M.L. Gamble - Trust With Your Life

“Looking for him? Why? Has it got something to do with the Brooker case, too?”

“I can’t comment on that.”

“Can you comment on the fact that it’s too much of a coincidence that, in a county of seven million people, two witnesses in a murder trial were involved in the same fatal car wreck?”

Cortez blinked. “No, I can’t. You got any explanation for that coincidence?”

“None.”

“Then we’ll leave it there. For now.”

Molly sighed, stood and walked over to Cortez, unable to shake the feeling that the cop was lying. “I’ll come in, but it’ll have to be later this afternoon, after I check on my men.”

Quickly she explained about the crew of installers, ending by pointing to the mantel clock above the fireplace. “It’s already almost eight. I have to be there by nine, so if you’ll excuse me, I need to get dressed and call someone to come pick me up.”

Cortez took a card from his pocket and handed it to her. “That’s my address and phone number. I’ll be back in around two. Be at the precinct by then, or I’ll come and get you.”

“Don’t you ever go home?” This small attempt at a more human interaction was ignored.

“I’ll see you at two, Miss Jakes. And let me take this opportunity to advise you that if you fail to appear, I have the authority to issue a warrant for your arrest, despite your friends at the Summer Point Precinct.”

What a jerk, Molly thought. A real hardball player. “You won’t need to do that, Lieutenant. I’m willing to cooperate, even though you’re treating me like a criminal.”

For a second, Cortez’s face softened, the wrinkles in his forehead slackening into his thick head of hair. But then he turned away and headed for the door.

Molly watched as he walked away. He never turned around or said goodbye, just slammed the door shut behind him.

Molly put Cortez’s business card on the coffee table and reached for the phone. She called Rafe Amundson, her installation foreman, at the shop. He agreed to send someone out, then proceeded to give her an earful about the new female cable puller, who didn’t pull fast enough to suit Rafe.

Rafe was sixty-three, one of the last icons of the prebreakup days of Ma Bell, when “men were men and women stayed home,” as he was fond of saying.

Rafe loved stirring up trouble, especially over equal rights and E.E.O. regulations, and hearing that he was in a balky mood threatened Molly’s last remaining hold on mature behavior. He enjoyed baiting her. She decided to give him a big thrill this morning and really get into it with him.

“Tell you what, Rafe. Why don’t you come here and get me yourself? We’ll discuss Sandra Jackson’s abilities on the way out to the client’s.”

Molly hung up and headed for the shower. As she cranked the window closed, her mind replayed Cortez’s denial that anyone had been shot. Though she was no medic, she was sure of what she had seen, and the round hole in the victim’s shirt didn’t look like anything he could have picked up from being bounced out of a car.

There were so many questions.

And there was Alec Steele.

Molly shook her head hard, wishing she could shake the thought of him away. He’d terrified her. And yet compelled her. Something told her he wasn’t truly a kidnapper and killer.

But what the heck was he then? Sexy as hell, some demented part of her brain answered. Disgusted with herself, Molly soaped up and washed her hair, running the water as hot as she could stand. She cut herself twice while shaving her legs and swore loudly over her lack of concentration. Ten minutes later, she was wrapped in her baggy robe heading for the bedroom.

With any luck of the bad variety, Rafe would be here before she was ready, and he’d have “women are never ready on time” ammunition to use against her during her planned consciousness-raising session.

She threw the towel and bathrobe onto the carpet in a heap, and wiggled her damp legs into panty hose. With a snap she put on her bra, then opened the closet and stared at clothes while brushing tangles out of her hair. Business suits, silk blouses and tailored dresses filled most of the space. But this morning she wanted something different. She sorted through an assortment of “mistake” buys: tweed culotte pants that made her legs look fat, a blue angora sweater dress that shed worse than a cat, a leather miniskirt that bunched up at the waist.

Finally she grabbed a beige silk dirndl and its matching cropped jacket. With a white sleeveless blouse, the outfit enhanced her skin, moderately freckled with typical brunette undertones of peach and brown. She hung the clothes on the doorknob and dropped to her knees to hunt in the bottom of the closet for beige pumps.

The bells from the front door chimed merrily. “Damn.” Molly was beginning to suffer from the lack of sleep. She suddenly felt furious, for the mistaken call for help that had halved her sleeping time, for the gruesome accident, for the damn Aussie stranger who didn’t seem at all suited to his adopted role as a criminal.

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