Free Third Degree by Greg Iles

” She paused, trying to blot Danny from her mind, as though not thinking of him might somehow protect him. “It’s signed, ‘Me.’ ”
    “How convenient,” Warren said acidly. “Don’t you think? And the writer seems to have his finger on the pulse of our marriage, doesn’t he? Or he thinks he does, anyway. Who do you think might know us that well?”
    She kept staring at the paper, wishing harder than she had as a child forced to sing in front of her father’s congregation that she could magically be transported elsewhere. As she stared, the periphery of her vision shrunk and went dark, until she was staring at the letter through a round window. Her dread of pain returned with enough force to take her out of the moment—almost.
    “Just tell me the truth,” Warren said softly. “Please. I won’t be angry.”
    Glancing up at his slitted eyes, she felt she had just heard a rattlesnake hiss,
Just step right here on my tail, I promise I won’t bite you.
    “I have told you the truth. You don’t want to hear it.” She dropped the letter on the floor. “I got a migraine aura thirty minutes ago. If I don’t get that injection, I’ll be flat on my back all afternoon, unable to speak. You won’t be able to continue this ridiculous interrogation.”
    He regarded her coolly. Withstanding his scrutiny as best she could, she tried to make a plan of action. Given the as-yet-unmentioned gun, she should probably get out of the house as fast as possible. But that wasn’t as simple as it sounded. She couldn’t outrun Warren, and no one could outrun a bullet. It seemed inconceivable that he would actually shoot her, but if someone had asked her whether Warren would threaten her with a gun, she would have declared that impossible, too. No…she was going to have to talk her way out of this. Talk and bluff.
    “Is that a gun in your hand?” she asked in a neutral voice.
    He lifted the pistol into plain sight. “This?”
    “Yes, that.”
    “It is.”
    “Is it loaded?”
    “Of course. An unloaded gun is useless.”
    Oh, boy.
“Where did you get it?”
    “I bought it a couple of months ago. Some punks hassled me one night when I was riding my bike on the south end of town. I carry this in my seat bag now. I’ve got a permit for it.”
    Warren was still an obsessive cyclist; he’d won dozens of regional races, and even a couple of nationals a few years ago. He rode countless miles in training, but she’d heard nothing about any gun, or any incident where he’d needed one.
    “You keep that in the house, with our children?”
    She’d tried to sound suitably shocked, but Warren ignored her apparent concern. “I have a lockbox for it in the storeroom. Top shelf. It’s kidproof, don’t worry.”
    It’s not the kids I’m worried about right now.
“That doesn’t mean it’s Grant-proof.”
    A smile crossed Warren’s face as he thought of his mischievous son.
    “Why are you holding it now?” she asked.
    “Because I’m very angry. And this makes me feel better.”
    Oh, God—
    “Apparently,” he went on, “you don’t want to tell me the truth. But you should know this: you’re not leaving this house until I know who wrote that letter.”
    “I don’t want to leave the house, Warren. I want a shot of Imitrex.”
    He frowned as though he were being greatly inconvenienced. “Give me your cell phone.”
    A shiver of panic went through her, until she remembered she was carrying both phones. There had been days when she’d only had her clone phone in her pocket.
    “Hand it over! Your car keys, too.”
    She slid her hand into her right front pocket and drew out her legitimate Razr. Warren reached out and took it, then laid it on the coffee table.
    “I’ve already gone over your cellular records online. I’ve got a couple of questions for you.”
    She shrugged. There was no danger there. She had always used her clone phone to call Danny.
    “The keys, come on.”
    She drew her car keys from her left front