Tentatively, she lifted it from his hand. It was not as heavy as she’d expected but it had a nice solidity. It fit in her hand as if it were made for her: her fingers fell comfortably into the grooves on the grip. Turning sideways, she pointed it at the wall on the far side of the room, and stared down the sights.
She dropped the gun to her side and handed it back, grip first. “How much?”
His eyes narrowed. “You got cash?”
She nodded. She’d emptied her bank account on her way in this morning.
He turned the gun, studying it as if it would provide him with the figure. Finally, he glanced up at her. “I’d take four hundred for it.”
It was a good price.
“You’ll throw in some bullets?” she asked.
He gave a somber nod. “I reckon I could spare a few.”
Harper pulled out her wallet. “A few is all I need.”
Setting the gun down, he picked up a stack of forms and slid them across to her.
“Just got to do the paperwork first. Uncle Sam’s got his rules.”
Twenty minutes later, Harper walked out of the pawnshop with the gun tucked at the bottom of her shoulder bag, along with a small box of bullets and a shoulder holster similar to the ones detectives wore under their suit jackets. While they waited for her background check to go through, they’d both abandoned the myth that she wouldn’t be carrying the weapon illegally. He didn’t seem to mind. But when she’d packed everything up and was heading for the door, he’d stopped her.
“You asked what I would tell my girlfriend if someone was coming for her.” He gave her a measured look. “I’d tell her to go for the head or the heart. It’s the only way to know for sure you’ll stop him. Don’t pick up that Glock unless you’re ready to kill.”
It was nothing she hadn’t thought of already. Still, his words were sobering, and as she walked through the lunchtime crowds, she was overly aware of the gun in her purse. She felt convinced everyone must know it was there. It was so heavy and obvious. By the time she walked into the restaurant a few minutes later, nervous sweat beaded her brow.
The Public was a trendy lunch spot for local office workers, and the main dining room was packed. Harper couldn’t see Dells anywhere. When she gave his name to the guy at the door, he immediately directed her up the stairs.
The building was sleekly furnished with spare, dark wood tables and slim chairs. She spotted Dells at the far end of the room. His head was bent over his phone, his high forehead creased. The navy suit he wore looked like it would be soft to the touch. His crisp white shirt set off the tan he sure hadn’t gotten around Savannah lately.
“Sorry I’m late,” she said, when she reached the table.
“You’re forgiven.” He stood up, a smile spreading across his face. He looked as good as she remembered—all high cheekbones and sharp, knowing eyes. He took off his frameless glasses before holding out his hand to shake hers. “Sit down. Let’s have some food.”
“Good, I’m starving.” Harper sat across from him and dropped the bag to the floor. It hit with a heavy thud and she froze, her stomach flipping. But no bang followed.
Dells didn’t seem to notice. “I’ve got to admit, I did wonder if you’d show up.” As he spoke, he motioned for the waiter, who appeared at her shoulder seconds later to pour water into one glass and wine into another. “I hope white wine’s okay?”
She never drank wine during the day, but she nodded. “I had to come,” she said. “I need to know what happened. You disappeared for months.” She cocked her head, looking at him. “Wherever you been, it worked. You look good.”
It was true. He looked rested. She didn’t know exactly how old he was, but she guessed early forties. He had good bone structure—a clean jaw and narrow nose. With the suit, and styled hair, the whole picture was that of a successful business executive.
In other words, not her type at all. And yet she’d never forgotten that kiss.
“You look great, too.” He leaned forward, looking at her critically. “You also look tired. What’s been happening at the paper?”
“Why do I think you already know?”
He smiled. “Well, I gather MaryAnne Charlton hasn’t backed down about funding cuts. Emma’s working unpaid overtime, as are you. Everyone’s exhausted by the pace, and three people have quit in the last few months. Only one of them was replaced.”
“You make it sound like so much fun,” she said.
Laughing, he motioned for the waiter. “Let’s order,” he suggested. “Then we can talk.”
The menu was all wedge salads and sandwiches with cranberries on them. Wrinkling her nose, she looked up at him. “Cranberry sandwiches?”
“Have the shrimp and grits,” he told her. “It’s a crowd-pleaser.”
“Fine.” She handed the menu to the waiter.
“I’ll have the same.” Dells handed his menu to him. “Bring us some olives to start, and a green salad.”
With a nod, the waiter disappeared.
“So.” Harper took a sip of wine. “What’s this all about?”
“I’d like to offer you a job.”
Harper choked. “Wait…” she said, coughing. “What? Where?”
“At Channel Five.”
Her coughing attack subsiding, she stared at him. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am very serious. I’ve taken over as head of news. That’s why I’m back in town. I want you to leave the paper and come work for me.” He seemed to be enjoying this.
“But how?” She was bewildered. “I don’t know anything about TV. I’m a newspaper reporter.”
He waved that away. “A reporter is a reporter. I could list twenty famous television journalists who started out in print.”
It was true but Harper had never imagined herself in that group. “What would I cover?”
“Exactly what you’re covering now. Cops on the late shift—four to midnight. The only difference would be, instead of doing it for the paper you’d do it for Channel Five.”
“Isn’t that Josh Leonard’s beat?” she asked. “What would he do?”
“Oh, don’t worry about Josh. He’d sacrifice a testicle to move to the anchor desk. He’ll be thrilled if someone takes over crime.” He angled forward, holding her gaze. “Look, Harper, you’re the best crime reporter I’ve ever worked with. We make a great team. I want you with me.” He paused before delivering the kicker. “I will increase your salary by twenty-five percent.”
She opened her mouth to reply and then closed it again. Twenty-five percent. That was a huge amount of money.
Money for a deposit on a new apartment. To replenish the savings she’d just drained to buy a handgun.
She was tempted. Dells was right: They did work well together. He was a ruthless editor, very certain of what he wanted from each reporter. His instructions were clear and inviolable. But he also listened. When they’d worked together on the story about the district attorney’s son last year, he’d had faith in her theories, and fought to publish a story the owner wanted to quash. In the end, he’d been fired because he refused to let the owner lay off more workers. He was loyal.
The waiter appeared with a dish of olives, and his presence gave her an excuse to stay silent as she thought through her options. In truth, she’d never considered doing anything other than working for a newspaper. It was the job she’d wanted from the moment she first discovered journalism at Savannah State. From the very beginning, she’d fallen in love with the work. The pressure of a deadline that made it hard to think about anything except getting the story, the rush from knowing things nobody else knew.
But standing in front of a camera. Could she do that? She got along well with the TV reporters in town, but she didn’t always feel like they were doing the same job. She worked sources at the police station, got down and gritty at homicide scenes. She never thought about how she looked.
Natalie Swanson, Channel 12’s reporter, wore an inch of makeup all the time and h
er hair was styled and sprayed into an immobile helmet. She’d told Harper once that although she ran around crime scenes nightly, “I think half the viewers only watch to see if I’ve gained five pounds. I won’t give them the satisfaction.”
And Josh, who wore nearly as much makeup as Natalie, was a good reporter. But all anyone thought about was his tie, his hair. His miraculously white teeth.
The camera was a distraction. It made appearance the most important thing. The story came second. The news came second.
“I don’t know what to say,” she said, when the waiter was gone again and her silence was becoming awkward. “I never thought about working in television.”
“You could do it,” he said confidently. “You’ve got the voice and the looks.” He gestured at her head. “That red hair would be a knockout if we styled you up a bit.”
There was a pause.
“That’s the thing,” she said quietly. “I don’t want to be styled up.”
He leaned back in his chair. “Come on, Harper. It’s not an insult. TV reporters have a certain look. Everyone gets a makeover when they first start. It’s part of the deal. It takes a couple of hours. You get a budget for some clothes we help you pick out, and that’s it.”
Harper thought of Natalie’s bright yellow suit and her fake eyelashes, and her dreams of a twenty-five percent raise began to evaporate.
“Paul.” She used his first name and saw him clock it. “Thank you for this offer. I’m honored that you thought of me. And I would love to work with you again. I just don’t think I’m cut out for TV.”
Seeing that he was formulating more arguments, she held up one hand to stop him.
“I know what you’re going to say and you’re right. Technically, I could do it. I could learn how to stand and what to wear. I could go to crime scenes and try to keep my hair perfect and my weight perfect and smile so my cheekbones looked higher, all while a body lies on the sidewalk behind me. But I don’t want to. Can you understand that?” She searched his face. “I’m not that kind of a reporter and I never will be. I don’t want to be recognized, or sign autographs, or get hate mail because someone doesn’t like my face. I just want to go out every night and write what I see. That’s all I ever wanted to do.”
For a long second he held her gaze. A faint smile lifted the corners of his lips. “That’s what I thought you’d say.” He picked up the wine bottle and poured more in their glasses. “Josh is going to be disappointed. He’s sick to death of covering cops.”
“At least he gets to keep his testicles.” Harper reached for her glass.
Dells snorted a laugh. “Look, I want to work with you,” he said, growing serious again. “I meant every word I said. But I understand.”
“No hard feelings?”
His smile was genuine. “None.”
The waiter approached with a tray of food, and they fell silent again as he worked. Harper looked around, surprised to note that the other tables in the dining room had emptied while they’d been talking.
Dells waited impatiently for the waiter to leave.
“I think it’s the right decision but I’m disappointed—I’m not going to pretend I’m not.” He speared a shrimp. “Harper, the newspaper is in real trouble.”
“I know,” she said, trying the grits. The garlic smell of the shrimp was making her mouth water.
“No, you don’t.” A warning note entered his voice. “It’s worse than you know. She’s nearly bankrupt.”
“Who, Charlton?” Her fork hovering in midair, Harper stared at him. “She can’t be bankrupt. You told me she bought a villa in the Caribbean.”
“She did,” he said. “And an apartment in Manhattan, and several businesses in Atlanta, and a house on St. Simons Island. Along with half of Chanel’s winter line. Money runs through her hands like water, and the board has been too weak to stop her. That’s why she keeps laying people off.” He paused. “There’s a rumor going around that she’s putting the paper on the market.”
Harper set her fork down with a clatter. “I don’t believe you. It’s been in her family for decades. Her great-grandfather started it.”
“And MaryAnne destroyed it,” Dells said.
Harper stared at him as her mind ran through a series of possibilities.
“Who buys newspaper companies these days?” she asked finally.
He paused before replying. “Nobody good.”
They exchanged a gloomy look. Then Dells gestured at her plate. “Eat your food,” he ordered. “Now that I’ve ruined your appetite.”
“No kidding.”
She popped a shrimp in her mouth. It was delicious—rich and buttery—but he was right. Her appetite was shot. Still, she made herself eat. She’d managed about half her plate when he smiled at her as if she’d done something funny.
“What?” she said, touching her chin in case there was food on it.
“Nothing,” he said, but he kept smiling.
“Really, what?”
“I was just wondering,” he said, “whatever happened with that guy you were waiting for.”
She didn’t need to ask what guy he was talking about. She’d told him about Luke. That it wasn’t working out, but that it didn’t feel right kissing someone else yet.
“Last time I checked he was dating someone.” She kept her tone light.
Dells took a deliberate sip of wine, setting the glass down carefully. “Well, he’s an idiot.”
The two of them exchanged a smile.
He straightened his neatly folded napkin. “What about you? Are you still waiting for him?”
Harper thought about how nice it had felt being with Luke at the bar the other night—the way he’d wanted to defend her—and looked down to where the tines of her fork made straight lines through the snowy grits on her plate.
“Not anymore,” she said, hoping it was true.
“Well, since you refuse to work for me, is there any chance you’d go out with me?”
Her head jerked up. He was watching her with a curious mixture of tension and amusement.
“What, like a date?” she asked, surprised out of any subtlety.
“Exactly like a date, actually. I’d like to go for a drink with you.”
It was so ridiculous. A killer was hunting her. She’d just learned that her father was at least partly responsible for her mother’s murder. There was a nine-millimeter semiautomatic handgun in her bag. And Paul Dells was asking her out on a date.
She fought back a sudden delirious desire to laugh. None of it was funny.
“I’m not your type,” she insisted, and his eyebrows rose.
“How do you know what my type is?”
“Oh, come on.” Setting her fork down, she folded her arms. “I saw the women you brought to office parties when you were at the paper. They were all very pretty and very…”
“… shallow?” he finished for her.
She lifted one shoulder in response.
“Look, Harper,” he said, “I’ve lived in this town for ten years and never dated anyone seriously.” He was watching her so steadily it was making her nervous. “I enjoy spending time with you. You’re smart. You’re funny. You don’t put up with any bullshit. I need that in my life. If you’re not going to work for me, and you have no objection, I’d like to take you out for a drink.”
Harper searched his face for deception, but he seemed to really mean it. She thought about all the things she could say. Then she thought about Luke, going home to someone every night while she went back to her empty house. To her cat. And she heard herself say, “Sure. Why not?”
His face brightened just enough that she could see he hadn’t been certain of her answer. “How about tomorrow night?”
“I can’t. I’m working.”
“I know,” he said patiently. “I meant after you get off. We could go back to that bar around the corner from the paper.” He tilted his head. “You remember the one I’m talking about?”
The way he looked
at her made her insides soften.
“I remember it,” she said. “But you know what my job’s like. I might get tied up.”
“I don’t mind waiting.”
He smiled then, and she found herself smiling back. She didn’t know what was wrong with her. Why was this happening now, when her life was spinning out of control?
But there wasn’t any point in asking questions like that. It was time to move on from Luke. That was the past. The man sitting in front of her was good-looking, successful, charming, and interested.
If she was still alive tomorrow, she’d have a drink with Paul Dells after work.
That was all she could say for certain.
20
After Harper left the restaurant, she barely made it back to the car before Baxter called.
“Where are you?” the editor demanded.
Harper wondered with a flash of panic if Baxter somehow knew she’d been meeting with her ex-boss.
“In the city,” she said, vaguely.
“I need you to come in to work. Nobody can get anywhere with the Rayne case and it’s dying on us. We need something today.”
Mondays were Harper’s day off but she’d been expecting this.
“No problem. I’ll run by the cop shop and see what I can find out.” Harper pulled her scanner out of her bag and set it in the dashboard holder. Glancing in her rearview mirror, she saw one of Savannah’s infamous parking-enforcement officers working his way down the street toward her. Hurriedly, she started the engine and pulled out into Bull Street traffic.
The sun was bright overhead, the day was warm for February. In its holder, the scanner crackled. If it weren’t for absolutely everything else, this could be a normal day. But there was a gun in the bag on the seat beside her and nothing was normal.
Five minutes later, she pulled open the heavy, bulletproof door at the Savannah police headquarters. At the front desk, Darlene shook her finger at her. “Girl, go home. It’s your day off.”
Revolver Road Page 16
