From the Heart

the shop. Why?”
    “I have to go out.” Slade rose swiftly and headed for the rear stairs. “Don’t go anywhere until I get back.”
    “What are you—” David broke off as Slade disappeared upstairs. Maybe he was a nut after all, David mused as he frowned at Slade’s empty chair. You’re having a casual conversation with a guy and all of a sudden he’s . . .
    “Make sure Jess stays put,” Slade ordered as he came down again. His jacket was already zipped over his revolver.
    “Stays put?”
    “Don’t let anyone in the house.” Slade paused long enough to aim hard, direct eyes at David. “No one comes in, got it?”
    Something in the eyes had David nodding without question.
    Slade grabbed a napkin and scrawled a number on it. “If I’m not back in an hour, call this number. Tell the man who answers the story about the cabinet. He’ll understand.”
    “The cabinet?” David stared dumbly at the napkin Slade thrust into his hand. “ I don’t understand.”
    “You don’t have to, just do it.” The back door slammed behind him.
    “Yeah, sure,” David grumbled. “Why should I understand anything?” A loony tune, he decided as he stuffed the napkininto his pocket. Maybe writers were supposed to be loony tunes. Jessica sure knew how to pick them. With a glance at his watch, he decided to check on her. Maybe the writer was a little loose upstairs, maybe not, but he’d managed to unsettle him. When David was halfway down the hall, the parlor doors opened.
    “David!” Jessica closed the distance between them at a run, then launched herself into his arms.
    “Hey, what gives!” He managed to struggle out of her hold and take her by the shoulders. “Is there a different strain of flu running around that affects the brain?”
    “I love you, David.” Close to tears, Jessica framed his face with her hands.
    He flushed and shifted his weight. “Yeah, I love you too. Look, I’m sorry about this morning—”
    “We’ll talk about that later. There’s a lot I have to tell you, but I need to see Slade first.”
    “He went out.”
    “Out?” Her fingers dug into David’s thin arms. “Where?”
    “I don’t know.” Intently, he studied her face. “Jessie, you’re really sick. Let me take you upstairs.”
    “No, David, it’s important.” Her voice changed from frantic to stern—the one he always responded to. “You must have some idea where he went.”
    “I don’t,” he returned a bit indignantly. “We were sitting there talking one minute, and he was up and heading out the next.”
    “About what?” Impatient, Jessica gave him a quick shake. “What were you talking about?”
    “Just this and that. I mentioned that Michael’d been moody—like he’d been when we’d had that mix-up on the Chippendale cabinet last year.”
    “The Chippendale . . .” Jessica pressed her hands to her cheeks. “Oh God, yes, of course!”
    “Slade gave me some business about not letting anyone in the house and calling some number if he didn’t get back in an hour. Hey, where are you going?”
    Jessica had swung her purse from the newel post and was rummaging through it. “He’s gone to the shop. To the shop and it’s nearly ten! Where are my keys! Call—call the shop,see if he answers.” In a quick move, she dumped the contents of her purse on the floor. “Call!” she repeated when David gaped at her.
    “Okay, take it easy.”
    While Jessica made a frantic search through the items on the floor, David dialed the phone. “I can’t find them. I can’t—they’re in my coat!” she remembered and dashed for the hall closet.
    “He doesn’t answer,” David told her. “Probably hasn’t had time to get there yet if that’s where he was going in the first place. Which doesn’t make any sense because it’s closed and . . . Jessie, where are you going? He said you weren’t to go out. Damn it, you forgot your coat. Will you wait a minute!”
    But she was already racing down the front steps toward her car.

11
    I t took Slade only a few moments to pick the lock on the front door of the shop. If there was one thing he was going to see to before he left, he decided, it would be to get Jessica to a decent locksmith. A miracle she hasn’t been cleaned out, he mused as he moved through the main shop into the back room. Blind luck, Slade concluded, then tossed his jacket over a chair. Moving in the dark, he passed through the kitchen into what served as an office.
    There was a large