by Karen Rose
The door opened and Grayson walked in. Paige opened her mouth to rail at him, but her anger fizzled. He looked terrible. Pale. Like he was in shock. Instead of yelling, she ran to him, bracketing his face between her palms.
“What happened to you?” she asked.
His eyes were stark, filled with devastation. And fear. “My boss knew, too. He knew Ramon was innocent.”
Paige stared. “Oh my God.”
“What the hell?” Stevie said, stunned. “How do you know?”
“He told me.” He slumped on the sofa.
“Just like that?” Stevie demanded. “He just came out and told you?”
“Pretty much. This is much, much worse than I’d ever thought possible. And on top of that, I’ve been reassigned. To the fraud division.”
“As of when?” Joseph asked.
“As of three hours ago.” Grayson scrubbed his face with his palms. “I just tried to access my files on the server but was denied. Tech support said they’d received a request to transfer my access and that it would take a few days.”
Stevie sat on the arm of the sofa. “Damn. You’ve been locked out.”
“Yes. They don’t want me getting to the bottom of this.”
Paige sat on the coffee table, facing him. “Who exactly is ‘they’? How high does this go? How many people knew Ramon was innocent? And how many other trials might they have manipulated?”
Grayson shook his head. “Good questions. At least Anderson. Could be others are involved. As for other trials, I can’t even contemplate. This is… mind-boggling.”
“And potentially life threatening.” Joseph stood, arms locked over his chest. “They’ve already killed three people to cover their tracks.”
“Four,” Grayson murmured. “Logan’s mother made four.”
Joseph scowled. “I won’t let you become number five. What will you do next?”
“I’m going to find out who gave the order to frame Ramon and who carried it out. And who knew it was happening. Which will hopefully answer the big question—who should have been prosecuted instead?” Grayson looked at Stevie. “You can go, if you want. This won’t be pretty for either of our careers if it goes wrong, which it probably will.”
She gave him a quelling look. “Shut up. You know I’m not walking away from you.”
He nodded, his eyes flickering relief. “Thanks.”
“I should hit you for even suggesting it. I’ve got work to do. I got Hyatt to give me and J.D. last night’s shootings. Since they’ve declared Elena’s case closed because of Sandoval’s suicide note, they can’t say Elena and Sandoval are connected to Delgado and Logan’s mother. Not unless they agree that the sniper is still on the loose, and they aren’t ready to backtrack on that yet.”
“Smart,” Paige murmured.
“I have my moments,” Stevie said. “I’ll check with Ballistics on yesterday’s shootings when I get to my desk. J.D. will call as soon as he and Daphne get the court order for Radcliffe’s tape. Be careful, both of you.” She left, closing the door behind her.
Paige frowned. “Why did Anderson tell you? How does it benefit you to know?”
“He threatened me with it. Said that if the truth came out, that ‘the right people’ would wonder if I wasn’t in on it, too. And if they did believe I prosecuted honestly, that they’d find me too naive to be effective. He said he was ‘saving my career.’”
“Sonofabitch,” Joseph gritted. “Who does he report to? The state’s attorney?”
“No. There are three layers of management between Anderson and the state’s attorney. Enough room to do real damage if any of the people in between are dirty.”
“Then take this straight to the top,” Joseph said.
“And prove it how?” Grayson said wearily. “Once I can prove it, I can have him disbarred, but right now, it’s my word against his.”
“You’re right,” Joseph said, his jaw tight. “But dammit.”
Paige had a disturbing thought. “Grayson, if you can’t access your server, does that mean we can’t get to the video taken of the pool party where Crystal Jones was killed?”
He looked grimly satisfied. “It might have meant that, if I’d waited until this morning to go looking for it. I downloaded it last night while you were sleeping.”
She lifted her brows. “You were a busy bee while I was sleeping last night.”
Grayson glanced at Joseph, who shrugged. “She guessed. I didn’t lie.”
Grayson’s mouth hardened. “I’m not going to apologize. I need you safe.”
“I appreciate that.” She could fight him, but he looked beaten already. She looked around her. “I appreciate all this. But you should have asked me first.”
“I figured you’d say no.”
She controlled what would have been an irate huff. “Because I’m apparently stupid.” She flicked her hand when he tried to backpedal. “Don’t even try. What about Peabody?”
“He can stay here with you. The manager approved it.”
Paige weighed her words. “I’m not going to be a prisoner, Grayson. I’m not stupid, and I don’t take foolish risks, but I can’t stay here indefinitely. The sooner we get this cleared up, the sooner we can all go back to our lives.”
“Already in progress,” he murmured.
Her heart squeezed without warning, startling her. They’d go back to the lives they’d been living before yesterday morning. Before they’d met. Because he didn’t do relationships. Even though every instinct she possessed told her that he yearned to.
But look how well her instincts had served her in the past. Not.
“Already in progress,” she repeated. “I’ll be careful. You have my word. But I won’t be idle. If you don’t want to work with me, I’ll work on my own. I won’t go anywhere alone. I’ll wait for Clay or I’ll call my friend to come from Minnesota. She’s offered to come if I need her. I won’t risk my life, but I will not be a prisoner. So what will it be?”
A muscle twitched in his cheek. “What about at night?”
“If you want me to stay here instead of my apartment, I’ll do that as long as they let me have Peabody. It’s your dime. If you want me to have babysitters, I’ll agree. I assume that’s who the adjoining room is for.”
Again the muscle twitched. “It is.”
“Fine. Just don’t try to lock me up and we’ll have no disagreement.”
He looked away. “Okay.”
She was surprised. “Okay? That’s it?”
“You promised to take precautions. That’s all I can ask. For now, I’d like you to review the video of the pool party and match as many of the guests as you can to the partial guest list that Rex McCloud gave us five years ago. Most of them have an online presence. You should be able to locate a current photograph to compare to the video. I want to know who left the pool area at any time during that party.”
“What will you be doing?” Paige asked.
“Reconstructing my witness list. I need to track them down and talk to them again.”
“While they’re still alive,” Joseph muttered. “Your witnesses are dropping like flies.”
“True enough,” Grayson said evenly. “I want Anderson and everyone who manipulated this case to pay.”
Wednesday, April 6, 11:35 a.m.
Adele held her breath while Darren opened their front door. “Oh God,” she said, grimacing. The smell was still strong. “I set up fans and sprayed and everything.”
“It didn’t help.” They hadn’t said much on their way home. He was waiting for her to talk to him, but she still didn’t know where to start. It sounded crazy. Maybe I am crazy.
She followed him to their bedroom, where he began taking off his clothes.
“Where are you going?” she asked, her voice small.
“Work. I barely have time for a shower and a shave before my afternoon meeting.”
“Can I fix you some food?”
“I can’t eat.” He went into the bathroom and she
heard the shower. She stared out the window, down to the street where the black car had been last night. Or had it?
She pressed her fingers to her temples, not sure of anything anymore. Except someone had poisoned Darren’s dog. And the box of chocolates was empty.
Poor little Rusty. She swallowed back the bile that rose in her throat. It could have been me that ate the chocolate. Worse, it could have been Darren. Or even Allie.
The water shut off. Darren stood in the bathroom doorway, a towel draped over his hips, watching her. “Adele?” he said quietly. “You need to tell me the truth because the possibilities I’m making up in my mind are driving me crazy.”
Interesting choice of words. “I think the poison came from the chocolates,” she said.
He stared, stunned. “The ones that you got in the mail yesterday?”
“They weren’t mailed. They were just dropped off.”
“Whatever. Why would you think that?”
“Lately some things have been happening. Strange things.”
“Such as?” he asked, guarded.
He already thinks I’m crazy. “I was run off the road two weeks ago.”
“When you popped the tire. You said you swerved to avoid a cat.”
“No. It was a car. A black one. It ran me off the road and I almost hit a tree.”
“Why did you lie?”
“Because a few days earlier someone pushed me down an escalator.”
“You said you fell.”
“I told myself that I had, because nothing else made sense. I was meeting a client in DC, near the zoo. There’s that long escalator in the subway.”
“I know it,” he said, no emotion in his voice.
“My hands were full of shopping bags and all of a sudden I felt someone push me. I fell down a bunch of stairs before I caught the railing. When I looked back up, there wasn’t anyone there. Then that car ran me off the road.” She glanced over at him. His face was like stone, unreadable. “Then it happened again.”
“When?”
“Wednesday. Allie was in the car that time.” So she’d gone to see Dr. Theopolis. “Then last night the chocolates came. I haven’t worked with the client whose name was on the label in six months. There wasn’t any reason for them to send me a gift. So I threw them away.”
“You think your old client did this?”
“No. But anyone could get my client list. It’s on my Web site.”
His jaw squared. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I sound crazy. I didn’t think you’d believe me.”
“I believe you, Adele.”
There was something in his voice that filled her with new fear. “You do?”
“Rusty was poisoned. I’d like to know why someone would want to harm you. You of all people.”
She thought of the black car cruising by the night before. Had she really seen that last night? Or was it just another hideous memory snaking its way out of the box in which she’d locked it? “I don’t know,” she whispered. Darren stood, waiting for her to say more. Finally she shrugged. “I don’t know,” she repeated.
Darren nodded once. “I see” was all he said. He went about choosing his clothes, his movements robotic. “I’ll get Allie from the neighbor and take her to the babysitter. My mother will pick her up this afternoon. You and I can discuss this more later.”
Adele nodded, bewildered. She’d known he’d be upset. She’d known he’d protect Allie. I thought he’d be more concerned for me. Instead he seemed hurt. Withdrawn. Even wary. “Sure,” she murmured. “I’ll be waiting for you.”
Toronto, Canada
Wednesday, April 6, 12:45 p.m.
“Papa, I don’t like this place.” Violet stood in the hotel room, her lips in a pout. She hugged her ratty old doll. “I want to go home.”
Silas shared a glance with his wife. Rose knew enough to be afraid, but not enough to hate him. Not yet anyway. She sat on the bed. “Come sit. We’ll watch some TV.”
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Silas said. He hoped. He gave Rose an ATM card. “I have an account at the bank next door.” He told her the PIN code. “Buy what you need.”
His wife studied the name on the card, the same name he’d given at the border stop. She looked back up at him. “You’ve been planning this.”
“Yes. But I hoped I’d never need it.” He held open his arms for Violet, but she turned her head. “Honey, I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I know you’re confused. I’ll be back soon and we can do some real fun things together, okay? Like… horseback riding. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
She looked back at him warily. “Really?”
“Sure. Where we’re going on vacation has horses all around.” The vacation part was false, but the horse part was true. His cabin was near a working ranch. At least he didn’t have to lie about everything. “You’ll love it.”
“If we’re going on vacation, why are you leaving? We just got here.”
“Papa’s got a few things to do first. I’ll be back soon.” He tickled her, making her giggle. She wrapped her arms around him and hugged hard. “Be good.”
“I’ll try.”
He swallowed hard. “There is no try.”
“There is only do,” she said dutifully, then kissed his cheek. “Love you, Papa.”
He held on tight, wondering if Jorge Delgado had gotten that last hug before his wife had driven away with their child. “I love you, too. Always.” He stood, kissed his wife good-bye. “Remember what I said.” He’d told her where to find his stash of cash. Where to hide in the event he did not come back.
Her eyes were terrified. “I’ll remember. Be careful. Come back to me.”
“I will.” He would be careful. Whether or not he’d come back to her…
He returned to his car, allowing himself one last look back at the hotel. They were safe. It gave him the strength to get back in his car and start the long drive home.
Baltimore, Maryland
Wednesday, April 6, 2:30 p.m.
“This is weird,” Paige said, blinking to bring the computer screen back into focus. She and Grayson had set up their situation room on the dining room table of his town house. They needed space to work and secure Internet. And snacks.
They’d arrived back at his home to find his refrigerator filled with food from Lisa and Brian’s kitchen, “leftovers” from the party they’d catered the night before. Paige had been so nervous this morning that she hadn’t been able to stomach the thought of food, but her appetite had returned with a vengeance and her work space at Grayson’s table was cluttered with empty bowls. The computer monitor she stared at was huge, taken from the desk in his home office. Which smelled like him.
She’d ignored that fact as she’d gathered the equipment she needed. She’d ignored that fact as she’d sat across from him while studying naked, privileged college brats cavorting in Rex McCloud’s swimming pool.
Grayson had files spread in a semicircle around him and had been making phone calls to the names on his old witness list while she reviewed video and tried to identify the faces in the pool from their society photos, Facebook pics. And mug shots.
They were a rowdy group, Rex McCloud and his friends. They’d gotten into more trouble in the intervening six years than she could fathom. Interestingly enough, not one had served any real time. Money talks.
Right now, money was screaming all around her. The dishes from which she’d eaten Brian’s Mac-a-Chee were antique Wedgwood. The furniture exuded the same kind of quiet wealth and breeding, leaving Paige more curious about Grayson than the naked people in the pool.
Unfortunately, the naked people could be key to keeping her alive. And one of the naked people had her frowning. “This video’s not right,” she said.
He looked up from his notes. “Besides being bad porn, what’s wrong with it?”
“This woman, Betsy Malone. Come see what I mean.”
He got up, wincing as he stretched, then came aro
und the table, his expression grim. He’d been watching her, stealing peeks as they worked. She knew because she’d caught him several times. The rest of the time she could feel his gaze.
Combined with watching naked people for two hours, Paige found herself a little warm. Gripping the back of her chair by her left shoulder, he rested his hand on the table at her right, caging her in. He leaned closer to see the screen and for a second she had to close her eyes. Okay, a lot warm.
Definitely not one-sided, his head dipped lower until his jaw rubbed against her temple and he inhaled. For a moment they hung there, the air growing charged between them. She wanted him. For a moment she let herself wish.
I don’t do relationships.
Abruptly she broke away. “Focus, okay?” she snapped.
“Okay,” he said, his voice husky. His swallow was audible. “What’s not right?”
“This woman. Betsy. She’s one of the names on Rex McCloud’s guest list.”
“Right. I interviewed her before the trial. She verified Rex’s alibi.”
“Of course she did. She was probably scoring crack from him. They got arrested together for possession at a party a year later.”
“That doesn’t prove she was lying about that night.”
“No. That’s not what wasn’t right. I’ve been watching the video on your laptop.” Which she’d connected to the large monitor. “I’ve been going through the guest list, pulling Internet social networking pages and mug shots and running other searches on my own laptop. Look at Betsy the night of the party. It was mid-September.” She expanded the frozen frame until Betsy filled the large monitor, all of her. The young woman was naked in the shallow end, being pummeled from behind by Rex himself.
Grayson cleared his throat. “Okay. Interesting choice of frames. What’s not right?”
“Her breasts. They’re small. Maybe A cup, if she’s lucky.”
“Are you fishing for compliments here? Because you’ve got her beat. In every way.” His voice grew gruff. “I really hope you’re about to show me what’s not right soon. Otherwise I have to leave.”
Paige brought up a screen on her laptop. “Look at Betsy on her MySpace page.”