A Righteous Kill (12 page)

Hero shook her head. “The classroom is more Andra’s department. I never really did well in such a structured environment. But you said ‘at first’ which means you don’t think it’s the University anymore?”

“I haven’t ruled it out, but take a look at this.” Luca pointed to the black X’s again. “There seems to be a correlation with parks in the area, too. Janelle lived by Portsmouth Park. Another victim, Amber, constantly met clients at Columbia Park. April Jensen, she went missing near Northgate. Now, you grew up near St. John’s Park and were—rescued in Cathedral Park. That’s looking less and less like a coincidence to me. Of course, there’s always a chance neither the University nor the parks have anything to do with the location of the murders but rather that whole area’s proximity to the two rivers.” Luca pointed to where the Columbia and the Willamette converged, right above the neighborhood where Hero grew up. Less than two miles from Cathedral Park. “You were reportedly pulled out of the river by a vagrant who called in to the authorities. He disappeared before he could be identified, but we have a good sketch from the officers on scene. As of right now, he’s a very strong suspect and he’d be familiar with the area parks.”

Hero took another sip of her coffee, prompting Luca to do the same. Jesus, did she put crack in there?

“I suppose that’s possible.” Hero’s teeth captured her lower lip as she ran her finger over well-worn creases in the map. “Isn’t there like, an app for this? Same with your notebooks and paper files. Can’t you use a scanner and lap top to organize most of this instead of carrying around a briefcase? It would save a few trees.”

Luca carefully folded the map, painfully familiar with the bends in the paper. “I could and I do scan electronic copies of everything.” He lifted a shoulder. “But I don’t like the idea of all my work disappearing into some electronic netherworld when I power down. I need it to be tangible. I can only trust what I see with my eyes. Feel with my hands. Write in
my
words. Call it old fashioned, but it’s how I work my cases.”

Hero’s eyes were soft as she regarded him, turning Luca’s insides to liquid. “I understand,” she murmured. “I think it’s—beautiful.”

“Yeah, well—” Luca tossed back the rest of his coffee, which had cooled enough to only resemble magma, but he liked how the pain distracted him from how adorable she looked in the morning. “What’s on the agenda for today?”

Hero brightened. “I’m taking some of my pottery to a friend’s house who has a Tunnel Kiln. I need to get a second fire on a few pieces for my upcoming exhibit.” She reached out and gave his bicep a few squeezes. “You can help me carry them to the car.”

An hour later, Luca shut the door to Hero’s funky blue Juke and turned to see her jogging down the driveway after her third trip back to the loft after something she forgot. Was it her purse this time? She looked like a ray of autumn sunshine in a flowing gold peasant blouse and bronze skirt. Some kind of fringed, Asian-looking bag swung from her right shoulder and, apparently she’d decided to thread some kind of scarf through her hair while he loaded the car.

He’d better get breakfast out of this. Heavy on the meat.

“Just one more thing before we go,” Hero called. “I have to talk to Angora about you staying here. She just returned from Morocco, and I don’t want to freak her out.”

Luca reluctantly followed her up the pathway to the front entrance of the mansion. He flipped through his mental rolodex to Angora Steinman, Hero’s landlord. From what he could remember, she’d been a cabaret dancer forty years ago, who claimed to be a stage actress before becoming the third wife of a Hollywood producer after the scandal of their affair broke in the media. She’d been born Ida Kreuk, but a glamorous name change and several Jewish weddings later, she settled in Portland with twice as many million dollars as she’d had husbands. Now content to serve on local art and drama councils, she still boinked rich older men she met at the local country club.

Hero just let herself in with a key. “Angora? Are you awake?” Her voice echoed off the marble entryway and carried above the chandelier to the second floor walkway.

Luca whistled. Nice digs.

“Hero is that you I just saw out the window owning the walk of shame?” A disembodied voice barreled down the stairs. It was two parts long-time smoker, one part sex-kitten. “Who was that beautiful man you were with? I could watch him carry heavy things all day.”

Hero threw a smirk to Luca over her shoulder and walked to the bottom of the grand staircase. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, do you have a minute?”

“Is he still with you?”

“Yes.”

“Then let me finish putting on my face and I’ll be right down. Take a seat in the solarium!”

Luca snorted. Who had a solarium anymore? “Is she for real?” He followed Hero through gilded French doors into a garish room that could only be categorized as a shrine to the past.

“I don’t think there’s much left of her that is, actually,” Hero laughed.

Chaotic portraiture of a woman who very much wanted to look like Marilyn Monroe littered the French wallpaper. Some of them were black and white, some of them in Technicolor. A few included other people, but only celebrities.

“I love that she kept these costumes,” Hero commented. “And look at all the wigs! Angora’s done everything from blonde bombshell to Arabian nights.”

“The mannequins are creepy.” Luca fingered a red wig belonging to a naughty mermaid costume. The “fins” had nothing in the way of substantial fabric. Had the mannequin been a real woman, he’d have known her
true
hair color.

Luca wandered toward the wall of photos, not trusting the delicate, no doubt expensive, furniture to hold his weight. Angora smiled expansively back at him through twenty years of big blue eyes. Though, as the years wore on in the pictures, certain aspects of her figure and face became much more accentuated while others chipped away.

“You’re missing out, young man, I just rotated out some of my nude portraits.” Angora floated into the room on feathered high heels sporting more pearls than had possibly ever been found in the Pacific Ocean. “I’m sleeping with this Republican Senator who is inviting too many friends to my Christmas Party. You know how
they
are about indecent exposure.”

Luca smothered his laugh with a cough.

Hero hurried over to her and the women air kissed on opposite cheeks. “Angora, this is my—boyfriend, Luca Ramirez. Luca, this is Angora Steinman.”

“Mrs. Steinman.” Luca held his hand out.

“
You
can call me Angora, darling man.” She extended her hand to him in an over-dramatic movement and he shook it gently, avoiding the mile-long crimson nails.

“Hero, my dove, he has the look of a Mediterranean God with the proud forehead and bladed nose of a native savage.”

Luca swallowed, frozen in place as she circled him as though studying the lines of a stallion. “Tell me you’re capturing this man in a sculpture. I’ll buy the original, but only if it’s
en dishabille
.”

Hero crossed her arms as Angora reached her and studied him intently.

Luca started sizing up which windows to break in his escape.

“Actually, I’ve been considering a sculpture since we met.” Hero winked at him.

“Well, you couldn’t have picked a better muse. The clay would positively quiver to immortalize this specimen. In fact, I’d pay double to play voyeur to the sitting.”

Jesus Christ. This wasn’t part of his job description. Did the FBI have a sexual harassment policy? Couldn’t someone just shoot him? In the head.

“But lo!” Angora flung her arm with a flourish. “A man who blushes! A rare find, indeed.”

Luca frowned. He didn’t fucking blush. His face was hot because old people kept their houses a balmy seventy-five degrees.

“What do you do, Luca?”

“Actually, Luca was one of the agents assigned to my case.” Hero rescued him. We just couldn’t deny our chemistry.” She sent him a look that could have set his shoes on fire.

“Scandalous!” Angora grinned, and then took both of Hero’s scarred hands in hers. “How are you doing with all that, my pet? I heard what happened yesterday and I’ve already ordered you a new refrigerator.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

Angora held her hand up. “I’ll hear none of it. Besides it’ll soothe my conscience. I didn’t arm the alarm system last night because I had a late visitor.” This was said with a meaningful, salacious smile.

Luca narrowed his eyes. He’d been wondering why the alarm hadn’t been triggered during the invasion.

“I know,” Angora pouted an overfilled, over-glossed lip at him. “I was naughty. But I promise that I’ll not be remiss again. Not until this villain is brought to justice.”

“I would caution you to be careful, too, Mrs. Steinman. You should be worried about your own safety as well as Hero’s.” Luca put his hands in his pockets, caught the appraising look she sent his zipper, and promptly took them out again, thankful for his suit coat.

“You’re so kind to worry about an old woman.” Angora stepped to him and planted a kiss on his cheek. It would have been his mouth if he hadn’t turned his head at the last moment.

“About that.” Hero cut in. “I was going to ask if you minded Luca staying with me for a while, you know, for safety’s sake.”

Luca glared at the smile on Hero’s face. She was enjoying this.

“Mind?” Angora laughed and put a flirty hand on Luca’s shoulder. “Just give me time to install cameras in the bedroom.”

Luca coughed again and tugged on his collar. Why
did
old people keep their houses so warm?

“That’s what I thought you’d say.” Hero gave her a hug.

“Well, you two young, beautiful people enjoy your day. I’m off to the Tea Garden for lunch with Josiah Winthrop.” She clip-clopped toward a side entrance that Luca guessed went to the garage.

“Another late-night visitor?” Hero asked.

“Not yet.” Angora winked from the door. “But there’s always hope.”

Chapter Nine

“To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is,

Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss:

So full of artless jealousy is guilt,

It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.”

~William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Hero kept sliding her gaze from the road to the sexy FBI agent in her passenger seat. If she thought he looked good in a suit, she should have known that jeans and a button-up over a tight t-shirt would be
so
much better. The V collar of the t-shirt exposed muscled curves and sinew that she’d never before noticed in a man. Who’d have thought clavicles could be so arousing?

One could tell a lot about a man from his eating habits, and like everything else about Luca, mealtime was all about control and efficiency. His sharp jaw flexed as he devoured his breakfast-of-death sandwich, balled the wrapper in his hands, and put it back into the oil-stained paper bag.

He took a swig of the coffee he’d pilfered in one of her to-go mugs and let out a huge sigh of satisfaction. “Now
that’s
breakfast.”

Hero rolled her eyes. He was, of course, referring to her prior meal of fresh, sugar-free organic fruit crepes and homemade Kefir yogurt from the raw deli on the waterfront. He’d turned up his nose at the menu and demanded drive-through. “What I ate was food. What you ate was fat, meat, and preservatives.”

“In a flaky biscuit.” He flashed his teeth.

God, that dimple did something to her that was completely unfair. “The eggs weren’t even real. When I get my new fridge and can actually store stuff, I’m going to make you meals full of things your body needs.”

“How do you know what my body needs?” The silky darkness in his voice caused her thighs to clench together.

“Trust me.” She added a husky thread in her reply. “I
know
.” Her daring glance clashed with the wry masculine challenge in his black eyes. If he didn’t wipe away the pure sex on his face, she was going to pull over and climb into his lap.

He must have ascertained her thoughts because he powered down like someone had released the pressure valve.

Yeah, batten down the hatches, sailor,
she thought.
There’s a storm a-brewing.

Trying to ignore the inconvenient warmth in her panties, Hero turned down a private drive where willow trees danced with alders.

“So, where is this?” Luca asked.

“Sea Crest Manor.”

“As in…”

“No, this house was built and named before that particular Seacrest was born.” Hero chewed on her lip. How much did she need to tell Luca about this place and the man who owned it? He seemed more relaxed now that he’d eaten and was enjoying the picturesque tunnel of trees. So maybe nothing? Maybe Alec wouldn’t even be home. She could just use her key to the side door and they’d be in and out with little fuss. For some reason, she didn’t want the two men to meet.

When the tree line opened onto a spacious yard, Hero pointed at a large, circular wing of the stately Tudor style mansion. “Whoever built this house was a glass and pottery worker. A walk-in tunnel kiln is installed right there. Because it is gas-powered instead of electric, it gets a gazillion degrees hotter than mine at home. The heat brings out bolder colors than my kiln at home.”

“Oh yeah?” Luca tilted his head like he was trying to take all eight thousand square feet at one time. “Who owns it now?”

Hero forced a smile. “Professor Graham. He taught an ancient European Myths and Legends course and also Renaissance Art History that I took back in college. We’ve kept in touch. He lets me use the kiln from time to time.”

“How does a local college professor afford a
manor
?” Luca’s tone made it abundantly clear he found the word pretentious.

“Family money, I think.” Hero shrugged. “I never really asked. I believe Alec just teaches for love of the subject matter. He is to history what Trekkies are to ComicCon. I heard he was a fellow at Duke University and sometimes consulted at the Smithsonian. Who knows why he ended up here?”