Maroon Rising Read Online Free Page A

it off with a graceful sweep of her hand.
    She was stunning.
    I reached toward her before I caught myself and dropped my arm.
    “Fancy seeing you here,” she said.
    “Heather.”
    My voice trembled, but not so much that they could hear. I felt my legs shudder and locked my knees so they wouldn’t buckle.
    The beautiful blond supermodel Johnny Blake had raved about: “Hot bitch is what I call her,” he’d said. Jack Dodson’s constant companion, he’d said.
    My ex-wife.

“W hat in the hell are you doing here?” My eyes were riveted on Heather.
    She turned to face Jack and they held a long glance. No words were exchanged, but her reaching forward to grasp his tattooed bicep, ever so briefly, was not lost on me. A wave of hot nausea hit—it was all I could do to swallow the bile shooting up from my stomach.
    “You have no right to be here, Reilly,” Jack said. “But since you are, why don’t we go inside and talk for a moment—”
    “I have no desire to talk to either of you. Heather, I asked you a question. I want an answer.”
    Heather’s 36Cs lifted toward the cobalt sky as she drew in a deep breath. My mind rewound to the years of our marriage, her travels as a model in global demand, my time spent in the armpits of third-world countries negotiating with crooked government officials for salvage rights while Jack held down the fort and schmoozed investors in our Northern Virginia corporate headquarters. Heady days, a jet-set lifestyle, anything goes—but how far? Images of us together, including Laurie, Jack’s wife, played in my mind like an old home movie.
    “So?” I said.
    “Jack and I have been together for a while—”
    “Since when? Since he got out of jail?” I turned to face Jack. “What about your wife?”
    Heather pursed her lips. Jack stared at me without a trace of remorse or guilt—hell, without any emotion at all.
    “Since when, Heather?”
    “Before jail.” A tear slid from a sky blue eye and down her bronzed cheek.
    No nausea now. Just three words like bullets.
    “How. Long. Before.”
    Jack crossed his arms. “Years before.”
    My vision blurred. For just a minute, I froze.
    “Buck, I’m so sorry, you were always gone—”
    “So were you!”
    “I was lonely, Buck—I’m not a suburban housewife type, you knew that. I’d go to your office and wait to hear from you. Because you never called—”
    “No cell reception in jungles—”
    “Jack was always there, he listened to me, cared about my career, my dreams, my needs … Buck, you can’t understand—”
    “Oh, I understand, all right.”
    “Buck—”
    “Spare me the tears, Heather. You vanished while I was fighting to stay out of jail, my parents got killed—and now I find out you were off with him ?” My finger stabbed Jack in the shoulder. He brushed it away, still calm and in control. Fucking accountant. “You cleaned out our bank account—took everything that wasn’t bolted down—and fucking disappeared!”
    Jack shoved me away.
    “Back off, Buck.”
    “Don’t tell me to back off, partner ! And you were pissed at me for not visiting you in jail? Are you fucking kidding me? You were banging my wife!”
    I felt the eyes of Jack’s crew on us. Mine were now aimed at Heather.
    A twinge of guilt stabbed at me. I had been gone a lot. I remembered our discussing it at one point, but there was always the next treasure waiting to be found…
    “And what about your billionaire husband—the one you married before the ink was dry on our divorce papers?” Spittle shot from my mouth and made Heather wince. “What the hell was that about?”
    “I didn’t … When I went to see Jack, I realized I didn’t love Barry, and—”
    “Now you’re with Jack, he has Betty, and he’s using the fruits of my time in those jungles to take what should have been ours!”
    The sound of laughter brought a cold numbness over me. Gunner must be loving this.
    My breathing settled. My heart rate became steady and my