29

Max strode into Leigh’s living room. Two detectives were seated in the large room. One young and dark-haired, the other older and nearly bald. A pot of tea along with dainty cups had been placed on a coffee table before them. They looked untouched except for the one Leigh held.

Leigh stood as he entered. “These two detectives have been very patient,” she said. “I explained that you told me you should be present and I couldn’t say anything but hello until you came.”

She sounded like a bubblehead, and he knew she was anything but.

“Gentlemen,” he acknowledged.

“Why can’t she talk if she doesn’t have anything to hide?”

“Would you?” he asked, giving him a pained expression. “Even if you didn’t have anything to hide?”

“Yeah, I would,” one said. The other just shrugged and took out a small recorder.

“Max,” Leigh said. “Detective Callum just asked about the gun permit that I have, and the firearms course I took.”

He wasn’t surprised. When they hadn’t appeared immediately, he concluded they had been doing some homework before showing up at the home of an influential family. Not to mention the up-and-coming politician who was Leigh’s second cousin.

He assumed from the way she posed the statement that the question had been asked, but not answered. Good for her. “She took lessons a number of years ago as a favor to her grandfather. Ed Westerfield had two passions in his life. Business and hunting. He wanted to see what she was made of. Leigh took lessons to please him. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out very well. On the first hunt, she couldn’t—or wouldn’t—shoot a deer. He killed it, and she refused to go again. She doesn’t like guns and she doesn’t like hunting.”

“I assume Ms. Howard can speak for herself,” one detective said, and turned back to her.

“Mr. Payton is right. I hated guns. They scared me then, and they scare me now, but my grandfather was insistent. He thought I was … too soft. He also said I needed to be able to take care of myself. I took lessons, but as Mr. Payton said, I wasn’t very good at it.”

“Ms. Douglas, one of the victims last night, said there might be some bad feelings between her and the Westerfields.”

“Did she now?” Max said. “Exactly like that?”

The detective shrugged. “Close to that. Seems she might be the heiress to”—he spread out his arms—“all of this. Money makes people do some strange things.”

“You can rest assured that Ms. Howard had nothing to do with any of these incidents. She was home last night.”

“Can anyone verify that?” The detective stared hard at Leigh.

She shook her head. “Our housekeeper left at five p.m. I went riding late in the afternoon, then came inside. I was supposed to have dinner with my cousins, but I decided to stay home. I looked over the program for a benefit auction preceding a charity horse show in two weeks.”

“Did you make any calls?” the dark-haired detective said.

“Several.”

The detective looked at Max. “We would like to look at the call logs.”

“Help yourself.”

The detectives exchanged glances. “Back to the firearms course,” he said. “How long did you take lessons?”

“Twice a week for a few months,” she said. “I don’t remember exactly.”

“It certainly doesn’t qualify her to shoot a silenced rifle from a hundred yards away,” Max broke in.

“How do you know how many yards?” the detective snapped.

“I had hired someone to look after Ms. Douglas. Two of them were present last night at city hall.”

“You need better talent,” a detective observed.

“I remedied that,” Max said curtly.

“What did they see?” Callum asked.

“Very little. They saw Ms. Douglas go down. Then two other people. Their first interest was to get to Ms. Douglas, not to find the shooter. I told them to go to the police department and tell them exactly what they saw.”

“I’ll make sure they did that,” the detective said. He changed course. “Before we came, we checked on gun registrations. There were a number registered to Ed Westerfield.”

“He was a hunter and gun collector,” Max said.

“May we see them?”

He nodded. The detectives didn’t have a search warrant, but they could get one, and the ATF could walk in at any time and demand to see the weapons. It would only make them all look more suspicious if he refused.

“I can tell you two are missing,” he said. “After the shooting last night, I knew you would pay us a visit. I checked the gun safe and rifle cabinet. A Remington Model 700 rifle is missing along with a forty-five. And to answer your next question, I don’t know when they disappeared. I haven’t looked in two years.”

“Why do you have access?”

“I’m administrator of the estate. Ms. Howard was left the house and all its contents. It was my job to catalogue them and make the weapons safe. I felt they were.”

“Show us the cabinet and safe,” Callum said.

Max walked them to the study and opened the gun safe. They compared copies of registration forms to the weapons.

“Did he have a silencer for the rifle?”

Max nodded. “It’s on the list. Mr. Westerfield never did anything in a small way. He was a hunter. He was fascinated with guns and their history.”

The detective frowned. “Who might have had access to the guns?”

It was a question Max had dreaded. “I don’t know,” he said. “I haven’t seen his guns since I took inventory after his death. I can tell you those two weapons were there then. I made sure then they were locked up until Leigh decided what to do with them.”

The detective turned to Leigh.

“As Mr. Payton said, my grandfather tried to interest me in hunting. I hated it. I didn’t want anything to do with his gun collection. I certainly haven’t checked on it.”

The detective looked at his notes again. “Anyone else have access to the guns?”

“Possibly,” Max said. “Locks weren’t changed on the house. I don’t know who may have had access to the gun safe. Westerfield had several hunting buddies that met here.”

“I want their names as well as those of anyone else who has access to the house,” the detective said. “Let’s turn to money. It seems Ms. Howard stands to lose a great deal. What about this charge of a baby switch thirty years ago?”

Max shrugged again. “I think the question has something to do with a possible mistake, nothing criminal. Ms. Howard is taking a DNA test to erase any doubt. She is cooperating in every way. She wants this settled as much as anyone does.”

“Not what we were told.”

“I don’t care what you were told.” He handed the older officer a card. “That’s the lab that’s sending over a technician. Call him yourself if you want.”

The detective ignored him and turned all his attention to Leigh. “Isn’t it true you could lose everything if the charge proves true?”

“Ed Westerfield left his estate to the granddaughter he knew,” Max interrupted. “Even if there is any truth to a possible mistake in the delivery room, Leigh Howard is still the person Ed Westerfield meant to inherit his money. Now is there anything else?”

“Not for the moment.”

Max stood. “Then I think this visit is over.”

“For now. We’ll be back with a search warrant.”

“If you have the probable cause for one,” Max said with a slight smile. “I don’t think you do.”

“We have motive.”

“Not much of one since Ms. Howard has agreed to a DNA test, and I think Ms. Douglas will tell you she doesn’t intend to contest the will.”

The dark-haired officer stood. “We’ll be back,” he said again.

“It’ll be a pleasure to see you again,” Max said wryly as he showed them the door.

A small triumph. They obviously had little to go on, and this was little more than a fishing expedition.

But the next hours might change that.

The phone rang. It stopped suddenly and Max supposed that Mrs. Baker had answered it. Before he could finish the thought, she knocked on the door and came in.

“A local television station,” Mrs. Baker said. “They want a comment on the … the story that babies might have been switched at birth.”

“Tell them, ‘No comment,’” he said.

“It’s started,” Leigh said.

“You can handle it,” Max said.

“For how long? And how long am I going to be Leigh Howard?”

He saw the questions in her eyes and wished he could answer them. He couldn’t. No more than he could answer the questions in another woman’s blue gray eyes. God, he wished he could stop thinking about her. Stop wanting to be with her. He wished he could reconcile his responsibility to Leigh with the need inside him for Kira Douglas.

But he couldn’t.

In a few hours the technician would be here to take the DNA test. By then, the press would be in full cry.

Kira knew immediately that Leigh Howard was surprised to see her, and none too happy about it. The woman’s expression softened as she greeted Chris behind her. Kira saw something pass between them, a connection that surprised her.

She would have thought that Leigh would be the last woman to attract Chris. She was cool and contained and reserved. As unlike the laughing Risa as anyone could be.

But then, she would have thought the same thing about Max and herself. Maybe it really was true that opposites attract.

That didn’t mean it was a healthy thing. She told herself that as she saw Max when they stepped inside. Her heart flip-flopped, then did a nosedive. His eyes were neutral, his expression grim. Even if she hadn’t seen him, she suspected she would have recognized the scent of sandalwood that always hovered around him and the way her body reacted whenever he was near. There was a kind of intense energy that played between them.

She resented that energy, even as it intrigued her. She liked being in control of her life. She didn’t want anyone to have the kind of impact on it that he did.

For the fleetest of seconds, their gazes met and she thought she saw possession in his eyes. It sent a shiver down her spine. Then heat.

She didn’t want to feel that heat. Especially since she didn’t trust him. He’d been honest about his commitment to Leigh Howard and the Westerfields. Maybe he could live with divided loyalties. She couldn’t. Not now.

He stepped back as if burned, then his eyes cooled.

“I didn’t realize you were coming,” he said. “Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

“Someone tried to kill my mother earlier today.”

She heard a small cry from where Leigh stood. Max’s expression hardened. “I’m sorry to hear that. Is she all right?”

“Yes, but the guy got away. I think it’s the same one who tried to push me off the platform.”

“You saw him?” Max asked, his gaze focusing on her.

She nodded. “Briefly. He was getting on the elevator when I got off. I think he was surprised when he saw me. He made a sudden turn, just like at the station. Catlike. It didn’t go with the stocky build.

“I called the nurse’s desk while I waited for the elevator and asked that they check on Mom. The nurse found someone leaning over her IV. Someone who shouldn’t be there.”

“What did he look like?”

“Overweight, which is a little different from the impression I had a few days ago. Messy red hair. Glasses.”

“You said the other man was wearing a cap?”

“This one wasn’t. That’s why it didn’t register immediately. It was only the way he suddenly turned when he saw me. He … spun. Just like before.”

Leigh moved closer. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“None of it makes sense,” Kira agreed. “My mother’s death wouldn’t change anything.” She looked directly at Leigh. She could barely control her anger. “If she’s murdered or dies because someone who could help, didn’t, all bets are off. I’ll go after every penny. I would probably end up giving it to charity, but not one person liable for her death will benefit from it.”

“You don’t think I had anything to do with the shooting or what happened today?” Leigh’s blue eyes flamed.

Chris stepped between them. His gaze warned Kira. Then he turned to Leigh. “No one is accusing anyone of anything. We’re just trying to find the truth.”

For a second, Kira felt a profound sense of betrayal. Was Chris taking Leigh’s side, too? First Max. Now Chris. He was certainly looking at Leigh with a lot more warmth than Kira felt. “It’s obviously someone in this family,” she persisted. “Or someone connected to it.”

“We don’t even know there was a switch,” Leigh said stubbornly as she glared daggers at Kira. “You walk into our lives with a lie, then make an outlandish claim. You demand I give a stranger a kidney without proof, then threaten me with blackmail if I don’t. You, Ms. Douglas, can go to hell.”

Kira took a step back. The litany of sins hit home. Yet she couldn’t back down. Her mother’s life was at stake. Why couldn’t people understand that?

Max started to say something, but was interrupted by Mrs. Baker, who’d been manning the telephones. “The guard at the gate said someone from a lab is here.”

Max glanced at Leigh. She hesitated, then nodded.

“Tell the guards to let him through,” Max said.

“They also said that television trucks are gathering at the gate.”

“Make it clear to them that we will charge trespassers,” Max said. “We will have a statement later. There will be no comment beyond that.”

“A statement?” Leigh asked.

“If you give them something, they will go away.”

Leigh glared at Kira. “You said you could keep this quiet.”

“I didn’t know then that my mother and I would become targets for a homicidal maniac,” Kira said. “I’ve been pushed in front of a train, my apartment was trashed, I was shot while an innocent bystander was killed. And my mother was attacked hours ago. And you’re upset because I wasn’t quiet. Come on. Someone on your side obviously has no interest in keeping this private.”

Chris put a hand on her arm, but Kira brushed it off. “I’m sick of all this poor-Leigh stuff.” She faced the person she now thought of as her nemesis. “Grow up. The woman who might be your mother is dying. That’s the only thing that should matter now.”

“I’ve agreed to the DNA test,” Leigh protested as she took a step backward.

“But not the blood tests for compatibility with Mom.”

“Your mom. Not mine. I didn’t have one. I haven’t had one for twenty-six years.”

The doorbell rang, and the conversation stopped. Max stepped past by Kira on the way to the door. His face was like stone.

Not for the first time, she wondered whether there wasn’t something more than a client/attorney relationship. He obviously held the purse strings of the trust, and he was lead attorney for a billion-dollar company. He was a chameleon. Someone who turned colors to meld into the background. She’d seen it several times now. He had been a different person at Lucchesi’s. Warm. Accessible. Now he was a stranger.

She would never know what he was thinking. He’d been gentle. Even tender. But that Max was gone now. He was in full protection mode of his client, and to hell with her.

To be honest with herself, she didn’t even know whether he was a murderer. Or a protector of one.

An hour later, a caller dialed a number from a public phone booth only to receive the message: “This number is out of service.”

No way to reach him now.

He was out of control. No one was to be badly hurt, and now a bystander was dead and others wounded.

What to do now? Someone had been killed. An accessory would be held equally guilty.

Never tempt a tiger.

The rage in him hadn’t been evident. The offer of five thousand dollars to scare off a pretender had seemed the only way to avoid disaster, to conceal a secret that could ravage the family, and the family’s fortune.

No one was to be hurt. Only frightened away. It had seemed the only way to avoid disaster.

Now the caller was probably the most frightened of all.