“Thanks,” I said, punching in the number of the shop.

“The Painted Lady.” I had never been so happy to hear Bitsy’s voice as I was that minute.

“Bits, it’s Brett.”

“Where are you?”

“That doesn’t matter right now, but what does is where Ace is.”

“Ace is here,” Bitsy said, and I breathed a sigh of relief. “Do you want to talk to him?”

“Yeah, I do.”

A few seconds passed; then I heard, “Brett?”

“Ace, what’s Charlotte up to?”

“What do you mean?” His tone was defensive, almost icy.

“I’m at Trevor’s apartment building, and she just shimmied down off a back balcony here like she was Spider-Man. This was after I got shot at from inside Trevor’s apartment.”

“Hold on, Brett, what are you talking about?” He sounded genuinely confused. I was glad to hear it.

“Charlotte, your main squeeze, is involved with something that doesn’t seem good for her health or for mine. Where is she hiding out?”

“I… uh… I don’t know. Really, Brett, I don’t. She won’t answer my calls; she’s not at her place. Bitsy told me what went down this morning at that guy’s condo. I’m worried about her.”

“That’s nice, Ace, but I think we all should have maybe listened a little more to that cop who told me she could be in some sort of danger because of her association with Wesley Lambert. Because you know what? She was, and is, but she’s also up to something herself.”

“Brett?” Jeff’s whisper was hurried. My back was to him, and as I turned around to see what he wanted, a hand came down on mine, the one holding the phone.

But it wasn’t Jeff now.

It was Frank DeBurra. And as he wrenched the phone out of my hand and closed it, he said, “Miss Kavanaugh, I think we have to have a little chat.”

Chapter 37

I looked to Jeff for support, but he just shrugged.

DeBurra nodded. “And your friend, here, is coming with us, too.”

“Hey, I’m just along for the ride,” Jeff said as he tossed his cigarette down and ground it with the heel of his cowboy boot.

“We wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for you,” I hissed.

“Isn’t this sweet? A lover’s quarrel.” DeBurra chuckled.

All the muscles in my body tensed up, and I glared at him.

“You’ve got no reason to be angry with me,” DeBurra said. “But I have all the reason to be angry with you. Maybe if you’d stuck around in the hospital and answered my questions, all of this”-he indicated the apartment house-“never would’ve happened.”

“So it’s my fault I got shot at?” I barked.

“Brett, calm down,” Jeff said softly.

I shot him a look. Easy for him to say.

“You’d better listen to your boyfriend,” DeBurra said. “It’s going to be a long night.”

At that moment I realized I wasn’t going home. I wasn’t going to sleep in my comfy bed. I wasn’t going to be able to relax.

I was going to be stuck with DeBurra and Jeff Coleman all night.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said, although my gumption was gone.

DeBurra noticed. “Okay, fine. Let’s go.” He herded us out of the pool area, and now we could see the police cruisers and cops milling around.

“Who was it?” I asked. “Who was shooting?”

DeBurra took a deep breath. “He got out the balcony. Someone downstairs said he saw a guy jumping from balcony to balcony and took off.”

“But what about that last shot? The apartment couldn’t have been empty then.”

Jeff’s nudge was too late. I’d spoken too soon.

DeBurra stopped and stared me down. “What do you mean?”

It was time to tell the truth. “We saw it,” I said. “That’s why we ran out to the front courtyard. We saw her drop to the ground and take off. But I don’t know where she went.”

“She?”

“It was Charlotte. Charlotte Sampson. But after she ran off, we heard another shot from up there. So she couldn’t have been alone.”

DeBurra rubbed his jaw thoughtfully and nodded, but he didn’t volunteer any information. All he said was, “If you’d talked to me earlier, maybe we could’ve found her.”

“I really haven’t known where she’s been hiding,” I insisted, then added, “At least we know she’s not sick.”

Sister Mary Eucharista would’ve said that was like making lemonade out of lemons, or something like that. My brain wasn’t working right at the moment.

They put Jeff and me into two different cruisers. He gave me a wink as they escorted him to a car a few feet away.

I fell asleep.

In the interrogation room.

On a stiff, metal chair with my head down on my arms on a stiff, metal table.

I dreamed of Red Rock and my bed, and the soft whirr of a tattoo machine was my white noise.

I’d been at police headquarters for about three hours, interrogated by none other than Detective Frank DeBurra, going over and over and over ad nauseum everything that had happened that day.

Except I left out my first visit to Trevor’s. I didn’t want to get Kyle in trouble, and did it really matter that I’d been there twice? Sure, DeBurra would string me up if he knew, but I kept to pertinent information, like what had happened at that condo this morning and getting shot at with Jeff.

I hadn’t seen Jeff since I’d gotten here.

I hadn’t seen Tim, either.

I wondered whether he was still at the hospital with sexy Dr. Bixby.

A thud jolted me out of my dreams and ramblings. I looked up.

“Why are you keeping me here?” I asked Frank DeBurra, who’d slammed the door. “I’ve answered all your questions. Can’t I go home now?”

He smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile; it had an edge to it. An edge that told me not to push it.

I sighed.

“What else do you want to know?” I asked, defeated, laying my head back down on my arms and staring up at him with one eye.

“Do you know where Ace van Nes is?”

My head popped up and I took my elbows off the table. “Ace?”

“Yes, Ace van Nes. I believe he works for you.”

“He’s at the shop,” I said. “I talked to him there earlier.”

“He’s not there now. And Miss Hendricks was not helpful.”

I couldn’t help but smile. I could just imagine what Bitsy had to say to Detective Frank DeBurra.

“You’re with Homeland Security; don’t you know where everyone is at all times?” I asked, my exhaustion turning into sarcasm.

He sighed dramatically. “That’s what Miss Hendricks said, too. Do you have employee training in how to respond to a police officer’s questions?”

“How did you guess?”

“Where is Mr. van Nes?”

“Maybe he’s home.” Ace lived in a condo that he sublet from some guy in a band over in Summerlin. “Don’t you have his phone number? Why don’t you just call him?” I asked.

“You really need to start cooperating.”

I stood up and faced him. “I’ve answered all your questions. I’ve sat here for hours allowing myself to be interrogated by you. I have cooperated thoroughly. Do I need a lawyer?” I paused. “And it’s not my fault my brother had a relationship with your fiancée, so you better get over that, too.”

As if on cue, the door opened, and Tim walked in.

DeBurra jumped back, startled. “Oh, Kavanaugh, it’s you.”

Tim looked from DeBurra to me and back to DeBurra again. “Don’t you think you’ve got enough now? She’s tired. I don’t know how much more you think you’re going to get.”

I wanted to know where he’d been the whole time I’d been in this little room. But at least he was here now, trying to rescue me from the clutches of Inspector Clouseau. I turned a smile on him, but he wasn’t paying attention to me.

DeBurra looked like he was trying to figure out just what to say, how he was going to justify the past three hours. I’d given him everything he wanted in the first hour.

DeBurra licked his lips, then pursed them together as if he were weighing a life-or-death situation. His eyes settled on me in a very unsettling way. Finally, he spoke.