Serial Bride. Ann Voss Peterson

heart pounded so hard he could feel each beat in his throat. “Is that a letter?”

      Sylvie let the copied article she was reading fall back into the folder and reached for the envelope.

      A loud thump sounded from the other room. “Police,” a muffled voice shouted from the hall. “Open the door. We have a warrant to search the premises.”

      Bryce met Sylvie’s desperate eyes. They’d barely scratched the surface. He needed to study the folder, to find out exactly what Diana Gale saw fit to collect, what she knew about Kane, and when she knew it. And most of all, he needed to read that letter. If it was from Kane and he had sent it last month, it might give him everything he needed to prove that for whatever reason, Diana Gale had acted as Dryden Kane’s conduit to the outside world. And that at Kane’s bequest, she had arranged Ty’s murder.

      Sylvie stuffed the letter back into the folder, snapped the cover shut and thrust up from the chair. “I’m not giving them this folder.”

      His feelings exactly. But there wasn’t much they could do to keep it. Not with the police right outside. “What are you planning to do?”

      “I don’t know. But I can’t just hand this over to Detective Perreth. He’ll only use it to twist things, to blame everything on Diana, not to find out what happened to her.”

      “If the police believe as you say, taking this folder amounts to removing evidence. It’s a criminal action.”

      “I don’t care. It might be my only chance to find Diana. To find the truth.”

      And Bryce’s only chance to find out who helped Dryden Kane murder his brother. A chill wound down Bryce’s throat and lodged in his gut.

      Sylvie ran her hands over her gown. “I was going to change clothes. Why didn’t I change clothes?”

      There was no room in that dress to smuggle a folder, that was for damn sure. The chill inside him grew until the walls of his stomach ached from it.

      Sylvie dropped her hands to her sides and started for the door. “I’ll throw it in my suitcase. I’ll say I came to pack my clothes.”

      “No good. If this Detective Perreth has a brain in his head, he’ll ask to search your suitcase before he lets you cross the threshold.”

      Another thump sounded on the door. The jangle of keys reached them.

      Sylvie looked around the room like a trapped animal. “What am I going to do?”

      Warmth leached from his veins, chills circulating through his body. He was an officer of the court. He couldn’t interfere with a legal search warrant. He couldn’t risk his livelihood, his freedom.

      He couldn’t.

      But could he just surrender the folder? Could he give up the only lead he had to nailing his brother’s killer before he even got a look?

      Oh, hell. “Give it to me.”

      “What?”

      It was crazy. Deluded. Definitely criminal. He watched his hand extend toward her, palm up. As if it was part of someone else’s body. As if someone else was taking this leap into the abyss. “Give me the folder.”

      She handed it to him.

      He tossed his briefcase onto the desk, popped the locks and stuffed the folder inside. “Go ahead and pack your clothes. Quickly. I’ll answer the door.”

      Chapter Three

      Sylvie jammed jeans, sweaters and toiletries into her suitcase. Her fingers were shaking so badly, she could barely grip the zipper and force it closed. In the other room she could hear the hum of voices. Perreth’s blunt rasp followed by Bryce’s level baritone. When Bryce had hidden the folder in his briefcase, she’d been shocked. Sure, she’d asked for his help, for an answer to her dilemma, but she hadn’t been expecting him to give her either. She certainly hadn’t expected him to stick out his neck for her. No one had ever stuck their neck out for her before.

      So why had he done it?

      He had to have his reasons. But she didn’t have time to discover them now. The only thing that mattered right this second was that she and Bryce leave Diana’s apartment with that folder. She needed to get a look at the letter, the clippings. She needed some sort of break if she hoped to find her sister. And she needed that break now.

      She finished closing the zipper, set the suitcase on its wheels and extended the handle. It was time to get out of here and get back to finding Diana.

      Before it was too late.

      She marched out of the office and down the hall. A small handful of police officers had already fanned out in the living room. Near the center of the room, Detective Perreth glowered at Bryce from under his bushy brows. Sylvie could smell his cologne of stale cigarettes as soon as she entered the room.

      “Nice to see you again, Ms. Hayes.” He glanced at a uniformed officer who had begun sorting through the drawers in the coffee table. “Thomas?”

      “Detective?”

      “Take a look through Ms. Hayes’s suitcase, will you? We wouldn’t want her removing anything other than her personal clothing from the suspect’s apartment.” He grinned, showing nicotine-yellowed teeth. “It’s all right if he takes a look, isn’t it?”

      “Of course.” Giving him an equally phony smile, Sylvie left her suitcase at the mercy of the officer and stepped toward Perreth. “I want to see the warrant.”

      “I already showed it to your boyfriend here. And the super. It’s legal.”

      Towering next to Perreth’s squatty frame, Bryce gave her a confirming nod.

      “I asked you to stay at the church,” the detective said. “Care to explain why that didn’t happen?”

      “I had things to do.”

      “Like what? Rushing to your sister’s apartment to remove evidence of premeditation?”

      Hot pressure built in her head until it made her ears ring. This whole situation was so stupid. A figment of Perreth’s imagination. An attempt to smear Reed and Diana. To get revenge for Reed’s reaction to Perreth hitting his wife. And all the while he was wasting his time suspecting Diana, she was in danger. He should be finding her, not blaming her.

      She gripped the stained satin of her gown in her fists and choked down the words she wanted to spit at him. Making Perreth angry would get her nowhere. She needed to get out of here and find Diana. “I came back to change out of this dress and move my things to a hotel. That’s all.”

      He eyed her gown. “What stopped you?”

      “I did.” Bryce’s voice rippled like waves in water. “We had some things to discuss.”

      Things to discuss? Sylvie bit the inside of her cheek. Bryce wasn’t going to tell Detective Perreth about their conversation, was he? No. That didn’t make sense. But why would he want to draw Perreth’s attention with a vague claim like that? Surely the detective would want to know more. Maybe enough to detain him for questioning. Or to search his briefcase.

      Next to her, the officer finished turning over her clothes and makeup.

      Sylvie gestured in his direction. “See, Detective? Nothing. Can we go now?”

      “Not so fast.” Perreth focused his glare fully on Bryce. Now that Bryce had given him a bone, he obviously didn’t intend to give it up so easily. “What was so urgent?”

      Bryce shrugged. “Doesn’t that go without saying? Sylvie’s sister disappeared.”

      Perreth frowned. He focused on the briefcase in Bryce’s hand. “And what do you have in the briefcase?”

      Sylvie sucked in a breath and held it.

      Bryce offered the