Ruthless Cross

by Barbara Freethy

  "A lot of people cared about Arthur," he said, feeling a heaviness in his heart. He wasn't sure what he was going to find out about Arthur, but at the moment he still had love for the man. And he was incredibly saddened that he was gone. "I'll help you bring this stuff in." He grabbed a bottle of wine and the nearest bouquet.

  It took them about ten minutes to clear the porch. They put everything on the very sleek and polished table in the formal dining room. Callie looked through the cards and tags. "Some of these are addressed to my mom."

  "I'm sure they're all for her, even if they've been sent in honor of Arthur's memory."

  "She'd be touched to see all this. I wish she could see it now. It might make her feel better."

  "She'll see it when she's better."

  She drew in a breath and let it out. "All right. What's next? It feels weird being here at night. It feels lonelier than it did earlier. Maybe that's because my mom is gone, too."

  "I want to check out Olivia's room first. I don't think it will take that long."

  "While you do that, I'm going to look in the study and see if I can find the trust information."

  "It was in the bottom drawer of the first file cabinet. A large binder. You can't miss it."

  "Okay. Good luck, Flynn."

  He knew she was purposefully letting him go into Olivia's room on his own, and he appreciated that. "Thanks."

  He moved up the stairs, feeling more trepidation with each step. At the second-floor landing, he switched on the lights and paused. He'd opened a lot of doors in his life, and behind those doors, he'd confronted danger, bullets, criminals, and terrorists, and he'd never felt the kind of fear he felt now. He'd locked his feelings for Olivia away. All the pain, the anger, had been banished to some distant part of his brain that he never accessed. But now he had to face the past.

  His hand moved to the knob, but he couldn't seem to turn it.

  He was being ridiculous. The room had surely been cleared out after so many years. He was probably going to see nothing but a bed and a dresser, same as the guest rooms on the first floor.

  Pushing past his paralysis, he opened the door, stepping inside and back in time.

  The room wasn't exactly the same, but there were more memories than he'd anticipated. The walls were no longer adorned with Olivia's favorite posters, but her favorite books were still on the bookshelves over the white desk where she'd once done her homework. The bedding had been changed from young and girlish and very yellow, Olivia's favorite color, to more neutral pastels, but still with a feminine edge.

  He walked over to the closet and opened the door. Thank God her clothes weren't there. That would have been too much. There were a couple of raincoats and down jackets hanging in the closet, but he suspected they were just overflow from one of the other rooms, because he didn't recognize them.

  On the shelf of the closet were several boxes, two of them marked with Olivia's name, and one with the added word—photos.

  He told himself to leave the box alone. This search wasn't about Olivia; it was about her father. But he couldn't stop himself from grabbing the box and setting it on the desk. Opening the lid, he found a pile of loose photos, and he was suddenly seeing Olivia again—beautiful, young, full of life.

  His breath caught in his chest.

  Pain rocked through him. He hadn't actually looked at her face in a very long time, but here she was, with blonde hair and hazel eyes that had often seemed amazed by life. Her smile was sweet and a little shy. He'd been taken in by that smile the first time he'd seen her. He'd been the new kid in high school, and as a senior, it was not the best position to be in. Everyone else had known each other, many from kindergarten, and he'd had to power his way through, hoping to find a few friends to hang with. When he'd met Olivia, he'd been immediately accepted by her group, and he'd been able to start over.

  He moved on to another photo, one of Olivia with her parents. The Corbyn family that he'd known—Olivia, Francine, and now Arthur—was gone. It was hard to get his head around that fact. An entire family gone too soon.

  As Olivia's face stared back at him, he could almost hear her pleading with him to find her father's killer. He really didn't want to let her down.

  "Flynn?"

  Callie's questioning voice brought his head around.

  "Did you find the phone?" she asked from the doorway.

  "Not yet. I got a little sidetracked."

  Callie crossed the room and looked into the box of photos. She pulled out a shot of Olivia and him at Zuma Beach. He had one arm around Olivia and the other around a surfboard. Olivia had on a bright-yellow bikini and he was bare-chested, wearing his favorite board shorts. His hair was longer and blonder. He didn't look like he had a care in the world, and neither did she. It was a perfect moment in time. And it hurt.

  "You both look young," Callie murmured. "And tan." She lifted her gaze to his. "Olivia was a surfer, too?"

  "No. She'd paddleboard, but she didn’t like deep water. Another reason why her dying at sea seemed so wrong. She must have been terrified when she went overboard. It's hard to even think about it."

  She gave him a compassionate look and put the photo back in the box. "Maybe you should keep some of these. I don't know anyone else who would want them."

  "I was thinking about that. There's no one left from the Corbyn family that I knew. I never would have thought they'd all be gone so young." He cleared his throat. "But I need to look for the phone."

  "There's not really much in here. I thought by the way Arthur treated this room that there would be more of Olivia."

  "I would have thought so, too," he agreed. "On the other hand, Arthur didn't like clutter. And even though they had a housekeeper, he was always on Olivia to clean things up or give things away. He was very rigid when it came to mess."

  "He was the same way with my mom. I don’t know how she managed to live up to his neat-freak standards."

  "Olivia used to hide stuff away so he wouldn't find it and then get rid of it when she left the house." He stopped abruptly, his gaze moving to the floorboards by the window. "Dammit. Why didn't I think of that sooner?" He walked across the room and squatted down, pushing on the end of a floorboard. It popped right up.

  "What's that?" Callie asked in surprise.

  "It was her secret hiding place. And it looks like it was Arthur's too." He pulled out a flip phone and set it on the ground. Then he took out an envelope, his heart starting to race at the thought of what might be inside.

  There were six photos, each one of a different painting.

  "What are those?" Callie asked.

  "I'm not sure. I don't recognize the pieces. I don't think I've seen them in this house. Have you?" He grabbed the phone and stood up, handing her the pictures as he did so.

  "They don't look familiar. Why would he hide pictures of paintings in the floorboard?"

  Only one answer ran through his head and his jaw tightened. "My guess is that the paintings are stolen."

  "You think Arthur stole them?" she asked in amazement.

  "No, I think he bought them. But we're getting ahead of ourselves. We first need to determine if these paintings were stolen. If they were, they could be the reason he's dead. I need to find out what the history is on each one, who owned it last, where it is now." He opened the flip phone, the kind of prepaid phone one might buy at any electronics store. It was locked by a password. "I'll get this to my tech, see if he can pull up the call history."

  "This could be the clue you were looking for, the one that leads you away from my mom."

  "I hope it is," he said, meaning his words. "But your mom does work in the art world."

  "She plans events at the museum. She doesn't buy and sell artwork."

  "She could still be a connection to someone else. I'm not trying to hang onto her as a suspect; I just don't want to lie to you." He was surprised by his own words, and he could see that Callie was startled too.

  "You wouldn't lie to me if you thought it m
ight get you to the truth?" she challenged.

  "Last night I would have said that I'd have no problem lying to you, but tonight, I feel differently. I like you, Callie. I admire the way you protect your mother, and I feel for what you're going through. I'd like to be honest with you, and I hope you'll return the favor."

  "I've told you everything I know."

  "Good. Did you find the trust?"

  "I did. I'll take it home with me. I don't want to stay here any longer. The house feels creepy."

  "I don't blame you. I'll give you a ride home, so you can leave your mom's car here."

  "Thanks. I want to put together a small bag for my mom, some familiar things to ground her in her life while she's at the hospital."

  "Good idea. I wouldn't mind looking in your mother's room, either. I haven't been in there yet, except for the few moments when she was on the balcony."

  Callie frowned at that reminder, then said, "That's fine. But I doubt Arthur would have left anything damning in their room. Not with the way my mom kept an eye on him."

  He still wanted to take a look.

  When they entered the master bedroom, a blast of cool air hit them in the face. Callie stopped abruptly, her gaze on the open door leading onto the balcony.

  "That was closed," she said. "Locked. And I pushed the desk in front of it in case my mom woke up and tried to get out there again. I never moved it back."

  His gaze moved to the desk that was a few feet from the wall and at an odd angle, as if someone had shoved it out of the way. Some of the drawers were open as well.

  He put a hand on Callie's arm, as she started forward. "Wait," he said. "Don't touch anything."

  She gave him a wide, scared look. "Why not?"

  "Someone was in here. Do you notice anything else that's different?"

  Her gaze swept the room. "The drawers in the bedside table are open. One has my mother's medication in it."

  "Someone was in here."

  "Maybe it was Lois. She might have come over to check on my mom even though I told her not to."

  "And left the door and the drawers open? Do you have her number in your phone?"

  "It's in my mom's phone, which is downstairs in my bag." Callie gave him a worried look. "You think someone came in here?"

  "Yes. But we'll call Lois to rule her out. What do you want to get for your mom?"

  "I don't know. I can't think," she said, panic in her voice. "This is too much, Flynn."

  He put his hands on her shoulders, feeling the tight knots in her muscles. "One step at a time. Let's get a bag for your mom. Where would that be?"

  "In the closet," she murmured, her gaze fixed on his. "You don't think they're still in the house, do you? It's such a big place. Someone could be hiding." She dropped her voice. "Maybe in the closet."

  He let go of her shoulders and moved over to the closet. The door was ajar. He slowly pushed it open, and then he saw the chaos. The drawers had been ripped apart, clothes pulled off hangers, shoes thrown around on the floor. But there was no one inside.

  "If Arthur wasn't dead, this would have killed him," Callie said, coming up behind him. "Sorry. That was thoughtless."

  "No, you're right. He would have had a heart attack if he'd walked into this."

  "I don't understand, Flynn. I didn't notice a mess like this in the study. Why wouldn't they have gone through that room?"

  "I don't know, but I'd prefer if you touched as few things as possible. I'll get my team over here to go through the house, with your permission, of course."

  "Do whatever you need to do." She grabbed a tote bag off a shelf and then packed a small bag for her mom.

  While she was doing that, he stepped back into the bedroom, his thoughts running a mile a minute. Why hadn't the intruder gone through the study? It seemed like an obvious place to hide something like a phone. And, clearly, they hadn't tried to make it look like this room had been untouched. Or had they gotten frustrated by the time they arrived in the bedroom? And just started ripping things apart?

  "I'm done," Callie said, coming out of the closet.

  "Let's go back downstairs."

  When they reached the study, he moved into the room. As Callie had said, it was neat, but…

  He walked around the desk and noted some of the drawers were still partly open. "Did you open these?"

  "No. I just opened the filing cabinet and took out the big binder and then I went back into the living room, because, to be honest, I just didn't want to look at Arthur's portrait." She paused. "They did come in here, didn't they? But they weren't as clumsy and ruthless."

  "Maybe they ran out of time when we arrived. It could explain why the door was open to the balcony. They might have taken off when we got here."

  "It would be on the security cameras, right?"

  He nodded, as they headed back into the living room. Callie grabbed her purse and pulled out her mom's phone. "Arthur put the camera app on her phone in case she was here alone." She opened the app and handed him the phone.

  It took him only a second to realize the cameras had been turned off. "They were able to turn off the system. It could have been a hack or was done on-site. This system is not particularly complicated." As he looked at the phone, he couldn't help noticing that Juliette had received voicemails and messages. "People have been calling and texting your mom."

  "I know. It's been buzzing all day, but I haven't had a chance to look through it."

  "Why don't you let me do that?"

  "No," she said abruptly. "I need to hang onto the phone. May I have it, please?"

  He handed it back to her, not wanting to break the trust they were starting to build. Plus, he thought he could probably get her to go through the messages and voicemails with him.

  "Thanks." Callie put the phone in her pocket and then wrapped her arms around her waist. "I feel cold."

  It wasn't all that chilly, but he suspected the events of the last twenty-four hours were catching up to her.

  "I'll take you home now."

  "I probably should say no and just drive myself."

  "Why should you say no?" he challenged.

  "Because…" Her voice drifted away, but her gaze clung to his. "I'm feeling too connected to you, Flynn. And it scares me. You seem like you could be a friend, but you could also be an enemy. I don't want to like you, but I do. And there's this really strong connection between us that I don't understand and that I'm not sure I want."

  He should lie and say he didn't know what she was talking about, but he'd already promised her honesty. "I feel the connection, too, Callie."

  "It's weird, right?"

  "Weird and not so bad at the same time," he said lightly. "I noticed you the first moment I saw you. When you walked into the museum last night in that spectacular red dress, my heart stopped."

  She flushed at his words. "I borrowed the dress from a friend. I thought it was a little too much, but she said I should go for it. I didn't have time to argue."

  "It wasn't too much. It was…nice. Really nice."

  "Thank you. I have to say a part of me thinks there's a hidden agenda behind your flirting."

  "I told you I was going to tell you the truth."

  "I'm trying to believe that. I just can't quite figure you out."

  "Good. I prefer to be more interesting than predictable. Now, why don't we get out of here?"

  "Before someone else arrives?" she murmured.

  He met her gaze. "I wasn't going to say that, but yes."

  "Do you think they were looking for the phone or the photos or something else entirely?"

  "That's what we need to figure out."

  Chapter Nine

  When they arrived at her apartment and took the stairs to her third-floor apartment, Callie was more than happy to have Flynn at her side. She was rattled from the scene at Arthur's house and not sure what to expect in her own home. She felt like she hadn't been home in days, even though it had only been twenty-four hours. So much had happened since sh
e'd met her mother and Arthur in the limo for what was supposed to have been a fun evening of art and champagne.

  She inserted her key in the lock and held her breath as she opened the door. Stepping inside, her gaze moved across the open space living area that included the living room, kitchen and dining area. Relief ran through her as it appeared that nothing had been touched.

  She wasn't nearly as neat as Arthur, but there was only one used coffee mug on the kitchen counter since she had loaded the dishwasher yesterday before she'd gone to the museum. Her laptop sat open on the coffee table next to a bottle of roasted peanuts, one of her favorite snacks, and the book she'd been reading was on the table by the couch.

  "No one has been in here," she said, turning to Flynn.

  "Mind if I check the bedroom?"

  "Go ahead."

  She followed him down the short hallway into the bedroom and attached bath. She hadn't made her bed, and her robe had been tossed haphazardly across the bottom of the bed, but she hadn't been expecting company.

  Flynn stuck his head in the bathroom and then said, "Looks fine."

  "I wish I'd made my bed now."

  He smiled. "Mine isn't made, either. Sometimes I don't see the point."

  "Right? You're just going to get back into bed at the end of the day."

  "Exactly. And I would really love to know what it is with women and pillows." He tipped his head toward the pile of blue and white throw pillows on the floor next to the bed. "That's where they always end up—on the floor."

  "But they look great when the bed is made. I'm just a little lazy. We don't have to stay in here," she added, thinking that getting Flynn out of her bedroom was probably a good idea.

  As they walked down the hall, he said, "I like your place. You're lucky to be beachfront."

  "I am lucky. A friend of my mother's owns this building; she gave me a break on the rent." When they reached the living room, she said, "Do you want some coffee?"

  "That would be great."

  As she started the coffeemaker, Flynn wandered around the apartment, stopping in front of her floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, which were not only stuffed with books but also with record albums.