Minutes later, he straightened, irritated by the lack of fingerprints. The desk had a rough surface, which made it hard to find a full print. But a tiny piece of what looked like hair lay on a white sheet of paper, and that he took with him, securing it with a pair of tweezers and sticking it in a tiny plastic bag that he then sealed. It wasn't much, but if it was human hair, the lab over at the FBI could tell them plenty about it. It was amazing how much data one strand of hair could provide. It was strangely coarse. He dismissed it instantly when Tabby came in the door, his eyes watchful as they skimmed over her. She made him feel as if he'd only just come back from a long journey. It was a very pleasant sensation. When he was with her, his restlessness seemed to go momentarily into eclipse.
"Anything?" Tabby asked hopefully.
Her question diverted him. "Not much," he said. "I couldn't get a full print...."
He stopped as a tall, unsmiling man appeared in the doorway behind Tabby.
“This is Dr. Daniel Myers," she introduced the newcomer, who was wearing a dark blue suit with a white shirt and conventional tie. On a Saturday, he was dressed like a preacher, which gave Nick a pretty accurate picture of his meticulous personality.
"Nick Reed," Nick said, introducing himself. He didn't offer his hand. Nor did Daniel, he noticed with some amusement.
"You must be discreet," he cautioned Nick. "I'm sure you understand what a theft like this could do to the image of Thorn College."
"Certainly," he agreed. "As aware as I am of what it could do to Tabby's future."
"Tabby?"
"Her family and mine have been close all our lives," Nick told the man.
"It sounds like something one would call a cat, don't you think, darling?" he asked Tabby, and slid a long arm over her thin shoulders.
Nick just stopped himself from leaping forward. Incredible, he thought, how his mind reacted to the sight. Tabby was like a sister to him. Perhaps he only felt protective. That had to be it.
He pocketed the sealed plastic envelope. "I'll run this over to the lab. I have a friend there."
"Will he be at work on Saturday?"
"Since I phoned him at home last night and asked him to meet me there, I do hope so," he replied.
"That was kind of him," she said.
"I'll drop you off on my way to FBI headquarters," he offered.
Daniel seemed to grow two feet. "That's hardly necessary," he said stiffly, and his arm drew Tabby closer. "Tabitha must have told you that we're to shop for an engagement ring today."
"Yes, I hear you're planning to be married," Nick said.
"A very sensible move, too," Daniel said carelessly. "I live alone and so does Tabitha. She had that huge house and lot, where we can live, and her car is paid for." He hugged her close. "She likes keeping house and cooking, so I'll have plenty of time to work on my book."
Nick was going to explode. He knew he was. "Book?"
"Our book," Tabby inserted with a glare at Daniel. "It's a new perspective on what I found at the Custer battlefield after the fire."
"And includes information I dug out about its history," Daniel added quickly. "Tabitha could hardly do it without my help on the grammar and punctuation."
Nick's eyebrows jerked up. "You think Tabby needs help with those? Are we talking about the girl who was school spelling champion in seventh grade and won a scholarship to Thorn College?"
Daniel shifted on his feet. "I have a master's degree in English." His watery blue eyes made mincemeat of Nick. "What was your field of study, Mr. Reed?" he asked with pleasant sarcasm, as if he considered that a detective probably had less than a high school education. In fact, an FBI agent was preferred to have a bachelor's degree in accounting or a law degree. Nick had a law degree. It wasn't something he'd ever boasted about. He wasn't going to now, either, if that careless, mocking smile he gave Daniel was any indication.
"Oh, I know a little about the law," Nick said. "I am, after all, a trained detective."
"Like a police officer." Daniel nodded, looking superior. "They're only required to have a high school education or its equivalent, I believe?"
Nick stiffened. But before he could explode, and he looked close to it, Tabby stepped in.
"We really have to go, Daniel," she said. "Thanks again, Nick. I'll talk to you later."
He murmured something and Tabby moved Daniel out into the hall with unusual dexterity.
"I don't like that man," Daniel said angrily as they walked down the hall.
"I know," she said, soothing him.
A loud screech sounded as they passed the temporary biology lab. "I don't like that monkey, either."
"Yes, Daniel. Let's go."
A door opened at the end of the hall and a small man with a moustache came out, pausing as he saw Daniel and Tabby. He looked uncomfortable for an instant. "Uh, the missing artifact," he said to Tabby. "Found it yet?"
"No. But I've engaged a private detective to look for it," she began.
Dr. Flannery stood very still for a moment. "Detective?"
"Just to look for the pottery," she said.
"Of course. Of course." He turned and moved off down the hall, stopped suddenly, turned and went back the other way with a mumbled goodbye.
"Flannery is a flake," Daniel muttered as they left the building. "He spends too much time with those monkeys. He's beginning to act like them."
"Primates," she corrected. "They're very nice when you get to know them. Even Pal. He's intelligent, you know, that's why he gets into so much trouble."
"Maybe Flannery took that piece of pottery," he said specula-tively. "Did you know that his house was repossessed just recently? He's in financial trouble. Some collectors would pay anything for a find like that."
"Yes, I know. But it couldn't have been Dr. Flannery," she said stubbornly. "My goodness, he's a biologist, not a thief!"
"Desperate men do desperate things," he said. He slid his hand into hers. "You are going to marry me, aren't you? We're very compatible, and this will certainly be a successful book. Probably the first of many." His eyes had a faraway look. "I've always dreamed of being in print."
"Daniel, you aren't marrying me so that we can write a book together, are you?" she teased.
He cleared his throat. "Of course not. Don't be silly."
She wasn't being silly. Daniel kissed her only when he had to, and not very enthusiastically. He'd never tried to step over the line, to be amorous. He never sent her flowers or phoned her at midnight just to talk. He only ever talked about writing. She sighed. Marriage was what she'd always wanted, but this wasn't how she'd envisioned it. Not at all like this.
Her dreams had been passionate ones, full of Nick. Dreams died hard, and hers never had. Now that he was back in her life, she'd have to start all over again forgetting him. Perhaps, she thought, it would be easier when he left. Meanwhile, all she had to do was live through the next week, and hope that he could clear her name. If he couldn't, she thought with real fear, she might not even have a job much longer!
Tabitha couldn't find a ring she liked. Honestly, she wasn't that interested in marrying Daniel at all. He seemed bent on using her, while she was hitting back at Nick in the only way she knew. It was ridiculous to promise to marry one man just to show another that someone found her desirable. As if Nick was fooled! He'd seen right through Daniel's motives for the engagement. Probably through Tabby's, too. She flushed.
Daniel had taken her to a nice restaurant for lunch. She was nibbling dessert while he went to the bathroom.
Her mind was far away from the strawberry shortcake she was eating. It was on that fatal New Year's Eve party.
She'd felt as if anything was possible that night. She'd been wearing a black dress with spaghetti straps, her long hair around her shoulders. She'd left her glasses off—despite the fact that she was nearly blind without them—and put on much more makeup than usual. Helen had told her that Nick was finally ready to settle down and that it was Tabby he really wanted. T
hat bit of encouragement had been just enough, along with the alcohol, to make her act totally out of character.
Nick, gloriously handsome Nick, had been leaning against a door frame sipping punch. Tabby had stared at him with her heart in her eyes, drowning in the sight of him. She'd loved him for, oh, so long!
Putting her punch on a nearby table, she'd walked a little unsteadily to where he was standing in the shadows of the room while sultry blues music played from the stereo nearby.
"All alone, Nick?" she'd asked, with pouting lips.
He'd smiled indulgently. "Not now," he mused. "You look nice, Tabby. Very grown-up."
"I'm twenty-five."
"That wasn't what I meant. You aren't very worldly."
"I'm working on it," she purred. "Want to see?"
She noted the faint surprise on his face as she suddenly stepped close to him, smoothing her slender body completely against his.
"Tabby!" he exclaimed.
"It's all right," she'd whispered nervously. "I only want to kiss you, Nick. And kiss you...and kiss you...!"
She'd reached up while she was speaking and looped her arms around his neck to draw his shocked face within reach. She knew little about men and less about kissing with her mostly academic background, but she loved him and she put her heart into it.
She seemed to shock him. His body froze for a few seconds. Then his dark eyes closed and his mouth hardened, and all at once, it was Nick who was doing the kissing. His steely arm clenched around her and jerked her into his body, one powerful leg moving just enough to let her slim figure intimately close while the kiss went on and on. His lips lifted while he breathed unsteadily.
"Is this what you want?" he asked roughly.
"Yes," she breathed, coaxing his mouth back to hers. "Do it again," she whispered against his hard lips.
He obliged her. The glass of punch found its way onto a table. They were hidden from the rest of the partygoers by a large potted plant and an alcove, but Tabby was beyond knowing where they were. She let her hands slide up and down his long back, gave her mouth to him totally even when he deepened the kiss far beyond her meager experience. She began to moan softly when she felt Nick's thighs against her.
That was when he jerked back and pushed her away with a vicious motion of his lean hands.
"What the hell are you doing?" he demanded harshly, his dark eyes blazing. "You're no drunken floozy out for a cheap roll in the hay, are you? Or is that what you do want?" he added with an insolent laugh. "Do you want me, Tabby? There's probably a room upstairs that we could use. Or as a last resort, we could go out on the patio into a dark corner and pull up your skirt..."
She'd cried out at his remarks. "No! Nick, I want to marry you," she'd blurted. "I know you're ready to settle down. I want to have children with you. Isn't that why you came back?"
His face had actually paled. "I came back to check on my father's house. Nothing more."
"But... But I thought..." She swallowed and went deathly pale. "I thought you wanted me."
"A dried-up spinster with a computer for a brain and no breasts to speak of?" he asked arrogantly. "My God, did you really?"
She ran. She turned and ran out the door and went straight home—blind and deaf to the turmoil she'd created in the face of the man she'd left behind. Helen had come after her and she'd cried on her friend's shoulder until dawn, only then swearing Helen to secrecy about her anguish.
She hadn't touched a drop of liquor since, and the shame lingered. But Nick would never know how badly he'd hurt her. All she required now was his help to clear her name. And then maybe she would—and maybe she wouldn't—actually marry Daniel.
Having Nick come back was slowly clearing away the desperation and madness of the past few empty months. She could see what she'd been doing, trying to substitute Daniel for the man she wanted. She couldn't have Nick, but she didn't need to make herself and Daniel miserable by trying to replace him with someone who would never be more than second best.
That decided, finally, she smiled at Daniel when he came back and managed to keep the conversation on just a friendly level for the rest of the afternoon.
Chapter Three
Nick had always been fascinated by the forensics lab at FBI headquarters. It had a reputation second to none for being able to put together evidence from almost nothing. A human hair with its DNA structure could yield a pattern as individual as a fingerprint. The tread of a tennis shoe involved in a murder could be traced to the person who purchased it. A scrap of cloth could yield an incredible amount of information about its owner. And the FBI boasted the largest file of fingerprints on record anywhere. It was an agency to which Nick had been proud to belong. Leaving it had been a wrench, too. A woman with whom he'd been involved had been killed while he'd worked there. She, too, had been a special agent, infiltrating a counterfeiting ring. She'd been spotted and eliminated. That was how the supervisor had put it. Nick had been inconsolable and he'd quit the agency.
He wondered now if it hadn't been a case of simple loneliness and pity. The woman had needed someone at a time in Nick's life when he was feeling hopelessly alone. He'd almost turned to Tabby. But at that time, she'd been shy and introverted and he'd been sure that she would back away from any advance he made. She'd seemed to see him in only one light—that of a protective, affectionate older brother.
Obviously she hadn't seen him like that at the New Year's Eve party. His blood still ran hot at the memory of how eager she'd been for him. Now, having had time to adjust to seeing her in this unexpected way, he'd regretted pushing her away.
But years ago, he'd wanted Tabby. It had been because of that that he'd pursued the woman at work in the first place, out of a need to prove to himself that any woman would do. He didn't need a shy, nervous young woman who didn't even see him as a man.
Sometimes he thought Tabby was a bit afraid of him. The first move she'd ever made toward him had been at that party, when she'd had too much to drink. Apparently he was only palatable to her if she was too tipsy to think properly, and that was hardly flattering. If she'd ever wanted him in the old days, it had never shown. He was defensive toward her because it hurt his pride to think that he couldn't even attract a backward egghead like Tabby. Good God, she wasn't even pretty, and her figure left plenty to be desired. Why, then, he wondered angrily, did the memory of her body against his keep him awake at night? Why did her kisses haunt him?
Momentarily diverted when the elevator stopped, he strolled into one of the huge laboratories that peppered the building and grinned at the elderly form bent over a microscope. That familiar sight had greeted him every time he'd come here during his tenure as a special agent.
“Hello, Bartholomew," he greeted.
The old man looked up, and smiled with delight. "Nick! How nice to see you! Can you stay a while?"
"At least long enough to let you identify something for me," Nick teased. He shook hands with the amused laboratory chief. "How are you, Bart?"
"I've been better. When you get to my age, even arthritis is encouraging. It means you're still alive enough to feel pain!" He chuckled. "Why are you in town? Come home, are you? We could use a good special agent..."
"No. I'm on vacation. I'm working as a private detective these days. It's a little less fraught than working for the agency," he added with a chuckle.
"You look as if it agrees with you. What can I detect for you?"
"This." Nick pulled out the small plastic bag with the strand of hair. It looked odd now that he was out of the influence of Tabby and her snobbish boyfriend, and he scowled as he handed it over to Bart.
The older man lifted an eyebrow as he opened the bag and took out the sample. "Losing your touch, aren't you?"
Nick let out a sharp breath. "I must be. My God, that isn't human hair!"
"Bingo." Bart studied it and shrugged. "Animal fur. Someone has a dog, right?"
He wasn't sure if Tabby had one or not, but she'd mentioned going into the biology la
b on the way over to the college. Probably she'd picked it up there, where they kept rats and mice and dogs and cats and such, and it had come off on her desk.
Nick took the sample back. "A dog or a rabbit or some such thing," he agreed. "Funny I didn't notice that it wasn't human."
"I can run it for you and tell you exactly what it is, if you like."
He shook his head. "No need. I'm getting careless, I guess," he said with a rueful smile.
"Something on your mind?"
"Yes. A lady," Nick replied. His broad shoulders rose and fell. "I'm sorry to have bothered you. There's been a theft. Nothing major, to my mind, but I'm trying to help a friend catch the culprit."
"If you come up with anything tangible, come back," Bart said with a twinkle in his eyes. "I don't get a lot of work these days. My eyes, you know. These younger boys and girls are taking over my old stomping ground." He stared at the test tubes and beakers and microscopes with a loving stare. "Don't get old, Nick."
"I'll do my best," he promised. He shook hands with the older man. "It was good to see you again," he said. "Sometimes I miss the old days."
"Don't we all. I didn't expect to hear from you again, after your own tragedy," he added sympathetically.
Nick nodded sadly. "It was a blow, losing her that way to a bullet. But I don't know that we'd ever have made a go of it. We were both career-minded, and she loved her work." He remembered the woman who'd filled the gaping hole Tabby had left in his life with fondness. He'd never loved Lucy, but he'd been fond of her. Her death had haunted him for years; now, he was finally able to face it.
The older man saw the bad memories in Nick's eyes and quickly changed the subject. "Say, remember that redhead who gave you fits when you first came here, the one who was transferred to Miami and we all got down on our knees and gave thanks?" he asked.
Nick chuckled. "Yes. What was her name...Cynthia something?"
"That's right. Well, she's chief agent in Miami these days," he told Nick. "Doing a helluva job, too. Married to one of her agents and has two kids."
Books By Diana Palmer Page 114
