Kip arched her eyebrows. “People tend to praise modesty, then overlook you.”
She turned to go and could feel the gaze on her back as she walked to the office door. When she got there she turned to salute smartly and made what she hoped was a dignified exit.
Sterling’s assistant was still not at her desk, and Kip wondered if the formidable Mercedes Houston was elsewhere so Kip wouldn’t be seen coming and going. Probably. A successful investigation was conducted in the utmost secrecy, not that anyone would get anything out of Mercedes Houston. People had tried. They had always failed. Mercedes’ considerable wit was company legend.
Her boss had IT’S A LAW OF PHYSICS—YOUR FOOT
WILL ALWAYS FIT IN YOUR MOUTH tacked to his office wall.The office door opened just as she reached it. She stepped back to let in the lanky, sandy-haired man. She recognized him 11
immediately and turned the bank reconciliations so the faces were hidden against her chest.
“The old girl in?” He smiled at her with boyish charm. Ted Langhorn was Director of Client Relations and Tamara Sterling’s longtime friend. And a suspect until she cleared him. “Where’s Mercedes? Are you temping for her?”
Kip was mildly irritated by the question, and peeved by Langhorn’s disrespectful use of “old girl” to describe the CEO.
He might say it to Sterling’s face, but Kip was a subordinate. He’d always struck her as a glib deal-broker. Essential, but incapable of doing the work he was selling to clients.
“Ms. Sterling is in. I was just dropping off something. And picking up.” She indicated the stack of papers she was clutching against her stomach.
“Oh, sorry. Don’t I know you? You did that Big Blue investigation last year didn’t you? Barrett, right? Great work.
Clients mention it all the time.”
Kip nodded, sorry she hadn’t been out of Sterling’s office thirty seconds earlier. Besides, she thought she’d been over-praised for that case. Fourteen million dollars was a lot of money, to be sure. But it had been stolen by a clumsy cocaine addict who had drawn a lot of attention to himself with conspicuous spending. He’d even ordered tickets to Brazil in his own name with his company credit card. Kip had seen the transaction on their tap of his credit card records just a few moments after he’d made it. The companion programmer working with her had laughed out loud. Stupid criminals made life easy.
It had felt good, arriving at the idiot’s office with two agents.
They’d done the arresting, and she’d pointed out the evidence they would need to take, including the laptop. That afternoon she’d helped the Fed’s forensic accountant hack into the guy’s system, though “hacking” didn’t really apply when she’d suggested they try his middle name for his password and had been right.
Local law enforcement had been delighted to receive the names and phone numbers of several cocaine suppliers. Yes, that had felt good, even the tedious preparation for her own testimony. It had 12
been too long since she’d had a moment quite so fulfilling.
Tamara Sterling’s office door opened abruptly. “Thought I heard voices. Come on in, Ted.” Looking at Kip, she added,
“Glad I was able to catch you. There’s one more folder for Woo.”
She looked annoyed that Kip had forgotten something.
Turning back to Ted, she said, “How’d you make out in New York? Oh, and the Seahawks lost a squeaker while you were gone.”
She waved vaguely at Kip as though she’d already forgotten her existence. Kip made a speedy exit.
“Don’t tell me about the Seahawks,” Ted was saying as the door closed. “They were supposed to beat the spread...”
In the elevator she looked into the folder she’d been given.
A dozen blank sheets of paper. That meant Sterling had waited to find out if Kip was going to be seen leaving. Since Sterling had misled Ted Langhorn about Kip’s reason for being there, it meant that she hadn’t dismissed Ted as a suspect.
She sat at her desk in a daze, overwhelmed. Her cubicle neighbors were tapping out another homage to the Kit Kat bar.
She had to get away this weekend. Everyone, even her, had their limits. She’d been working weekends for so long she wasn’t sure what day of the week it was unless she checked her cell phone.
She hunkered down over her work for another hour, carefully double-checking everything because she was so tired. The papers Sterling had given her were tucked into her satchel, out of sight, but to her they were glowing like neon. When the clock told her she had to leave right then or completely miss Jen’s birthday party she packed up her running shoes, coffee travel mug, paperback she’d been trying to finish for two months and a half of a banana that was probably going to be her dinner.
Cafe C’est Bon had been chosen by the birthday girl for the crepes, and by the time Kip pulled into the parking lot she was sure that dessert was already flambéed and served. She could linger for thirty minutes. The only break she was catching was 13
that C’est Bon was most of the way to the Queen Anne Hill address Sterling had given her.
On the walk from the parking lot she spied Jen at a table for seven. The chair to Jen’s left was conspicuously empty. Jen had cut her long, blond hair—it only brushed her shoulders now. Her boyfriend, Luke, was in his usual black tie on a black shirt, but instead of the customary glower that Kip was used to seeing he was laughing at something Jen had just said.
She threaded her way through the crowded cafe and slid into the empty chair after dropping a kiss onto Jen’s forehead. If she had a best friend, Jen was it. “Sorry—work, as usual.”
“It’s always work with you,” Jen muttered. Her schoolteacher you-flunked face was in full evidence.
“It’s a living,” Kip answered, hoping to change the subject.
It was also a calling, something that nobody ever seemed to understand. Certainly not Meena, whose parting words had been,
“I moved out two weeks ago and you just noticed.”
“Tell us about it,” Luke said, tossing a little kindling on the emotional fire. “We’ve already ordered dessert.”
“I’d be honored if Jen would let me have a taste of whatever she ordered,” Kip said, trying hard to smile. “I don’t deserve more. But if there’s coffee I’d kill for some.” The last she directed to the hovering waiter, who nodded and sped away.
“A new, important case?” Luke was smiling in that not-a-clue-why-my-girlfriend-tolerates-you way. Kip understood why Jen found him attractive, but the charm of the carefully trimmed beard and moody brown eyes was lost on her. He waited tables to support his career as a bass guitarist in a Goth band, which was fine by Kip except, near as she could tell, the band hadn’t gigged in a year. Thirty-something was a little old not to have any kind of plan for the next six decades. Jen deserved better, and she was pretty sure Luke felt the same way about her as Jen’s friend.
Before she could answer, Luke added, “Oh, I forgot. You can’t say.”
“That’s right,” Kip said brightly. She glanced at Jen and Luke’s other friends—two more couples she had met several 14
times and whose names escaped her. They were politely ignoring the undercurrents. She knew Luke had some justification for his feelings. If the other couples had been clients or suspects, she’d remember every last detail. She might not be a bad person, but she was pretty much a bad friend these days.
However, she had her good moments, and hoped this was one of them. Pulling the small wrapped box out of her satchel, she set it next to Jen’s plate. “Happy birthday.”