Overkill(45)

“In the meantime, I suggest the surveillance on Clarke be continued indefinitely. He has the means, cunning, and backing of his influential father to pull up stakes and flee at any time.”

It was a coin toss as to whether or not the boss would approve that request. Eban Clarke was a free man. At this point, there was no probable cause to justify keeping him under surveillance. He was living like a prince but doing nothing illegal.

She entered her house from the garage door that opened into the kitchen.

She flipped on the light, went over to the island, and, with relief, let her heavy bag slide off her shoulder onto the countertop.

Noticing that several sprigs of Spanish moss had shaken loose from the container of orchids, she swept them into her hand and patted them back into place.

In the fridge was a bottle of Chardonnay already opened. She poured herself a glass, smiling ruefully and saying softly, “Sometimes I drink white.”

She slipped her phone from the outside pocket of her bag. Taking it and the wine with her, she turned off the kitchen light and made her way through the living room, using only the ambient light coming through the front windows.

But as she moved into the hallway that led to her bedroom, for some inexplicable reason, she paused and looked back into the living room. Everything was as she’d left it, nothing was amiss, but something compelled her to go into the foyer and make certain the front door was locked. It was.

She’d never been a ’fraidy cat, and couldn’t account for the odd feeling, almost a shiver, that had come over her, but she attributed it to fatigue and continued down the hall.

In the bedroom, she flipped the switch that turned on the bedside lamps. Setting her wineglass and phone on the table next to the chaise, she started toward her closet.





Chapter 19





Just as Kate reached for the door handle, her phone rang.

Thinking—hoping—it might be Zach, she hurried back to the table. In her haste to grab the phone, she knocked over the picture of her with her parents on the beach. The gold frame clattered loudly against the glass tabletop.

She righted the frame, then, after four rings, and without checking the caller ID, she answered rather breathlessly. “Hello?”

“Ms. Lennon?”

Not Zach. She squashed her adolescent disappointment. “This is she.”

The man at the other end gave her his name and told her he was with the company that monitored her alarm system. “What’s your password, please?”

She hesitated, then gave him an erroneous one.

“I’m sorry, that’s not the password on record.”

“I’m glad you know that. I was testing you.”

After giving him the correct password, he said, “Your silent alarm was triggered this evening at nine eighteen. When you didn’t answer our call, we left you a voice mail and dispatched the police.”

Her phone had rung while she was plowing through the work piled up on her desk. Not recognizing the number and believing it to be a spam call, she’d let it go unanswered and had ignored the voice mail notification.

“Two patrolmen checked your house and yard,” he was saying. “They reported there was no sign of a break-in. Your alarm was disengaged a few minutes ago, then immediately reset.”

“That was me. I just came in.”

“When we got the all-clear from the police, we reset your alarm from here. Sometimes a low battery can set it off. I’m just following up to make sure everything is okay.”

Maybe animal instinct had caused the uneasiness that had crept over her minutes earlier. She darted a glance toward the closet door, the foot of the bed, the bathroom door standing ajar, the open bedroom door, and the dark hallway beyond. “Can you please hold on while I check the house?”

“Yes, of course.”

She kept her phone in her hand as she looked first into the bathroom. No one there, nothing displaced. She knelt to check beneath the bed then crossed to the closet. Heart in her throat, she twisted the horizontal handle on the door and yanked it open. The light flashed on. Nothing.

Turning quickly, she moved to the door and looked down the hallway. Empty. Starting down it, she came first to her home office, where she turned on the light, and checked the closet. She did the same in the guest bedroom and bath. Unlike her own glass shower door, this one had a curtain, which she fearfully flung aside, then felt silly for being fearful.

There was no place for an intruder to be hiding in the living room. If anyone had been lying in wait in the garage, she would have been attacked when she got out of her car.

That left only the kitchen. She thought of the disturbed Spanish moss.

Trying to keep the fear from her voice, she said, “Are you still there?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Thank you.”

With one switch, she turned on every light in the kitchen and blinked against the sudden glare. The only place for concealment was the walk-in pantry. She gathered her courage and opened the door. Nothing.

She slumped against the doorjamb, realizing only then how shaky her knees were. Inside her clothes, her skin had turned clammy. “Everything appears to be in order.”

“You’re all right?”

“Yes.”

“Your duress code word, please?”

Her brain scrambled to come up with it, but she did.