“He coded ten minutes ago and we weren’t able to get him back.”
“Sonofabitch,” she hissed.
Now it was Nurse Benson’s turn to say, “Excuse me?”
“Sorry.” She was quick to apologize. “That wasn’t meant for you. Thank you for your call.”
She thumbed off the phone and found Dillan eyeing her expectantly. “Professor Chastain is dead,” she informed him. A dull headache was beginning to throb behind her right eye.
Dillan’s ridiculously handsome—and annoyingly dimpled—chin jerked back. “How?”
“Don’t know.” She shoved her phone into the breast pocket of her suitcoat. “Let’s go find out.”
13
Black Knights Inc.
The spicy scent of Fisher’s aftershave lingered in Eliza’s nose as she paced at the end of the bed. Her father’s voice boomed through her cell’s speaker as he once again attempted to browbeat her into flying to Washington.
“Dad,” she interrupted line-item number six on his ongoing list of reasons why she needed to pack up and leave Black Knights Inc. behind until the mystery of the shooting at the cocktail party was solved. “I’m sorry Professor Chastain died.” She wasn’t surprised her father had heard the news mere minutes after it’d happened. No doubt he’d told his contacts in the bureau to phone him with any and all new information regarding the case. “But that changes nothing. I’m safer here than I would be anywhere.”
Fisher tossed off the covers and sat on the edge of the bed. Without sparing her a glance, he began pulling on his biker boots.
First there’d been Senator Chastain’s cryptic phone call. Then she’d had another mini-emotional breakdown. And now her father had called.
Three strikes and you’re out!
Her opportunity to do something terribly wonderful—or terribly foolish—looked like it was about to walk out the door. A tension that matched the roiling chaos of the storm clouds outside took hold of her.
She needed to get off the call with her father. Now. Before Fisher could leave and the moment was lost. Maybe forever.
“Surely you don’t suspect foul play,” she said hastily into the phone. “I mean, the man was shot in the head and then spent an hour in surgery having his skull cracked open. At his age, is it any wonder he had a heart attack?”
“I don’t discountanypossibility. And neither should you.” She detected notes of concern and weariness beneath her father’s usual bombast.
It was the weariness that stopped her pacing and had her forgetting Fisher—or at least deprioritizing him—to give her father her full attention. Leonard Meadows was such a larger-than-life figure that sometimes she forgot he was also seventy-one years old and saddled with one of the most stressful jobs in the world.
“How about we revisit this discussion in the morning, once I’ve gotten some sleep?” she offered placatingly.
He didn’t answer her immediately. Instead, she heard him shuffling paperwork and knew he was still at his desk in the anteroom off the Oval Office.
Glancing at the clock on her bedside table, she noted the time. It was nearly one in the morning in Chicago. Which meant it was almost two AM on the East Coast.
“You should get some sleep too, Dad,” she added quietly. “Weren’t you the one who always said things are clearer in the light of day?”
“No.” He harrumphed. “That was your mother. I always say why put off to tomorrow what can be done today. Ialsoalways say better safe than sorry.” She opened her mouth, sure she would have to argue her case further. But she snapped her jaws shut when she heard him sigh heavily. “But you’re right. You need rest.”
“So do you, Dad,” she told him softly.
“I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”
“You keep burning the candle at both ends like this, and that’s likely to happen sooner rather than later.”
Silence greeted her pronouncement. She blinked at her own audacity and instinctively curled her fingers around her locket.
She and her father didn’t have the type of relationship where she couldsaythings like that. In fact, she wasn’t sure they had much of a “relationship” at all.
As a child, she’d always felt like she was simply another task he needed to complete. Head up a campaign? Check. Outline policy for the next candidate he’d decided to put his substantial political clout behind? Check, check. Make sure to pay his daughter’s boarding school tuition? Triple check. And once she’d become an adult, their interactions had evolved into something she’d describe as more of a “professional partnership.”
