by Debra Webb
“Not yet. I have a ways to go.”
The tension along his jawline warned that he was not pleased with her reading those so very private entries.
“Your wife must have been a very selfish woman.”
Bella had done her research. Rather than spend some of her time and efforts to charitable pursuits, Cara Pierce traveled extensively while her husband devoted himself entirely to his work. She wore extravagant clothes and jewelry and she refused to have children. That was something Bella had learned in the journal. Pierce—Devon—wanted children. His wife adamantly did not. She bemoaned the idea of ruining her body with stretch marks.
How had he fallen in love with a woman who held so little in common with him?
“She traveled all the time while you worked,” she added for clarification.
“Perhaps she was merely lonely. I was not a very attentive husband.”
The doorbell rang before she could argue with his reasoning.
Devon picked up a remote and changed the channel on the small television mounted near the refrigerator. The image on the screen was of his front door and the parking enclave. Several cars besides her own sat around the center fountain. Detectives Corwin and Hodge stood at the door, a couple of uniforms and what looked like a crime scene team behind them.
“So it begins,” Pierce muttered.
Bella set her cup aside and followed him through the house. “Where’s your housekeeper?”
“My house manager and her staff have the week off.”
“You gave everyone the same week off?” she asked as they walked across the glossy marble and headed for the door.
“She oversees the cleaning staff and the landscaping team. It’s best that they vacation at the same time.”
She got it now. If the rest of the staff was off at the same time as the manager, he didn’t have to interact with them.
They reached the door just as another chime of the bell echoed through the vast hall. “I’ll handle this,” she said, hoping he would acquiesce to her offer.
He gestured to the door and stepped back. She understood how detectives analyzed their persons of interest. Corwin and Hodge would be scrutinizing his every word, his every look. They made it their mission to understand how to get under his skin. How to prod responses. Pierce would be far better served to not give them any more ammunition.
Bella opened the door and flashed the detectives a smile. “Good morning, gentlemen.” She opened the door wide as she stepped back. “Please come in.”
Corwin thrust the warrant at Pierce without bothering to say good morning or even hello. From the dark circles under his eyes and the rumpled suit, he’d likely been working all night. Bella remembered well the necessary hours required to investigate a case like this one. No one wanted more bodies piling up.
One of the uniforms stayed outside the door while the other came inside. The team of forensic techs spilled in next. Hodge hooked a thumb toward them. “They’ll be here for a while.”
Bella nodded. “As long as nothing is damaged and every single thing they touch is put back exactly as it was, you won’t get any trouble from us.”
Corwin strolled over to her, close enough to whisper his question. “Isn’t that the same suit you were wearing yesterday?”
Bella looked him up and down, and when she responded, she didn’t whisper. “That’s funny—I was just thinking the same thing about those khaki trousers and the tweed jacket you’re wearing. With the white shirt it’s a little more difficult to say, but there is the matter of all those wrinkles.”
The other detective’s lips quirked with the need to smile.
Moving on to business, Bella filled in the two detectives as to what Maynard’s mother had to say, including the part about her daughter being home recently. If she’d been held hostage by Pierce for the past two months as she’d claimed, it was unlikely that he’d allow her to go home for visits.
“Any news on Audrey Maynard’s whereabouts?” Pierce asked, his tone sharp, impatient.
Hodge shrugged. “Nothing. It’s like she dropped off the planet.”
“Or got dead,” Corwin countered. He looked from Bella to Pierce and back. “I’m presuming the two of you were together last night.”
“That’s correct,” Bella said without hesitation. “We worked late. Rather than drive an hour home, it was more reasonable that I stay here.”
The techs fanned out, taking the upstairs rooms first. Corwin shifted his attention to Pierce. The doctor was six or more inches taller than either of the detectives, so looking up was necessary. “Hodge and I would like to see the red room.”
“I think you’ve watched too many movies, gentlemen.” Pierce indicated they should follow him. “What I have is an adult game room.”
Bella suspected the room wasn’t about games or even sexual pleasure; the space was about punishment. She kept those thoughts to herself. Who was she to cast the first stone? God knew she had plenty of her own hang-ups.
En route, Bella gathered her bag. She didn’t want one of the techs poking into her things, particularly the journal. Cara Pierce’s private notes about her life were not something these guys needed to see just yet. Not until Bella had something to neutralize the advantage the glaring motive the woman’s words appeared to provide.
While Corwin and Hodge were examining the numerous sex toys, Bella pulled Pierce aside and warned him that this could take all day, maybe longer. If he wanted her to stay and go through the house with the detectives, she would gladly do so. At this point, however, her instincts were leaning toward sticking to him.
So far, the trouble that had shown up at his doorstep was designed to create issues for him, but that scenario could change quickly. If the person behind this obvious setup felt his ultimate goal was not being accomplished quickly enough, he could make an attempt on Pierce’s life. At least one person had lost his life so far.
Pierce apparently felt the same. He called in the house manager’s chief assistant to stay with the house while the police did what they had to do. During the drive into the city, Bella had a captive audience for a little more than an hour. She decided now was as good a time as any to bring up her concerns about his private staff.
“I’m sure you vet your staff very carefully,” she began, “but your wife’s journal was kept in your bedside table. There was a page torn from it. I have to say that it’s very likely you have an employee who is willing to take money in exchange for access to your home, or at least to the things inside your home.”
“I am aware that scenario is swiftly becoming one I cannot deny.” His voice was grim. “My security system is not one easily breached. If the system had been tampered with, audio or video altered, I would know it. The page was either given to my former partner, or he was allowed into my home after the security system had been turned off.”
Bella merged onto the interstate. “You’re convinced, then, that it’s Sutter.”
“I can think of no one else who knew me well enough to know my weaknesses. Jack Hayman never showed any interest in my personal life. Even now, he spends most of his time on a beach somewhere surrounded by exotic women. I doubt he would go to all this trouble for any reason.”
If Hayman was ruled out and it was Sutter who had the affair with Pierce’s wife, he likely knew all his secrets. Cara would have shared plenty with her lover.
“Did you have the adult game room before she died?” Traffic was already crazy heavy. Those who lived in the suburbs were winding their way into the city, their automobiles lined up bumper to bumper.
“No. That came after.”
She thought of the things his late wife had said in her journal. Clearly her secret lover was playing those same sorts of games with her. “Were you and your wife intimate in that way?”
“Are you asking me if we played games? Used pleasure enhancements?”<
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Heat flushed her skin, making her want to squirm in her seat. She was a professional investigator who’d asked any number of personal questions throughout her career. She’d heard it all, from all kinds of people. It took a hell of a lot more than sexual kink to knock her off balance.
And yet that was exactly what Dr. Devon Pierce and his ridiculously sexy adult game room had done.
As uncomfortable as asking made her, she needed to know—to understand the dynamics between them. Didn’t she?
“Did you?”
“No. I was very busy and preoccupied. I’m certain she considered our sex life quite boring.”
After the way he’d touched Bella last night, she doubted sex with Pierce would be boring by any definition of the word. “You were married for five years before the accident. Surely there was a time when the two of you were happy.”
The silence was so thick it was difficult to breathe. She adjusted her grip on the steering wheel, stared at the rows of taillights in front of her. The decision to have this conversation now suddenly felt incredibly awkward. Pretending that last night hadn’t happened felt like the right thing to do when she’d got up this morning. In spite of that decision, there was no way around talking about sex.
“We were happy at first. She became jealous of my work. Felt neglected. Rightfully so.” He sighed and stared out the window. “I’m not sure anything I could have done differently would have mattered, but I will always wonder.”
Bella allowed the silence to settle between them.
They’d just taken the exit for downtown when he answered a call on his cell. “I’m almost there,” he said to the caller. When he’d put his phone away, he surveyed the traffic. “A bus loaded with children headed to a dance competition crashed on the expressway. Most of the injured are en route to the Edge.”
Even as he said the words, a half dozen ambulances seemed to appear out of nowhere, sirens blaring.
By the time they reached the parking area, the ambulances were already lined up at the emergency entrance. Bella pulled as close to the area as possible. “Go,” she said. “I’ll park and catch up with you inside.”
She watched until Pierce was safely inside. She parked her car and hurried to the ER’s entrance. Gurneys were rushing in with patients while others were rushing out to retrieve more. Children were wailing. Mothers were crying. Keeping her attention on their faces rather than their bloody bodies, Bella hurried to the registration desk.
“What can I do to help?”
The two registration specialists glanced at her. The older of the two evidently recognized her as a friend of Dr. Pierce’s.
“We’ve got six adults, including the bus driver, here who were with the children,” said the older woman, Patsy, according to her name tag. “But we’ll have a whole lot more showing up. There’re sixteen children. The parents of the others will be arriving any minute. If you can keep them calm until we get the paperwork done, that would be great.”
Bella nodded. “I can do that.”
As Patsy said, a dozen or more cars descended on the ER parking lot in the half hour that followed. Frantic parents were not easily placated. One of the mothers who had been on the bus and who was uninjured helped with passing along information about whose child was where. Some were at imaging; others were in treatment rooms. Thankfully only two had injuries serious enough to warrant surgery.
One by one, the parents were reunited with their children in treatment rooms or in the ER lobby if they had been released.
When everyone appeared settled, Bella walked through the double doors into the corridor beyond the triage area. She passed the nurses’ station. As she approached Treatment Room Six, she heard Pierce’s voice.
The door opened and a nurse walked out. She smiled at Bella and left the door partially open. A girl—six or seven years old, Bella guessed—sat on the exam table. Her left eye was swollen and swiftly turning colors. There was a bandage on her right leg. The mother stood on the opposite side of her, her worried face showing her struggle to keep up with what Pierce was saying.
“Bethany is going to be fine, but the images show a small linear skull fracture.”
The mother covered her mouth with her hands. “Oh my God.” Tears flowed down her cheeks.
“There’s no shift or movement in the bones—that’s a very good thing. Most likely we can simply monitor her overnight and send her home.”
The mother’s hands came away from her mouth, rested at her throat. “So she’ll be okay.”
“Absolutely. But,” he said carefully, “because I’m not one to take chances with the life of such a precious little girl—” he smiled down at the child “—we’re going to transfer her over to Rush Medical Center for the night. The nurse is taking care of the arrangements now.”
The worry was back. The mother’s face paled. “Something is wrong.”
The little girl looked from her mother to Pierce and back. “Mommy?”
“This is just to make me feel better, Mrs. Jamison, I assure you. If on the outside chance Bethany needs any additional treatment, she will be in the best hospital this city has. I’m quite certain that’s not going to happen, but I would feel better if she was there. I think you’ll both rest better tonight at Rush.”
“All right. My husband is on the way. Can we wait to be moved until he’s here?”
“Of course.” Pierce held out his hand to the little girl. She shook it with all her might. “You are a very brave little girl, Bethany. Your mother and father should be very proud.”
The little girl grinned and the mother thanked him profusely. Before he could get away, she grabbed him and hugged him fiercely.
When at last the relieved mother released him, he walked out of the room. When he saw Bella, surprise flashed in his eyes. Bella smiled. “I had no idea you had such a way with children.”
“I’m only an ogre with beautiful women.”
Bella laughed. She had a feeling Dr. Devon Pierce was no monster at all. The problem was all those secrets he’d been keeping for so long. They tended to weigh a person down, darken their spirit. “You would make a very good father.”
“No.” He captured her eyes with his own, his gaze hard. “I wouldn’t.”
Stinging from his pointed rebuke, she shadowed him as he moved through the ER ensuring all was under control. Their next stop was in the surgery unit, where he checked on the two patients now in recovery. Both were doing well and would be moving on to Rush for admission.
As they walked toward his office, Bella paused and waited for him to meet her gaze. “It’s time we tracked down your old partners and found out what they’ve been up to.”
“If nothing else,” he said, looking away, “you’ll learn that my wife wasn’t the only person who felt cheated by me.”
As long as they learned which one felt cheated badly enough to seek revenge, Bella could deal with the rest. The sooner this case was solved, the less likely she was to cross the line she had brushed far too closely last night.
Chapter Seven
Chicago Police Department, 1:00 p.m.
Detective Corwin had called. He’d asked Devon to come downtown at his earliest convenience.
“They found something.”
Bella’s words reverberated inside him as she sent him a pointed glance before turning back to maneuvering through Chicago traffic. She’d insisted on driving. He’d agreed without protest. He wasn’t entirely sure he could trust his ability to focus at this time. Not to mention his car was at home. The woman who’d pretended to be his wife remained missing, unless they had found her body and that was the reason for this command appearance.
“We really should call your attorney,” she repeated. She’d made this statement twice already.
“I’ll call my attorney if I need him.”
Too many people were aware of h
is weaknesses and secrets already. He detested the idea that the woman driving had learned the most private part of him. His ability to experience pleasure came only with pain. He could only imagine how many more people would be involved before this was over.
“You holding up okay?”
If he didn’t say something, she would continue prodding at him. “Why wouldn’t I be? The police believe I’m a murderer, perhaps a repeat offender if Maynard is not found alive. I see no readily available avenue for refuting their insinuations.”
He chose not to discuss the subject of how Ms. Lytle must see him. She was attracted to him; that was evident. As much as he would like to learn every part of her, he would be far more pleased if she respected his accomplishments. Whatever else he was beyond the creator of the Edge was of little value.
Hadn’t his own wife proved as much? He was unable to please her...unable to make her happy in any way.
“You know, you could have stood by your position that they call your attorney with further questions.”
“I might as well get it over with,” he confessed. “Otherwise, they’ll believe my lack of cooperation is yet further proof that I’m guilty.” He’d considered this at length during the long sleepless hours last night. He had nothing to hide—at least nothing related to criminal activity.
Bella parked on the street near their destination. “What they believe is irrelevant.” She turned to face him. “All that matters is what they can prove.”
They emerged from her sedan simultaneously. “What do you believe?”
She met his gaze over the car. “I believe someone is trying very hard to make you look guilty. Let’s not give them any help.”
She’d avoided his question. Perhaps her avoidance was an answer in itself.
Inside the precinct, they were escorted to a small conference room and offered water or soft drinks. He declined and she did as well. They didn’t speak while they waited. Devon felt confident the detectives were listening in hopes of gleaning some tidbit that would support their case. Ten minutes, then fifteen passed. The delay was another tactic designed to make him restless, to heighten his anxiety.
