“Rylee’s taking this pretty hard. The whole drive over here, she kept going over all the things she could have done for him these past few months instead of taking up the position that he was a bastard who didn’t deserve anyone’s help.”

  “I think those are the same thoughts going through Briar’s mind.”

  “Any idea who did this? Does it have anything to do with that Black Jacket outfit?”

  “I think it has everything to do with it.” I ran my hand over the top of my head, trying to order my chaotic thoughts. “Abraham Black called me.”

  Maclean looked hard at me. “The guy Roman was meeting with the night Rylee nearly died?”

  “Yeah. The owner of Black Jacket. He offered me a position with his company not long ago, insisting that Johnson coming after Rylee was all some sort of test of my skills.”

  “No kidding?” Maclean said lightly, but a dark cloud passed over his face

  “He didn’t appreciate me turning him down. Not long afterward, his people discovered some emails Paxton sent me about that guy, Vaughn.”

  “He was dirty?”

  “Very. But he was also working with Homeland Security, something I’m pretty sure Black Jacket isn’t aware of yet.”

  “No shit?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You think them killing Roman was retaliation for that?”

  “I think them killing Roman was retaliation against him for something he was supposed to do and didn’t. I’m still working that one out.” I looked across at Briar. “I also think it was a message for me.”

  “Why?”

  “Abraham called me as he killed him.”

  Maclean pushed away from the car, and stood opposite me. “You are serious right?”

  “I heard Pierce scream. Ten minutes later, the alarms went off.” I gestured to the house. “Must be when they brought him to the house.”

  “Then you should have it on the feed!”

  I nodded. But a part of me was afraid to look. Roman knew there were cameras all around the house and in it. It wasn’t a secret. Most people in town were talking about it, and Roman had been arrested a few days ago because he had set off the alarm.. Was it possible Abraham hadn’t known, that he hadn’t noticed them when he approached the house? Somehow, I doubted that. He was too careful, too aware of everything around him. But why then, would he choose Briar’s house? He had to have known about the cameras and he had to have known I would get an alarm signal when he entered the house. That’s what made me think it wasn’t just Roman’s murder that was a message.

  I pulled the phone out of my pocket and opened the app where the feeds from the cameras on Briar’s house were stored. I hesitated a second with my finger over the thumbnail that indicated the alarms that had gone off moments before Briar found her husband in her living room. Maclean stood close to me, looking over my shoulder, and we both watched as a man dragged Roman’s body across the backyard, nearly tripping over a child’s tricycle in the yard. Across the yard and up onto the porch. He forced the back door with some sort of pry bar, but his face was never turned to the camera, never revealed. He was wearing a shirt I recognized, so familiar that my heart sank.

  In the house there were two cameras that caught the man and his burden, one by the back door, the other in the sitting room. We watched as the man settled Roman on the couch, where carefully positioned him to look as if was sitting there almost naturally. And then he looked up at the camera.

  “That’s you!” Maclean exclaimed quietly

  I nodded. The face that looked up, smiling over Roman’s dead body, was mine.

  But was it my imagination, or had I seen a break in the video just before his face was revealed? It couldn’t be my imagination. The video had been edited; I was sure of it. Someone had to have messed with the image—but how was I going to prove that?

  It was me. The face that looked up, smiling over Roman’s dead body, was mine.

  Chapter 1

  Dear Roman,

  Class was tough today. I couldn’t keep my eyes open since the baby got me up four times in the night. Four times! How can a child eat that often? But every time, she sucked like her life depended on it—which I suppose, in a way, that it does—and then fell right back to sleep. And, of course, I couldn’t just put her back in her bassinet. I had to sit there and admire her pretty face, her perfect little fingers and toes, her button of a nose. I still can’t believe something so small and precious came out of me!

  She’s in daycare now. I can’t express how grateful I was to discover there was an opening in the daycare here on campus. I’ve scheduled my classes so I can go see her for a few minutes between classes. When I can keep my eyes open, that is! But we’re doing all right. I wish I had family I could trust to come and sit with her, a grandmother who wouldn’t mind babysitting during the day, or a grandfather who would want to spoil her rotten. Unfortunately, my father is still in jail and my mother… I don’t even know where she is now. She took off a couple of days after the judge said my dad would have to serve fifteen years this time. Not too surprising. She only sticks around people who are willing to do for her.

  Speaking of family, I saw your sister the other day. She just came up to me and introduced herself. I guess rumors about me and Molly have gotten back to them. She was really nice, offered to help anytime I might need it. But she seemed to be going through her own sort of trouble, so I don’t think I’ll take her up on it. But it was nice to meet her.

  Anyway, I need to get to bed before Molly wakes for her first feeding. Talk to you again soon.

  I really hope you’re getting these letters.

  Briar

  Kai

  I played the video over and over again on my laptop, trying to figure out how they had done it and when, They must have been monitoring the camera feed in the house for days.

  Why hadn’t I noticed it? Why hadn’t I seen that my system had been compromised? How could I have been that stupid?

  I guessed the cops would get there eventually, but that was the least of my worries.

  There was something else I had noticed about the video. They’d searched the house. There was no evidence of another person in the room other than the man who had positioned Roman on the couch, but there must have been. Objects had been moved around and then returned to their former places; and then they were in slightly different places again indicating a second search The video had been edited—cleverly— but there were still discrepancies. They had been looking for something, which made me wonder if Briar, unknowingly, had something they needed. But how could she have? She hadn’t had contact with Roman in weeks except for the night he broke into her house.

  Was that why he’d done it? But had Roman stashed something in the house before this?

  If so, Briar could be in trouble.

  . He would never hurt her again. Her divorce was no longer an issue and she would never again have to fight his visitation rights, which normally meant his taking their daughter and dumping her on a nanny paid for by his mother, while he went out to get drunk. However, now she would have to worry about Roman’s mother making trouble over custody of Molly, using her money and influence to interfere with Briar’s natural rights. Not to mention the questions Molly would have someday about her father’s death, and the cloud she would live under until someone was arrested and tried for Pierce’s murder. This didn’t fix Briar’s problems; it only traded one set for another.

  I felt responsible. Maybe if I hadn’t begun checking into Roman’s connection to Black Jacket, things might not have come to this. But, again, if I hadn’t, Briar and Molly would have been even more vulnerable. Whatever Roman’s dealings with Black Jacket had been, he had put both Briar and his daughter in real danger.

  something had come back to me early this morning when I finally gave up the pretense of attempting to sleep—Roman, in the back of a squad car, asking me to protect them, to protect Molly. I thought it was odd at the time seeing how I’d just told him I would kill him for coming near them. But now, I had to wonder if he’d known something. Had he known they might kill him? Had he known that he’d put Briar in danger with his actions? Had he actually cared about what he’d done?

  I didn’t know. I would never know now. But it made me wonder.

  I closed my laptop and packed it away in a backpack purchased for the purpose, but rarely used. I added my phone, my wallet and keys. I swung the thing over my shoulder as I headed out the door. My receptionist looked at me curiously.

  “Where you going, boss? To class?”

  “Very funny.” I glanced out the front door, half expecting the cops to be out there, waiting to arrest me, but the parking lot was empty save for a customer of the tattoo parlor next door. “Close up for the day.”

  “What?”

  “We don’t have anything going on and neither Maclean nor Paxton are going to come in today. No reason to stick around if you want a day off.”

  “I suppose not.” But she frowned, doubt clearly expressed on her face. “Where are you going to be?”

  “I need to go check in on Briar Pierce, and then I’ll be at my house.”

  She nodded. “Okay. I’ll just have the phones forwarded to your place, then.”

  “Forward them to my cell, actually.”

  “Okay.”

  I started for the door and she called out to me as I went through the door. I turned to look at her but she came away from her desk toward me.

  “I’m sorry your friend died,” she said, giving me a hug. I pulled her close, accepting the hug, but then corrected her assumption.

  “Roman was never my friend.”

  “But you shared a room in that hospital!” I looked at her questioningly, wondering where she’d heard that. She made a gesture with her hand. “He told me that day he came to hire you.”

  “We were in the hospital at the same time. We shared a room. He was in a coma the whole time. We never even spoke. The only reason he knew about it was because some nurse told him.”

  “He said you read letters to him, that he could remember the sound of your voice.”

  “I doubt that. I read them, but he was in bad shape. I don’t think he heard.”

  Besides, I only read a few aloud, and only when the nurses came around.

  “Well, anyway…I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “Thank you.”

  I walked out to the car, feeling strange, her words not really setting well with me. My friend. My loss. He wasn’t my friend. I’d spent the last few months trying to prove he was a criminal and send him to prison! His death wasn’t my loss. It was a complication.

  I drove my massive, powder blue Skylark to Rylee’s—Briar’s house was still a crime scene—and was not really surprised to see a large number of cars in the driveway and along the curb. I had to park nearly three blocks away just to get a spot. I put the laptop bag into the trunk, . Besides, it wouldn’t look right to walk into a wake with it slung over my shoulder.

  I walked slowly, a blister that had formed on my stump the night before was beginning to bother me. I hadn’t put my sock liner on properly last night and the wrinkles it had made had l rubbed my flesh raw. I’d have to be careful over the next week or so to keep it from getting worse. The last time I’d had a blister, I hadn’t been able wear my prosthesis for three weeks.

  A woman I didn’t know opened the door at my knock, but Molly—my little buddy—caught sight of me and came running, jumping into my arms like we hadn’t seen each other in months.

  “Daddy died,” she told me.

  “I know, baby. I’m sorry.”

  She laid her head on my shoulder for a second, but being the restless five year old that she was, her head immediately popped up and she studied my face.

  “Do you have my candy?”

  I nodded, reaching into my pocket and pulling out two little hard candies. She giggled as she grabbed them from me, wriggling out of my arms to go show them to her mother. Briar was in the large living room, surrounded by people, but she was watching us. Our eyes met and I thought, for a moment, I saw a touch of relief in her eyes.

  Was she happy to see me? I was afraid to hope.

  Maclean kissed the top of Rylee’s head and came over, his expression cautious. “Everything okay?” he asked.

  “If you’re wondering if the cops have come to talk to me, they haven’t. Have you heard anything?”

  “They talked to Rylee this morning, asked her about his history in the military, about the company he’s kept since his injury. She said they asked about his trust fund and his relationship with his mother, too.”

  I frowned. “I wonder what that means?”

  “I think they’re just fishing.”

  I nodded. “Have they talked to Briar?”

  “Not since last night. But we expect them to talk to her soon.”

  “I’m surprised they haven’t. The moment they learn about their divorce, though, they’ll be right on her.”

  Maclean shrugged. “She’s having a hard time. Rylee had to practically drag her out of bed this morning.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” I glanced over at Briar. She seemed to sense my gaze and looked up, her eyes moving over my face for a moment before she turned to refocus on the woman beside her. “I need to talk to her for a second.”

  “Did you find anything to explain the video?”

  “No. But I have a good idea that they might have searched the house.”

  “In less than ten minutes?”

  I shook my head. “I think they knew about the cameras, that they found a way to bypass the alarms.”

  “But the alarms went off.”

  “When they were ready for them to.” I watched as understanding crossed his face. “Briar and Molly had a routine. Anyone who knew anything about them would have known the house would be empty until after seven.”

  “But the alarms…”

  “The system was probably compromised.”

  Maclean glanced at Rylee. “It’s the same system we used to protect her. It’s what we’ve used for most of our clients.”

  “I know. It never occurred to me it could be breached, but I guess I should have known. I should have been more diligent.”

  red-rimmed and swollen. She’d been crying.

  It bothered me to think of her crying for Roman. I knew, logically, that he had been her husband, the father of her child, and that once she had she loved him. I knew that despite the divorce and the violence between them that there was still some kind of connection. But it still hurt me to see the evidence of honest grief on her face.

  “How are you?” I asked, drawing her away from the crowd that seemed to spill into the foyer where I still stood.

  “Exhausted. And sad and angry and confused.” She smiled, a sad little smile. “I don’t know how I am, to be honest.”

  “It’ll take time to process.”

  She nodded. “I’m glad you came by.”

  I glanced at the crowd, and took her arm to lead her to the back of the house. We went into the kitchen first, but there was a group of women in there going through casseroles and plates of sweets that people had brought. I pushed her in the other direction, until we found ourselves in the master bedroom. The bed was still unmade, and Maclean’s clothes were mixed up with Rylee’s on the floor. But it was unoccupied, and that was what mattered.

  “I need to talk to you about Roman.”

  “What about him?”

  “Did he give you anything in the past few weeks, anything he asked you to keep safe?”

  She frowned, shaking her head slowly. “I haven’t—hadn’t—seen him in weeks, except for that night he broke in. Rylee took Molly to him for the visitations—since that day of the party when he was ...” She blushed, glancing at me before looking away, as if ashamed that I’d had to save her from her soon to be ex-husband. “Besides, he wouldn’t have given me anything for safe keeping. He often said he wouldn’t trust me to walk a dog, let alone do anything else. He did and said a lot of cruel things to me.”

  “That was just his anger talking. You know that.”“Do I?” She shook her "I know. I’m sorry for that.”

  “All those people out there, they seem to think I should be devastated, but I—I don’t know how to act. I don’t know if I should play the grieving widow, or if I should be having a party to celebrate the fact that I’m finally free! Everything he put me through…” She shook her head, tears beginning to spill down her cheeks. “I hated him so much, but now? I just—I can’t stop seeing him sitting there—all that blood!”

  I pulled her to me, cradling her against my chest. “I’m sorry.”

  She let me hold her, but she stood with her arms at her sides, not responding. Not really. But then, slowly, one hand came up and rested on my back, drawing me slightly closer. I stayed still, afraid of scaring her away.

  “I wish things had been different.”

  “I know you do.”

  “He wasn’t like this before. I mean, it’s not like I knew him for a long time before he went to boot camp. But he didn’t seem to be like this. He never raised his voice at me, never hit me. He was kind and gentle and… and I thought he was a good man.”

  “I know.”

  “You do, don’t you? You read my letters.” She pulled back and looked up at me. “Do you think it was the head injury that changed him?”

  “I hope so.”

  She made a soft little sound against my chest, and then pulled back, her eyes moving up to my face. “I’m sorry. This isn’t what you pulled me in here to discuss.”

  “It’s all right.”

  She bit her bottom lip, chewing on it almost thoughtfully. “Someone called me this morning, asking me questions about Roman. When did he last come to the house, when did we last have a conversation, did he tell me that he was planning to leave town any time soon…things like that.”

 

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