“I’d try talking to him, because family dinner is in four hours, and Nonna is expecting him to be there.”

“Then Nonna needs to get over it, because I’m not even going.”

“Noelle…”

“No, Trent. I have a job to do. I have work that needs to be done, and I need to decide exactly what I want. I can’t think for a second about me and Drake if I have her muttering in my ear about weddings and shit I couldn’t care less about. So, if she bitches, tell her I’m right here, in my office, working.”

“She’ll come down here. You know that, right?”

My phone rings. Grecia’s extension is flashing.

“Yep?”

“Ms. Shearer is here to discuss the mayor’s flyers with you.”

“I’ll be right down.” I slam the phone down. “Apparently, Jessica is downstairs.”

“With the flyers?” Trent asks.

“Jesus, she’s gotten around today,” I mutter, taking to the staircase.

Sure as hell, she’s standing in the middle of the waiting area, a small box deposited on the coffee table. I don’t miss the handful of magazines scattered on the floor or the way Carlton and Mike are staring at her like she walked off the front cover of Playboy.

“Carlton? That information I needed? I’m assumin’ you have it given that you’re standin’ around like a lobster waitin’ to be boiled.”

“Aw, shit,” Bek mutters, briefly making eye contact with me.

Carlton snaps out of his apparent haze and jogs past Trent and up to the stairs.

“Mike? Didn’t you say you were headed out for surveillance?” I shoot at him.

“I… Yeah.” He shuffles out when he sees my hard gaze.

Finally, I turn my attention to Jessica, who’s still standing somewhat demurely in the center of the room, an amused smile curving up her perfectly painted pink lips. “Jessica. What can I do for you?”

“I was hoping your assistant would have passed on my message.” She glances at Grecia.

“Oh, she told me you called.” I offer her my own fake smile. “But I was too busy working my way through the messages pertaining to my investigation and checking on my staff. I’m sure you can forgive her oversight, given the circumstances surrounding that little investigation.”

Trent prods me in the back.

“Oh, no, of course. That is the most important thing.” She laughs.

Someone take my gun away. “So, as I said, what can I do for you?”

“I’m handing out campaign flyers for the mayor, and he’s requested that everyone puts one in their window to show their support for him, especially during this difficult time for Madison.”

Unreal.

“So,” she continues, “I have a small box here, maybe two hundred and fifty, and it would be fabulous if you could put them out here on your table, too.”

“Can I see them? Do you mind?”

“Not at all.” She pulls one out from the open box.

A big picture of the mayor’s head stares at me, with a campaign slogan I don’t care to read.

“Sorry. No.” I hand it back to her.

“No?” She purses her lips and pulls her plucked eyebrows in for a frown. “What do you mean no?”

“I mean no, I’m not putting this in my window or on my table,” I explain slowly. “I make it a rule not to have political choices on display in the workplace. This is, of course, a neutral building, and I can’t risk having potential clients scared off by my choice. Besides, I have other staff members who might not even plan on voting for the mayor.”

“Do you plan on voting for the mayor, Ms. Bond?” she asks scathingly. “Given that he’s hired you and is paying you a considerable amount of money for your services?”

I take one step forward. “The council hired me with the mayor as their liaison, and I’ve asked him for no more money than I charge any other clients of mine. The additional fees were added at his insistence. Please get your facts straight before you throw your inaccurate comments in my face.”

“I will inform him of your refusal to display your support for him.”

“Please go on and do so. I couldn’t give a flyin’ shit what you plan on doin’.”

Her lips twist in annoyance, but the evil glint in her eye tells me that she has a score to settle in Holly Woods—and it has fuck all to do with the mayor. She bends to pick the box up and ends up two or three steps closer to me. Accidentally, I’m sure.

“I expect you’ll be fired within the next twelve hours, Ms. Bond. Then you’ll have absolutely no need to work with the HWPD, will you?”

I pull my lips to the side. “Expect all you like, hon. Was that everything?”

“For now.”

“Good. Now, Ms. Shearer, get the fuck out of my building before I help you out.”

“Are you threatening me?” she squeals. She looks around me at Trent. “She just threatened me!”

Trent moves out and looks at Bek. “You hear a threat, Bek? Grecia?”

They both shake their heads.

My brother looks at Jessica. “My apologies, Ms. Shearer, but all I heard was her offering to help you out of the building. Those shoes are real high, after all.”

Jessica scowls at him, marring her usually pretty face, and clicks her way over to the door. Then, with a tight grasp on the handle, she looks back at me. “This isn’t over.”

The door echoes as it slams behind her.

“Sounded like a war declaration, didn’t it?” Bek offers chirpily, breaking through the silence.

I laugh once before heading for the stairs. “She can declare all she likes. Doesn’t mean there will be a war—or that she’ll even win it. The chick is deluded.”

I’m going to kill my brother for telling on me.

After he left, I got a frantic call from Nonna in Italian so fast that I could barely keep up with it, demanding why I was refusing to go to family dinner tonight. So here I am, at family dinner, with my laptop and notepad.

I’m determined to work. I’m determined to focus on something other than the fact that it’s been ten hours since I walked out of the police station and Drake has only called me once.

I’ve been in my office all day, expecting him to walk in the brash way he normally does and kick my ass. I expected him to storm in, slam my door so hard that the hinges rattle, and pin me against it until I explode and we scream at each other.

That’s how we work. Isn’t it?

But he didn’t. So I ate my cupcake, drew kaleidoscope-esque patterns all over what could now be the new theory of relatively for all the sense it makes, and threw my Sharpie at the wall.

At least I settled on a color for the office’s kitchen walls and e-mailed the decorator, I guess.

I’ve all but crossed Nick off of my suspect list. I think he knows more than he’s letting on, but if knowing stuff got Vince killed, then I don’t blame Nick for not saying a word. Although I do have to wonder if he knows he has police protection just in case.

The evidence is bugging me more than who the murderer is. That’s the link. But it could be anything. Evidence can never be pinned down to a single thing. It has to be tangible though. It also has to be something incredibly damning to make Natalie and Vince think they could get a ton of money for it from the mayor.

The obvious answer is, of course, the baby. But since extracting DNA from a fetus is pretty tough, that’s ruled out.

Maybe it’s text messages or e-mails or the D.O.M. contract the mayor is probably paying to keep under wraps.

Who knows? Mayor McDougall is so corrupt that even Satan will refuse his soul entry to hell. The amount of people he’s rumored to have paid off over the last few decades must be as long as Santa’s Christmas list. The media, the police… Probably even his own wife. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that he’s paying her to stay married to him at this point.

So, what would he pay so much to keep quiet?

“Auntie Noelle!” Aria bursts through the front door while I’m still sitting in my car.