LITMIR.BIZ

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gone to bed and had pleasant dreams.” When she looked down at the tea box in her hand, her blond hair fell forward, hiding her expression. “I have no regrets. I’m glad I saw. That man can’t get away with murder.”

      He reached across the counter to comfort her. He clasped her hand in his, rubbing the delicate skin of her palm with his thumb. In a casual way, they’d been in physical contact all night as he guided her through the hotel and bumped against her in the elevator. But this touch felt significant.

      Her gaze lifted to meet his eyes, and he felt an instant, deep connection to her. At that moment, she became more than a witness. His instinct was to pull her into his arms and cradle her against his chest until her fears went away.

      No way could that happen.

      She’d blamed the champagne for making her behave in a less-than-professional manner. What was his excuse? He knew better than to get personal with a witness, especially someone who was only passing through Arcadia. Reining in his instincts, he released her hand and sat back on his stool. “What did you want to talk about?”

      “I’m not sure when it started,” she said, “but I’ve been having that weird feeling you get when someone is watching. You know how it is? The hairs on the back of your neck stand up and you see things in your peripheral vision.”

      “When did the feeling start?”

      “Not when we first arrived at the hotel. Not when we were going through the rooms. It was after we saw Reinhardt and I swallowed my tongue.” Her voice broke. “Talk about being in trouble. I’m up to my armpits. I don’t know how I’m going to find the nerve to show up for that meeting tomorrow.”

      “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

      “Oh, but I did. It’s my job to facilitate the discussion and make things easier for the investors. Instead, I created a big fat problem.” A tear slipped over her lower lashes and slid down her cheek. “I’m going to get fired for sure.”

      He wanted to wipe away her tears and tell her that everything was going to be all right, but he wasn’t a liar. He was a cop, and the proper procedure for answering a 911 call didn’t include cozying up to the witness.

      Circling the counter, he rifled loudly through the cabinets until he located a stainless-steel teakettle, which he filled with water and placed on the burner. When he faced her again, she had regained her composure.

      “Okay,” he said, “skip ahead to the time when you felt like you were being watched.”

      She thought for a moment. “When we were at the front desk, finding out how the key cards for the hotel rooms worked, I started to take my parka off. I shivered. Then I felt the prickling up and down my arms. It was like a warning. I looked around, but I didn’t notice anybody watching me.”

      The front desk was located in the wide-open atrium area where dozens of people came and went. Plus there was a balcony overlooking the marble pond and the statue of the huntress. They could have easily been spotted. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

      “I didn’t want to interrupt. It seemed like we were making some progress. The key cards were a pretty good clue.”

      Using the computerized system, they’d learned that key cards had been made for the suite on the sixth floor. The key had been activated prior to the time when she saw the couple having dinner, indicating that someone could have been in the room. “If the security cameras in the hallway had been operational, we’d have this all wrapped up.”

      “Do you think he was planning to kill her from the start?” She bit her lower lip. “That the murder was premeditated?”

      “I don’t know.”

      “I think it was,” she said. “It took some planning for him to get her alone in that room without anybody knowing.”

      Premeditation made sense to Brady. The slick way the body had been whisked away without leaving a trace seemed to indicate foresight. For the sake of argument, he took a different view. “He might have just wanted a free night at a classy hotel, eating free food and enjoying the view.”

      “When I was first watching them, I thought they were a couple. They weren’t talking much, and I thought it was one of those comfortable silences between people who have been together for a long time.”

      “Like a husband and wife?”

      “Not really.” She shook her head. “The woman was all dolled up, and that made me think they were on a date. Her fancy gold necklace isn’t the kind of thing a wife would wear.”

      “Why not?”

      “It’s too formal. I think she wanted to impress him with her outfit, and he was doing the same by taking her to the expensive suite.” As she chatted, she began to relax. “If he was trying to impress her, he wasn’t planning to hurt her.”

      “And his attack wasn’t premeditated.” He found a couple of striped mugs in the cabinet above the sink, and she popped a tea bag in each. “Is that your theory?”

      “That’s one theory,” she said. “But it leaves a lot of details unexplained. I saw him pick her up in his arms. He must have gotten blood on his clothes. How could he risk walking through the hall like that?”

      The teakettle whistled, and Brady poured the boiling water over the tea bags. He had a couple of theories of his own. “When the forensic guys went over the room, they didn’t find a single drop of blood. Not even when they used luminol and blue light. He was tidy. He could have covered the blood with a jacket and slipped on a pair of gloves.”

      She nodded. “And he could get rid of those clothes when he left the hotel.”

      Brady didn’t often handle complicated investigations, and he appreciated the chance to discuss the possible scenarios. He probably shouldn’t be having this talk with her, but there wasn’t anybody else. Due to the lack of evidence, the sheriff was going to tell him to forget about this investigation. Jacobson might be inclined to throw around a few ideas, but his plate was full with getting the hotel security up and running.

      Brady sweetened his tea with sugar and took a sip. The orange-scented brew tickled his nostrils. “His real problem was disposing of the body. If he carried her any distance, there would have been a trail of blood drops.”

      When she lifted the mug to her lips, her hand was trembling so much that she set it down again.

      “Sasha, are you all right?”

      “It’s okay.” She lifted her chin. “Keep talking.”

      Her struggle to control her fear was obvious. He didn’t want to make this any harder for her. “Maybe we should go and sit by the fireplace.”

      “I said I was fine.” Her voice was stronger. “You were talking about a blood trail.”

      “If he’d planned the murder,” he said, “he could have arranged to have one of those carts that housekeeping uses to haul the dirty sheets.”

      “That doesn’t seem likely. How could he explain having a maid’s cart standing by?”

      “It’s hard to imagine that he wrapped her up in a sheet or a comforter and didn’t leave a single drop of blood. What if he ran into someone in the hallway?”

      “But he didn’t have to go far,” she said, “only down the hall to the elevator. That goes all the way down to the underground parking.”

      Brady preferred the idea of the maid’s cart. “He could have been working with someone else.”

      A shudder went through her, and she turned away from him, trying to hide the fear that she’d denied feeling a moment ago. “Would there be a lot of blood?”

      He didn’t want to feed her imagination. “There’s no way of knowing. This is all speculation.”

      “The red blood stood out against her white

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