So, on that May 1, she’d reluctantly packed bagels and lox and cream cheese and magazines and bikini and sunscreen. She endured the surly rent-a-car clerk, she endured the traffic, she endured the tense company of the poor, shy Claire. She suffered through all the stress of a day in the country. Yet there was one aspect of the trip that didn’t require enduring. Robert Gillespie, Portia thought at first, was hardly a catch. As she sat in the back of his 4x4 with Lis and Claire, en route to Indian Leap, she reviewed his ledger and came up mostly with debits: only marginally cute, fifteen pounds overweight, too smooth, too pompous, too talkative, a wife who was a complete cipher.

There was, Portia realized, no logical basis for finding him irresistible. But irresistible he was. While Lis had dozed in the back of the truck and while dull Dorothy liberally applied her oh-puh-leaze red nail polish, Robert deluged Portia with questions. Where did she live, did she like the city, did she know this or that restaurant, did she like her job? It was all a come-on. Of course it was. But still… And his liquid eyes danced with excitement as they talked. Portia recalled thinking helplessly, Oh, it’s true: seduce my mind and my body will follow.

By the time they arrived at the park, Portia L’Auberget was his for the asking.

As they walked along the path from the parking lot to the car, he glanced at her running shoes and discreetly asked-in a way that was both intimate and lighthearted-if they might take a run together.

She responded, “Maybe.”

He took this to mean yes. “Let me leave before you,” he whispered. “Then I’ll meet you near the old cave. Give me ten minutes. Then follow me.”

“Maybe.”

When they got to the beach she appraised her power over him and decided not to abdicate a single bit of it. She did a few fast stretches then jogged away first, blatantly ignoring him. She ran a half mile to the secluded gully he’d mentioned. Past the cave was a stand of pine trees, beneath which was an inviting nest of soft needles, some green, some ruddy. Portia sat on a nearby rock, wondering if he’d join her. Maybe he’d retaliate for her defiance by remaining with his wife and Lis. She’d certainly have more respect for him if he did. Yet Portia L’Auberget had no particular desire, or need, to respect men, especially men like Robert Gillespie, and decided he fucking well better show; she’d make his day miserable if he didn’t. She examined the small clearing, which was gloomy and shadowed by the steep walls of pale rock rising on either side of the trees. Overhead the sky had turned heavily overcast. Much less romantic, she reflected, than a Club Med beach in Curaçao or Nassau. On the other hand there were no condoms littering the ground here.

She scooted from the rock to the needle bed, separated from sight of the clearing by a tall line of bushes and young hemlocks. A half hour passed, then forty minutes, and finally Robert came jogging toward her. He caught his breath and earned many points by not saying a word to Portia about disregarding his instructions. He was studying his chest, pouting.

She laughed. “What?”

“My wife says I’m getting tits.” Portia pulled off her T-shirt and sports bra. “Let’s compare.”

They rolled back under the pine trees. Robert kissed her firmly, stroking her bare nipples with the backs of his hands. He closed his fingers around hers and placed them on her breasts. She began fondling herself while his tongue slid down to her navel then continued to her thighs and knees. He remained there, teasing, until Portia finally seized his head in both hands and directed it firmly between her legs. Her thighs rose as her head pressed back hard into the pine bed, needles fixing themselves in her sweat-damp hair. Staring through half-closed lids at the speeding clouds she gasped for breath. He rolled on top of her, and their mouths met hard, brutally. He had just entwined her legs around his waist and was thrusting into her savagely when a branch snapped near their heads.

Claire walked out of a stand of trees and stopped, frozen, six feet from them. Her hand rose to her mouth in shock.

“Oh, my God,” Portia shouted.

“Claire, honey…” Robert began, as he rolled to his knees.

Claire, speechless, stared at his groin. Portia remembered thinking, My God, she’s eighteen. This can’t be her first hard-on.

It took a moment for Robert to recover some wits and he looked frantically for his shirt or shorts. As the girl’s eyes remained fixed on him, Portia watched the young blonde. This curious à trois voyeurism aroused her all the more. Robert grabbed his shirt and wrapped the knit garment about his waist, abashed and grinning. Portia didn’t move. Then Claire choked a sob and turned, running past the cave and back up the path.

“Oh, shit,” Robert muttered.

“Don’t worry.”

“What?”

“Oh, don’t take it so seriously. Every teenager gets a shock at some point. I’ll talk to her.”

“She’s just a kid.”

“Forget her,” Portia said offhandedly, then whispered, “Come on over here.”

“She’s going-”

“She’s not going to say anything. Hmm, what’s that? You’re still interested. I can tell.”

“Jesus, what if she tells Lis?”

“Come on,” she urged breathlessly. “Don’t stop now. Fuck me!”

“I think we ought to get back.”

Portia dropped to her knees and pulled his shirt away, taking him deep into her mouth.

“No,” Robert whispered.

He was standing, head back, eyes closed, shuddering uncontrollably and gasping when Lis stepped into the clearing.

Claire must have run into her almost immediately and Lis had either learned, or deduced, what had happened. She stood above the half-naked couple and stared down at them. “Portia!” she raged. “How could you?” Her expression of horror matched Robert’s perfectly.

The young woman stood and wiped her face with her bra. She turned to face her sister and with detachment watched Lis’s throat grow remarkably red as the tendons rose and her jaw quivered. Robert pulled up his running shorts, looking around again for his shirt. He seemed incapable of speaking. Portia refused to act like a caught schoolgirl. “How could you?” Lis gripped her arm but Portia stepped away abruptly. Meeting her sister’s furious gaze she dressed slowly then, saying nothing, left Lis and Robert in the clearing.

Portia walked back to the beach, where Dorothy was starting to pack up; the temperature had dropped and it was clearly going to rain. She looked at Portia and seemed to sense something was wrong but said nothing. The wind picked up and the two women hurried to gather up the picnic baskets and blankets, carting them to the truck. They made one more trip back to the beach, looking for their companions. Then the downpour began.

Moments later sirens filled the park and police and medics arrived. It was in a rain-drenched intersection of two canyons that Portia met her sister, red-eyed and muddy and disheveled, looking like a madwoman, being led by two tall rangers out of a flooded arroyo.

Portia had stepped toward her. “Lis! What-?”

The slap was oddly quiet but so powerful it brought Portia down on one knee. She cried out in pain and shock. Neither woman moved, and Lis’s hand remained frozen in the air as they stared at each other for a long moment. A shocked ranger helped Portia to her feet and explained about the deaths.

“Oh, no!” Portia cried.

“Oh, no!” Lis mimicked with bitter scorn then stepped forward, pushed the ranger aside and put her mouth close to her sister’s ear. In a rasping whisper she said, “You killed that girl, you fucking whore.”

Portia faced her sister. Her eyes grew as cold as the wet rocks around them. “Goodbye, Lis.”

And goodbye it had been. Apart from a few brief, stilted phone conversations, those words had been virtually the last communication between the sisters until tonight.