Brief Encounters

“I was thinking of something a little less drastic,” he intoned.

“Like what?” She didn’t trust any part of this. He wasn’t moving his hand, but she couldn’t help thinking that his eyes were unnaturally bright, and his breathing had deepened. It mortified her to think that he might have discovered the damp spot. Fiend. He was enjoying this.

“Like this wad of nylon must be ballistic,” he told her. “It could stop a bullet. I recommend Plan B.”

“These are my best black panties! And my last pair of Tanga panty hose!”

“Would you like us to be buried in them?” he inquired politely. “Because that’s how long it will take to get the damn things unsnarled.”

“Oh, use the scissors in the drawer,” she said crossly, gesturing to the vanity where he’d set the penknife.

Just moments later Swan’s panty hose were in shreds and so were her nerves. She told herself that going commando was preferable to having an FBI agent in her pants, but as Gaines snipped away at her underwear, she wondered how this entry would look in her journal. “Tonight I was handcuffed in my bathroom while an FBI agent surgically removed his hand from my panty hose, after which he hauled me to jail and threw me in a holding cell with hookers and drug addicts.”

A shudder started at the base of her heels and slithered up her spine.

“Hold still,” he said. “I’m almost there.”

She didn’t ask where. She just closed her eyes and held her breath until she felt the wad begin to give way. A moment later his fingers were no longer nestled against her private parts and the garrote that was strangling her stomach was gone! With a few more snips of the scissors, he had the lingerie free and he was gingerly peeling it off her. He even made sure her lower extremities were covered with her skirt. What a prince.

What was that he was humming? “Natural Woman?”

She opened her eyes and was surprised to find him standing there, studying her intently, his hands planted on his hips. She could hardly believe this was the same man who’d nearly achieved lift-off in her design center. He could have had the decency to look a little flustered, couldn’t he? Especially when she was breathing like a distance runner. All she could think about at that moment was the satisfaction of breaking through his reserve and making him squirm, too.

“I’m going to take the cuffs off,” he said, leveling a firm gaze at her. “But I don’t want any problems. Understand?”

He even waited for her to nod.

The moment her hands were free, Swan adjusted her blouse and skirt, as if that could restore her respectability. “This is outrageous,” she said in a trembling voice. “How dare you come in here and accuse me of— What am I accused of anyway?”

“You’re under arrest for several counts of bank fraud, embezzlement, conspiracy and forgery. Serious stuff.”

Swan gaped at him as he took a card from his coat pocket and began to Mirandize her. He was as nonchalant as if he’d never been messing around in her pants, as if he hadn’t made her tremble and gasp.

She heard the words about her rights, heard what he said about lawyers and about how anything she said could and would be used against her in a court of law. She heard every bit of it, but none of it truly registered. It felt as if she were not in her own skin anymore. Was she going into shock?

“Do you understand your rights as I’ve explained them to you?”

“Uh—”

“I need a yes or no.”

She gave him a defiant look, her spirit flooding back. “Yes, I understand my rights, and I also understand that I haven’t done anything wrong. You and your buddy out there have made a terrible mistake.”

“Have we?” he said. “It’s all on videotape.”

“Videotape of what?”

“Of you, forging a name on loan documents and walking out of the bank with an unauthorized bank draft for—”

“Unauthorized?” Until this very moment Swan had clung to the notion that this was a practical joke or some kind of mistake. Now, with a clarity that made her heart tumble, she understood what was happening. She didn’t know what he meant by “unauthorized check,” but she had signed Lynne’s name to the loan papers and somehow the Feds had found out. Those were serious charges.

But she could explain them!

She forced herself to breathe, even to smile. “It is a mistake. All you have to do is call Art Long at First National Heritage. He’ll explain everything.”

Art would probably lose his job over this, she realized, if he hadn’t already. She didn’t want that to happen, but she didn’t want to go to jail, either.

“Art Long has been taken into custody. He’s cooling his heels down at the federal building right now. And by the way, he cracked under pressure and told us everything.”

She stared at him in amazement. “You arrested Arthur? What did he do?”

“Conspired with you to rob First National Heritage.”

“No! That’s ridiculous. Lynne Carmichael and I got a loan from the bank. I did sign her name, yes, but I had her permission, and she’s my business partner.”

Gaines nodded, not particularly interested, apparently. “Long gave you some papers today and a book,” he said. “A gift, I believe. Where is that book now?”

Swan shook her head, confused. “The organizer?”

“Yes.”

“It’s right there.” She pointed to the floor between the commode and the vanity. In her haste to get her panties down, she had set it there.

Gaines took some rubber gloves from his coat pocket and tugged them onto his hands. He picked up the organizer, gave it a cursory once-over, and then opened the bathroom door a crack. “Hey, Joe, you want to witness this?”

From her vantage point, Swan could see Gerard as he sat on a chair in the far corner of the bedroom. He looked forlorn and frightened. Joe Harris stood over him, scribbling notes on a small pocket-size pad. Gerard glanced up and shrugged, obviously as much in the dark as she was herself. Harris said something to Gerard that she couldn’t hear. Gerard nodded weakly and stood up. He offered Swan a tiny smile and then left the room.

Special Agent Harris pulled on his own pair of gloves as he entered the bathroom. “Find it?” he asked.

Gaines casually waved the engraved book to prove he had it.

Swan’s stomach was in knots as both men focused on her. She felt like a lab specimen. “What does this have to do with the loan papers?” she asked.

Neither man replied. The silent treatment in full swing. Gaines plucked out the cashier’s check she’d picked up from Art Long yesterday. He handed it to Harris, who studied it for a moment and then slipped it into a clear plastic bag he’d taken from his pocket. As Harris was doing this, Gaines picked up the penknife that he’d planned to operate with and carefully cut a razor-fine slit down the inside of the book’s back cover. Swan was aghast. He’d ruined it! Wasn’t her underwear enough?

“What are you doing with my check?” she asked Harris. And then to Gaines, “Look what you’ve done to my organizer!”

“Evidence,” Harris said.

“Evidence,” Gaines said.

“Evidence of what? I’ve done nothing wrong. It’s all a mistake. Lynn will tell you that!”

Gaines arched his brows. “This is a mistake?”

Swan watched in silence as he carefully removed a piece of paper that had obviously been hidden between the book cover and its back piece. He held it up for her to see. It was another cashier’s check of some sort. It was made out to Lynne Carmichael and the amount brought a gasp of disbelief.

Four million, nine-hundred-thousand dollars and no cents.