Her Sworn Protector

Had she not withdrawn into the bathroom just when she had, she could very well be lying in a pool of blood beside Ari and Milos.

Sensing she wasn’t alone, Kady looked up into the mirror and saw Byron standing behind her in the doorway. Their eyes met.

“I called the police,” he told her quietly. “You’re going to have to give a statement.”

Gripping the faucets, she turned them off simultaneously. She continued holding them for a moment, as if they were all that was keeping her from sinking to the floor. “I know.”

“After that,” he said, sounding as if he was reciting some preauthorized schedule, “I’ll have someone drive you home.”

She turned around to face Byron. “How can you be so calm?” she demanded.

His face was completely unreadable. “Practice.”

Chapter 3

Detective Larry Wilkins of the New York Police Department, Homicide Division, was born worn around the edges, rumpled and suspicious. He operated each of his investigations from the standpoint that everyone was guilty until proven otherwise. At least ten pounds overweight and wearing clothes that hadn’t seen a hanger in over a decade, he had a habit of invading people’s personal space when he spoke to them. He thought of it as a useful technique during an investigation.

Right now, as he questioned her, Kady could all but taste the pizza he’d had for dinner last night. It was apparent to her that the detective was immersed in a love affair with extra garlic. It took all her strength not to turn her head away.

Detective Wilkins looked at her as if he’d already made up his mind that she had either killed Milos Plageanos herself, or masterminded the murder.

Holding on to a much-used notebook, Wilkins looked at her with small brown eyes that could have cut holes through a steel plate.

“And you were in the bathroom the entire time the murders went down?”

She’d already told him that. Twice. Wilkins made it sound as if she’d spent an eternity in the room when it had merely felt that way. In total, she’d been there maybe five minutes, maybe less.

It didn’t take long to end a man’s life, Kady thought.

Wilkins had her isolated in one corner of Milos’s bedroom. She tried desperately to block out the sounds of the forensic team as they went about their business, gathering evidence that attested to the last moments of the billionaire’s life.

“Yes,” she answered again, then couldn’t help adding, “But I don’t think it took too long to shoot two people.”

A smirk raised the corners of Wilkins’s mouth. It reminded her of a hyena waiting for lunch. “Timed it, did you?” He took a step in, cutting the space between them. “During the actual occurrence or the dry run?”

“Dry run?” she echoed, stunned. He actually thought she had something to do with it. How dare he? “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The smirk deepened. “Sure you do. You and your accomplice probably did a dry run to see how long it would actually take to walk in and shoot the old guy and his bodyguard.”

She stared at him. The man was insane. Completely, utterly insane. “What possible reason would I have to kill Mr. Plageanos?”

Heavyset shoulders rose and fell beneath a houndstooth jacket that looked slept in. “Dunno yet. But I’ll find out.”

Anger came streaking in on a lightning bolt, fueled by exhaustion and powered by exasperation. Her eyes blazed as she looked at this would-be Colombo. He was forgetting one very salient point. “And did I plan his anxiety attack, too?”

It was evident that Wilkins had expected her to be intimidated, cowed, not furious. He glared at his notes. “Thought the old guy had a heart attack.”

He would have gotten that information from someone else, she thought. Kady took offense at the cavalier way he dismissed the late shipping magnate.

“Mr. Plageanos had an anxiety attack, not a heart attack,” she corrected tersely. “And the reason he had the attack was because he was a micromanager who took everything to heart.” She drew herself up to her full five-four stature, wishing it wasn’t against the law to punch out a police detective. “I had no way of knowing that I was even going to be here today. How the hell could I have planned this?” she demanded.

“You planned for the eventuality,” Wilkins countered, but it was obvious that he was losing steam. Some part of him was being won over by the idea that her only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Still, he wasn’t about to give up all at once. “Maybe disarmed the security system so that your man could come in.”

“And maybe I smuggled ‘my man’ in my medicine bag,” she retorted sarcastically. Struggling, she regained control of her temper. “Look, Detective, I’m a cardiologist, not an electronics technician. The only thing I was doing here today was responding to Mr. Plageanos’s request for medical attention.” Her voice began to rise by increments. “Now why don’t you stop making ridiculous accusations and get me together with a sketch artist so I can describe the man who killed Mr. Plageanos and Ari.”

For a moment the look on Wilkins’s face was triumphant, as if he thought he had her. “You saw the guy’s face. This guy you didn’t know.” Half a foot taller than Kady, he leaned in, bringing his face close to hers for emphasis. “I thought you said you were in the bathroom.”

She was sorely tempted to dig into her purse and hand the man breath mints. “I was,” she said in between clenched teeth.

“Then how did you see his face?”

Instead of answering, Kady let out an angry sigh and turned on her heel.

Stunned, Wilkins called after her. “Hey, we’re not through here. Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he demanded. When she didn’t turn around, he shoved the notebook into his back pocket and hurried after her.

“To show you,” Kady tossed over her shoulder. Walking into the bathroom, she deliberately left the door wide open, the way it had been before. She opened the medicine cabinet and angled the mirrored door so that it reflected the interior of the bedroom. “I saw him like this.”

Wilkins craned his neck, coming over to her side of the room. From where he stood, Milos’s bed was clearly visible. The detective chewed on the inside of his check as he continued to glare at the mirrors. Finally he exhaled rather loudly.

“Smart,” he allowed grudgingly.

It was the first decent thing she’d heard the man say since he’d pounced on her. Vindicated, Kady chose not to comment—just in case it was another verbal trap. To her way of thinking, her action hadn’t been smart so much as desperate.

Wilkins began flipping through the notes he’d jotted down during her recounting of the events. Kady couldn’t help wondering just how much he’d annotated. For the first time in her life, she understood what the term railroaded meant.

Finally Wilkins flipped the cover closed, returned the pad to his back pocket and nodded. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll have someone take you in to the station. You can work with a sketch artist.”

“I’ll take her,” Byron volunteered quietly.

The sound of his voice coming up behind her surprised Kady. She thought he was downstairs with the other detective. The bodyguard seemed to materialize out of nowhere.

Had he been there all the time, listening?

Wilkins had blotted out everything with his close proximity, keeping her from being aware of anything else but him. She knew the detective had meant for it to be that way.

Byron had been the first to be questioned, but he had caught Wilkins’s partner instead of Wilkins. Luck of the draw, she supposed.

She saw Wilkins look at Byron for a long moment, then the older man passed a hand over his all but bald pate and snarled, “Okay. You know the way.”

Byron met Wilkins’s scrutiny without flinching. “Yeah, I know the way.”

“Why do you know the way?” Kady asked the bodyguard several minutes later as they left the penthouse.

Just before they left the building, they passed one of the maids. The young woman, not more than twenty-two, was standing off to the side, sobbing. Kady fought the urge to stop and comfort her. But her morning was quickly disappearing and she still had a practice waiting for her. Mercifully, Mondays she went to the office in the afternoon.

Byron made no answer. He led her to a well-cared-for Nissan Z. She knew little about cars, but decided it had to be old since the insignia on the back said Datsun instead of Nissan. He opened the passenger door for her.

Getting in, she looked at Byron. “Or am I not supposed to ask?”