by Norah Wilson
Chapter 11
Quigg leaned back in his chair, twisting a coin absently in his hand as he waited for Suzannah to answer the special cell phone he’d given her.
On the third ring she picked up, her voice breathless. “John?”
“Where’d I drag you from?”
“I was upstairs napping, but I’d left the phone downstairs.”
“Keep it close,” he instructed. He hated not being there to help her endure the waiting. He couldn’t even be part of the surveillance team holed up in the adjacent houses. He had to be seen to have removed himself from the role of Suzannah’s guardian. It helped a little to be able to talk to her occasionally. “How you holding up?”
“Great.”
“Baby, you are such a lousy liar.”
“Okay, I’m a wreck. It was hard enough sitting here for the staged version. The real thing is killing me.”
He flinched at her turn of phrase, knew by the quality of the silence humming between them that she’d caught the echo of her own words. He rushed to offer reassurance.
“Hey, this is gonna be a cake walk. Our boy thinks we’re preoccupied with the suspect we collared. He thinks surveillance has been dropped and that you and I are splitsville. He believes you’re defenseless, and that’s what’s gonna sink him.”
“I know. It’s just ... wearing.” A pause. “John, what if he doesn’t make a quick move? What if he delays for weeks? How long can your guys sit on my house?”
Her question would have scared hell out of him if it hadn’t already occurred to him. But it had, and he’d thought it through. “He’ll make his move, couple of days, tops.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Three things.” He shifted the cell phone to his left hand to accept a sheaf of messages a clerk was handing him. He sifted through them quickly. Dammit. A break in his biggest case. Looked like the scumbag’s secretary-slash-lover was ready to dish the dirt on her boss. Seeing surveillance photos of said boss renewing his wedding vows with his wife after promising he would divorce her must have done the trick. Quigg suppressed a groan. A month ago, he’d have given his left testicle to nail this guy, but the timing really sucked.
“Three things?” Suzannah prompted.
“Yeah, sorry. Someone just handed me a message, but I’m back again.” He turned away from the pink message slips. “Number one, his attack on you at the Registry Office. He made personal contact for the first time. He promised a reckoning soon. With that action, he’s taken it to a new level, the penultimate level.”
“Good ten-dollar word, Detective.”
He heard the fear edging the sarcasm in her voice. “I actually know quite a few of them,” he said mildly.
“Okay, what’s number two?”
“Number two is you fought back. You inflicted an injury on him. He won’t let that lie for long. From what he said to you it’s always been personal, he always intended to make you suffer, but I’m willing to bet your striking out at him has taken that desire for revenge to a whole new level of urgency.”
“And number three?”
“Number three, you drew blood.”
“I thought that was number two?”
“No, I mean the blood itself. DNA. And unless he’s fallen off the edge of the earth, he knows by now that we have a suspect in custody. He’ll act before we have a chance to realize we apprehended the wrong man.”
“But DNA tests take forever,” she protested. “Even if you put an urgent rush on it, it’s going to take weeks. That’s pretty common knowledge.”
“True. But blood typing doesn’t take any time at all. And everybody knows that, too.”
A short silence while she digested that. “You’re right. Thanks. I feel better.”
“And I’d feel better if I were there with you.”
“Me, too. I missed you last night.”
Her voice had turned husky, taken on that tone that made his groin tighten. “Ditto.”
“I’ll be so glad when this is over.”
“We should take some vacation, go somewhere.” The words were out before he had a chance to consider how he’d cope if she declined.
Silence stretched for a moment, then her husky voice again. “I’d like that.”
She’d said yes. He grinned. Then the clerk came back bearing another message slip. He glanced at it quickly. “Look, Suzannah, something’s breaking here, a case I’ve been working forever. I hate to hang up, but I gotta go.”
“Of course.”
“I’m just a phone call away. I’ll keep this cell on me. And you’re in good hands with Ray.”
“I know.”
“And the ERT team’s top notch. They drill for this stuff all the time.”
“I’m not scared. Just nerved up and anxious to have it over. Don’t worry about me. Besides, I have work to do. I still haven’t done a tap on that corporate re-org Vince gave me.”
Quigg grinned. The last time she’d tried to tackle that project, she’d abandoned it in favor of having her way with him on the couch. He was probably the only man in the world who got hard at the words ‘corporate re-org’.
They said their good-byes. Quigg’s lingering smile faded as he picked up the latest message from Letitia Wood. Time to go talk to her. He grabbed his jacket, marveling at his good luck. When would men learn not to mix business with pleasure? Stupid to be dipping his wick at the office, but doubly stupid to do it with a personal assistant who knew his business so intimately. Hell hath no fury and all that jazz.