by Beverly Bird
But Fox didn’t know that. He’d never noticed her ring at all. And without writing it down or taping it, he wasn’t going to remember the finer details of what she’d said so far. For some reason she couldn’t begin to fathom, he was bending the rules for her. He wasn’t allowing her to incriminate herself. If she said anything iffy and it was on tape, it would be caught for posterity. As long as he took notes, if she shot herself in the foot it would simply be a matter of not writing something down.
She wasn’t giving a statement here, she thought shakily. They were having an…an unofficial chat. But why? Something soft and achy and vulnerable filled her and it terrified her even more than the thought of going to jail.
Tara sat back in her chair. “As soon as I called 911,” she said carefully, “it dawned on me that maybe Stephen had been killed for the ruby. That frightened me. So I hung up to look in the safe.”
Still, he didn’t write anything. “It seems to me that a lot of people are inordinately captivated by this rock.”
“It’s not just a rock.”
Fox shrugged. “I’ve read up on it. Twenty-four carats. Red. Big deal. We’ve got the Hope Diamond, the—”
“My great-grandmother brought it from Hungary,” she interrupted.
“So?”
“So do you read the newspapers? Do you know anything about collectibles? Do you know how she got it?”
Fox waited, knowing she would tell him…and because he was bewitched by the fire that was suddenly in her eyes.
Here was another layer, he thought, and he’d peeled his way down to it intentionally. She’d rarely been passionate about anything in the short time he’d known her. She controlled those impulses, he realized, and she did it fiercely. But they were there, like lava shifting and swimming beneath the hard surface of the earth. He’d gotten a rise out of her once when he’d referred to Stephen Carmen as her brother, and now, talking about this gem, he’d done it again.
“Her name was Tzigane Romney,” Tara said. “She was a Gypsy, but not just any Gypsy. She was one who could see.”
“See,” Fox repeated with deliberate blandness. But his heart shifted a little. In that moment, he could see Tara that way, too, with her long, black hair catching and gleaming with the orange hues of firelight. He imagined a long, bright skirt swirling about her ankles as she danced barefoot. Her arms would be stretched to the heavens, to embrace all that was hers by birthright. Magic. Heat. Passion.
Fox blinked and rubbed his eyes.
“She had a sixth sense,” Tara explained. And for a woman who was cool, calculating and cosmopolitan, she didn’t bat an eye when she said it. “Tzigane knew things.”
Fox felt Ellinghusen shift uncomfortably in his seat beside him. He glanced at his partner; Rafe was scowling, too. “Go ahead,” he said. “Enlighten me.”
“Okay. There are two versions of the story. One has it that the Blood of the Rose—that’s its full name—was given to Tzigane by a poor but titled nobleman when she read his fortune and gave him accurate advice that brought him untold riches. He searched long and hard to find her again and he gave her the ruby in gratitude. The other story says that she had a wild and memorable affair with the gentleman.”
“And he gave her the Rose as a gift of love.”
Tara leaned forward. “Yes. Because, of course, nothing could come of their relationship. It was a way to insure that she would never forget him.”
“Why wouldn’t anything come of their relationship?” he had to ask.
“They were too different.”
“Different,” he repeated.
“He was an aristocrat. He was polished, genteel, and she was a vagabond. She was the moon and the stars and the earth. She rode the wind on a black pony.” Tara sat back again and lifted a shoulder as if to say there you have it.
For some reason he couldn’t explain, it made Fox angry. “Opposites can attract. Just because one person prefers a few social graces to a more no-holds-barred attitude, it doesn’t mean they can’t be compatible.”
“Who said anything about compatibility?” Tara frowned at him.
“You did.”
“No, I didn’t. They were just from two different worlds, worlds that could never jive.”
Fox forced himself to relax again. “And they never tried.”
Her scowl deepened. “Who knows? The point is, once she had the Rose, Tzigane got her heart’s desire. Money fell into her hands for passage on a ship sailing to America. That was in 1919. Freedom in our land of plenty was what Tzigane cherished most.”
“It was her fondest wish.”
“Exactly. When she died, she passed on the Rose—and its benevolence—to my grandmother. And then she got her heart’s desire.”
Something nudged up against the back of Fox’s mind. Romney. He knew the name and then he placed it. “Your grandmother was Anastasia Romney, the Broadway actress.” He thought her answering grin was like the firelight he had been imagining a moment ago—hot and teasing and just a little wicked.
“Yes. Tzigane still wasn’t up to snuff with the aristocrats even after she arrived in America. She gave birth to Anastasia out of wedlock. But by the 1940s when Anastasia hit the stage, it didn’t matter so very much anymore. In a way, it just added to her mystique. It made her more famous. You see, the Rose brings untold good luck to whoever possesses it—a woman’s deepest wish, if you will. Tzigane craved the bounty and freedom of America.”
“More than she craved her nobleman.” For some reason, Fox thought, he was stuck on that.
Tara nodded. “And Anastasia coveted fame.”
“What did your mother want?”
Tara hesitated briefly. “Security would be my guess—a safe and staid life where the money would never run out. My grandmother squandered her wealth. By the time she died when my mother was twenty-three, her career was long over and there was no money left. I know that was hard on Mom. But she met Scott Carmen that year, after her mother bequeathed her the Rose.”
Fox noticed how she skipped over any reference to Will Cole, her own father. And earlier, she’d referred to her stepfather by his first name—impersonally, as she would a mere acquaintance. He would have to think about all that later. It felt important.
“The thing is, the Rose’s luck is a two-way proposition,” Tara continued. “It has a dark side. It’s said that Tzigane put a curse on it. If any of us lets it go out of the family, the price will be death.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Fox was about to point out that if the courts were to be believed, Letitia Cole Carmen had done exactly that. Then he realized that she had subsequently died in an avalanche while vacationing in Switzerland. A chill touched his spine, one he didn’t want to contemplate too closely.
“What about you?” he asked. “Does the curse extend to you?”
Tara hugged herself. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I didn’t let the Rose go voluntarily. I’ve done everything I can to get it back.”
Fox felt something tighten around his spine, making him straighten again. There was something about the way she said it. She hadn’t said that she was safe from the stone’s curse because she’d gotten it back. “So where is it? Where’s Tzigane’s Rose now?”
Her gaze locked on his. “You’ve got it. You just said you didn’t to trick me into talking.”
Fox leaned forward across the table. “Tara, I’ve never laid eyes on the thing.”
The cry that slipped from her throat was pained. She came to her feet with it. “It was there! In the library, on the floor. Did you look on the floor near the window?”
“We had technicians all through there. And I went over every inch of the room myself as well.”
“You missed it then. And they did.”
“It’s not possible. Start back where you left off. You said you hung up on the 911 call because you thought someone might have killed Stephen for the ruby. You looked in the safe.”
Tara sat again as though she had just discovered
her bones were made of sand, and it was all pouring out of her. “No. I started to go to the safe. It was open. But then I stepped on it. The ruby was on the floor.”
His investigative antenna went on alert again. “Where?”
“Behind Stephen’s desk. I picked it up, then I heard the dog.”
Fox felt his expression go slack and blank. “What dog?”
“That little ugly thing. You must have seen it. It was in the library, some kind of Chihuahua, I think. I tried to run and it jumped on my leg. It wouldn’t get off. So I tried to swat it away and I lost my grip on the ruby. It went flying toward the wall near the window.”
The quick, loud jolt of Rafe’s laughter cracked the tension in the room. “A Chihuahua?” Rafe asked.
“Something like that,” Tara said, glancing his way. “It was little with big ears.”
“Did she have a crooked nose?” Rafe asked. “Like maybe she had been shot there?”
Tara’s eyes widened. “Yes! How did you know that? I remember thinking that there was something wrong about her muzzle.”
“Did you see this animal?” Fox asked his partner. What the hell was going on here?
“Nope,” Rafe said, then he backpedaled. “Not recently, away.”
“What is it with you and dogs?” Fox demanded. This was the second case where Rafe’s radar had honed in on one. The last time was the case in which he’d gotten involved with his now-pregnant wife.
Rafe was still laughing as he headed for the interrogation room door. When he left the room, Fox thought he was muttering something about love, murder and mayhem.
“Are we done here?” Tara asked.
Fox’s gaze finally pulled away from his partner’s retreating back. “One last question. Where were you in that house? I looked everywhere.”
Some of her color came back. “I hid in the pantry closet.”
“I looked there.”
She held his eyes. “I know.”
His temper kicked a little. “Why didn’t you just tell me all this on Monday?” She could have saved him a lot of energy, not to mention manpower.
“Stephen Carmen hurt me more times than I can tell you. I knew dying wouldn’t stop him from doing it again. As it was, you believed I killed him. What would your reaction have been if you’d found me standing over his body?”
He hadn’t believed she’d killed Stephen Carmen, Fox thought indignantly. From the moment he’d watched her lean her head against the back door of that house, something had bothered him about the whole situation. And he’d been sitting on that bench in the first place because the case had been coming together too easily.
But he was honest with himself. He’d always been open to the possibility that she’d committed murder. And if he had found her right there with the body, Fox knew she would probably have spent the night in jail. It seemed absurd to apologize for doing his job, but the words were on his tongue anyway. Then she stood.
“May I go now?” she asked.
“You can’t leave the city—”
“Oh, stuff it. I was supposed to go to Maine on business today and I intend to do it tomorrow. Am I a suspect or not?”
Not. She had him there. But every moment he spent with her was turning out to be one in which he wanted to know more about her. And if she wasn’t involved in this investigation, then she was…gone.
“This is an ongoing investigation,” he hedged.
“Then investigate without me. I gave you what you wanted. Now leave me alone and go find the Rose.”
She left the interrogation room. Fox watched her go, struggling for some legitimate reason to hold her. Then he heard her shriek.
He came out of his own chair so fast it toppled over. He collided with her attorney in the doorway. He squeezed past the larger man first. When he managed to reach the Robbery-Homicide den, Tara was staring at John Wesley, one of the other R-H detectives. The man was holding a small dog—okay, a Chihuahua, he conceded. And it had big ears and a crooked snout.
“That’s it!” Tara cried. “That’s the dog!”
“She’s yours?” Wesley asked. “I found her outside a little while ago, shivering in the cold. If she belongs to you, just take her.”
“Take her?” Tara’s voice rose again. “Take her? That dog started this whole nightmare! I’m going to kill her!”
The dog’s ears shot straight up then she leapt deftly from the detective’s arms. She ran out of the room, into the hall. Tara took off after the mutt and ran headlong into Rafe Montiel in the hallway. He caught her.
“You don’t want to do that,” he cautioned. “In fact, you’ll probably just want to take her home. Her name is Belle and generally she doesn’t leave until she’s good and ready.”
From somewhere down the hallway, Tara thought she heard the dog bark. The nasty little critter had ruined her life. She’d made her lose the Rose. She’d brought Fox Whittington into her world, some Southern-drawling cop in alligator boots who made the air heat when he got too close to her and who did odd things to protect her. Tara showed her own teeth.
“We’ll just see about that.”
Chapter 6
Five minutes later, Tara came back to the R-H room empty-handed. Montiel and the other detective had departed.
“She’s gone,” she said to Fox and Ellinghusen. “I don’t know where she got to, but good riddance.”
In response, Fox pointed over her shoulder. Tara turned, wary of his expression, to find the nasty little mongrel asleep on a pink blanket in the corner. Empty sandwich wrappings were laid out in front of her like roses at the feet of a queen.
It was impossible! “That corridor is a straightaway! She couldn’t have gotten past me to come back here. I would have seen her!”
Ellinghusen cleared his throat. “My dear, we really must be going.”
“Oh. Of course.” But Tara gave one last antagonistic look at the dog. It still boggled her mind how the animal had turned up again, like a bad penny. She started out of the room after the lawyer.
“Not so fast,” Fox drawled.
Tara hesitated and glanced back at him. His eyes had taken on that deep, devil’s blue. “You said we were done.”
“No. You said we were done.”
“I don’t remember it that way.”
He looked at Ellinghusen. “I’ll give her a ride home. You can go.”
“Like hell he can! Don’t you dare move,” she warned the lawyer.
“Chicken,” Fox murmured.
“What?” Tara could scarcely believe her ears.
His voice lowered another notch, closing Ellinghusen out of the conversation. “Cluck, cluck, cluck.”
“If you’ve got something to say, just say it!”
“Okay. You’re afraid to be alone with me without your watchdog.”
Tara choked. “I am not!”
“And your meek acceptance of a curse on your head is awfully banal as well. In fact, it’s beneath you.”
“Banal?” She was dumbfounded. “Beneath me?”
“Not your style at all.”
“You have no idea what my style is!”
“Actually,” Ellinghusen said, “I really do have to be getting back to the office. I would strongly advise that you come with me, Tara.”
Fox wrote quickly on the notepad he’d been carrying around with him. Tara watched him tear the top page off and hand it to the attorney. “What’s that?” she asked suspiciously.
Ellinghusen took it and lifted a brow. “This will make the matter interesting to prosecute, assuming you ever prosecute.”
“Give it to me.” Tara snatched the page from the lawyer’s hand and read aloud. “In my most humble opinion, Tara Cole did not kill Stephen Carmen. Signed, C. Fox Whittington.” She looked up at him again.
He didn’t really think she’d killed anyone.
She did not want it to matter to her. “What’s the C stand for?” she asked before her heart had a chance to roll over.
That discomfitted lo
ok passed over his features again. “Charles.”
“That’s banal. And you’re lying.”
He looked at Ellinghusen. “As long as you have that piece of paper, you can throw a major monkey wrench into any trial. So relax and go back to your office. She’s no longer a suspect. I’ll write that down, too, if you like.”
“It’s meaningless,” Ellinghusen said.
“Of course it is. Except in the hands of a good lawyer.”
“It’s good enough for me. You can go,” Tara said to the lawyer. She was damned if she was going to let Whittington call her a chicken.
Chicken or not, it still felt very, very important that she hold her own against this man. If he thought that her reluctance to be in his company was purely based on the investigation then that was all for the better. She could never let him realize just how much his slow grins and steady eyes were starting to rock her. Ellinghusen left and she faced Fox, tilting her chin up a notch.
“Okay, Blue Eyes, if it’s that important to you, you can give me a ride home.”
Fox frowned. “I don’t know. Put that way…it’s not flattering.”
Tara startled herself with a quick peal of laughter. Then he came to stand near the desk closest to her. She had to pivot to keep her eyes on him.
He leaned his hands on the metal. “You want your Rose back, right?”
“Yes.” She hated the bald longing in her tone, but she couldn’t mask it.
“I want Stephen’s killer.”
“It’s not me.”
“I know that. I just gave your lawyer a piece of paper that more or less ties me to the opinion.”
“Why? Why would you do that?” He wouldn’t go out on a limb like that just to keep her around and provoke her for a few more minutes. Would he?
Fox shrugged. “Because your stepbrother was killed prior to five-thirty.”
The hurt poured through her like cold rain. He didn’t think she was innocent because he’d believed her. He accepted it because of forensic evidence.