Chapter Forty-Three

Jessie walked the nearly abandoned sidewalks back to Sam’s place. Her footprints left a Hansel-and-Gretel path behind her that would soon disappear beneath the fast-falling snow. She thought about Nina’s warning, and her reasoning made sense. It also made Jessie more wary than she’d been before.

This thing with Ian upped the stakes to a whole new level. That man was here yesterday, gone last night.

But Nina’s argument also made Jessie more resolute. The idea that Talmont would exonerate himself from Sam’s murder by killing again—craftily staging a suicide—made Jessie more determined to beat him at his own game.

The blanket of snow gave the neighborhood a storybook ambiance that tempered Jessie’s paranoia. There would be few SUVs careening out of nowhere to run her down tonight, and no one following her too closely without being heard and seen.

Even so, she turned and looked.

Several people walked on the sidewalks on either side of 19th Street, all at least a half block behind her, bundled beyond recognition in their harsh-weather gear. When she reached the fence in front of Sam’s townhouse, she paused and thought of Michael. He’d stood in the same place the night Talmont had shown up. She remembered letting him into the foyer, shaken from her confrontation with Talmont, and recalled how he’d claimed to be suspicious about Talmont’s involvement in Sam’s death.

Jessie had been, too, ever since Philippe had told her about Sam’s extortion scheme. But even more so after he’d come to Sam’s condo, drunk and mournful, claiming that Sam had died alone in her bed without him. How had her attention been drawn away from suspecting him after he’d made such a telling slip?

She made her way up the walk to Sam’s townhouse, opened the gate and the door. Almost hopeful, she glanced at the mailboxes. But no envelopes had been delivered tonight.

Inside the condo, she tossed her purse on a chair and hung up her coat to dry. She sank onto the couch and put her head in her hands. She’d been distracted by all the glossy pictures of Helena and Ian, Elizabeth and Philippe. They’d diverted her attention away from Talmont and down some dead-end yellow-brick road.

She pressed her fingers against her closed eyes. “If I only had a brain.” She had known she was being manipulated; she’d just banked on it being for better, not worse. But it had only been a false hope that someone was on her side.

Michael had tried to warn her about Talmont. She thought back to the night she’d taken Sam’s files from Ian’s office. Michael had followed her there because he was concerned that Talmont had sobered up and decided he’d revealed too much to her. She remembered the concern in Michael’s eyes.

I was worried he might try to correct his mistake…. He has a reputation for retaliation when he doesn’t get his way. If he thinks you suspect him in Sam’s murder, he won’t give you enough time to make the case.

Not long after Michael had said those things, she’d been staring into the grille of an oncoming SUV. And everything after that had been about Elizabeth and Ian.

And Michael.

She shoved aside the intimate thoughts of him that threatened to sidetrack her logic. And steal her heart.

Was Michael still tracking Talmont? She hoped he was, that at least one of them hadn’t lost focus. He had experience and connections and intuition, and he would make the case against Talmont.

Eventually.

But Jessie had ideas and attributes that Michael didn’t. And she had an immediate plan.

…

Michael stepped into his apartment, tossed his coat and gloves on the couch, then slumped down next to them and tugged off his soggy boots. He leaned back and stared at the ceiling.

He needed a vacation. Away from Jessie and Croft, and far from the memory of Sam. True to his nature, he’d immersed himself in work and hadn’t allowed himself to grieve. He’d lost his dad. He’d lost Sam. He’d lost Jessie in a different way, but she was gone just the same.

Michael could feel the spring coiling, the pressure in his chest, like a rerun of what had happened after Wes was killed. Tighter and tighter. Then all hell had broken loose.

He went to the refrigerator and got a beer.

Half a bottle later, action on Jessie’s phone line interrupted the easing tension of his not-so-happy hour. She was making a call. He checked his phone screen and read the number.

Talmont.

The number was registered to his personal cell phone. Michael had seen it at least a hundred times—every time Sam had called him, and every time he’d called her. What the hell was Jessie doing now? He turned up the volume on the speaker and chugged the rest of his beer.

“Hello.” Talmont answered with an I-don’t-recognize-this-number tone.

“Hello, Senator. This is Jessica Croft.” Using what was surely a deliberately sexy voice. Michael’s gut clenched.

Dead air on the line, then the sound of a woman talking in the background.

“Senator?”

“Yes.”

“I wanted to apologize for what happened when you were here,” Jessie said. “At Sam’s place. I didn’t realize you had a key. And when you came in late at night like that, it scared me.”

“Sure. I understand.”

“I’ve finished going through Sam’s belongings,” Jessie said. “I’ve found something that looks like it might be yours, and something else you might like to have.”

More dead air. Jessie was waiting him out.

“Okay.”

“Would you like to come by and pick them up?”

Michael started to sweat, despite the draft in the apartment. He rolled the cold beer bottle between his palms.

“Let me check my schedule,” Talmont said. “I’ll get back to you.”

“I’m leaving in the morning, weather permitting. Could you, um, could you come over tonight?” Jessie’s invitation came out locked and loaded, and Michael’s pulse took off in a full-out sprint.

Say no, you slimy bastard. Say no.

“I don’t know, Ryan,” Talmont said, as if he were speaking to Croft.

Michael had no doubt that Jessie was quick enough to catch the clue. The woman in the background was probably Talmont’s wife.

“With the weather like this,” he said, “it would be tough.”

“It would mean a lot to Sam,” Jessie said. “And to me.”

“All right, buddy.” Talmont made it sound as if he’d given in under duress. “Give me an hour. Lorna’s not going to be happy.”

“I’ll see you then.”

They both clicked off the line.

Michael closed his eyes and dreaded what was coming.