Private Scandals

sheet.”
    “Don’t.” She cringed back; her eyes flashed toward the fire door leading to the stairs. She would have to get past him. She would get past him.
    “Hey, what’s going on?” The concern in Roger’s voice had her gaze sliding cautiously back to him. “You’re shaking. Maybe you’d better sit down.”
    “I’m fine. I’m leaving now.”
    “You’d better catch your breath first. Come on. Let’s—”
    She jerked back, avoiding his hand. “What do you want?”
    “Cassie stopped downstairs on her way out.” He spoke slowly, letting his hand fall back to his side. “She said you were working late, so I thought I’d come up and see if you wanted to catch some dinner.”
    “Finn’s coming.” She moistened her lips. “He’ll be here any minute.”
    “It was just a thought. Dee, is everything okay? Your folks all right?”
    A new fear gripped her throat, digging in like talons. “Why? Why do you ask that?”
    “You’re rattled. I thought you’d gotten some bad news.”
    “No.” Giddy with panic, she edged away. “I’ve got a lot on my mind.” She barely muffled a scream as the elevator rumbled again.
    “Jesus, Dee, take it easy.” In reflex, he grabbed her arm as she started to race by him toward the stairs. She swung back to fight, and the elevator doors opened.
    “What the hell’s going on?”
    “Oh, God.” Tearing free from Roger, Deanna fell into Finn’s arms. “Thank God you’re here.”
    His grip tightened protectively as his eyes bored into Roger’s. “I said, what the hell’s going on?”
    “You tell me.” Shaken, Roger dragged a hand through his hair. “I came up a minute ago, and she was ready to jump out of her skin. I was trying to find out what happened.”
    “Did he hurt you?” Finn demanded of Deanna and earned a curse of outrage from Roger.
    “No.” She kept her face buried against his shoulder. The shaking, the horrible shaking wouldn’t stop. She thought she could hear her own bones rattling together. “I was so scared. I can’t think. Just take me home.”
     
    Finn managed to pry a disjointed explanation from her on the drive home, then, pushing a brandy on her, had watched the tape himself.
    She offered no protest when he strode to the phone and called the police. She was calmer when she related the story again. She understood the value of details, of timetables, of clear-cut facts. The detective who interviewed her in Finn’s living room sat patiently, jotting in his notepad.
    She recognized the gray-haired man from the tape from Greektown—he had snatched the little girl out of the line of fire.
    Arnold Jenner was a quiet, meticulous cop. His square face was offset by a nose that had been broken, not on the job but by a line drive during a precinct softball game. He wore a dark brown suit that strained only slightly over the beginnings of a paunch. His hair was caught somewhere between brown and gray and trimmed ruthlessly short. There were lines around his mouth and eyes that indicated he either laughed or frowned easily. His eyes, a pale, sleepy green, should have been as nondescript as the rest of him. But as Deanna stared into them, she was comforted by a sense of trust.
    “I’d like to have the letters.”
    “I didn’t save all of them,” she told him, and felt ashamed by the tired acceptance in his eyes. “The first few—well, it seemed harmless. On-air reporters get a lot of mail, some of it on the odd side.”
    “Whatever you have, then.”
    “I have some at the office, some at my apartment.”
    “You don’t live here?”
    “No.” She shot a look at Finn. “Not exactly.”
    “Mmm-hmmm.” Jenner made another note. “Miss Reynolds, you said that last portion of tape would have been taken this evening, between five-thirty and six-twenty.”
    “Yes. I told you, I’d fallen asleep. I was tense, so I thought I’d try this routine a guest on the show had suggested. An imagery, meditation thing.” She shrugged, feeling foolish. “I guess it’s not my style. I’m either awake or I’m asleep. When I woke up, I saw the second rose on the desk. And the tape.”
    He made noises in his throat. Like a doctor, Deanna thought.
    “Who would have access to your offices at that hour?”
    “All manner of people. My own staff, anyone working downstairs.”
    “So the building would be closed to all but CBC personnel?”
    “Not necessarily. The rear door wouldn’t be locked at that hour. You’d have people going off