Father and Child Reunion Part 2. Christine Flynn

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      He pulled a breath and slowly released it. He didn’t have to try very hard to remember the day he’d come barging in here with all the finesse of a tank wanting his interview. Eve had been sorting through her mother’s clothes when he’d arrived, and the task had torn her apart. It seemed that she’d since had to go through the entire house.

      “If you’re sure that’s what she wanted to donate, I’ll pick one up and drop it by the center this week. No, that’s fine. I can do it myself. I’m sure the electronics store on Juniper has plenty of Blu-ray players. It’s no problem at all.”

      She watched him from across the room as she spoke. Hanging up a few moments later, she looked from him to the list he held. The consternation she’d masked during her call reasserted itself.

      “That’s private.”

      It wouldn’t be once it was filed with the court, but he didn’t mention that. He wasn’t looking for a story. Though he didn’t want to admit it, he just wanted to know what all she was dealing with.

      He also wanted to know why she was looking at him as if he’d just pulled the wings off a butterfly.

      He set the tablet back on the table. “I didn’t think you minded. I was just looking.”

      “Like you were just asking my brother about his car and his stock?”

      The accusation in her voice threw him. “What?”

      “You heard me.”

      “Eve, I was doing my job. He’s the one who assumed I’d come here looking for him. I wouldn’t have brought any of that up, if he hadn’t.”

      “It doesn’t matter who brought it up.” Crossing her arms, she moved toward him, stopping a cautious arm’s length away. “I just want to know what that was all about. Why would the police treat Hal like a suspect?”

      She was truly bewildered. That was easy enough to see. He could also tell, despite the way she’d deliberately lowered her voice, or maybe because of it, that she was more upset than she wanted to let on.

      “The police are looking into anything that appears even remotely out of line, Eve. No one is exempt.”

      “But he’s family!”

      She spoke as if the relationship provided automatic immunity. Hal was family, therefore he was incapable of harming any of its members. While Rio admired her loyalty and idealism, he couldn’t help wondering at her naiveté.

      “I take it you don’t catch much of the evening news or crime shows,” he muttered, not particularly proud of how jaded his own thinking had become.

      “I have a five-year-old. At our house it’s ‘Princess Jasmine and reruns of ’Dora the Explorer’ all the time. But I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”

      “It has to do with motive. That’s the key to any investigation. The members of the victim’s family are usually the first people the police check out in a murder case. Especially when one of those members isn’t being terribly cooperative. Your brother didn’t even want them to do the autopsy that revealed what had happened to your mother. Remember?”

      Of course she remembered. The fact that she hadn’t sided with Hal on that issue hadn’t helped his attitude toward her at all.

      “Did it occur to anyone to consider the stress he was under at the time? If he was less than cooperative, it was because it seemed so unnecessary to him to have that awful procedure done on her. If you think he’s not as cooperative as he should be now, maybe it’s because he’s as frustrated as I am with the lack of progress in the investigation. Instead of wasting time looking into his affairs, the police should be out looking for whoever killed our mother. It’s been nearly two months.”

      Molly was on the porch. For her daughter’s sake, Eve tried to calm herself. She didn’t want Molly to know she was upset. The little girl never slept well when she knew her mommy was troubled.

      “Losing Mom has been hard on him,” she continued, her tone lower even if her level of anger and frustration was not. “Aside from that, I don’t think he’s heard a word from his fiancée since she left. I don’t know if he’s hurt or worried or what he’s dealing with there, but being dumped two minutes before the ceremony would certainly impact a person’s mood. When you add all that to the fact that he’s trying to handle his city council work along with doing Mom’s job, it doesn’t take a degree in psychology to figure out that the stress might be getting to him.”

      Her thick bangs slipped down to brush the corner of her eye and the top of her cheek. She started to push them back, but when she lifted her hand it was trembling. Not wanting him to notice, she lowered her hand before it reached her chin and recrossed her arms.

      That small show of control got to him.

      Had it not been for that effort, he could have stepped back, considered himself chastised and let it go at that. But he knew the stress of all she was dealing with was getting to her, too. It was obvious to anyone who cared to look closely enough. But instead of thinking of her own needs the way her brother seemed to do, she reached beyond herself, graciously handling all that needed to be done and protecting the people she cared about. Her daughter. Her brother.

      He didn’t want another connection to her. Sharing a child and needing her as a source were about two too many strings as it was. But Rio understood all too well the need to keep feelings in check. And to protect. Like it or not, that was how he felt toward her. He must have. Otherwise, he’d have put the questions he had about her brother to her long before now.

      “I understand things aren’t easy for him,” he said, his objectivity firmly in place. The guy really had been dumped on lately, and, despite his thoughts about the way he was treating Eve, Rio kept his mind truly open where Hal was concerned. The chips could fall either way. “It’s just that he raises more questions than he answers, Eve. Take that car he’s driving.” He lifted his hand toward the door, then threaded his fingers through his own hair to keep from pushing her bangs back from her eyes. “How can he afford a new Mercedes on a public servant’s salary? That car’s worth seventy thousand bucks, easy. The Lexus hadn’t been cheap, either. Forty, at least. Is he spending his inheritance already?”

      She shot him a disgusted look.

      Taking that for a no, he tried again.

      “He mentioned investments. Is that how he makes his money?”

      She didn’t know. And when Eve admitted that, she also had to admit that yet another facet of her life was no longer what it had once been. She and her brother had never been close, but now it seemed she knew precious little about him. Except for one thing.

      “I love my brother, Rio. And he loved Mom as much as I did. He can’t possibly know anything about her murder.”

      She spoke with conviction, but what Rio heard was a plea. She wanted him to believe as she believed. Or maybe, he thought, lifting his hand toward her face, she was just trying to find a belief she could hold on to herself.

      With the tip of his finger, he drew her bangs away from her eyebrows. Her skin was warm to his touch, and so soft that it almost felt like air.

      His fingers lingered at her temple, his palm curving near СКАЧАТЬ