“Sorry, Nat,” the older man apologized, and then he paused because he didn’t want working relations to deteriorate between them. “But we’ll get him—or her,” he augmented since the killer had left no indication as to gender. There was always an outside chance that Candace had been done in by a jealous wife or girlfriend who had been thrown over by her man because the partying heiress had come on the scene.
Natalie sighed and nodded her head. It was clear to Matt that passive was not a role she played well. He waited until the two detectives had left with their booty, then looked expectantly at the young technician. Without a word, Wilson began typing, his fingers flying again.
Natalie had caught the look that had gone between the two. Caught, too, the swift sleight of hand that had occurred when Matt had passed the technician’s keyboard. She doubted if either Parker or Davidson had noticed. If they had, something would have been said. Matt was still that good.
“What did you do?” she asked him.
His intensely blue eyes looked at her with amusement. “Excuse me?”
There was a time when she would have found this charming. But that naive girl had grown up years ago.
“Don’t try to sound innocent, Schaffer. It’s far too late for that. When Parker and Davidson came in, before they even asked you for the tapes, you did something on the keyboard as you walked by. Don’t bother denying it,” she cautioned. “I saw you.”
“My hand slipped,” Matt deadpanned. He knew that it was just a matter of seconds before the computer was finished going through its paces and he had what he needed.
Who the hell did he think he was kidding? Natalie thought.
“That might fly with Parker. He doesn’t know computers—or you—the way I do.” Her eyes narrowed, pinning him. “Now, what did you do?”
He would have thought she would have figured it out by now. “I backed up the tapes that were just handed over to your buddies.”
Even though she’d viewed the pertinent ones, she’d still wanted to have the tapes so that she could look them over more closely. She looked at him in surprise. “You made me a copy?”
“I made me a copy,” he corrected, then added loftily. “And, if you’re very nice to me, I just might let you have them—”
She was not in the mood to play games—and even if she was, it wouldn’t have been with him. “You’re obstructing justice—” she began.
“On the contrary,” he contradicted her in a mild, easygoing voice that she found infinitely irritating. “I cooperated with law enforcement. Law enforcement just took the tapes with them. You, in this case, are a private citizen, remember?”
She pinned him with a look. “I also have a temper, remember?”
Matt grinned then, recalling how volatile she could be—and how much fun making up afterward always was. It was hard to believe that he had once been that young, that devoid of a sense of impeding consequences to have considered allowing her to remain in his life. He knew better now.
“How could I forget it?” And then he added, “Don’t worry, I still remember how to share and play well with others.” He looked toward the tech. “Are you finished?”
“Just about.” Wilson pushed his glasses up his noise, something she noticed he did every few minutes. “Just gotta put it on a disk.”
“Make it a jump drive,” Matt told him. He took what looked like a key chain advertising Montgomery Enterprises out of his pocket and handed it to the tech. “Easier to carry around.” He said the words to the tech, but he was pointedly looking at Natalie as he said them.
He was going for “hide in plain sight,” she thought. “Thank you,” she said grudgingly.
Matt was already walking away, and he shrugged in response. “I owe you.”
Natalie saw no reason to dispute that. “Yes,” she agreed emphatically. “You do.”
Three minutes later, the newly uploaded key chain in hand, she walked into Matt’s office without bothering to knock first. There was a TV on the side of the office, and he had it on, giving it his attention for the moment. But he was aware of her entrance. She still wore the same fragrance.
Matt turned around in his chair. “Leaving now?” he asked.
She was about to say no, but the words temporarily evaporated from her lips. Her eyes were drawn to the TV on the back wall despite the fact that he had the sound lowered. Along the bottom of the screen was a banner announcing “Breaking news.” Candace’s photograph, taken at some other recent function, was in the upper right-hand corner as a newscaster read words off a teleprompter announcing to the few who hadn’t yet heard that Candace Rothchild, the darling of the paparazzi set, had been found dead in her condo. Because the room where she was found had been ransacked, the banner continued, foul play was suspected.
“Foul play,” Natalie echoed incredulously, spitting the term out. “What an innocuous term for murder.”
He was well aware that news reporting was an art form. They had to tantalize the public, taking care not to put them off so much that they couldn’t bear to hear the details.
“Keeps the public coming back for more and still separates them from the horror of it.” Something protective kicked in within him. Leaning over, he deliberately turned off the TV. She didn’t need to be subjected to that. “Otherwise, if you showed all the gruesome details, the only ones who’d tune in would be serial killers in the making. And ghouls,” he added. He rose from his desk, guessing why she’d sought him out. “Leaving?”
Natalie shook her head. “Just getting started,” she contradicted.
He’d forgotten how stubborn she could be. Like a junkyard dog once she got hold of something—except a lot prettier. Still, he knew he had to give appealing to her common sense a shot. “Natalie, I really think you should leave this to the others.”
Was he serious? “And I really think you should help me.”
He thought that his part was over with the tapes. “What?”
Damn, she hated sounding as if she was asking for favors, but he was right. She had no official capacity here, couldn’t rely on her badge, so this placed it in the realm of favors.
“Believe me, this is not something I’m asking lightly, but you were the last one to see Candace alive,” she reminded him.
“Correction, a whole plaza full of people were the last ones to see your sister alive—not to mention whoever killed her,” he added.
She intended on asking questions until someone remembered something, or said something that would point her in the right direction. For that, she needed him, because he could pave the way for her. And, as he had already mentioned, he owed her.
“I need to talk to Luke to find out what the argument was about, and I need to talk to the valets on duty to see if any of them noticed anyone leaving with Candace,” Natalie told him. “She was obviously smiling at someone off camera.”
As she paused, she realized that Matt looked as if he was going to refuse her. She wasn’t about to give him the chance. She intended on hammering at him until he surrendered.
“Now, I’m going to do this with you or without you,” she said, “but it would go a whole lot easier for me if you were there to smooth the way for me.”
“Natalie—”
He still looked dubious. Did having her around repulse him so much that he would deny her the right to find her sister’s killer?
She guessed at the reason behind his reluctance. It