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brick trimmed with dark brown woodwork and shutters. Despite its modest architecture, it was a showpiece. The interior was splendid. The grounds were a study of horticultural perfection.
    He led Jordan and Reeves through the sculptured garden and down the stone steps to his private dock. A uniformed boatman helped them aboard a sleek craft after Helmut had kissed her good night. Helmut often hired motor taxis for an evening to shuttle his guests from his island in the lake to the shore. They were not luxurious launches, nor were they mediocre.
    When she and Reeves were settled into deck chairs, the pilot started the inboard motor and they chugged away from the dock. Helmut waved them off until they disappeared into the darkness, the fine spray rising in their wake.
    Jordan sat tensely in the low canvas chair, shivering slightly in the cold evening air. She snuggled deeper into her satin floor-length cape. She kept her eyes away from the man in the chair next to hers. The helmsman had his back to them as he navigated the smooth water, so they were all but alone.
    Out of the darkness, she heard a scratching sound, then saw the flare of a match as it was put to the end of a cigarette. Reeves fanned out the match and conscientiously placed it in a pail of sand anchored to the glossy deck. Jordan caught the pungent aroma of the tobacco smoke as Reeves inhaled deeply on the cigarette and then exhaled slowly.
    “I didn’t know you smoked,” she remarked quietly.
    There was a long pause and she thought that either he hadn’t heard her or that he planned to ignore her. Finally he said, “I don’t. I quit years ago. I just started again.”
    “Oh.”
    He shifted around in his chair until he was facing her. He stared hard at her with cold green eyes as he drew once more on the cigarette, coughed, cursed the cough, and flicked the cigarette through the air to die a sudden, hissing death in the lake. “Is that all you can say? ‘Oh’?”
    “Reeves, please, I—”
    “Spare me the theatrical explanations,” he cut in sharply. “None is necessary, I assure you. We shared a great roll in the hay during a thunderstorm. Very romantic. Very cozy. I enjoyed it. You enjoyed it. That’s all there was to it.” He sliced his hands through the air to emphasize that the subject was closed and she noticed again the napkin-wrapped fingers.
    His words had pierced her to the core, but her attention was momentarily distracted by the bloodstained napkin. “What happened to your hand?” she asked.
    “What?” His agitation was apparent. Every muscle in his body was pulled taut and strained against the restriction of his clothing.
“What?”
he repeated more heatedly, as though she hadn’t responded in the way he thought she should have.
    “What happened to your hand?”
    He looked at her in angry bewilderment and then down at his hand as if seeing it for the first time. “Oh, I…uh…cut it. It’s fine.”
    “It’s bleeding.”
    “Not anymore.”
    “Are you sure? Maybe—”
    “I said it’s fine.”
    “Let me see—”
    “Will you forget my damned hand!” he roared. He stood up and stuffed his hands into the pockets of his tuxedo trousers, walking to the rail of the boat and leaning against it. She could tell by the heaving of his shoulders that he was almost gasping for air. Up until now she hadn’t realized the extent of his fury.
    He stood at the rail a long time, thumping his fists against the polished wood, looking out over the water and staring at the lights of Lucerne while they loomed larger on the horizon as the boat drew closer to the city. Jordan stared at his back and remained quiet. She longed to tell him about her relationship with Helmut, but his frame of mind wasn’t conducive to calm explanations. She’d let him vent his temper, then she would try to explain.
    When he spun around and faced her, she jumped. “It’s not that I have scruples about sleeping with another man’s fiancée,” he sneered.