He didn’t respond, but, instead, watched her, searching for something that might convince him she was telling the truth.
“You don’t trust me, do you?” she challenged. “You think I have something to do with this? With Silver’s murder?”
“Well, you can’t deny that it does appear a little suspicious. Our victim’s got your name, your number, even your address. And obviously he was intent on calling you, judging by the exclamation mark beside your name.” He picked up the journal. “Then a couple days later he turns up dead.”
He flipped a few more pages in the journal, but there were no more references to Claudia or anyone else in the last two days of Silver’s life.
“You gotta admit,” he said, “you’d be coming to the same assumptions if the tables were turned.”
“Assumptions? So what kinds of ‘assumptions’ are you making then? That he contacted me, and over a plate of greasy eggs we had a disagreement about Frank? And because of that, I came over here last night and shot him? Is that it? Well, I think you’ll find some flaws with your theory, Detective Monaghan. For one, I was on shift last night.”
“I didn’t ask for an alibi. But since you mention it, the squad wasn’t on until midnight.”
She let out a sharp breath, a caustic smile pursing her lips. “So just because my name’s in his date book you’re going to view me as a suspect? Is that it? Well—” she crossed the office and snatched the journal from his grasp, snapping it shut and practically tossing it back at him “—you’ve really got your work cut out for you then, Detective, because there are a hell of a lot of names in there.”
She turned from him, as if to storm from the office, but Gavin caught her arm. When she tried to tug free, he tightened his grip and pulled her around.
“Claudia, listen to me.”
He waited for her gaze to meet his and was struck by the quiet fury that darkened them.
“Look, I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot here.”
“Well, I’m not sure about the other units you’ve worked with, but accusations aren’t generally the best foundation for a partnership.”
“I wasn’t accusing you of anything.”
“No? It sounded like it to me.”
“I’m sorry. It’s my first case.” He tried to adopt a tone of sincerity, hoping to convince her. He couldn’t afford to lose her trust so soon, in spite of his own suspicions. “I just want to be sure I’m getting all the facts,” he said calmly.
“Truly, Gavin.” He was glad to hear her adopt a softer tone. “I have given you all the facts. I told you how I know Silver. I told you we had little contact in the past. And in spite of what his date book might imply, I never met with him two days ago. I’ll even go one step further and admit that yes, I was at Jimmy’s for breakfast that day. But I ate alone. I was going over my files to prepare for the arraignment hearing on the Brown case. I didn’t meet anyone at Jimmy’s. And I most certainly did not meet with James Silver.”
“All right. I believe you.”
Claudia looked exhausted, spent, even more than she had when he’d met her. She combed her fingers through her hair with obvious frustration as she closed her eyes and turned away from him. Releasing a long breath, she peered through the slats of the blinds and lifted a hand to her neck in an attempt to massage the stress that no doubt had settled there.
“Claudia, we’re both tired. Why don’t we call it a day? Get some sleep. We can box this stuff up, take it in, and look at it when we’re more awake. Less on edge.”
She nodded silently, her gaze fixed out the window.
Gavin tossed the two date books into the box, along with several other files he’d set aside, and folded the top closed. Claudia was still staring out the window when he came to her side and handed her her jacket.
“Thanks.” Even her voice sounded weary as she slipped her jacket on and tugged the bottom over her holster. “And I’m sorry for snapping. I need sleep.”
“No apology necessary.” He liked the smile that struggled to her lips, giving her mouth a wry but sensual curve. It was only a smile, Gavin reasoned; yet he felt himself respond—a low, warm tug deep in his gut—when he imagined what those lips might feel like against his.
But imagining was all he’d be doing when it came to Claudia, Gavin resolved as he turned from her to the box on Silver’s desk. Suspicions or no suspicions, she was definitely off-limits. He was hardly going to jeopardize his case, his entire career, for the sake of a woman. He’d never done it in the past, and he certainly wasn’t about to start now, no matter how alluring Detective Claudia Parrish was.
AFTER SHE AND GAVIN HAD closed up Silver’s office, Claudia drove them back to headquarters. Gavin’s car had been parked in a lot along the way, and she’d dropped him off before hauling the box of Silver’s files to Evidence Control. She hadn’t bothered to go back to the office after that, but went directly to the garage to get her own vehicle. It was noon by the time she steered her weather-beaten Volvo onto Shakespeare Street.
She parked halfway up the block, outside a yellow-brick three-story Victorian row house. Shouldering her briefcase, she took the marble steps to the massive oak doors and shoved one open.
From the first-floor apartment, she could hear Mrs. Cuchetta playing the baby grand piano she used for lessons, but as Claudia staggered up the stairs, exhausted, the thick walls of the old, converted row home swallowed the classical melody. And when Claudia finally closed her door behind her and threw the dead bolt, there was nothing but silence. Gratifying silence.
She dropped her keys onto the front hall table and stepped into the small but cozy apartment she’d called home for the past three years.
Shedding her jacket and holster and kicking off her shoes, she put some water on for tea.
On the corner of the kitchen bar, next to a mounting stack of bills, the answering machine blinked. She tossed a tea towel over it, covering the demanding red light. It hardly mattered; even before she’d finished pouring her tea, the phone rang.
“Faith, I just got in,” Claudia told her sister after being verbally censured for not returning her calls.
“Well, I wanted to be sure you were all right. October sixteenth and all.”
Claudia stirred sugar into her tea. Leave it to her little sister to remember anniversaries that weren’t even her own. Faith remembered everything to do with family; not at all like Claudia. The only things she managed to remember these days were the details of her cases. It hadn’t always been that way, of course. Before Frank’s death, before she’d immersed herself so completely in her work that it seemed there was nothing else, things had been different.
Now, faced with Faith’s concern, Claudia wondered if maybe she should never have told her sister. It might have been easier to let the secret die along with Frank, so that no one could remind her of the love she’d shared so briefly with him.
“Look,” Faith was saying. “Greg mentioned just this morning that it’s been a while since you’ve been out here. And you know it’s only a forty-minute drive. You’d think it was a forty-minute flight given the number of times we’ve seen you in the past year. So what do you say to dinner tonight? I know it’s short notice, but it wouldn’t be if you actually listened to your messages.”
Claudia didn’t respond. She yanked the tea towel off the answering machine, the red light blinking as insistently as ever. James Silver. What if he had tried to call her? With preparations for the Brown arraignment, she hadn’t checked her messages in days.