Release Me (8 page)

Allie stepped off the elevator and her legs nearly gave out beneath her. Her mind was racing as fast as her pulse, but she couldn’t even let herself think about what had just happened until she was safely behind closed doors.

Hudson didn’t follow. And when the elevator doors whispered shut behind her, she didn’t look back. The haunted look in his eyes when she’d left him that morning at his penthouse was already ingrained in her memory. The last thing she needed was to see that sadness and confusion again, especially since now it would be a mirror reflection of her own.

So instead she moved as quickly as unsteady legs on four-inch heels would allow, praying she could make it to her office unseen.

The thirtieth floor was usually a hotbed of activity. All day long assistants, mail clerks, clients, even reporters, would zigzag through the hallways. But as Allie rounded the corner, she was relieved to discover there wasn’t a soul in sight.

Unfortunately, that relief was short-lived.

When she pushed through the glass doors that lead to the executive offices, her steps faltered. Colin was seated at his desk just outside her office door. Judging by the deep crease between his brows, he was concentrating hard on whatever was displayed on his computer monitor. Even so, Allie knew he’d look up and greet her as she approached, just as he had every other time over the past three days. Only this time she knew she had the look of someone who’d just been thoroughly well-fucked. Colin had a keen eye, and in the short time he’d worked for her had proven quite adept at reading her expressions. But in this case no special intuition would be needed. One look at her disheveled hair, smeared lipstick, and rumpled clothes and he’d know exactly what she’d been up to.

“Hey there, boss lady,” he said as she blew past his desk.

She kept her head down, running a hand through her hair in an attempt to not only restore some order, but in the hopes of hiding her flushed face as well. “Hold my calls, please, Colin.”

“Sure thing,” she heard him reply as she closed her office door.

Dazed, she stumbled to her private bathroom, where she sank to the ground and dropped her head in her hands. With a heavy exhale the tears began to fall. Tears of grief, sadness, regret. But most of all, anger. What the hell had she been thinking? She’d been doing so well keeping Hudson Chase at arm’s length. And while yes, it was partly to punish him for the lies and deceit, it was also to protect her heart. But instead of telling him to go to hell when he’d pinned her against the elevator wall, she’d let him fuck her. And at Ingram headquarters, no less.

Way to be professional, Allie.

A harsh laugh cut through her silent tears. Because despite everything she was feeling, she had to admit it wasn’t her unprofessional behavior that was in the forefront of her mind. It wasn’t even the anger she felt toward herself for giving Hudson the satisfaction of knowing he’d broken through her defenses. No, what consumed her thoughts as she sat on the cold tile floor was how much she’d enjoyed every minute of it. And how if Hudson had followed her, she’d likely have let him do it again. On her couch, over her desk, in her shower . . .

This has to stop.

She scrambled to her feet and stepped in front of the vanity. The sight made her wince. Her hair was even worse then she’d imagined, the once-soft curls now a matted, tangled mess. Her lips were swollen from Hudson’s bruising kisses, the edges smeared with the remnants of pink lipstick. Her cheeks were raw from the scrape of his stubble against her skin, and her eyes were streaked with mascara from where she’d swiped her tears away with the back of her hand.

And on top of everything else, she was without panties.

Just fucking great.

She pulled the shredded lace out of her pocket. What a mess. When she and Hudson were named co-CEOs, she’d devised a plan. No matter what he said, she would keep their dealings professional, steering the topics back to Ingram whenever he digressed. It shouldn’t have been difficult. She should have been able to resist him, no matter how sexy he looked in that damn Armani suit. And yet there she was, less than a week since their appointment, cleaning herself up after a walk of shame back to her office. What the hell had she been thinking?

As if taunting her rhetorical question, the memory of Hudson’s fingers stroking the damp fabric between her thighs filled her mind. She shook her head hard to clear it, then looked her reflection in the eyes and told herself in no uncertain terms that what happened was a mistake. Granted it was a mind-blowing mistake that had her coming so hard she’d ripped the buttons from his shirt, but a mistake nonetheless. A lapse in judgment. And it would never happen again. Ever.

Feeling a new sense of determination, Allie tossed her ruined panties into the trash. She dabbed her face with a wet towel, ran a brush through her hair, and after a quick reapplication of makeup, was almost good as new. But although she might have looked presentable, the ache between her legs as she walked back to her desk was a cruel and constant reminder of what had just happened.

Work. She needed to get Hudson Chase out of her mind and concentrate on work. Luckily, there were piles of it waiting on her desk. Not to mention the prep she needed to do for the battle that was looming at tomorrow’s board meeting.

Hudson had made his feelings on the newspaper division painfully clear. In his opinion it was outdated and a drain on the bottom line. While that might be true, there was also a considerable amount of respected brand recognition with consumers and a legitimacy that came along with that. Allie’s grandfather had started his entire empire with that paper. She wasn’t giving up on it without a fight. With any luck she’d be able to convince the board to retain their flagship division by offsetting any print losses with the lucrative streaming component she was going to suggest for their online content. But before she and Colin could put the finishing touches on that proposal, there were affiliate contract renewals to review.

She’d barely gone over the first one when there was a tap at the door.

“Come in.”

Colin slipped into the room and closed the door behind him. “Sorry to disturb you, but Detective Green is here to see you,” he said. His hushed tone explained why he hadn’t simply used the intercom. “She doesn’t have an appointment, so if you’d rather, I can tell her now’s not a good time.”

As shaky as Allie felt, was there ever going to be a good time to discuss the details of her parents’ murder with the investigating officer? Might as well get it over with.

“No, I’ll speak with her.” One more reason to wish she’d never crawled out of bed this morning.

Colin nodded but didn’t move. He simply stood there, regarding her for a moment. “You okay, boss lady?”

Allie really needed to work on her poker face. “I’m fine. But can you give me just a minute, though?”

“Sure thing. Buzz me when you’re ready.”

She signed and initialed the contract, then stacked it neatly in her outbox. After a few deep breaths, she hit the button on the phone’s intercom and gave him the go-ahead to send her in.

A moment later the door opened.

“Thank you for seeing me, Miss Sinclair,” Detective Green said, striding toward Allie with her hand extended. She was dressed in another dark, boxy suit and wore her brown hair in the same no-nonsense bun she did every time Allie saw her. The gold shield wasn’t clipped to her belt this time, but Allie knew that a gun was holstered beneath her jacket. And after seeing the damage a bullet could do firsthand, the mere proximity to a gun, even one carried by a police detective, made her uneasy. “I would have called first, but I was in the area on another case and thought I’d take a chance you were free.”

“It’s not a problem,” Allie said. She shook the detective’s hand, then motioned to a chair in front of her desk. “Please, have a seat. Can I offer you something to drink?”

“Coffee would be great.” She looked at Colin. “Black, one sugar.”

He nodded. “Anything for you, Miss Sinclair?”

Coffee was the last thing Allie needed given the current state of her nerves. “Maybe a cup of tea?”

“Right away,” he said. But he lingered, regarding her a moment more before crossing to the bar on the far side of the room.

Allie watched as the detective’s shrewd stare took in her surroundings. Even though her office wasn’t a crime scene, it was obvious she was cataloging every detail. From the oversize mahogany desk to the cluster of wingback chairs arranged near the bar, to the gallery of historic headlines framed in chronological order on the far wall, nothing went unnoticed.

“This was your father’s office?” Green asked.

It wasn’t a tough assumption to make. Everything about the room resonated with a sense of masculine power. If her position at Ingram became permanent, Allie would eventually redecorate. Something lighter, more in keeping with her own personality and taste. But for now she had bigger concerns than replacing tapestry with silk. “And my grandfather’s before that.”

Colin returned with two china cups. Allie glanced up to find his handsome face etched with concern. “Thank you, Colin.” She gave him a reassuring smile. “I’ll call you if I need anything else.”

The moment he was gone, Allie turned her attention to the woman seated across from her.

“What can I do for you, Detective?” she asked, cutting right to the chase. Detective Green hadn’t stopped by just to tell her there were no new developments. Or to have a look at Ingram’s executive offices. There was a purpose for her impromptu visit, and as far as Allie was concerned, the sooner they got to it, the better.

Green put her cup back on its saucer and reached for the leather satchel at her feet. “There are a few things I’d like you to look over.”

A lump formed in the pit of Allie’s stomach. Surely this woman hadn’t come to her office in the middle of the day to show her crime scene pictures? Or worse, her parents’ autopsy photos? Regardless of the rocky start to her morning, Allie didn’t think she’d ever be ready to see those images.

She breathed a sigh of relief when Detective Green dug through her bag and pulled out not eight-by-ten photos, but a stack of papers that appeared to contain some sort of list.

“This is the complete inventory of your parents’ Lake Forest home. We’ve given a copy to the insurance company and asked them to cross reference it with the policy riders to see if they can determine what was taken.” Green slid the printout across the desk. “We’d like you to look it over as well.”

Allie pulled the list toward her and with trembling fingers flipped through page after page of items: artwork, furs, crystal, silver, jewelry.

Jewelry
. An audible gasp escaped her lips.

“What is it?”

With wide eyes she met Detective Green’s curious stare, but when she spoke, her words were barely a whisper. “Her ring.”

“Excuse me?”

She swallowed hard to find her voice. “When they were bagging my mother’s hands, she wasn’t wearing her engagement ring. Would they have removed it?”

“No, they wouldn’t have tampered with the evidence.”

“My mother always wore that ring. She never took it off.”

“Can you describe it for me?”

“The center stone is an oval Ceylon sapphire,” she said. “About ten carats, I believe. It’s surrounded by a ring of diamond solitaires.”

The detective glanced up from her notes. “Like Princess Diana’s?” Allie nodded and the detective scribbled a few more lines in her notebook. “Is there anything else that jumps out at you?”

Allie scanned the list a second time. “It’s hard to say. Nothing as obvious as that, but I’ll have to think about it.”

“Take your time and let me know if you come up with anything. In the meantime, I’ll follow up with the insurance company and make sure a list of stolen property is given to area pawnshops as well as the local precincts. That ring would be hard to fence, but if someone tries to move any of the other items, we’ll be ready.”

“So you’re still going on the assumption that this was just a burglary?” Allie asked. It wasn’t hard to miss the hope in her voice. As much as she hated the thought that her parents’ death was due to some random act of violence, it was even worse to imagine they’d been targeted specifically.

“Right now we’re not ruling anything out. That’s actually the other reason I’m here. In addition to going over the household inventory, I’d like you to compile a list of any of your parents’ known enemies.”

“I’m not sure I’d classify anyone in their life as ‘known enemies,’ Detective. My mother’s friends at the country club can be catty bitches, but they’re relatively harmless.” She thought about that and added, “For the most part.”

“I know this is difficult, Miss Sinclair. No one wants to imagine such a heinous crime could have been committed by someone they knew. But your parents lived in a very elite, powerful circle. And at this point in the investigation, we have to look at any and all possible leads.”

Green leaned back in her chair and crossed an ankle over her knee as Allie turned her attention back to the list of household items. She’d just begun working her way through the section marked
ART
&
COLLE
CTIBLES
when the Detective clarified her earlier comment.

“Although you’ll be relieved to know we met with your new business partner on Thursday and have cleared him as a suspect.”

Allie’s head snapped up from the papers in her hand. “Hudson—I mean, Mr. Chase—was a suspect?”

“Given the recent revelation that he’d been targeting Ingram for a hostile takeover, and for some time it seems.”

She cringed at the mention of how long Hudson’s plan had been in the works. “Hostile is an expression, Detective Green. These types of acquisitions, while unpleasant, don’t involve murder.”

“I happen to agree with you, Miss Sinclair. And as it turned out, Mr. Chase had an airtight alibi.” She flipped the page on her notebook. “Visiting his brother at a rehab facility in Wisconsin that day. But we have to look at every possibility, and once we’d learned he’d met with your father—”