Under His Protection Read online

  Nash hated this part and prayed she hadn’t been anywhere near her husband in the past twelve hours. “Your husband is dead.”

  Her expression went slack. “That’s impossible.”

  “I’m sorry, but he’s in the next room, with the coroner.”

  “But he was fine last night.”

  Oh, God. “You were with him?”

  She didn’t clue in to the narrow look he shot her. “I was married to him, Nash. If he was in town, don’t you think we’d at least see each other?”

  “But you haven’t been living in the same city?”

  “That’s because we were divorcing. As of this morning, our divorce is final.”

  Nash frowned. This was not the conversation he’d thought he’d be having with her right now.

  “Who do you think killed him?” she asked.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “I noticed the badge, Nash.” Her gaze darted where it hung on his jacket pocket. “You’re a detective now, not the chief coroner.” She arched a brow. “And Peter was a stockbroker—he made enemies daily.”

  “I work on all suspicious deaths. You one of those enemies?”

  “No, of course not. Peter adored me.” Too much, she thought. That adoration had twisted into something ugly. “However, we’ve been legally separated for two and a half years.”

  A year after her marriage they separated? He didn’t want to feel smug about that. “Legal separation before filing isn’t that long. Why not divorce sooner? Why now?”

  His shock didn’t do a thing for her except make her feel sick. It was tough to admit that her marriage had failed so early. “I couldn’t afford to divorce him till recently, and he wouldn’t do it. In fact, last night, he…oh, jeez.”

  For the first time it hit her, really hit her. And Nash watched as her features fell, her lower lip quivered. She looked down at the china cup, but when she brought it to her mouth, her trembling proved that her grip on her emotions was tenuous. She set the cup down.

  Tears welled up in her eyes and fell. She cried without sound.

  Nash ached to hold her, but he was on duty, and not one of her favorite people, so he kept his distance. She was a suspect, a prime one. She wouldn’t want his help, anyway, but it was killing him to watch her fight her tears. Lisa had always been a tough cookie, and to see her come apart was heartbreaking. Teardrops hit her hands and the table in tiny plops.

  He felt them like gunshots.

  He left his chair and grabbed a tissue, shoving it into her line of sight. She muttered thanks and took it. It was several more minutes before she regained her composure. Nash felt useless.

  “I need to ask you a few more questions.”

  She nodded and met his gaze, sniffling once.

  Nash set a tape recorder on the table and pushed record. He recited her name, marital status, age, the time… Lisa didn’t hear the rest. She was too stunned to listen. Was he questioning her as a suspect or character witness?

  “For the record, when did you last see Peter Winfield?”

  She blinked at the recorder, then met his gaze. “Last night at around eight-thirty, nine o’clock. He’d called me and asked me to come over.”

  “What happened?”

  “He wanted one more chance to make me stay with him.”

  “Make you?”

  Always a cop, she thought, reading something into every little thing. “Well, make isn’t really correct. Convince would be a better word.” Threaten would be even better.

  “Why did you divorce?”

  She looked down at her coffee, watching the cream separate into a star shape. “Irreconcilable differences.”

  “I don’t buy that for a second.”

  Her gaze jerked to his. “It’s personal.” Nash wasn’t getting details. No one was.

  “But you left town with him so quickly.”

  This was old news, she thought. “It was four months after you and I had broken up, Nash. You’d already shoved me out of your life, so what do you care now?”

  His mouth tightened, a lid on what he really wanted to say. “We were together for a year, and you never did give me a good reason for why you left me.”

  She didn’t want to rehash this now. “Oh, there was plenty of reasons, they just weren’t yours. I needed someone who wanted what I did.” Someone to love me back, she thought. To want me for a lifetime and not just a frequent date.

  “And did you get all you wanted?”

  Damn him. He knew she hadn’t, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t deliriously happy with what she had right now. It wasn’t any of his business why her marriage ended, only that it had. And who was he to ask questions now when he didn’t bother four years ago? If he had, she’d have told him about their baby. “Are old feelings and reasons part of this investigation, Detective?”

  Nash felt the slam of a door as if it hit his nose. She was right. He had to get back to business and not relive their past.

  “Did you drive over last night?” he asked.

  “No, it was only just getting dark and it was a clear night. I walked.”

  “Did anyone see you?”

  “Walking here? I imagine so. Anyone I know? I can’t say. When I got here, the restaurant was full, and the staff were waiting on guests. I came up here and knocked.”

  “What was Winfield wearing when you saw him?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Answer the question, please.”

  With the way he spoke to her, so cold and detached, as if they’d never shared a bed and some really great sex, she wondered if she should stop right now and call a lawyer. But she hadn’t done anything wrong.

  “He was wearing Brooks khaki slacks, matching socks. A hunter-green, tailored, short-sleeve shirt, pressed and creased. Brown Florsheim shoes and a brown belt.” Good clothing had been an addiction of Peter’s.

  Nash made notes in a black leather book. His gaze slid up to meet hers, and for a second his expression softened a fraction. Lisa glimpsed the man she once loved. Then just as quickly that man was gone again.

  “Did anyone else know you were going to see him?”

  “I might have mentioned it to my staff.” She wiped her eyes again, then threw the wad of tissue into a trash can.

  “I’ll need to talk with them.”

  Why? she wanted to know, but she didn’t argue. “Free country. They’re adults, not children. I’ll give you their home numbers.” She wrote the information on the back of a business card and handed it to him. He didn’t even glance at it, simply tucked it in his notebook. “Kate’s at the counter now, and Chris doesn’t come in till after his last class. He’s a college student at USC.”

  Nash scribbled and she noticed the shorthand. She’d flunked that course.

  “What were you wearing at the time you visited your husband?”

  “A lime-green skirt and top, matching sandals and purse.”

  He arched a brow.

  “Matching jewelry, too. Wanna see it?”

  “I’ll want to take all of it.”

  “What?” Her eyes widened, and the feeling she’d had moments ago landed like a brick against her heart. “You think I had something to do with Peter’s death.”

  Nash continued to write.

  “Nash Couviyon!”

  Still he didn’t comment, then slowly met her gaze again. “I don’t have an opinion yet. We need samples from your things to compare with what forensics finds in the room.”

  “You definitely think he was murdered?”

  Nash wasn’t ready to say so just yet. “The death of a healthy man is always suspicious.”

  “Oh, for the love of Mike,” she said, and the air left her lungs in one shot. “You actually think I had something to do with it?”

  Her words drained away any feeling she had, any trust she might have given him. Then the she-cat he remembered and had loved came racing back.

  “This meeting is over,” she said.

  He strove for p
atience. “Lisa, I have to look at all the possibilities.”

  Her green eyes narrowed to slits. “Look elsewhere, Detective,” she said, and started to rise.

  “Sit down!” he snapped.

  Lisa lowered herself into the chair again, scowling at him.

  “It’s either here or the station, Lisa. Your choice.”

  She folded her arms and glared. “Fine. Ask away.”

  “Did you carry anything into the room besides your handbag?”

  Lisa searched his features. “No, but I had on a scarf.”

  Something inside Nash froze. “Describe it please.”

  “It was my grandmother’s. It’s pale green with hand-painted irises. It’s the reason I got here so quickly this morning. I was on my way here to get it back.”

  “Why did you leave it?”

  “I didn’t. It was in my hair, which I had in a ponytail. The scarf was tied around the rubber band to hide it. It must have come undone. It’s silk and slippery.”

  Nash wrote, the notebook sliding on the highly polished table. The business card she’d given him showed and he flipped it over.

  Lisa thought she saw sadness flicker in his eyes.

  “The Enchanted Garden, that’s your business?”

  “Yes.” She frowned. “Didn’t you already know that?”

  Nash shook his head.

  “I started it up about ten months ago. It’s on my land around the house and it’s doing really well.” Her brows knit. “I don’t get it. Your brother Temple buys some of his plants for his landscaping business from me. I thought you knew.”

  “I knew he used this nursery, but he never mentioned it was yours.”

  “Maybe he thought he was being disloyal to his older brother by doing business with me. I know how you Couviyon brothers stick together.”

  “Obviously, Temple has his own set of rules.”

  “I know, he’s an outrageous flirt.”

  She was trying to ease the tension in the room. But Nash could feel it thicken the air. He tossed the card down and rose, moving to the door and speaking to the officer posted outside, who moved off to do his bidding. Nash waited, glancing back at her only once. She couldn’t have done this, he thought.

  “Why didn’t you ever come by to say hello, Nash?”

  “I knew you were here, Lisa.” He didn’t look at her. “I didn’t want to open that door again.” It hurt too much, he thought, then realized it still did.

  “And saying hello, how’s your mama, would have been torture?”

  “Yeah, it would have.”

  Lisa’s lips tightened. Well, that said a lot, she thought.

  “Why didn’t you come to me?” he asked.

  “I was still married.”

  Nash simply stared, wondering if she’d been single would they have gotten back together. And in the same moment he remembered that she had dumped him. She’d wanted picket fences and babies, and he couldn’t give her that. Aside from the fact that he’d just taken a bullet in the line of duty and lost his partner, he’d watched the devastation hit the widow and cut a strong woman off at the knees. He couldn’t do that to Lisa.

  The officer returned, interrupting his thoughts and handing him two paper bags. Nash moved back to the table and set them on the floor. He reached into one and pulled out a plastic evidence bag.

  “Is this your scarf?”

  “Yes.” She extended a hand.

  He pulled it back. “Evidence.”

  “What do you mean, evidence? It’s my scarf.”

  “It was found wrapped around the victim’s neck, Lisa.” Her eyes widened, and she went perfectly still. When she sank back into the chair, he asked, “Now do you want to tell me what you argued about?”

  “No, I don’t. It was personal.”

  Nash backed off for now. “Were you angry when you left here?”

  “No, I was just tired, Detective.”

  Nash heard the wall go up between them, even if he couldn’t see it. He returned the plastic envelope to the bag. “Do you make teas?”

  She blinked, taken aback. “Yes, I do. My herb plants grow quickly in this weather, and I have to cut them back. It’s a waste not to do something with the herbs.”

  “And do you sell the teas at your place of business?”

  “Not as a regular commodity, no. I use the cuttings for cooking or rooting new plants. Occasionally I make bath teas, scented bath salts, a couple of mint and catnip drinking teas, and I put them in baskets with a live plant. But it’s not a main part of my business, and it’s time-consuming to put them together. So I make them up as requested.”

  “The baskets are for regular sale?”

  “No, only with the custom orders. They’re handmade, too expensive to make a profit and to keep a reasonable stock of them takes up considerable space.” Lisa glanced at the notes he was furiously writing. “Especially because the humidity can rot them. I run a nursery, not a bath-and-tea shop.”

  “Did you bring one of these custom baskets to the hotel or have it delivered?”

  Her brows knitted. “No.” Peter would have seen any gift as a peace offering. Heck, she thought, her very presence made him believe she wasn’t going to divorce him, although she’d signed the papers weeks before and it had been only a matter of the time line hitting a specified mark. One that had her in deep trouble right now, she suspected.

  “Describe the baskets please.”

  Lisa told him what they looked like, but when she described the brass oval engraved with “Enchanted Garden,” he wilted in his chair. She’d bet her best Kamali pumps that a basket just like one of hers was in that larger bag at his feet.

  “Did you speak to anyone on your way to the Baylor Inn, and did anyone see you enter and or exit the building?”

  That Nash wouldn’t look at her, wouldn’t even acknowledge her with so much as a nod as he wrote, made her bristle. “I don’t recall. At the time I didn’t know I’d need an alibi. Now my husband is dead. My ex-husband. And you’ve all but accused me of his murder.”

  “I don’t have enough evidence for charges.”

  Something inside her shattered. “We have nothing more to say to each other.” She stood. “Unless it’s with my lawyer present.”

  It was on the tip of his tongue to say that, by law, he could hold her for questioning. “I’ll need everything you were wearing last night.”

  “Fine. I’ll deliver the clothing to the station within the hour. Are we finished?”

  “For now, yes.”

  Lisa strode to the door. Before she could open it, Nash was there, his hand over her fist.

  Her gaze snapped to his. He could taste her fury, it was so pungent.

  “Back off, Detective.”

  He didn’t. “Lisa, let’s not start like this.”

  She laughed, sharp and bitter. “We aren’t starting a damn thing, Couviyon. We were finished four years ago.” Four years ago when I was pregnant with your child, she thought, knowing that if she’d ever considered telling him the truth, she sure didn’t now.

  “You finished it. I didn’t.”

  “You were never in the relationship, Nash. You had your own neat version and you kept me on the outside unless we were in bed.” She shook off his hand and jerked opened the door.

  “Lisa. This is my job.”

  “I’m thrilled for you. Go do it. And until you have something more than accusations, don’t come near me.”

  She left, striding past the officers. Nash signaled to let her pass. She was pure anger in a snug skirt and high-heeled sandals.

  “Seems like a hostile witness, Detective,” an officer said.

  Nash let out a breath. “Oh, yeah.”

  Chapter Two

  Nash watched Lisa storm off, leaving him feeling twisted and confused. This was why he hadn’t dropped by her place to say hello, he thought. She did things to him no other woman had and he still hurt. The humiliation of being dumped by her hardly compared to the feelings of regret he
’d had for months after learning she was six hundred miles away walking down the aisle with another man.

  Seeing her today warned him he still wasn’t over her. Just looking into her eyes stung his heart.

  Suddenly Quinn stuck his head out of the room, caught a glimpse of Lisa and whistled softly. Then he looked at Nash.

  “That Couviyon charm not working today, laddie?”

  Nash eyed Quinn. “You knew she was coming here?”

  “I heard the supervisor call her. And yes, I also remembered her married name.”

  Quinn’s look said Nash had had his head in the sand. Not good for a cop, Nash knew. “She’s divorced officially as of this morning.”

  “So she was still the wife when the victim died?”

  Any connection between Lisa and the victim was suspect and damaging, Nash thought. “As I recall, the exact time of death is your job, Kilpatrick,” he snarled, pushing past Quinn and into the suite.

  Nash ordered a background check on the victim. And his wife.

  “Detective?”

  Nash rounded, ready to chew someone in two.

  A short, wiry man in a black suit stepped into the room. “You couldn’t keep this quiet?” he said, glancing around.

  Nash’s breath snapped out of him. Baylor, the owner of the hotel, and he looked pissed. The day was just getting better and better.

  “There are other guests, you know, and they want back into their rooms.”

  “They will be allowed in soon. And it’s a little hard to hide a suspicious death.”

  The man’s eyes were glued to the black body bag rolling away on a stretcher. “Murder?”

  Ignoring that, Nash took out his pad, and when he was about to escort Baylor to another room for questioning, the man rushed over to an officer dusting the dresser for prints. “Is that going to leave a stain? This chest is two hundred years old.”

  The police officer gave Baylor a once-over, then glanced beyond him to Nash and said, “No sir,” before going back to work.

  “Sir?” Nash crooked a finger. “You’re Mr. Will Baylor?”

  The man nodded. “William Reese Baylor IV,” he clarified. “I’m the owner. My family built this home over 150 years ago.”