the pocket of his jacket, then unsnapped his holster lock and headed back to the BMW. The window was gliding down as he looked in and met those deep blue eyes.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
Joshua didn’t miss the fact that her right hand was on the steering wheel and her left hand was out of sight.
“Hands in sight,” he said.
She quickly raised both her hands, palms toward him. “Hey, just a minute. I—”
“Please step out of the car,” he said, his right hand hovering by his holstered gun. He saw her eyes dart to the gun, then back to his face. Now she was scared and that could bring any action, from trying to run, striking out at him or collapsing into tears. He didn’t want any of that to happen. He just wanted her out of the car with her hands empty.
“Why?” she asked, not moving, her hands still in the air.
He reached for the door handle and pulled, but it was locked. “Please unlock the door, ma’am.”
“Sure, sure,” she said, hitting the automatic lock opener and it clicked.
He pulled the door open and stood back as far as he could from the woman. She squinted up at him, then stepped out into the frigid air. Her shirt looked as though it was made of thin cotton and her well-worn Levi’s showed a strategic rip at one knee. Somehow he thought the rip was accidental and not an intentional statement of fashion. She was wearing running shoes, no socks and even though her license had said she was twenty-six, she looked like a teenager.
“Step clear of the car, ma’am,” Joshua said as he let go of the door and moved back, motioning to her left.
She darted a look at the other squad car, then back at him. “Please, tell me what’s going on,” she said as she took a step toward him.
“Turn around and face the car. Place your hands on the top, palms down. This car was reported stolen from Chicago, and unless you’re Mrs. Barton Wise, you’re under arrest for suspicion of grand theft auto.”
“This is crazy!” she gasped. “I’m just driving this car for delivery to San Diego. I came around the long way. I got lost, then realized I had to cut back this way to get on the route to Las Vegas.” She spoke quickly in a breathless voice. “I’m just delivering it. It’s not stolen.”
He was willing to listen, if she could prove it. It would make his life simpler at the moment. “Okay, show me the paperwork.”
She frowned at him. “Paperwork?”
“The agreement you signed, the bond you put up, anything to prove that you have the right to be in this car.”
She swallowed hard. “Okay, sure, but I need to get it,” she said, holding her hands up, palms toward him. “I just need to get my bag.”
“Okay, slowly,” he said with a nod.
He watched her carefully as she reached inside the back of the car and pulled out a duffel bag. She held it up to him. “It’s in here,” she said.
“Okay, get it.”
She unzipped the bag, dug into it, and he found himself holding his breath until she pulled out an envelope. She opened it and held it out so he could see the contents. Inside, there was a stack of bills and a piece of paper.
“Take out the paper and put down the bag.”
She shivered as the wind gusted, but she did as she was told, pulling out the piece of paper, then dropping the duffel at her feet on the icy shoulder of the road. She held the paper out to him. “Here. This is all I have.”
He took it, glanced at Wes, then shook the paper to open it. It was mostly blank, but at the top was a San Diego phone number, the name Mindy Sullivan and a date, eight days from today. It looked as if it had been printed off of a computer. “What does this prove?”
“That’s the number I’m supposed to call when I get to San Diego. They’ll tell me where to take the car.”
“And the money in the envelope?”
“It’s the payment for my services, combined with my money that…that I put in with it.”
He didn’t realize until then how much he wanted her story to be true. But she hadn’t shown him anything that would prove it. “Sorry, that doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means I answered an ad in the paper to drive this car from Chicago to San Diego, and I’m doing that. Call Mindy Sullivan and ask her. Her attorney in Chicago hired me.” She looked relieved. “That’s it, the attorney. Call him. He’ll tell you this is all a big mistake.”
Wes was coming toward them now. “Everything okay?” he asked.
Joshua said “Fine” at the same time the woman said “No, it’s not.”
He ignored her statement and asked Wes, “Was there a Mindy Sullivan on the sheet for the BMW?”
“No, boss, the only name was Barton Wise.”
He looked back at Riley Shaw and realized she was close to tears. He didn’t want to deal with a hysterical female, even if she was a car thief. “You can’t do this,” she muttered.
He hesitated, something a cop should never do. “If you have anything to prove you didn’t steal this car, give it to me now. Otherwise I have no option but take you in.”
“The attorney in Chicago,” she said. “Just call him. You can check with him and find out this is a mistake.”
“I can’t do that from here, so we’ll go to the station,” he said. “Now, turn around and place both hands on the car.”
“Please, this is insane. I didn’t steal this car.”
He moved closer. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. It’s up to you,” he said as he looked down into her face. He could see she was shaking. Fear? She could just be cold. Her clothes were little protection against the gusting wind. “Let’s do this the easy way.”
RILEY CLOSED her eyes for a long moment to try to calm herself and shut out the sight of the man right in front of her. His clothing was heavy, but even so she could tell he was a lean man, maybe six feet tall, with roughly angled features. He was wearing reflective sunglasses, so she had no idea what his eyes were like, and a uniform cap covered most of his hair. All in all, there was no hint of softness in the man.
The hard way or the easy way? Maybe he didn’t care which way this played out. But she did. It was a mistake. A crazy mistake. A misstep on her way to San Diego. She’d call the attorney and wipe that smug look of control off the cop’s face. She looked at her own reflection in his glasses and thought she looked like a vagrant. She hadn’t dressed to impress for the trip.
“What about my money?” she asked, holding up the envelope. “It’s mine.”
“I’ll take it,” he said, and did. He put the paper back in the envelope, then shoved it into the pocket of his green uniform jacket. “I’ll give you a receipt at the station.”
