AllFreeNovel
Share Us
An answer at last, coming out of a brass speaker. “Yes?”
“Samantha Cargill?” Quinn asked, making it brisk.
“Yes.” The voice impatient now.
There was a camera aimed at her, Quinn had noticed. She worked some more on her expression and said, “I’d like to ask you some questions about your brother-in-law. Beckett Hughes. May I come up?”
“That son of a bitch? What’s he done now?”
Quinn kept her face carefully neutral. “May I come up and ask you some questions?” she asked again.
“Why not,” the voice said. The door buzzed, and Quinn pushed it open.
Showtime. Again.
* * *
Samantha wasn’twhat Quinn had expected. Yes, she was tall, rangy, and blonde, but she didn’t look anything like a scientist or like the photos of her sister, who’d had the alert, intelligent kind of good-looking-blonde face, like the more cerebral kind of actress. Meryl Streep, or somebody like that. Samantha’s hair was fairly short, and her face was sharper, somehow, or maybe just tougher, even though she was wearing makeup. She was wearing loose cotton pants that came to just below her knee and a short-sleeved T-shirt that showed some muscle. A day-off outfit.
At the moment, she was saying, “Would you like a cup of tea?”
“Please,” Quinn said, although she could think of lots of things she wanted more. A hole in the head, for instance. Had this country never heard oficedtea? It had been made for iced tea!
Samantha headed into another sleek, extremely modern kitchen, and Quinn perched on the inevitable barstool and looked out at the view, which was of, yes, the Brisbane River, with some hills rising beyond. “Your place is nice,” she said, although, in fact, it was another Triumph of Sterility to her. “You’re an air-traffic controller, I hear. Wow. I’ve never met one of those. Civilian, or military? I’m betting it’s civilian, if you can afford this apartment.” She’d keep up the no-class thing. Samantha, she had a feeling, might be more sympathetic to that.
“Civilian,” Samantha said. “Though I was trained in the military.”
“Oh,” Quinn said. “That’s impressive. And you’re not working today, obviously.”
“I’m on nights just now,” Samantha said. “I haven’t been to bed yet, in fact. Who are you, exactly?”
“Quinn Jeffries. I’m American, as you can probably hear. I’ve been in a relationship with your brother-in-law for a while now.”
Samantha’s hand stilled on the electric kettle she’d been filling. Then she set it on the base with deliberation, pushed the button, and got down two mugs from a shelf. “I can’t imagine why you’re here.”
“I just found out what happened to your sister,” Quinn said. “It seems so … so sketchy. Sostrange.I thought—what kind of guy am I dealing with here? But you know, he’s pretty … pretty appealing, and great guys aren’t exactly thick on the ground where I live. Maybe it’s better in Australia.”
Samantha gave a suppressed huff of laughter. “Not so much. They’re not any thicker if you’re looking at him, either. So instead of breaking up with him, you flew to Oz to check him out. That’s pretty odd.”
“I can be impulsive,” Quinn said, which was probably true. “Follow my gut.”
“Surprised you could afford it,” Samantha said.
“Ah,” Quinn said. “My family owns a … a very large store.”
“An heiress,” Samantha said.
“That sounds so worthless,” Quinn said. “Like I’m a Kardashian.” She tried to make herself look fluffier. Probably unsuccessfully. She wasn’t very fluffy to begin with, and then there was the capsule wardrobe. “I’m just … fortunate, I’d say, to be able to spend my time pursuing the things I’m interested in. Especially mysterious things.”
Samantha’s lip didn’t curl. Quite. She put teabags in the mugs and poured boiling water over them, then leaned back with her hands clutching the edge of the white quartz counter and studied Quinn from direct blue eyes. “You fancy yourself a private detective.”
“I dabble,” Quinn said. “I wasn’t expecting to find a mystery so close to home, though. It’s—well, it’s disturbing.” That was true.
“Uh-huh,” Samantha said. “What do you want to know?”
“Well,” Quinn said, “let’s start with this. How did your sister, who seems like she was a star—I looked her up—right from the start, and beautiful, too, end up with such a—well, a—”
“A mismatch? Same old story. She’s not the first woman to fall for a fella who’s not up to her class.”
