Page 19 of Mistletoe and Malice
The rest of their lunch hadn’t gone much better, often eating in an uncomfortable silence. He didn’t even bother walking out with her, taking off as soon as the waitress returned his credit card.
His lack of grace for her detail confused her. It was as if he considered them a threat, rather than the exact opposite. A threat of what, she didn’t know. Even if they weren’t there as part of their job, it wasn’t as if she and Graham were a couple.
In her mind, at least. Over the past few months, though, Graham had started to push for more. She liked him fine, and they’d been friends since high school. But he wasn’t husband material. Not for her, anyway. Not when he took his faith so lightly.
Her gaze strayed to the man standing with his back to the window beside her office door, keeping watch in the hall while Mr. Paxton remained in the waiting area and Mr. Jamison in the main floor lobby near the parking garage. The day had been strange, being chauffeured around all morning and ushered into buildings, the two guys flanking her ever watchful of their surroundings.
Yet even as much as she wished they weren’t there, her heart had softened as she watched them work. It hadn’t been as much fun as she thought it would be, springing her packed calendar on them yesterday after what she perceived was Mr. Blankenship’s condescending remark in the car. But all she felt was shame, realizing the amount of work she’d made for them.
She’d given them as much information as she could on every location, the people she would see, the folks in charge they would need to reach out to. But the entire time she’d beenwith Avery, Detective Stapleton, and the sketch artist later that afternoon, all three men had been on separate laptops and their phones to make sure everywhere she stepped over the next few days would be safe for her.
By the time she’d run out of steam last night and decided to go to bed, she peeked into the study down the hall from her suite, where Mr. Blankenship still sat at the desk at half past ten, phone pressed to his ear, laptop open in front of him. When he swiped his hand down his face, her heart caught. The man was exhausted. Yet there he sat and worked.
For her.
How could she not admire that?
Sitting up with a sigh, she determined to make the best of this situation for the next thirteen days. Certainly, she could last that long.
She picked up a pile of mail and sifted through it. One envelope caught her attention, and she put the others down while she studied it. Red envelope with a card inside, not addressed or stamped. Her name had been scrawled across the front, almost like a child’s handwriting, yet in cursive.
With a shrug, she grabbed her letter opener, sliced open the envelope, and extracted a card embellished with a cartoonish figure of a fashionable woman in sunglasses with shopping bags hanging from her arms. With a grin, she opened it.
My dear Miss Hudson,
I’ve been watching you, and I’m impressed. You have a reputation for winning, but that might change if you’re not careful. Are you sure about your new pet project? This one could be your undoing.
Sincerely, Your biggest fan
Her smile faded as she read from the top again. Her new pet project? Could be her undoing? Did that mean Shane?
Her gaze went back to the man outside her door. While odd, the card was probably nothing she needed to concern him with. She’d received mail in the past from victims’ unhappy family members convinced the original jury had been correct. Or from someone finally put behind bars once the true culprit was discovered.
But this one … was it someone who truly respected what she did? Or a veiled threat?
She picked up the phone on her desk and punched a button.
“Hey, Riley,” her assistant Hallie said from the other end. “What can I do for you?”
“This red envelope on my desk, the one with just my name on it. Do you know where it came from?”
“It was delivered up from the lobby security desk. Someone dropped it off for you down there when they couldn’t get up here.”
“Did the guard say who it was?”
“Some guy. Didn’t leave a name. Joe from Security sent it down to the mailroom to have it scanned for hazardous materials before having it brought up here.”
There would be video of the front lobby, so maybe she could identify the sender that way. “Can you ask Joe to send me the video footage, please? I’d like to see it.”
“You got it.”
She eyed the front of the card. Gooseflesh crawled along her skin. A woman with shopping bags.
Coincidence. Had to be.
Chapter Ten
“My, but don’t you three look handsome.”
