some more ice cream into her mouth and closed her eyes as she savored it.

“What do you mean, not exactly?” Serena could barely wait for the girl to swallow.

“Well,” said Ariel, fully a minute later, “I introduced myself to him one day. In the elevator.”

Now Serena was fully agog. It was one thing for a grown woman to take risks, but a girl Ariel’s age? “You spoke to a strange man in the elevator?”

Ariel shrugged. “Not exactly a stranger when he lives in our building.”

“Jeffrey Dahmer lived in someone’s building!”

Ariel looked at her as if to say, you poor frightened person. “He looks rather respectable, don’t you think?”

“No I don’t think. Nobody dresses like that around here. In London he would look respectable. Maybe even in France. But not here. Here he looks like a man who lives a pretense.”

Ariel frowned. “Do you really think so? He seemed perfectly nice to me.”

Ice cream forgotten—if only for a moment—Serena tapped her finger on the marble top of the coffee table. “Don’t you listen to the news, Ariel? What do they always say about the killer or the drug dealer? ‘He was quiet, kept to himself, never caused any trouble.’”

“Oh.” Ariel shrugged and took some more ice cream. “Well, he didn’t bother me. I said hi, told him my name, he told me his, and I welcomed him to Gull’s Rest. That was it.”

“You don’t know how lucky you are.”

“I don’t?”

Serena had the distinctly uncomfortable feeling that those green eyes were laughing at her, but Ariel’s face merely looked interested.

She took another tack when she spoke again, hoping this fey young woman wasn’t speaking to every stranger she met in elevators. “Didn’t you hear what that weaselly man said when he left?”

“That he had Mr. Maxwell’s mother?” Ariel nodded and dabbed the corner of her mouth with a paper napkin, erasing the evidence of chocolate syrup. “That was odd.”

“It was more than odd. It sounded like a threat.”

“True.” The young woman sat up straighter. “But it still doesn’t mean that Mr. Maxwell is up to any wrong. He might be a victim.”

“Hah. When I told him there was a man in his apartment and offered to call the police, he refused. Said he would handle it himself.”

“Hmm.” Ariel once again frowned. “That’s a strange response.”

“I think he’s a rogue. A dangerous rogue.”

Ariel nodded. “Probably a pirate. He looks like he’s fresh off the boat from Marseilles, doesn’t he? What with the peg leg and the eye patch and all….”

Trust youth to make an older person feel stupid, simply by pointing out the absurdity of the obvious. “Okay, maybe he’s not that dangerous. But something’s not right about him. You mark my words.”

Ariel, once again attacking her sundae with a gusto that would have shamed wolves, paused to speak. “Well heaven forfend that there should be anything not right about someone. Those perfect people are so hard to come by.”

“Okay, you win. He’s probably a perfectly ordinary, dime-a-dozen junior executive.”

“Anything but, I hope! God, how boring would that be?” The girl took another heaping spoonful of ice cream, laden with nuts, syrup and sprinkles. “But there’s a lot of room between boringly ordinary and dangerous rogue.”

Serena gave the girl her most serious look. “I,” she said, her voice weighted with significance, “am on vacation.”

Ariel looked up, chocolate staining one corner of her mouth, her unusual eyes suddenly looking very puckish. “And you can’t go on that naked cruise.”

“Clothing optional,” Serena corrected her.

Ariel shrugged. “Same thing.” She ate another huge spoonful of ice cream. Serena wouldn’t have guessed Godiva could go down quite so fast.

“It’s vacation,” Serena said again, ominously.

Ariel nodded. “And you need to get into trouble.”

“Right.”

“Okay.” That charming smile speared again. “A little trouble.”

“Certainly not enough to get me arrested.”

“Well, you didn’t get arrested last winter when I suggested you take that job playing Mrs. Santa Claus at the mall.”

“Only because I didn’t commit murder.”

Ariel laughed. “You sure raised a ruckus, though.”

In spite of herself, Serena had to smile.

“And,” Ariel added, “I’m sure there are quite a few parents who now take child-rearing more seriously.”

“I hope so, for the sake of civilization. But that won’t do this time, Ariel.”

“No, of course it won’t. It’s the wrong time of year.” Ariel put down her empty bowl. “I suppose you want to spy on Mr. Maxwell.” Her eyes danced. “He does have a job, you know.”

Serena felt her stomach sink. She didn’t want the man to have a job. That would ruin all her fun. How boring it would be if he were a loan officer. “How did you find that out?”

“I asked him,” Ariel replied complacently. Her eyes started dancing. “He’s an international art dealer.”

Serena’s eyes widened with joyous anticipation. Her heart leaped. “Do you have any idea how many illicit activities that could cover?”

Ariel laughed. “I was afraid you were going to say that.”

“Afraid? Why?”

“I didn’t really mean afraid. Just that I guessed you were going to say that.”

“Oh.” Serena settled back, satisfied. “Well, you know I don’t want to get you into any trouble.”

Something passed over Ariel’s face, at once amused and wise. “I won’t get in any trouble. Have I gotten into any trouble yet?”

“Not that I’m aware of, but there’s always a first time.”

Ariel rolled her fey eyes. “This won’t be it,” she said, as if the future were as clear to her as writing on the wall. “I know how to take care of myself. You might get into trouble, though.”

“That’s the point.”

Ariel leaned forward gleefully. “But it might be more trouble than you’re looking for.”

“Pish-tosh,” Serena said with a wave of her hand. “I can take care of myself, too.”

“So how are you going to start?” Ariel asked. “Wiretapping? Spy cameras?”

Serena frowned. “That would be illegal. No, I’m just going to follow him. And so are you.”

“But that’s boring.”

Serena had to agree. Especially in this heat. “Well then, what do you suggest?”

Ariel’s eyes danced. “You have to meet him.”

All of a sudden Serena had an inkling that she might be in for real trouble, and not of her own making.

“I’ve already met him,” she said, remembering the encounter just a few minutes before.

“No, I mean meet him when you don’t look like a condo commando.”

“Was it that bad?” Serena asked, having spared herself the indignity of a mirror before she washed up.

“Arnold Schwarzenegger would have quailed,” Ariel replied. “‘More flies with honey than vinegar’ and all that. So, you have to meet him.”

“If I must.” Unfortunately, Serena could think of no other plan that didn’t involve wandering all over town in the heat trying to stay out of sight, an activity she suspected she would not be very adept at.

“Don’t worry,” said Ariel. “I’ll take care of it.” Serena wasn’t at all comfortable with that notion.