Risking It All. Beverly Bird
went sharp without really rising.
Aidan reached the door and looked back at her.
“Let’s…” She licked her lip again. “Let’s start over,” she finished as though the words tasted bad.
He wagged a finger back and forth between them. “This? Us?”
“I’ve had a long day. Maybe I was too…” She faltered, seeming unable to finish.
“Condescending?” he offered. “Judgmental?”
Ah, there, he thought. There was heat in those eyes. They’d been cold and blank up until now, but something that reminded him of a solar flare hit them as he watched.
It was enough to make him go back to the table. He wanted to see how many other ways they could change, and how quickly. There was a lot going on in there beneath her surface disdain, not that he trusted an ounce of it.
This time when he pulled the chair out, he sat properly. “Go ahead. Start over.”
He sounded as if he was giving her permission, Grace thought. In a way, he was, and that galled her.
Her heart was still beating with a sick thudding rhythm against her chest wall. How would she explain to Lutz if she lost the guy in the initial interview? Her head was fogged. Her thoughts seemed to be swimming through muck. She was tired, she thought, just tired. It had nothing at all to do with the fact that he…well, he unbalanced her.
If she was reading him right, he didn’t like her. Most men never got to the point of deciding whether they did or not. They saw her and that was enough. They looked at her and they wanted her. Grace had learned a long time ago that she need not have a single redeemable quality. They’d trail after her like pups looking for their mama anyway.
He was watching her, waiting for something, she realized. “You…ah, want me to ask you if you’re innocent.”
He nodded.
Grace swallowed carefully. “Okay. Are you innocent?”
“Well, for one thing, I’m not Bran Downey.”
He didn’t actually answer this time, she noticed. She looked down at the papers in front of her. “Bran Downey shot a cab driver on the corner of Broad and Vine. Of course, he was aiming for his wife at the time.”
Aidan reached for the other guy’s paperwork. “Did she get away?”
Grace fought the urge to slap his hand away. “Who cares?” Had she just sounded shrill? Grace briefly covered her face with her hands. “It doesn’t matter. You’re not Bran Downey.”
“Nope. But she did. Get away, that is. Good for her.”
“Yes.”
“If I’m here, where’s Downey?”
“How the hell should I know?” God bless her, now he was making her swear!
“It just makes me wonder about this fine city I’ve vowed to protect and serve. I’m here for undisclosed reasons. Meanwhile, Downey is probably in Bimini by now. What’s wrong with this picture?”
Undisclosed? What did that mean? “I don’t know and I don’t care. I’m not representing Downey.”
“Lucky for him. You’re a little tense there, lady.”
He had no idea, Grace thought. Her first felony case had damned near dumped her within minutes of meeting her. He wasn’t the man whose paperwork she’d been given. He wouldn’t let her take charge.
And he was big and blond.
She finally looked at him, really looked at him. He had sea-green eyes that moved between candid and flinty. And it was quite possible that that was a dimple there on the lower part of his left jaw. It showed up when he flashed that quick, arrogant grin. Burly guys with rough jaws ought not to have dimples, she decided.
And why, pray tell, was she thinking about that when she was sitting here with the wrong guy’s paperwork?
“Hold on,” she said sharply, pushing to her feet. Grace left the room to find the guard.
She didn’t see him anywhere in the corridor so she headed for the intake area near the prison lobby. The guy sitting at the desk there was reading something. He glanced her way at the sharp rat-tat-tat of her high heels on the flooring, then he looked back at his magazine for approximately a second. His head jerked up again and he grinned.
This was the kind of reaction she had expected from Aidan McKenna. She had wondered many, many times in the past ten years if her father would really have sent her from Maruja and everything she held dear if he hadn’t worried about the soldiers noticing her and doing unspeakable things.
She reached the desk and pointed a manicured finger at a file there. “Is that the paperwork for everyone who was brought in today?”
“Yeah.” He picked the folder up eagerly.
“Could you look through it for Aidan McKenna’s correct forms? You gave me the wrong ones.”
He grinned crookedly. “Sorry. It got a little hectic around here earlier.”
There hadn’t been another soul at Intake when she’d arrived, Grace thought.
The guard looked through the folder. Then he looked again.
“Is there a problem?” she asked finally, sweetly.
“I got nothing in here for him. Sorry, Miss…uh…”
“Ms.,” she corrected. “Ms. Simkanian. Okay, thank you.”
She went back to the interrogation room and pushed through the door. “Did they take anything from you when they brought you in here?” she asked McKenna. “Your wallet, for instance?”
“Of course.”
“Good. Then let’s go. We’re leaving.”
“Lady, I hate to break this to you, but I really don’t think they’re going to let me walk out of here just because you tell me to.”
Grace almost smiled. “Not only were they tagging you as Bran Downey, they have nothing here for you personally. No papers means no charge. Captain Plattsmier mentioned something about extortion charges—that’s what my senior partner told me—but they don’t have the proper forms so they can’t legally hold you.”
“So that’s it. Extortion.”
“What did you think they were charging you with?”
“I had no idea.”
What kind of game was he playing? She started to point out that charges generally stemmed from whatever a suspect had done, but he was claiming his innocence—sort of—and that would be inching a little too close to the ground that had ticked him off earlier. “I’m sure they’ll chase their tails all night and have you in custody again by morning on the proper ID,” she said instead. “But for now you’re a free man.”
“Can I kiss you?”
Grace backed off fast enough to ram her spine against the doorjamb.
“Purely in gratitude,” he explained.
“None necessary. I’m just doing my job. Keep your mouth to yourself.”
She was rattled, he thought. Interesting.
Since he wouldn’t be spending tonight in a cell, maybe he’d keep her for an attorney after all. Of course, that would involve deciding just how he was going to deal with that jet-black hair and those Violet Eyes. And the legs. Miles of them, he thought, watching her.
They were nearly back at the desk before someone noticed him strolling down the corridor as free as a bird. Four more guards came running. They seemed to come out of the crevices between the bricks in the walls, appearing out of nowhere. They included the