Finlay Donovan Is Killing It(Finlay Donovan #1)(30)

“It’s really done?” she asked with a furtive glance at the neighboring tables.

I nodded.

Patricia’s hands shook as she withdrew an envelope from her purse and pushed it across the table. Her eyes were ringed in purple shadows, as if she hadn’t slept. I imagined she wanted this whole ordeal over with as much as I did. Still, I hesitated to reach for the envelope.

“You can count it. It’s all there,” she insisted, pushing it toward me another inch.

“I believe you.” The envelope was fat, stuffed so thick the flap hardly closed. I whisked it off the table into my lap and reached into my purse for Harris’s wallet, keys, and phone. Patricia took the key ring, her trembling fingers fumbling over it as she separated one tiny key from the others.

“I’ll wait until tonight to report him missing,” she said, palming the key. “That should give you time to wrap up any loose ends.” She pushed the rest of the ring back across the table, along with Harris’s wallet and phone. She swallowed hard, unable to look at them, as if she wanted to be rid of every part of him, too.

“You want me to get rid of them?” I asked.

“Isn’t that what I’m paying you for?”

The nerve of the woman. If Delia had opened a mouth like that I would have sent her to her room for being sassy and confiscated her toys. Patricia withered, clearly mistaking my mom face for something else … some callous expression worn by contract killers and hit men. Maybe they’re similar. I wouldn’t know. Her nervous smile made her lips quiver as if she might start crying.

I bit my tongue as I slid her husband’s personal effects back into my purse along with the money.

“I hope you don’t mind,” she said, clearing her throat. “A friend of mine … more of an acquaintance, really. We have Pilates together at the club on Tuesdays and Saturdays,” she admitted with a guilt-ridden wince, as if stretching was the crime. “She’s having some … issues … with her husband. I told her I might know someone who could help.” The folded slip of paper she pushed across the table left me with an ominous sense of déjà vu. My mouth fell open, my tongue fumbling over all the arguments scrambling to get out. Until I read the numbers beside the dollar sign.

All seventy-five thousand of them.

I stared at the name—Andrei Borovkov. The address was some fancy high-rise condominium in McLean. I folded the note and slid it back across the table.

“Look,” I started, “you’ve got the wrong idea about all of this. I don’t…”

The rest of my argument fell away. Patricia’s seat was empty.

I pivoted in the booth, searching for her by the trash bins. By the hall to the restrooms. By the dessert counter. But she was already gone. Through the window, I saw her duck into a car. The brown Subaru wagon tore out of the lot like it was on fire, the bumper stickers obscuring the back window as she darted between oncoming cars.

I stared at the slip of paper. The name on it felt familiar for reasons I couldn’t begin to guess. Or maybe it was just this moment, this all-too-familiar feeling of dread that I’d crossed a line I couldn’t come back from just by holding it. I tucked the note in my purse with the money and the contents of Harris Mickler’s pockets, wondering what the hell to do next.





CHAPTER 15





I left Panera and drove straight to The Lush. The bar wouldn’t open for another hour, and the parking lot was empty of all but a handful of cars, making Harris Mickler’s easy to find. A Mercedes logo was emblazoned on his fancy key fob, and the ring attached to it had only held three keys: one most likely to his office and one most likely to his house. The smaller key that had dangled between them—probably the key to a gym locker or to a secure cabinet or file drawer—Patricia had kept. I didn’t care. I wanted them gone. The last thing I needed was for some detective to track me down and find them inside my house.

My van idled between the only two Mercedes in the lot. I pressed a button on the key fob and caught the flash of taillights in my rearview mirror. Lining up our driver’s-side doors, I backed my van into the space beside Harris’s car. Then I used one of Zach’s burp rags to wipe everything down: his phone, his keys, his wallet … Curious, I pried open the billfold, my eyes widening at the crisp bills nested inside. I could take them, I thought. Make it look like a robbery. But then why would a common street thug leave a wallet full of credit cards and an expensive cell phone in Harris’s car?

No, better to leave it neat.

If there was no sign of foul play, maybe the police wouldn’t investigate his disappearance too deeply. Maybe they’d assume he’d left the bar, ditched his life, and run off to Tahiti or Milan with some mystery woman he’d just met.

Still wearing my wig-scarf, I slunk out of the van with my sunglasses on, the long strands of the blond wig hanging loose to conceal my face as I fidgeted with Harris’s key fob. His car alarm blared. The taillights flashed and the horn honked in time with my heart. I frantically pressed buttons until the commotion stopped.

Peering around the parking lot, I used my sleeve to open Harris’s car door. Then I wiped down the key fob and dropped his possessions on the driver’s seat inside. I’d never been arrested and booked before, so I knew a fingerprint couldn’t be used to find me. But it could definitely be used to convict me if I ever became a suspect.