Chapter 6
“Are you sure you don’t know him?”
Rachel shook off the image of the dead man. “Yes, I’m sure.” She noticed they weren’t headed for his city house. “Where are we going?”
“To see Jared.”
Alarm electrified her. To see Jared? For real? Why? Aware of her elevated pulse and breathing, Rachel pretended calm.
“You’d rather not?” He saw right through her. He knew she kept facts from him.
She steeled herself against her failing strength. He could not break her. “No. All right. Let’s go see him.” She looked out her window as he parked in front of a familiar building, the location of her dream job, when she’d believed that dream had come true.
Lucas held the door for her, and she resented his gloating. He looked forward to her squirming through this. He had no idea why she’d squirm, though.
He asked the receptionist to let Jared know they were here. Rachel didn’t doubt Jared would drop whatever he was doing. She concealed a stressed exhale.
There he was. Jared walked with a low brow toward them, suit lapels flowing, tie swaying. He hurried too much. Talk about making it obvious.
“Rachel,” he said as he came to a stop. Then to Lucas, he extended a professional hand. “Lucas. It’s been so long.”
“Jared.”
The tone Lucas used piqued Rachel. She couldn’t see any animosity in his face, but the clipped name clued to some underlying tension.
Jared glanced to her as though wishing she’d clue him in to the purpose of this impromptu visit. She offered no help. If not for him, she wouldn’t be in her current situation, one that hadn’t gone away since she’d discovered Jared’s lie. She’d been a fool to think it would.
With a wary look at Lucas, Jared said, “Why don’t we talk in my office?”
Rachel followed him first, Lucas’s hand going to the small of her back. The contact gave her a shock. Had he done that unconsciously? He didn’t pay her much attention, so maybe he had.
In Jared’s office, she preferred to stand—a good distance from where Jared faced them in front of his desk, arms folded defensively. Lucas stood beside her, his hand dropping from her back, leaving her bereft for the few seconds before she braced herself for the conversation to come.
“What can I do for you?” Jared asked.
“We’re not one of your clients, Jared,” Lucas said, low and dark.
Jared barely looked his way before going straight to her. “How do you know him?”
“How do you think I know him?” Rachel couldn’t keep a little of her own animosity out of her voice.
She didn’t expect the hardening of his eyes. And then the aloofness. “He’s always thought I killed his sister.”
“Did you?”
Jared scoffed. “You know I didn’t.”
“How would she know?” Lucas asked, pouncing, and probably trying to get Jared to reveal something, whether willingly or not. And include her. Implicate her.
Rachel sent Jared her best warning, direct eye contact he glanced over and dismissed. He better not try to implicate her, too. She put her hand on the edge of one of the guest chairs, hoping Lucas didn’t notice her dig her fingers into the supple black leather.
Stepping forward, Lucas stood beside her and in front of Jared, who’d moved back with Lucas’s advance. He now stood beside the desk.
“I’ll ask again. What can I do for you? I presume you came here for a reason?”
“Someone broke into my apartment,” Rachel said, not adding it couldn’t be a coincidence after he’d come to see her.
Jared turned to her, genuinely shocked. “A burglar?”
She grunted at the funny joke. “No, Jared. As you recall, I don’t own anything of value.”
“Whoever broke into her apartment must think she’s a threat.” Lucas moved closer to her side.
Rachel tensed. Why had he moved closer? She watched him regard her softly, glancing at Jared to see him notice the act. And it had to be an act. Why was Lucas doing this? Why make a point to show her affection now?
“You went to see her,” Lucas said to Jared, whose eyes shifted to him in defense.
“My relationship with Rachel is our private affair.”
“Affair,” Lucas scoffed. “Yes, it was that, wasn’t it? You cheated on my sister. You haven’t changed.”
“Oh, don’t start that again, Lucas. So I dated a lot of women. I don’t know why that bothered you so much. It’s not as though you had a shortage of admirers.”
“Luella was my sister. Do you think I wanted her to end up with you?”
“She loved me. I loved her.”
“Until you met Rachel?” Lucas glanced at her, a silent reassurance that he meant her no insult, and then a hardening that stopped the sentiment. She had, in fact, had an affair with his sister’s husband. Maybe he believed it hadn’t been intentional. It hadn’t. Rachel had a strict moral code when it came to that sort of thing.
“Luella and I started to have problems the year before I met Rachel,” Jared said. “We were going to get a divorce. If you were close to her, she’d have told you that.”
When Lucas took a menacing step forward, Rachel put her hand on his biceps.
He stopped, heeding her gentle request to remain calm.
Jared again noticed this exchange and pinned her with his gaze. “How long have you known him?”
Rachel chose not to answer and after a few seconds, caught Lucas’s subtle, repressed grin.
“We just met,” he said to Jared, playing him again.
“Well, if we’re through...?” Jared moved behind his desk.
“When was the last time you saw my sister alive?” Lucas demanded in the most intimidating tone that Rachel had ever heard from him.
Jared stopped in the process of sitting down. He slowly straightened. “I’ve told it before. The last time I saw her, I left for work. When I came home, dinner was in the refrigerator. It was her night to go out with her friends. I went to bed at nine thirty.”
“You didn’t hear her when she came home?” Lucas asked with less force, more of a manipulating detective now. A hunter.
“No.”
Luella’s keys had been found in her purse. Her car was in the garage. There had been no sign of forced entry. No blood. Rachel had read the news.
“You told police she came to bed,” Lucas said.
“She did.” Jared glanced at Rachel as though seeking her support.
She eased her grip on the leather chair.
“You told them the time. Ten twenty,” Lucas said.
Jared turned from her to him, paying closer attention. “I was asleep when she came home.”
He should not get lackadaisical with a man like Lucas in the room. Lucas could ferret out a lie expertly. And he had a physical presence that commanded obedience.
“Then how did you hear her? How did you know the time?”
“Look, I’m not lying. I estimated the time. And I did hear her. I fell right back to sleep. She must have gotten up in the middle of the night.”
Rachel still found it difficult to believe Jared didn’t wake up or notice his wife missing from bed. Had Luella never come home that night? Had something happened before ten twenty? Her car had been in the garage. No sign of forced entry. Someone she’d known must have lured her away.
“Are you sure you don’t know anything about why someone would break into my apartment?” Rachel asked as amenably as she could. She did not trust him. A man who could deceive his wife and the mistress he obtained did not deserve trust. In that, she agreed with Lucas that he could be the prime suspect in Luella’s murder.
Jared absorbed that awhile. “Why do you think I had anything to do with that?”
Rachel decided it was best if she didn’t respond. She saw Lucas study her in frustrated disappointment. He needed to hear why.
“What’s going on with the two of you?” Jared asked.
Why did he ask? Rachel glanced at Lucas, who still regarded her with heated, hidden emotion. Feeling that heat begin to seep into her, she realized perhaps Jared had picked up on some undercurrents. Her secretiveness put him at odds with her because of the attraction neither of them could control. The animal, physical desire couldn’t be turned off.
Jared swept his arm from Lucas to her, but his growing angst arrowed on Lucas. “You had your hand on her back on the way in here, and I can see the way you look at her.”
The personal reference took Rachel aback.
“Jared?” She had to check to see if she’d read him right.
“Why are you with him?”
“What?” She put her hand to her upper chest, not understanding.
“Did you kill my sister to be with Rachel?”
Rachel sucked in an appalled breath and turned on Lucas. “Stop!”
“No,” Jared said, “I did not. I wouldn’t have had to kill anyone to have Rachel.” He slid unrecognizable, mean eyes to her. “Until she found out about Luella, but by then Luella was already dead.”
“Jared—”
“Why are you with this man?” he cut her off.
“I am not with him.” Then she said to Lucas, “My relationship with Jared had nothing to do with her murder.”
“That remains to be determined.”
Stung by his indifference and cold regard, Rachel went for the door. “Stay out of my life, both of you!”
“Rachel, wait,” Lucas said, concern in his tone.
But as she cleared the door, she heard Jared say, “Now you’ve done it. If you want to be on her good side, you’re doing a lousy job.” He let out a wicked chuckle. “You must not know her very well.”
No one knew her very well. Her mother had known her. No one since. As she wondered about that. A sinking feeling settled over the idea that maybe she’d done that to herself.
She jogged to the elevator, catching the closing doors and squeezing into a full car. As the doors closed, she saw Lucas rush to a resigning stop before he was blessedly blocked from her view.
Staring at the numbers going down, Rachel wished she didn’t feel like running every time something or someone cornered her. As an adolescent, that had been juvenile court. As an adult, anything that threatened her chances for a normal life, a life like she saw in other people like the woman at the mall. She feared being sucked down into a cesspool her adolescent choices had created, forever circling the consequences.
Meeting a man like Lucas didn’t help. He could be something good for her, if he could open himself to that. His sister’s murder, her association with Jared and his lack of trust made that an impossible dream.
That was what made her run. Lucas. His perception of her. And her inability to change anything. She had to stay her course. Graduate. Work hard to secure her future. For herself. That was why she’d left everything and everyone behind. She needed to prove her worthiness not only to herself, but also to all who’d witnessed her downfall after her parents died.
Getting involved with Lucas would only spin her back into a cesspool. She cared too much about her reputation and her future to allow that to happen.
* * *
“What is going on between the two of you?”
Lucas turned from the elevator doors to see Jared had followed him. “That’s a question I’d like to ask you.”
“You may not like to hear this, but I fell in love with Rachel.”
“You fell in love with the last woman you slept with while you were with Luella.” Satisfied he’d surprised his ex-friend, Lucas said, “Yes, I knew about your affair before you married my sister. I didn’t say anything to her because I hoped you’d be faithful once you were married.” That Lucas hadn’t told Luella had plagued him ever since. After her murder, the burden had grown. How he regretted not telling her. Maybe she’d have left Jared and still be alive today.
Jared stepped back as two women in business skirts and jackets approached the elevators. “Is that why you started hating me so much?”
One of the women glanced back at Jared and then at Lucas.
Lucas moved across the hall to the wall where Jared stood and kept his voice low. “No, I recognized what a snake you were shortly after I introduced you to Luella.” That had been after Jared had gotten this job and he’d partnered with Eldon Sordi, a man with a high taste for the good life. He’d gone through four wives so far, and went on glamorous poker tours. Jared had never told him and didn’t have to, but Eldon also had a drug problem, one he’d picked up after meeting Jared.
Lucas had warned Luella but she’d been taken in by the promise of a rich life. He’d had words with Jared, who’d dismissed his recreational drug use as merely that.
Then, after he married Luella, she had called Lucas crying one night after Jared had come home from work late, drunk and wired on cocaine. Lucas had urged her to divorce him, but she’d said she loved him.
Lucas had flown home and gone to see Jared two days later. He’d given him more than an earful. He’d sported a black eye after going nose to nose with him. That had been the beginning of their falling-out. The last and final hammer slamming down had been when Eldon’s fourth wife hired a private investigator, who’d snapped several photographs of Eldon and Jared on a yacht with two strange women. Eldon’s wife had sent them to Luella.
The call Lucas got from his sister had infuriated him.
That was six months before her murder.
More people got off the elevator and walked down the hall.
“You were always too righteous,” Jared said when they were alone again. “Your dad died in the line of duty, and you made it your life’s goal to martyr him. You would never have become a cop.”
Lucas didn’t know how Jared had drawn that conclusion. His dad had died when he was a young boy. True, having only photos of him and his mother’s narrations, his dad had seemed like a superhero.
“Is your life’s goal infidelity and greed?” he asked his old friend.
Jared scoffed. “I do love money. The rest just happened.”
And he’d let it happen. “That’s what people without integrity say. It’s much easier to let things happen than to take care not to hurt those closest to you. Hurting others never concerned you. I didn’t realize that until Luella started seeing you.”
“Like I said, righteous. You’d be a lot less stressed out if you let go a little, Lucas. Relax and just live.”
His partner Eldon appeared in the hall, walking as though his tight schedule pressed him. “Ah, there you are.” He passed an uninterested look at Lucas. “We’ve got that HealthFirst policy meeting in fifteen. I need to talk to you.”
“I was just heading there.” Jared turned to Lucas. “You remember Lucas Curran?”
“Your wife’s brother. Of course.” Eldon reached out an impersonal hand.
Lucas shook it briefly.
“I’m sorry to cut this short, but...” Eldon stepped back and then waited for Jared to go with him.
“Next time you stop by, let me know first. Maybe we could meet somewhere more casual.” Jared started off with Eldon.
“One more thing, Jared.” Lucas waited for him to turn, Eldon doing the same with a hint of annoyance. “I’d have become a cop whether my dad died or not. It’s in my blood. And I’m good at it.”
Eldon turned away first, Jared lingering as the unspoken message dawned on him.
If he killed Luella, Lucas would bring justice to his door.
When they disappeared back into the office area, Lucas faced the elevator. A few seconds later the d
oors opened, and he stepped in. Someone hurried inside after him. As he faced forward, he saw Marcy.
“Oh, hello, Mr. Curran.”
“Marcy. What are you doing here?”
“Oh.” She glanced back toward the offices. “I’m seeing one of the executives here.”
How had she met an executive here? Joseph’s company had nothing in common with this one.
“I’m glad I ran into you,” Marcy said, full of bright energy. “I wanted to apologize for your girlfriend overhearing me talking. I didn’t mean for—”
Nothing about her indicated she felt caught. Lucas wasn’t sure why he thought she should. He just found it peculiar to find her here.
“Don’t worry about it.”
She moved closer, putting her hand on his upper arm. “But I do. With your sister’s murder still unsolved, you might have learned something if she hadn’t found out you got her that job as a ploy. Your dad told me she might know something about your sister’s murder.”
His dad had a big mouth.
“If there’s anything I can do to help, all you have to do is tell me.”
What did she think she could do, besides stick her nose where it didn’t belong and then spread rumors? And have affairs with one of Lucas’s estranged friend’s executive peers.
She lowered her hand, coquettish now. “I was real glad to hear you moved back to Bozeman.”
She’d flirted with him before. Marcy had the reputation of flirting with every available executive. She’d gone her rounds in Joseph’s office, and for some reason had moved on to Jared’s. Lucas couldn’t compare her to Rachel. Though when he’d first met Rachel and thought she practiced the same dirty tactics as Marcy, the two were completely different. Rachel sought successful men because she had aspirations for a better life. Marcy pounced on them out of greed. Rachel looked for love. Marcy looked for money.
Rachel looked for love?
Since Rachel lost her parents, he couldn’t see how she wouldn’t, whether she realized that or not.
The elevator doors opened, and Lucas stepped out. Marcy trailed behind, trotting to catch up to his longer strides.
“I heard your ex-wife moved here. Tory Curran?”
Justice Hunter Page 8
