nodded to herself, thinking ahead. She knew the basics. She’d started studying criminal law at university herself, before dropping it in favor of art and corporate law. The combative nature of the criminal justice system wasn’t a fit for her personality. She’d learned that pretty quickly.
“Keep me updated via mobile,” Robert told her. “I’ll start assembling a criminal team at the town office.”
“You…think it’s that serious?”
“It is if they believe they have enough to take her in. My team will commence background checks on the arresting officer right away. What did you say his name was?”
She glanced up at Peebles, now rifling through cabinet drawers, and she thought of the cop with the steady blue eyes. “Detective Sergeant Hastings.”
“By the time I’m done, Hastings won’t have a job. And you let him know it.”
Megan hung up picturing the tall, swarthy and cerebral Robert D’Angelo squaring off with the physically robust and tanned cop. And a shimmer of electricity rippled through her belly at the thought of having to square off with him herself.
She was no substitute for the formidable lawyer.
And no match against that determined hunk of police officer.
Chapter Two
“Mrs. Lipton, get someone to bring a car round for me!” Megan yelled as she raced up the sweeping marble staircase.
She flung open the cupboard in her guest room, grabbing a sleeveless shift dress, the creation of a young up-and-coming Sydney designer, urban casual.
All Megan’s clothes were the work of emerging artists—fledgling designers she predicted would become household names. She liked to support them at the start of their journeys. It had become her trademark philosophy, and her sartorial style on the Sydney art gallery circuit had begun earning her a familiar spot on the social pages of the city newspapers and glossies. That in turn had garnered attention for her clients.
Attention for her clients was good. It fed her business.
She shimmied into the dress, not wasting time to take her bikini off. Quickly sliding her feet into sandals, she grabbed her purse, and stalled in front of the mirror as she caught sight of her wet hair still plastered to her head. She cursed, grabbed a silk scarf off the dresser, flinging it over her hair as she snagged her large sunglasses, and clattered down the broad staircase, and out the front door.
“Biltong” Laroux, Louisa’s rugged broodmare manager, had brought her aunt’s champagne-colored Aston Martin DB9 convertible round to the front door.
Megan stalled, eyes whipping to his. “You want me to take this?”
“Patrick’s got the sports ute. The other cars are either out or in the shop.”
“It’s…not an automatic,” she said.
Biltong pushed his felt hat farther back on his head, a glint of amusement in his warm brown eyes. “Do you need someone to drive you, Ms. Stafford?”
“Of course not,” she said reaching for the door handle. “Just…hold fort here, please.”
Megan started the ignition and promptly stalled the high-end sports car. She cursed, hotly aware of Biltong watching her from under the brim of his bush hat. She knew how to drive a stick shift. She just hadn’t done it in a while.
She depressed the clutch and turned the key, setting the engine purring again. She shifted into First gear, and jerked sharply forward, almost giving herself whiplash before taking off down the driveway in a blast of dust, Louisa’s blue heelers yipping at the wheels.
Damn.
Louisa rarely went anywhere without her two cattle dogs, and they were going to get hurt if they kept this up all the way down to the estate gates.
Megan hit the brakes, kept the engine running as she reached over to open the passenger door. “C’mon. Get in Scout, Blue!”
The blue heelers scrambled excitedly onto the butter leather, settling next to her in the two-seater.
Megan engaged gears, releasing the clutch as she simultaneously depressed the gas pedal, having to consciously think in order simply to drive. Finding her rhythm, she gathered speed down the mile-long driveway under the jacaranda trees, billowing fine red Australian dust in her wake.
As she neared the gates, a group of horses kept pace at a canter in the adjacent field.
She wheeled the sports car onto the farm road, picking up more speed as she headed for the small town of Pepper Flats. Dusk was settling over the dry valley, and her heart hammered in her chest as she mentally prepared to face the physically disarming cop again. She wondered just how the hell she’d gotten to this point in the space of a week.
Dylan had been born in Pepper Flats. For the past ten years he’d worked the area as a local cop, and not once during that time had he ever heard mention of a Fairchild niece.
And a woman like Megan Stafford wouldn’t go unnoticed in this valley, he thought as he led a stone-faced Louisa into the station charge room, ordering her to sit while he entered her into the system.
A long-lost niece conveniently popping out of the woodwork with her great-aunt tipping the wrong side of eighty seemed a little too contrived for his liking. She was probably after the old dame’s fortune, and the thought turned Dylan’s blood cold.
He knew Megan’s type—all warm surface gloss and seductive appeal on the exterior, but calculating and devoid of compassion on the inside.
He’d learned the hard way just how deceptive a gorgeous-looking woman like her could be. He’d married one. And he had spent the past ten years of his life raising his kid alone as a single dad, when all he’d dreamed of was a real family.
It was a mistake he was not likely to make again.
He handed Louisa two forms outlining her rights and began setting up the recording equipment in the interview room while keeping an eye on his octogenarian charge sitting thunderously silent.
She’d gone ash-pale under her tan and refused his offer of water. A small wedge of worry edged into Dylan’s chest.
It was a custody manager’s priority to watch for signs of ill health that might arise from police detention, and with Peebles executing the search warrant, Dylan was doing double duty as both custody manager and investigating officer in a station that wasn’t even a designated holding facility.
D’Angelo would have his balls over this “transgression” alone. But given the state of emergency and the police shortage, Dylan had no choice but to wing this as best he could, and hope that Crown prosecutors would argue extenuating circumstances on his behalf should D’Angelo try to nail him for it.
“This way please, Miss Fairchild?” he said, taking her arm. “I need to get your fingerprints.”
“You have one hell of a hide doing this, Hastings,” she snapped. “I know your sort. You—”
“You know nothing about me,”
