“Two months ago.”
“A month after my father died?”
“We believe the papers went missing during your father’s visit to the Archives last year.”
“You believe?” she said sharply. “You aren’t sure?”
He shrugged. “The Archives has billions of documents. It’s impossible to inventory them all.”
“Then how do you know my father took anything if you don’t even know what really belongs to the Archives?”
“We have documents connected to the missing items,” he retorted. “Responses to letters, maps from the same military campaigns. Trust me, we know.”
“Trust you?” she scoffed. “I don’t think so. Not when you’re making accusations and you don’t even know for sure that the missing documents were in the files at the time my father did his research. They could have been stolen years before that.”
“True,” he agreed. “The only problem with that is you sold all of the missing items on eBay. So where did you get them if your father didn’t steal them?”
Caught in the trap of his mocking eyes, Mackenzie couldn’t believe he was serious. Her father was the best man she’d ever known. He’d taught her more about history than any college professor she’d ever had, and there was nothing he respected more than the rare books and documents he bought and sold to collectors all over the world. He would never have stolen the very things he loved, then sold them to an unsuspecting buyer. He wasn’t that kind of man.
And yes, she did sell the playbill Agent O’Reilly taunted her with, as well as the other documents he claimed her father had stolen. There were no file notes, however, nothing to indicate that the documents were anything but privately owned. So why would she suspect anything? None of this made any sense.
Except that your father was doing research at the Archives, an irritating voice whispered in her ear. If he’d wanted to steal something, the opportunity was there.
Cold chills raced down her arms at the thought. No! she silently cried, drowning out the doubt that suddenly pulled at her like a molester in the night. Her father knew he was dying…and that any theft at the Archives would turn up long after he died. He had to know that if he really stole something, she would be the one to take the fall for him. He loved her. He wouldn’t have done that to her. He would have sold his soul first.
Fighting the need to cry just at the thought, she lifted her chin and met the agent’s gaze head on. “My father wasn’t a thief. I don’t care what records you found or what misguided conclusions you’ve come to. You’re wrong. I handled every one of those documents. There was nothing on them to indicate they were the property of the U.S. government.”
“So where did they come from if they weren’t stolen?” he demanded. “Show me your records.”
She didn’t even blink. “Where’s your search warrant?”
Patrick had to give her credit. She was quick. And he’d made the rookie mistake of letting his curiosity get the best of him when he’d shown up here in the first place. He was still investigating her, still putting the case together, still trying to determine exactly what her father may have stolen and just how much she knew about it. He didn’t have a search warrant yet, and now he’d tipped his hand.
Cursing his own stupidity, he said, “You’ll get it soon enough. It’s in the works.”
“What the heck does that mean?” she demanded. Then her blue eyes flared as understanding hit her. “You don’t have enough evidence. You think my father stole those documents, but you can’t prove it. So you showed up here with your fake map just to see what kind of person I was. Or were you hoping you’d find a reason to arrest me?”
“I’m just doing my job,” he said with a shrug. “If you’ve done nothing wrong, you’ve got nothing to worry about.”
Fuming, she stepped around him to snatch open the front door to her shop. “I have nothing else to say to you. Get out. And next time you decide to check me out, you sure as hell better bring a search warrant.”
When he hesitated, she added coldly, “The shop closed ten minutes ago. Don’t make me call the police.”
She would, Patrick thought with reluctant admiration. She had a hell of a lot of explaining to do about her shady business practices and the evidence that was piling up against her, and she was threatening to call the cops on him? She was something else.
“Save your call to the cops, and call a lawyer instead,” he advised as he strode out. “You’re going to need one.”
When she slammed the door behind him, Patrick didn’t even flinch. He wasn’t impressed with her anger. She was in the business of selling privately owned records of the past, and she had every right to sell anything she wanted that she’d bought from private citizens. But when she sold stolen documents from the National Archives, she was stealing the history of the United States.
And she wasn’t going to get away with it, he promised himself. The problem was, even though he’d led her to believe differently, he didn’t have a clue how many documents her father had really taken from the Archives. He’d tracked down those ten that had been sold on eBay, and knew for a fact that there weren’t any more posted on the Internet, but that didn’t mean anything. The more valuable items could have been sold to private buyers and would never see the light of day again. Without Mackenzie Sloan’s cooperation—and records—his investigation was at a dead end.
He had to find a way to gain her trust, he decided, and the only way he could think of to do that was to appeal to her apparent love of history. If greed hadn’t completely darkened her soul, she just might care enough about the loss of some of the documentation of the country’s past to step up to the plate and help him. If that didn’t work, then he’d appeal to her own self-preservation. She wouldn’t like prison.
And he wouldn’t like putting her there. There was nothing he liked more in a woman than intelligence, and she had plenty of that. When you added flashing blue eyes, a pretty face and plenty of spunk to the package, she was a hard woman to ignore.
Suddenly realizing where his thoughts had wandered, he swore softly as he reached his car. He didn’t care how pretty she was; he wasn’t interested in her as anything but a suspect. He had no use for a lying woman—he’d been there, done that—and had good reason to never trust any female other than his mother and aunts ever again. A smile from Mackenzie Sloan didn’t change the fact that she was a suspect. And if his investigation proved that her father was guilty and her partner in crime, she was going to hate the day he ever walked in her shop. Because he would do everything he could to put her in jail.
Pacing restlessly, her stomach roiling with worry, Mackenzie snatched up the phone the second it rang. “Stacy! Thank God!”
“What’s wrong?” she demanded. “I just got your message. Are you all right?”
Not sure if she wanted to cry or throw something, she said, “No, I’m not all right! You know that good-looking hunk you thought was so wonderful when you were here earlier? He’s an agent with the National Archives, and he’s investigating me.”
“What? John and I will be there in ten minutes.”
Eight minutes later, Stacy and her husband, John, rushed into the shop. Sinking into a chair at the reading table, Stacy rested her hand on her stomach and braced herself. “Don’t sugarcoat it. Give me the worst. What are the Feds after and what did you say?”
“In a minute,” Mackenzie said, frowning as she and John both stepped to her side. “Are you all right? I shouldn’t have called you. I wasn’t thinking.”
“I’m your lawyer, silly,” she scolded. “Of course