Guilty as Sin (10 page)

"Is Josh talking?"

"Did he identify Wright?"

Ellen gave them a ghost of a smile. "We're very confident about our case."

She turned and walked away from them with Cameron falling in step beside her. They pushed through the main doors and turned up the steps to the second floor. The reporters didn't hesitate to follow, storming into the building like a human tornado, all noise and motion. Ellen couldn't help but think about what Brooks had said to her about the lack of security. "This is a highly volatile case you've got here. Anything might happen. . . ."She made a mental note to talk to Rudy about it. There was no sense taking unnecessary risks.

She kept her poise as the reporters' questions filled up the cavernous hallway and resounded off the high ceiling, drowning out the noise of the third-floor renovations. She let them draw their own conclusions from her cool silence, let them think she had this case in her pocket, when those same questions rattled around inside her like a pair of dice. Would Josh pick Wright out of a photo lineup? Would they get him to talk about what had happened? Or had he been so traumatized he would lock the secrets inside his mind forever?

"You're a cool one, Ms. North," Cameron said with a smile as they entered the sanctuary of the outer office.

Ellen gave him a wry look. "Never let 'em see you sweat, Mr. Reed."

She breathed a sigh of relief. This was her turf, her second home, this warren of scarred wooden desks and ancient filing cabinets that smelled of 3-In-One Oil. Portraits of county attorneys past hung high on the dingy beige walls that were waiting for the renovators. Bulletin boards sported notices and dictates from higher offices and court-related cartoons. Telephones rang ceaselessly, ignored by the people arriving for work in favor of unwrapping the layers of outerwear from their bodies. Someone had started the first pot of coffee—Phoebe, by the exotic scent of it.

The secretary who served as Ellen's assistant shunned the ordinary in most respects, a tendency immediately obvious in her choice of clothes. The standard office look for Phoebe was Holly Hobby meets Buddy Holly—cotton peasant dresses with Doc Marten shoes and black-rimmed nerd glasses. Somehow Phoebe managed to make the look work. Rudy had raised his eyebrows at her more than once, but her work was exemplary, and Ellen was her staunchest advocate.

"What's our treat this morning?" she asked, grabbing her mug off the shelf above the pot.

"Cinnamon Praline," Phoebe said, her voice muffled by the thick llama-wool poncho she was struggling out from under. She emerged with long kinky hair a wild black cloud around her head. A tiny, breastless thing, she had dressed in filmy layers today—a tunic the color of eggplant

over a skirt the color of dirt over a pair of black tights with army boots. She tossed the poncho over her chair, her brown eyes bright with excitement and fixed on Ellen. "Is it true? Is Josh back?"

"He showed up at home around midnight."

"That's so great!" she said, tears of joy welling up. Her emotions never ran far from the surface; only the sheer weight of the boots kept her on the floor. "Is he all right?"

Ellen weighed her words as she warmed her hands with her coffee mug and let the scent of cinnamon tease her nose. " 'All right' might be a stretch, but he seems in good shape physically."

"Poor little kid." Phoebe dug a tissue from somewhere among the layers of her outfit and rubbed it under her reddening nose. "Imagine how scared he must have been."

"It could have been worse," Ellen said.

It could have been unspeakable. Other cases from other places went through her mind as she let herself into her office. Horrible tales of bodies found in pieces cast into drainage ditches or discarded in the woods like so much garbage for scavengers to feed on. They were so very lucky to have Josh back, talking or not. Not even the lingering feeling that it was all part

Wright's twisted game could dampen Ellen's sense of relief.

She tried to hit her office light switch with an elbow, missed, and moved on. Setting her briefcase on the floor beside her desk, she took a sip from her coffee and reached to set the mug on the cork coaster beside her blotter. The mug hit a neat stack of reports instead. Surprised, she pulled back.

She was fanatic about her desk. Her first year in Deer Lake, Phoebe had given her a plaque for Christmas that read Persons Moving Objects On This Desk Will Be Prosecuted To The Full Extent Of The Law. It resided in its usual spot at the front edge of the blotter. The stacks of papers and files were neat, but not quite where she had left them. All pens were in their tooled leather cup, but the cup was six inches out of place.

Must have been someone new on the cleaning staff, she rationalized as she moved the reports and unearthed the coaster. But as she shrugged out of her coat and hung it on the rack in the corner, that smoky drawl whispered in the back of her mind— "assumptions can be very dangerous things. Your boss needs to have a word with someone about security . . ."

A shiver skittered like a bony fingertip down the back of her neck.

"Things have taken quite an interesting turn, haven't they, Ms. North?"

Ellen wheeled around. He stood just inside the door. The light coming through the window was gray and grainy. It suited him, playing on the angles of his face. He hadn't bothered to shave, looked, in fact, as if he had yet to go to bed.

"How did you get in here?"

A smile quirked one corner of a mouth that would have looked perfect on a high-priced hooker and was somehow sexier on him. "The door was open."

Ellen went on the offensive.

"See this?" she asked, curling her hand into a fist and raising it. "Around here it's customary to make one of these and strike it against a door or door frame prior to entering another person's home or office. We call it knocking."

"I'll try to remember that," Brooks commented, strolling away from her.

He started on a slow circuit of the cramped room, absorbing the details of it—the framed diplomas, the well-tended plant on the credenza, the small CD player and neat rack of CDs nestled in among the law tomes in the bookcase. Everything neat and tidy, like Ellen North herself. Not a hair out of place, literally. Her hair was swept back flawlessly into a slick, no-nonsense twist his fingers itched to pull loose.

"Can I help you, Mr. Brooks?" Her tone was acid with sarcasm.

"I came to make an appointment."

"I have an assistant for that. And before you bypassed her desk, you walked past our receptionist, who could also have taken care of you. You actually could have saved yourself a trip—we do have telephones."

"They're ringing off their hooks today." He watched her from the corner of his eye as he circled around behind her desk.

She clearly didn't like him trespassing. She stood with her arms crossed over the front of her smart charcoal suit, her lips pressed into a thin line, her gray eyes narrowed slightly. He could tell she was building a fine head of steam, and yet she kept it contained inside the pretty, polished exterior.

"I understand the boy showed up last night."

"His name is Josh."

"Reappeared like magic, I'm told."

"Told by whom?"

He chose not to answer. Looking away from her, he noticed the crystal candy dish on the upper right-hand corner of the desk, filled with polite little after-dinner mints in pastel colors. He fished out a green one and met her eyes again as he placed it on his tongue.

"The bond hearing is this morning?"

Ellen had to force her gaze away from his mouth, but jerking it upward was a mistake, because there were his eyes—watchful, unblinking . . . amused.

Picking up her briefcase, she skirted around him. "Yes, the bond hearing is this morning. I'm very busy. If you'd care to make an appointment, stop and do so on your way out."

Jay ignored the dismissal. He surrendered the space behind the desk and sauntered back to the bookcase, scanning the titles of her CD collection. Quiet, orderly music: Mozart, Vivaldi. New Age artists: Philip Derg, William Ackerman. Background music. Nothing that could distract her from her work. Nothing that could hint at the woman behind the cool control. The lack of clues only served to intrigue him further.

"You can call me Jay," he offered.

"I can also call security and have you thrown out."

The threat bounced off. "Think he'll make bail?"

"Not if I have anything to say about it."

She settled herself in her chair and slipped on a pair of scholarly-looking reading glasses. If her intent was to hide or tone down her femininity, she failed miserably. The spectacles were more a counterpoint to her looks than a cover. He could imagine leaning across that neat desk and sliding them off her face or kissing her and watching her surprise as they fogged up.

He had the most devilish urge to rattle her, but he would keep it in check. At least for the moment. He was already pushing his luck with her, though he could have argued that was a vital part of the process. He wanted to know more about her: she wasn't the kind of woman who offered those insights freely. On the other hand, it would be essential for him to have her cooperation if he decided to make this case his next best-seller.

It had all the ingredients—a fascinating criminal, sympathetic victims, a setting that would draw readers in; a crime with complications, twists, the extras, the side stories that elevated it above the level of news story. Most of all, it had captured his attention as nothing had in a long time. He didn't know yet what approach he would take or even if he would do it. All he really knew at this point was that he wanted to know more, that he needed the distraction—badly.

He eased himself down into the visitor's chair- "He stays in the can, it shortens your prep time for the probable cause hearing."

"I'm not concerned."

Picking up a purple glass paperweight from atop a stack of reports, he curled his hand around it as if it were a baseball and he was fixing to throw a slider. The slider was a great pitch. His personal favorite. It looked as if it were going one way, then exploded in another.

"You could set a reachable bail," he suggested. "Buy yourself a little time."

Her eyebrows rose above the rims of her glasses. "And release a kidnapper, a man who brutally assaulted a police officer? You must be insane."

"He allegedly committed those crimes. What happened to the presumption of innocence?"

"It's for jurors and fools. And if you quote me on that, I'll sue your ass eight ways from Sunday. I'm not about to let Garrett Wright out of jail."

"What's he gonna do if he gets out?" JaY needled. "Steal another kid? I don't think so. He's smarter than that...if he's your man at all."

"He's our man."

"So who brought Josh home?"

Ellen bit down on her reply. He was baiting her and she was sitting here and taking it. Here, in her own office. What the hell was he doing here, anyway? Pumping her for information as if he had a personal stake in the case, as if be were Wright's attorney. Denny Enberg should have been sitting in that chair making that same argument. She glanced at the message slips to see if any of them bore the name of Wright's attorney. None did.

"Other than dispensing unsolicited advice, do you have a purpose for bothering me, Mr. Brooks?"

The pirate grin stretched across his mouth. "I bother you, Ms. North? Why is that?"

"It could have something to do with the fact that you're an extremely annoying person."

He splayed a hand across his chest. "Who, me? Time magazine said I'm loved by millions."

"So is McDonald's, but you won't find me eating there. I'm a woman of discriminating taste."

The grin curled into a smile that was nothing short of feral. He came aut of the chair and leaned across the desk, planting his hands on her slotter.

"I can see that you are, Ms. North," he said in a voice like black velvet. "A woman of incomparable style and taste. Sharp-tongued. Sharp-vitted. Makes me wonder what you're doing in a nowhere place, in a nothing job like this."

Ellen resisted the urge to grab her letter opener and stab him with it. For all the satisfaction it would have brought, she had to prepare for court and didn't have time to deal with the mess. She met his gaze with a cool look as she rose slowly from her chair to take away his dramatic height dvantage.