Bulletproof (Unknown Identities #1) (3 page)

Astonishment claimed Bernie’s face.

It was a shot in the dark but she’d had to try. Clearly he wasn’t buying that theory.

“Really. Think it through.” She grabbed onto the bravado that attempted to escape once more and turned to Fincher. “Just because I haven’t found anything missing yet, doesn’t mean it wasn’t a robbery attempt, right?”

Maybe someone wanted her Godiva and failed to find her hidden stash. And there was the Absolut. People paid good money for the stuff’s priceless stupor-enhancing quality. Usually she would grieve the potential loss of the chocolate first and foremost, but lately she’d reached for the vodka a little more often.

“Right?” she prompted Fincher when he stood there looking from her to Bernie and back again with that same noncommittal expression he’d had pasted on his face since he arrived.

Fincher shrugged, something else he’d been doing each time she asked him a question. “I suppose anything’s possible.” He turned his palms up. “I can’t give you an official answer yet.”

Amelia nodded appreciatively as if he’d provided an invaluable insight. He didn’t know jackshit anymore than she did. Theories, speculation – that was all anyone had at the moment, but rehashing the unknown would buy her some time. She kept her attention fixed firmly on the detective, hoping he’d add something beneficial to her predicament.

She would pretty much have to be in a coma not to feel Bernie’s furious glare burning into her profile.

“I guess the freak that ripped your place apart left you that message just for fun?” Her boss’s voice echoed several octaves higher than usual. He waved magnanimously to the bloodied wall.

“There could be –” she started to explain.

“Conference.” He snarled the word, cutting her off.

Amelia rolled her eyes and heaved a dead-tired breath. “Would you excuse us, please?” she said to the detective. Being polite wasn’t exactly on her mind just now, but the exchange dragged out the inevitable for ten or fifteen more seconds.

“No problem. But,” he held up his gloved hands and turned them back and forth to ensure both she and Bernie paid attention, “don’t touch anything.”

“Of course.” Amelia backed toward her front door. “We’ll just step outside.”

Once out the door, Bernie strode to the end of the corridor, she followed, putting some distance between them and the officer stationed at the door. Her boss turned sharply and glared at her. “This fixation of yours is over. I’m taking you off the story. Don’t even try changing my mind.”

Fixation? Why didn’t he just say what was on his mind? Amelia folded her arms over her chest to isolate the quaking that had started down deep and went for broke. “Fine. I’ll leave my resignation on your desk tomorrow when I clear out my cubicle.”

The stare-down dragged on for another five seconds or so.

He didn’t budge.

That was the one ace she had up her sleeve. And he wasn’t throwing down his cards. Not good. She shifted her weight from side to side twice before halting the visible show of weakness.
Gotta be stronger than this, girl
.

More of those trauma-filled seconds ticked off. She held her breath. If he didn’t give in...

“I’m serious, Bennett,” he ordered, the inflexible tone bending just a fraction.

“So am I.” Don’t let him see you sweat. Don’t back down. Deep in her bones Amelia understood that this story was too important.

Rather than risk him seeing her falter, she moved past him to the window and stared out at the steady drizzle beyond the streaked glass. She couldn’t look him in the eye when he got like this. Never mind the shaky nerves of her current state.

You’re fearless, Amelia
.
Remember that
.

The dreary night added the perfect layer of disturbing ambiance to the occasion. She latched onto that distraction with both hands. The weather had everyone talking. It was insane. A solid week of rain. The temperature hovered at the forty-degree mark, well above normal. And the seven-day outlook called for more of the same.

She, for one, would be prowling for the Prozac if that forecast didn’t change soon.

Bernie moved up beside her. “You’ve managed to piss off the conservatives,” his voice was noticeably calmer now, but still a wee bit overbearing, “and the liberals. Even the independents are raising hell. It’s a week until Christmas, the world wants a miracle, Bennett. If they believe Senator Larimore is it with his new global data security plan, why not let them have it? The political pundits will figure it out eventually.”

“But then the story will be over and Average Joe America will be screwed.”

“
But
,” Bernie offered, “there will always be another story.”

But not like this one. “Provided reporters are allowed to keep reporting.”

In the last three weeks, two of her contacts had gone missing. Only one body had been found, which hopefully meant the other guy was out there somewhere. She needed to find him. To get to the truth before it was too late.

And if the guy was dead, she needed to find a new source.

She wanted
this
story.

An annoying wisp of damp hair managed to slip loose and she tucked it behind her ear. Since he obviously didn’t plan to relent, Amelia adopted another strategy. “What about circulation?”

Bernie grunted. “That’s a low blow even for you.”

“The paper’s circulation is higher than it’s been for the past two years,” she reminded him.

He was well aware of that cold, hard fact. The past couple of years had been particularly difficult for independently owned media outlets.
The Torch
barely stayed in the black and a significant part of the reason was Amelia’s controversial story lines. She knew it and so did Bernie. She wasn’t bragging, just stating the facts.

He leaned against the opposite side of the window, ensuring she couldn’t ignore eye contact any longer. “We’ve worked together since you were a snot-nosed kid kicking academic ass at Boston College. I am not about to let the lust for a story go this far.” He hitched a thumb toward her apartment. “It’s not worth the risk to your life.”

Easy for him to say. He wasn’t the one out there beating the bushes to drum up interesting leads that would pump up circulation.

The Torch
was as important to her as it was to him. Almost, anyway. The paper had been in his family for six generations. But that legacy didn’t make him right at the moment.

“It’s not the end of the world, Bernie.” She had insurance. She could replace most of her things. “The stuff doesn’t matter. The story matters.” Her work was her life. She didn’t want to dwell on the idea of what that said about her, but it was true.

Frustration and no small dash of fire renewed in her boss’s brown eyes. She usually liked his eyes. Big, chocolate brown, just like that cuddly old Labrador she had adored as a kid. Except there was nothing cuddly about Bernie’s disposition at the moment.

“The letters, the calls. Most of which,” he continued before she could get a word in, “contain threats to your person if not your life. Now this.” He sighed, the sound resigned. “It’s enough, Amelia.”

Amelia
. Uh-oh. The whole father-figure thing had reared its overbearing head.

“All good stories that strike the universal emotions carry risk, Bernie. I can take care of myself.” It annoyed the crap out of her when he let his overprotective side show. She could do this... she did it every day!

“So you say, but this,” he shook his head, “this threat is different. Whoever tore apart your place knows where you live. Has been watching you. What if he’d waited for you to come home?”

“If... if... if,” she argued. “I could get hit by a bus crossing the street.” The man was acutely overreacting.

“If you jump in front of the bus,” he contended, folding his arms across his chest, “you increase your odds of being hit.”

She straightened to her full height, squared her shoulders. “I’m not stopping.” She might as well end this futile debate now. She went toe-to-toe with him, “I’m going to get to the bottom of this cover-up whether I write the story for you or for someone else.”

His eyebrows reared up his forehead. “I try to protect you and this is the grief I get?” He gave her his back and started to pace.

Damn. She’d pushed a little too hard with that one. She’d just offended, ticked off, and wounded her oldest and dearest friend. Truth was, Bernie was the closest thing she’d ever had to a father and she played the part of disobedient offspring a little too often.

No wonder he was the only friend she had... the only person in this world she trusted.

Bernie muttered furiously under his breath with every step he took.

Amelia dropped her head back. What the hell did she do now? Why didn’t he just give it up and save them both a lot of energy? He always trusted her instincts and they had served them both well.

His point about the escalation of the tactics in protest of her reporting on this lead was valid. Her apartment was a wreck. Long before the story had hit the wire, she had known this sort of thing was a possibility. There was always someone ticked off at her.

Besides her breaking news byline, she penned a regular column called
Spilling the Beans
. The letters and calls from the occasional angered reader, usually the subject of her barbed storyline, were par for the course. But
this
...Bernie was right...
this
was different.

Not that anything this side of the grave was going to keep her from pursuing the real story every time she went out there.

That was her job.

She leaned against the window once more. Across the street, beneath the lamppost trying valiantly to chase away the gloom, something dark snagged her attention. She squinted, peered through the rain and thin, curling fog. A man, tallish, dressed in a long black trench coat and matching hat moved into the pool of light near the bus stop.

As she watched, almost as if he could feel her interest on him, he lifted his face in the direction of her building...
of her apartment
.

Dread mushroomed in her stomach and spread through her limbs. Not that she could actually determine from this distance that he looked specifically at her apartment windows...but she sensed it deep down.

Amelia swallowed back the lump of tension that rose in her throat. She was not afraid. She would
not
be afraid.

“Are you hearing a word I say, Bennett?”

She pushed away from the window and turned her attention to her boss. The last thing she needed was him discovering any additional details related to her personal safety, like the possibility that she had a stalker. She was probably overreacting to trench-coat guy
.
Even if there was no bus running at this time of night. Maintaining her fearless reputation might be her top priority, but avoiding stupid mistakes was something she kept firmly in mind... most of the time. Trench-coat guy she would deal with later, if he became a real problem.

She banned the troubling thoughts and turned to Bernie. “What were you saying?”

“I’ll make a deal with you,” he offered.

“I’m not sure I want to know what that means.” Could mean he was backing down but his obstinate expression warned otherwise.

“Well,” he puffed out his chest, “you don’t have a choice in the matter.”

Totally off the subject, she noticed he’d missed a button in his haste to get dressed. For a man who never looked anything less than put together and completely classy, it was yet another indicator of how worried he’d been when he’d heard the news and rushed over here. Emotion stirred in Amelia’s chest. She could be missing or dead for a week and there wasn’t a damned person on this planet who would care... except Bernie.

She should cut him some slack.

At the moment, however, that was part of the problem. Bernard Kessler had no children of his own and exercised his parental urges toward her far too often. He had eyes and ears in every precinct. Later, when the storm had passed, there would be hell to pay for her decision not to inform him immediately of this incident.

Chances were, if she cut him any slack – even a measly yard, he’d snatch a mile.

“You can stay on the story on one condition.”

Amelia searched his face for an indication of what he was up to. “I’m almost afraid to ask the terms of this condition.”

He did that thing he always did when he was about to lay down the law to an employee. Kind of lifted his chin while stretching his neck from side to side. To make himself taller maybe.

“A bodyguard. I want him with you twenty-four-seven.”

Hysterical laughter bubbled into her throat. “What?” He couldn’t have said what she thought he said. A bodyguard?

“No negotiation. I want a professional security expert at your side until this is done.”

“And where am I supposed to get this bodyguard?” He had to be kidding. The idea was beyond ridiculous.

“You’re a reporter. Google it.” His houndstooth clad shoulders lifted and fell with feigned indifference. “Ask some of your contacts. Check the Yellow Pages. The paper will foot the bill,” he added. “But if I hear you’re giving him the slip or not keeping him informed, we’ll revisit this subject and there won’t be any discussion. I will kill the story.”

She couldn’t let that happen, but twenty-four/seven? “That’s unacceptable.”

The last man she’d allowed to share a roof with her had slept with her best friend whenever Amelia wasn’t handy. Which was precisely why she didn’t have a boyfriend or a best friend anymore. She didn’t have time for friends anyway. And men couldn’t be trusted period.

Well, except maybe for Bernie.

“You make the call or I will,” he fired back. “Those are my terms and they’re nonnegotiable.”

“Fine.” Amelia held up her hands in surrender. “I’ll call someone.”

Under no circumstances was she allowing him to make the call. Knowing Bernie he’d hire some Nazi babysitter who wouldn’t let her brush her teeth alone. She would hire her own bodyguard. It could be a good thing.

What were the chances someone reliable and with a stellar reputation would be available at a moment’s notice? If she managed to drag out her search, Bernie would have time to cool off and eventually drop the issue. That would be that and she’d still have her freedom.