Lisa Scottoline - Dead Ringer

She gave up trying to look hot, went back to her desk chair, and tried to act like a mature, sensible woman. She made a phone call to get her doors and back window replaced, and convinced them to rush the job, since she had been broken into by cops and robbers. They’d even agreed to do it without her being there, and to leave the new front door key inside. She hung up with satisfaction, but she still wasn’t feeling mature and sensible when Marshall appeared at her threshold, with David.

“Bennie, Mr. Holland is here to see you,” Marshall said, suppressing a smile, and waddled off without shouting, Bennie, a total hunk is here to see you!

“Hey, Bennie,” David said, entering her office in a white oxford shirt, pressed khaki pants, a tan leather belt, and Timberland loafers. He looked like a man in uniform, even out of uniform, but it could have been his shoulders, which were made for epaulets. Bennie was trying not to be attracted to him, but it wasn’t working. A sprig of dark chest hair sprung out of his open collar, and he smelled like mint something. Mint testosterone, maybe.

“Hoo-yah!” she said, and he laughed.

“You say it like an army man.”

“Okay, how do you say it?”

“Hoo- Ah! ”

It did sound cool, and male in the extreme. “Forget it, I took Latin. Thanks for coming by. Sit down.”

“Thanks.” He eased into the chair across from her desk, linking his fingers loosely between his legs. He was smiling at her with brown eyes that looked surprisingly sympathetic. “I’m sorry about your client.”

“Thanks.” Bennie felt a pang even the hots couldn’t erase.

“You had quite a night last night. How are you doing? Did you get any sleep?”

“Some. I’m okay.” Bennie had already decided not to offer David coffee because she wasn’t his professional. Well, wait a minute. She had made him coffee last night at her house, so the precedent was set, and this was merely a change of venue. She couldn’t decide. His chest hair was intentionally confusing her. “Coffee?” she asked, at the last minute.

“No thanks. I ate already.”

Bennie laughed. “You’re so nice today, and very talkative. What happened?”

“I feel bad for you, and frankly, I’m worried about you.”

“Me, why?”

“Because somebody got killed. Somebody close to you.” David’s smile vanished, and his jaw set. “I did a little research online last night about your twin. I read all the newspaper articles from the murder trial, and all the information about her. We don’t know how long she’s been back in town, but if you look at her moves in a series, a logical series, it’s a very dangerous scenario.”

“What do you mean?”

“Alice is on the attack, and her attacks are escalating. She has attacked your reputation, your home, and an animal you love. And now possibly your client.” David’s eyes turned dark and bored into her. “You see where I’m going with this?”

Bennie nodded. It was bad and good to have her suspicion confirmed. Ambivalent falling short, again. “You think Alice killed Robert.”

David shook his head. “Not only that.”

“What?”

“I think you’re next.”

Whoa. Bennie’s heart stopped. Maybe it was the gravity behind his eyes or the authority in his voice. Or maybe his words just rang true. She felt a tingle of fear.

“It’s not out of the realm of possibility, and you have to take measures to protect yourself.”

“But I’m not sure she’s the one who killed Robert.”

“You can’t take any chances. You have to behave as though she did. You have to protect yourself, and you can’t let it go just because so much else is going on.”

“You’re scaring me.”

“I don’t mean to, and I know this isn’t my business.” David leaned forward. “I’m just saying that last night, when you found out about the murder, you flew out of the house. It was like everything else went out of your head, including Alice. You didn’t think twice about the danger to yourself, even though we had just found out how she’d broken in. Even though she had just tried to kill Bear.”

Bennie remembered. She had barely said good-bye.

“I bet you didn’t think about her this morning, either, in the aftermath of last night.”

“I thought about her,” Bennie told him, defensive.

“What I’m saying is, you have to end this. You have to stop her. You have to get her. You can’t afford to keep disregarding your enemy because your friend was killed, or because you have a law firm to run.” David gestured at her wall of fame. “I read about you last night. You’ve accomplished a lot in your life, and you have too much on your plate. I can’t even begin to imagine what it takes to run a law firm. It isn’t my expertise.”

Mine either, she almost said.

“My expertise lies in another area. This area. I teach how to wage war, and how to win. I believe it’s the same whether it’s a real battle, a simulated battle, or any other conflict. War is war. It can be everywhere and anywhere.”

Bennie had always believed as much. Litigation was war. She had thought it yesterday in the courtroom, when she had declared on Linette. And look what had happened.

“I can tell you, from my experience, that you have an enemy who isn’t distracted. Alice is following a plan of attack, and she’s acting without hesitation or remorse. She’s aggressive and she’s going forward. And you’re directly in the line of fire.”

Bennie was quiet a moment.

“I’m concerned. I like you, and I wouldn’t feel so great if you got yourself killed.”

Bennie felt a rush of warmth even she couldn’t deny.

“It’s your cooking I would miss. Also your dog, who loves me, I can tell.”

Bennie felt her cheeks flushing. It was the L word that did it.

“My point isn’t that I can and should help.” David raised a finger like the instructor he was. “That isn’t my point. Even though I am the best man for the job, come completely free, and have nothing better to do.”

“Nothing?”

“All I have to do is work out.”

“No job? What do you live on?” Bennie was so curious about him. David had come out of the blue and was entering her life in a very intimate way. Talking about her getting killed. What if he was working with Alice somehow? Even he had said that Alice could have an accomplice. Bennie couldn’t help feeling suspicious. She was a lawyer, after all.

“I’m still drawing my pay, and I’m a saver.”

Now that was suspicious. “Did you always want to be in the military?”

“Yes. I was ROTC in high school, a battalion commander.”

“Why did you want to do that?”

“It suited me.”

Okay . Bennie had wanted to be a lawyer for about the same reason. “Where do you live?”

“You’re getting in a lot of personal questions here. Don’t think I don’t notice.”

“Where you live is personal? Then what’s your weight?”

He smiled. “I live on Spruce, at Twentieth, in an apartment I rent month to month. I don’t know how long this break will be. Long enough to help you through this.”

Bennie considered the proposition. “And you think I need help, that I can’t do it myself.”

“I know you can’t.”

Bennie bristled. Anything you can do I can do better. “Why the hell not?”

“Because Alice knows what you look like.”

Oh. Bennie hadn’t thought of that. She put her gun back in its holster.

“She can see you coming. In fact, she’s been following you. And, since you and your law firm represented her, she knows what all of your associates look like. She’s met them, hasn’t she? They were in photos together in the newspapers, taken on the courthouse steps.”