Nora Roberts - Remember When

Max waited until the door clicked shut. "You've got very protective friends."

"How much of the ten minutes do you want to waste on irrelevant observations?"

"Could you sit down?"

"I could, but I won't." She walked over to Vince's Mr. Coffee machine. She needed something to do with her hands before she surrendered to impulse and pounded them into Max's face. "What game are you running, Max?"

"I'm working for Reliance Insurance, and I'm skirting a line telling you that before I clear it with my client."

"Really? But breaking into my shop after spending several hours having sex with me isn't a line you're worried about, apparently."

"I didn't know. I didn't expect..." Fuck it, he thought. "I can apologize, but it wouldn't make any difference to you, and wouldn't excuse the way this happened."

"Well, there we are." She drank coffee, bitter and black. "We're on the same page on something, after all."

"You can be pissed off at me if you want-"

"Why, thanks. I believe I will."

"But you've got to get past it. Laine, you're in trouble."

She lifted her eyebrows, stared deliberately at the handcuffs. "I'm in trouble?"

"How many people know you're Elaine O'Hara?"

She didn't bat an eyelash. He hadn't expected her to be quite that good.

"You'd be one, apparently. I don't choose to use that name. I changed to my stepfather's name a long time ago. And I fail to see how this is any of your business." She sipped at the coffee. "Why don't we get back to the part where, about an hour after we were sliding around naked on each other, you were arrested for breaking into my place of business."

Guilt swept over his face but gave her little satisfaction. "One doesn't have anything to do with the other."

With a nod, she set the coffee down. "With answers like that we don't need our allotted ten minutes."

"William Young died outside your store," Max said as she took a step toward the door. "Died, according to witness reports, all but in your arms. You must've recognized him."

Her facade cracked minutely, and the grief eked through. Then she shored it up again. "This sounds more like an interrogation than an explanation. I'm not interested in answering the questions of a man who lied to me, who used me. So you can start telling me what you're doing here and what you want, or I'll bring Vince back in and we'll get started on pressing charges."

He took a moment. It was all he needed to confirm in his mind that she'd do exactly that. Shove him aside, lock the door, walk away. It was all he needed to understand-he'd toss the job aside before he'd let that happen.

"I broke into your shop tonight so I could clear you, so I could report to my client this morning that you weren't involved, and so I could tell you the truth."

"Involved in what? The truth about what?"

"Sit down for a damn minute. I'm tired of craning my neck."

She sat. "There. Comfy?"

"Six weeks ago, diamonds appraised at and insured by Reliance for twenty-eight point four million dollars were stolen from the offices of the International Jewelry Exchange in New York City. Two days later, the body of Jerome Myers, a gem merchant with offices in that location, was found in a New Jersey construction site. Through the investigation it's been determined this merchant was the inside man. It's also been determined he had a connection and an association with William Young and Jack O'Hara."

"Wait a minute, wait a minute. You're saying you believe my father was involved in a heist with a take of over twenty-eight million? Million? That he had something to do with a murder? The first is ridiculous, the second impossible. Jack O'Hara dreamed big, but he's small-time. And he never hurt anyone, not that way."

"Things change."

"Not that much."

"The cops don't have enough to charge Jack or Willy, though they'd sure like to talk to them. Since Willy's not going to be talking to anybody, that leaves Big Jack. Insurance companies get really irritated when they have to pay out big-ass claims."

"And that's where you come in."

"I've got more of a free hand than the cops. And a bigger expense account."

"And a bigger payoff," she added. "What's your take?"

"Five percent of the recovered amount."

"So in this case, you bring back the twenty-eight-plus, you tuck away..." Her eyes narrowed as she did the math. "A tidy one million, four hundred and twenty thousand in your piggy bank. Not bad."

"I earn it. I've put a lot of hours in on this. I know Jack and Willy were in it, just like I know there was a third party."

"Me?" She'd have laughed if she hadn't been so angry. "So I, what, broke out my black catsuit and watch cap, bopped up to New York, stole millions in jewels, cut out my share, then came home to feed my dog?"

"No. Not that you wouldn't look hot in a catsuit. Alex Crew. The name ring any bells?"

"No."

"Both the merchant and your father were seen with him prior to the heist. He's not small-time, though this would be his biggest effort. In the interest of time, let's just say he's not a nice guy, and if he's looking at you, you're in trouble."

"Why would he look at me?"

"Because you're Jack's daughter and Willy died minutes after talking to you.

What did he tell you, Laine?"

"He didn't tell me anything. For God's sake, I was a kid the last time I saw him. I didn't recognize him until... I didn't know who he was when he came in.

You're chasing the wrong tail, Max. Jack O'Hara wouldn't begin to know how to organize or execute a job like this-and if by some miracle he had a part in it, he'd be long gone with his share. That's more money than he'd know what to do with."

"Then why was Willy here? What spooked him? Why were your home and business broken into? Whoever got in your house was looking for something. They were probably doing the same, or about to, when I interrupted them in the shop.

You're too smart not to follow the dots."

"If anyone's looking at me, it's probably because you led them here. I don't have anything. I haven't spoken to my father in over five years, and I haven't seen him in longer than that. I've made a nice life here, and I'm going to keep right on living it. I'm not going to let you, my father or some mythical third party screw that up."

She got to her feet. "I'll get you out of the cuffs, and out of this jam with Vince. In return you leave me the hell alone."

"Laine-"

"Just shut up." She rubbed a hand over her face, her first sign of fatigue. "I broke my own rule and followed impulse with you. Serves me right."

She went to the door, gave Vince a weary smile. "I'm sorry about all this trouble. I'd like you to let Max go."

"Because?"

"It's been a stupid misunderstanding, Vince, and largely my own fault. Max tried to convince me I needed a better security system at the store, and I argued that I didn't. We had a little tiff about it, and he broke in to prove me wrong."

"Honey." Vince lifted one of his big hands and patted her cheek. "That's just bullshit."

"I'd like you to write it up that way, if you have to write it up at all. And let him go. There's no point in charging him when he'll use his investigator's license, his rich client and their fancy lawyers to get it tossed anyway."

"I need to know what this is about, Laine."

"I know you do." The sturdy foundation of her new life shook a bit. "Give me a little time, will you, to sort it all through. I'm so damn tired right now, I can barely think straight."

"All right. Whatever it is, I'm on your side."

"I hope so."

She walked out without another look, without another word for Max.

***

She wasn't going to break. She'd worked too hard, she'd come too far to break over a good-looking man with a dreamy southern accent. A charmer, Laine thought as she paced around her house.