had surfaced. Rebecca already seemed to have a pretty good picture of the compelling evidence against her brother. She couldn’t seem to stop wringing those slim white hands.
“But he said Monica was alive when he left her. Natalie, his daughter, saw him later. We talked to him. It wasn’t like a fight, not on his part. He only pushed her because she was attacking him with that letter opener, and he had no reason to lie about her still being alive. He could have claimed self-defense if she’d died accidentally in a struggle like that. I’m telling you, someone else was either already in the house or came in after Jake left. My brother did not kill her, Gabe.”
Gabe crossed the room to the art deco bar. Nothing back there was quite as good as the thirty-year-old Scotch he’d found in the kitchen, but at the moment he’d have settled for Kentucky moonshine. Not for him. Being around Rebecca predictably inspired him to drink, but the immediate problem was the damn heartsick look in her eyes.
He splashed some whiskey in a cut-crystal shot glass and carried it over to her.
She took the glass and sniffed it. “Yuck,” she said.
“Shut up and level it, shorty.”
“If you call me ‘shorty’ one more time…” she began, but then her voice trailed off. It was truly a landmark occasion—she actually didn’t bristle up and argue with him. Instead, she lifted the shot glass and chugged the brew in an impressive three gulps. Once she finished coughing, she wiped her eyes with a shudder. “Personally, I’m with Mary Poppins. If you have to take medicine, you should be able to add a spoonful of sugar to it.”
Imagining the taste of whiskey and sugar was enough to make him shudder, but he could see that the liquid courage did its job. Color shot back into her cheeks. She quit trying to knit those hands into a sweater. Gabe figured if there was ever going to be a two-second window when she could handle a dose of realism, it had to be now. “No other suspects have surfaced, Rebecca—not a single name, much less a clear fingerprint. All the physical evidence points to Jake…and he had motive.”
“Monica was blackmailing him. I know. Milking him for shares of the Fortune company, from the time she found out Jake was born on the wrong side of the blanket. If she exposed him, he was afraid he’d lose everything. I know all the family dirty linen, Gabe, and I know the mistakes my brother made. I know he’d been drinking a lot and had been screwing up at work. That the pressure split up his marriage, and set him against Nate. It still doesn’t mean he killed her.”
It was pretty rare that two and two didn’t add up to four, Gabe thought, but it was hard to argue with such blind loyalty. “I just thought you might need to recognize how bad it looks,” he said gently.
She surged out of the chair, suddenly as restless as a wet cat. “You know what I recognize? That Monica Malone has somehow managed to hurt my family for two generations—she’s dead now, and it still isn’t over. The old witch was guilty of kidnapping, sabotage, infidelity, stalking, theft, blackmail—you name it, she did it against the Fortune family, starting way back when she had an affair with my father. I swear she’s hurt us for the last time. It’s got to stop.”
“Rebecca,” he said patiently, “go home.”
“No.”
“Maybe you’re right. Maybe someone did come in this house after your brother left, and murdered her. But if there’s a shred of proof in this house pointing in that direction, I promise I’ll find it.”
“I know you would try. And I know you’re good. But you don’t have a woman’s eye, Gabe. There’s every chance I could see things that you couldn’t.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. No point in continuing in that direction, so he tried another. “There’s a tiny element you may not have considered, Red. Finding evidence that someone else murdered Monica doesn’t mean you’re going to be any happier. I know the whole story of how she preyed on your family. But that’s the point. If there is another suspect, it could well be another member of your clan. There’s no shortage of motives all through the Fortune family.”
“It wasn’t any of us,” Rebecca said firmly.
“I hate to tell you this, but it’d be tough to prove that viewpoint in court. Some misguided folk might think you were coming from blind loyalty instead of from rational, objective thinking.”
“Well, they’d be wrong. That woman was a greedy, selfish, conniving shrew her whole life, Gabe. She could have had a thousand enemies besides us. And…oh God, I can’t just sit here…. I’m going to start looking.”
She shot toward the door and out before he could stop her. Not that Gabe would have tried. Reasoning with the woman was like trying to get through to a mule. He cast a longing glance at the bottle of whiskey.
He didn’t believe she would find any evidence clearing her brother, but there was a slim chance it existed. And if the thousand-to-one odds that Rebecca was right paid off, there was still a real murderer out there. A cold-blooded killer wouldn’t likely appreciate anyone poking and probing for the truth. Gabe had never mentioned that threat of danger to Rebecca, but the nasty, rotten thought crossed his mind that someone had better watch over her.
It wasn’t his problem. If worse came to worst, he could sic her mama on her. Kate Fortune could make a battalion of marines behave with a look.
It was just for this night that he was stuck with her. When he got home, there’d be ample time to dip into a consoling shot of whiskey. While he had to be around Rebecca, he definitely needed all the wits he could beg, borrow or steal.
Rebecca propped her fists on her hips. Monica Malone’s bedroom was about what she’d expected—a study in a vain, greedy, self-indulgent woman.
Monica’s world had definitely revolved around Monica. She had two oil portraits of herself on the wall, for Pete’s sake. Walk-in closets stuffed with plunging necklines and more shoes than Madame Marcos. The bed was heart-shaped—how corny could you get?—with satin sheets and a plump satin headboard. Probably had to kill a whole whale to get all the bones and wiring in her corsets; the aging Monica had definitely been into pushing up, shoving out and, above all else, displaying her boobs. The vanity was sardine-packed with more bottles and vials than a cosmetic company could produce—and since the Fortune family had founded a dynasty in cosmetics, Rebecca ought to know.
She’d already rifled the drawers and closets. While she was in the sybaritic malachite bathroom, she’d also yanked down her jeans—away from Gabe’s eagle eyes—to figure out why her fanny was hurting so much. There were certainly enough mirrors to display a nasty bruise already turning rainbow colors. Her forehead throbbed, her behind was killing her, and the long scrape on her chest and ribs refused to stop smarting.
Well, she could soak once she got home. Now wasn’t the time. She refused to admit to being exhausted, even though it had to be three in the morning. Thunder boomed outside. The frustrated scowl on her forehead was just as dark and gloomy as the pitchy, witchy night outside.
Gabe didn’t believe there was any evidence to find, she knew. He didn’t want her around. She knew that, too. The rancid slug of whiskey had finally warmed her from the inside, though, renewing her determination. For some idiotic reason, she’d actually hoped Gabe might believe in her brother’s innocence. It was obvious he didn’t—no different from everyone else.
It wasn’t the first time Rebecca had felt alone. As her gaze scanned the width of the room, she automatically rubbed
