by Brandi Reeds
“There’s a lot of weird guys out there,” he says. “Are you careful? You meet him out, right? He doesn’t come to your place?”
“Not that I need to clear it with you, but no. I haven’t invited him over yet. So far, we’ve only met at restaurants. And he drops me off at the curb at the end of the night.”
“So it’s just the opposite of you and me.”
“Yeah. He actually shows up.”
“Ha-ha.” He nudges me. “I mean we don’t waste our time in public.”
“I mean it,” I say, maybe because I can’t stop thinking about the day he didn’t show up at the damn restaurant and kept me waiting—and worrying—for days. “This is the last time.”
“In that case . . .” Decker slips a hand down the front of my panties. He’s still nude, still semihard. He never quite deflates after the adrenaline of calls like the one we hit early this morning, especially when he suspects there’s more to the story. It’s almost like seeing death and destruction day in, day out, inspires him to live to the fullest. “I want a five-star review.”
“It was good.”
“Good.” A guttural sound, half breath and half groan, escapes him. “That might be the most inconsiderate thing you’ve ever said to me.” He gives his head a small shake, just enough to tousle his hair—a bit longer than he usually wears it—so it drops over his left eye.
“It was—”
“Phenomenal?” He blows the hair from his forehead now. I feel his stare, as if his eyes simmer with actual flames instead of desire. “Mind-blowing?”
He’s spot-on with that terminology, but he hardly needs the ego pump. I cup his face in my hands. His stubble scratches my fingertips. “Solid. Good. It always is.”
“If at first you don’t succeed . . .”
My good sense—the modicum I’d just regained, anyway—melts away the moment his calloused fingers twitch in my panties. Sometimes the reminder that life could end in a snap inspires me to keep living, too.
Our tongues meet. He tastes like bourbon.
Another bad decision: the bourbon for breakfast. It’s why I opted to stay longer than I should’ve.
“I should go.”
Maybe I will.
I will.
I’ll go.
But I’ve already crossed the line once today.
And this doesn’t count, anyway.
Decker was here long before Jack walked into my life. And he’s brilliant. Take today, for instance. Woman hanging from her rafters. Apparent suicide. But he sees things others don’t see.
If anyone else had been on that call this morning, this case might have been open-and-shut. Suicide. But because Decker was the detective in charge . . .
“What did you say?” I ask between kisses. “If it was a suicide . . .”
“Mm-hmm.”
“You said something about that at the scene. The techs bagged her hands. Is it just the note the neighbor found that has you thinking it was more?”
“Hmm.” His guttural groan at my ear sends a shivering vibration to all the parts of me that count. “Maybe.”
“It couldn’t possibly have been a break-in. There were four or five hundred-dollar bills left there on the counter.”
“Look at you, the amateur cop! When are you going to stop dancing around the fact that you’re part of the wrong force and join us in blue?”
I like being a firefighter, but I’d be lying if I said I’d never thought about making the switch.
“Maybe it was a suicide.” He yanks me back that inch, smashing me into his chest. “But she wasn’t wearing underwear.”
“Yeah.” Like a snapshot in my mind, I see the scrap of red bra in the corner of the living room. It was one of only a few items seemingly out of place in her loft, and the panties were nowhere to be seen—not on her person, and not dangling from some corner of furniture. “Maybe she just didn’t wear underwear. It’s not that strange.”
“She had an entire drawer of sexy little things in her dresser. She wore underwear.” His fingers trail up from the small of my back to my shoulders. “But there was also a vase in the sink. Half-filled with water.”
“Any decaying flowers in the trash?”
“Trash was recently taken out. No bag in the can.”
“So someone could’ve tossed out key evidence.”
“I’ve got some lackeys wading through the dumpster behind the building. We’ll know soon enough. But my guess? She’d been strangled before that rope was strapped around her neck.”
“Strangled?” I stiffen in his arms. The images of her swaying body, of the chair knocked sideways, haunt me, like a slideshow replaying in my mind.
“Strangled.” He gives me a roll so I’m pinned beneath his lithe body while he works my panties off over my hips.
What the hell.
Like I said, I’ve already crossed the line once today.
Chapter 4
KIRSTEN
I drive home from the dry cleaner’s, over hills still draped with fog and around curves, in a daze.
That girl is dead.
And it sounds like she may have met with foul play.
My husband obviously knew her.
I saw her at the wedding. I’m pretty sure Quinn did, too, though she didn’t mention it to me. Who else might have noticed Margaux and my husband sneaking off together?
I tighten my grip around the steering wheel.
Think.
Would anyone else at the reception be able to make the connection between the face on the morning news and the gorgeous woman in the red dress?
If the police start poking around, are they going to connect Ian to this girl? Are they going to start asking me questions?
What time did Ian come home last night?
I don’t know. I felt a little off yesterday, so I took a pill, turned in early, kept waking up. I heard him come in, and suddenly, he was just there. He brought me a glass of wine. It was nice. This morning, there were roses in a vase in the kitchen. And the bottle of red was open and unfinished on the island.
What was his state of mind? Did he act strangely?
Nothing was out of the ordinary.
Until that girl turned up dead.
I glance at the resealable plastic bag poking out of my purse. The thong.
I press a button on my steering wheel. “Call Ian.”
A computerized voice confirms: “Dialing. Ian. Mobile.”
“Fordham, Holloway, and Lane.”
He must have forwarded his calls to the office.
“Hi,” I say to the receptionist. “This is Kirsten Holloway. I need to talk to Ian.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Holloway. Mr. Holloway is out of the office.”
“Oh. When’s he due back?”
“I’m not sure, ma’am. Perhaps late afternoon.”
“He’s in court?”
“I’m . . . hmm . . . not sure, actually. His schedule is just blocked off.”
What does that mean?
A nervous feeling spins in my stomach. Suppose the police have already connected Ian to Margaux? Suppose they’re questioning him right now?
“Would you like his voice mail?”
“No, thank you. Is my son in, by any chance?”
Patrick is interning with Ian’s firm, a fact that makes my husband nearly giddy. The plan is for Ian and Doug to bring Patrick on full-time once he finishes law school.
“He just stepped out, ma’am. Maybe an hour or so ago. I expect he’ll return shortly. Would you like his voice mail?”
“I’ll just speak with him later.”
I take my eyes from the road for just a second—to terminate the call, to again regard the panties in my purse—and when I shift my gaze back to the road . . .
“Oh!”
I slam on the brakes but still clip the rear right quarter of an enormous deer crossing the road.
The car skids to a halt.
My heart feels as if it’s leaped into my throat, and adrenaline pumps through my syst
em. My hands tremble as I put the car in park.
Deep breath.
The animal is getting back to her feet.
I bring a hand to my heart.
My gaze trips into the deer’s, and for a moment, we’re locked in a stare—me, trying desperately to catch my breath, and the deer, limping onto the shoulder of the road.
Is she going to make it?
Her leg buckles, but she manages to regain her balance and picks up her pace.
Then, still favoring her rear right leg, she darts into the woods. Perhaps to rest before going home. Perhaps to die.
I want to follow her, to make sure she’s okay, but what can I do if she’s not?
Should I call someone? Animal control and rescue, maybe?
I sit for a few seconds before deciding there’s nothing I can do. I put the car in gear and again begin toward home.
Our driveway is long and winding through the woods, and one might miss it if not for a gate marking its location at the county road. The gate bears the name previous owners endowed upon this property: Giardino Segreto.
Secret garden.
Maybe if I hadn’t landed here after (because of?) the most humbling and humiliating experience of my life, I’d find such a thing charming.
But as things are, I long for my smaller house on a postage stamp–size lot in Evanston. Or maybe I long for the days before all our neighbors and friends watched me fall to pieces, the days before my phone ceased ringing, as if the episode were a contagious plague that might befall anyone attempting a conversation with me.
I turn onto the driveway. Did I leave the gate open when I left with the dry cleaning?
Maybe I did.
But I don’t think so.
When I see Ian’s car parked on the motor court, however, I breathe a sigh of relief. If he’s here, he opened the gate. If he’s here, I’ll be able to talk to him about these red panties. If he’s here, he’s not at the police station, so maybe no one knows about his connection to Margaux Claire Stritch.
I park next to Ian’s BMW, inspect my SUV and find a crack in the grille where the doe and I collided, and enter the house.
I see him standing on the back porch, right hand in his pocket, his cell phone to his left ear. I hear him laugh.
I approach the french doors leading outside and hope to catch a word or two to determine to whom he’s talking, and about what.
I take a step closer.
He turns toward me and instantly ceases conversation.
“Patrick,” I say, when he says, “Mom.”
To whomever is on his phone: “I’ll call you back.” My firstborn pockets his phone and approaches me with open arms. He walks into mine.
“God, from the back, you look so much like your father.” And he does. His posture, his mannerisms, even his haircut are reflections of Ian, but he’s a nice mix of the two of us, resembling my side of the family in facial features. “Your father’s car is in the driveway, and I just thought—”
“Yeah, I took his car in from the city,” he says. “Dad’s in court, but he said you didn’t seem right this morning, so—”
“I’m fine.”
“—he asked me to pay a visit.”
“Just trouble sleeping last night.”
Patrick’s gaze narrows. “You seem rattled about something.”
I glance at my purse atop the island. I could tell Patrick about the panties, which would certainly explain things.
“You sure you’re okay?” He slides a hand back into his pocket.
But if I tell Patrick, he could go straight to Ian and forewarn him that a confrontation is coming, and I’m counting on the element of surprise to garner my husband’s genuine reaction. Besides, do I really want my son to know these sorts of things about his father?
If, that is, he doesn’t know already. I’ve considered more than once since they’ve begun working together that Patrick may now be part of a traditional boys’ club. And men stick together.
Already, I know Ian and Patrick concealed Doug’s affair with his current bride from his ex-wife. During Ian’s best man’s speech, he’d said, “I’ve gotten to know Donna over the past six months.” But Doug had divorced his first wife only three months prior.
“There was a package for Dad on your porch,” he says. “A padded envelope. Probably another one of his autographed golf balls or monogram tees. I left it in Dad’s study.”
I nod. “Okay.”
“You sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine.” I take a breath. “At the cleaner’s, the news was on, and there was a girl . . .” Tears threaten to well in my eyes, but I ward them off. “They think she might have been murdered, and she was so young and beautiful.”
I pause to gauge his reaction, but there’s no recognition there. If he’s seen the report of Miss Stritch’s death, or if he knows about any affiliation his father may have had with her, he’s wearing a poker face. “That’s terrible.”
“It just got to me,” I say. “She was so young. I couldn’t help but think of Quinn.”
He opens his mouth to respond, but I don’t want to hear another dissertation about cutting apron strings or about the natural order of things, and I can’t listen to one more word of pity regarding the episode—or worse, warnings that another may be coming and I ought to medicate, take care of myself.
“And to top it all off,” I say before Patrick can go there, “on the way home, I hit a deer, so if I seem shaken—”
“You hit a deer?”
“A doe. A big one, too. She ran into the woods. I don’t know if I should call someone, or—”
“If she ran, she’s probably fine.”
“Yeah.”
“Any damage to the car?”
“It’s minor.”
For a few seconds, neither of us says anything.
“Mom, maybe you should find something fun to do.” Patrick leans a hip against the porch rail. “A hobby.”
Something to keep me busy, he means to say, while his father romances young girls. I shake my head and sigh.
“Join the women’s league, or something,” he suggests. “A tennis club. Take up golf.”
“Golf? Please. Patrick, I’m fine.”
He chews his lower lip, and his brows come together, as if in deep contemplation. “I just want you to know you can. If you want to.”
“You even sound like your father these days.”
“Well, like I said. He’s worried about you. We all are.”
I can’t say it aloud, but to be honest, I’m worried about Ian, too. This girl is dead. Possibly murdered. Panties matching the color of her dress were stashed in his jacket pocket. If Ian had anything to do with her death . . .
“How’d he seem this morning?” I ask.
“Fine, Mom.”
“Not at all upset about anything?”
“No.” He shrugs. “He just wants you to adjust, you know.”
“I’ll adjust. I’ll settle into this place.”
“Do you like it here? Because if you don’t, you could always find another place. Maybe not Evanston, but Winnetka. Lake Forest, maybe.”
“I will like it here. I will. Once I start to meet people. And I’m sure you have better things to do than babysit me.” I hope it doesn’t sound like a brush-off, but he doesn’t appear to be affected by this girl’s death, and if I expect to breathe today, I have to learn as much as I possibly can about the end of her life. If Patrick doesn’t know anything, I’ll find someone who does.
“We are pretty busy, actually. Dad’s got me working on a continuance for this millionaire so we can protect his assets from his bimbo third wife. I mean, come on. They were hardly even married. Six months doesn’t amount to half his life’s work, am I right?”
“That’s what they have you doing? Cheating some poor girl out of a marital settlement?”
“Not a poor girl, Mom. A gold digger. There’s a difference.”
I try to smile. “Well, I’d better let you g
et to it, then.”
My son wraps me in another hug. “I always enjoy seeing you, Mom.”
“Love you. Close the gate when you leave, okay?”
I watch until my son, in my husband’s car, rounds the first bend and is out of sight.
Then I pounce on my laptop to see what I can learn about the girl found dead in Bucktown.
Chapter 5
JESSICA
Jack canceled our lunch plans via text: I’ll make it up to you. So sorry.
The truth is that I’m not like other girls.
The youngest of five, with four brothers, I grew up as the only female in the household once Mom and Dad split. Mom rarely exercised her every-other-weekend visitation, so maybe I didn’t have a strong female example to follow, or maybe my brothers teased me if I became overly sensitive about something girly and I simply learned to toughen up. But I don’t care about my birthday. I don’t worry about a few extra pounds—drinking beer does that, you know—and I couldn’t care less about a guy canceling a date . . . as long as he calls or texts and doesn’t leave me waiting like some people I know.
I’m sure Jack expected me to throw a fit, and I really was looking forward to seeing him. But when you’re dating a financial analyst, there are going to be times he hops a flight to New York at a moment’s notice.
And then there’s the matter of my commitment issues. I sort of like that he’s not hovering over me all the time. Truth be told, I don’t know that I would be in this relationship with Jack if his career didn’t afford me a certain amount of freedom.
I text back, Totally fine. See you when you’re home.
Before I put my phone back in the breast pocket of the flannel shirt I’m wearing—it’s Decker’s; I wore it home after our tryst, and shared shower, this morning—I send a text to the detective I can’t seem to quit: Late lunch?
A girl’s got to eat, after all.
After a few minutes, he returns: Meet me at the station. 2:00.
I draw in the faint scent of Decker’s cologne, still lingering in the threads of the shirt fabric, and I wish I didn’t care that the scent of him comforts me.
I’m late to meet Decker, but it hardly matters. He’s not at the station when I arrive. I tell the desk sergeant at the door that I’ll be waiting at the lieutenant’s desk.