So far the FBI had gotten lots of good publicity: always a welcome circumstance for the continually besieged Bureau. Savich and his new FBI unit had brought down two killers in weeks. Reporters wanted to interview him, but he wasn’t having any of it. No one was to speak to any reporters. Louis Freeh held a press conference, praising the work of the new Criminal Apprehension Unit. Savich had asked not to attend. Freeh had wanted him there but hadn’t insisted.
She avoided Hannah Paisley, working closely with Ollie to get back into the Radnich case. She wasn’t looking forward to the evening with Douglas, but it couldn’t be helped.
Lacey dressed up that evening, wearing her hair loose, pulled back with two small gold combs, gold hoops in her ears that her mother had given her for her twenty-fifth birthday, a nice black dress that was classic enough to be two years old and still pass as current style, and three-inch heels. She felt strange in her different plumage and a bit exposed. But good. She felt really good. She realized at the last moment that Douglas could take it wrong. But there wasn’t time to change.
The first thing Douglas said when he walked in was “The
sling looks awful with that dress” and grinned at her. “Don’t you have several styles and colors to match different outfits?”
The evening was lighthearted and amusing until near dessert, when Douglas dropped his good humor and said, “You’ve gotten what you wanted, Lacey. I want you to quit the FBI and come home. Surely you see that it’s finally over, that it’s your music that is important now. You nailed the guy who killed Belinda. Come home. Do what Belinda did. Come stay with me. I’ll take care of you.”
She looked at him across the candlelit table, at the pure lines and angles of his face, and said simply, “No.”
He drew back as if she’d punched him. “I plan to divorce Candice. It will be done quickly, perhaps I can even get an annulment. It can be just you and me, Lacey, as I always wanted. Just give us time together, once I’m rid of Candice.”
He’d always wanted her? He’d never said a word to her until she’d joined the FBI and finished her training. Had he somehow gotten turned on because she was now a law officer? It didn’t make sense to her. She was shaking her head even as she said again, “No. I’m sorry, Douglas, but no.”
He said nothing more about it. When they were once again in her living room an hour later, she held out her hand to him, desperate for him to leave. “Douglas, I had a lovely time tonight. Will I see you tomorrow?”
He didn’t say anything, just jerked her against him. He kissed her hard, hurting her arm. She pushed at his chest but couldn’t move him. “Douglas,” she said against his mouth and felt his tongue push against her front teeth.
The doorbell rang. He still didn’t release her, just kept grinding his mouth into hers. Her knee was almost in motion when she managed to jerk her head back far enough to call out, “Who’s there?”
“Let me in, Miss Sherlock.”
A woman. Who could she be?
Suddenly Douglas was two feet away from her, standing there looking bewildered, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s Candice,” he said blankly, then walked to the door and opened it.
The woman standing there was no older than Lacey, with long honey-blond hair, nearly as tall as Douglas, and endowed with very high cheekbones that had to be a cameraman’s dream. But it was her eyes that riveted Lacey. Dark, dark eyes that held fury, malice, and even more fury this instant than just the moment before. She looked ready to kill.
“Candice! What the hell are you doing here?”
“I followed you, Douglas. And you came here just like a little trained pigeon. I knew you’d come to her, even though I prayed you wouldn’t. Damn you, I’d hoped our marriage meant something to you. Just look, you let her kiss you. You’ve got her lipstick on your mouth. Damn you, you smell like her.”