Under His Protection. Amy J. Fetzer

on what he really wanted to say. “We were together for a year, and you never did give me a good reason for why you left me.”

      She didn’t want to rehash this now. “Oh, there was plenty of reasons, they just weren’t yours. I needed someone who wanted what I did.” Someone to love me back, she thought. To want me for a lifetime and not just a frequent date.

      “And did you get all you wanted?”

      Damn him. He knew she hadn’t, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t deliriously happy with what she had right now. It wasn’t any of his business why her marriage ended, only that it had. And who was he to ask questions now when he didn’t bother four years ago? If he had, she’d have told him about their baby. “Are old feelings and reasons part of this investigation, Detective?”

      Nash felt the slam of a door as if it hit his nose. She was right. He had to get back to business and not relive their past.

      “Did you drive over last night?” he asked.

      “No, it was only just getting dark and it was a clear night. I walked.”

      “Did anyone see you?”

      “Walking here? I imagine so. Anyone I know? I can’t say. When I got here, the restaurant was full, and the staff were waiting on guests. I came up here and knocked.”

      “What was Winfield wearing when you saw him?”

      “I beg your pardon?”

      “Answer the question, please.”

      With the way he spoke to her, so cold and detached, as if they’d never shared a bed and some really great sex, she wondered if she should stop right now and call a lawyer. But she hadn’t done anything wrong.

      “He was wearing Brooks khaki slacks, matching socks. A hunter-green, tailored, short-sleeve shirt, pressed and creased. Brown Florsheim shoes and a brown belt.” Good clothing had been an addiction of Peter’s.

      Nash made notes in a black leather book. His gaze slid up to meet hers, and for a second his expression softened a fraction. Lisa glimpsed the man she once loved. Then just as quickly that man was gone again.

      “Did anyone else know you were going to see him?”

      “I might have mentioned it to my staff.” She wiped her eyes again, then threw the wad of tissue into a trash can.

      “I’ll need to talk with them.”

      Why? she wanted to know, but she didn’t argue. “Free country. They’re adults, not children. I’ll give you their home numbers.” She wrote the information on the back of a business card and handed it to him. He didn’t even glance at it, simply tucked it in his notebook. “Kate’s at the counter now, and Chris doesn’t come in till after his last class. He’s a college student at USC.”

      Nash scribbled and she noticed the shorthand. She’d flunked that course.

      “What were you wearing at the time you visited your husband?”

      “A lime-green skirt and top, matching sandals and purse.”

      He arched a brow.

      “Matching jewelry, too. Wanna see it?”

      “I’ll want to take all of it.”

      “What?” Her eyes widened, and the feeling she’d had moments ago landed like a brick against her heart. “You think I had something to do with Peter’s death.”

      Nash continued to write.

      “Nash Couviyon!”

      Still he didn’t comment, then slowly met her gaze again. “I don’t have an opinion yet. We need samples from your things to compare with what forensics finds in the room.”

      “You definitely think he was murdered?”

      Nash wasn’t ready to say so just yet. “The death of a healthy man is always suspicious.”

      “Oh, for the love of Mike,” she said, and the air left her lungs in one shot. “You actually think I had something to do with it?”

      Her words drained away any feeling she had, any trust she might have given him. Then the she-cat he remembered and had loved came racing back.

      “This meeting is over,” she said.

      He strove for patience. “Lisa, I have to look at all the possibilities.”

      Her green eyes narrowed to slits. “Look elsewhere, Detective,” she said, and started to rise.

      “Sit down!” he snapped.

      Lisa lowered herself into the chair again, scowling at him.

      “It’s either here or the station, Lisa. Your choice.”

      She folded her arms and glared. “Fine. Ask away.”

      “Did you carry anything into the room besides your handbag?”

      Lisa searched his features. “No, but I had on a scarf.”

      Something inside Nash froze. “Describe it please.”

      “It was my grandmother’s. It’s pale green with hand-painted irises. It’s the reason I got here so quickly this morning. I was on my way here to get it back.”

      “Why did you leave it?”

      “I didn’t. It was in my hair, which I had in a ponytail. The scarf was tied around the rubber band to hide it. It must have come undone. It’s silk and slippery.”

      Nash wrote, the notebook sliding on the highly polished table. The business card she’d given him showed and he flipped it over.

      Lisa thought she saw sadness flicker in his eyes.

      “The Enchanted Garden, that’s your business?”

      “Yes.” She frowned. “Didn’t you already know that?”

      Nash shook his head.

      “I started it up about ten months ago. It’s on my land around the house and it’s doing really well.” Her brows knit. “I don’t get it. Your brother Temple buys some of his plants for his landscaping business from me. I thought you knew.”

      “I knew he used this nursery, but he never mentioned it was yours.”

      “Maybe he thought he was being disloyal to his older brother by doing business with me. I know how you Couviyon brothers stick together.”

      “Obviously, Temple has his own set of rules.”

      “I know, he’s an outrageous flirt.”

      She was trying to ease the tension in the room. But Nash could feel it thicken the air. He tossed the card down and rose, moving to the door and speaking to the officer posted outside, who moved off to do his bidding. Nash waited, glancing back at her only once. She couldn’t have done this, he thought.

      “Why didn’t you ever come by to say hello, Nash?”

      “I knew you were here, Lisa.” He didn’t look at her. “I didn’t want to open that door again.” It hurt too much, he thought, then realized it still did.

      “And saying hello, how’s your mama, would have been torture?”

      “Yeah, it would have.”

      Lisa’s lips tightened. Well, that said a lot, she thought.

      “Why didn’t you come to me?” he asked.

      “I was still married.”

      Nash simply stared, wondering if she’d been single would they have gotten back together. And in the same moment he remembered that she had dumped him. She’d wanted picket fences and babies, and he couldn’t give her that. Aside from the fact that he’d just taken a bullet in the line of duty and lost his partner, he’d watched the devastation