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Deadly Secrets

Page 19

by Ann Christopher


  This person?

  Not so stupid.

  Henry felt grudging respect. Oh, sure, he was pissed as hell that it had taken this long and been this hard. But he knew and respected players when he came across them, and this was a player.

  The door swung open.

  In walked a middle-aged pantsuit-wearing Hillary Clinton type carrying several plastic grocery bags and a bouquet of pink roses. The hair was shorter now, he noticed as she strode to the dining room table and put everything down, a drab brown instead of her usual blonde, but otherwise she looked the same as in her pictures.

  She clicked on the overhead light. Gasped and flinched when she saw him and Kramer, one small hand flying to her neck.

  “Hello, Dr. Harrison,” he said, unfolding his arms and letting his arm dangle over the chair’s arm so she could get a better look at his piece. Kramer, meanwhile, raised his head and thumped his tail. “So nice to finally meet you.”

  Keeping a close eye on him, she dropped her keys on the table. “I can’t say the same.”

  He chuckled. “Don’t blame you for that. But you’ve had your little fun. We need you in Miami. Time to get back to work.”

  “How did you find me? I thought I did a pretty good job hiding.”

  “You did a great job hiding. Hats off to you. Your old friend Rickey Hughes—”

  “The janitor?”

  “—dropped the first breadcrumb on you. From there, I followed you all over the place. Always a couple steps behind. Now here we are.”

  “How did you know to look for me?”

  “Oh, I get it. You thought with Kareem dead, you’d get a reprieve?”

  Wry smile. “I suppose I did. I should have known better.”

  “It’s not that hard. There aren’t that many people around who do your kind of research. And someone who quits without notice and leaves town…” He shrugged.

  “I wanted to help cancer patients,” she said bitterly. “Not be Walter White.”

  “And I wanted to be retired and sitting on the front porch with my wife and dog with a cold Heineken in my hand. We both took wrong turns. Made bad choices. Que sera, sera.”

  She nodded crisply. No hard feelings. “You understand I don’t want to go to Miami and work. That’s not what I want to use my skills for.”

  “Do I understand? Absolutely.” He sighed. “But neither of us have a choice, doctor. Time to go.”

  “What if I refuse?”

  “I can make you go. And if you refuse when we get to Miami, or don’t do the job to the best of your abilities, we’ll turn you in. The feds would love to hear about you.”

  “They’d love to hear about you and your boss as well.”

  “Fair point,” he said. “Have you got proof of all of our wrongdoing?”

  Her expression tightened, but she said nothing.

  “That’s what I thought. Do you want to grab a few things? Do you have the formula?”

  “I only ever made the copy I gave Kareem.” She tapped her temple. “Photographic memory.”

  “Bad plan. What if you bump your head?”

  Wry smile. “Fair point.”

  “Let’s go.”

  The good doctor squared her shoulders and reached for her purse, proving herself to be the class act he’d long suspected. Taking a long moment, she looked around her little apartment, noting the puzzle. The fresh roses.

  There were no framed family pictures to give her away.

  See? A player.

  “I don’t need to take anything with me,” she said finally.

  “Suit yourself. Come on, Kramer.”

  He and the dog both stood. He swept an arm wide. She marched on ahead like the team player she’d evidently decided to be.

  “I’m going to miss Jefferson City,” she said, zipping her purse shut and tucking it under her arm. “It’s a nice city. Good people.”

  “I agree. I had dinner at a nice little—”

  She turned back around. Stared him dead in the face as, with slow deliberation, she raised a hand to her neck. Bewildered, he noticed a flash of metal as she made an abrupt movement.

  A lightbulb went off over his head just as Kramer barked. Whimpered.

  “No!” he shouted.

  Blood sprayed, narrowly missing him before splattering to the floor.

  Dr. Harrison blinked. Once…twice. Frowned and opened her mouth like she wanted to say something.

  Then she collapsed to her knees and let the knife drop.

  No, not a knife, Henry saw. A scalpel.

  They stared at each other while she bled out. Henry had seen a lot of death in his life. Guys during the war. People he’d killed. Kerry Randolph sprawled on that plastic sheet with his eyes open. Henry might not care every time a soul left a body, might not lose sleep about it, but he remembered.

  This one, he knew as he watched the light leave those eyes and saw her tumble to her side, was going to leave a mark.

  Kramer whined.

  “Go!” he snapped, pointing away from the mess.

  Kramer slunk away, tail between his legs.

  “Why?” Henry cried, resisting the violent urge to go to her. To comfort her while she died. If there was a way to reach her without stepping in the blood and leaving footprints everywhere, he’d have done it in a heartbeat. “Why?”

  But it was a foolish question, and he knew the answer long before she’d finished gurgling and her nonplussed expression eased into something that was almost a smile and was definitely peace.

  Why had she done it?

  Because she’d decided that death was better than living fearful and enslaved.

  And because she had a million times more bravery and courage than Henry did.

  When she went still and her eyes were flat and dark, Henry dropped back into his chair, covered his face with his hands and sobbed as he hadn’t done since his son died. Kramer trotted over and rested his chin on Henry’s knee, offering comfort where he could.

  But there was no comfort to be had in the world when Henry still had to notify the Llama.

  So Henry sat up straight, blew his nose, wiped his face, scratched the dog’s ears and made a call.

  “Hello, hello,” the Llama said after the first ring. “Have you found our friend?”

  “Yeah.” Henry cleared his gruff throat. “She, ah, made creative use of her scalpel. She won’t be coming to Miami.”

  Harsh sigh from the Llama. A sip. A slurp. A clink.

  “I’m beginning to think you’re not putting your heart into this, Henry,” he said in a voice colder than an Icelandic tombstone in December. “I’m beginning to run out of patience.”

  Sudden exhaustion kept Henry from answering.

  “What about the formula?” the Llama asked.

  “She had a, uh, photographic memory. Only gave the one copy to Kareem.”

  “Well, you’ll have to go back to Cincinnati and start shaking some bushes there, won’t you?”

  The line went dead.

  Henry began to wish he were dead, too. Alice or no Alice. In that dark moment, anything seemed better than driving the seven hours back to Cincinnati.

  All in search of a flash drive that he was beginning to think was an urban legend.

  29

  Okay.

  She could absolutely do this, Jayne told herself.

  She could decide.

  Either she’d stay in the car and drive back home.

  Or she’d get out of the car, go into the restaurant and have dinner with Kerry.

  The thing she would absolutely not do?

  Sit in the car listening to Adele and cooling her heels for another twenty minutes, stuck between ambivalence and utter paralysis.

  Jayne tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. Flipped down her visor and checked her makeup. Flipped the visor back up and checked her watch.

  Seven ten.

  Yeah, she’d shown up early. Now she was late. She eyeballed her phone, thinking hard. Maybe if she went inside, sh
e should have one of her friends send an “emergency” text in half an hour or so, just so she’d have an escape plan if she—

  Someone knocked quietly on the driver’s-side window.

  Jayne jumped, squawked and dropped her phone in her lap. But it wasn’t until she looked around and realized it was Kerry that her pulse rate spiked.

  She’d parked under a huge light pole, so she had no problem making out his dark sweater, sharp leather jacket and sardonic eyes.

  She rolled her window down about six inches.

  “Hi,” she said sheepishly.

  “Here.” He handed her a heavy leather-bound menu. “You’ve got to be hungry by now. Your brain’s been cranking hard for a good twenty minutes.”

  Her jaw dropped and joined her cell phone in her lap. “How did you—?”

  “My table’s right there.”

  He pointed to one of the restaurant’s windows, where, sure enough, a white tablecloth and flickering candle were visible through the slats in the blinds.

  “So go ahead and have a look at the menu, and I’ll send the server out for your order in, say, five minutes? Great. Bye.”

  He walked off, leaving her feeling like a complete idiot.

  “You’re not funny, Randolph,” she called after him.

  He pivoted and came back, shrugging. “So what’re you going to do, Jayne? I’m starving. I’ve waited the polite length of time and I’ve already killed an order of steamed dumplings.”

  She hesitated.

  “Yeah, okay.” His jaw tightened. “Guess you’re not the woman I thought you were. Again: bye.”

  The veiled implication of cowardice galled her. “You don’t know one thing about me.”

  “Hence the dinner,” he said with a sweeping gesture toward the restaurant.

  “You know what? Fine.” She thrust the menu back at him. Then she rolled up the window and cut the engine before grabbing her things. “Just… Fine.”

  He stepped aside. The hint of amusement in his eyes turned to a glimmer of triumph as she got out, giving her the vague and disquieting feeling that she’d just been handled. But then his gaze heated up and swept over her, touching on her legs, hips and cleavage in her blue wrap dress. Suddenly all she could do was send up a quick thanks to Diane von Furstenberg, for creating dresses that flattered big girls like her, and her local resale shop for making such dresses affordable.

  “You’re beautiful,” he said in a husky voice. “You’re really beautiful.”

  “Well.” She fought a mighty battle to keep her wits about her, which was no mean feat when he was sexiness personified. A Greek god face, cast in shadow. The athletic body. The faint scent of his earthy cologne, layered with the leather and his soap. The look in his eyes, as though she were Beyoncé laid out on a bed for him. “You know. I wanted to look my best when I turned around and drove back home.”

  He laughed. Forty-eight percent of her body melted into brownie batter, leaving her with only shaky legs to stand on.

  “At least I got you out of the car.”

  “It wasn’t you. It was the promise of sushi with only five points.”

  Another laugh, and there went another ten percent of her body, melted into goo. “I said rainbow rolls have seven points.”

  “Eh. I’m not leaving now. That would just look foolish.”

  “You don’t know how glad I am that you’re here,” he said, the smile sliding off his face. He took a shuddering breath. Ran a hand over his nape. “You have no idea.”

  All that intensity made her heart thump and scared her a little. Garciaparra also tended to get intense with her, but that was different. That was Garciaparra’s problem.

  With Kerry, all that unwavering focus when he looked at her seemed like a perfect reflection of the way she felt when she looked at him.

  “Kerry…”

  Some of her anxiety must have leaked through, because he blinked, locking it all away behind a banked expression.

  “You ready to go inside? Before we freeze our asses off?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be,” she said.

  He started to turn, then thought better of it. “Hang on. You don’t have some friend on standby, waiting to call with some fake emergency, do you?”

  The question caught her so completely off guard that she couldn’t hide her grimace. “Ummm…no?”

  He frowned. “You thought about it, didn’t you?”

  “Define thought.”

  He snorted out a laugh, then shook his head. “I don’t even care. You’re here now.”

  Yeah. She was here now. Out of the car and crazy excited. All the warnings she’d given herself (Danger, danger!) quieted down, leaving only the two of them, the possibilities she felt when they were together and tonight’s promise.

  Everything else could shut the hell up.

  “So,” he said, sobering again.

  “So…”

  “Let’s just…talk. Pretend we met online or something. Whatever happens…it doesn’t have to be a whole big production. Can we do that?”

  This, right here, was her problem with Kerry in a nutshell. She meant to tell him no a much higher percentage of the time. But then he looked at her with those eyes…hit her with that vulnerability…that sincerity…that undisguised yearning…and the only thing that came out of her mouth was a yes as big as she could make it.

  “Yeah,” she said. “We can do that.”

  He held out a hand.

  She took it.

  The second his fingers twined with hers (warm; strong; protective; right), she knew she was wrong. This feeling she had when she was with him? The way the feeling amplified when he touched her?

  Big freaking production.

  30

  The restaurant was a nice choice, with mellow golden walls, modern paintings and overhead light fixtures with deep orange paper shades that bathed everything with a romantic aura. They sat in a secluded booth that felt like their own island and made Jayne’s heart skitter with anticipation.

  “I’ll have the saké.” She handed the drink menu back to the server. “Thanks.”

  “Just the water for me, thanks,” Kerry said.

  Jayne watched the server go, her memory flashing back to the night she talked to Kerry on the phone and he’d said he was holding a fifth of Jack and wishing he hadn’t promised to stop drinking. Alcohol fucks with the mind, he’d told her.

  Once again, he employed his disarming insight to read her mind.

  “I don’t drink anymore,” he said.

  “You mentioned that.”

  “My, ah…” He took a deep breath. “My father was an alcoholic. Who wrapped his car around a telephone pole one night when I was four. He took my mother with him. That’s how I wound up with my mother’s mother.”

  “Oh.” Her heart fell. “I’m glad you told me.”

  “Why? So you can put another big red X by my name?”

  “No, O Sarcastic One. So I can understand you.”

  He grinned. “Not sure if that’s better than you calling me Randolph.”

  “I haven’t called you Randolph since we sat down.”

  “It’s early yet.”

  “True.” She sobered, deciding it was best to just fess up and get it out there. “I should probably mention… In the loser father department, I think it’s a draw.”

  He was all eyes as he rested his elbows on the table and leaned in. “I know we’re supposed to be engaging in casual chitchat, but…”

  “But you don’t care about my sign or my favorite color.”

  “I want to know when your birthday is. But we’ve already been through a lot together. You saved my life. You’ve seen my blood and probably my ass in that hospital gown.”

  The image made her laugh. “I somehow missed your ass that day. Alas.”

  “You can see it anytime you want. We could have a viewing later, if that works for you?”

  More laughter. “That does not work for me.”

  “So…you won’t b
e showing me your ass tonight, either?”

  “I will not, Randolph!”

  “See?” he said sadly. “There it is. The first ‘Randolph’ of the night. And stop trying to get me bogged down with chitchat and flirting. We were discussing an important topic.”

  “You’re the one who said we should pretend we met online.”

  He took a moment to straighten his chopsticks, his smile fading away.

  “Tell me about your father,” he said softly. “He’s why you became an AUSA, isn’t he?”

  Whoa.

  Wasn’t it bad enough that being with him threatened her job, her equilibrium and possibly her physical safety? Now he had to go clairvoyant on her, too?

  “Stop reading my mind,” she snapped. “It’s annoying.”

  He shrugged. “Try not to be such an open book. And stick to the subject.”

  The server arrived with her saké just then, giving her the pause she needed to get her thoughts together. After a fortifying sip or three, she wasn’t ready, but she was less unready.

  She took a deep breath and dove in, telling him things it had taken her months to tell her FBI agent ex-boyfriend. Confessing her worst secrets felt easier when she already knew all of Kerry’s.

  “Like I said, my father was an idiot and a criminal. And an alcoholic. Which is a bad combination, because he was too drunk and stupid to know he couldn’t outsmart the cops. And way too lazy to ever keep a real job that required him to show up somewhere on time. So he’d, say, break into a liquor store, do his time, get out on probation, get a job as a janitor, decide being a janitor required too much hard work and integrity, then break into the next thing.”

  Kerry nodded, his expression shadowed.

  “This continued until he had the brilliant idea, ‘Hey! Why not rob a bank? That’s where the money is!’ and got sent to federal prison, where he had a heart attack and died. The last time I saw him was when we dropped him off so he could report in. It was raining.” She took another sip of saké. “I wished I’d never see him again. And I didn’t.”

 

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