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It just didn’t makesense.
“What do you mean you think Abe was murdered?”
He held up his hand, but they’d locked themselves in a bathroom about the size of a Tardis—without the magic inside—and now Hudson leaned against the door, his arms folded over his impressive football chest, wearing a grim expression.
Gone was the Greek god, and now she faced a tired, just-a-little-bit-frayed, self-appointed bodyguard who apparently wasn’t going to let her out of the room.
And maybe she didn’t want to go anywhere either, so there was that.
“According to your boss, or maybe it was the other guy, Abe was poisoned. And yeah, Ziggy said that she thought the assassin after you was this guy Alfonzo that you met—”
“Alan Martin, according to Ziggy. Ex-CIA spy.”
“Right. Him. But she wasn’t sure, and she said there was no way to track down who did this until after the hit was done, right?”
“Where are you going with this?”
“Well, maybe—maybe it’s not Alan.”
“Then who?”
Outside in the hallway, voices hummed in conversation, most of it in English, although she heard some French, some Spanish, maybe some German. Abe had been well known and beloved as a line judge before he moved to umpire.
“Well, that’s the thing—what if Abe was on the hit list too? And now that he’s—”
“Dead? Now that he’s dead, we can figure out who wantsmedead?”
He made a face. “Well, yeah.”
“That’s horrible.”
“Sorry.”
She turned, grabbed some toilet paper, and pressed it against her eyes. Oh brother. She wasn’t a crier, but something about losing Abe… “He was just about the nicest man I knew. Besides my dad.” She lowered the tissue. Perfect. Now she had black smudges. And then… “What if this is my fault?”
She looked up. Hud had narrowed his eyes at her. “I don’t think—”
“I mean. This happened after…well, the thing in Prague, right?”
“You mean the thing where your cousin nearly bled to death, right before my eyes?”
And for a second, she saw it all in his eyes—the rainy night, the dark outline of Tate, his contact, the moment when an assassin stabbed him. She’d seen it all.
She’d also seen Hudson run out from his secure position and save Tate’s life, so there was that too.
“Yes,” she said softly. “I keep asking myself—why would Alan want me on that bridge?”
“I sort of thought it was because he wanted to frame me for Tate’s murder.”
She looked at Hud. “Oh. I hadn’t thought ofthat.”
“Why else? You were supposed to take pictures, send them back to him, right?”
Right.
“Why would he want to frame you?”
“I don’t know. Take me out of the picture? I have no idea.”
