A big hand grasped her shoulder. Lausanne screamed. With his hackles raised, Freckles barked repeatedly, loud enough to wake the dead. Struggling to free herself from the man’s tight grip, Lausanne dropped onto her stomach and rolled, surprising her attacker and enabling her to pull away from him.
“What’s going on out there?” a male voice called from the parking lot.
“Help!” Lausanne cried as she managed to get to her feet. “Please, help me!”
The man who had followed her looked right at her, a menacing frown on his shadowed face, then he glanced in the direction of the parking lot.
“I’ll see you later,” he told her, his tone threatening. “To finish the job.” Then he ran in the opposite direction.
Breathing hard, her body shaking, Lausanne stood there quivering from head to toe. Pete Harris came running across the parking lot, heading straight toward her.
Freckles trotted over to Lausanne and nuzzled his wet nose against her pants leg.
“Are you all right, Lausanne?” Pete asked as he came up to her. “I heard you screaming and the Bakers’s dog barking and then I saw that man with you. Did you know him?”
“No, I—I didn’t know him.” Lausanne’s voice quivered.
“Did he hurt you?”
“No, just scared me to death.”
Pete reached down for Freckles’s leash, then nodded to the apartment complex. “Come on and I’ll walk you back upstairs before I head on out to work. I’m on the twelve-to-eight shift this week. I was just leaving for work when I heard you hollering.”
“Thank goodness you did. I don’t know what he might have done to me.”
I’ll see you later. To finish the job. The man’s words echoed inside her head.
When she, Pete and Freckles neared the exterior stairs, she realized they were not alone. At least half a dozen of the complex’s residents had come out of their apartments and were staring at them.
“What’s wrong?”
“What happened?”
“Was that you screaming?”
“Is anybody hurt?”
Everybody started talking at once.
Pete stopped and faced the small crowd. “Some guy she didn’t know grabbed Lausanne. But he’s gone. I scared him off.”
“I called the police when I heard you scream.” Mrs. Potter, who lived in the building next to hers was a sweet old lady, but a bit of a busybody. “I expect they’ll be here soon.”
The police? Damn! But then again, maybe it was a good thing that someone had called the law. After all, she’d been attacked tonight, at least had been on the verge of being attacked and might have been killed if not for Pete Harris. Lausanne could have passed the incident off as a potential robbery or rape, but the man’s threat kept repeating itself over and over in her mind. I’ll see you later. To finish the job.
He had meant to kill her. And it was personal.
She had expected to hear from Lt. Desmond after they’d dragged Bobby Jack Cash’s body from the river, had figured she’d be their number one suspect, but that had been days ago and she hadn’t heard anything from the Chattanooga PD. Well, she’d hear from them tonight. And they’d hear from her. Call her crazy, but she knew in her gut that the attack on her tonight had something to do with Audrey and Bobby Jack.
THE PATROLMEN WHO ANSWERED Mrs. Potter’s call took down all the info Lausanne could give them and cautioned her to be careful about walking her dog so late at night. With no more to go on than a general description—white male, tall, dark hair, dark mustache, nondescript clothing and an inability to ID his face—there was little chance the police would ever apprehend the guy. Molly had invited Lausanne to spend the night with her, but she’d declined, wanting nothing more than to hide away in her apartment.
Sitting on her sofa, alone and still shaken from her experience, Lausanne jumped sky-high when she heard someone knocking on her door. Get real—no self-respecting attacker would announce himself.
Pattering to the door in her aching sock feet, she called, “Who is it?” She peeked through the viewfinder.
“Ms. Raney, it’s Lieutenant Desmond.”
Oh, great, just what she needed. “What do you want? Why are you here?”
“I understand you were attacked tonight. I’d like for you to tell me about it.”
“Why?” Something wasn’t quite right about this. “How did you find out—”
“Open the door and talk to me.”
Reluctantly, Lausanne unlocked the door and opened it just a fraction. Peering through the narrow gap, she glared at the detective. “Are you still keeping tabs on me?”
“Only in a round about way. If anything comes into headquarters concerning you, I’m notified immediately.”
“Oh, I see.”
“You’re all right?” he asked. “You weren’t harmed, were you?”
Lausanne eased the door open halfway. “Do you really care?”
“I care the same as I’d care if any law-abiding citizen was harmed by an attacker.” Desmond eyed her skeptically. “And you were attacked, right?”
“Yes, I was…well, I would have been if Pete Harris hadn’t scared the guy off.”
“You didn’t know the man who grabbed you?”
She shook her head.
“Did he say anything to you?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Then he did say something. What was it?”
“He said that he’d see me later…to finish the job.”
“Hmm…Do you have any idea what he meant?” Desmond asked.
“I have an idea,” she told him.
“And that would be?”
“I’m not sure exactly why, but I think it has something to do with Audrey Perkins’s disappearance and Bobby Jack’s murder.”
“And it might not,” Desmond said.
“You don’t believe me. Why am I not surprised?”
“I believe someone approached you tonight and frightened you and that another Glennview Apartments resident scared the guy off. And I believe it’s possible this guy intended to rob you or rape you, but as for a connection to Audrey Perkins or—”
“You asked me if I had any idea why this man tried to attack me and I told you what I thought.”
“It’s quite possible that you fabricated this attack and the theory that it was somehow connected to Ms. Perkins and Mr. Cash in order to throw suspicion off yourself and onto some unknown person. Maybe you knew this guy. Maybe he’s an old boyfriend. Maybe—”
“Maybe you’re nuts,” Lausanne said. “That’s a load of malarkey and you know it.”
“I agree with her.” The voice—Dom’s voice—came from somewhere behind Lt. Desmond.
Lausanne’s heart skipped a beat. “Dom?”
The detective stepped aside and turned to face Domingo Shea. “You certainly got here in a hurry. You must have broken every speed limit between here and your hotel.”
Dom frowned at Desmond as he passed him and went straight to Lausanne. He shoved open the door, then grabbed her by the shoulders and searched her face. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m okay.”
“When I heard what happened, I—”
“How did you find out?” she asked.
“I called him,” Lt. Desmond said.
Dom glowered at the detective. “Look, I appreciate your contacting me. I owe you one. But harassing Lausanne is no way to conduct an investigation.”
“I’m not conducting an investigation. I’m merely having a nice, friendly talk with Ms. Raney.”
When Dom slid his arm around her waist, her stomach did a silly flip-flop; then when he said, “She doesn’t have anything else to say to you without her lawyer present,” Lausanne wanted to hug him.
“I knew I should have waited before I called you,” Desmond said, a hint of humor in his voice. “How do you think it’ll go over with Edward Bedell when he finds out that you’re Ms. Raney’s champion?”
“Is Mr. Bedell your ne
xt phone call?” Dom asked.
“Nope. Not tonight.”
“Look, if it’s any of your business, I’m not taking sides here,” Dom said. “Not exactly. I’m on the side of the truth. And that’s what Mr. Bedell wants, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, but he could still see this—” Desmond eyed Dom’s arm around Lausanne’s waist “—as a conflict of interest.”
“If and when I feel that things have reached that point, I’ll take myself off this assignment.”
Desmond grunted, then looked directly at Lausanne. “I’m leaving you in good hands, Ms. Raney.” He turned to go, then glanced back at her. “Remember not to leave town.”
Dom maneuvered her around and nudged her into her apartment, then closed and locked the door. “Tell me what happened. And don’t leave anything out.”
Clinging to his arm, she asked, “Will you believe me or will you doubt me the way Lieutenant Desmond does?”
“Tell me the truth—the complete truth—and I’ll believe you, honey.”
DOM SAT WITH LAUSANNE on her sofa and listened as she talked, telling him every detail of what had happened to her tonight while she was walking the Bakers’s dog. If she was lying about anything, then she was an Academy Award-winning actress. He saw real fear in her eyes, sensed genuine anxiety when she told him what the man had said to her.
“He’ll come after me again,” Lausanne told Dom. “I know he will. He said he’d be back to finish the job. He’s been hired to kill me.”
“Why would someone hire him to kill you?” Dom asked. “In Palm Beach, you thought the man who tried to kill you was after Audrey Perkins, but now that you’re no longer impersonating her, then why—”’
“You don’t believe me.” She jumped up off the sofa. “You promised that you’d believe me if I told you the truth. But you lied to me. You lied, damn you, you lied.”
She stomped toward the door. Dom shot up off the sofa and ran after her, catching her seconds before her hand connected with the doorknob.
After swinging her around, he held both of her wrists tightly. “God, woman, you’re the most aggravating female I’ve ever come across. You go on the defensive before there’s any reason to and you don’t give a guy half a chance before you cut him off at the knees.”
Glaring uncertainly at him, she tugged on her wrists, but he held fast. “We’ve had this discussion before and we agreed that since we can’t trust each other, we need to go our separate ways.”
“I believe you about the man trying to attack you tonight,” Dom said. “And unlike Lieutenant Desmond, I’m not dismissing your theory that the man who came after you is somehow connected to Audrey Perkins’s disappearance.”
Dom wanted to believe every word out of Lausanne’s mouth. For days now, he’d been waging an internal war with his own emotions. When Desmond had called to tell him about Lausanne being attacked, he’d been half out of his mind with worry until he’d seen for himself that she was all right. On the ninety-to-nothing mad dash from his hotel to her apartment, he’d gone over everything from the moment he first saw her in Palm Beach until they had said their goodbyes in her apartment doorway three nights ago. He had come to several conclusions, but no decisions. He wanted to trust Lausanne, but what were the odds that a woman with her background was on the level? Then on the other hand, what if she really was innocent of any wrong doing in the ongoing case and he didn’t do all he could to help her? He’d feel like a heel. And he’d lose the one chance he had not only to help her, but to screw her.
He wanted her. Wanted her in the worst way. Every day they’d been apart, he’d had to force himself to stay away from her.
She looked up at him with those hungry green eyes and all he could think about was making love to her. Slow and sweet. Hot and nasty. Over and over again.
“Are you saying you believe me?” she asked.
“Yeah, honey, I believe you.”
“And you think it’s possible that I’m right about someone trying to kill me and it somehow having a connection to Audrey Perkins?”
Did he really believe she might be right? Maybe. Maybe not. Damn it, man, tell the lady what she wants to hear, what she needs to hear. You can work through any lingering doubts later.
He released her wrists, lifted his hands and cupped her face between his open palms. “Yeah, I think it’s possible.”
“Oh, Dom.” She swallowed hard. “Thank you for believing me.”
The gratitude and the hope he noted in her expression really got to him, making him wonder how many times she had been hurt and disappointed, how many times she’d had her heart broken.
He eased his hands down her neck and across her shoulders, resting them there while she gazed up at him, a tentative smile on her lips.
“You can’t possibly know how much it means to me that you’re taking a leap of faith like this and at least giving me the benefit of the doubt. It’s more than…”
She ended the thought midsentence, making him wonder what she’d been about to say.
“Lausanne, do you have any idea why someone connected to Audrey and Bobby Jack might want to kill you?”
“I’m not sure, but…well, there’s something I know, something I haven’t told anyone.”
Dom’s stomach muscles tightened. “Will you tell me?”
When she nodded, he squeezed her shoulders.
“The morning we flew in from Palm Beach and went to the Bedell mansion, I saw a portrait in Mr. Bedell’s study, a portrait of Audrey.”
“Yeah, so?”
“So, it was then that I realized the woman who hired me to impersonate Audrey Perkins wasn’t Audrey herself, just someone else impersonating her.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
“I’M BEGINNING TO THINK I need to hire a new cleanup guy. It’s obvious that you’re no longer capable of handling the job.”
Okay, so he’d had things go wrong twice now, had sent less-than-competent goons out on assignments. He’d made the mistake of hiring locals—one in Palm Beach and the other in Chattanooga—to terminate Lausanne Raney. But he’d thought that he could save a few bucks that way and keep the profit for himself. Big error in judgment on his part.
“Look, I’ve never let you down before and I swear if you give me another chance, I’ll make sure—”
“You’ve made that promise before and failed to deliver.”
“Just say the word and I’ll have somebody in Chattanooga tomorrow who will guarantee to get the job done.”
“No. Not tomorrow. After two attempts on her life, she’ll be very careful. Wait. I’ll tell you when. But go ahead and line up someone. And this time, he’d better be the best my money can buy. Do you understand?”
“Yes, I understand.”
The dial tone hummed in his ears. He understood, all right. This Raney woman knew something she shouldn’t know or had done something she shouldn’t have done. The only way to keep her quiet or to punish her was kill the bitch.
Okay, so he’d lose money on this deal, but it paid to keep a repeat customer happy. If he screwed up just one more time…
He knew just the man for the job. Corbin didn’t come cheap, but he was the best. He had a ninety-nine percent success rate. That one failure was now in a permanent vegetative state, which in the grand scheme of things was as good as dead.
DOM STARED AT LAUSANNE in disbelief, as if he thought perhaps he’d misunderstood her, so Lausanne repeated her confession. “Did you hear me? I said that Audrey Perkins was not the woman who hired me to impersonate her.”
“I heard you, honey. It’s just that you’ve been so adamant about Audrey having hired you that I’m having a difficult time understanding this.”
“What’s to understand? Someone else was impersonating Audrey when she hired me to—”
“Yeah, yeah, I get that part,” he told her. “What I don’t understand is why you didn’t know right away that the woman wasn’t Audrey Perkins. After all, you’d been working at Bedell, Inc. for months. You mus
t have seen Audrey when she came to the office to visit her husband or her father.”
Just when she’d thought he believed her, that she could trust him, he proved her wrong. “Do you think I’m lying about this?” Furious and disappointed, she broke eye contact.
“Look at me, Lausanne.”
She stubbornly refused to meet his gaze.
“Damn it, woman, look at me.”
She glared at him. Their gazes locked, a battle of wills ensuing.
“I don’t think you’re lying,” he said. “I just don’t understand why you didn’t recognize the woman who hired you as a phony.”
“I’d never seen Audrey Perkins. During the six months I worked at Bedell, Inc. she never came to the office while I was there. I swear to you that the first time I met her, or thought I met her, was the day I was summoned to her house.”
Dom nodded. “Okay. So tell me about that meeting. Tell me about the woman.”
“I’ve told you before. She hired me to impersonate her, to impersonate Audrey Perkins. And she paid me—”
“You met her at her home, at Audrey Bedell’s downtown penthouse apartment. And no one else was there, not even the maid. Didn’t that seem odd to you?”
Lausanne shook her head. “No, not really. What are you getting at?”
“Whoever this woman was, she was able to arrange to meet you alone, to dismiss any servants, to make sure Grayson Perkins wasn’t there and she had access to the house.”
“You’re right. That means she was somebody close to the family, someone who had a key to the house and knew when no one would be there.”
“Patrice Bedell,” Dom suggested. “Or Cara Bedell.”
“The stepmother? Yes, I can see that.” Lausanne’s own stepmother would have gladly killed her if she’d thought she could get away with it. “But I’ve met her and it wasn’t Mrs. Bedell.”
“Okay, what about Cara, the sister who’s in love with Audrey’s husband.”
“You picked up on that, too, huh? But no, it wasn’t Cara, either.”
“Let’s not rule out the husband,” Dom said. “Grayson Perkins could have hired someone to impersonate his wife.”
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