Читать книгу For the Baby's Sake - Beverly Long - Страница 9

Detective Sawyer Montgomery arrived just minutes after the bomb squad had disarmed, dismantled and disconnected—she wasn’t sure of the technical term—the bomb that had been left in the middle of Jamison’s desk. It had taken them eleven minutes to arrive. The longest eleven minutes of Liz’s life.

Beat cops had been on the scene within minutes of the 911 call that Liz had made from Jamison’s phone after she’d pulled him, his phone and herself from the building. They’d blocked off streets and rousted people from their apartments. OCM’s neighbors, many still in their pajamas, had poured from the nearby buildings. Mothers with small children in their arms, old people barely able to maneuver the steps, all were hustled behind a hastily tacked-up stretch of yellow police tape.

Liz had wondered if Detective Montgomery would come. She hated to admit it, but she’d considered calling him. In those first frantic moments before help had arrived, she’d desperately hoped for someone capable. And Detective Montgomery absolutely screamed capable. She doubted the man ever encountered anything he couldn’t handle.

But now that he’d arrived, Liz wanted to run. She couldn’t decide if she wanted to run to him to seek shelter in his embrace or run far from him to protect herself from his intensity, his questions, his knowing looks.

Liz watched him get out of the car and scan the crowd. He said something to the man who rode with him. Liz knew the exact moment he spotted her. It didn’t matter that three hundred yards separated them. Liz felt the shiver run up her arm just as if he’d touched her.

“What the hell happened?” he asked when he reached her.

Liz swallowed, trying very hard not to cry. How ridiculous would that be? No one had been hurt. No one injured. And she hadn’t even thought about crying until Detective Montgomery had approached.

“Bomb threat,” she said. “Actually, more than a threat, I guess. The bomb squad removed it just a few minutes ago.”

“Where was it?”

“In the middle of my boss’s desk. In a brown sack.” The tears that she’d dreaded sprang to her eyes.

“Hey.” Detective Montgomery reached out and touched her arm. “Are you okay?”

He sounded so concerned. That almost made the dam break. “I’m fine, really. Everyone’s just been great.”

Detective Montgomery frowned at her, but he didn’t let go. The most delicious heat spread up her arm.

“Come over here.” He guided her toward the curb.

“Okay.” Whatever he wanted. As long as she didn’t have to think. Because then she’d think about it, the bomb and the look on Jamison’s face. She’d remember the pure panic she’d felt as they’d run from the building.

He pulled his hand away, and Liz felt the immediate loss of heat all the way to her stomach, which was odd since his hand had been nowhere near her stomach. He unbuttoned his suit coat, took it off and folded it. He placed it on the cement curb. “Why don’t you sit down?” he suggested, pointing at his coat.

“I can sit on cement,” she protested.

“Not and keep those…short pants clean,” he said. His face turned red. “I know there’s a word for them, but I can’t think of it right now.”

He was smokin’ hot when he was serious and damn cute when he was embarrassed. It was a heck of a combination. “They’re called capri pants.”

He smiled. “It might have come to me.”

Oh, boy. She sat down. She knew she needed to before she swooned. “I’m sure it would have, Detective Montgomery.”

“Sawyer,” Detective Montgomery said. “Just Sawyer is fine.”

Liz nodded. The man was just being polite. After all, in a span of less than forty-eight hours, their paths had crossed three times. They weren’t strangers any longer. She was sitting on his coat. “Liz is fine, too,” she mumbled.

“Liz,” he repeated.

She liked the way the z rolled off his tongue. She liked the way all the consonants and the vowels, too, for that matter, rolled off his tongue. It was a molten chocolate center bubbling out of a freshly baked cake. Smooth. Enticing.

Maybe he could read her the dictionary for the next week.

“I need to ask you some questions,” he said.

She wasn’t going to get a week. “Sure.” Why the heck not? Together they sat on the faded gray cement, hips close, thighs almost touching. Liz wanted to lean her head against his broad shoulder but knew that would startle the hell out of him.

She settled for closing her eyes. It seemed like a lifetime ago that she’d crawled out of bed and caught the fiveo’clock bus.

“Sawyer?”

Liz opened her eyes. The man who had been with Sawyer when he’d arrived now stood in front of the two of them. He was an inch taller and probably ten pounds heavier than Sawyer. He had the bluest eyes she’d ever seen.

Was the sky raining gorgeous men?

“What did you find out?” Sawyer spoke to the man.

“Bomb, all right. Big enough that it would have done some damage. Quick to shut down. Looks like they wanted to make it easy for us.”

Sawyer didn’t say anything.

“Who are you?” Liz asked.

The man’s face lit up with a broad smile showing perfect teeth. “I’m Detective Robert Hanson. My partner has no manners. Otherwise, he’d have introduced us.”

“I’m Liz Mayfield.”

“I guessed that. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I—”

“What else?” Sawyer interrupted his partner.

Detective Hanson shrugged. “We’ll get the lab reports back this afternoon. Don’t expect much. Guys thought it looked like a professional job.”

“Professional?” Sawyer shook his head. “Half the kids in high school know how to build a bomb.”

“True.” Detective Hanson stared at Sawyer. “Did you get her statement?”

“Not yet,” Sawyer said, pulling a notebook and pen from his pocket.

Detective Hanson frowned at both of them. Then he turned toward Liz. “Who got in first this morning?”

“I did,” she said. “I got here about five-thirty.”

Sawyer looked up from his notebook. “Short night?”

Liz shrugged, not feeling the need to explain.

“Door locked when you got here, Ms. Mayfield?” Detective Hanson asked.

“Yes. After I came in, I locked it again and reset the alarm.”

“You sure?”

“I’m usually the first person in. I know the routine.”

“Did you see anything unusual once you got inside?”

“No. I went to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee.”

“Then what?”

“I heard the front door, and then I thought I heard Jamison’s door open. It appears I was right.”

“You didn’t see anybody?” Detective Hanson continued.

“No. When I left the kitchen, I looked around.”

“Then what—”

“You looked around?” Sawyer interrupted his partner.

“Yes.”

“You should have called the police.”

She frowned at him. His tone had an edge to it. “I can’t call the police every time I hear a door.”

“You got a threat mailed to your office, and then shots were fired through your window,” Sawyer said. “Maybe you should have given that some thought before you decided to investigate.”

“Maybe we should keep going.” Detective Hanson spoke to Sawyer. “You’re taking notes, right?”

Sawyer didn’t respond.

“After I looked around—” she emphasized the words “—I went down to my office and started working. After Jamison arrived, we came upstairs for coffee.”

“What time was that?”

“Almost eight. Jamison’s cell phone rang and then…we called 911. That’s about it.”

“It sounds like you stayed pretty calm. That takes a lot of guts.” Detective Hanson smiled at her again.

She smiled back this time. “Thank you.”

Sawyer grabbed Robert’s arm. “Come on. Let’s go. I want to talk to the boss.”

Liz stood—so quickly that her head started to spin. She picked up Sawyer’s suit coat, shook it and thrust it out to him. “Don’t forget this,” she said.

He reached for it, and their fingers brushed. The fine hairs on her arm reacted with a mind of their own. What the heck was going on? She’d never ever had this kind of physical reaction to a man. Especially not one who acted as if he might think she was an idiot.

Sawyer jerked his own arm back. “I’ll…uh…talk to you later,” he said. Great. She had him tripping over his own tongue.

Sawyer got twenty feet before Robert managed to catch him. “Hang on,” he said. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

Sawyer shook his head. “Just forget it.”

“You act like an idiot and think I’m going to forget it?”

“Maybe you’ve forgotten this. We’re here to investigate a crime. We’ve got a lot of people to talk to. I didn’t think it made sense to spend any more time with Liz.”

“Liz,” Robert repeated.

“Yeah, Liz.” Sawyer did his best to sound nonchalant. “She told me I could call her Liz.”

“Since when do you hang all over witnesses?”

“I wasn’t hanging all over her. She seemed upset. I offered her some comfort. Perhaps you’ve heard of it. It’s called compassion.” Sawyer started to walk away.

Robert kept pace. “That wasn’t compassion I saw. That was a mating call. What’s going on here, partner?”

Sawyer didn’t know. Didn’t have a clue why he started to unravel every time he got within three feet of Liz. “Liz Mayfield is a material witness to a crime. We had questioned her. I figured we needed to move on.”

“That’s it?”

“What else could it be?”

Robert looked him in the eye and nodded. “Your timing sucks. I could have had little Lizzy’s phone number in another two minutes.”

“Lizzy,” Sawyer repeated.

“She’s my type.”

Sawyer clamped down on the impulse to punch his partner, his best friend for the past two years. “She is nothing like your type.”

Robert cocked his head. “Really?”

“Yeah. Really.”

“I’ll be damned.” Robert laughed, his face transformed by his smile. “You like her.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Sawyer walked away from his partner.

Robert ran to catch up with him. “You’re interested in a witness. Mr. Professional, Mr. I always use my Southern manners. This has got to be killing you.”

“Liz Mayfield is going to help me get Mirandez. That’s my only interest,” Sawyer said.

Robert slapped him on the back. “You just keep telling yourself that, Sawyer. Let’s go talk to the boss.”

When Sawyer and Robert reached Liz’s boss, the man held up a finger, motioning them to wait while he finished his telephone call. From the one side of the conversation that Sawyer could hear, it sounded as if the guy was making arrangements to refer his clients on to other sources. After several minutes, the man ended the call and put his smartphone in his pocket.

“Detective Montgomery.” The man greeted Sawyer, giving him a lopsided smile. “I have to admit I was hoping there wouldn’t be any reason for us to talk again.”

Sawyer felt sorry for him. He looked as if he’d just lost his best friend. “This is my partner, Detective Robert Hanson.”

“Nice to meet you, Detective Hanson. I’m Jamison Curtiss, the executive director of OCM.”

Sawyer watched Robert shake the man’s hand, knowing Robert was rapidly cataloging almost everything there was to know about Jamison.

“I understand you got the call this morning, warning you of the bomb,” Sawyer said.

“Yes. I’d just gotten to work. It was probably about ten minutes before eight.”

“What happened then?”

“Liz and I left the building.”

“Then what?” Sawyer prompted the man, reaching into his pocket for his notebook.

“Then I got a second call.”

“What?” Sawyer stopped taking notes.

“The second call came in just after they’d found the bomb. Same guy who called the first time. Congratulated me on following directions. Then he told me that unless I closed the doors of OCM, there would be another bomb. I wouldn’t know when or where, but there would be one.”

“Liz Mayfield didn’t say anything about a second call.” Sawyer couldn’t believe that she’d withheld information like that.

“She doesn’t know. I’m not looking forward to telling her.”

“Anybody else hear this call?” Not that Sawyer didn’t believe the guy. The man looked shaken.

“No. It lasted about ten seconds. Then the guy hung up.”

“What are you going to do?” Sawyer asked, keeping one eye on Jamison and casting a quick glance back at Liz. His heart skipped a beat when he didn’t see her right away. Then he spied her. She had her back toward him. It took him all of three seconds to realize he was staring at her butt and another five to tear his glance away.

Robert laughed at him. He was quiet about it—just loud enough to make sure Sawyer heard him. Jamison Curtiss looked confused. Sawyer nodded at the man to continue.

“In the past forty-eight hours,” Jamison said, “one of my employees received an anonymous threat. On top of that, my business has been shot at and almost blown up. Whoever is trying to get my attention has it. Unless you can tell me that you know who’s responsible, I don’t think I have a lot of options.”

“We don’t know—” Robert spoke up “—but we will. Who has a key to OCM?”

“All the counselors. And our receptionist. Everyone has a slightly different schedule.”

“And everybody knows the code to turn off the alarm?” Robert asked.

“Of course.”

“Keys to the office doors all the same?”

“Yes.”

“Same as to the front door?”

“Yes.”

Sawyer and Robert exchanged a look. One key and a code. Child’s play for somebody like Mirandez.

“You already gave us a list of employees with their home addresses. I’d like their personnel files, too,” Robert said.

Jamison wrinkled his nose. “Is that really necessary?” he asked.

“Yes.” Sawyer answered in a manner that made sure Jamison knew it wasn’t an option.

“Fine. I’ll have them to you by this afternoon.”

“Anybody else have a key? A cleaning service, perhaps?”

“We all know how to run a vacuum. We can’t afford to pay someone to clean.”

“Anybody really new on your staff?”

“No, we’ve all been working together for years. Liz and Carmen came at about the same time.”

“Carmen?” Robert asked.

“Lucky for her, her brother wasn’t feeling well this morning. She came to work late.” Jamison pointed to the group of counselors gathered across the street. “Carmen Jimenez is the dark-haired woman standing next to Liz.”

“My God, she’s beautiful,” Robert said, then looked surprised that the comment had slipped out. “Sorry,” he added.

Jamison shrugged. “That’s the reaction most men have. Many of our clients are Spanish-speaking. She’s a big asset.”

Sawyer studied the two women who stood close together, deep in conversation. Carmen stood half a head shorter, her black hair and darker skin a stark contrast to Liz’s blond hair and fair complexion. “Liz and Carmen close?”

“Best friends. We’re all like family.” Frustration crossed Jamison’s face. “I’ve got to talk to them,” he muttered. “They deserve to know what’s going on.”

Sawyer watched him walk across the street, joining Liz, Carmen and one other woman, who looked about ten years older. He assumed it was Cynthia, the counselor who just worked mornings. He couldn’t hear what Jamison told them, but by the looks on their faces, they were shocked, scared and, he thought somewhat ironically, Liz and Carmen looked downright mad.

It took another ten minutes before the group broke up. Jamison walked back to Sawyer and Robert. “Well, they know. I told them that I’ve already started making arrangements for our current clients to be referred to other agencies. We have a responsibility to these young girls.”

Sawyer understood responsibility. After all, he’d made it his responsibility to bring in Mirandez. “I’m going to go talk to Liz,” Sawyer said to Robert.

Robert gave Liz and Carmen another look. “I’ll go with you,” he said.

When Sawyer reached Liz, he realized that Mary Thorton sat on the bench directly behind her. The young girl looked up when Sawyer and Robert approached. She didn’t smile, frown or show any emotion at all. She just stared at the two of them.

Sawyer couldn’t help staring back. The girl had on a green shirt and a too-tight orange knit jumper over it. With her big stomach, she looked like a pumpkin. Then the dress moved in ripples.

Sawyer remembered the first time he’d felt his baby move. It had rocked his world. He’d first put his hand on his girlfriend’s stomach, then his cheek. It had taken another hour for the baby to roll over again, but the wait had been worth it.

Sawyer stuck his hand out toward Carmen Jimenez. “Ms. Jimenez,” he said. “I’m Detective Montgomery.”

“Good morning,” she said.

“This is my partner, Detective Hanson.”

Robert reached out his own hand. “It’s a pleasure, Ms. Jimenez.” Robert smiled at the woman. It was the same smile Sawyer had seen work very well for Robert in the past.

Carmen Jimenez didn’t have the reaction that most women had. She nodded politely and shook Robert’s hand so briefly that Sawyer wasn’t sure that flesh actually touched.

Sawyer turned his attention to Mary, keeping his eyes trained on her face. He didn’t want to make the mistake of looking at her baby again. “Mary.” He spoke quietly. “Where were you at six o’clock this morning?”

“Sleeping.”

“Alone?”

Mary gave him a big smile. “I don’t like to sleep alone.”

“So, I guess whoever you were sleeping with could verify that you were in bed this morning?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Come on, Mary. Surely he or she would know if you’d slipped out of bed.”

“Trust me on this, Cop. It wouldn’t be a she.”

“Didn’t think so,” Sawyer said. “What’s his name?”

“I can’t tell you.”

The girl’s eyes had widened, and Sawyer thought her lower lip trembled just a bit. Liz must have seen it, too, because she sat down next to Mary and wrapped her arm around the girl’s shoulders.

Sawyer deliberately softened his voice. He needed Mary. Hated to admit it but he did. “Mary, we can help you. But we need to know what’s going on. You need to tell us.”

“I don’t know anything. You’d need to talk to him.”

“Mirandez?”

Mary shook her head and frowned at Sawyer.

“No.”

“Who, Mary? Come on, it’s important.”

She hesitated then seemed to decide. “Well, okay. His name is Pooh.”

“Pooh?”

“Yeah. Pooh Bear. He’s been sleeping with me since I was six.”

He heard a laugh. Sawyer whirled around, and Robert suddenly coughed into his hand. Carmen, her dark eyes round with surprise, had her fingers pressed up against her lips. Sawyer looked at Liz. She stared at her shoes.

Damn. He could taste the bitter metal of the hook. The girl had baited her pole, cast it into the water and reeled him in. It was all he could do not to flop around on the sidewalk.

“Funny,” he said. “Hope you’re still laughing when you’re sitting behind bars, waiting for a trial.”

Liz stood up and jerked her head toward the right. “May I speak to you in private, Detective?”

Sawyer nodded and walked across the street. When he stopped suddenly, Liz almost bumped into him. She was close enough that he could smell her scent. It was a warm, sticky day already, but she smelled fresh and cool, like a walk through the garden on a spring night.

“Don’t threaten her,” Liz warned. “If you’re going to charge her with something, do it. Otherwise, leave her alone. This can’t be good for her or the baby.”

Sawyer took a breath and sucked her into his lungs. As crazy as it seemed, it calmed him. “She’s a little fool.”

“She’s a challenge,” Liz admitted.

Sawyer laughed despite himself. “Paper-training a new puppy is a challenge.”

Liz smiled at him, and he thought the world tilted just a bit.

“I’ll talk to her,” Liz said.

“How? Isn’t she being referred on?”

Liz glanced over her shoulder, as if making sure no one was close by. “I’m going to keep seeing her. She needs me.”

“Your boss is closing shop.”

“I know. Carmen and I already discussed it. We’ll see clients at my apartment.”

Calm disappeared. “Are you nuts?”

She lifted her chin in the air.

He pointed a finger at her. “You received a threat. Which may or may not have anything to do with the shooting. Which may or may not have anything to do with today’s bomb. Which may or may not have anything to do with Mirandez or Mary or the man in the moon. What the hell are you thinking?”

“I have to take the chance.”

She’d spoken so quietly that Sawyer had to lean forward to hear her. “Why?” The woman had a damn death wish.

“I just have to,” she said.

Was it desperation or determination that he heard in her tone? All he knew for sure was that nothing he could say was going to change her mind. “When? When are you starting this?” he asked.

“Mary’s coming to see me tomorrow.”

Great. That gave him twenty-four hours to figure out how to save them both.