Justice

by Karen Robards

  Booking it toward the first corner, her purse slung over her shoulder, her briefcase and a plastic grocery sack containing the despised pink suit in her hand, Jess felt a prickle at the back of her neck. The weight of unseen eyes, she thought with a shiver, and shot a quick glance behind her. The good news was, if the guy from last night was anywhere around, he probably wouldn’t recognize her. She was wearing a blue, spaghetti-strapped, smock-topped sundress from Maddie’s pre-pregnancy days. It was loose and almost ankle-length on her, and she’d coupled it with a pair of too-big flip-flops. Her hair was twisted up into a haphazard bun. She’d dabbed some foundation on the fist-sized bruise on her temple, and in the uncertain light she was pretty sure it was nearly invisible. Without her usual contact solution, she’d tucked her contacts away in her purse and fallen back on the sturdy black glasses she kept as a backup. In other words, she looked almost nothing like the woman who’d been attacked the previous night.

  Which didn’t keep her from being jumpy as all get-out.

  She was nearly at the corner when someone unexpectedly stepped out of the shadowy gap between two parked cars. In that first startled instant she registered that he was big, a man, and coming her way.

  Gasping, her heart giving a giant thud, she jumped back even as he stepped onto the sidewalk and the light hit him: Mark.

  “Want a ride?” he asked.

  “Good God, you scared the crap out of me!” Having clearly not gotten the message that it was a false alarm, her heart pounded as if she’d been running a race.

  “Sorry.”

  She might have thought he was genuinely penitent if the twist to his lips hadn’t told her he was suppressing a smile. Her eyes met his. The memory of that brief, blazing kiss hung in the air between them. Jess’s lips compressed in sheer self-defense even as she shook her head.

  “I’ll take the metro, thanks.” She started walking away.

  “Jess.” He fell into step beside her. “We both know I’m not going away. If you want, I can get back in the car and just cruise along in the street beside you while you tramp down the sidewalk, but that’s just stupid.”

  Meeting his gaze, Jess gave it up. Truth was, she was glad to see him. At least his presence meant she wouldn’t have to jump at every swaying shadow between here and her apartment. After that, hopefully, it would be full daylight, and the streets would lose their power to terrify.

  “Fine.”

  Now that she was looking for it, she spotted his Suburban on the other side of the street, nestled among a long line of other vehicles. With a quick glance left and right, she headed across the street toward it. He followed and got in without coming around to open the door for her, the subtlety of which she appreciated as she walked around to the passenger side and climbed in on her own. Opening the door for her was something he would have done if they’d been in a relationship. Something he had done, before. Now he didn’t.

  Wise man, she thought. But her heart gave a little pang.

  “Thanks for the ride.” Surprised at how relieved she felt to no longer be on the street, she pulled on her seat belt as he started the engine. Hot air began blowing out of the air conditioner vent, and she repositioned it away from her. “How long have you been out here waiting for me?”

  It couldn’t have been too long, because he was freshly shaved, showered, and dressed in one of the ubiquitous dark suits that, with a white shirt and dark tie, was the universal fed uniform. The maddening thing was, he looked supergood in it. Tough and handsome. Typical Mark.

  She immediately felt both scruffy and cross.

  “Little while.” They passed the kid on the bicycle, cruised on through Friendship Heights. A few more vehicles were on the streets, a few more people were moving about. A new day had dawned. In which, as his presence made clear, in addition to everything else she had going on, she had to worry about being killed. It was starting to feel like the story of her life. Which didn’t make it any more fun.

  “You’re babysitting me, aren’t you? What, do you think whoever attacked me last night is going to try again?”

  “Since I have no idea who attacked you last night, I don’t know. Think of me as an insurance policy.”

  “I don’t want to think of you as an insurance policy. I don’t want to think of you at all. If I have to have a babysitter, I want somebody else.” If she was being unreasonable, she didn’t care. Being with Mark again was making her … tense. Yeah, that was the word. It was playing with her emotions. Especially in light of that thrice-damned kiss.

  “You want somebody else, huh? Baby, answer me this: who else can you trust?”

  That was so true it momentarily shut her up. Dried up every protest that had been hovering on the tip of her tongue. The fact of the matter was, there was no one else. If the attack last night had been some shadowy government agency’s attempt to silence her permanently, Mark was the only fed she could be absolutely sure wasn’t in on it. The only law enforcement type she could be absolutely sure wasn’t in on it. Even a safe house wasn’t safe if your minders were the ones who wanted to do you in.

  “What you’re saying is, I’m stuck with you, right?”

  “That about sums it up.”

  Running beneath her very real annoyance was a deep, dark, secret little thrill that that was so. Acknowledging its existence aggravated her so much that she was goaded into directly addressing the elephant in the room.

  “You kissed me last night.”

  “You’re right. I did.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “Habit?”

  “Don’t do it again.”

  “I kind of got the impression you liked it.”

  “Then you kind of got the wrong impression.”

  “Kid yourself if you want.” He slanted a look at her. His voice went soft. “You can’t kid me. You kissed me back.”

  Just because that was true didn’t make it palatable. Jess saw red and grabbed for the door handle. They were slowing for an intersection, and she’d had enough.

  “To hell with this. I don’t need the hassle.” The door was locked, which infuriated her more. As the Suburban came to a stop, she yanked at the handle in frustration. “Let me out. I’m taking the metro.”

  “Jess, wait. Stop. Calm down. I apologize for the kiss, all right? It just… happened. I won’t do it again, I promise.” The Suburban was once again moving, rolling in its turn through the intersection. “From here on out, our relationship is strictly professional.”

  She shot him a narrow-eyed look.

  “I swear,” he said. “No more personal stuff. You know you can trust me. To keep my word, and to keep you safe.”

  The funny thing was, she did know that. Which didn’t mean she had to like the situation. Being with Mark was not good for her peace of mind.

  “This sucks,” she burst out.

  “You’re not the only one suffering here, you know. I got maybe four hours of sleep.”

  “Oh, stop. You’re breaking my heart.”

  “You know, I’d forgotten how crabby you always were first thing in the morning.”

  “Bite me.”

  He laughed.

  “You find out anything pertinent about Leonard Cowan’s death yet?”

  “Nope.”

  “Crap.”

  They rode in silence for a moment.

  “So how’s the head?” Mark asked.

  Jess shrugged. “Advil helps.”

  Actually, her ribs were what had bothered her most during the night, because she’d kept rolling onto her bruised side. But now that she was upright and stoked with pain reliever, it wasn’t too bad. The creeping, ever-present fear was much worse, but she wasn’t going to think about that. Not now, not while it was daylight and Mark was with her, in any case. She might have been through with him romantically, but she had to admit that his presence had an upside: she was a lot less likely to wind up dead.

  “Did you—did they find anything that might lead to that guy, last night?�
�� She meant the man who had attacked her.

  He understood. “No. I picked up your shoes.”

  With a jerk of his head, he indicated the backseat. Glancing around, Jess saw the pink heels she’d lost last night. Remembering how she’d lost them made her go cold all over.

  Please God let it just have been a random attack. So it can be over and forgotten and I can get on with my life.

  “You went by my apartment? When?”

  “After I left your mother’s. I wanted to go over everything for myself. There wasn’t anything. The grass was too thick for any footprints. No surveillance cameras anywhere in the area. We had people go door to door checking for anybody who might have seen or heard anything, and there’ll be more of that today, but we got nothing last night and my guess is we won’t today.”

  Jess shook her head. “There wasn’t anyone around.”

  He nodded. “Hasbrough doesn’t think it was any kind of covert ops thing, and I’m inclined to agree.”

  “Why?”

  “Nobody tried to kill me.”

  A beat passed while she processed that. “Oh, great, so you’re the canary in the mine now?”

  “If I was coming after you, I’d kill me first. Anybody with any sense would.”

  Jess hadn’t even realized they’d reached Foggy Bottom until he turned onto her street. The line of painted brick row houses looked stolidly respectable in the now pink-tinted light. Anybody looking at them would automatically think, Nice neighborhood: nothing bad’s gonna happen here. As they approached her building, details like the black shutters against the colonial blue walls and the wrought-iron window boxes bursting with colorful flowers beckoned. The magnolia tree with its creamy white blossoms oozed Southern charm in her front yard. Its long shadow was the gossamer gray of smoke now, not menacing at all. The deep red front door radiated welcome.

  Looking it over, Jess unexpectedly felt her stomach clench. The last thing she wanted to do, she discovered, was head up that sidewalk again.

  Thank God Mark’s here.

  “You okay?” Mark must have seen in her face something of what she was feeling, because he frowned at her as he parked the car.

  Jesus, the lease runs for another ten months.

  “Of course I’m okay. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  Bravado on the hoof, Jess grabbed her shoes from the back, then slid out the door before he could even turn off the engine. Seconds later, he did, and got out, too. Keys in hand, flip-flops slapping the pavement determinedly, she was already on her way to the front door when he caught up.

  Like she didn’t need him at all.

  “What you want to do is get a security light installed. Right out front here. That way there wouldn’t be anyplace for anyone to hide.”

  “I’ll take it up with the owner. Oh, and the historic commission. And the other tenants.” Sarcasm was a good way to mask the edginess she was trying to hide. As she inserted her key into the lock, her gaze slid sideways to the shadowy alley behind the magnolia. The curved stone window well on which she had hit her head gleamed pale against the dark jade of the carpet of manicured grass.

  I almost died there.

  Jess couldn’t help it. She shivered.

  “You don’t have to worry. Whoever he was, he won’t get to you again.” Hard certainty was in Mark’s voice.

  She realized he’d seen her shudder. “I’m not worried.”

  By way of a reply, his hand dropped onto her nearly bare shoulder in a gesture that was both protective and clear proof he knew perfectly well how uneasy she was. It felt big and warm and so achingly familiar that it made her stomach tighten. Giving him a hands-off look over her shoulder, she shrugged it off.

  As she stepped into the hallway a rush of cold air greeted her. Glancing nervously around was an instinctive reaction: of course no one was there. But the gloomy corners and echoing silence made her more than ever glad of Mark’s presence, not that she had the slightest intention of letting him know it. The small chandelier meant to add elegance as well as light to the space had two of its six candle-shaped bulbs out, which meant the hall was even gloomier than usual. The walls were creamy white, the floor age-darkened hardwood. Each floor held two apartments divided by the center hall. This downstairs hall also contained the mailboxes for all six apartments, in a big brass rectangle set into the wall, and, at the rear, a staircase that zigzagged upward.

  Her mailbox was 6B, the very last one. Jess automatically collected the mail—bills and junk—then headed toward the staircase. There was an elevator, but it was ancient and balky and so slow that it was just easier to take the stairs.

  Mark was right behind her. Once they reached her apartment and she unlocked the door—no sign of a break-in, she was relieved to note—he followed her inside, then proceeded to walk through the place, turning on lights as he went.

  Ignoring him, she headed straight for her bedroom. The front door opened into a small square entryway, which opened into a large open space that had been furnished as a living room/dining room combination. Courtesy of Grace, who liked to decorate, the walls were lavender, the upholstery beige, with a fluffy rug under the Plexiglas coffee table and hardwood floors and touches of apple green and black to liven things up. A short, beige-painted hall led past the kitchen, half bath and laundry room to the two side-by-side bedrooms, each with its own en suite bathroom, at the back. Grace’s was deep purple. Jess’s was, at her insistence, untouched, which meant it was creamy white. Grace’s door was open; her bedroom was presumably empty. Jess poked her head in just to make certain—sure enough, no Grace—then went into hers and closed the door behind her. Firmly.

  When she emerged again some half an hour later, showered and dressed in her fall-back workday ensemble of a black pantsuit with a white V-neck tee, feet in her favorite power pumps, which gave her at least three additional inches of height, contacts firmly in place, bruise hidden under layers of cover stick and powder, she felt significantly better. Refreshed, reenergized, and ready to tackle all manner of problems.

  The first of which was Mark.

  He was in the kitchen. She knew that even before she saw him, because the smell hit her as she was coming down the hall: coffee.

  Reaching the kitchen’s open doorway, she paused briefly to take in the scene: white cabinets, white appliances, black and white tile floor. Apple green walls, again courtesy of Grace. A small glass-topped table in the center, surrounded by four black-painted bistro type chairs. Mark sat in one of those chairs, his jacket off, his tie loosened, his sleeves rolled up. His shoulders in the crisp white shirt were broad enough to dwarf the chair, and he would have looked like he’d come right out of one of those upscale coffee commercials if it hadn’t been for the shoulder holster complete with gun strapped to his left side. The usually unflattering overhead light was not unflattering to him. It picked up gold strands in his thick hair, and, while it did indeed accentuate the tiny lines around his eyes and the deeper grooves bracketing his mouth, they just made him look more ruggedly masculine, in, of course, a really hot kind of way. As she acknowledged that, her mouth turned down at the corners: as she knew from experience, that same light played up the hollows under her eyes, making her look like she hadn’t slept for days, and washed her out so that her naturally fair skin looked as pale as the undead’s.

  Her nose had not lied: Mark was tucking into a plate of scrambled eggs and toast, with a cup of coffee and a glass of orange juice within easy reach. An identical meal sat across from him.

  Jess was struck by a pang of remembrance so sharp that it felt like an arrow to the heart.

  Talk about déjà vu all over again. How many times had he made her breakfast in her kitchen, or his, before …?

  He looked up and saw her, gestured at the second plate. “Hungry?”

  She folded her arms over her chest and scowled at him. “You know, I was perfectly happy with you out of my life.”

  He placed a hand over his heart. “If I believed that, I’d be w
ounded.”

  “By all means, consider yourself wounded.”

  “Come on, Jess. Even ambition-crazed lawyers have to eat.”

  “I don’t have time for this.”

  But there the food was, and, admittedly, wasting it would be foolish. She gave up, sat down, and picked up her fork.

  “You look good.” His eyes slid over her as she swallowed some eggs, then bit into a piece of toast. “But I got to admit, I miss the glasses.”

  She felt another of those heart pangs. He’d always insisted he liked her in her glasses, which were big and thick-lensed and made her feel about as attractive as a mole.

  “Do you mind if we don’t talk? I really only have a few minutes. I need to be at work by seven thirty.”

  “Half an hour before the big shots get in.”

  “How do you know? Oh, that’s right, you have sources, don’t you?”

  “You’re pressed for time, remember? Eat, don’t talk.”

  She ate because she was hungry and because Mark, for all his failings, knew just how she liked her eggs. It was unfair, really, when she’d worked so hard to get over him.

  They polished off their meal in a near silence that Jess refused to even think about terming companionable. Spending time like this with Mark was such a mistake, but under the circumstances she didn’t seem to have any other choice. She ate in record time, then whisked her dishes into the dishwasher and went away to brush her teeth. Then, to the sound of the dishwasher doing its thing, which meant he must have put his own dishes in and turned it on, she retraced her steps and found him with jacket and tie restored, waiting for her by the door.

  “Tick-tock.” He greeted her with an eye-crinkling half smile that she refused to be charmed by and opened the door for her. Lips firm and head held high, she sailed past him, clattering down the stairs with him at her heels. It was full daylight now, she saw as she emerged from the building. The street was filling up with vehicles, and the sidewalk sported a reassuring number of people hurrying to get where they needed to be. What was the saying about there being safety in numbers? Add, and daylight, too. She could absolutely safely take the metro now. Walking down the front steps, she glanced at Mark over her shoulder.