Finlay Donovan Is Killing It(Finlay Donovan #1)(61)

“Spinning, huh? Killer class,” he said between ragged breaths, gesturing loosely toward the room I’d just come out of with the tip of his racquet.

“You’re not kidding.” I turned away, my face angled down and sideways as I rushed toward the locker rooms.

“Wait,” he called after me, jogging to catch up. “Do I know you?”

“I don’t think so.” I wasn’t wearing a stitch of makeup. I was hot and blotchy and probably beet-red, my limp brown hair and the sleepless bags under my eyes on full, hopeless display.

“Are you sure?” he asked, following a few steps behind me.

I paused, torn between stealing one last look at him and running away. His smile was soft and his face was kind, and he was sweaty enough for me to see the outline of every muscle through his clothes. “Pretty sure I’d remember you.”

“It’s just … You look kind of familiar.” His voice was close behind me as I reached for the locker room door. Close enough that I could smell the clean sweat coming off his skin, his breath still a little heavy with exertion.

I should not turn around. I should definitely not turn around. Vero was right. Communicating with Julian was dangerous and foolish. Especially now that Nick had been to The Lush asking questions. Julian was the one person who could positively identify me if he figured out who I really was. And yet, part of me wanted to turn around and confide everything to him.

I peered around the curtain of my hair, just enough to see his eyes narrow as they struggled to put the pieces of me together.

“I should go.” I clutched my backpack to my chest as I pushed through the door into the locker room. “I’m probably late for … something.”

I ducked inside and leaned back against the door. But when I looked around the locker room, Irina was already long gone.





CHAPTER 27





“I can’t believe Patricia Mickler is dead.” Vero hunched low in the driver’s seat of the Charger, watching the door to Theresa’s real estate office from the far side of the parking lot where we’d strategically positioned her car. Zach babbled to himself behind us, munching on Goldfish crackers while he watched cartoons on Vero’s phone. “I can’t figure out if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.”

“How could that possibly be a good thing?”

“Because now if they find her, she can’t rat you out.”

“No, but Irina can.” And if I didn’t kill her husband, I was sure she’d have no problem rolling me under whatever bus she’d used to squash Patricia.

“Do you think she got her husband to kill Patricia?”

I shuddered at the memory of the knife in her back door. “Probably.” Irina had managed to put me in an impossible situation, forcing me to deal with Andrei before she gave Andrei a reason to deal with me. But I didn’t have time to think about that now. First, I had to ferret out Theresa’s alibi, so that in the likely event of my untimely demise, my children had someone to live with.

I squirmed in my seat as I checked the time, regretting the second cup of coffee I’d had at breakfast. Delia was only in preschool until lunch, and nothing exciting had happened since we got here an hour ago.

“I have to pee,” I said.

“You can’t pee. We’re on a stakeout.”

“This is not a stakeout.”

“Yes, it is. And this is a stakeout vehicle.”

“My bladder doesn’t care.”

“If you pee in my new car, I will kill you on principle.” Easy for her to say. She was twenty-two and had never had children. She could probably hold it until menopause.

“We don’t even know what we’re looking for,” I grumbled.

“You heard the hot detective. We’re looking for anything suspicious.”

“Wouldn’t it make more sense just to ask Theresa where she was that night?”

Vero gave me a heavy dose of side-eye. “When has Theresa Hall ever been honest with you? You seriously think she’s gonna come out and tell you what she was doing on some random Tuesday night when she didn’t bother telling you she was doing your husband all last year?”

I sank lower in my seat. My ass had fallen asleep thirty minutes ago. “Theresa’s here and Steven’s at the farm. Why don’t we just go to their house and poke around?”

“One,” Vero said, holding up a finger, “because that’s breaking and entering, and we don’t get paid for that. And two, because if she was up to something shady while Steven was at work that night, she wouldn’t have left any evidence at home where he could find it. Even Theresa’s not that dumb. Anything incriminating would be on her laptop or her phone, and she’s probably got those—”

“That’s her,” I said, sinking lower as Theresa’s long legs and high heels became visible through the glass doors to the vestibule. The double doors swung open. A man in an expensive-looking suit strode out behind her. “Holy shit. That’s Feliks Zhirov.”

The familiar black Town Car pulled to the curb in front of them. Andrei emerged from the driver’s seat to open Feliks’s door. Theresa extended her hand to Feliks, a purely professional gesture, but Feliks used it to draw her close, whispering in her ear before pressing a kiss to her cheek. She blushed, darting an anxious glance behind her to the windows of the building.