Her Sworn Protector. Marie Ferrarella

Plageanos and Ari.”

      For a moment the look on Wilkins’s face was triumphant, as if he thought he had her. “You saw the guy’s face. This guy you didn’t know.” Half a foot taller than Kady, he leaned in, bringing his face close to hers for emphasis. “I thought you said you were in the bathroom.”

      She was sorely tempted to dig into her purse and hand the man breath mints. “I was,” she said in between clenched teeth.

      “Then how did you see his face?”

      Instead of answering, Kady let out an angry sigh and turned on her heel.

      Stunned, Wilkins called after her. “Hey, we’re not through here. Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he demanded. When she didn’t turn around, he shoved the notebook into his back pocket and hurried after her.

      “To show you,” Kady tossed over her shoulder. Walking into the bathroom, she deliberately left the door wide open, the way it had been before. She opened the medicine cabinet and angled the mirrored door so that it reflected the interior of the bedroom. “I saw him like this.”

      Wilkins craned his neck, coming over to her side of the room. From where he stood, Milos’s bed was clearly visible. The detective chewed on the inside of his check as he continued to glare at the mirrors. Finally he exhaled rather loudly.

      “Smart,” he allowed grudgingly.

      It was the first decent thing she’d heard the man say since he’d pounced on her. Vindicated, Kady chose not to comment—just in case it was another verbal trap. To her way of thinking, her action hadn’t been smart so much as desperate.

      Wilkins began flipping through the notes he’d jotted down during her recounting of the events. Kady couldn’t help wondering just how much he’d annotated. For the first time in her life, she understood what the term railroaded meant.

      Finally Wilkins flipped the cover closed, returned the pad to his back pocket and nodded. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll have someone take you in to the station. You can work with a sketch artist.”

      “I’ll take her,” Byron volunteered quietly.

      The sound of his voice coming up behind her surprised Kady. She thought he was downstairs with the other detective. The bodyguard seemed to materialize out of nowhere.

      Had he been there all the time, listening?

      Wilkins had blotted out everything with his close proximity, keeping her from being aware of anything else but him. She knew the detective had meant for it to be that way.

      Byron had been the first to be questioned, but he had caught Wilkins’s partner instead of Wilkins. Luck of the draw, she supposed.

      She saw Wilkins look at Byron for a long moment, then the older man passed a hand over his all but bald pate and snarled, “Okay. You know the way.”

      Byron met Wilkins’s scrutiny without flinching. “Yeah, I know the way.”

      “Why do you know the way?” Kady asked the bodyguard several minutes later as they left the penthouse.

      Just before they left the building, they passed one of the maids. The young woman, not more than twenty-two, was standing off to the side, sobbing. Kady fought the urge to stop and comfort her. But her morning was quickly disappearing and she still had a practice waiting for her. Mercifully, Mondays she went to the office in the afternoon.

      Byron made no answer. He led her to a well-cared-for Nissan Z. She knew little about cars, but decided it had to be old since the insignia on the back said Datsun instead of Nissan. He opened the passenger door for her.

      Getting in, she looked at Byron. “Or am I not supposed to ask?”

      Byron got in on his side and turned the ignition on. The car hummed to life. “You can ask.”

      He picked his way through the maze of police cars and the coroner’s van crowding the exit of the underground parking structure. His voice had trailed off even before they hit the street.

      “But will you answer?” she probed. And then she made an attempt to fill in the blank herself. “Did you work out of that precinct?” He looked at her sharply just before he made a turn. “You said you were a cop once,” she reminded him.

      He nodded. He’d forgotten he told her. Milos’s murder had thrown everything else into the background. He hadn’t deserved to have been cut down that way. If he’d had to die in his bed, it should have been after enjoying himself with a lusty, willing partner. He should have died with a smile on his face, not staring into a gun barrel.

      Kady was still waiting for an answer. With a shrug, he gave her one. “I was based in Brooklyn.”

      “And they had an exchange program with the detectives in Manhattan?”

      It was an absurd thing to say and she knew it, but she was trying to get him to talk, create some distraction from the thoughts of what she’d just left behind and what she’d been a witness to. Besides, she knew nothing about this stoic man beside her. She wanted a few blanks filled in.

      He laughed shortly at the display of tenacity. “There was an attempted robbery at the penthouse about six months ago.” He had caught the thief before the man could get away, but he left that part unspoken. “I took Mr. Plageanos in to file a report.”

      The details didn’t quite jibe but she couldn’t think of a reason why Byron would lie to her. Something was missing. “And Wilkins was working the Robbery Division at the time?”

      “Our paths crossed.”

      The answer told her nothing except that he wasn’t willing to talk about it. Frustrated, Kady blew out a breath. It was like trying to get into a conversation with the sphinx.

      “Okay, you pick the topic.”

      He spared her a glance as he stepped on the gas, making it through the amber light before it turned red. The streets were swollen with cars. “What?”

      “Well, you obviously don’t want to answer any questions and I’m not in the mood to sit here beside you in silence until we get to the police station, so talk about anything you want to. Just talk,” Kady added with emphasis.

      He made a right at the end of the next block. Kady couldn’t tell if he was amused, or if it was just the angle of his profile that made him look as if his lips were curving.

      “It might have escaped you,” he finally said, “but I don’t talk much.”

      “No, it hasn’t escaped me.” It wouldn’t have escaped her even if she’d been a single-cell amoeba. “But I thought in light of everything, today might be a good day to start.”

      He didn’t follow her logic, but then, she was a woman and he found that he’d never been able to tune in to the way they thought, a by-product of being raised by just his father. “Why?”

      Ordinarily she didn’t like to showcase a weakness. She prided herself on being strong. But today someone had thrown out the rule book.

      “Because I don’t want to cry, and right now I’m about this far away from it.” Kady held her thumb and forefinger an inch apart almost directly in front of him.

      He moved her hand aside so that he could see the road more clearly. “Didn’t sound like you were going to cry when Wilkins was questioning you.” Again, that odd little half smile took possession of his mouth. “I thought I might be called in to restrain you.”

      He was amused, she thought. “You heard?”

      He inclined his head in an abbreviated nod. “Got a temper on you,” he observed, then glanced at her as they came to a red light. “Wouldn’t think it to look at you.”

      As far as she was concerned, she had good reason to be angry. “Wilkins was accusing me of being involved in Mr. Plageanos’s murder.”

      “Wilkins