Murder in the Aisles (8 page)

“We can pick up my car from your place then head over to the precinct,” Mark said.

“Fine.” She put the car in gear and they headed back.

The first twenty minutes or so, Felicia struggled to stay focused on the growing mid-morning traffic and not the pure male scent that wafted around Mark Rizzo. When he wasn't looking she stole glances at his profile and memorized the way his hair curled at the nape of his neck. His hands rested on his thighs. His knuckles were dark and scarred in places; she was sure from him punching something or someone. His fingers were long, more for piano playing or stroking flesh than shooting a gun. She inhaled deeply and turned the radio up a bit louder in the hopes of drowning out the thoughts that were running through her head.

“Did you see anything of interest at the service?” Felicia asked.

“Nothing out of the ordinary. Everyone looked respectably sad. I recognized a few faces from the day of.” He cleared his throat. “Seemed that he was well liked.” He angled his head in her direction.

Felicia nodded as she navigated around a car that was making a left turn. “He was very well liked and admired. He was brilliant, funny. Dr. Dresden was the one that hired me, groomed me, mentored me.” She blinked rapidly.

Mark watched the way those luscious lips pressed tightly together, how her lashes fanned her eyes, and the way her throat worked up and down. He wanted to cover her hand with his and tell her that he'd figure it out and that everything would be all right.

“What about you, Detective, did you have a mentor?”

He snapped out of his daydream of pressing his nose against the hollow of her neck. “Uh, I suppose.” He cleared his throat and shifted in his seat. “My first partner, Adam Connelly. Tough as nails. A real old-school beat cop. Reminded me of Sean Connery in
The Untouchables
.” He grinned at the memory.

Felicia squinted. “I don't know that one.”

His head snapped toward her. “You don't know
The Untouchables
with Kevin Costner, Sean Connery and a very young Andy Garcia?”

“Should I?”

“It's a classic,” he insisted.

“What makes it a classic?”

Was she shitting him? “It's right up there with
The Godfather
, and
Goodfellas
.”

She gave a slight shrug. “If you say so, Detective. I take it that these are all cops-and-robber movies and gangs and such.”

He wasn't sure if he should be offended or amused. “Well, what kind of movies do you like?”

She hesitated for a moment. “Foreign and indie films mostly,” she said in a tone of defense.

“Figures,” he muttered under his breath.

“Excuse me?”

“Nothin'.” He drummed his fingers on his thighs. “So, uh, besides watching foreign films and doing all that book reading, what do you do for fun?”

“You make it sound as if my interests are worthless.”

“Naw, not at all. Just—”

“Just what, Detective?”

“Boring.”

She sniffed and sat a bit straighter. “I go to cycling class and take yoga. Do you consider those boring, too, Detective?” she said with an edge in her voice.

That would explain her out-of-this-world body
. “Hey, I'm all for exercise and I hear that yoga is good for the mind and body. I prefer a hard game of racquet ball and weight lifting, myself.”

Suddenly, the tires screeched. Mark reflexively flung his arm across her body. She'd hit the brakes inches before rear-ending the car in front of her.

“Close one,” he said, lowering his arm. “You good?”

She swallowed.

He felt the way her heart had pounded against his arm.

“Yes.” She shook her head slowly from side to side. “Sorry about that.”

“Happens. The stress and all.”

“Yes. Stress.”

Chapter Eleven

Felicia cut the engine of her Navigator after pulling up in her driveway next to Mark's excuse for a car. “I suppose I could follow you to the precinct, but I'm really starved. I could fix us something to eat or if you're not hungry I can meet you there in about an hour or so?”

More time alone with Felicia Swift was the last thing he needed. He was still semi-hard from the near miss when he had his arm pressed across those amazing breasts. “Sure, I'm pretty starved myself.”

“Great.” She got out.

He proceeded with his visual mantra of cars, trucks and shootouts while he took his time getting out of the vehicle. The front door was standing open and Felicia was hanging up her coat in the hall closet by the time he got to the entrance. She pulled a hanger from the rod and handed it to him. He shrugged out of his coat and slid it on the hanger. “Thanks,” he muttered and handed her his coat.

“Make yourself comfortable. I'll check and see what I can whip up.”

“Sure.” He watched her walk away and he'd swear that she intentionally put an extra sway in her hips. He strolled into the living room and took another slow tour, picking up items and putting them down. It was clear that she had great taste, much like Elaine. He walked over to the framed photographs that were mounted on the walls on either side of the windows and that gracefully lined the table that sat beneath. They were a montage of Felicia's life. One of the earliest pictures was of her as an infant in her mother's arms with her father standing beside them. If the saying goes that a woman turns into her mother then Felicia had nothing to worry about. She had her mother's wide expressive eyes, full mouth and the soft angles of her face. She had her father's nose and warm toffee coloring and his naturally curly hair. There were other photos of her at various times, most of them with her stiffly posed, holding some sort of award, plaque or trophy for her host of accomplishments; most of those taken before she was an adult. There were the numerous graduation pictures, and a few of Felicia in canoes, on hiking trails and mountainsides; he assumed during her times of research. She didn't seem like the kind of woman that did anything just for the hell of it. There were no pictures of her with a man or significant other, and the only photos where she actually seemed happy were a shot of her and her friend Elizabeth, all dolled up standing outside the White House, and one of the two of them posing together in a park.

“Chicken salad okay?”

Mark spun around and for an instant was caught off guard at how soft and vulnerable she looked, not the haughty, brilliant scholar that she put on for the world, but just a regular girl who was fixing food for a guest.

“Great. I'm easy.” He grinned. “Need some help? I can be pretty handy.”

She offered up a tight, tentative smile and shrugged her right shoulder. “Sure. Come on.”

Mark followed her into the kitchen. Spread out on the immaculate white and black granite countertop was a cooked half chicken, celery stalks, mayo, seasonings, tomatoes, romaine lettuce and fresh rolls.

“You can carve up the chicken and put it in that bowl over there.” She pointed to the glass bowl. “Small pieces,” she added as she began to dice the celery and slice the tomatoes.

Mark bit back a laugh. “Sure thing, Doc.”

They worked in companionable silence, but Mark couldn't ignore her presence, her scent. Funny, she wasn't as tall as he'd thought she was. She'd taken off her heels and changed out of her formal dress to a T-shirt and jeans and still she looked like a cover model. She was barefoot and he estimated that if he turned her around and pulled her into his arms, he could easily rest his chin on her head and she could tuck hers in the hollow of his neck.

“Tell me about this
Untouchables
movie.”

Mark blinked away the image and chuckled. He knew for sure that she was pulling his chain until he looked into her eyes and found them wide and innocent. His dick twitched. He swallowed.

“Umm, well, it's about Elliot Ness.”

Her brows rose. “The federal agent that fought prohibition back in Chicago.”

He chuckled in delight. “Yeah, him.”

“Okay.” She grinned like a kid who'd finally gotten the right answer. “Go ahead.”

He stopped cutting and rested his hip against the counter. “So, it's this group of guys that Elliot Ness pulls together to stop Robert DeNiro, I mean Al Capone, during prohibition. None of them have done this kind of work before. Anyway…”

He went on a roll about the storyline, totally animated from facial expressions to hand gestures. Felicia seemed mesmerized.

“There's this one scene after Kevin Costner, I mean Elliot Ness's, crew has taken out one of Capone's locations. Capone is all dressed in white and he flips the hell out. ‘I want this fancy-pants Ness dead! I want his family dead! I want him in the ground!'” Mark tossed his head back and roared with laughter, all the while imitating DeNiro jamming his hand toward the table to emphasize every word. “Oh, oh, and the scene at the train station. That's when Andy Garcia shows his stuff and takes the crook out with one shot between the eyes, all while he's laying down on the steps balancing a baby carriage! Classic.” He points his finger like a gun. “Pow. Right between the eyes.” He grinned in clear admiration.

“I see.”

His bubble began to deflate. “I mean, that kinda stuff isn't for everyone.”

“You make it sound exciting.”

“You should check it out sometime.”
Or we could check it out together
.

She angled her head to the side and looked at him as if to say “really?” She reached for the bowl and dropped in the diced celery and several dollops of mayo, sprinkled it all with black pepper and a bit of salt and then mixed it all together. “Care for tomato and lettuce?”

“Sure, why not.”

She turned away, reached into the cabinets above the sink, took out two plates and put them on the counter. “Help yourself. I have some iced green tea if you want.”

“I'll give it a try.”

Her head jerked back in surprise. “Detective, you've never had iced green tea?”

“Can't say that I have, Doc.”

“Well, today is a day of firsts. I learned all about these untouchables and you get to try iced green tea.”

He chuckled. “We're making progress, Doc, making progress.”

They loaded up their rolls with chicken salad and dug in.

“Really good,” Mark mumbled and chewed. “The tea ain't half bad either.” That earned him a smile. He slowly reached over and, with the pad of his thumb, dabbed away a spot of mayo from the corner of Felicia's mouth.

Felicia held her breath when his gaze caught hers. He moved toward her. When he touched her, innocently, it was the most sensual experience that he could recall. The pit of his belly heated and warmth spread, yet at the same time goose bumps rose on his arms.

Stupid
. He shouldn't have touched her, not like that, not that way, like she was somebody more important than she really was. “Little mayo,” he said, his voice suddenly thick. His eyes bored into hers.

Felicia swallowed, found it hard to breathe. “Thanks.” She hopped up from her seat, grabbed her glass and spun toward the fridge. “More ice for your tea?” She kept her back to him while the ice from the icemaker plopped into her glass. She wanted to run a cube along her throat.

“I'm good. We probably should get on over to the precinct.”

“Hmm.” She took a long swallow of her tea. “Yes, it's getting late.” Finally she turned around. “Ready when you are.”

He brought his empty plate to the sink. “Thanks for lunch.”

“Not a problem.”

He needed some air. “Uh, I'm gonna wait in the car.”

She blinked. “Okay. Give me a few minutes.”

He walked out and grabbed his coat from the closet, but it wasn't until Felicia heard the door close behind him that she released her grip on the counter.

* * * * *

Felicia followed Mark's Honda at a safe distance, at least a safe physical distance. She couldn't say the same thing about what was going on with her inside. Being in the same space with Mark Rizzo was becoming difficult. Something had shifted in the dynamics of their relationship, if you could call it a relationship. What was once adversarial had morphed into that wide-open space that left room for anything to happen. It was a space that she made a point not to venture into. It was that space where feelings resided. Feelings, she understood long ago, were too unreliable. She needed facts and data, and hard evidence. She was a scientist. That's what she had to keep in the forefront of her mind. Whatever this thing was that stirred her belly was purely some physical response to a man. Nothing more. She could not allow these small tokens of his—the looks, tone of voice, his dimpled smile, touching her—distract her from why they'd come into each other's lives: find out what really happened to Dr. Dresden. That was it. Then he could go back to whatever it was that he did and so could she.

Felicia pulled up behind Mark's car when they arrived at the precinct. He got out and came up alongside her window. She depressed the button and the window whizzed down.

“Pull into the space up ahead on your right. Take this.” It was a placard for temporary parking. “Put that in your window.”

She nodded, pulled away and parked. Mark waited for her on the front steps. “You'll need to get a visitor's pass when we get inside,” he said when she joined him. He held the door open for her and her shoulder briefly grazed his chest. She heard him swallow.

Mark led her to the front desk and got the visitor's pass, which was nothing more than a peel and stick label.

“This way.”

Felicia slung her hands into the pockets of her coat and followed a step or two behind Mark, taking in the scene as she walked. The front of the precinct was the equivalent of an airport check-in. There were uniformed officers and what she determined as plainclothes detectives hustling back and forth, some with other officers, others ushering handcuffed individuals down hallways. The click, click of computer keys, could be heard between the din of heavy male voices. The level of testosterone was overwhelming to the senses and even Mark, as all-male as he appeared to be, seemed to take on an added layer of male swag the moment he crossed the threshold of the boys' club. Maybe it was that they all carried guns, or knew that they had a power that was reserved for a chosen few, and that every day of their lives they lived on the edge were the things that charged the atmosphere like high octane fuel in an engine. She couldn't be sure. What she was sure of was that she could feel it.

Mark led them down one hallway and around a short corner that opened onto what was referred to as the bullpen—rows of desks and file cabinets, and officers in various stages of activity: hammering away reports in triplicate, barking into the phones, conferring in corners and slamming in and out of the space.

When she came fully into the room, a momentary silence coated the air. She felt as if she was suddenly undergoing some kind of out-of-body experience, where the world stood still and she was the only one aware of it. Then just as suddenly the buzz and hum resumed.

Mark walked over to what Felicia assumed was his desk.

“Hey, Ed, this is Dr. Swift from the library.” Mark shuffled some papers around on his desk.

Eddie lowered his paper and for an instant his eyes widened. He sat up straight in his seat, put his paper down and actually stood up. He extended his hand. “Nice to meet you, Doctor. Eddie McKnight.”

Felicia slipped her hand into his. “Nice to meet you, too.”

“So, uh, what brings you down here?”

Felicia opened her mouth to speak but Mark cut her off.

“The library case.”

“The library case? Captain closed that case a couple of days ago.”

Mark gave him a hard look.

Eddie cleared his throat. He looked from one to the other. “Hey, then I guess you better get to it. Captain's out at a meeting with the Commissioner. Heard he won't be back until late.”

Mark's expression eased. “Thanks. I'll be in the back room.”

“Sure. Nice to meet you, Dr. Swift.” He slowly sat back down and watched them walk away.

Mark led her down another hallway to a string of small offices. He opened the door to the last one on the left. He held the door for her. The room, if you could call it that, was about a foot bigger than Felicia's hall closet by her estimation. It was windowless. How a desk, a computer and two chairs fit was a challenge to the laws of physics.

“I would say make yourself comfortable…” He looked around and offered an apologetic grin.

“No problem.” She took off her coat. Already the airless room was beginning to get the best of her. She felt a wave of anxiety sweep through her. A line of perspiration etched itself across her hairline.
Breathe. Breathe. Count. Count. You're not locked in here
.
You can get out at any time
. Her vision blurred. Flashes of that room, that night, that terror, raced through her head.
Breathe
. She was seventeen again.
Breathe
.

“You okay?” Mark stepped up to her and placed his hand on her shoulder. “You're shaking all over. What's wrong?”

“Could I, uh, have some water please?”

“Sure. Sure. Hey, sit down.” He ushered her to a seat. “I'll be right back.”

The instant he left, Felicia put her head between her knees and took long, deep breaths. Slowly the panic began to subside, but her heart continued to thunder. She lifted her head and looked around, accepting the room for what it was, not the vagaries that her mind told her that it was. She clenched her fists on her lap.

“Here ya go.” Mark came up from behind her and handed her the Dixie cup of cold water.