Finally he asked, "How much do you love me?"
She didn't hesitate, though Pell noted something cautious in her response. "As big as that sun."
"Looks small from here."
"I mean as big as the sun really is. No, as big as the universe," she added quickly, as if trying to correct a wrong answer in class.
Pell was quiet.
"What's the matter, Daniel?"
"I have a problem. And I don't know what to do about it."
She tensed. "A problem, sweetheart?"
So it's "sweetie" when she's happy, "sweetheart" when she's troubled. Good to know. He filed that away.
"That meeting I had?" He'd told her only that he was going to meet someone about a "business thing."
"Uh-huh."
"Something went wrong. I had all the plans made. This woman was going to pay me back a lot of money I'd loaned her. But she lied to me."
"What happened?"
Pell was looking Jennie right in the eye. He reflected quickly that the only person who'd ever caught him lying was Kathryn Dance. But thinking of her was a distraction so he put her out of his mind. "She had her own plans, it turned out. She was going to use me. And you too."
"Me? She knows me?"
"Not your name. But from the news she knows we're together. She wanted me to leave you."
"Why?"
"So she and I could be together. She wanted to go away with me."
"This was somebody you used to know?"
"That's right."
"Oh." Jennie fell silent.
Jealousy . . .
"I told her no, of course. There's no way I'd even think about that."
An attempted purr. It didn't work.
Sweetheart . . .
"And Susan got mad. She said she was going to the police. She'd turn us both in." Pell's face contorted with pain. "I tried to talk her out of it. But she wouldn't listen."
"What happened?"
He glanced at the car. "I brought her here. I didn't have any choice. She was trying to call the police."
Alarmed, Jennie looked up and didn't see anybody in the car.
"In the trunk."