A Shot of Red (4 page)

Mia shrugged. “I’ll get the next one.”

“You need a ride home?” he asked, before he could stop himself.

“Um, sure. But if it’s out of your way, I can wait for a cab. It’s actually nice out here tonight.”

“Nice enough for a motorcycle ride?”

Her face brightened. “You’re on your bike?”

Gio nodded, pleased that she seemed to like the idea. He imagined her on the back of his motorcycle, her hair blowing in the chilly night air, her arms wrapped tightly around him. But his wishful thoughts screeched to a smoking stop.

He only had one helmet.

“What’s wrong?” She must have seen the disappointment in his eyes.

Gio rubbed his forehead, a little embarrassed that he’d acted on impulse and offered her a ride when he wasn’t prepared. “I’m sorry.” He shook his head. “I wasn’t thinking. I don’t have an extra helmet.”

Was he imagining it, or did she look disappointed too?

Damn.

“Another time,” he said. “I promise.” But he couldn’t imagine when there’d ever be another chance like this one. He sighed. “Let’s get you a cab.” He raised his hand to hail the cab that was cruising their way.

“You still hangin’ around?” Karl called to Gio as he led a couple of gangly guys out of the club. One of them immediately lit a cigarette.

Gio waved off the cab, and Mia looked at him quizzically. “I want you to meet my neighbor.”

She raised her eyebrows as Karl joined them.

“This is Mia,” Gio said to Karl. “I work for her mother.”

Karl looked appreciatively at Mia, and an inexplicable pang of possessiveness ricocheted through Gio.

“Pleasure to meet you,” Karl said.

“You, too.” Mia shook his hand.

“You a groupie,” Karl asked, “or are you waitin’ for a cab?”

Mia lowered her head and glanced up playfully at Gio. “I’m just a girl who wanted a motorcycle ride.”

Karl whistled and looked at Gio knowingly.

Mia flashed a teasing smile.

Good God.

“Not on your bike tonight?” Karl asked Gio.

“I am,” Gio said sheepishly. “I offered her a ride—before I did a helmet count.”

“I understand, man.” Karl grinned. “And I’ve got your back. I have an extra. Keep it here at the club, just in case.” He winked, then turned his attention to Mia. “Wanna borrow it?”

Mia’s lips turned up at the corners. “Sure,” she said to Karl, then turned to Gio. “If you’re still game.”

“Oh, he’s still game,” Karl said before Gio could get a word in. “Let me get your helmet, little lady. And my man Gio will take you for a ride.”

Chapter Three

Mia stepped out of the swanky salon and onto the busy DC sidewalk just as Claude pulled up to the curb. She hurried to open the front door and duck inside before he could get out because she’d rather sit with him than in the back. He gave her an exasperated smile.

“Indulge me, please,” she said. “This hasn’t been the best day.”

Claude nodded. “Your hair looks nice.”

She smoothed her hand over the silky strands. “Thank you. Lila was right. It needed a cut and color. But I feel guilty. I mean, the first thing I did after I found out Brent died was go to the salon. Seems inappropriate.”

Claude opened his mouth to reply the second her phone rang. Mia flinched at the unexpected sound, then rummaged in her purse and pulled out the phone. She didn’t recognize the number.

Shooting a glance at Claude, she said, “My first call.” She shrugged and answered the phone. “Hello?”

“Mia?” a woman asked, sounding hesitant.

Mia tried to place the voice. “Yes.”

“I’m glad they gave me the right number,” the woman said. “This is Nora English.”

Brent’s mother.

Mia’s heart jumped into her throat. “Oh, Nora. I’m so sorry to hear about Brent. I was so shocked by the news.” Mia had met Brent’s mom a few times when she dated Brent. She’d immediately insisted on being called Nora. “I’ve been out of the country for a while and just found out today when I got back to the States.”

“You’ve been in Haiti.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Mia guessed Brent had filled her in on what happened between the two of them. Mia felt a little guilty, as if her being in Haiti had been a bad thing. In the context of her relationship with Brent, she supposed it was.

“I’m sure you’re busy since you just got home. But it’s critical that I see you right away. I have something to give you from Brent, and something…” She paused for a long moment. “I can’t tell you on the phone. Please come, or I can meet you somewhere.” She’d started to sound a little frantic.

Mia swallowed hard, her heart going out to Nora. She ran down her schedule, wondering when she’d have time to visit, feeling as if she owed it to Brent.

“I can come tomorrow after work—about five thirty. Is that a good time for you?”

“Not today?”

What could Nora have to share that had her so keyed up? Mia didn’t have a good feeling about it, and wanted to find out sooner rather than later. She glanced at her watch. Three hours until the press conference.

“Are you still living at the Broadmoor?” Mia asked.

“Yes. On the eighth floor—802.”

“I’m not too far from there. Give me about fifteen minutes.”

Mia ended the call and gave Claude an imploring look. “We need to make a detour to the Broadmoor, and a stop at the florist on the way.”

…

Mia clutched a bouquet of fresh wildflowers as she stood at Nora’s door. She took a deep breath and knocked. Footsteps sounded on the other side, and Mia braced herself. The door opened with a
creak
.

Mia expected Nora to look stressed, tired, and grieved. But she wasn’t prepared to see her looking as if she’d aged years during the months Mia had been away. Surely a lot of the damage had been done during the last couple of weeks.

Nora hunched a little, dressed in black slacks that seemed to hang on her gaunt frame, and a loose-knit lavender pullover meant for way cooler weather. The color did nothing to complement the ashen tone of her skin, and her face was drawn with tension. Even so, her short gray hair was carefully styled, and she wore a little lipstick to give herself some color.

Mia’s heart ached for her. No mother should have to lose her child. “I’m so sorry, Nora.” She fought back tears as she embraced Brent’s mom, finding little more than bones to hold on to.

Nora hugged her. “Thank you for coming so quickly.”

Mia pulled away and they went inside the apartment, where little had changed since Mia had been there last. Nora kept her furnishings updated, and Brent had given her a large flat-screen HD television to watch all her favorites such as HGTV and classic car auctions. Despite the encroaching darkness, the blinds were still open, the deepening shadows of wooded Rock Creek Park shifting in the distance.

“These are for you.” Mia handed Nora the wildflower bouquet. “They seem so inadequate, considering…”

Nora gave her a small smile. “They’re lovely.” She took the flowers and went into the adjacent kitchen, returning with them in a vase. She placed them on the coffee table in front of the couch, next to a decorative brushed-silver urn affixed with an engraved plaque that read
Brent Harlan English, Beloved Son.

Brent’s ashes?

Other plants and flower arrangements that people had sent brightened the apartment, but Mia could hardly tear her gaze away from the urn.

“Have a seat,” Nora said. “Would you like something to drink?”

“No, thank you.” Mia sat on the edge of an upholstered chair. “I have to be at a press conference in a little while, so I’m afraid I can’t stay long.”

Nora settled nearby on the couch. The awkwardness of all that had happened hung in the air between them. Mia regretted that the comfortable vibe they used to share was no longer there. But what had she expected? “I don’t know where to start.”

“You don’t owe me an explanation about what happened,” Nora said sincerely. “Although I listened while Brent talked about it over and over.”

A pang of guilt shot through Mia. “I tried to explain things to him, but it was hard when I didn’t even understand it myself.” Which had been mostly true at the time. Suddenly too warm, she unbuttoned her jacket. Nora had the heat cranked despite the heavy sweater she was wearing. “I needed to get away from the corporate games my family was playing.” Her conscience tugged at her. Nora probably wasn’t interested in the business explanation, but it had been a minor piece of the puzzle. “And I needed to reassess where my life was headed.”

Nora did one of the worst things possible and remained quiet, waiting for Mia to continue. If she’d been anyone but Brent’s mother, telling her the truth would’ve been difficult, but doable. But what Mia had come to understand was too cruel to say to her. She wished she could have loved Brent more. It would’ve been a whole lot easier than not being able to love him enough.

“He deserved better than what I could give him.” That sounded lame, even to Mia, but it was as truthful as she could be without causing even more pain.

Nora nodded. “But he would’ve taken whatever you were willing to share and been happy.”

“That wouldn’t have been fair to him.” Mia hoped she’d at least done the right thing by letting him go.

“I get the logic of that,” Nora said. “But that doesn’t change the fact that I have a mother’s heart, and I hated to see him hurt.”

Mia pressed her lips together tightly. She’d run away and left an emotional mess in her wake. “Believe it or not, I did, too.”

A solemn moment passed, then Nora appeared preoccupied. Mia thought it would be best for her to leave. After all, what more could she offer Nora other than apologies?

As if she suspected Mia was about to go, Nora said, “I need to tell you what Brent was doing in Switzerland.”

Lila had filled Mia in on the details she knew. “Wasn’t he was attending a funeral for a friend?” Mia asked, although she’d never heard him mention a friend from Switzerland.

“That’s what he told everyone. He even found an obituary for a young man from Lucerne and used his story as cover.”

“I’m confused. Didn’t Brent fall from a mountain ridge while he was spreading his friend’s ashes?” Listening to her own words, she started to see the contradiction. “How could that have happened if the funeral story was only a ruse?”

The creases between Nora’s eyebrows deepened. “I hesitated to tell you, but I promised Brent I would. And when keeping a promise is the last thing you can do for someone…”

“Why would you hesitate?”

She leveled a serious gaze on Mia, her eyes full of fear. “It involves your family’s company.”

Mia’s heart hitched. “In what way?”

Nora stared at her tightly clasped hands. “He suspected some corporate wrongdoing involving the vaccine, so he went to investigate. I told him you weren’t the person to confide in about this, considering your connection to the company, but he insisted.”

Mia’s pulse ticked faster. “You’re saying he went to Switzerland to investigate something suspicious that had to do with Moncure’s vaccine and ended up dead?” Grief could do strange things to a person’s mind, and Mia began to worry even more about Nora.

She nodded slowly. “Brent called me two days before he died. He told me if anything unexpected happened to him that he’d gotten a safe-deposit box at a Swiss bank where he’d leave the information he’d uncovered about the vaccine.”

Mia couldn’t believe what she was hearing, and wasn’t sure she should. Adrenaline pulsed through her in waves. She took off her jacket, unable to stand the heat.

“He asked me to write down the name of the bank,” Nora said. “But I wasn’t sure I really needed to. I didn’t understand that something so serious was going on. Brent loved working for your family’s company. I figured he was just making sure he was wrong about some suspicion he had, then he’d come on home and things would work themselves out.” Her eyes welled and she pulled a tissue from a flowery box on the end table.

“Did you write down the name of the bank?”

Nora picked up an old-fashioned address book from the coffee table. “He would always test me, you know?” She smiled sorrowfully. He’d done the same thing with Mia, sometimes asking her about a detail of a conversation they’d had just to make sure she’d been listening. “I knew he was going to make me read the name of the bank back to him, so I did what he asked and put it in my address book.” She put on her reading glasses, paged through the book, stopped, and read carefully. “Luzerner Kantonalbank, Pilatusstrasse 12, Lucerne.”

What business did Moncure Therapeutics have in Lucerne? “Did he authorize you to access the safe-deposit box, since he was worried something might happen to him?”

Nora closed the address book, took off her glasses, and set them both on the coffee table. “No. The only other person he authorized to access the box was you.”

Mia suddenly felt light-headed. “Me?”

Nora nodded, watching Mia closely. Mia’s thoughts ricocheted in so many directions she could barely make sense of any of them. This couldn’t be true, could it? Nora slid open the drawer in the end table next to the couch, took out a plain white envelope, and handed it to Mia. “And there’s this.”

Mia took the flimsy sealed envelope and glanced at the front of it. “Mia” was written on the front in Brent’s familiar handwriting. Her heart overflowed with sorrow for him and Nora, and her throat thickened with emotion.

“He sent it from Switzerland before he…before the accident,” Nora said.

Mia wasn’t sure she wanted to open the envelope in front of Nora, but her expectant gaze left Mia no choice. She gently tore the seam across the top and looked inside to find a tiny flash memory card wedged into a bottom corner. Reaching in, she pinched it between her fingers, pulled it out, and shot Nora a questioning gaze.

“He sent one for me, too, along with a note saying if he’d made it home by the time I got the letter, to give it back to him. But if he hadn’t…” Nora’s voice wavered. “I should watch the video on the one he sent to me, and make sure yours got to you.” She wrung the tissue in her wrinkled hands. “I didn’t know how to find you in Haiti.” She gazed at the urn on the table, hunching her narrow shoulders even more. “And honestly, I was afraid to ask.”

Afraid of who?
The heat in the room kept her from drawing a satisfying breath. Her pulse pounded, whooshing in her ears.

Mia gazed at the flash card. Could she handle seeing a video that Brent had made for her? Dread crawled over her clammy skin and she stifled a shudder. No telling what further disturbing information he’d reveal, or what deep emotions he’d stir when there was no opportunity for forgiveness.

“These came to you in the mail?” Mia asked.

“No, Brent sent them to Shirley, my best friend who lives downstairs.”

“Why did he send them to her?”

“The note said he didn’t want them to be intercepted, and for me to be careful using my phone or my email to contact you, and not to use my computer to watch the video.” Nora sniffled. “I watched it on Shirley’s computer.”

Mia glanced at her purse. Should she be paranoid to use the smartphone Lila had given her yesterday, or even her personal laptop? “Have you told anyone that Brent sent us the flash cards?”

“Shirley’s the only one who knows, since he sent them to her.”

“Did you call me from her phone?” Mia asked.

Nora nodded. “I called Ellen Sloane last week and asked if she could help me get in touch with you since she worked with you and Brent. She called me today and gave me your number.”

Mia couldn’t fault Ellen for that. She probably thought she was doing a grieving mother a favor. “Did you tell her why you wanted to talk to me?”

“No.”

Mia felt a twinge of relief. There was no way this story should see daylight until she found out if there was any truth to it. Even then, whom could she share it with? “Does anyone else know what you told me about Brent’s death—about the safe-deposit box and his suspicions about the vaccine?”

Nora was silent long enough for Mia to know that she’d shared the story with someone. She didn’t seem the type to go telling lots of people, so that gave Mia hope.

“I told Shirley.” Nora pressed the tissue in her hands into a tight ball. “She’s the only person I could really talk to about everything. She helped me when I had to decide whether to have Brent cremated, or brought back here to the States.” Nora looked pleadingly at Mia. “I needed her. Besides, I’d have had to explain everything to her anyway, now that she got the mail from Brent and all.”