Night Fires

He slammed the glass down on a table; the fragile stem snapped, then broke, and a drop of amber liquid spilled on to the wood. He turned to her, his eyes burning with dark night fires.

‘I quit the prosecutor’s office. Did you know that?’

She nodded. ‘Vitale told me.’

‘Hell, when I took that job I was so damned self-righteous. I told my father I was going to be the kind of lawyer he wasn’t.’

‘I don’t understand. What does your father have to do with this?’

‘My father practices corporate law. He asked me to come into his firm with him, but I was such a smug bastard, accusing him of believing in nothing but dollar signs. I was going to save the world.’ He walked to the window and put his palms against it, staring out into the night and the lights winking across the river in the borough of Queens. ‘After a few years, I got my first big case. The authorities had been after Tony Vitale for years, and they finally had something on him.’

‘The killing of Riley,’ Gabrielle said softly.

James nodded. ‘Yes. But we needed your testimony to make murder charges stick.’ He paused; she saw his shoulders rise as he drew a deep breath. ‘I was determined to find a way to force you to co-operate.’ He leaned his forehead against the glass. ‘And I did. But along the way—along the way, I learned some ugly truths. I learned that I don’t have a lock on morality, that life isn’t as black and white as I wanted it to be.’ He drew in his breath again, then turned towards her. ‘And I learned I could fall in love with a woman who represented everything I claimed to despise.’

Gabrielle’s heart filled with love. If only she could go to him. If only she could tell him…

‘By the time your father died, I hated myself for what I’d done to you. I knew your life was in danger—I wanted to protect you..’

‘So you followed me to New Orleans.’

James nodded. ‘Yes. I told myself it was only to safeguard you as a future witness. But it was more than that…’ He fell silent. When he spoke again, his voice was low. ‘When I came back to the carriage house that night and found you’d gone, I almost went crazy. I drove the streets of the Quarter, I searched the city—I demanded the cops send out an all-points bulletin. But then, the next day, your picture was everywhere. You and Vitale…’

Gabrielle closed her eyes. She and Vitale, the photo of her in his arms….

‘I wanted to kill you both. I dreamed about it; hell, I even…’ He paused and drew a breath. ‘In the end, I decided there had to be a better way.’ His head lifted and he looked at her. ‘I decided to put Tony Vitale away. Forever.’

‘You can’t,’ she said brokenly. ‘No one can.’ .

James gave her a bitter smile. ‘I hate to disappoint you, baby. I took a logic course in college once—I’ve forgotten most of it, but one thing impressed the hell out of me. There aren’t any insoluble problems, just poor solutions. So I stopped concentrating on the Riley murder and I took a good, hard look at all the other slime Vitale’s involved in.’

She stared at him, afraid to ask the question. Finally, she cleared her throat.

‘And did you—did you find something?’

‘Not at first. But I kept at it. And I turned up a lead. Townsend wouldn’t touch it; there wasn’t enough to go on. So I quit my job and I went out on my own, listening to anybody who’d talk, buying whatever information I could—and then, last week, it all came together.’

She stared at him, her heart beginning to trip erratically,

afraid to let herself believe.

‘I don’t suppose…’ Her voice faded and she inhaled shakily. ‘I don’t suppose you found what you’d been looking for, though.’ She hesitated. ‘A way to—to put him away forever.’

‘I did, indeed. Vitale’s hands are so dirty, he’ll spend the rest of his life in prison and never get them clean.’

Gabrielle began to tremble. ‘Are you sure?’

‘That’s what tonight’s arrest was all about.’ His mouth twisted with pain. ‘I struck a deal with Townsend—I convinced him to let me get you out first, although why in hell I did it…’ He turned away from her and looked out of the window. ‘Come on,’ he said with a terrible weariness in his voice, ‘I’ll get you a taxi.’

She was dizzy with excitement. Was it true? Had James’s rage worked in a way he’d never intended? Had it set her free? It seemed too much to believe, and yet…

She took a hesitant step towards him. ‘ Are you certain? Vitale will—he’ll never get out of prison?’

He shook his head. ‘Not in this lifetime, he won’t.’ Suddenly, he spun towards her. ‘What’s the matter, Gabrielle? Are you afraid you won’t be able to… ?’ The angry tumble of words stopped when he saw her face. ‘What are you smiling at?’ he demanded.

Her smiled faded. He was looking at her with such cold fury—would he believe her story? Would he even listen while she told it?

‘James.’ Her voice was a tremulous whisper. She held her hand out to him, as if to implore his understanding. ‘I—I have something to tell you.’

He watched her through narrowed eyes. ‘And I’ll just bet it’s fascinating.’ His words fell between them like bits of ice.

‘I—I didn’t go back to Vitale willingly..’

She waited, her breath stilled. Something gleamed in his eyes, then was snuffed out. ‘As I said, fascinating.’ He turned away. ‘Let’s go. It’s getting late.’

Some new emotion swept through her. Pain. Yes. Desperation, of course.

But suddenly—suddenly anger rose inside her.

‘Dammit, James Forrester…’ Gabrielle took a step forward. ‘Can you get down from that high horse long enough to listen?’

James folded his arms. ‘I’m listening,’ he said coldly. ‘Why wouldn’t I? You’re one hell of an actress. I wouldn’t want to miss this performance.’

‘That night—Vitale telephoned me after you left. He said if I didn’t come back to him, he’d—he’d kill you.’

‘What the hell kind of fool do you take me for?’ he demanded. ‘The cop on duty at your front door told me how you’d called him inside to check on a noise, how

you’d sneaked out while he was upstairs…’

‘The cop lied. Vitale arranged it. He arranged for my plane ticket, for the cab that picked me up ’

James’s mouth curled in disgust. ‘Stop it !It’s over. You’ve lost, don’t you see that? Just be gratef

ul you still have the things he gave you, the furs and the jewels.’

That was what he believed, that Vitale had bought her. She thought back, remembering his bitter words when they first met, the questions about how she’d gotten the carriage house in New Orleans, the suggestions that it had been hard to turn away from the man who’d given her presents back in New York.

Nothing that had happened since would have convinced him that he’d been wrong. There’d been pictures of her everywhere, stories about the fortune in jewels and furs Vitale had lavished on her. Even now, as she pleaded with James to believe her, she was draped in Big Tony’s booty, wearing his silks and furs and gems.

Her glance fell to the ruby necklace lying on the floor, and a sudden hope was kindled in her heart.

She bent and picked it up, moved past him to the window and looked out. Far below, the river gleamed like black oil beneath the lights of New York City.

‘Do these windows open?’.

‘Yeah. They open. What’s that got to do with—’

Gabrielle opened one of the windows. The necklace fell through the night, twinkling like hundreds of tiny suns as it rushed toward the water.

‘What the hell are you doing?’

Gabrielle smiled. ‘I love you,’ she said. ‘I’ve never loved anyone but you.’

James stared at her in disbelief, and she laughed a little.

‘Tiffany’s,’ she said. ‘Five hundred thousand dollars. Can you imagine that?’ Her eyes held his as she slipped a ruby and sapphire bracelet from her wrist. ‘Bulgari. Twenty thousand, I think.’ She laughed again, this time at the look on his face. ‘Well, maybe just a little bit more.’ Her arm drew back, her hand flexed, and the bracelet soared out of the window, winked against the inky darkness, and vanished from sight.

James took a step towards her. ‘Gabrielle. What are you doing?’

‘And then, of course, there’s this.’ She pulled the diamond ring from her finger and held it before her. ‘I hated this most,’ she said with a shudder. ‘God, how I hated it!’ A quick toss, and the ring sailed after the bracelet, winking like a shooting star as it tumbled through the sky.