Under the Gun

“Just relax and tell me what you saw.”

Luke moved his hand over hers. She didn’t even realize she had twisted a business card in her palm until Luke slipped it out from between her fingers and put it on the desk.

As soon as the warmth of his skin came, it left again. His hand was back at his keyboard, but the touch had returned her to the present. She could finish the story. She had to finish.

“There was blood splattered on the walls and on the floor. I remember kneeling, looking around trying to figure out what I was seeing. Then I heard the sirens.”

“The police.”

“Yeah, but it still didn’t sink in. Even seeing the cleaning bucket didn’t compute.”

“And that’s where the police found you.”

“On the floor by the bloodstain.”

“They say you killed Phil and hid the body.” Luke’s hand hovered over the keys. “That they caught you cleaning up the scene.”

“But they conveniently forget that Phil made a call from the house only a short time before that.” She scoffed. “I mean, did he turn into smoke or something?”

Luke nodded. “Admittedly, the timeline is going to be the prosecution’s weakness at trial.”

“Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence. Maybe you should be on my defense team.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“Phil set me up with a brilliance I didn’t know he had in him. He called his brother that night and claimed I broke in.” The prosecutor depended on the delay in calls from Phil to Steve to the police to explain the problem. “The theory is that I killed a 190-pound man and hid the body within a fifteen-minute window.”

The evidence didn’t fit. The fact that everyone refused to see that made her seethe in frustration.

“I’m assuming you deny killing him.” Luke said it more as a fact than a question.

“I can’t kill someone who’s not dead.”

Luke began typing. Even with one hand, he moved fast. Images flipped by on his screen. She could see him trying to log in passwords as fast as possible. Probably feared she would somehow break into his system.

A Web site she recognized popped up. “Wait, you’re with the FBI?”

He smiled. “Definitely not.”

“But you just entered a password to get on their system.”

“True.”

Lines of information filled his screen. She leaned in closer to see.

He eyed her for a second. “Sit back.”

“But that said something about Homeland Security.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“We’re talking about my life here, Luke.”

“This is confidential information.” He said the words but didn’t do anything to hide the monitor from her view.

“Then why do you have it, Mr. Antiques Expert?”

Another window opened. This one had the D.C.

Police logo on it. A few more strokes and Luke entered another password. The page that popped up looked like a bank statement.

“Other than violating about a thousand state and federal laws, what are you doing?” she asked.

“Checking for evidence that Phil is alive. Phone and bank records. Something that would support your theory about Phil setting this up to make it look like you killed him so he had cover to run.”

“That’s exactly what happened.”

Luke’s gaze did not leave the monitor. “So you keep saying.”

“You don’t work for the FBI.”

“I already said no.”

“Or the police.”

“Still no.”

Wariness spiraled through her. He had access to all sorts of information he shouldn’t have access to. “Exactly what side do you work for?”

Luke stopped typing long enough to stare at her. “Do you really care?”

“Yes.” She said the word but didn’t mean it. Her question wasn’t about following the rules. It was about trying to figure out who he was—the man he claimed to be or the one who carried a gun.

Luke hit a few more keys and then sat back in his chair. “There’s nothing on Phil. No sign of life at all. He hasn’t accessed any account or anything else in the three weeks since he disappeared.”

“The man is a multimillionaire.”

“I seem to remember you mentioning that when you left me for him.”

She dug her fingernails into the arms of the chair to keep from shaking him. “Phil has money hidden all over the place.

“None of it’s moving.”

Luke didn’t believe her. The fact hit her with enough force to push the breath out of her lungs on a whoosh. Desperation bubbled in her stomach. She had to move before it ran up her throat and she embarrassed herself.

She got up and paced the few feet between her chair and the open door to the office. A few steps and she could hit the hallway, run as fast as possible for the door and hope his injury slowed him down enough to let her get away.

“Don’t even think about it.” Luke issued the threat without moving an inch.