She took his arm. “It’s not your fault.”
Inside, pale apricot walls soared two full stories. Above the double doors, three tiers of windows faced Southeast. Sparkling globes in a brass chandelier threw off pools of lemony light onto dark hardwood floors.
Quinn’s mouth dropped. The place was straight out of Architectural Digest. She caught their reflection in an oversized gold-framed mirror hanging above a Queen Anne table and blurted, “It’s so...so neat.”
Pierce’s laugh was strained. “Thanks to Mrs. Taylor. She comes early—so she can stay on top of my clutter.”
“Clutter? You? The hopeless, unrepentant junk collector?”
Hoping to distract him for a second or two longer, Quinn, who could not abide messy, kept chattering. “The bungalow always looked like the aftermath of an earthquake.”
Not dirty—just messy.
He pointed to a living room—spacious and impeccable. “I don’t think you want to see the family room.”
She managed to hold back a sigh of relief. “Let me know if I can help.”
“Having you here helps a lot.” He turned away before her relief turned into guilt.
In the living room, Quinn picked up a coffee-table book about Maui. A gift from Pierce’s parents, inscribed on the front-page. Mrs. Jordan was Hawaiian, dark and exotic like her son. She never tired of trying to lure him back to Hana, where she and Pierce’s retired Navy father lived.
Quinn turned the pages, remembering her first visit to paradise—long before she knew Pierce. She’d gone twice with him. Each time she returned home, determined to ignore his mother’s unspoken—but unmistakable—disapproval. Three months after their last trip, she’d discovered Pierce with Brittany and kicked him out of her bed, making his mother very happy she was sure. Rumors were she liked Brittany.
Pictures of romantic beaches and blazing sunsets blurred, and Quinn mentally kicked herself for letting the past suck her downward. She sat up straighter and tried to imagine Pierce in his family room staring at blood. She flipped past several more pictures without seeing them, without feeling the paper. Images of her opening her arms to him distorted the photos. Footsteps sent her heart racing and short-circuited the familiar ache of longing. She whipped around, expecting Pierce.
The book slipped through her fingers, but she caught the spine before it hit the floor. She lurched out of her chair. Her legs felt like stilts—too stiff and wobbly to carry her across the room. Pierce came toward her. The short, red-haired man beside him studied her thoughtfully. Grim-faced, shoulders sagging, Pierce shook his head.
Her heart twisted high in her chest, but she bit down on her bottom lip, holding back a whoosh of sympathy. Careful. She had to be careful. Very careful. Too much had happened for her and Pierce to go back. She’d offer sympathy, but measured sympathy. Sympathy from one old friend to another. Nothing too personal. Nothing he could misconstrue.
“When will you know for sure?” he asked, his voice hoarse. He never took his eyes off the policeman, but reached for Quinn and tucked her under his arm,
“Couple of hours. Sooner if the M.E. isn’t swamped.” Penetrating eyes stared openly at her bruises. Her throat closed, but she returned the stare.
“In the meantime, search the house again. Just because we can’t see anything missing doesn’t mean there’s not. And, you may find other evidence.” The policeman hesitated, looked at Quinn and exhaled. “Or the body.”
Sheer willpower kept her from parroting, the body? But willpower didn’t keep the hair on the back of her neck from standing up or her heart from slamming against her rib cage like a freight train.
Pierce steadied her and agreed he’d follow up. A nod, then the policeman snapped his fingers. “For the record, Miz Alexander, did Mr. Jordan spend last night with you?”
His implication put her on the defensive. Face burning, momentarily mute, she felt like a teenager caught necking at a funeral. She stared at him without speaking, letting her silence slam into his self-satisfaction, letting her silence make him shift his weight from one foot to the other before she moved her head downward in a curt, defiant nod.
“Can you swear, ma’am, that he never left at any time?”
“If I had to.” She primped her lips, holding the elf’s gaze, feeling like a phony for sounding like an outraged Victorian maiden, but enjoying his frown.
The silence expanded, contracted, scraped her nerves, making her feel guilty and edgy—aftermath of two near attacks in one day, she assumed. Unsure what was happening in Pierce’s house, she wasn’t about to bring up yesterday’s attacks. Whatever the cop read on her face raised his busy brows, but he tipped his head in her general direction and strutted back to the family room.
“What body?” Quinn forced herself to speak normally.
Her ankle hurt and her knees felt so weak that she wanted to scream the question. Better, she wanted to forget it. She didn’t know people who got themselves murdered. Dead bodies belonged in books or in movies or on TV...along with nutcases and ski-masked attackers.
“We think—” Pierce looked toward the family room and cleared his throat. “We think someone...someone came in the house and...killed...my...my cat.”
“Your cat? You don’t have a cat.”
Good thing Pierce knew she was intelligent, or based on her response, he might conclude she was mentally impaired.
“Yeah, I do.” He swallowed and kept his gaze on the family room. “An old orange and white guy. Fat Floyd.”
Silence. Charged silence. Skin-twitching silence. The silence swelled, threatening to take over and shut her out.
Determination coiled into a knot in her stomach. She squared her shoulders and took Pierce’s hand. He looked like a little boy who’d dropped his ice cream cone in the dirt.
“I-I’m surprised. You’ve never had a pet. I never even knew you liked cats.”
“Floyd adopted me a couple of years ago—after Brittany left. He treats me just fine.” Pierce released Quinn’s hand and scrubbed his eyes so viciously she winced.
“Why?” he demanded. “Why come in and kill a harmless old tomcat?”
He looked at Quinn as if she must know the answer.
****
Depressed and confused, Quinn left Pierce’s for work, driving his Corvette. Mercifully, he didn’t ask her to stay while he continued searching for Fat Floyd. She promised to return for lunch. Just to make sure he ate something.
Maybe she’d talk him into going to the office.
Unless they found the cat’s body.
Pushing the thought aside, she concentrated on negotiating the morning traffic. The powerful car demanded her full attention. Street crews had salted the streets, but extra-cautious drivers posed more danger than ice.
Cars crept bumper to bumper along Ward Parkway, the major North-South traffic artery from The Plaza. East-West traffic from nearby Kansas suburbs like Fairway, where she lived, vied for the same lanes. Gridlock reigned on the bridge spanning frozen Brush Creek. Fears spurred by the recession were bringing people to work despite the weather,
Quinn checked her rearview mirror. She needed to call Michael. Remind him the recession, the weather, and the time of year added up to the worst conditions ever for finding Rex a job. Factor in no references from Pierce...
Her mind veered back to Pierce’s troubles. They all assumed the blood belonged to Fat Floyd, but what if it belonged to a human? The senselessness knotted in her stomach. She rechecked the mirror.
Three cars behind her, a black Jeep changed into her lane. She couldn’t see the driver’s face, but her heart fluttered. She switched her gaze to the side mirror, but a blue Lexus SUV blocked her line of sight.
You’re being ridiculous. She craned her neck, saw only the SUV and tried thinking logically.
Jeeps weren’t common vehicles on The Plaza. Thinking this one was the same vehicle on her cul-de-sac the night before screamed coincidence.
The car riding her bumper moved into the
far right lane. The SUV moved up, but not before the Jeep also switched into the right lane.
Her heart pounded and her mind leaped to a new coincidence. The Jeep was black. Her wannabe mugger had worn all black. Pierce’s assailant wore all white. What if...her mugger drove his Jeep to her cul-de-sac and morphed into Mr. Ski Mask?
The driver to her left took advantage of her momentary lunacy and cut in front of her. A Mercedes behind the lane-changer moved up next to Quinn. Instead of moving forward, the Jeep stalled. Horns blared. The light turned green. Quinn hit the gas and tailgated the lane-changer through the intersection.
Adrenaline buzzed in her fingertips, and she whipped up the incline on Southwest Trafficway without a hitch. Cold deliberation spurred her past the entrance to the underground garage. Forty-Sixth Terrace was only half a block long before it intersected with Wornall Court doubling back the direction she’d just come.
If the Jeep took the same convoluted route into this area of outrageously priced high-rise condos, she’d know she wasn’t dealing with a coincidence. She’d know the driver was stalking her.
She kept her foot on the brake and inched down ice toward Wornall. Fighting for calm, she parked illegally under an EMERGENCY SNOW ROUTE sign. Her fists clenched reflexively, and her stomach knotted as she checked and rechecked the rearview mirror every five seconds.
Ten minutes passed before she turned the key in the ignition. She felt ridiculous for succumbing to paranoia. A traffic cop came toward her, ticket book in his hand. She wet her lips, swallowed and rolled down her window—resigned to accept her punishment.
****
Quinn’s headache evaporated the instant she drove into the garage behind Janelle. On the one hand, she had no intention of letting the Dim-Bulb incident make her afraid for the rest of her life. On the other hand, she didn’t mind a companion on the day after the encounter.
“Hey, Quinn.” Janelle circled the Corvette. “Where’d you get the wheels?”
“Where’d you get the wings on your feet?” Quinn countered, focusing on walking without limping. “How’d you get out of your car and over here so fast?”
“Are you avoiding answering my question by asking two more?”
“Now why would I do that?” The chatter helped Quinn ignore the dull ache in her ankle.
Janelle tossed her head, and her long black hair flew out like a black cape. “I think I see where this is going.”
“Where?” Quinn clenched her jaw. Stop obsessing about Dim Bulb.
“Nowhere.” Janelle punched the UP button on the elevator.
Laughing felt good until they walked in the office and Sami cried, “Thank God, you’re here. Rex Walker’s called every ten minutes since I opened the door at eight. Triple A called twice. Want me to pick up your private line? It’s on the second ring.”
“Thanks, I’ll get it.” Stomach churning, Quinn jogged awkwardly past the closet door. She didn’t know if her stomach hurt because of residual stress from last night’s scares or because of this morning’s parking ticket or because of new stress from not knowing who was on the other end of the phone. Her breath sounded ragged as she grabbed the receiver.
“Glad you made it safely,” Pierce said.
Her stomach dropped. She’d never heard him so down. “Did you find Fat—”
“Nothing yet. I’m taking a sanity break.”
“Uh-huh. I used to be schizophrenic, but we’re okay now.”
Silence boomed in her ear.
“God, Pierce. That was stupid. Insensitive. Off the wall. I’m sorry.” She wished she could see him, look him in the eye, prove her sincerity. “Hold on. Next mood swing in six minutes.”
He surprised her and actually chuckled. “I should do the apologizing. With everything on your plate, you don’t need me whining and wringing my hands.”
“You’re not. Honestly. What can I do? Come back?” She stopped unbuttoning her coat.
“No. Isn’t this where I’m supposed to say just hearing your voice is enough?”
“Hard—after my dumb-ass jokes.”
“Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused.”
Caught off guard, Quinn blurted, “Did you just make a joke?”
“You know I’m humor impaired. Ask Detective Olsen.”
She balanced the receiver between ear and shoulder and lowered her backside into the chair behind her desk. “The elf?”
“None other. He can’t believe I can’t give him a dozen names of people who’d do something this vicious.” Pierce exhaled. “Rex is the only name I came up with since I don’t know our golf-course nut.”
Quinn bit her tongue, then said, “Maybe the break-in’s a fluke—a random act.”
“No way. Whoever broke in has to know computers damn well. Besides, you know what they say about coincidences.”
A sudden spurt of fire burned through the lining of Quinn’s stomach. “You mean, isn’t it a coincidence Rex knows computers damn well?”
“He had means and motive and opportunity.” Pierce’s calm recitation shook Quinn.
“Opportunity?”
“That attack on the golf course wasn’t a random coincidence—excuse the redundancy—or whatever it is.”
Vocabulary didn’t interest her. Thank God she hadn’t mentioned the black Jeep. Pierce would, she was certain, declare Rex was the driver. She held back a sigh and said, “When did Rex have opportunity?”
“Last night. On the golf course. The little creep followed us, put me out of commission, then came here for more fun.”
“You make him sound like a monster.”
“Monster pretty much does it for me.”
The harsh judgment knocked the breath out of Quinn. Her throat ached from holding back tears. The problem was, she could almost buy Pierce’s scenario. Almost.
“It’s snowing again.” She rolled her chair closer to the window behind her desk. “Traffic’s standing still on Southwest Trafficway.”
Without missing a beat, he said, “Is your next line, ‘the traffic’s a monster’?”
“Close.” Below her, a distant red light flashed behind the gridlock. “I’m wondering why a monster would drive five hundred miles in this kind of weather to help a friend.”
A snort. “Easy. There’s a payoff.”
“What payoff?”
“You won’t like it, so you go first. Change my mind.”
“I accept that challenge.” The red light wove through three lanes of traffic, past the intersection to an accident Quinn couldn’t see from her vantage point. Traffic below her inched forward.
She took a deep breath and said quietly, “Rex already has his payoff. I promised him yesterday I’d help him find a new job.”
“And you wonder why he goes off like a Donner Party explorer to help Michael?”
Consciously, she chose to ignore this trap and made her point. “Being with Michael actually hurts Rex. Some of the people stranded in their cars on Southwest Trafficway, work in banks. Some of them will—unlike the Donner Party—turn back...”
“I hope he turns back. I hope he finds out every VP in town stayed home.”
Quinn closed her eyes and said brightly, “Guilty until proven innocent, right?”
“Will you come to lunch if I say yes?”
She waited a beat, hoping he’d worry about her answer, then said, “What time?”
“About one. Does that give you enough time to work a few miracles?”
“Absolutely.” She paused, dialing back the aggression in her voice and softening her tone. “And if there’s bad news about Fat Floyd, I’ll come sooner.”
****
Miracle workers multiplex. At nine on the dot, Quinn booted up her PC, dialed Rex, and punched the speaker phone.
“Are you just getting into the office?” he asked, his tone low and ugly.
Not a good beginning, but she didn’t give a damn. Except he was meeting Michael. She kept her voice businesslike. “
The weather’s screwing up phone service.”
“You should’ve kept trying. I expected a callback no later than seven.”
Tough. At seven, she’d been at Pierce’s trying not to throw up. She rocked her foot back and forth, hoping to loosen the stiffness in her ankle. “Traffic’s a circus.”
“Tell me about it. A big rig jackknifed outside Blue Springs.”
“Damn, I can’t believe it.” Where the heck was her screen saver?
“Believe it. The Highway Patrol estimates another half an hour. I’ve talked to Michael twice. He suggested meeting me in Mexico.”
“In good weather, that’s at least an hour from St. Louis.” Quinn slipped out of her chair, stuck her head under the computer desk and rummaged for the damn power strip.
Her ankle screamed with a million pinpricks of stabbing pain. “How would he get home if Luce goes into labor?” she shouted.
“Why are you yelling?”
“The better to hear me.” Quinn withdrew her head and forced a normal voice through clenched lips. “I’m checking to make sure my PC’s plugged in.”
“Why the hell wouldn’t your PC be plugged in?”
“Because two asteroids collided last night?” She took a deep breath and dove back under the desk. “I don’t know why, but it wasn’t. Okay?”
“Wellll, excuuuse me.”
A thousand smart-ass comebacks flooded her brain. Jamming the plug back in the power strip took the edge off her throbbing ankle.
“Can we go back to Michael?” Her hostility was winding down, but she didn’t soften her voice. Rex wasn’t getting the upper hand—no matter what she owed him. “Is he meeting you in Mexico?”
“Of course not.” Surly. “I talked him out of it. Swore I’d meet him by one.”
By then she’d be at Pierce’s. Guilt ate into her. “You’ll never make it.”
“Luckily, I have a bladder like a camel. There’s not much traffic and no snow east of Columbia. I’ll make it.”
“Bless you,” she said softly, meaning it.
“You know how I feel about Mich—oh-oh. Believe it or not, a State trooper’s waving me on. Gotta hang up. Don’t want a ticket for driving and talking on my cell.”
Unraveled Page 9
