Page 419 of A Matter of Time

I laughed at how uncomfortable he was. “Sorry.”

He groaned.

“I’ll be here. Hurry up.”

“Baby, don’t touch anything. If you touch something or ruin evidence then Caleb’s screwed.”

“I know. I’m just gonna walk around.”

“Baby—”

“Hurry up,” I said, and hung up.

“Jory?”

I looked at Tyler.

“Maybe I shouldn’t be here, huh?”

I nodded. “Probably not.”

“Call me later if you need a place to crash,” he said, taking my hand, turning it palm up, and writing his number in pen on my skin.

“Thanks.” I patted his shoulder.

“For the record,” he said, walking backward away from me. “You are seriously hot and a rush to hang out with, and if you wanna see me later, just call.”

I had a man. What did I want with a boy?

“Did you hear me?”

I waved and started back through the apartment.

What had I been expecting? So many thoughts ran through my head. Scenes from CSI, or Silence of the Lambs, even Seven. What had I been expecting, a severed head? Perhaps nothing so dramatic, but the apartment was pristine, and I found that strange.

In the smaller bedroom were the same kinds of things that were in Sam’s second, unused bedroom. Gym equipment and a computer and a twin bed shoved up against one wall. But if this was the place where guests slept and the free weights lived, where was the furniture that should have been in the master bedroom? Walking back out, I went through the kitchen and found nothing out of the ordinary; the living room was the same. Somebody just like me lived there, and yet the wall in the bedroom and the lack of furniture spoke to something else altogether. It didn’t add up.

The bathroom was clean, but from the products in the medicine cabinet and on the counter and under the sink, a guy lived there. The bathroom had no feminine touches, but there were a few articles of women’s clothing hanging in the closet of the master bedroom. There was nothing under the bed in the second bedroom, hardly any food in the refrigerator, and very little in the pantry as well. It was a bachelor pad, plain and simple, but whose?

I used my sweater sleeve and unlocked the sliding glass door that went out on the balcony. There was nothing out there but dead plants and wicker furniture.

“Freeze!”

Not Sam.

“Hands on your head!”

I did as I was told, and seconds later I was face down on the carpet with my hands cuffed behind me, being frisked. When I rolled my head sideways, I saw shiny black leather shoes.

“Mr. Harcourt.”

I let out a deep breath. “Agent Calhoun.”

“You think I don’t know my own city, Mr. Harcourt?”

“No, sir” was all I could think to say.

“Take him to county now. Put him in lockup.”