“I have no doubts,” he said. “We’re right for each other.”
“But you should have doubts,” she said. “For instance, doesn’t it seem odd to you that I’m such a physical match for your first wife, for Annie? She was the same build as I am, the same size. She had the same color hair, the same eyes. I’ve seen those photographs of her.”
He was a little upset by that. “Do you think I’ve fallen for you only because you remind me of her?”
“You loved her a great deal.”
“That has nothing to do with us. I just like sexy, dark women.” He smiled, trying to make a joke of it-both to convince her and to stop himself from wondering if she was at least partly right.
She said, “Maybe.”
“Dammit, there’s no maybe about it. I love you because you’re you, not because you’re like anyone else.”
They rode in silence.
The eyes of several deer glittered in the brush at the side of the road. When the car passed, the herd moved. Paul caught a glimpse of them in the rearview mirror-graceful, ghostly figures-as they crossed the pavement.
At last Jenny said, “You’re so sure we’re meant for each other. Maybe we are-under the right circumstances. But Paul, all We’ve ever shared is good times. We’ve never known adversity together. We’ve never shared a painful experience. Marriage is full of big and little crises. My husband and I were fairly good together too, until the crises came. Then we were at each other’s throats. I just can’t . . . I won’t gamble my future on a relationship that has never been tested with hard times.”
“Should I start praying for sickness, financial ruin, and bad luck?”
She sighed and leaned against him. “You make me sound foolish.”
“I don’t mean to.”
“I know.”
Back in Black River, they shared one kiss and went to separate rooms to lie awake most of the night.
4
Twenty-eight Months Earlier:
Saturday, April 12, 1975
THE HELICOPTER-A PLUSH, luxuriously appointed Bell JetRanger TI-chopped up the dry Nevada air and flung it down at the Las Vegas Strip. The pilot gingerly approached the landing pad on the roof of the Fortunata Hotel, hovered over the red target circle for a moment, then put down with consummate skill.
As the rotors stopped churning overhead, Ogden Salsbury slid open his door and stepped out onto the hotel roof. For a few seconds he was disoriented. The cabin of the JetRanger had been air-conditioned. Out here, the air was like a parching gust from a furnace. A Frank Sinatra album was playing on a stereo, blasting forth from speakers mounted on six-foot-high poles. Sunlight reflected from the rippling water in the roof-top pool, and Salsbury was partially blinded in spite of his sunglasses. Somehow, he had expected the roof to bobble and sway under him as the helicopter had done; and when it did not, he staggered slightly.
The swimming pool and the glass-walled recreation room beside it were adjuncts of the enormous thirtieth-floor presidential suite of the Fortunata Hotel. This afternoon there were only two people using it: a pair of voluptuous young women in skimpy white string bikinis. They were sitting on the edge of the pool, near the deep end, dangling their legs in the water.
A squat, powerfully built man in gray slacks and a short-sleeved white silk shirt: was hunkered down beside them, talking to them. All three had the perfect nonchalance that, Ogden thought, came only with power or money. They appeared not even to have noticed the arrival of the helicopter.
Salsbury crossed the roof to them. “General Klinger?”
The squat man looked up at him.
The girls didn’t seem to know that he existed. The blonde had begun to lather the brunette with tanning lotion. Her hands lingered on the other girl’s calves and knees, then inched lovingly along her taut brown thighs. Obviously, they were more than just good friends.
“My name’s Salsbury.”
Klinger stood up. He didn’t offer to shake hands. “I’ve got one suitcase. Be with you in a minute.” He walked back toward the glass-walled recreation room.
Salsbury stared at the girls. They had the longest, loveliest legs he had ever seen. He cleared his throat and said, “I’ll bet you’re in show business.”