Vanished (Private Justice Book #1): A Novel (7 page)

“No.”

The tautness in his shoulders eased. He didn’t stop to analyze why. “I’m still at the office. We were wrapping up a case. Do you want to swing by here?”

“Sure. I should be able to get there in fifteen minutes or so. No . . . wait. Make it half an hour, if you don’t mind. I have to run a quick errand first.”

“No problem. That will give me a chance to go through the rest of the material on Blaine before you arrive. See you then.”

As he slid the phone back onto his belt, the whisper of a smile tickled the corners of his lips.

Perhaps the evening ahead wouldn’t be quiet and empty after all.

Balancing her notes on top of the large supreme pizza box, Moira reached up to ring the bell at the Phoenix front door. It took two tries. The white bag containing the cans of soft drinks and napkins kept getting in the way.

As she waited for Cal to greet her over the intercom and release the lock, she bit her lip. Maybe he’d already grabbed a quick bite at one of the nearby neighborhood restaurants while he waited for her. She should have let him in on her impromptu dinner idea.

Oh well. Too late now. Worst case, she’d have leftover pizza for breakfast for the next week. Or two.

The handle of the door rattled, and she retreated a few inches. He must have come to the front to greet her rather than simply press a switch to open the door.

That earned him another gold star for good manners.

An instant later he pulled the door wide. As he homed in on the pizza box, the gleam of appreciation—or was that hunger?—in his eyes reassured her she’d made a sound call.

“I come bearing food. Since you won’t let me pay, the least I can do is feed you.”

He relieved her of the pizza box and the bag, then ushered her in. “I’d say you shouldn’t have, but I’m starving.”

“Join the crowd.” She edged past him, close enough to get a whiff of a subtle, rugged, masculine aftershave even the aroma of pepperoni couldn’t disguise.

Nice.

She had to fight the temptation to tarry.

He shut the door behind her and motioned her toward the hall. “We can eat—and talk—in the conference room. I was
going to order out for us, but you beat me to it.” He held an access card over a pad beside the door that led to the offices.

She wrinkled her brow. Why hadn’t she noticed that on her first visit?

As if reading her mind, he snagged the door and pulled it open for her. “During the day, Nikki controls the release from her desk. There’s a concealed button on the floor.”

She was treated to another whiff of that appealing scent as she moved past him. “I didn’t realize a PI firm would need such aggressive security measures.”

“Second door on your right. Not all firms do, but we’ve dealt with some sensitive cases. Plus, all three of us have potentially dangerous enemies from our past law enforcement lives.” He followed her in and set the pizza and bag on the table.

“That sounds a little scary.”

He shrugged and looked into the bag. “That’s one of the risks of a law enforcement job. You learn to deal with it.”

“Have you ever had anyone actually come after you?”

A muscle in his jaw clenched. “All three of us have our war stories.” He pulled out four aluminum cans and the napkins. “I could have provided the drinks.”

The answer to her question was yes. But he didn’t want to talk about it.

Message received.

“When I bring dinner, I also bring drinks. I didn’t know what you preferred, though, so I brought a selection. No time to pick up dessert, however.”

“The pizza’s plenty. Thanks for doing this. And any of the drinks is fine with me. Take your pick while I grab a notepad and Blaine’s file from my office.”

As he disappeared out the door, she opened the lid on the pizza box, selected a diet Sprite, and pulled out her own notes.

Once he returned, he gestured to the chair at the end of the table and took the one at a right angle to it after she sat.

“I got a loaded pizza. I figured we could pick off any toppings we didn’t like.” She helped herself to a slice.

“I like them all.” He chose the lemonade from the remaining cans of beverages, picked up a piece of pizza, and took a large bite.

“Me too.”

Cal demolished his first piece without much conversation, but after snagging a second slice and depositing it on his napkin, he pulled his notepad closer. “I know Blaine told you he has an alibi for that Friday night, but before we close this case, let’s take one more careful look at the situation. I do have a question for you first, though. I noticed on the police report of the incident that you mentioned you were distracted for a moment when you reached for your glasses. Any reason you weren’t wearing them?”

She wiped her mouth with a napkin. “I left them at home, in a different purse. I guess I should have mentioned them in our first meeting. They help me to a small degree with distance vision, especially at night, but they’re not a restriction on my license.”

“I know. I checked.”

That didn’t surprise her.

She glanced around the room, focusing on the corner at the far end of the rectangular table. “There’s a vase of silk flowers on that cabinet. Rather exotic. Orchids, birds of paradise, anthurium. They’re in a tall, clear glass vase with a fluted edge. The front of the vase is etched with a fleur-de-lis design, and there’s Lucite in the bottom to simulate water.”

One side of his mouth hitched up. “Very convincing.” He picked up his pen. “Okay, why don’t you read through your interview notes from Tuesday while you eat? If you come to anything that reminds you of an impression you had, stop and tell me. No editing. Let’s not decide yet what’s important and what’s not.”

“Okay.” She popped a stray piece of pepperoni into her mouth and opened her notebook.

They continued to eat in silence as she perused her notes.

“Here’s something. During my prep for the interview, I’d
read somewhere he was interested in the elderly. But when I asked him about that, he passed over it quickly. All he said was that he visited nursing homes through a program with his church, but not in a professional capacity. I got the feeling he didn’t want to talk about it. The subject seemed to make him uncomfortable.”

Cal jotted on his tablet but remained silent as she read through the rest of her notes and finally shook her head.

“There wasn’t anything else that gave me pause. Besides, once I saw the ring, my powers of observation were compromised, to say the least.”

“All right. What about his office?”

“It was very sterile. Other than the framed photos of his clinic in Guatemala, there was no personality to the space. Not even a picture of his wife.”

“Interesting.” Cal took a swig of lemonade and jotted another note on his pad. “Let’s move on to today. Walk me through it and focus on anything that struck you as odd or curious.”

“I didn’t have all that much personal interaction with him except at lunch. Professionally, I think he’s highly skilled and very respected by his peers and his patients.”

“Then let’s concentrate on your experience during lunch.”

She frowned and stared at the blank wall across from her, reconstructing the conversation in her mind. “He took me off guard by bringing up the bruise immediately. It’s faded a lot, so I was surprised he noticed it. We talked a bit about our families too. I got the feeling in the interview Tuesday that he and his father—also a doctor—were close. I could see a lingering sadness in his eyes when he mentioned today that his dad had been dead for many years, and that he died too young. There may have been some hero worship going on there.” She picked up a stray piece of mushroom and added it to the slice of pizza on her napkin. “Not much to go on, is it?”

“I don’t know.” He wiped off his fingers, wadded up the
paper napkin, and tossed it onto the table as he ticked off the notes he’d taken. “Discomfort at your question about his interest in the elderly. No pictures of his wife in his office. Hero worship of a father who died young. Each of those could suggest interesting scenarios. But I’m most intrigued by the fact that not only did he invite you to shadow him, he made it a point during your limited conversation to volunteer an alibi for that Friday night.”

Moira swallowed the last bite of her third piece of pizza. “You think he could be trying to deflect suspicion?”

“That’s one theory. If he is your man, he might have wanted to head you off at the pass by impressing you with his professional standing and making certain you knew he could prove his whereabouts on that Friday night.”

“But if he can prove where he was, he isn’t my man.”

“‘If’ being the operative word. Maybe he hopes an alibi will discourage you from further investigation.”

“Well, it’s working.” Moira picked up a napkin and swiped at the beads of condensation on her soda can. “The truth is, after listening to him speak all day, I can’t distinguish between his voice and my Good Samaritan’s anymore.”

“That could also be part of his strategy.”

“And I thought
I
was paranoid.”

“There’s a difference between paranoia and healthy suspicion.”

“Are we crossing the line here?”

“You tell me.” He linked his fingers on the table and leaned closer, eyes steady and intent. As if he was looking into, rather than at, her. “Trust your instincts, like you do on a story. What are they telling you to do?”

Keeping her gaze locked on his, she thought about how she’d felt the first time she’d heard Blaine’s voice, on the news program. About her stunned reaction when she saw his ring during the interview. About the highlights Cal had just distilled. About the terrified woman in her headlights.

“They tell me to keep digging.”

“Then that’s what we’ll do.” He continued to look at her for another couple of seconds with those intense brown eyes. Finally he leaned back and picked up the file he’d brought in with him.

Moira released the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding and wove her fingers together on the table.

“I had Nikki run some preliminary background for me. Nothing unusual turned up. Now that we’ve talked, though, I’m going to have her dig deeper on a few things while I check out his alibi.”

Nikki, the punk rocker with the purple hair and seashell necklace, assisted with research?

“Um, does she do a lot of that kind of thing for you?”

Cal’s lips twitched. “Don’t let the externals fool you. She’s a whiz with online databases and has a degree in computer forensics. We brought her on board when we opened our doors, and at this point I don’t know what we’d do without her.”

Computer forensics. Iridescent toenail polish.

Major disconnect.

“You’re surprised, aren’t you?”

A flame flickered to life on her cheeks and she fiddled with her can. Was she that easy to read? “A little.”

“She runs into that a lot, but she’s learned to be amused rather than offended.” His expression sobered. “Nikki’s had a tough life. She ran away from an abusive home at fifteen and became a street kid. But she had ambition. She got her GED and a full-time job, then applied for college. She also managed to get custody of her younger brother after the family finally splintered. He still lives with her. She got married a few weeks ago to a great guy.” He shook his head. “She’s a real tribute to the power of perseverance.”

Boy, had she read the receptionist wrong. You’d think after her experience with Jack she’d have learned that appearances could be deceiving—in either direction.

“Are you finished?” Cal indicated the pizza box, where two pieces remained.

“Yes.”

He closed the lid. Checked his watch. Hesitated. Some odd—but pleasant—vibes wafted her way, sending a tiny trill down her spine.

“Since you brought the dinner, can I treat you to dessert? There’s a great ice cream place by the old train station. It’s only a short walk.” He rose and began gathering up the trash, avoiding her eyes. As if he was embarrassed by his suggestion. “But given your early start, I understand if you want to call it a day.”

Was he having second thoughts about the invitation already? Trying to talk her out of accepting?

She waffled. Having ice cream with the handsome PI who was doing pro bono work for her probably wasn’t wise. Theirs was a business relationship, nothing more.

But then she remembered the sound advice Cal had given her earlier.

Trust your instincts
.

So she did.

“Thanks. I’d like that.”

Trash in hand, he sent her a tentative smile. “Okay. Let me get rid of this stuff.”

A moment later he disappeared out the door.

Leaving her to wonder why a man who came across as decisive in every other way seemed uncertain about an impromptu little outing like this.

C
al slipped his wallet back in his pocket and gestured to a bench a dozen yards down the street from the ice cream stand. “We’re lucky. This place is usually packed.”

Moira led the way, and he followed—still unsure if he should have extended the evening. She’d given him enough information to take the investigation to the next level. It might have been wiser to call it a night and go home.

Yet as he watched her tip her head to get a better angle on her double scoop of mint chocolate chip ice cream, he couldn’t conjure up one iota of regret. Sharing dessert with a beautiful, intelligent woman was far better than spending yet another evening alone.

“This is great stuff.” She sat carefully, balancing her cone as the bench shifted under their weight. “However, I’m not certain I should thank you for introducing me to temptation. I see many more trips here in my future, and my hips will pay the price.”

He gave her trim figure a discreet scan. “Hard to believe.”

“Hold that thought. So do you live close by?”

Her casual question brought to mind far less casual subjects.

“Glendale.” He took a bite of his rocky road ice cream. When would he ever manage to get through just one day
without being reminded of things he’d rather forget? “Not quite walking distance, but I could jog it on a good day.”

“You jog?”

He latched on to the new topic. “Three times a week. How about you?”

“No. Nothing that ambitious.” She paused to wipe an errant chocolate flake off the corner of her mouth. “I do walk with a friend two or three times a week, though. So do you have one of those century houses that are all over this area?”

His cone cracked as he involuntarily tightened his grip. He grabbed for the top with his free hand, supporting it as it collapsed.

“Whoops! Let me get you a paper cup. Hang on.”

Before he could respond, Moira jumped to her feet and took off for the stand with her long-legged stride, smiling and offering some comment he couldn’t hear as she bypassed the line that had formed. She was back in less than a minute, brandishing the cup.

He dumped his ice cream into it. She stuck a spoon in the top, then handed him some napkins she’d tucked into her pocket.

“Close call.” She retook her seat and examined her own waffle cone as he wiped the sticky residue from the melting ice cream off his fingers. “They must not be making these as sturdy as they used to. Okay, where were we? Oh . . . I’d asked about your house.”

So much for any hope that the ice-cream incident might have distracted her.

He finished cleaning off his fingers, wadded up the napkins, and picked up his spoon. “It’s a small older home, but not in the century category. Most of those are in Webster and Kirkwood.”

“Have you lived there long?”

His throat constricted, and he swallowed. “Seven years. My wife and I bought it when we got married.”

“Oh.”

Her sudden lapse into silence told him his attempt at a conversational tone had failed. As he was fast learning, Moira had a keen aptitude for picking up nuances.

“You know, there’s one thing I forgot to mention in this whole weird story about vanishing people.”

Her change of subject was telling as well. The lady also had a well-developed sense of empathy—and consideration.

“What’s that?” He took a bite of his salvaged ice cream cone.

“The Good Samaritan guy said there was broken glass on my seat. And I felt it digging into my thigh. Now here’s the weird part. Other than the taillight, the repair shop didn’t find any broken glass. But I had a bruise in the exact spot where I felt something sharp.”

If she was trying to take his mind off their previous topic, she’d succeeded.

“Any other bruises?”

“No. Except for my forehead. Mainly I had sore muscles. And the bruise wasn’t big. Quarter size, at most.”

He took another spoon of ice cream as he mulled that over. “How much glass was there?”

“I don’t know. The man who stopped thought he saw blood on the passenger seat, and I twisted sideways to check it out. That’s when I felt the glass. I think I said ow, and he had me hold still while he brushed it off the seat. Except . . . there wasn’t any glass.”

“And not long after that you lost consciousness. For an hour. From a mild concussion.”

She let a beat of silence pass. “What are you suggesting?”

“Maybe he injected you with some kind of knockout drug.”

Her eyes widened. “And I thought the ring connection was a stretch.”

He leaned forward, the explanation feeling more credible by the second. “It never did make sense to me that you’d be
unconscious for so long. But if you were drugged? Absolutely. And getting you out of the picture could let him finish whatever you stumbled across.”

Her fingers clenched around her napkin. “You’re thinking he wasn’t a passing motorist at all. That he was with the woman I saw.”

“Were there many other cars on that road?”

“I only saw one. It wasn’t the kind of night people would be out driving unless they had no choice.” A glob of melted ice cream snaked down her cone, onto her hand. She didn’t seem to notice.

He reached over and wiped it away.

She didn’t seem to notice that, either.

“And who better to have access to a powerful knockout drug than a medical professional—like a doctor. But why would he have had such a thing with him?” She blinked and blew out a breath. “Are we grabbing at straws here?”

“A thorough investigator looks at every possibility. However remote.”

She caught her lower lip between her teeth. “Maybe it’s a good thing you’re going to check his alibi.”

“First thing tomorrow.”

She crunched into the bottom of her cone, holding her other hand underneath. The pieces that splintered off left a mess in her palm.

“My turn to come to the rescue.” This time he handed her the napkin rather than take care of the problem himself. He didn’t want another blood pressure spike when their fingers brushed.

“Thanks.” She cleaned herself up, then leaned back against the bench while he finished off the last of his ice cream, her expression pensive. She didn’t appear to be in any hurry to leave.

Neither was he, but he couldn’t come up with a legitimate excuse to prolong their outing. And if he lingered over his ice cream, it would soon melt anyway.

“So do you come here often?”

At her question, he scraped up the last bite of his collapsed cone with the plastic spoon. “More now than when . . . than in the past. I like ice cream.” He didn’t mention that Lindsey hadn’t, but Moira nevertheless seemed to follow the direction of his thoughts.

She shifted toward him on the bench, her eyes soft with sympathy. “You know, you took me off guard in the coffee shop that day when you told me you’d lost your wife, and I don’t think I responded adequately. But I want you to know I’m very, very sorry. Was it . . . an illness?”

He almost wished it had been. That might have been easier to accept.

“No. She was killed by a hit-and-run driver while she was taking her daily walk, two years after we got married. She was twenty-eight.”

Shock parted Moira’s lips. “Oh, Cal. I’m so sorry. Was the driver caught?”

“No.” But he knew who’d arranged it. Had always known.

That, however, was a story for another night.

Maybe.

“It’s a terrible thing to lose someone you love.”

At her soft words, tinged with sadness, he looked over at her—just in time to catch a quick flash of pain in her green irises. Curious. Their preliminary background check on her hadn’t revealed a spouse or ex-spouse. And in light of her comments about her faith at their first meeting, he doubted she’d have been involved in a live-in relationship.

But he sniffed a failed romance here.

That was none of his business, of course. If he didn’t want her venturing into his private territory, how could he expect her to welcome probing queries from him?

Yet he was curious enough to make a cautious foray.

“You sound as if you’re speaking from personal experience.” He left it at that. If she blew him off, he wouldn’t push.

Silence stretched between them, broken only by a mournful whistle in the distance, along with a faint rumble from the nearby tracks that signaled the approach of a train.

She wasn’t going to respond.

But as he searched for some other topic to introduce, she suddenly moistened her lips and focused on scrubbing a smear of chocolate off the back of her hand.

“I am. No one died, but I did lose a fiancé to another woman. A year ago.” She gave a small, mirthless laugh. “Isn’t it funny how someone can be smart and intuitive on the job yet wear blinders in her personal life?”

Instead of answering what he assumed was a rhetorical question, he posed a question of his own. “What happened—if you don’t mind me asking?”

She shrugged. “It was the classic story. He was cheating right under my nose. I might not have found out until too late if I hadn’t returned early from a visit with my dad and decided to surprise him. When I showed up at his apartment with Chinese takeout and fortune cookies, his neighbor answered. Based on what she was wearing—or I should say, not wearing—it was obvious she wasn’t there to borrow a cup of sugar. At least not in the literal sense.” Her mouth flexed into a mirthless smile. “Guess what my fortune cookie said? ‘Beware of false hope.’ Here’s the irony. Her name was Hope.”

As the rumble of the train grew louder, Cal had just one thought.

What kind of idiot would cheat on a woman like Moira and risk losing her?

“I’m sorry.” He had to stifle an impulse to twine his fingers with hers. “Were you together long?”

“Two years. He was the assistant youth director at my church, and the congregation loved him. Everyone considered him a fine role model for the teens. No one ever suspected the values he professed were a sham—including me. In hindsight, I don’t even know why he proposed, unless he figured
marriage would give him an added aura of respectability. Maybe position him for the director job, since his boss was getting ready to retire.”

The train appeared in the distance, and she watched it approach. “I suppose my experience with him is one of the reasons I’m not yet convinced Blaine isn’t my man. People aren’t always what they seem. Including your receptionist.”

“True.” He raised his voice slightly to be heard above the growing rumble. “And if it’s any consolation, time does take the edge off loss.”

The train thundered by, and she shot him an assessing look. As if she wasn’t sure whether to believe his reassurance.

Truth be told, he wasn’t certain, either. Thinking about Lindsey still left an acute ache in his heart. Or it had, until recently. For whatever reason, the pain had been diminishing in tiny increments since Moira had walked into his life.

Perhaps it wasn’t time that was the great consoler, after all.

Pushing that disconcerting thought aside, he gathered up their trash and walked to the litter receptacle to deposit it while the freight train continued past the station. Only when the caboose at last clickety-clacked into the distance and quiet once more descended did he turn toward Moira to speak.

But she beat him to it.

“For the record, I’m over Jack.” She regarded him, her gaze steady, letting that statement sink in before she continued. “I’ll admit he left me a little gun-shy about romance, but once the hurt and humiliation faded, I was more angry than anything else. At this point, I’m just grateful I didn’t end up married to him.”

Was that a subtle hint? An invitation? An “I’m available” message? Or simply a wrap-up statement? An “I’m okay, everything’s copasetic, don’t worry about me” assurance?

He had no idea. He’d been out of the dating game so long
his signal-reading skills were rusty. Nor did he have a clue how to respond.

When he remained silent, she broke eye contact and glanced at her watch. “Should we start back? It’s almost 8:00.”

Was it? He checked his own watch. Where had the past couple of hours gone?

“I guess it is getting late. Shall we?” He gestured down the street.

She fell in beside him as they strolled back toward his office, confining her comments to the weather and the spring flowers.

The trek was much too short to suit him.

When they stopped beside her car in front of his office, she fished her keys out of her purse and hit the power locks. “Thanks for the ice cream—and for continuing to pursue a case that still has a high chance of going nowhere.”

As she stood before him, the soft glow of the setting sun bathing her face in golden light, Cal’s heart skipped a beat. Dev was right; Moira was hot. But that term didn’t come close to capturing her true beauty, nor her depth.

“What’s wrong?” She gave him an uncertain look.

He shoved his hands in his pockets and coaxed up the corners of his lips. “I think I’m fighting a sugar rush from all that ice cream.”

“Oh. Well, as far as I’m concerned, it was worth it.” She hesitated, one hand resting on the top of the door, the other gripping the strap of her purse. “I had a nice time tonight.”

“I did too.” Better than he should have, based on the niggle of guilt in his conscience. What would Lindsey think?

She gave him a melancholy smile, as if she’d sensed—and understood—his conflict. “It was just an ice cream, Cal. No harm done.” She tossed her purse onto the passenger seat. “I hope my candor won’t embarrass you—but your wife was a lucky woman.”

He shook his head. “No. I was the lucky one.” His voice roughened on the last word, and he cleared his throat.

She didn’t respond in words. Instead, she reached out to
him, her fingers gentle on his arm, the warmth of her hand seeping through the cotton of his shirt—and into his heart.

Then, still silent, she slipped into her car. He shut the door and retreated to the sidewalk. Only after her taillights disappeared did he slowly circle the building toward the back parking lot.

So much for a simple, innocent little outing to the ice cream stand. After his cautious query, Moira had shared far more than he’d expected about her painful past, baring her heart and trusting him with her secrets.