Part 28 (2/2)
”Good one,” he said. ”Now do me a favor, will you?”
”What's that?”
”Go back to the party.”
Click. He was done.
I pocketed my phone, exiting the browser and powering down the laptop as quickly as I could. All the while, I kept glancing at the door, willing it to remain closed.
But it wasn't the door I should've been worried about. It was the desk.
The desk?
CHAPTER 86.
I TOPPLED to the floor so fast there wasn't even time to break my fall. Instead of throwing out my hands, the best I could do was lead with my shoulder. Better a cracked collarbone than a cracked skull.
What the h.e.l.l just happened? Did I really just get decked by the desk?
Sort of.
Right there under it, and still gripping my ankles, was the Annie Oakley of skeet shooting herself, Beverly Sands. What on earth she was doing there I was certain we'd get to in a moment. But first, it was pure instinct as I tried to kick myself free. I almost did, too, until she grabbed both my s.h.i.+ns.
Uh-oh. My s.h.i.+ns.
The second she felt the holster beneath my pant leg, out came a snub-nosed .38 that was strapped to her inner thigh courtesy of a tricked-out leather garter belt. Very La Femme Nikita.
”Who are you?” she demanded. ”Why do you have a gun?”
”Right back atcha,” I would've said if it hadn't been for the fact that her gun was aimed right at my head.
Instead, ”I'm Trevor Mann,” I answered, trying to catch my breath. ”We met when you arrived, remember?”
”Yeah, but you don't write for the Times.”
”What makes you so sure?”
”You don't look smug enough,” she said. ”You're also too nervous to be law enforcement.”
”Yeah, well, sorry I can't be more cool for you with a gun in my face.”
She was losing her patience. ”What the h.e.l.l are you doing in here? Who was that on the phone? And what do you want with Brennan's computer?”
”Jesus, one at a time, will you? Slow down.”
She motioned over her shoulder toward the door. ”We don't have that luxury.”
”Whatever I tell you, you won't believe me,” I said.
She was about to respond, her mouth open to form the first word. But she suddenly stopped, pointing at me.
”Trevor Mann,” she said, repeating my name as if running it through her memory. ”Why does that ring a bell?”
”The NYPD pension fund?”
She nodded. Bingo. ”You're that lawyer.”
”Yes, I'm that lawyer.”
Her finger was still pointing at me, but fortunately the gun wasn't. She lowered it. ”Honest to a fault,” she said.
”Thank you.”
”That wasn't a compliment,” she informed me. ”But go ahead, I might just believe you now.”
There are times to talk and there are times to shut up. Then there are times when you're on the floor with a woman wearing a leather garter-belt holster in the private office of a rich and powerful man who'd be less than understanding, to put it mildly, should he walk in on you.
Whatever you tell her, Mann, make it fast....
With that, I gave the quickest possible summation of what I was doing and why. ”We think Brennan is involved with something he shouldn't be.”
”Join the club,” she said. ”But who's we?”
”Me and the guy on the phone.”
”Were you hacking Brennan's e-mail?”
”Something like that.”
”Was it something more than that?”
The way she asked the question, she sounded-of all things-hopeful.
That was when it clicked, what she was doing underneath the giant desk. I could see the wires running straight down from the top through a grommet-covered hole.
”You were bugging his phone, weren't you? And I walked in on you,” I said.
”Something like that,” she replied, mimicking me.
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