Lethal Attraction: Against the Rules\Fatal Affair Read online

  “I’ll…ah…give you a moment,” he heard Sam say as she followed him.

  In the hallway, she joined Nick in resting her head against the cinderblock wall. “Are you all right?”

  “I was,” he said with a sigh. “I was doing a really good job of convincing myself, despite what I saw yesterday, that he was in Richmond or at the farm. But after that, after seeing him like that…”

  “Denial’s not an option any more.”

  “No.”

  Soft words and sounds of weeping drifted from the conference room.

  “I’ve never before felt like I didn’t belong with them. Not once in all the years I’ve known them, have I ever felt I didn’t belong…until in there…just now…” His voice caught, and he was surprised when her hand landed on his arm.

  “They love you, Nick. Anyone can see that.”

  “John was my link to them. That’s gone now.” His head ached, his eyes burned. Hating the uncharacteristic bout of self-pity but needing her more than he’d needed anyone in a long time, he sighed. “He’s gone…my job…everything.”

  Sam squeezed his arm and then removed her hand abruptly when Freddie came around the corner.

  Seeming to sense he was interrupting something, Freddie paused and looked to her for guidance.

  “They needed a minute after seeing him,” she said. “Could you do me a favor and find Mr. Cappuano some water?”

  “That’s not necessary,” Nick protested.

  A nod from Sam sent Freddie off.

  “You didn’t have to—”

  “It’s water, Nick.”

  “Thank you.” He glanced over at her. “How’re you holding up?”

  “I’m tired.”

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “Something else.”

  She cast her eyes down at the floor and kicked at the tile with the pointed toe of her fashionable black boot. “I’m pissed. Seeing those people,” she nodded toward the conference room. “Others like them. Something like this happens to them and their lives are permanently altered. That bothers me. A lot.”

  “You care. That’s what makes you such a good cop.”

  “I don’t know too many who’d call me a good cop lately.”

  Taking her hand, he saw that he’d startled her with his public display of affection. “There’s no one else I’d rather have on John’s case. No one.” He surprised her further when he kissed the back of her hand and released it.

  Before Sam could chew him out for the risky PDA, Freddie returned with a cold bottle of water for Nick.

  “Thank you.”

  “May I have a word, Sergeant?” Freddie said.

  “Of course,” Sam said. To Nick, she added, “Tell them we’ll be right in.”

  *

  Sam followed Freddie into the conference room across the hall and closed the door. “I know what you’re going to say, and it’s not what you think.”

  “Guilty conscience, Sergeant?”

  Since his question was accompanied by a teasing smile she didn’t remind him that she outranked him by a mile and an insubordination complaint wouldn’t look good on his record. “Not at all.”

  “The financials came back on all the principal players.”

  “And?”

  “Royce Hamilton is up to his eyeballs in debt.”

  Sam’s heart reacted to the burst of adrenaline by skipping in her chest. “Is he now?”

  “There’s a lien on their house, which is mortgaged to the hilt.”

  “And his kids were O’Connor’s likely heirs. Very interesting, indeed.”

  “We also found a regular monthly payment of three thousand dollars from the senator’s personal account to a woman named Patricia Donaldson. I ran the name and came up with hundreds of hits, which I’ve got some people checking into.”

  “We can ask his parents who she is.”

  “Third thing, the tox screen on the senator was clean, except for the small amount of alcohol we already knew about. No drugs, prescription or otherwise.”

  “Okay, that’s good,” she said, starting for the door. “One less thing to figure out.”

  “Wait,” he said. “I wasn’t done.”

  She waved an impatient hand to encourage him to proceed.

  “They found porn on his home computer. A lot of it.”

  “Kids?”

  “None so far, but what’s there is hard core.”

  She smoothed her hands over her hair. “Christ, can you believe a United States senator would take such chances?”

  Freddie frowned at her use of the Lord’s name. “What do you suppose it means for the case?”

  “I don’t know. Let me think about it. Any word on the warrant to search Christina Billings’s car and apartment?”

  “I just checked when I went back to get the water and nothing yet.”

  “What the hell is taking so long?” she fumed. “If we don’t have it by the time we finish with the parents, I’ll get the chief involved.”

  “What about Hamilton?”

  “After we get the wife and in-laws out of there, we’ll go at him.”

  Freddie’s eyes lit up with anticipation. “Good cop, bad cop?”

  “If necessary.”

  “Can I be bad cop this time? Please?”

  She shot him a withering look that said “as if.”

  “I never get to be bad cop,” he said with a pout. “It’s so not fair.”

  “Grow up, Freddie,” she shot over her shoulder as she crossed the hall to where the O’Connors waited. Before she opened the door, she took a moment to collect herself, to take her emotions out of the equation. She appreciated that Freddie knew her moods well enough by then not to question what she was doing or why. “Ready?”

  He nodded.

  Sam opened the door. “I’m sorry to keep you waiting.” She did her best to avoid looking directly at the four faces ravaged by grief as she took them through what the police knew so far, leaving out anything that would compromise the integrity of the investigation.

  “So you’re telling me that after two days, you’ve got absolutely nothing?” Graham said.

  “We have several persons of interest we’re taking a hard look at,” Sam said as the chief slipped into the room. She nodded at him and returned her attention to the O’Connors. “I wish I could tell you more, but we’re working as hard and as fast as we can.”

  Graham turned to the chief. “I’ve known you a lot of years, Joe. I need the very best you’ve got.”

  Chief Farnsworth glanced at Sam. “You’re getting it. I have full faith in Sergeant Holland and Detective Cruz as well as the team backing them up.”

  “So do I,” Nick said quietly from where he stood against the back wall.

  Senator and Mrs. O’Connor turned to him.

  With his eyes trained on Sam, Nick said, “I’ve known Sergeant Holland for six years. There’s no one more dedicated or thorough.”

  As Sam fought to keep her mouth from dropping open in shock at the unexpected endorsement, Senator O’Connor held Nick’s intent gaze for a long moment before he stood and held out his hand to his wife. “In that case, we should let you get back to work. We’ll count on you to keep us informed.”

  “You have my word, Senator,” Chief Farnsworth said. “I’ll show you out.”

  “Before you go,” Sam said, “can you tell us who Patricia Donaldson was to your son?”

  Graham and Laine exchanged glances but their expressions remained neutral.

  “She was a friend of John’s,” he said.

  “From high school,” Laine added.

  “A friend he paid three thousand dollars a month to?”

  “John was an adult, Sergeant,” Graham said, appearing nonplussed to hear about the payments. “What he did with his money was his business. He didn’t have to explain it to us.”

  “Where does she live?” Sam asked.

  “Chicago, I believe,” Graham said.

  Inter