waited, leaning back in his chair and rubbing a steady pain by his temples. At least the lights had come on about an hour before. The room the two of them occupied was small and windowless. Probably a business conference center at the hotel. There was a long table in the center of the room and a dozen chairs pulled up around it. The serviceable carpet was a medium shade of gray. Still new enough not to be stained or flat in patches.
Carpet, Jonathan thought to himself. I’m thinking about carpet. What the hell is wrong with me?
But he knew the answer to that. If he didn’t think about carpet, he might think about his brother again. About what David had done or wanted to do. About a threat of murder that was probably a whole lot more than a threat. About how things had gotten so screwed up and how he didn’t have a clue as to how to fix them.
“What time?” Stryker asked.
An edge in the detective’s tone alerted Jonathan. He turned in his seat until he faced the blond man leaning against the edge of the table. Stryker’s face tightened.
“I see. All right.” He paused. “Yeah. I’ll tell him.”
He continued talking, but Jonathan stopped listening. He knew the subject of the conversation and he knew what Jack Stryker planned to say. David and Lisa were both dead.
The news wasn’t a surprise, he thought grimly as he waited for the realization to slam into him. He’d heard the gunshots. He’d seen their too-still bodies lying on the ground and the pools of blood around them. He’d known the truth the second he’d stumbled across their bodies. So he wasn’t surprised to have the information confirmed.
Stryker shoved the phone into his jacket pocket. “Jonathan, I’m sorry.”
Jonathan held up a hand. “I know. They’re dead.”
Stryker nodded. “They were pronounced dead on arrival at Vanderbilt Memorial. There will be an autopsy. It might delay things for a day or two.”
It took Jonathan a second to figure out that the detective was talking about a funeral. Nothing could be scheduled until the bodies were released.
He swore under his breath. “What happened?” he asked and realized a second too late the detective would think he meant his brother’s death, when Jonathan was really talking about a lifetime of a relationship gone wrong.
“There was luggage in the car,” Stryker told him. “Eight good-size suitcases, passports and tickets to Rio. Several witnesses reported seeing them with a smaller, soft-sided black bag, but we haven’t found that yet. Maybe it got kicked under one of the cars. We have officers searching the area.”
Jonathan decided it was easier to talk about the murder than to explain what he’d really been asking. “Do you think it held the money?”
“Maybe.” Stryker settled on a corner of the table.
“David said he and Lisa were going to be far away when I was killed. Being out of the country would make their alibi even better. But who killed them?”
“We’re going to have to find that out. We’re looking for the two cars you saw leaving right after the shooting. Obviously David and Lisa weren’t working alone. There had to be at least one other person involved, possibly more than that.”
One other person. The murderer. “So if my brother was telling the truth about going away, then he was probably also telling the truth about having me killed.”
Stryker’s steady blue gaze locked with his. “That’s my read on it.”
Jonathan couldn’t escape his feeling of disbelief. This wasn’t happening. “Where would David find someone willing to kill me. Neither of us travel in the ‘gun for hire’ circle.”
“Unfortunately it’s not as difficult as you might think. A couple of discreet questions in the right bar and you have a contact. One contact leads to another. If someone was motivated, he could set up a hit in a couple of days.”
“David was motivated,” Jonathan said, trying to figure out why he wasn’t more worried. Right now all he felt was numb. How had he and his brother turned out so differently? When had David started to hate him enough to want him dead?
“To make it more complicated,” Stryker was saying, “there’s no way of knowing if David’s death ended the threat or not. You’ll need to hire a bodyguard. The department can help, but a full-time professional is your best bet. I know some good people. They’re not local, but they can be here by morning.”
“Good idea,” Jonathan said, even though he didn’t believe the words as he spoke them. Protection? From a hired gun? That happened in the movies, not in real life.
“Let me get their phone numbers,” Stryker said as he headed for the door leading in to the hallway. “I want to check a few things, too, so I may be a minute.” He paused and looked at Jonathan. “There will be a uniformed officer outside the door. He’s there to keep you safe so don’t go wandering off without him.”
“Not a problem,” Jonathan said.
He didn’t feel like wandering anywhere at the moment. He was too busy trying to absorb all that had happened. David and Lisa both dead. Was it possible?
Stryker stepped out into the hallway. Jonathan heard him talking with someone, then saw a flash of aqua. His brain quickly shifted gears, providing a name and a face to go with aqua tulle and silk. Cynthia? What was she doing here?
Before he knew what he was doing, he was on his feet and pulling open the door. Stryker and the uniformed officer had Cynthia pressed up against the hall wall. Jonathan couldn’t see her face, but he realized she was shaking. She carried a cup of coffee in one hand and the cup rattled against the saucer.
“Stryker, she’s with me,” he said quickly.
The detective glanced at him. “Are you sure? She was lurking in the hallway.”
“I didn’t mean to do anything wrong,” Cynthia said, her voice trembling as much as her hands. She stared at Stryker. “I was worried about Mr. Steele. He went outside when the lights went out and then there were gunshots. I heard the police had brought him to a conference room and I just wanted to make sure that he was okay.” She turned her attention to Jonathan. “That’s all. I’m sorry if I made trouble or anything.”
Her dress looked out of place away from the ball and she still wore a ridiculous rhinestone tiara. Despite the fake jewelry, the smudges of mascara under her impossibly large hazel-green eyes and the patches on her long gloves, she was both lovely and sincere.
“Does she look dangerous?” he asked the detective.
“Ask me if that matters,” Stryker told him. “But if you know her, then it’s fine.” He motioned for Cynthia to join Jonathan in the small conference room, then he glanced at the uniformed officer. “No one else gets in there. Just me. You got a radio?”
“Yup.” The man touched the radio, then his gun. “I’ll keep him safe.”
“You do that.”
As Stryker turned to leave, Jonathan ushered Cynthia into the small room.
“Why
