“What’s up?” she asked, guiltily aware that it wasn’t an answer. Nervous flutters in her stomach made her tone more abrupt than the smile might suggest, but she couldn’t help it. Clearly something was afoot, though, for Mona to spring up after her like that.
Mona didn’t appear to notice anything amiss. With her short, flaming-red hair framing an animated face dominated by big brown eyes and wide, scarlet-painted lips, and her pin-thin body clad in a burnt-orange turtle-neck and gold plaid skirt, brown opaque hose, and heels, she resembled nothing so much as a living finger of flame.
“You’re not going to believe this.” Mona stopped, steepling her hands with their long, scarlet-painted nails beneath her chin. Several rings glinted on her fingers. “The View called.”
“What?”
Mona nodded eagerly. “They want you to be a guest on the show. They’re calling you the heroine of courtroom 207! They want to fly you out there and everything.”
For a moment Kate was rendered speechless. She stood rooted to the spot with growing horror. For her part, Mona practically vibrated with excitement. Appalled blue eyes connected with thrilled brown ones for a pregnant instant. Then Kate broke eye contact, shaking her head.
“No.”
Trying to ignore the fact that her pulse had just made like a race car when the driver stomps the gas and jumps from zero to sixty in a couple of seconds, Kate turned and continued walking toward her office.
“What do you mean, ‘no’?” Mona screeched. Mona definitely wasn’t the shy, retiring type. She was vocal and opinionated, and one of the firmest of her opinions was that Kate needed to be taken under her wing. “Do you realize what a chance this is for you? You’ll be famous.”
“I don’t want to be famous.” Kate was getting almost used to the feeling of her heart pumping furiously in her chest. But that didn’t mean she had to like it.
“But-but . . .” Mona sputtered. “Think what it could mean for your career. You’d get noticed! Maybe you could even use it to get a TV gig, like Greta Van Susteren or somebody.”
“I don’t want a TV gig.” Just the thought of appearing on national television under the circumstances gave her the willies. The whole ‘heroine of courtroom 207’ thing was a terrible lie that she just wanted to move as far away from as fast as she could. It was already all over the news. The thought of compounding that lie by appearing live and in person on national TV to repeat it filled her with fear. To say nothing of the fact that such exposure would give Mario even more ammunition, and might even flush out additional rats from her past.
“But, Kate . . .” Mona was right behind her as Kate turned on her heel and resumed the march toward her office. Kate was looking straight ahead at the gilt-framed portrait of the governor that adorned the far end of the hall, but she didn’t have to see Mona to know that she was wringing her hands.
“No buts,” Kate said, reaching her door and turning the knob. She looked back at Mona as she pushed the door open. “I don’t want to be on The View, or any other television show, thank you very much.”
“You can’t just . . .” Mona protested. Whatever else she said after that was lost as Kate stepped inside her office to find a man already in there, standing in front of her desk, turning to look at her as she entered.
The black-haired cop who’d been her lifeline in courtroom 207, to be precise.
Chapter 11
“ WHAT ARE YOU DOING in here?”
Kate was so shocked that her tone was a whole lot sharper than it would have been if she’d had even a few seconds’ warning to prepare. A cop—even this cop, especially this cop, with whom she discovered she felt a weird kind of connection, like the courtroom thing had linked them in some mysterious way—waiting in her office right on the heels of where she had just been and what she had just been doing was as unnerving as a skeleton popping out unexpectedly from behind her desk. No, make that more unnerving. Mona practically bumped into her before stopping dead behind her. Even as Kate breathed in the faint but unmistakable scent of cigarette smoke that always hung around Mona, she could feel her administrative assistant peering over her shoulder.
“Umm, that’s the other thing I meant to tell you,” Mona said in her ear, sounding sheepish. “There’s a couple of cops waiting in your office.”
“Thanks for the heads-up.” Kate’s voice was dry.
A couple of cops . . .
She spotted the second one as he stepped out from behind the first. Stylishly dressed in a dark blue pinstriped suit with a pale blue shirt and a yellow tie, he was about five-ten, stocky, with close-cropped sandy hair, a ruddy complexion, and a blunt-featured, goodhumored face. Stubby-lashed eyes the color of his suit moved over her appraisingly. The cop from the courtroom smiled at her—he really was as good-looking as she remembered, tall, dark, and lean, with a hard, angular face, heavy-lidded coffee-brown eyes, and a slow smile—and held out his hand.
“Thought I’d stop by to see how you’re doing,” he said as she took his hand and gave it the brisk, businesslike pump that lawyers give people. Gratitude for his efforts to save her life yesterday was swamped by an uprush of extreme wariness: What did he want? His hand was big and warm and firm, and she dropped it like it was hot while vivid images of him scooping her up in his arms after her knees gave way and carrying her out of the courtroom yelling for an EMT danced in her head. He was broad-shouldered but didn’t look overly muscular in his loose-fitting tan jacket, limp-looking white shirt, red tie, and nondescript navy slacks. Still, she knew from personal experience that he was strong. Slim as she was, she was no feather, and he had lifted her with ease. “I’m Tom Braga, by the way. Detective, Homicide Division.” His eyes touched the small Band-Aid on her cheek, then slid quickly over her. “I’m glad to see you’ve recovered so fast.”
Gulp.
Her heart was beating a mile a minute, and not because he was cute. Probably because he was a cop—a homicide detective, yet—and she felt like a criminal. Like he knew she was a criminal. Like he could somehow tell that what he believed had happened in the secure corridor yesterday was a lie.
Which he couldn’t. No possible way.
Could he?
Get a grip, Kate. As far as he knows, you’re the victim here, remember?
Forcing a smile to her lips, she sucked in air through her nose so he wouldn’t notice, hoping the deep breath would prove calming.
It didn’t.
“This is Detective Howard Fischback, also from Homicide,” Braga added, gesturing at the other man. The second cop stepped forward with his hand out. His was fleshier, with stubbier fingers. He smiled at her, and she noted the white gleam of his teeth and the deep dimples on either side of his mouth. His suit was immaculate, and his shirt and tie looked new. This guy might not be as classically handsome as his partner, but clearly he worked it.
“Kate White.” She pumped his hand and let it drop.
“Pleased to meet ya.” His smile was broad and genial.
His eyes were warm on her face.
Okay, he was definitely trying to charm her. Fat chance. She glanced at her watch—time, two-fifty-five—desperately searching for an excuse to shoo them away.
She was due in court? No, the courts were closed. An urgent appointment? Mona would know it was a lie.
“And I’m her administrative assistant, Mona Morrison.” Obviously operating under the assumption that Kate had forgotten all about her—which she had—Mona stepped forward with her hand out. Both men shook it briskly, and Fischback flashed her that dimpled smile, but it was Braga who she made big eyes at. Of course. Mona made no bones about being perpetually on the hunt, and Braga was nothing if not sexy.
“I’ve seen you around the building for years, so it’s nice to finally meet you,” Mona gushed, her gaze targeting Braga like a laser.
“You’ve worked here for years?” Braga’s eyes slid toward Kate. He had thick, straight black brows, and they lifted slightly in surprise.
She shook her
head.
“Oh, I’ve only been with Kate since she came to work here in June. Before that I was in the RO unit.”
“Ah,” Braga said.
“Thanks, Mona,” Kate said. Her nerves were raw, and watching Mona flirt was the last thing she wanted to do. What she desperately needed was to be alone, to have a small window of time to get her thoughts in order and her emotions under control.
Fat chance at that, too.
Her administrative assistant flashed her a reproachful look, but took the hint. “Well, I’ll be in my office if you need anything.”
Kate nodded. Fischback’s gaze followed Mona as she left the room. Braga, on the other hand, was watching her, Kate discovered when she looked back at him and their eyes met. He smiled at her. The office suddenly felt way too small. She and Braga were maybe a yard apart, so close that she could see that his jacket was worn around the edges of the lapels and his morning shave was starting to grow out.
“After yesterday, I’m surprised you’re at work,” Braga said.
“You’re working today,” Kate pointed out.
“I already used up my sick days for the year.”
From the hint of humor in his tone, Kate knew not to take that seriously. She was walking as he spoke, putting some much-needed distance between them by moving around the two men to set her briefcase down on her desk. That gave her a moment with her back to them in which she tried to relax the muscles of her face. They were so rigid with tension that the smile she had given them had felt like it had been dragged out of hardening cement.
Stay cool. They have no clue.
When she faced them again, they were glancing around her office. Like all the ADA’s in her division, she had a ten-by-twelve rectangle with pale green walls (it was officially called celadon, but as Ben said, the shade was more akin to squished caterpillar), a standard-issue, L-shaped black metal desk with a faux-wood top that claimed the center of the room, a matching black metal bookcase and a pair of file cabinets shoved against the wall behind the desk, a big black leather desk chair that she used, and two small black-leather-and-steel chairs positioned in front of her desk for visitors. On the wall behind her desk were her framed diplomas. On her desk was last year’s school photo of Ben. An empty coatrack stood in one corner. In another, a spindly fake ficus tree—Kate had given up on real plants long since, because she always forgot to water them—stood forlornly beside a double-hung window. The window was outfitted with narrow gray blinds that were almost always open, providing Kate with a thrilling view of the plain stone front of the office building across the street. Occasionally, her day was enlivened by watching pigeons perch on her windowsill or, for variety, the sills across the street.
If she went to the window and looked straight up, she could see a river of sky snaking above the high-rise canyon in which she worked.
“I saw you leaving the Justice Center behind a sheriff’s deputy on a stretcher yesterday. I hope he’s doing okay?” The best defense was always a good offense, and taking the lead in the conversation was a classic diversion strategy. A warm, interested tone was what she was shooting for. She wasn’t sure she succeeded. Like her face, her voice felt stiff and unnatural.
Braga shrugged, and a shadow passed over his face. “He’s alive, and the doctors say he’s going to make it.
He’s still in ICU, though.” His eyes flickered. “He’s my brother.”
That pierced her wariness a little bit. Clearly, he cared about his brother. She nodded with genuine sympathy.
“I thought I saw a resemblance. The black hair.”
A small smile touched his lips, lightening his expression, as he gave an acknowledging nod.
“Which brings me to the other reason why we’re here.
Do you mind answering a few questions?”
Caught off guard, Kate felt her face freeze. Her heart lurched. Her stomach clenched. Hoping against hope that it wasn’t already too late, she tried her best to keep her instant, instinctive rejection from becoming apparent.
“I gave my statement yesterday. Some officers came by my house.”
God, she’d been so rattled then—could she even remember what she’d said? The TV truck had been only the first of a wave of media that had descended on her house. They had knocked on her door and rung her doorbell incessantly until one of the pair of uniforms who had arrived to take her statement had gone to the door and told them to knock it off. By the time she’d finished giving her statement and walked the cops to the door, her front yard had become a sea of reporters and cameras and umbrellas and satellite trucks and dozens of flashing lights that popped at her like balled lightning through the falling rain as she stepped out onto the porch.
“Kate, is it true you shot your captor with his own gun?” “Kate, did you think you were going to die?” “Kate, can you tell us about your ordeal?” “Ms. White, how are you feeling?” “Ms. White, what did Rodriguez say to you?” “Kate, look this way!”
She had looked at the throng, horrified, and said, “I have nothing to say” when a reporter stuck a microphone in her face, stepped back inside the house, and slammed the door on them, carefully locking it behind her. Through the door she’d heard the cops yelling at them to leave the area. Even as they grudgingly obeyed, her phones had started to ring, both landline and cell. Her insides twisted into one big Gordian knot. Gritting her teeth, she turned the ringers off on both phones, then walked through the house, methodically closing all the drapes, checking the doors and windows to make sure they were locked. She ended up in Ben’s room, where he was propped up in bed reading. Automatically, she turned on the lamp beside his bed—he was always reading in what she considered the dark—and he took his nose out of his book for long enough to look up at her.
“Mom, what were all those people doing outside? Did you really shoot somebody today?” He was wide-eyed with interest and—no mistake about it—awe at the thought that his mother might have actually done such a thing.
Clearly, all the commotion had pulled him from his book and he had looked out his window. No doubt he’d heard some of the questions shouted at her.
Her heart sank.
“No,” she said, because she couldn’t lie to him about something as enormous as that, because she didn’t want him to think of his mother and violence in the same breath, because that wasn’t part of the life experience she wanted for him. Then, because she had to, because if anybody asked him questions she couldn’t have him saying, “My mom said she didn’t shoot anybody,” she then changed her answer to “yes.”
And then his eyes got even wider and he scooted up taller against the pillows to stare at her, and she sat down beside him and told him the whole story. Sort of. With a lot of editing and a few crucial lies.
Just like she was getting ready to do again with these guys. Just like she’d done in her official statement.
The truth—most of her story had been the absolute truth. Because in almost every way that mattered, she was the victim here. She had nothing to hide. Except for the end . . . and the beginning.
Her heart beat faster at the thought.
“It won’t take very long.” Braga correctly interpreted her hesitation as reluctance, although he was wrong about the reason for it.
She fought the urge to swallow. Her hands—damned telltale things!—had clasped at her waist without her even being aware of it. Now that she was aware, it was all she could do not to not to jerk them apart. But that would be a giveaway, too.
Fortunately, Braga was looking at her face, not her hands. Casually, she let them drop so that her fingertips just rested on the surface of her desk.
“Everything’s in my statement,” she tried again.
“I read through it this morning. But there’s still a few things—while they’re fresh in your mind.”
“This won’t hurt a bit, scout’s honor,” Fischback assured her with a flashing smile. He pulled the guest chair closest to him out a bit. Its sturdy metal legs made a scraping so
und against the hardwood floor. “Mind if we sit down?”
He was already suiting the action to the words.
“Of course not. Go ahead,” Kate said, like she had any choice. Braga sat, too, and pulled a small, flip-top notebook and a pen from his jacket pocket. She sank into her own chair, facing them across her desk, acutely aware that he was reading through scribbled notes. Notes, she had no doubt at all, pertaining to her statement.
“After Rodriguez pulled you back into the hall, did you see anyone?”
It took everything Kate had to keep her eyes from widening. They know about Mario. That was her first, instantaneous thought. She went cold all over. Her pulse raced. Her stomach cramped. Then she remembered Braga’s brother, the other fallen deputy, and the other downed prisoner in the holding cell. Of course, Braga meant them.
She picked up a pen and fiddled with it to hide her relief.
“Besides Rodriguez, do you mean?” Her voice was amazingly steady despite the fact that her mouth had gone as dry as the Sahara in the split second before reason had regained its grip on her. She prided herself that her expression was just right—a little painful remembrance, a little curiosity, nothing more.
“Besides Rodriguez,” Braga agreed.
“There were three men lying on the floor of one of the holding cells. I just got a glimpse. Two of them were deputies—your brother was one although I didn’t know that at the time—and the third was wearing an orange jumpsuit, so I assumed he was a prisoner. I . . . I thought at the time that they were all dead.” A quick vision of them lying there made the little catch in her voice all too real.
He nodded and wrote something in his notebook. Fischback, Kate saw, was looking over her desk. A quick, searching flicker of her eyes confirmed that there was nothing incriminating—such as Mario’s file, which earlier she had called up on her computer—to be seen. Her laptop was open but in sleep mode, and she didn’t think he could see anything on it anyway, positioned as he was in front of her desk. The phone, stacks of files, piles of paperwork, a trayful of mail, a couple of plastic boxes crammed with computer discs, a few assorted books, a construction paper-covered tin can (Ben had made it; it was supposed to be a dog) full of pencils and pens—her desk was clean. She dared not look behind her, but she knew what he would see back there: big brown accordion files lined on top of the bookshelf, shelves crammed with books and manila folders and papers, a big seashell she and Ben had found during a visit to the shore. Both file cabinets were closed, with only a few yellow Post-its adorning their fronts. A fax machine was on top of one of them. Her calendar, which was stuck to the side of the other file cabinet by a pair of black Scottie dog magnets that had been a gift from Ben last Mother’s Day, had nothing about today’s appointment at the detention center on it. She was too much the lawyer now to ever write down anything that could possibly be used against her at a later date.
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