Home Before Midnight

by Virginia Kantra

  Ellis raised his head and stared blankly. “What are you doing here?”

  Did he suspect? But there was no awareness in his face. No awkwardness. No fear.

  Was it possible, after all, that he wasn’t a threat?

  “I was hoping we could talk.”

  “Now.” Ellis didn’t sound alarmed. Maybe curious, and a little drunk. Perfect. He sprawled in one of the room’s big leather chairs, his legs stretched out on the Oriental carpet. The desk might have been even better, but the chair was positioned a good three feet from the bookcase behind him.

  Plenty of room.

  “I wanted to catch you without an audience around.”

  “If you mean my darling stepdaughter, she’s upstairs.” Ellis set an empty brandy glass on the table beside him. “You know she wants me out of the house.”

  “I heard.” Hands in his pockets, he walked behind Ellis’s chair, pretending to study the books on the shelves. “These your books?”

  “Some of them.”

  He scanned the spines. Breathing Space. Murder-in-Law. A Time to Die. Ellis was a clever guy. Just not clever enough.

  “Shame about Billy Ray,” he offered.

  Paul rested his head against the back of the chair. “Shit happens. It won’t affect me.”

  He looked down at Paul’s full, graying hair, a little taken aback by his dismissive attitude.

  “It will affect your book. Unless you plan to write about the Dawler murders without talking to the murderer.”

  “But I did talk to Billy Ray. Several times, in fact. And I have other sources.”

  “What other sources?”

  “You want names, you’ll have to get in line to buy the book. Just like everyone else.” The bastard had the balls to sound amused.

  Rage rose like bile in his throat, but he controlled his voice carefully. “If you’ve discovered new evidence, then it’s a matter for the courts. Or the police.”

  Paul sniffed. “I’m not an officer of the court. I don’t have to do your dirty work.”

  “You’re bluffing,” his visitor decided. “You don’t know anything.”

  Paul smiled. “I know there was a witness.”

  He froze, his hand curled in his pocket. “To the killings?”

  “Not quite. But according to Billy Ray, someone else was in the house that night.”

  His heart threatened to choke him. He dragged in air. “Did he tell you who?”

  “He told me . . . enough to figure it out. Sooner or later.”

  Really, Ellis left him no choice.

  He brought this on himself.

  “Sooner, I think,” his visitor said.

  Hooking his arm around Paul’s neck, he jammed the gun to his temple. Quick. Hard.

  Paul’s body arched. His eyes went wide.

  He turned his head, the way he would from a camera flash, a popped balloon. And squeezed the trigger.

  The blast shook him. Hot. Loud. Noisier than he’d reckoned. He had considered using a silencer, but Ellis was the type who would choose to go out with a . . . well, with a bang. Anyway, Regan was dazed with drugs and alcohol and grief. The noise wouldn’t rouse her.

  Slowly, he straightened, quelling the lurch in his stomach, and looked. Not bad. A round black hole to the side of the head, welling blood. A .22 was only one step from a BB gun. The bullet tumbled inside the skull without sufficient force to exit.

  But it certainly did the job.

  He eased his hold on Ellis. The body slumped, the head dropping forward. Very natural. If not for the blood and the spatter on his clothes, he could have been drunk or asleep.

  Carefully, he took out his handkerchief and wiped the gun. He wrapped Ellis’s flaccid hand around the butt of the revolver and, pressing the unresponsive index finger to the trigger, held the barrel to the small neat hole in Ellis’s head. Done.

  He released the hand and the gun together, surprised to notice his own hands shaking. Ellis’s arm fell to his lap.

  He stepped back to survey the scene. One gun. One glass. No sign of struggle. He didn’t worry about footprints in the carpet. People had been in and out of every room of the house all day.

  Ellis slouched almost as he’d found him, a suicide, overcome by grief or guilt.

  Let the police decide. He tucked his handkerchief back in his pocket. Either theory suited him fine.

  STEVE’S Inscrutable Cop Face set like stone.

  Bailey’s stomach sank.

  “It didn’t mean anything,” she said, pushing away the memory of Paul’s wet, invasive kiss. Of his erection prodding her belly. “But Regan saw, which makes the situation a little . . .”

  Compromising?

  Damaging?

  Disastrous.

  “Awkward,” she repeated lamely.

  “It meant something,” Steve said in his flat, neutral voice. “To make you quit.”

  Bailey straightened her spine. “It means Paul was drunk, and I was stupid.”

  Steve shook his head. “Not stupid. Set up.”

  Great. He thought she was so undesirable even a drunken wife-murderer wouldn’t want to kiss her.

  But there was no way Paul had faked his hard-on.

  “I don’t think he was acting,” she said.

  Steve went very still. His eyes narrowed. “You don’t think so?”

  And no way she was telling him why.

  “Anyway,” she said hastily, “Paul couldn’t count on Regan coming downstairs at that moment.”

  Steve shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. He sets the stage. He makes his move. Or another move. He has no reason to believe you’ll reject him. Sooner or later, stepdaughter’s going to get the idea.”

  He has no reason to believe you’ll reject him.

  Oh, God. Her face, her stomach, her whole body burned.

  “But why would Paul want Regan to think we’re . . .” Bailey choked on the words. She swallowed and forced herself to continue. “It just makes him look more guilty.”

  “Of cheating on his wife.”

  “Of killing her. An affair is a motive for murder.”

  Steve shrugged. “Depends how he plays it. He can argue that while Helen was alive he had it all. A wealthy wife. A willing, adoring assistant. All he has to do is convince the police you were pressing for more and he told you no. Then, when the weapon is found in your possession . . .” He leaned forward. “Are you all right?”

  She couldn’t breathe, she was about to throw up, but other than that she was hunky-dory.

  “Fine,” Bailey assured him. It was sweet of him to be concerned. She struggled to form a coherent thought, to frame a coherent sentence. “I still think it’s risky for Paul to pretend to have an affair with me.”

  “As long as he could sell his wife’s death as an accident, sure. But once we start treating it as a possible homicide, he has to divert suspicion. Who else benefits from Helen’s death?”

  “Her children. Richard—”

  “Was sleeping it off in a drunk tank in Chicago,” Steve interrupted.

  “Then . . . Regan?”

  “Didn’t leave the bank until five-thirty that night and went to her gym after dinner. Even assuming she could get into the house without somebody noticing, she couldn’t make the drive from Atlanta in time.”

  Bailey gaped at him. He’d just shared actual information with her about the case. He was investigating other leads.

  She felt—not safe—but suddenly less alone. Hot tears burned her throat and rushed to her eyes. Oh, God. Like she wasn’t embarrassed enough already. She crossed her arms over her chest and stared at Eugenia Burke’s white-painted ceiling, willing the tears not to fall.

  When she looked down again, Steve was watching her, his eyes unexpectedly kind. “I told you I was keeping an open mind.”

  “Yes, you did.” She cleared her throat. “Thank you. What happens now?”

  “Tomorrow I’ll contact the DA. He can authorize emergency testing at the state lab in Raleigh.”
/>   “You can’t do it yourself?”

  “I could spray it with Luminol, check for traces of blood. But that would jeopardize the value of the evidence when we go to trial.”

  When, not if. It was suddenly hard to breathe.

  “How long will testing take?”

  “If the chief pushes the request through, I could have results in a day.”

  Her stomach churned. “And then what?”

  “You’ll have to come in. Sign a formal statement.” His gaze was sympathetic, his tone neutral.

  That didn’t sound too bad. She’d done that before. She nodded.

  “And we’ll need to take your prints,” he continued, still in that kind, neutral tone. “For the purposes of elimination.”

  “Are you going to read me my rights, too?”

  He frowned. “You’re not being detained. Technically—”

  Disappointment and fear made her sharp. “I’m not asking you a technical question. I’m asking you as a . . .” What? Friend? He wasn’t her friend. “I’m asking you,” she repeated. “Do I need a lawyer?”

  He didn’t answer right away. Her stomach pitched and rolled.

  “You can get one if you want,” he said finally. “I need to talk to the chief and the DA before I move forward on this.”

  “And Regan,” she said. “And Paul. You have to talk to them, too.”

  His jaw set. “I will. Believe me.”

  “Regan saw Paul kiss me.” It was a relief, Bailey discovered, to get all the bad stuff out, all her sins and fears. Like popping a blister. Or going to confession. “Even if you don’t think I’m guilty, even if the DA doesn’t think I’m guilty, Regan believes I killed her mother. Or conspired with Paul to kill her mother, which is just as bad.”

  “You were the one who came forward.”

  He leaned forward across the table, big and solid and competent with his deep drawl and seductive sympathy, his muscled arms and macho readiness to take her problems on to his broad shoulders.

  Everything she’d never wanted.

  “Why did you come here tonight, Bailey?” he asked quietly.

  She couldn’t admit, even to herself, what she wanted from him. But she gave him as much of the truth as she dared. “I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

  Something—could it have been disappointment?—flickered in his eyes. “So you decided to cooperate with the police. Smart.”

  “Only if you believe me.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Why wouldn’t I believe you?”

  She swallowed hard. “I might just be trying to get a lesser sentence.”

  “You might,” he agreed. “If I had any kind of case without the murder weapon.”

  “Or Paul and I could have had a falling out.”

  “You did,” he said without inflection.

  “Oh, God.” She covered her face with her hands. “See? Even you think I could be guilty.”

  “I think,” Steve said slowly, and stopped.

  Had she offended him? She lowered her hands.

  But he wasn’t even looking at her. His attention fixed over her shoulder. Turning, Bailey peered into the shadows of the hall.

  “Gabrielle? What are you doing out of bed?” Steve asked.

  The nine-year-old rose from behind the hall table, four feet two of injured dignity in pink-and-gray striped pajamas. “I didn’t want to interrupt your date.”

  Steve raised his eyebrows. “So you decided to eavesdrop instead? Apologize to our guest and go upstairs.”

  “I’m not a date,” Bailey said. Not unless the kid was talking court date.

  Gabrielle slipped forward into the kitchen light, her heart-shaped face creased in concentration. “I remember you.”

  “Hi,” Bailey said. “I remember you, too.”

  “Are you still in trouble?”

  Oh, yes. And she was getting in deeper by the minute.

  “Not as much as you’ll be in if you don’t get up to bed,” her father said. “How long were you down here?”

  Bailey flushed. What exactly had she heard?

  “I heard you talking about work.”

  “And?” Steve asked sternly.

  Gabrielle grinned. “Bor-ing.”

  Steve narrowed his eyes with mock severity. “Did I ask for your critique of my dating technique?”

  This wasn’t a date, Bailey wanted to protest.

  “Hey, I’m just trying to help,” Gabrielle said. “You are out of practice.”

  “To. Bed,” Steve said, enunciating each syllable.

  The girl rubbed one bare foot on top of the other, looking at him through her lashes. “Isn’t somebody going to tuck me in?”

  Steve’s hard face softened. Amazing to watch the big, tough detective totally manipulated by a nine-year-old girl. “Right. Up we go.”

  The Look turned on Bailey. Once again she had the sense of being sized up for . . . something. “Can she do it?”

  Bailey was flattered but wary.

  Steve simply looked wary.

  Of course. Whatever kind of show he was putting on for his daughter, he wouldn’t want—what had he called her?—a person of interest in an ongoing investigation tucking his precious only child into bed. No matter how open-minded he was.

  “I’m a lousy tucker-inner,” she said, to get them both off the hook. “But thanks for asking.”

  “Maybe you could both do it,” Gabrielle suggested, still shifting from foot to foot. Her toenails were painted sparkly blue to match the blue stones in her ears.

  “Fine,” Steve said before Bailey could think of another excuse. “But no more getting up.”

  “Yes, Daddy,” Gabrielle said, all demure obedience now that she had her way. She flashed Bailey another grin. Bailey smiled back cautiously.

  They all trooped upstairs.

  Gabrielle’s room, like the rest of the house, was conventionally feminine, with ruffled curtains at the windows and botanical prints on the walls. Bailey’s gaze traveled over the polished mahogany furniture to a fuchsia chair, glaringly out of place against the seafoam carpet.

  “Nice paint job,” she said.

  Gabrielle beamed. “Thanks.” She jumped on her mattress, making the items on her nightstand bounce. “That’s my mom.”

  Bailey studied the framed photograph beside the bed. Gabrielle’s mother was exotically lovely, with her daughter’s heart-shaped face and dramatic coloring.

  Bailey felt plain and tongue-tied. “She’s very pretty.”

  “Dad put her picture there so I can see her when I say my prayers. But it’s not the same as really talking to her.”

  “Lights out,” Steve said.

  Gabrielle sniffed and scrambled between the floral print sheets.

  “You could write her a letter,” Bailey suggested before she thought better of it.

  Gabrielle gave her a patient look. “No, I can’t. She’s dead.”

  “Um.” Bailey didn’t dare turn around to see Steve. She could just imagine what kind of look he was giving her. “Right. But that doesn’t mean you can’t put down how you feel to her in words.”

  “If she’s dead, doesn’t she already know how I feel?”

  Bailey was so out of her depth here. Totally over her head. But she had plunged in, so she floundered on. “Yes, but the letter’s not only for her. It’s for you to feel closer to her.”

  Gabrielle flopped against her pillows. “But you couldn’t mail it.”

  Clearly, she had inherited her father’s logical mind.

  “You wouldn’t have to mail it,” Bailey said, acutely conscious of Steve listening. “You could burn it. Or bury it.” Did that sound too depressingly funereal? “Or . . . or tie it to a balloon and let it go. The important thing is getting your feelings down in words.”

  “The balloon thing could be cool,” Gabrielle conceded. “Are you spending the night?”

  “Gaah,” Bailey said, which was bad, but better than asking if her daddy had sleepovers often.

&nbs
p; “No,” Steve said from behind her. “We’re just going to talk awhile, and then Bailey has to go home.”