Sawyer, Meryl Read Online Free PDF Page B

though she'd spent the
better part of the weekend thinking about her stupidity.
    The noise in the hall. Someone had passed by as she was kissing
Mitch. Had that person seen them? Thank heaven it hadn't been Brent. There
would have been no way she could have explained to him what she couldn't even
explain to herself.
    "So," she concluded with false bravado, "I'm
spending this week researching the homeless, ready to face Mitchell Durant in
front of a camera."
    "Don't attack him," warned Val. "While you were
living in Rome, one of his trials was televised. The man's a shark. He
annihilated every prosecution witness."
    "No one has to remind me what he's like in
court."
    Talia touched Royce's hand. "Get it over with and you'll
never have to see that dreadful man again."
    "I can't just let it go. If I have the chance, I'm going to
embarrass that jerk or something. Whatever I do won't pay him back, but I can't
live with myself if I don't try."
    She didn't add that after the kiss in the dark, she was more
determined than ever to get even with Mitch Durant. With any luck it would be
Friday night in front of millions of viewers.
     
    "You're positive you want to run away?" Mitch asked
Jason as he drove his Viper into the Tenderloin, San Francisco's sinister
netherworld, the side of the city tourists rarely saw. Drug addicts, pushers,
pimps. And worse. Mitch hated being here, especially at night. Too many
memories. All of them bad.
    "I can make it on my own, dude. I'll take my drums and hook
up with a rock band. Or somethin'. I can't stand that man Mom married dissin'
me. I don't do nothin' right. Nothin'."
    How well Mitch remembered thinking the same thing.
    "I'm almost fifteen—old enough to be on my own."
    Yeah, right. The expensive sports car slugged through the heavy traffic
past neon-lit tattoo parlors and the latest crop of Thai restaurants. Old
enough? That's what Mitch had thought.
    Mitch shot a look at Jason. Short, skinny, with dusty-brown hair
and eyes a shade darker. Tonight he wore his prize possession, the leather
jacket he'd saved for a year to buy, the haute couture of postpunk chic.
    "Tell you what. You want to be on your own? I'll give you
fifty bucks"—Mitch shifted to street talk—"that's fifty dead
presidents, to spend a couple of hours here."
    Jason gazed out the window, seeing the bright lights, not the walk
on the wild side—the living hell. "You're on," he said as Mitch
wheeled to the curb.
    "I'll pick you up right here," Mitch yelled to Jason's
back, "in two hours." He let the kid saunter into the crowd before he
picked up the car phone and dialed. "Paul? You got him?"
    "Yo, Mitch, relax." Paul Talbott's mellow voice seemed
to fill the car. "We've got a tail on him."
    "Great. Now, scare the shit out of him. And while you're at
it, snatch his jacket." Mitch hung up and gunned the engine, bullying his
way into the heavy traffic. He raised his fist and flipped off a curbside
pharmacologist, barely dodging the pimp trying to flag him down by banging on
the Viper's hood.
    While he drove to his office, he thought about Royce Winston. Son
of a bitch. He'd gotten to her. Big time. He chuckled, a low gruff sound that
reflected his deep sense of satisfaction. At least on one level nothing had
changed between them. Over five years. He hadn't been sure.
    Memories could deceive. Lure you. Then betray you. He knew that
better than anyone. It had almost gotten him killed.
    But this time, unlike the first, he'd been dead-on. Royce Anne
Winston could wish him in hell. Still, deep down inside, in that secret window
into the soul, an ember of the past remained, more easily fanned to life than
he'd expected. Helluva lot of good it would do him, since she was set to marry
that wuss.
    So, now what? he wondered after he'd parked his car and was
unlocking his office. Damned if he knew. But he'd think of something. He always
did. Too bad the noise that ended the kiss hadn't been Brent Farenholt.
Goddamn, he would have passed on a