Pink Neon Read online

  A frown cut down the center of his forehead. “Didn’t you read about it in the papers online or watch the news video?”

  It never occurred to her and she hadn’t wanted to know anything else. “No, I wasn’t interested enough to bother. I got done with his ass a long time before the divorce. So I probably know less about it than you do.”

  “I’d say so.” Daniel sighed and sat up, shaking his head.

  “Isn’t it a good thing?”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” he told her. “Thing is, the FBI’s got no other suspects so far so they want to put you under the microscope. I believe you’re innocent but I can also see how – hypothetically – your situation looks to someone who doesn’t know you. You divorce the man, you don’t take much money and you walk away from it all. A short time later – what was it a month? – he’s dead and the jewelry in a locked safe is stolen. Profilers are probably saying the un-sub has to be familiar with the layout of the house and know Bradford’s routines. You’re up on both so they’re looking at you.”

  “Are you going to tell them it’s not me?”

  When he didn’t answer immediately, she got a sour feeling in her gut. “It’s not as simple as just telling them I believe you’re innocent,” Daniel said after a long pause. “I wish like hell it was. But we’ve either got to find some way to prove you had no part in any of it or figure out who’s guilty. I’ll let you read the case file if you want – if anyone has any insight in who could be the un-sub, it’s you.”

  “What’s ‘un-sub’?”

  “Unknown subject, the perpetrator, the probably guilty person.”

  I am so fucked, screwed, nailed to the wall. But if there’s a way out, I’ll find it.

  “Well, shit,” Cecily said.

  “Yeah,” he agreed. “Anything else you want to know?”

  His question took her mind away from the tangled mess and she smiled. “Oh, I’ve got about a thousand things I’d like to know sometime, sugar, but that’s all for now. Well, just one more thing – when’d you decide you liked what you saw?”

  In a way she couldn’t begin to describe, Daniel’s face changed. His features softened and some of the lines around his eyes, the ones cutting deep, relaxed until he looked ten years younger. “You know the ice cream place next to your shop?” he said, a smile so tender Cecily ached within. “I sat over there, checking you out the day before you opened. You came out and you didn’t like much like the woman I’d been sent to tail. I expected some high-toned rich bitch but this amazing, beautiful woman walked out instead. But you didn’t have me, querida, until you turned on the Pointer Sisters and drove off singing.”

  God, she remembered. If she’d known anyone watched, she’d been too embarrassed, too restrained to cut loose. “‘Fire’,” she said. “The song was ‘Fire’.”

  “Yeah, it was.” His beautiful eyes burned with heat as he met her gaze.

  “So you came back the next day to Pink Neon?”

  Daniel shook his head. “No. I followed you to the supermarket, trailed you and tailed you home. I sat over in the park for a few minutes and I knew right then I wanted you to be innocent. In the morning, yeah, I headed for your shop.”

  She remembered. “And you asked me to sing. That’s why. Is Down To The Water really one of your favorite songs?”

  “Si, querida,” he said. “Are you angry I followed you?”

  Under any other circumstances, she’d be furious but Cecily shook her head. “I’m not. You were doing your job and if you hadn’t, you wouldn’t be here now so how can I be?”

  “I’m glad.” His voice wasn’t much more than a breath between them.

  Reality shadowed some of her happiness. “It’s going to get harder before we get this thing resolved, isn’t it?”

  “Probably,” he replied. “When you said you had questions, you meant it, huh?”

  Cecily traced his cheek with two fingers. “Uh-huh, I did but I’m done for now.”

  “Are you?” he sounded interested.

  “Oh, yeah,” she replied. “I have to get up and open Pink Neon in a couple of hours.”

  Daniel squinted at the bedside alarm clock. “When do you open? Nine?”

  She laughed. “You ought to know better than that. You were my first customer. I open at eight.”

  “Then you’ve got time for me to take you out to breakfast.”

  Pleasure crept over her at his invitation. It’d been a long time since she enjoyed small things so much. “I’d like that, a lot.”

  “Good,” he replied. “Then you’d better get dressed or I might come up with another idea I like better.”

  His grin left no doubt what the other option might be so Cecily climbed out of bed before she yielded to temptation. As she showered, then dressed for the day, she couldn’t stop smiling – or marveling he’d managed to convince her of his sincerity.

  They breakfasted at a little café downtown, a classic old-fashioned restaurant with vintage fixtures. Cecily nibbled sausage patties and whole-wheat toast, watching with awe as Daniel ate a full meal with two eggs, over easy, hash browns, bacon, and biscuits and gravy. He ate with apparent relish and since he’d come clean with Cecily, she thought she saw a new ease in his movements. His shoulders relaxed in a natural pose and some of the tautness she’d noticed in him was absent for the moment. They’d driven their separate vehicles so she could open the store on time and he could check out of his crappy motel.

  “Are you coming to Pink Neon after you dump your stuff at the house?” she asked.

  Daniel shrugged and mopped up the last of his egg yolk with toast. “Do you want me to?”

  The look he sent across the table turned her insides into mush and heated up her girl parts. “I like having you around,” she told him.

  “Then I’ll come but I don’t want to drive off business. I doubt I fit the profile for your average boutique customer.”

  “You don’t,” she said with blunt honesty. “But you make nice eye candy.”

  Pink flushed his face despite his complexion and he grinned. “Do I?” He sounded pleased. “Yeah,” she said. “You do but I’ve got dibs on you so all they can do is look.”

  “Look but not touch?”

  She smiled back and her foot under the table shifted to stroke his leg. “That’s right, sugar. You understand.”

  When they parted, he kissed her long and deep as if he headed far away. Cecily liked it, tasting the lingering flavor of coffee on his breath and she held onto him a few more moments. People passing on the sidewalk paused to look but most smiled and she waved as she got into her GTO, “Don’t make me call you, you hear!”

  “I’ll be there, querida.”

  In the driver’s seat she fired the engine and kicked up the sound on the stereo. Cecily backed out as the Pointer Sisters began to sing and just for Daniel, she sang along. Then she made her way through the morning traffic to Pink Neon. She parked farthest from the front entrance to leave the prime parking open for customers and unlocked the door. Once inside, she glanced around to make sure everything remained in order. A few things were jumbled so she put them in place and turned the window placard around at the stroke of eight.

  Cecily stared out the window and reflected. Everything shifted from her pre-opening jitters. She’d opened Saturday as a single woman trying to make a new path but on Monday morning, she walked in here with a lover, a man she craved like chocolate and wanted to keep. His revelations might’ve sunk their new relationship but instead, once she accepted what he said as truth and understood, it somehow strengthened it instead. She’d known him for two days, almost to the hour and yet Cecily believed she knew him down to his bones.

  I don’t know where we’re going from here but I’m ready to take the ride.

  When the shop bell chimed, she glanced up and smiled at her first customer of the day. “Hi,” she said. “Is there anything I can help you find?”

  “Oh, I just want to look around. My sister in law said you had so
me nice things,” the woman said. “I collect angels.”

  “I’ve got some lovely ones, over this way,” Cecily said and her day began.

  Although she lacked as many customers as she’d had on Saturday, business stayed steady. She sold two angels to the lady who collected them, a boxed tea set and pot imported from England to an older gentleman, Victorian styled greeting cards to a woman dressed for the golf course, and potpourri to a twenty-something blonde dressed in a long calico dress complete with sunbonnet. Two sisters from Iowa bought a pair of the funky hats and a man who told her he’d just retired purchased a pair of coffee mugs.

  During a mid-morning lull Cecily pulled out her laptop from underneath the counter and booted it up. She checked emails for her brand new address and answered one from Nia. On impulse, she dialed Daniel’s number but he didn’t pick up the call and she hung up when forwarded to voice mail. They’d exchanged numbers over breakfast. Curious, Cecily typed in his name into her favorite search engine and came up with a few mentions of her lover. Among other things, he’d been awarded the Medal for Meritorious Service for saving a man’s life after a mugging near one of the Kansas City area casinos and an FBI Star for being injured in the line of duty.

  Then she gave into temptation and looked up the details of Willard’s death. Within minutes, Cecily wished she hadn’t. The lurid image of his body lying on the front steps of the mansion she’d called home disturbed her and the spreading dark pool beneath him made her sick. She skimmed several print reports and watched a WGN online news story. Scenes of the house, of her ex-husband’s ransacked study and open safe, upset her more. When she read there were no suspects named but ‘Bradford’s former spouse remains a person of interest’, Cecily shivered and her breakfast soured in her stomach. The son of a bitch is gonna get me from beyond the grave if I don’t watch out. I’m glad Daniel’s on my side ‘cause otherwise I’m starting to get the feeling the law wants to screw me.

  In an effort to shake off her unpleasant feelings, she tried Daniel again but he didn’t answer. Cecily dialed Nia, even though she’d be at work at the salon, and her cousin answered.

  “Hey, what’s up, girl?”

  “Second day of business at Pink Neon,” Cecily said with a light bravado she didn’t feel. “I thought I’d just touch base and see how things are going up in Chi town.”

  “Things are going,” Nia replied. “Hang on a second, let me put my customer under the dryer and then we’ll talk a minute.”

  Cecily waited and then Nia said, breathless, “Hey, you alone?”

  “Yeah, I am right now. Why?”

  “You may be in a deep load of shit, honey.”

  Her stomach rolled. “Over Willard?”

  “That’s right. How’d you know?”

  “It wasn’t a lucky guess,” Cecily said. “Let’s just say I heard I’m named a person of interest.”

  “Yeah, you are. Maybe you need a lawyer.”

  “Maybe but I think it’d just make me look guilty. I’m not.”

  “Shit, you don’t need to tell me. I know you’re not. If you’ve been in a mood to kill him, he’d died years ago,” Nia said. “I gotta go but watch your back. How’s your man?”

  A little of her earlier buoyant mood returned. “He’s fucking awesome.”

  “Good. Well, you hang onto him if he’s that good, you hear? And keep me posted, okay?”

  “’Kay.”

  Customers trailed in at an increasing pace as the morning headed toward noon. Three hours after she opened, Cecily hadn’t heard from Daniel and she alternated between worry and irritation. Just after she sold an Asian painted parasol and a feather boa to a sassy redhead, Cecily’s cell rang and she answered it. “Hello!”

  “It’s me.” She’d have known who it was without the caller ID.

  “I tried to call you but you didn’t answer.”

  “I’m sorry, babe. I got tied up on the phone.” His voice lacked the light tone he’d used at breakfast and she sighed. “Was it work-related?”

  “Yeah, I’m on my way over. I’ll fill you in later, when we’re alone. My stuff’s at your place. Everything going all right at the store?”

  “It’s good,” she said and added, “I miss you.”

  “Really?” his voice became brighter. “First time anyone’s missed me in years. I’ll see you in a few.”

  Daniel ended the call before she could say anything else. Distracted, she waited on customers and kept one eye on the traffic watching for a black Ford sedan. Fifteen minutes later, Daniel parked outside the door and strode in. She adored the way he moved but she didn’t like the frown on his face or the wrinkle across his forehead. Since no customers were present, Cecily met him and he opened his arms wide. She stepped into their circle and he hugged her.

  I’ve got it bad, real bad. I feel safe just ‘cause he showed up and his body against mine gets me hot. He smells fine, too and I want him.

  “You look like something’s wrong,” she said after he kissed her hard enough to make her breathless for more than a minute.

  “The situation is under control,” he said, cryptic but serious as a foreclosure. “We’ll talk about it tonight, querida but not now. You’ve got customers on the way inside.”

  Four women climbed out of an SUV and headed for the entrance with purpose. As they came inside, two more cars pulled into the lot. Daniel retreated behind the counter and without asking permission he opened her laptop and turned it back on. When Cecily snuck a glance or two, she noticed he read the Kansas City newspaper. Maybe I don’t have any reason to worry, none at all.

  But her intuition screamed like a fire alarm or a banshee.

  Chapter Nine

  At the café, Daniel turned his damn phone on so he could put Cecily’s number in the memory and like an idiot he didn’t turn it back off. His idea had been to make it possible for her to call him but instead, he fielded a call from his supervisor before he made it to the Strip. He almost didn’t answer it but he wasn’t quite ready to flush a decade with the FBI down the toilet.

  “Padilla.”

  “You’re a hard man to find these days.” Special Agent in Charge Martin’s voice remained level making it hard to determine if he was pissed or professional.

  “Cell service is spotty here,” Daniel said. “Modern technology can’t always get through these hills. What’s up?”

  “I think it’s time to bring her in and talk.”

  The words he’d feared to hear evoked a desire to curse and shout but Daniel did neither. In as calm a tone as he could muster, he said, “You’re the boss. I was on my way over to her shop right now. Do you want me to scratch that and bring her in?”

  “I like the way you think,” Drew Martin said with a chuckle. “Go ahead, scope her out and then call me back. By then I’ll have something set up with the satellite office at Springfield. And, Padilla?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Try to stay clear of mountains so I can get through when I call.”

  “I’ll do my best,” Daniel said, inwardly fuming. “But be advised, the place is surrounded with them.”

  “I understand. Let me know how it goes later.”

  “Will do.” He repressed an urge to toss the phone out onto the roadway and headed to the cheap shit motel. It didn’t take long to pack his things, dump his empty bottles into the trashcan outside, and check out. Feeling more capable to find his way through the tourist town, Daniel headed for Cecily’s house. He used the key she gave him and put his stuff in the corner of the living room for now.

  Although it wasn’t noon yet, he craved a drink, needed it in a way he hadn’t for more than forty-eight hours. Daniel rooted out a bottle of tequila and didn’t bother with a glass. He swigged a long drag out of the bottle, shuddered as the booze burned its way down. He almost repeated but didn’t. Cecily would be wondering where in hell he’d wandered and he needed to stay sober enough to think. He needed a strategy, some plan to keep Cecily out of trouble and his job off
the line. And he’d realized something else, something with even more potential danger. Whoever killed Bradford knew Cecily didn’t and if it became apparent she might realize who had motive and did the job, they’d kill her too without remorse. The stakes notched higher and he longed for more booze to dull his increasing anxiety. With regret Daniel closed the bottle and put it away, then turned off the phone so no calls could come in until he had time to ponder the situation. Then he sat, head in his hands for a long time.

  He considered actions and weighed options. After years as a loner making decisions to affect someone else proved difficult, all the more so when he cared so much. Daniel sat, tempted to erase all his anxieties with more tequila, and then, after some heavy thought and a little prayer, he phoned the only other person he trusted. And he used the pay-as-you-go phone he used for emergencies, not his work cell.

  Thirty minutes later, Daniel headed for Pink Neon. On the way he called Cecily from his own phone. He needed to hear her voice and he hated what he would have to tell her. He didn’t think she’d like it at all and he couldn’t blame her. He didn’t like it either.

  Her perception amazed and pleased him. She knew from the second he walked through the door something was up and asked.

  “I’ve got the situation under control,” he told her, ashamed, a little, of the blatant lie because he didn’t. All he could do was handle it the best way possible and so far, his best wasn’t anywhere good enough. They needed to talk but not in the presence of customers. Color him paranoid but Daniel didn’t trust the FBI not to send someone else to trail Cecily, not if Martin picked up on the slightest hint he wasn’t sold on Cecily’s guilt. If his boss caught a whiff of anything but his way and by-the-book, he’d send another agent, probably one Daniel wouldn’t know. I’ve worked under him for the last eight years. I know how he thinks and how he acts.