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She shook her head. “I’ve never heard of either of them. Were they murdered, too? Or did Bowe meddle with their evidence?”
“I can’t say, really. Orr is dead now, anyway—my sister, Melissa, shot him in self-defense. Just wondered if you knew of either one of them.”
“No. Could be they frequented the health spa,” she offered. “Fritz used to keep a pretty good list of his clients—though, from what I’ve been told, recently they were mostly women. And not all just for his pleasure. He was particularly good with older women, patient, able to get them to stick to routines because he designed programs that were accessible, set achievable goals, and also because he made them feel good about themselves.”
Again, there was no bitterness in her tone. Glancing her way as he finally got a green light and moved slowly forward in the traffic that had stacked up, Clarke wanted in. He wanted to know how she did it. How she stayed so...impartial. Seeming to see both sides to everything.
Except about her grandmother, of course.
“Do you mind if I have an officer swing by your house and pick up Fritz’s computer so the GGPD tech guy, Ellie, can get a look at it?” he asked her.
“Of course not.”
And while he was at it... “Will you also give me permission to search his phone records?”
“Yes.”
Good. He’d have plenty of work to do to keep his mind busy—and off her—until party time.
The car’s system was a little different from his own, and though he’d already paired his phone, he pushed the wrong button while trying to make a call and ended up missing his turn. Not a big deal, he could go around the block, just didn’t like having Everleigh out any more than necessary. His course was firmly set as the shortest distance between two points.
He’d made the requests and hung up by the time he was able to right the error and make the correct turn. A red car, a newer-looking small SUV, turned when he did. Which was odd. It had been behind him, a few yards back, at the long light, too. During his time there, he’d taken an inventory of all the vehicles on all four corners. The odd thing was, he’d missed a turn. Was just doubling back. Why would someone else be mimicking his mistakes?
“Get down.” The words were an unmistakable order.
Everleigh complied immediately, ducking first and then actually turning to her side and half lying on the console. Bringing her head close enough that he could feel a brush against his side. Resisting the urge to use his body to shield her, only because he needed both hands on the wheel, he quickly did an illegal U-turn and then turned again. He’d thought he’d lost the other car for a minute, when his continued rearview-mirror glances vetted nothing, but then it was there again. Several cars back. Too many for him to make out any kind of identifying markers. He knew it was the same vehicle, though, because the passenger sun visor was at an odd angle: halfway down. He couldn’t make out a driver. Couldn’t even see if the person was wearing a ski mask or not.
“We’re being followed,” he let Everleigh know. And put in a quick call to his sister, too. And then he just drove. Not to his place, or anywhere in particular. He stayed in traffic, in the downtown area, a part of the city with a lot of police presence, waiting for the car to be pulled over. But as soon as he’d passed the turn to his condo, the red SUV seemed to have disappeared. He’d lost it in traffic, behind a Chevy Suburban—a vehicle almost twice its size—and when his view was clear again, his pursuer was gone.
His concern was not.
Chapter 10
Everleigh’s heart was still pounding as Clarke pulled into his condo garage. He’d had her stay down until they were safely inside, and she shot up as soon as he gave her the all clear, determining that she preferred to face what came head-on, not hide any more than she had to.
How could she hope to defend herself if she couldn’t see what was coming at her?
She knew there were major fallacies in her argument—didn’t want a bullet in the head, nor could she protect herself from one even if she saw it coming—but she’d just learned something about herself. She wasn’t going to run away. She was going to stand and fight.
Even if that meant spending time in close quarters and a fake intimate relationship with a man who was wreaking havoc on everything she knew about herself. Or wanted for herself.
Clarke’s phone rang before he’d even turned off the car. “Yeah,” he said succinctly. “We’re in, all good.”
And then, as he was looking around them and unbuckling his seat belt, he added, “Good. Thanks. Let me get her inside and I’ll call you back. We need to rethink her going to that party tonight.”
Her. Her?
Like she wasn’t a fully capable and functioning adult, in charge of her own life, sitting right there? Had he forgotten she’d hired him? Yeah, at his suggestion, coming from his sister, the chief of police. And, yeah, she needed his help. But...she had a say.
For the rest of her life, every breath she took, she would have a say.
And she was going to the party at her mother’s that night.
Wise enough to understand that they needed their wits about them as they exited the car, and that the faster they got up to his place the better, she held her tongue until they were locked safely inside his condominium. And he did a quick sweep of the place.
Though, with the twenty-four-hour security of the building, she wasn’t a bit surprised when he joined her at the base of the stairs to tell her that everything was fine.
She nodded, her hand on the banister, intending to head to her room to freshen up her makeup and fix her hair before heading out to her mother’s.
