Free Hot & Bothered by Susan Andersen

like to tell me.”
    Sunshine from the leaded-glass entry sidelights shone in her eyes, picking out the gold flecks in her moss-green irises. Feeling a sudden need for an emotional, as well as physical, distance if he wanted to keep himself from doing something they’d both regret, he said flatly, “It was the conversation I had with the police about Jared. I was thinking about the lead detective, who’s a donut-eating lard-ass too lazy to look at anyone else when he’s got a nice, convenient scapegoat in your brother.”
    That gave him the distance he wanted, but seeing the humor wiped from her face gave him no satisfaction. On the contrary, the strained worry he was responsible for putting in its place made him feel like a school-yard bully. Pulling his hands from his pockets, he leaned toward her.
    Only to watch her back snap poker-straight and her expression smooth out into the bland aloofness he hated. It should have put his back up. Instead her words played back in his head. I suppose, though, that it’s just as much a way for you to keep your feelings to yourself as it is for me.
    Shit.
    He reached for her hand. “Come on.” Tugging it gently,he led her down the hallway toward the office she’d assigned for his use. “Let’s go sit down and talk about it.”
    A moment later he seated her in the chair facing his desk, then circled it to take his own. “Can I have Mary bring you anything? Some iced tea, maybe? Something stronger?” He wasn’t exactly accustomed to summoning servants, but he’d been the housekeeper’s golden boy since he’d questioned her and the rest of the help yesterday, so what the hell. Might as well take advantage. No one understood better that he was likely to drop out of favor just as quickly as he’d come into it.
    Victoria merely shook her head, however.
    â€œShe agrees with you, by the way.”
    She blinked at him. “Mary does? About what?”
    â€œJared’s innocence.”
    That got her attention and John saw with satisfaction a spark of anger igniting in her eyes. He considered that a big improvement over the defeat that had dulled them.
    She straightened in her chair. “You questioned Mary?”
    â€œYes, ma’am. And the cook and the two girls who come in once a week to clean, as well. Oh, and the gardener.” He gave her a smile he knew would aggravate the hell out of her. “And except for the gardener, who’s still hacked off at Jared for running over his dahlias with the car, they all agree the kid couldn’t have killed your father. Swore that he wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
    â€œ I told you that!”
    â€œYes, you did. But I take nothing on faith and no one’s word is good enough for me. I’m not satisfied I’m even getting in the vicinity of the truth, in fact, until I’ve double—and preferably triple or quadruple—checked every statement I take, every assertion I hear. That, darlin’, is what you’re paying me for.”
    â€œTo be a cynic?”
    â€œDamn straight. You want someone to hold your hand, agreeing with every word you speak and ‘poor-babying’ you about your murdered dad and missing brother, go talk to one of your country-club boys. You want Jared found, you got me. And that means poking my nose in every corner of his life, finding out things the help might know, discovering the stuff he’d never in a million years confide in his sister.”
    He waited for her to ask what kind of stuff, but instead she straightened in her seat and eyed him with speculative consideration. “The police aren’t going to look any further than Jared, are they?”
    â€œNot if the conversation I had with Detective Simpson was any indication.” Anger burned in his gut all over again at the thought of the cop’s incompetence. It wasn’t something he was accustomed to running into with most