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“Are you crazy?” she screeched. “You could’ve been killed!”
She was worried about him?
He dropped his hand and stood, slipping behind the expressionless mask he’d perfected over the years. “I wanted to test your car’s acceleration and responsiveness. I’ll follow you to see if you have a tail.” Her face was still too pale. “Are you okay to drive? If not, you can ride with me, and I’ll arrange for one of my team to bring your car back to your house.”
“I’m fine. I can drive,” she snapped, barely giving him time to step back before she yanked shut her door. She rested her forehead on the steering wheel for a second, then reached for the gearshift.
Ryder hurried to the Suburban before she zoomed off and left him behind.
Fortunately, the restaurant had their order ready when they arrived, and the drive to her home only took another ten minutes.
His headlamps lit up the interior of her sports car as she waited for the garage door to lift. After she pulled in, he parked in her driveway, front facing out, and was at the Miata before she emerged. “Same deal as before. Sit in my car, doors locked, engine running until I come for you. If you see anyone you don’t recognize, or if anyone approaches the vehicle, you take off and call Lachlan. If they try to block you in with another vehicle, go around or through them if you have to. The Suburban’s hard to take out. Don’t worry about damaging it.”
Nathalie’s lips pressed together in a thin line. But this time, she didn’t argue.
Once she was seated in his SUV, he asked, “Can you disarm your home security system from your phone?” At her nod, he added, “Do it.”
Ryder unbuttoned his suit coat and withdrew the Glock nestled in the shoulder holster beneath his left arm as he entered the garage.
The space was wide enough to hold two cars. Garden tools hung on a pegboard on one wall, and a bicycle leaned against four plastic storage bins along the other. He opened the utility door on the rear wall. Water heater and HVAC unit. The other door opened to a closet with wire-racked shelves containing more plastic bins, some labeled “Christmas,” others unlabeled. To his right, beige carpeted stairs led to what he assumed was the main floor.
The knob on the door at the top of the stairs turned easily beneath his grip.
Unlocked.
He’d have to speak with her about that.
Warm light spilled from under-cabinet lighting in Nathalie’s open kitchen in front of him and from table lamps in the living room to his left. He went left, toward the open living room and stairs leading to the third floor.
Moving around the seating arrangement clustered in front of a gas fireplace, he checked the sliding glass door. It was locked, with the security bar down. He took more carpeted stairs up to the third level. A quick search revealed two spare bedrooms and a hall bath. All empty. Nathalie’s bedroom and ensuite bathroom faced the street. He slid into her room, his gaze going to her king-size bed and its green quilted cover.
When he dug further into her background, would he find someone who routinely shared the bed with her?
The back of his neck tightened. He continued forward.
Her bathroom had a garden tub encased in rustic beige porcelain tiles and a clear glass stand up shower. He snagged the fluffy off-white bath towel hanging next to the shower and held it to his nose. Lavender. Her body wash.
Returning to the main level, he passed the kitchen and the stairs leading down to the garage. On his left, an open dining room was adjacent to the kitchen. A modern chandelier with clear glass shades in a cage of intersecting bronze hoops hung over a dark wood oval table and six chairs. The room had a bay window that looked out onto the street.
Along the back wall hung a watercolor painting of cherry trees along Washington, DC’s Tidal Basin. Was it Nathalie’s?
He stepped around the table to the wall to inspect the name scrawled in delicate black brush strokes on the bottom right.
Vivienne Williams.
Her mother’s work then, not hers.
Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen any of Nathalie’s paintings in her home, which was strange. She’d been a prolific artist despite the heavy demands of her computer science program.
Across the hallway from the dining room was the only walled-in room on the main level. He turned the knob, pushed open the door and switched on the overhead light. Plantation shutters covered the windows facing the street. A large desk took up most of the space. Behind the desk was a gray filing cabinet with an electro-mechanical combination lock that told him she brought her work home with her.
The opposite wall had built-in white shelves lined with textbooks and a small home safe tucked into the bottom corner. His peripheral vision locked onto the royal blue frame half-hidden on the bottom shelf next to textbooks. A strange place to display a photograph, below eye-level.
He was here to make sure no one was in her home, not to snoop, he lectured himself even as he reached for the frame.
The image punched him square in the midsection like a well-timed body blow, forcing the air from his lungs.
If he’d been nothing more than a dalliance, then why had she kept a photo of them, after all these years? Not just kept the photo taken of them in Edinburgh, but framed it.