Unlawful Contact

by Pamela Clare

  He dropped the drugs into the plastic bag and put the plastic bag inside his backpack, planning to dispose of both drugs and paraphernalia once he got home. Trying to eliminate any lingering traces, he sprayed the drawer and the area beside the bed with Lysol, knowing full well it wouldn’t fool a well-trained drug dog. But he’d thought of that and had the perfect solution. He pulled the box of doggy biscuits out of his backpack, opened it, and shut it in the drawer, spilling a few on the floor.

  The dog would react—but no one would ever be sure why.

  An hour later, after searching the rest of her bedroom just to be certain there wasn’t more, Marc let himself out and walked back to the Jag, backpack on his shoulder.

  The night sky was clear and cold, Orion sailing high in the sky. Before too long, the police would show up with their search warrant. They’d tear Sophie’s apartment apart, but they wouldn’t find anything. It wasn’t nearly enough to make up for what she was going through tonight—Christ, he hated to think of her in that place!—but it was all he could do for her.

  He slipped behind the wheel and had just stuck the key into the ignition when three squad cars, one of them a K-9 unit, turned onto her street. “Sorry, boys. I beat you to it.”

  But, damn, talk about a close call.

  SOPHIE ROLLED OVER to face the wall, the two-inch plastic pad that served as a mattress doing nothing to lessen the discomfort of lying on a bed of cold steel. Her tiny cell was dark and chilly—steel bunk, steel toilet, steel sink with no faucet. Though she couldn’t see another living soul, she could hear them, women whispering, laughing, crying in the dark.

  This had to be the most humiliating night of her life.

  Spread your feet apart and bend over. Now squat and cough.

  They’d taken everything she had on her and had handed her a stack of folded clothing—two pairs of white cotton panties that bore faint menstrual stains from a previous wearer, a bra with bad elastic fatigue, a pair of socks, a lame pair of sneakers, a T-shirt, and a blue jumpsuit. They’d also handed her a rule book, a towel, a toothbrush, and a small comb that might work on a man’s short hair but looked like it would lose teeth the first time she hit a tangle.

  What they hadn’t given her was pajamas. Or anything to wash her face with. Or aspirin for her headache. Or truly warm blankets.

  She pulled the thin cotton blanket up to her chin and stared into the darkness, butterflies swirling in her stomach. How strange it was to think that this experience was reality for most of the people she’d written about as a journalist. She’d listened to their stories over the years, had done her best to sort real injustice from whining, and she’d known that incarceration was hard. What she hadn’t known was how humiliating it was to lose your freedom or how terrifying it was to hear that thick steel door clang shut—and not know when it would open again.

  And then it hit her.

  Hunt had lived this way for more than six years.

  More than six years.

  He’d gone to prison, knowing he was innocent of drug dealing and premeditated murder. Had he felt then the way she felt now—hopeful that the courts would see the truth?

  How betrayed he must have felt in the end—and how completely alone.

  At least she had her friends.

  You’re all we’re thinking about tonight. Remember that.

  Sophie tried to concentrate on the simple act of breathing, letting oxygen fill her lungs, willing herself to relax. It was going to be all right. Tomorrow morning the attorney Tessa and Julian had retained for her—how could she repay them?—would get her out of this place. She’d explain things to Tom and do whatever she had to do to prove she wasn’t involved with drugs—take a lie detector test, submit to a blood test, swear on a stack of dictionaries.

  Yes, it would be all right.

  She must have fallen asleep because the next thing she knew, a key was sliding into the lock on her cell door. She came awake with a surge of adrenaline and sat bolt upright, barely able to breathe. Outside the narrow Plexiglas window, a shadow moved in the darkness.

  Then there came a burst of radio static and a garble of words. “…Looking for you. Where in the world are you? We need you down in psych. Over.”

  “Fuck!” A man swore under his breath, then spoke in a normal voice, apparently answering. “I’m taking a leak. That okay with you? I’ll be right out. Over.”

  Taking a leak?

  Whoever was outside her door was lying. Whoever was outside her door didn’t want anyone to know he was there. Whoever was outside her door…

  Chills skittered down Sophie’s spine.

  Maybe the man Hunt was looking for wasn’t a cop.

  Maybe he was a CO at the Denver County Jail.

  Heart slamming, she waited.

  She heard the key withdraw from the lock, followed by the sound of a man’s receding footsteps. She shuddered with relief, afraid to think of what might have happened. Then belatedly realizing her opportunity, she leapt off her bunk, ran two steps to the door, and pressed her face to the window, hoping to catch a glimpse of the bastard’s face.

  But it was too late. He was gone.

  And if he comes back, Alton? What will you do then?

  Dread slithered through her belly. She backed away from the door and sat on the bunk with her back against the cinder block wall, watching, waiting.

  CHAPTER 16

  MARC AWOKE TO find himself staring at familiar gray concrete. He knew every bump, every indentation, every crevice and crack. A strangled gasp in this throat, he lurched upright, jumped to his feet, banged his shin against the steel rim of the toilet.

  He was back. In his cell. In the pen.

  Blood rushed out of his head, left him dizzy.

  What the hell?

  He’d gotten out. He’d escaped. He’d gotten away.

  How could he possibly be back here again?

  Maybe you’ve lost your fucking mind.

  He squeezed his eyes shut, opened them again.

  He was in prison.

  Christ Jesus!

  Had it all been a dream?

  No, it hadn’t.

  He’d seen Sophie, held her, kissed her, and she’d been real.

  It was then he heard her scream. He leapt to the cell door, pressed his face against the slab of Plexiglas and saw her.

  The shower hawks had her, and they were dragging her away.

  “What’s the matter, Hunter? Afraid she’ll like it? Afraid we’ll hurt her?”

  “God, no, Sophie!” He banged on his door, tried to get Kramer’s attention. “Help her!”

  But the bastard either didn’t hear him or didn’t care.

  “Kramer, you son of a bitch! Help her! Kramer!” Marc banged and shouted until he grew hoarse, Sophie’s terrified cries making him desperate.

  But still Kramer didn’t seem to hear him.

  Marc shouted like a madman, clawing at the door, trying to tear six inches of solid steel apart. Only when he saw blood on the door—his own blood—did he realize it was hopeless.

  He couldn’t help. Her couldn’t save her. Just like he hadn’t saved Megan.

  “Sophie! Oh, Christ, Sophie!” He leaned against the door, sank to the floor.

  Marc’s eyes jerked open.

  He found himself staring into the dark, drenched in sweat, cotton sheets tangled around his bare thighs, his heart pounding like a jackhammer in his chest.

  A nightmare.

  It was just a nightmare.

  He sucked air into his lungs, kicked off the sheets, and walked naked to the family room, where he’d seen that bottle of William Lawson’s. He grabbed it, screwed off the top, and drank from the bottle, feeling it burn its way to his stomach.

  Holy fucking shit.

  He hadn’t had a nightmare like that since his early years in prison. But this nightmare hadn’t been about him—not really. It had been about Sophie.

  She was in trouble, and not only because she’d been arrested. Someone was after
her, someone who wanted her out of the way. Someone who probably wouldn’t hesitate to kill her if given the chance.

  Happy now, Hunter? You dragged her into this.

  What a fucking mess! Marc was no closer to finding Megan and Emily, and now Sophie’s life was being torn apart, too. Not what he’d planned.

  Whether Sophie liked it or not, she needed him. He was better suited to protect her than anyone else. He knew more about what she was up against than the cops, and he could do whatever it took to keep her safe without worrying about breaking rules or laws because he was already fucked. But more than that, no man alive cared for her the way he did.

  He put the bottle to his lips and took another swallow of scotch, then set the bottle down. Outside, the sunrise had turned the eastern horizon pink. It was morning. For some reason, God had decided to grant the human race another day.

  Knowing there was no chance in hell he’d be able to sleep now, Marc walked back to the bedroom, slipped into a T-shirt and gym shorts, and headed downstairs. He’d pump iron and run a few miles on the treadmill, work off some of this tension, sweat the nightmare out of his body and mind. Then he’d take a hot shower, get something in his gut besides whisky, and head downtown.

  Sophie needed him, and he wasn’t going to fail her.

  “HOLD OUT YOUR wrists.”

  Sophie did as the guard asked, gasping as steel grew tight against her skin. It hadn’t felt like this when Hunt had put her in cuffs. “They’re really tight.”

  “They’re supposed to be tight.” The guard, a young man with short blond hair, connected the handcuffs to a chain that encircled her waist then shackled her ankles, while another guard stood off to the side, watching as if he thought she’d turn violent. “Come on.”

  Sandwiched between the two men, she shuffled down the hallway with awkward steps, feeling like she was living someone else’s life. The last time she’d been wearing handcuffs, she’d been stuck in a blizzard with an escaped convict and afraid for her life. It had felt surreal then. It felt surreal now. Only this time she was the supposed criminal and the men she feared weren’t convicts, but those sworn to uphold the law.

  Last night, someone had come in secret to her cell and would have done God only knew what had he not been called away. But who was he?

  He couldn’t have been either of the men walking beside her. There’d been a change of shifts at seven, so whoever it was had probably gone home to bed. If she hadn’t been such a damned chicken, if she hadn’t hesitated, she might have gotten a glimpse of his face or even seen his name tag and been able to ID him. Instead, she’d been so afraid she hadn’t thought to look until it was too late.

  At least he hadn’t come back.

  Sophie had sat there in the darkness, unable to sleep, so afraid her stomach had hurt, the hours stretching into what had felt like eternity. Finally, at five the lights had come on when two female COs brought in the prior day’s orders from the jail commissary—chocolate bars, tampons, potato chips, lotion, lip balm—and she’d finally fallen asleep.

  Breakfast had arrived two hours later, and lockdown was over. Exhausted, she’d wanted to go on sleeping, but she’d known there wouldn’t be another meal until noon, so she’d dragged herself out of her cell and into the dayroom, where about twenty other women sat eating runny scrambled eggs and limp white toast. Most of them had seemed to know who she was and why she was there, probably because they had nothing better to do than watch television all day. She’d found herself asking them questions about their lives until one of them had jokingly asked whether she was really in jail just to interview them.

  God, how she wished that were true!

  The guards led her through a checkpoint to one of the visitation rooms, where she found a middle-aged man with a shock of bright white hair and—

  “Holly!”

  Looking gorgeous in a gray Prada blazer and skirt, Holly hurried over to her on a pair of purple Miu Miu pumps and gave her a hug, her brown eyes filled with worry. “God, Sophie, what have they done to you? Look at the dark circles under your eyes!”

  Before Sophie could answer, Holly reached into her own blouse, pulled a small Gucci makeup bag out of her cleavage, and set it on the table. “It set the alarm off, but I told them it was the underwire in my bra. Sit down. We don’t have much time. John is going to talk you through the lawyer stuff, while I see what I can do with your hair and face. I’m his paralegal for the day. It was the only way I could get in to see you.”

  Sophie sat, unable to keep from smiling. She was in jail under arrest for a major felony, and Holly had lied to the jail staff in order to do her makeup? It sounded like the premise for a new reality TV show—Prison Makeovers.

  “I love you, Holly.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  While Holly conducted cosmetic CPR, combing the tangles from Sophie’s hair, washing her face with a premoistened facial cloth, and putting moisturizer and makeup on her face, Sophie listened to John Kirschner talk about her bail hearing, his gaze veering every few seconds to Holly’s round butt.

  So that’s how Holly charmed him in to letting her become his “paralegal.”

  “Sorry to meet you under these circumstances, Ms. Alton.” He was dressed in a dark green suit that looked like it had cost several months’ salary. “I’ve always admired your work.”

  Sophie said the first thing that came to her mind. “The heroin wasn’t mine.”

  “Of course it wasn’t.” Kirschner sounded like he didn’t care one way or the other. “The DA’s probably going to push for a hundred grand, but there were no fingerprints on the evidence, and a search of your home yielded nothing—”

  Sophie found her mouth hanging open. “They searched my apartment?”

  “Of course. Thirty grams of heroin is more than enough to pull a warrant. As I was saying, given the totality of your circumstances—that you were recently held hostage by an escaped murderer and drug trafficker, that your profession makes you a target, and that you’ve got no priors, I’m going to ask for ten grand. We’ll probably get fifty.”

  Sophie’s stomach sank. “I don’t have fifty thousand dollars.”

  “You’ll only have to put up ten percent. Will you be able to manage that?”

  “Yes.” It would take every dime she’d set aside for David’s tuition.

  God, what would she tell him?

  “Is there anything you think I should know before we head to court?”

  There was one thing.

  She quickly told him about the guard who’d come to her cell last night and explained how she thought he might be connected not only to the heroin, but also to her investigation of sexual assaults at Denver Juvenile. “I didn’t file a complaint because I have no idea who he is or who his friends are. I thought it would be safer to tell someone on the outside.”

  Kirschner took down a couple of notes, his white eyebrows pinched together in a frown. “So you believe whoever sexually assaulted those girls is trying to keep you from uncovering his identity and that he not only planted heroin in your car, but also tried to assault you last night?”

  “I’m not sure what he would have done, but we need to find out who he was.”

  Kirschner nodded. “Absolutely, we do.”

  “Don’t talk for a minute.” Holly outlined Sophie’s lips, then brushed on gloss. “Now say ‘mwah.’ You know, this is exactly why I work in arts and entertainment. Rock stars and actors never come after you with guns.”

  Kirschner glanced at his Rolex. “Do you like dogs, Ms. Alton?”

  The question seemed to come from nowhere. “Dogs?”

  “When they searched your home, the drug dog alerted them to the nightstand in your bedroom. Instead of drugs, they found dog biscuits.”

  Sophie started to say that she didn’t own a dog, much less dog biscuits, but something in Kirschner’s expression stopped her. And then she understood.

  Someone had planted illegal drugs in her apartment, and someone else ha
d removed them and replaced them with dog biscuits, somehow knowing that a K-9 unit was on its way.

  She wasn’t sure what she felt more—shock and rage to think that the same bastard who’d planted heroin in her car had also broken into her home or relief that someone was watching out for her. If police had found drugs in her home…

  Like Hunt, she would never have been able to convince a jury that the heroin didn’t belong to her.

  Hunt.

  It had to have been him. He must have heard what had happened to her and had taken it on himself to make sure her apartment was clear. He’d risked being caught by the police in order to make sure she was safe.

  “I love dogs,” she said at last.

  Kirschner smiled. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  Several strokes of mascara later and Holly pronounced Sophie ready for her court appearance. “You look gorgeous—well, except for the clothes and the shoes and the chains.”

  Sophie was surprised at how much better she felt just knowing that she was presentable. Last night, her dignity had systematically been stripped away, and Holly had helped to restore it. “Thanks, Holly. I owe you big time.”

  Holly dropped her cosmetics back into the bag and tucked the bag back into her bra. “You can do the same for me if I’m ever arrested.”

  Sophie stood and walked, Kirschner at her elbow and Holly behind her, out of the room and into the hallway, where her two guards were waiting together with Julian.

  Julian watched Holly walk by, a bemused expression on his face, then looked at Sophie, one dark eyebrow raised.

  But Sophie had other things she need to talk about besides Holly’s unauthorized presence. “There’s something important I need to tell you—in private.”

  One of the guards looked first at her then at Julian but said nothing.

  Julian frowned. “Okay. Let’s get bail set and get you out of here. But I’m warning you—this is going to be a media circus.”