Smoke Screen Page 3

  Her second night had been spent in Rotorua, where she'd found a different New Zealand. The city, which in its infancy had been nicknamed "Rotten Egg Town," smelled of sulfur and catered to tourists. There were expensive hotels and natural spas that tapped into the vast geothermal resources for heating. Paige imagined there was another Rotorua, one she hadn't had time to see, but aside from wallowing shamelessly in the bubbling hot bath adjacent to her hotel room, she had left the city without experiencing any of its attractions.

  Then she had found her way to Waimauri.

  "What did you think of Rotorua?"

  Paige pulled herself back to the present. "I didn't have much of a chance to see it. It seemed like an interesting place."

  "It's the major tourist attraction in New Zealand. Did you go to Whakarewarewa? Ohinemutu? Government Gardens?" He watched as Paige shook her head. "There are only two other countries in the world with anything similar. Iceland and your Yellowstone Park."

  Paige thought she might understand what he was leading up to. "And you believe there's room for more tourism?"

  Hamish leaned back in his chair, his eyes approving. "Rotorua's expanded as far as it can. They've tapped into their geothermal field until there's nothing more to get from it."

  "Just how do you want to develop the Waimauri thermals, Mr. Armstrong?"

  "Hamish."

  "Hamish," she acknowledged. "I am right? That is what you want to do?"

  He wove his fingers together and rested his chin on them. "Rotorua's a tourist town. People come in for a night or two, tour here and there, maybe take in one of the Maori shows at their hotel, fish a little in the lake, then they head back where they came from." He paused. "Anyone can see Rotorua," he said at last. "Anyone."

  Paige lifted an eyebrow. "And you object to that?"

  He made an absolutely-not gesture with his hands. "It's fine with me, but there's always room for a little something different, too, isn't there?"

  Paige started on her second scone. She waited silently for him to tell her about "something different."

  "I represent a group of Australian investors who would like to build a world-class resort here in Waimauri."

  Paige was surprised she hadn't placed Hamish's accent, but then, there were many Australian accents, just like there were many American ones. Hamish's was almost British in its careful precision. "So you're not from New Zealand."

  "Sydney. We already have resorts outside of Perth and Sydney, and one in Fiji. Perhaps you've heard of Palm Island?"

  "I've heard of it." Paige tried to remember just what she had heard, but the kind of development Hamish was talking about was so foreign to the sturdy, middle-class condominiums and suburban housing her father's company dealt in that she hadn't paid much attention. All she remembered was that it was one of the crowning jewels in Fijian tourism.

  "What we have in mind for Waimauri is something smaller, of course. After all, we can't take over the whole North Island, can we?"

  "I imagine the Kiwis would object if you tried," Paige said.

  "We want to combine old-world elegance with modern technology. Some of the pools in the Waimauri thermals are said to have healing properties. We'd be catering to the very rich—the very old, very rich. We'd have a full staff of physicians, physiotherapists, nutritionists. We'd offer the finest, freshest New Zealand foods, the latest therapies, and all the scenic wonders within a hundred miles." He paused. "We'd boost the local economy one hundred percent. Everyone would benefit."

  Paige smiled. "Just how would Duvall Development benefit?"

  Hamish named a figure that made her eyes widen.

  "Is that American, New Zealand, or Australian dollars?" she asked.

  "American."

  "If the thermals have all that potential," Paige said, struggling not to show her excitement, "what makes you think we would want to sell them? Why wouldn't Duvall Development want to develop them and reap the profit?"

  "May I speak frankly?"

  Paige nodded.

  "Because, Miss Duvall, your company doesn't have the expertise, and you don't have any kind of reputation here in the Pacific. Oh, you could do it, but not on the same scale we can. And when you were done, you'd come out with less than we're offering for the land."

  "And why are you offering so much?"

  "To keep you from doing what you just suggested. We plan to make a fortune. We're happy to share."

  Paige knew from experience that no one in the cutthroat world of real estate development was happy to share. If Hamish and his group of investors could have stolen the land right out from under Duvall Development's nose, she knew they would have. On the other hand, Hamish was showing keen business sense by not underestimating Duvall. He had done his homework.

  "And you're prepared to make this offer right on the spot?" she asked.

  "The necessary papers can be drawn up in a day's time."

  Paige considered Hamish's words at the same time she surreptitiously examined him. He was trying hard to appear nonchalant, as hard as she had tried when he had mentioned the money his investors were willing to pay. But she was too experienced and too astute not to see subtle signs of tension. Hamish Armstrong wanted the Waimauri thermals as badly as she wanted peace of mind. And she wasn't going to give them to him. Not yet.

  "You understand that I'll have to talk to my father about this," she murmured, looking at her new watch in the time-honored signal for concluding a meeting. "Will you be in Waimauri a few more days, or is there someplace else I should reach you?"

  He took his glasses out of his pocket and slipped them on. Paige noticed the designer emblem on the thin gold frames. Somehow it fit with the mental picture she was forming of him.

  "I'm staying at a hotel in Rotorua." Hamish pulled out a business card and wrote a number on the back. "When you leave a message, I'll be back in touch immediately."

  Paige let the corners of her mouth turn up in a lazy smile. "I'll be in touch."

  "Perhaps I could interest you in dinner while you're thinking over my offer?" He held up his hands to stall off her refusal. "No business. Just," he hesitated, "pleasure? It's only too rarely that I have such a beautiful business adversary."

  There was something about Hamish Armstrong that wasn't quite what it seemed. Paige sensed a shrewdness that was somehow at odds with his polished manners. He interested her because she didn't understand him, and that was rare. She had an intuitive sense about people that almost never failed her.

  "Dinner sounds nice," she said.

  "Tomorrow night?"

  She nodded. "Shall I meet you in Rotorua?"

  They made plans as he walked her to her car. She was on the road heading toward Four Hill Farm before she began to have regrets.

  * * *

  "You'll fall on your head, then what will I tell Granny?" Adam ruffled his son's hair, supporting him with a hand on his shoulder as he did. Jeremy Tomoana was perched on the top rail of the wooden fence surrounding the small front yard of the brick farmhouse, and Jeremy never stayed perched for long. Adam was hovering just close enough to make a grab for the little boy if he decided sitting wasn't as much fun as walking along the edge.

  "Granny won't know."

  "She will if I take you inside screaming."

  Jeremy didn't answer, but Adam hadn't expected him to. The real surprise had been the complete sentence he'd spoken first. Jeremy was given to either silence or one-word answers. Adam felt victorious if the little boy forgot his fears long enough to speak at all. In the year and a half Jeremy had been with him, Adam had learned not to be uncomfortable with his son's lack of response. Jeremy's silences, like the nightmares that haunted him each night, would fade with time. Adam had to believe that.

  "I've got to finish nailing these boards to the post, e tama. Would you like to help?" Adam watched Jeremy consider his offer. Jeremy considered everything; it almost broke his father's heart. At four, his spontaneity had already vanished, leaving an old man inhabiting a child'
s body.

  Finally, gravely, he nodded. Adam held out his arms, and Jeremy circled his neck with his hands to be lifted down. Only Adam didn't lift him down. He hugged the child against him and buried his face in his hair. "Taku aroha ki a koe," he whispered against the soft curls. "I love you."

  The hug was interrupted by the wheeze of a car climbing the steep hill leading to their house. Adam turned, Jeremy still in his arms, and watched the car approach. "Well, she found us."

  Jeremy's arm tightened around his neck.

  "No, she didn't hurt you last night, and she's not going to hurt you today," Adam reassured him. "Last night you weren't scared. You took the jumper up to the porch by yourself. Remember?"

  Jeremy squirmed, trying to get down, and Adam let him go. As he watched, the little boy ran up the path to the house and disappeared inside. At almost the same moment Adam heard the slam of Paige's car door. He wanted to go after his son, but he knew it was too late. With a sigh of resignation he started toward her.

  Paige brushed a strand of hair back from her eyes, tucking it behind an ear, where it promptly escaped again. She gave up the struggle as useless and waited for Adam to reach her. He was wearing a gray wool jacket trimmed and lined in sheepskin. Unbuttoned, it showed a burgundy flannel shirt tucked into well-worn blue jeans. He looked less like Lucifer and more like the New Zealand farmer that he was, although the change in no way diminished him. He was a powerful man, a man who throbbed with good health and vitality, and Paige felt something odd trace along her nerve endings as he came closer.

  "I see you found us."

  Paige wished he would smile, just so that she could measure the effect. She suspected that if he did, only a seismograph could chart the resulting vibrations. "Did you know I'd come?"

  One corner of his mouth turned up. "I suspected you were too well bred not to."

  "The sweat—jumper was beautiful. I wanted to thank Mrs. Tomoana for it."

  "You've been busy today."

  She nodded. "Detective work. But then, if you'd just given it to me yourself, told me who it was from, and told me why, I wouldn't have had to ask questions all over town until I found my answers."

  One shaggy eyebrow rose in inquiry. "All over town?"

  Paige smiled. "An exaggeration."

  "I intended to give it to you, but my son insisted on doing it by himself." He didn't add how out of character Jeremy's insistence had been. Adam had never seen the little boy willingly approach a stranger, particularly a female stranger. He suspected Jeremy's reason, and it made something clench deep inside him.

  "Were you there?"

  Adam nodded.

  "He's a beautiful little boy. I'm sure you and your wife are very proud of him."

  Adam rarely had to respond to such comments, because Waimauri was a small community and everyone in it knew Jeremy's history. He tried to keep his voice even. "I have no wife. Jeremy and I live here with my grandmother. Come inside and I'll introduce you to her so you can say your thank-you."

  Paige read his sudden tension and knew immediately that it wasn't the tragic loss of his wife that had made the cold fire flash in his midnight eyes. "I'd like to thank Jeremy, too. Will he be there?"

  "I doubt it," Adam said curtly.

  She knew she was trespassing in territory as treacherous as the thermals, but she felt compelled to go on. "I wanted to assure him I wouldn't hurt him. He seemed afraid of me last night."

  "There's nothing you could say to him, Miss Duvall, that would convince him you mean him no harm. He's suffered too much at the hands of his mother to believe anything a woman says." Adam turned and started toward the path.

  Paige watched the stiff set of his body as he neared the house. "And you, Adam," she said too softly for him to hear, "you've suffered too much, too, haven't you?" Surprised that it should matter to her, she started after him.

  Chapter 3

  The inside of Adam's house was dark and cool, with the entwined scents of bayberry and roasting lamb perfuming the air. Paige waited on the threshold for her eyes to adjust to the dim light before she stepped into the hallway. The floor at her feet was a highly polished dark wood, and a staircase of the same wood rose in front of her. The cream-colored walls were freshly painted, and framed photographs of laughing men and women decorated them in random, colorful groupings.

  She walked behind Adam, admiring the house as they went. Each room was scrupulously neat and tastefully decorated with subtle prints and beautifully refinished antique furniture. "You have a lovely home, Adam," she complimented him. "Just the kind of house to raise a little boy in."

  He turned, as if trying to discover if she were patronizing him. "Hardly what you're used to."

  "How do you know what I'm used to?" she countered. "You know nothing about me."

  Adam took in the way she kept her big, dark eyes carefully blank, but he knew he had hurt her. He realized he was still caught up in her remarks about Jeremy's mother. When would Sheila's destructiveness end? "Well, I know you're an American city girl," he struggled to sound pleasant.

  "I'm sure the American part is obvious, but how do you know I'm a city girl?"

  He could have told her that he knew everything about her, including her genealogy, but there was no point. Apparently she had no memory of the time she had once spent in New Zealand, and no knowledge of their ties.

  "No country girl wears designer clothes to visit a sheep farm."

  She looked down at the dark tweed pants, one of the simplest pieces of clothing she owned. "This is what we wear on American sheep farms," she said with a self-mocking grimace.

  "It suits the jumper."

  She was surprised. His words could almost have passed for a compliment.

  "Granny's in the kitchen. We're just about to have tea."

  Paige took a quick glance at her watch and realized it was noon. Her timing couldn't have been much worse. "I'll just tell her thank-you and go. I didn't realize—"

  "You'll stay," Adam said in a tone that brooked no resistance. "She'll have it no other way."

  Paige wanted to tell him that she'd just eaten and couldn't possibly handle another bite, but even as she opened her mouth to say the words, she realized that despite the scones she had shared with Hamish, she was hungry again. And the smells coming from the kitchen were mouth-watering.

  Adam pushed a swinging wooden door, and Paige followed him through it. She listened as he spoke a language she didn't understand to the old woman standing by a large stainless-steel stove.

  Mihi Tomoana was time itself. Paige could no more have guessed her age than she could have guessed what Adam was saying to her. Her face was square, with strong, prominent bones that, despite the ravages of age, were the most assertive aspect of her countenance. Her skin was brown and wrinkled, and her hair snow white, caught back from her face in a tidy bun. Her features were blunt, obviously Polynesian in origin, but nothing like her grandson's. She was tiny, but sturdy, and as Adam spoke, her face was wreathed in smiles.

  It was only as Mihi started toward her that Paige realized she was blind.

  "Do you know how to hongi?" Adam asked Paige.

  She blinked. "I don't think so."

  Adam said something to his grandmother, and the old woman laughed. "I'll teach you," Mihi said in English. "Come." She held out her hands, and Paige took them. "Bend over."

  Paige did, and the old woman leaned toward her. Their noses touched, then their foreheads. Mihi stepped backward, dropping Paige's hands.

  "So tall," Mihi said, shaking her head, "but then, your mother was tall."

  "You knew my mother?"

  "Does she never speak of anyone from Waimauri?"

  "Mother lives in the present." From one bottle of scotch to the next, Paige added silently, knowing that sharing that bit of information with Mihi Tomoana would be unkind. "She's said very little about her life in New Zealand."

  "After tea I'll see if you look like her," Mihi said. "But for now, perhaps you'd like to freshen
up."

  "I really didn't mean to come at mealtime," Paige began.

  "You are welcome here any time of the day or night. Ann's daughter is always welcome in my home. Come, I'll show you where you can wash your hands."

  "I'll see if I can ferret out Jeremy," Adam told them.

  "Tell him I said he must come," Mihi told her grandson.

  When Paige emerged from the bathroom, Mihi was carrying a casserole into the small dining room off the kitchen. "Have a seat, dear, and wait for Adam and Jeremy."

  "Is there anything I can do?" Paige rarely did anything more domestic than pop the cork on French champagne, but now, in addition to sheer good manners, there was something about the warm, fragrantly pleasant kitchen that made her want to lend a hand.

  "Not a thing. I have everything arranged just so, and if anyone else comes in and changes the least little thing, I get confused."

  Paige had almost forgotten that Adam's grandmother was blind. Mihi was so efficient, so sure of herself, that it was almost as if the filmy dark eyes could see every detail of the kitchen. Only the way her eyes failed to focus gave her away.

  "Jeremy, say hello to Miss Duvall."

  "Paige, please," Paige said, turning at the sound of Adam's voice. "Hello, Jeremy." She smiled at the little boy. "I'm glad to see you again."

  Jeremy hid his face against his father's flannel shirt.

  "Jeremy," Mihi said in a stern voice. "Greet our guest."

  "H'lo." The voice was muffled, but the word was unmistakable.

  Paige cleared her throat. She knew she should do something more, say something more, but she felt much like she had in the thermals. If she took the wrong step, she might be in worse trouble yet.

  "Let's eat," Mihi said, saving her from fashioning a response. "Jeremy, you may show Paige where to sit. She'll be right between you and your father, across from me."