Page 3 of Luck of the Devil (Harper Adams Mystery #3)

I couldn’t suppress the smile spreading across my face. The forceps he’d brought looked medical grade and nothing like the pair I’d picked up at the drugstore. “I suppose that wouldn’t be very hygienic. Where do you want me?”

He turned to look at me. “You can sit at the table.” He took in my bare shoulders and upper chest, but didn’t say anything as I walked over to the table.

He’d turned the chairs so they were facing each other, one in front of my coffee mug and the other next to his medical kit.

I sat in front of my latte and took a sip.

It was still warm, but more importantly, I was hoping the caffeine would help take my edge off.

Not likely, since caffeine typically had the opposite effect.

Malcolm watched me, still standing.

“Would you like me to make you something?” I asked.

“You can when I’m done,” he said.

“I don’t have any to-go cups.”

“Won’t be needin’ one,” he said, taking a seat in the chair opposite me. Then he started to pull on what looked like a pair of nitrile gloves.

So, he planned to stay after he was done.

Why? We weren’t friends, something he’d insisted both times we’d worked together, but there was no denying he’d saved my life last week when Skip Martin had kidnapped me to find out what I knew about the finances of Hugo Burton, the man he’d murdered five years before.

Skip had also made it clear he intended to kill me and leave my body somewhere so Malcolm would be accused of my murder.

That’s why it could be argued that Malcolm had only burst into the cellar to save his own hide by saving me.

But we both knew better.

He’d eliminated the threat to my life when he’d killed Skip and his underling, Pinky.

I wasn’t in any danger other than the mild concussion I’d suffered after Pinky had run my car off the road and I’d crashed into a tree.

But he’d taken me to his office at his tavern and woke me up every few hours to assess my status.

Those were the actions of a friend.

His bartender Misti and his attorney Carter Hale had told me that Malcolm took care of his own, meaning his employees, and that I had come into the fold.

I wasn’t sure what that meant exactly since he hadn’t hired me.

We’d only worked together to fulfill our mutual business needs, and I’d been too numb over the past five days to give it much thought.

But now, as Malcolm picked up a pair of fine-tip scissors, my mind fully went there.

What did his presence here mean?

He must have seen the cogs in my head grinding, because he said gruffly, “Don’t read too much into me being here. We have things to discuss, and I knew you wouldn’t be bothered with removing the sutures, so, two birds with one stone.”

“Yeah,” I said, as I slipped the strap of my gray camisole down over my shoulder. “Makes sense.” But I wasn’t sure what we had to discuss. We’d solved the case of who killed Hugo Burton, so I didn’t think he was here for that.

He studied my healed wound, then lightly probed around it with both hands. “It looks like it healed okay. No sign of infection.”

I didn’t see any reason to say anything since he wasn’t asking a single question. The true wonder was that I hadn’t pulled out any stitches during my car accident and kidnapping. Or that, other than Malcolm and the nurse in the woods, no one else knew I had them.

He lightly rested a hand on my shoulder as his scissors slipped under the first suture and snipped. He reached for the forceps and grabbed the knotted end, then gave a tug.

I drew in a breath as a pain shot through my shoulder blade.

“Sorry,” he murmured, dropping the suture onto the blue cloth. “Only eight more to go.”

“Okay,” I said. “No big deal.”

He started to work on the second suture, then caught me by surprise when he said, “I was sorry to hear about your mother.”

“Yeah,” I said, surprised when it came out sounding choked. I hadn’t shed a tear since hearing the news, but his offer of sympathy seemed to have ripped a tear through the thorny thicket encircling my heart.

“From what little you said, you seemed to have a complicated relationship.”

“That’s an understatement,” I grunted, wishing I had a drink.

“You got someone to talk to?”

I jerked my gaze up to him in shock, only to gasp again as he pulled out the other stitch. When I recovered, I narrowed my eyes. “You don’t seem like the kind of guy who likes to hear women unburden their souls.”

The left corner of his mouth ticked up. “I’ve had my ear bent a time or two.”

That shouldn’t have been surprising. Malcolm was forty-four.

One would hope he’d had at least one significant relationship, and to my surprise, I hoped he’d been a considerate partner—the kind of man who’d listen.

I nearly laughed. What had prompted that thought?

Not that I had a great frame of reference.

I was thirty-six years old and had never had a relationship rich enough to share deep feelings.

The closest I’d come to it was my relationship with Keith, my Little Rock police detective partner, and the last thing he’d been interested in were my deep feelings.

Still, I was struggling to make the empathetic Malcolm and the emotionally detached Malcolm fit together.

Or why he seemed to be making the offer to me .

He snorted. “The look on your face suggests you find that hard to believe.”

“Maybe it’s because I’ve never been good at listening to men unburden their souls.”

He chuckled. “That doesn’t surprise me.”

“You think I’m incapable of having a relationship?”

“Oh, you’re capable,” he said. “You just have too much to hide to be in a committed one.”

“Now you’re a relationship expert?” I asked in a snotty tone.

He chose that moment to pull out the third stitch, which seemed to hurt a bit more than the other two.

“Besides,” I added. “Pot meet kettle.”

“We aren’t talkin’ about me. We’re talkin’ about you,” he said, dropping the suture onto his cloth. This one seemed to have more crusty skin around it, so maybe he hadn’t purposely hurt me.

“How convenient for you,” I said, still pissed, especially since my forehead seemed to be sweating now and I had to grip my hands in my lap to keep them from shaking.

He moved to the next suture and was quiet for several seconds before he asked in a hushed tone, “How long has it been since your last drink?”

I jerked my gaze up again and found myself staring into his softened deep brown eyes. “What?”

“How long?”

I considered telling him it was none of his business, but he was the only one who had noticed my drinking had grown out of control. Why lie? “I had a sip from my flask before the graveside service.”

“And before that?”

“A shot in my coffee before the funeral.” Before Louise had shown up to check on me.

“Nothin’ else?” I felt a tug and realized he’d just taken out the fourth suture.

“No.”

He was silent again as he dropped the stitch onto the cloth, then moved to the next one. “Why stop now?” he finally asked.

“I have my reasons,” I said in a huff. I wasn’t about to confess my guilt over missing the signs that my mother had been missing. Sure, I’d caught on, but not until the day before they’d found her. I should have noticed the signs the first day. Then again, I had noticed. I’d just blown them off.

He gave a slight nod before he pulled out the next suture. As he got to work on another, he nonchalantly said, “What would you say if I told you that I’m not so sure your mother’s accident was an accident?”

Anger burned in my chest, and I gritted my teeth as I looked up at him. “So you’re like all those other idiots in town and think she killed herself?”

He stared back, his face blank, as he said, “No. I think she was murdered.”