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She licked her lips, then firmly kissed him back, showing him that she was very okay with this. “Actions speak louder than words.”
“Maybe I just want to hear how much you like me.” He grinned devilishly. “I have a very sensitive ego. It needs constant reminders that I’m worthy of you.”
He said it playfully, but Lucy heard just a hint of awe and apprehension in his voice, as if she were special and he really did need to know how she felt.
“I like you,” she assured him. “You’re wonderful. You’re worthy of me. Let’s get this over with and take our mutual admiration society home.”
“Before we go upstairs, call Kate. We need to know about the flowers.”
Noah needed daylight.
He’d been holed up in Kate’s windowless computer room at Quantico all day. While he understood the need for the added computer power, he didn’t understand why they couldn’t have set up anywhere else. His cubicle at regional headquarters had a window.
“Your tension is suffocating me,” Kate said.
“How do you work in here?”
“I’ve had worse. You can leave—I’ll call you when the files are uncoded.”
Kate was running a program to re-create every email that had passed through Roger Morton’s account. She needed to keep on top of it to prevent hiccups, and she was simultaneously grading tests from the current session of FBI recruits. Running this program had taken nearly three days. Noah would never have survived in cybercrimes.
Noah had decided to work from here rather than his cubicle downtown because he was still uncomfortable about pulling in someone to help who had such a twisted history with the victim. But Kate had been nothing if not professional. A bit hotheaded at times, but sharp.
“Where’s Abigail?” Kate asked.
“She’s been working all day on getting the GPS data from Morton’s car. It’s a federal holiday, not that you were looking at the calendar or anything.”
“I don’t see you taking the day off, Armstrong.”
The phone blinked but didn’t ring. Kate answered it. She listened for a minute, then said, “I didn’t see the logo on the truck. The delivery guy was five foot eleven, wore black pants, navy-blue jacket, red turtleneck underneath. Probably a sweater as well; I couldn’t see because the jacket was bulky. Green cap—white words…” She closed her eyes. “GW Florist. He had a long blond ponytail.… Yes, of course I’m sure it was a guy. Lucy, what’s wrong?”
The edge in Kate’s voice had Noah turning his attention to her phone conversation with Lucy.
Kate said into the receiver, “Don’t leave the house.… Dammit, Lucy!”
Kate stood and paced as far as the phone cord could go. “I want to talk to Sean.… Listen, Sean, I’m coming home as soon as I can. I don’t like this at all.… I can’t believe you let her go to WCF!…You’d damn well better keep an eye on her.” She slammed the receiver down.
“Is everything okay?”
“Just peachy. Lucy has a—”
“One sec,” he said as a new message popped up on his screen. “The ballistics from the Ralston homicide came back. No match to anything in the database.”
“Did they check it against Morton? That was recent—”
“They did. No match.”
Her computer beeped, and Kate turned to the screen. She grinned widely. “I’m a genius.” She pressed a few buttons. “It’s printing now. We have a lot of reading to do tonight. I want to take it home.”
“So is there something wrong?”
“You heard the call.”
“Couldn’t miss it.”
“It’s Lucy. I think she has a stalker. I need to follow up on some roses that were delivered. I’d assumed they were from Sean. They weren’t.”
After Lucy gave Sean a “tour” of WCF offices and he’d planted bugs in the conference room and Fran Buckley’s office, he left her there with the admonition not to leave the building until he returned. Then he drove back to Georgetown to GW Florist.
