The Arms Of The Law Read online

  Nikita’s temper began to climb. Minor resentment over her old friend’s easy success gave way to annoyance at her brother’s blatant disregard for his marital vows. She twisted her arm in his grip. “I’m sure she’s a suspect, too, Martin. Let go, will you? You’re smudging my coat.”

  His hand fell away as he started ticking off points on his fingers. “Some of the patients are bound to be on his list. Beldon, too. And Dean,” he said with a covert glance at his father-in-law. “He thinks I cheat on Deana.”

  “Do you?” Nikita demanded.

  “Of course not.”

  “Don’t sound so affronted, Martin. I’m your sister, remember? I’ve lived with your faults my whole life.”

  He made a shushing motion. “I know your feelings about me. You don’t have to advertise them.”

  She scrubbed at the fingerprints on her sleeve. “Why are you so afraid of Vachon? Have you met him?”

  “Sort of. I, uh, got someone off a charge that he’d spent eight months working undercover to bring about.”

  “I’ll bet he loves you for that.” She sighed, then spun to confront him as a sudden thought struck her. “Did you use a loophole?” At his innocent expression, her anger soared. “You did, you bas—”

  “Ah, Nikita.”

  Adeline Sorensen made a regal, untimely entrance. Beside her, looking as if he belonged there, stood Vachon, large as life and five times as handsome.

  As usual, Adeline was outlandishly dressed. She’d stuck purple feather combs in her curly gray-white hair and wore a burgundy velour track suit that she’d undoubtedly bought at Walmart.

  “No comment on my companion, Martin?” she challenged her grandson openly. “Judging from your expression, I’d wager you know full well who this young man is.”

  “I, uh—yes.” Martin recovered as if a whip had been cracked over him, snapping him out of his momentary paralysis. He straightened. “Detective Vachon and I met in court.”

  “A rather unpromising meeting place.” Dean Hawthorne remained by the library window, his arthritic hands planted atop his walking stick. “Are you in charge of the investigation into that young woman’s murder at the hospital, Detective?”

  “Involved,” Vachon agreed.

  Nikita wondered abstractedly if he always dressed in black. Or was that a white rugby shirt under his black overcoat? His jeans, though well-worn, were black. So were his boots. His hair was clean but rumpled. He also had a sleepy-eyed look about him, as if he’d spent most of last night awake and thinking. Possibly bad news for Martin.

  Wary of a trap, her brother regarded his watch. “Good Lord, it’s after nine. I have an appointment in less than half an hour.”

  Vachon’s expression remained pleasant. “Would you mind stopping off at police headquarters?”

  “Damned right, he’d mind,” Adeline chortled. “But he’ll do it all the same. What time do you want him at the station?”

  “That’s up to him. There’s a uniformed officer outside, Mr. Sorensen. You can go with him now and miss your appointment, or be at the station at one o’clock. If you go now, Manny will question you.”

  Martin was shrewd enough not to need the alternative spelled out. “Let me make a call,” he mumbled and headed, tight-lipped, for the phone.

  Nikita stared at Vachon in mounting mistrust.

  He returned her stare with an easy one of his own. “Your brother was a bonus, Nikita. It was you I hoped to find here.”

  Nikita was glad for the knickknack table between them. She had the most ridiculous urge to unbutton his coat and feel the lean warmth of his chest, to run her hands up and over his shoulders into the hair that fell with such careless abandon onto his neck.

  Shaking off the impulse, she said simply, “Why?”

  She knew she’d schooled her expression appropriately. He couldn’t possibly know what she’d been thinking seconds before, yet the way his gaze held hers, with an intensity that made her feel hot and mildly panicky, she might readily have believed him telepathic.

  “Lally Monk and Verity Whyte.” His answer doused the heat in her veins like a pail of ice water.

  Her defenses shot instinctively into place. “What about them?”

  “Don’t be daft, girl.” Adeline flapped a thin arm. “They’re suspects.”

  “They’re patients, Gran, and Vachon knows it.” She remained focused on him. “How did you know I was coming here?”

  “Your sister-in-law told me. I talked to her an hour ago at the hospital.”

  Dean Hawthorne looked startled. “Surely you don’t suspect my daughter of murder!”

  “I suspect everyone,” Vachon replied in a genial tone that fooled no one. “I eliminate people one by one as proof of their innocence surfaces.”

  Using her cane, the only true concession she’d made to the ravages of time, Adeline thumped the carpet between Vachon and her granddaughter. “Time out,” she ordered. A delighted smile lit her wrinkled face. “Are you saying that I’m a suspect, too, Detective?”

  Give him his due, Vachon was adept at banter. “Do you want to be, Mrs. Sorensen?”

  “It’s Adeline, and you bet I do. Sadly, I was snapping out orders left, right and center till I went to bed at midnight.”

  “The murder could have been committed anytime up to four o’clock, Gran,” Martin said, slapping his gloves against his palm in annoyance.

  Vachon’s gaze slid sideways. “I don’t remember mentioning a time.”

  But Martin was too slick to falter. “Deana told me,” he said with a defiant thrust of his chin. “Maybe you want to ask her where she got her information.”

  Dean’s face went beet red. Nikita honestly thought he was going to hit Martin with his stick. He certainly would have raised it if she hadn’t hastened to prevent him.

  “Don’t let him bait you, Dean.” She sent her brother a cutting look. “He always goads people when he’s angry or upset.”

  With a final glare at Martin, Dean addressed Vachon. “My daughter is one of the finest psychiatrists in this state, indeed, in this country. Only once in all her life did she allow passion to rule her good judgment.” He shot a contemptuous scowl at Martin then continued. “She has no meanness in her. She couldn’t even bear to see her dog put out of its misery when the animal became old and blind. Tell him, Nikita.”

  Caught off guard, Nikita nodded. “Well, yes, it’s true. She refused to have Sigmund put down.”

  Adeline shrugged. “‘Course Deana’s dog and Laverne Fox are two different kettles of fish—metaphorically speaking.”

  Nikita blew out an exasperated breath. “I think I’d avoid metaphors if I were you, Gran.”

  “It’s the only thing you would avoid, then.” Using her cane, Adeline hobbled up to Vachon and peered into his face. “She’s a corker, my Niki. No one pushed her up the ladder of success. Hell, her father didn’t give her so much as a nudge. I’m not picking on Deana,” she said over her shoulder to Dean, whose brows had come together in an expression of displeasure. “I’m only saying what is. Deana’s good, no one can deny that. But so’s my Niki.” She tapped Vachon’s chest with her cane. “You remember that, mister, or you’ll have both of us to reckon with.”

  Vachon kept a straight face as he replied. “I won’t forget, Mrs.—Adeline.”

  “Good.” Feathers bobbing, she hobbled toward the door. “Now that that’s settled, let’s have breakfast. And afterward, Martin, you get down to the police station and tell Vachon the truth.”

  Martin’s lips thinned. “I fully intend to.”

  “See that you do.” Her voice drifted back as she tapped across the threshold. “And don’t leave out the part about you and Laverne Fox having dinner last week at La Grange.”

  “IF I’D WANTED to eat with you, Vachon, I’d have stayed for breakfast at Gran’s.”

  Vachon let Nikita remain a step ahead of him as he trailed her around the stately hospital corridors. He had no problem with a place that resembled an old Englis
h estate house and even less with watching Nikita as she moved from lobby to office to cheerfully decorated therapy rooms.

  “You might as well come out with me,” he said while she made her rounds of the colorful craft tables. “At least if you do, you’ll know I’m not badgering your patients.”

  That slowed her down. It didn’t increase her trust, but she took the time to meet his gaze. It was more than she’d done since Adeline had dropped her bombshell about Martin and Laverne Fox having dinner at La Grange.

  “Are you going to push me for information about Martin?” she demanded warily.

  Vachon shrugged, leaning against a polished timber wall. “I had a chat with him while you were hauling your grandmother aside and reading her the riot act.”

  “She shouldn’t have said that.” Nikita hesitated, then bowed her head. “Martin shouldn’t have done it.”

  “There were four other people with them,” Vachon told her. “Two lawyers, a nurse from Boston General and one of your own doctors.”

  “Which one?”

  “Susan Craddock.”

  “She’s in Tuscany with her husband.”

  “Manny’ll contact her.” Before she could escape, Vachon snared her arm with his fingers. The feel of her firm, silky flesh through the thin fabric of her lab coat sent an unexpected shock of anticipation and awareness through his system. He masked it and held on. “I don’t bite,” he promised. “And I’m not looking for a scapegoat. If your brother’s innocent, he’s got nothing to worry about.” He paused. “You’re trembling.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  A small smile pulled on his lips. A door was near at hand, so he eased her through it onto some sort of enclosed glass porch. Gentle flakes of snow drifted down from a leaden sky. The room was cold and smelled of autumn apples and pears.

  He took in her mutinous countenance and stance. “Are you attracted to me, Nikita?”

  She jerked free, rubbing her chilled arms as she turned away. “That’s even more ridiculous than your first remark.”

  “I don’t think so.” He came up close behind her. “It’s a little thing called chemistry. Sometimes it’s there, whether you want it to be or not.”

  She moved away from him. Wind whipped around the porch, causing the snowflakes to dance outside the leadpaned window. Her eyes on his were large and unwavering. “It doesn’t matter what I feel, Vachon. My concern is for my patients. I’ll talk to Deana about letting you see Verity and Lally. That’s the best I can do.”

  He didn’t want this, he reminded himself. Didn’t want it or need it, and certainly shouldn’t be pursuing it. But he felt his head lowering even as he thought these things and knew he wasn’t about to check himself.

  He half expected her to pull away, yet oddly, she didn’t move, not even when his lips hovered an inch above hers.

  He gave up at that point. Temptation could be avoided for only so long, especially when the need to kiss her clawed in his stomach like a hungry tiger. That might explain why, as gently as he meant to touch her, he quickly lost any semblance of control, deepening the kiss even as he drew her to him.

  She offered no response at first, neither resisting nor encouraging his lips and tongue to explore the delicate contours of her mouth. Then, as if a thread had snapped in her mind, she raised her hands and cupped them around his face.

  Hers was a lighter hold, more tentative, filled with a blend of wonder and wariness, of suspicion and surprise.

  Vachon was not content. He needed to kiss her on a deeper level, to plunge into the sensations she extracted from him the same way he’d once jumped in and out of his father’s magic cabinets. Of course those actions had been prompted by the reckless exuberance of youth, and recklessness, he’d learned, was often the forerunner to danger. …

  Something began to gnaw at his insides. The image surfaced as if from a liquid fog: his grandmother’s face, pale and drawn, sucked dry of the life that had once fired her. Her decline at the hands of Dr. Marcel Fontaine, leech, vulture and complete jackass. Vachon could not, would not believe in head doctors, even one as beautiful and beguiling as Nikita.

  The fire in his lower limbs warred with his feelings of despair and loyalty. She tasted like some delicious wild berry he’d eaten as a child. Her mouth was warm, her body pliant and giving. If he let himself sink into her, chances were he would not come out whole. There was only one thing to do and one brief moment in which to do it.

  He broke the kiss with a swift, decisive wrench of his head. Although his eyes were blurred by the force of the emotions she’d dredged up in him, he had enough perception left to glimpse the brief expression of bewilderment on her face. Then her better judgment clicked into place, and she stepped swiftly back, breathing hard and pressing her wrist to her burning mouth.

  “My God,” she whispered, wide-eyed with awe. “I didn’t think it would—” She steadied herself with a visible effort. “I shouldn’t have reacted like that.”

  And he shouldn’t have started it, Vachon thought angrily. Now matters were complicated, and they would never be simple again.

  He allowed his eyes to close. The cold air helped to cool the fire in his blood, but it wasn’t close to enough. What in God’s name had spawned this attraction? He swore silently, then spoke in a subdued voice. “It was me, Nikita. I started it.”

  She lowered her wrist. “There’s no fault involved, Vachon, if that’s what you’re getting at. We’re not fifteen years old. We’ve both been kissed before.”

  Not like that, he hadn’t. Vachon wanted to take her by the arms and make her look at him, but he was afraid to touch her until he had his hormones under control. Damn fate and nature for causing a situation like this. Damn himself for caving in to it.

  He stared out the window while he struggled to gather his scattered wits. A covert glance showed Nikita fingering her lips. For a moment she answered his gaze, then looked hastily out the window.

  Was that a smile tugging on the corners of her mouth? If Vachon hadn’t been so busy berating himself for his own stupidity, he might have seen the humor in the situation. As it was, he wanted to be away from her so he could think without being tangled in a maelstrom of sexual desire.

  There was a definite smile in her voice when she challenged him. “So, Vachon, do you still want to have lunch with me?”

  He wasn’t sure what his response would have been. He only knew he detected a movement to his right a split second before the glass next to Nikita shattered into a thousand razor-sharp pieces.

  Chapter Six

  The projectile that crashed through the window missed Nikita by less than six inches, and only by that much because Vachon tackled her out of its path. The fall knocked the breath from her lungs but otherwise left her uninjured.

  When her head cleared, she eased her eyes open and whispered apprehensively, “What was that?”

  Vachon’s muffled voice came from underneath her. “I’m not sure. Stay here, and I’ll check.”

  He rolled out from under her as if she weighed nothing. Had circumstances been different, Nikita would have enjoyed the idea of him cushioning her body with his, but a woman was dead and so might Vachon have been if whatever it was had hit him.

  Curiosity more than bravery brought her to her knees. She crawled after him across the thin carpet. “What was it?” Splaying her hands on his back, she peered over his shoulder while he searched through the glass. “A bullet wouldn’t take out half the window, would it?”

  He kept searching. “You don’t follow orders very well, do you, Nikita? I told you to stay down.”

  She ignored the remark and frowned at the object in his left palm. “Is that it? An ugly little clay pot?”

  “A very tough one.” Vachon studied the crude markings. “Poorly made.” He held it up for her, his expression knowing. “Now who in this hospital might want to launch a pot through a window?”

  Nikita gnashed her teeth. “Mr. Bedrosian. Damn Sammy Slide. Sammy’s one of our
orderlies,” she explained. “He was supposed to be watching the hobby room. It’s two floors up to the right of this porch.”

  “Would he have been alone with your patients?”

  “No, there are always plenty of staff monitors, but Sammy’s a notorious slacker. If trouble happens, nine times out of ten it’s because he screwed up.” She climbed to her feet, pushing loosened strands of dark hair from her flushed cheeks. “That sounds nasty, I know, but Sammy Slide would try the patience of a saint, and I’m not in line for sainthood.”

  Rising from his crouch, Vachon tucked a strand of hair she’d missed in with the others. His knuckles grazed her cheekbone, bringing a shiver to her skin that Nikita knew better than to acknowledge.

  A thoughtful look invaded his dark eyes. “Was Slide here the night Laverne Fox was murdered?”

  The chill air penetrated Nikita’s lab coat as if it were made of paper. “He went off duty at eight o’clock. I don’t know if he hung around or not.”

  “Do the orderlies log in and out?”

  “Yes.” She bit her lip as Vachon removed his overcoat and wrapped it around her shoulders. “Well, no,” she conceded, “not always. Dr. Drake doesn’t believe in rigid rules. The actual medical staff—doctors and nurses—sign in and out for obvious reasons, but the orderlies and other workers often don’t. They can leave, eat, watch TV, swim, work out, whatever.”

  Vachon surveyed the broken window. “Sounds more like a spa than a hospital.”

  Her chin came up at his critical tone. “The facilities were available when the manor was converted, Vachon. Would you tear out an indoor swimming pool if you didn’t have to?”

  “I guess not.” With his head, he motioned to the door. Although he made a similar move with his hand, she noticed he didn’t touch her.

  Just as well, she decided, preceding him inside. Patients relied on her to administer compassion with dispassion, something she’d done on a regular basis for the past five years. On the other hand, it was easy to be dispassionate when you had few ripples, let alone a serious wave, to disrupt your life.