Deadly Reunion

“See? I’m already doing my job protecting you.”

He sent her the same impish grin that used to warm her heart. Turned out it still did. They were connecting again, like old times—there was no other way of putting it.

He put the car in gear and turned his attention to driving out of the small parking garage next to his office building, but she watched his profile, unable to tear her eyes away, feeling more alive than at any time in the last six months…

What was she thinking? How easily she’d fallen back into the electric, fun banter they’d once had, as if everything was normal between them. His agreeing to help her, a little verbal football, and a whiff or two of his cologne—was that all she needed to get wrapped up again in her emotions and feelings for him? Stupid. In about an hour, maybe two, Boone was going to drop her off at her candy-orange car and they would never see each other again, unless she had an occasion to arrest someone he was defending and have to testify. And she already knew how going up against him in court worked out. No, thank you. She did not need Boone Walker–type grief.

Lord, help me to let him go. Because at this point, she wasn’t sure what would be more dangerous—running into a murderous Warren Detry…or losing her heart again to Boone.

TWO

“I know you still believe Detry is guilty,” Boone said after they’d pulled out onto the busy, uptown street, “so tell me. Why do you think Cliff Haggis, a cop, would hide a gun to protect a guilty man from a murder rap?”

Her warm and fuzzy feelings toward Boone fled, and her nerve endings went on red alert. That had to be the quickest answer to a prayer she’d ever had. She hadn’t wanted to feel a connection to Boone again, but she also hadn’t wanted this irritation at him washing through her. She’d rather not be feeling anything for him at all.

“You’re trying to argue again,” she pointed out.

“I’m a lawyer,” he said with a charming smile. “Arguing is what I do.”

She sighed. “Can’t you just be my bodyguard and let me take care of the business end?”

“If I have to shoot somebody, that is the business end. The more knowledge I have about what’s going on, the better chance I’ll have of not picking off an innocent man.”

True. She took a deep breath. “I don’t know why Cliff hid the evidence. Maybe he knew Detry from someplace and owed him a big favor. Or maybe Detry offered a bribe to hide it and Cliff desperately needed money.”

“Or maybe Cliff hid the weapon because he killed Detry’s wife himself.”

She was wrong. Warm and fuzzy was preferable to wanting to box Boone’s ears in. “Get real,” she denied flatly. “I told you already, Cliff couldn’t commit cold-blooded murder.”

“Anyone could, given the right circumstances. Like right now, you look like you want to kill me.”

“That would be justifiable homicide, not murder.”

The boyish grin, so out of sync with his rugged, dark features, returned. She couldn’t help herself, she slowly grinned back. They both knew she didn’t mean it, about wanting him dead. And smiling at Boone didn’t mean she was any less irritated with him.

Did it?

“Cliff’s wife said they didn’t know the victim, and I believe her,” she said, preferring the arguing to examining how she was honestly feeling. “Detry killed his wife with the missing weapon, and I believe what we find is going to prove it. And the new evidence might just stand up in court, because no way a cop is planting Detry’s fingerprints on it to frame him, but then burying the weapon. That doesn’t make sense.”

“Look, Angie, they found no other evidence against Detry anywhere. So why are you so sure you’re going to find usable prints?”

“I just am.”

Boone shook his head, but Angie let the argument go, gazing out the window at the large city park they were passing, with its trees and walking trails. She actually had a lot of reasons for thinking Detry had murdered his wife, and they were all good.

The first reason stemmed from something that had occurred at the scene of the crime. She’d arrived soon after Cliff that afernoon at the Detry mansion in response to the 911 call reporting a murder. She’d checked the victim’s cold body and spotted what she presumed was the murder weapon several feet away. She had to help Cliff secure the huge place, so she didn’t remain there. In the next room, she’d found Detry, sitting with his face in his hands. The early middle-aged man, a total stranger, had looked at her, and his expression had changed from grief to surprise—and then to a coldness that had left a permanent chill in her. Before they could exchange words, Cliff had found them and given her rooms to search. Later, Detry metamorphosed back into the grieving husband, but Angie had walked away that day convinced he was guilty.

Another reason for still doubting Detry’s innocence was the e-mail she’d gotten a week after his acquittal that said, simply, “I will not forgive you.” She’d had it traced by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s computer division to a nearby library, but they’d never located the person who’d sent it.

And finally, there was Angie’s sister. Detry had gotten involved with a church’s Reach Out to Prisoners program while incarcerated to await trial and claimed to have found God. What he’d also found was her sister, Chloe, who was involved in the ministry. If that had been their only connection, it would have been a coincidence, sure. But not a month after Detry had been found not guilty, he’d tracked down and begun dating Chloe. Out of the blue, Chloe had called Angie up to forgive her for a past wrong and to try to reconcile—because Warren Detry had asked her to.

Angie shivered. She figured Detry was dating Chloe for revenge on her, since she’d refused to back down in court about having seen the presumed murder weapon. The man was evil, and she was not waiting around until he decided he would get his ultimate revenge on her—killing her sister. She was fighting him now with all she had in her.

Gut instinct, that’s how she knew the prints would point to Detry. But Boone didn’t trust instinct or feelings. He dealt in hard evidence. That was fine. She had a fact for him.

“I’ll give you one reason I’m sure about Detry’s guilt,” she told him finally, when they’d come to the outskirts of Copper City and were riding down a highway studded with ranch homes. “The insurance policy on his wife was for half a mil. That always screams husband.”

Boone shook his head. “Not this time.”

“Why do you say that?”

“The insurance broker said the wife was the one who took out the policy, not Detry. He even remembered her saying her husband wasn’t going to like it, but she wanted him to have money to keep up the house if she died.”

“A house he promptly sold after he was acquitted. You don’t think he influenced her at all?” she asked skeptically.

His look said “you know what I think already.”

How exasperating could one man get? “I can’t wait till we get a print match.”

“Me, neither.” He grinned like that would make him the happiest man on earth.

Since she was afraid she would say something that would get Boone talking about the relationship they didn’t have, she concentrated on watching the highway behind them for signs they were being followed. Boone also kept silent, for which she was grateful.

A few minutes later, they passed under the gateway arch at the cemetery and parked in front of a small building toward the front that resembled a homey cottage more than a place of business. Tiny flowers in various shades of pink and red growing in window boxes brightened the front, and a sign that read “Last Stop” in flowing script hung over the door.

Boone and Angie got out and scanned the area around them.

“No cars, no one lurking around the trees,” she observed. “No one followed us, either. We’ve been lucky.”

“It’s too quiet,” Boone said. “Dead quiet.”

“I am not walking down that pun trail,” she told him, swinging her shoulder bag from her side to her hands to dig for her badge and ID.

“I wasn’t trying to be funny. Somebody threatened you with death if you don’t forget about the Detry murder, which remains unsolved, with a murderer still out there—”

She opened her mouth to protest, but Boone narrowed his eyes, and she gave up, preferring to pick her battles.

“But there’s not so much as a hint of anything out of place on the trip over, or here.” He shook his head. “Something’s not right.”

“We took your car so no one would spot us. Maybe we’re just doing everything right.”

“Or maybe the danger isn’t who or what you think it is.”

“Boone, please go back to doing funny. I like you better that way.” She found what she needed to prove she was a cop to the caretaker and zipped her bag closed.

“Right. We can joke. Just don’t discuss anything serious, right?”

“You’re not talking about Detry now, are you?” She met him eye to eye and knew she was correct. His grim look was back. That warning, knowing stare that convinced jurors he was right and won court cases—but wouldn’t win her.