“Hey,” the tech said, meeting us halfway into the room and extending his hand to me. “Finlay Donovan, wow!” His handshake was enthusiastic and more than a little sweaty.
“I’m sorry,” I said with a puzzled glance at Nick, then back at the tech. He was young, cute in a geeky, awkward sort of way. He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. Even when I could see through them more clearly, I couldn’t place how we knew each other. “And you are?”
“Oh, right!” He shook his head, giving himself a playful slap on the forehead. “Sorry, I’m Peter. We’ve never met. But Georgia’s told me all about you. I’m a huge fan, actually.” He wiped his palm on his lab coat, his ears flushing pink. He snuck a peek at Nick and leaned toward my ear, confiding in a low voice, “I’ve read your books.”
“Oh! So you must be the one.” I laughed as Peter’s face fell. “I’m kidding.” I pitched my voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “There are at least two of you.” The corner of Peter’s lip pulled up with an uncertain smile. “Seriously, I’m kidding.”
He released a nervous laugh. “Nick told me you might be coming. I was wondering if you’d sign an autograph?”
“Sure,” I said through a blush. No one outside my family had ever asked me for an autograph before. “Why not?”
Nick gave a reticent shrug, but I could tell he was anxious to get what we’d come for and his patience was wearing thin. Peter pulled a dog-eared paperback and a Sharpie from the pocket of his lab coat. Nick glanced at the bulging pecs of the model on the cover and heaved an impatient sigh as I scribbled a quick signature in it. Peter studied my face as I handed him back his book.
“You don’t look anything like your picture,” he said, thumbingto my bio page. “You know, the one in the back of the book? You’re blond in your photo. And with the dark glasses, it’s sort of hard to see your face.” He held up the photo, scrutinizing my features against my headshot. My scalp itched, and I tucked my hair behind my ear. “If I didn’t know you were coming, I totally wouldn’t have recognized you.” I avoided looking at Nick as he glanced over Peter’s shoulder at my photo, then checked his watch. “You probably wear a disguise so you won’t be recognized in public and get swarmed by your fans, right?”
“Right,” I said with a nervous laugh. Or be recognized when I’m abducting scary rapists from bars, breaking into real estate offices, or taking contracts to kill problem husbands while eating cheesecake in Panera. Through all of this, I had never stopped to consider that my headshot—which appeared in every copy of my books—was now an incriminating piece of evidence against me. Or that Nick could use it to place me at The Lush.
“Georgia said you have a new book coming out. I can’t wait to read it. If you ever have forensic questions, I’m your guy. I’ve always wanted to—”
“Pete,” Nick barked. Pete turned, as if only just remembering Nick was there. “Do you have something for me?”
“Oh, yeah! You’re not going to believe this.” I released a held breath as Peter tucked my book back in his pocket and waved us toward a lab table. A wad of muddy grass sat in a specimen dish beside a microscope. He pushed up his glasses, his dark eyes brimming with excitement. “So, normally,” he explained, “this would be a monumental feat you’ve asked me to pull off, and the best I would be able to do would be to narrow the sample down to a particular growing region—like, maybe a few counties, or even states—butnevera specific piece of property. However,” he said with a dramatic pause, “in this case, the grass you found is pretty rare.”
Nick leaned in. “How rare?”
“Like…” Pete’s eyes rolled up as if he were calculating in his head, the way Vero often did, “really rare. It’s a variation of a popular fescue, but this specific variety is new, so it hasn’t been widely used in this part of the mid-Atlantic. The sample you grabbed contained a layer of topsoil, and the combination of industrial-grade fertilizers and pesticides I found suggests it was professionally maintained. So I pulled up a list of seed distributors and used that to track down a list of companies in the mid-Atlantic that recently purchased it. There are three possible matches in Virginia. But only one of them hits all the criteria you gave me—west of the airport, east of Interstate 81.”
Peter handed Nick a piece of paper.
Nick’s brow pulled down, his posture becoming rigid as he read the report. He frowned, uncharacteristically quiet as he folded it and slipped it into the breast pocket of his coat.
“Wait,” I said, curious about the reason for Peter’s excitement. “What did it say?”
Nick turned me by the shoulders and directed me with a firm hand toward the door. “Thanks, Pete. Gotta go.”
Pete’s smile crumbled. “Wait, you’re leaving? But there’s more.”
“I’ll call you later,” Nick said over his shoulder.
“Bye, Finlay!” Pete called after me. “It was great meeting you!”
I didn’t get a chance to reply. Nick applied a steady pressure to the small of my back, ushering me to the head of the stairs.
“Where are we going?” I clutched the rail to keep from slipping on my heels.
“I’m taking you home. There’s something I need to check out.” His gait was tense and quick, his low voice rumbling like a revved engine.
“What did you find?” Whatever it was, it must have been important. “Why won’t you tell me?” I asked, chasing him down the stairs.
“Because I’ve already told you too much.”
I stopped in the middle of the lobby, arms crossed stubbornly over my chest as he barreled toward the glass doors, his car keys already in his hand. “If this is because of last night, I’m fine. You don’t have to protect me from Feliks or his goons.”
He doubled back and took me firmly by the elbow, hauling me toward the door. “You weren’t fine. I’m taking you home. I made a mistake. I don’t want you anywhere near this investigation.”
I planted my heels, pulling him up short. “If you didn’t want me involved, you wouldn’t have brought me along.” A muscle tensed in his cheek. “You found something in that report you don’t want me to know. Didn’t you?”
He raked a hand through his dark hair and swore under his breath.
