The Art of Deception

you knowing who’s going to kill you. Now pick up the painting, Kirby. It’s time.”

    With a jerk of her arm, Kirby tossed the turpentine mixture, splattering it on Melanie’s neck and dress. When Melanie tossed up her hand in protection, Kirby lunged. Together they fell in a rolling heap onto the floor, the gun pressed between them.
     
    “What do you mean Hiller’s been in New York since yesterday?” Adam demanded. “What happened this morning wasn’t an accident. He had to have done it.”
    “No way.” In a few words McIntyre broke Adam’s theory. “I have a good man on him. I can give you the name of Hiller’s hotel. I can give you the name of the restaurant where he had lunch and what he ate while you were throwing chairs through windows. He’s got his alibi cold, Adam, but it doesn’t mean he didn’t arrange it.”
    “Damn.” Adam lowered the transmitter while he rearranged his thinking. “It gives me a bad feeling, Mac. Dealing with Hiller’s one thing, but it’s a whole new story if he has a partner or he’s hired a pro to do his dirty work. Kirby needs protection, official protection. I want her out.”
    “I’ll work on it. The Rembrandt—”
    “I don’t give a damn about the Rembrandt,” Adam tossed back. “But it’ll be in my hands tomorrow if I have to hang Fairchild up by his thumbs.”
    McIntyre let out a sigh of relief. “That’s better. You were making me nervous thinking you were hung up on the Fairchild woman.”
    “I am hung up on the Fairchild woman,” Adam returned mildly. “So you’d better arrange for—” He heard the shot. One, sharp and clean. It echoed and echoed through his head. “ Kirby! ” He thought of nothing else as he dropped the open transmitter on the floor and ran.

    He called her name again as he raced downstairs. But his only answer was silence. He called as he rushed like a madman through the maze of rooms downstairs, but she didn’t call back. Nearly blind with terror, his own voice echoing back to mock him, he ran on, slamming on lights as he went until the house was lit up like a celebration. Racing headlong into the dining room, he nearly fell over the two figures on the floor.
    “Oh, my God!”
    “I’ve killed her! Oh, God, Adam, help me! I think I’ve killed her!” With tears streaming down her face, Kirby pressed a blood-soaked linen napkin against Melanie’s side. The stain spread over the rose silk of the dress and onto Kirby’s hand.
    “Keep the pressure firm.” He didn’t ask questions, but grabbed a handful of linen from the buffet behind him. Nudging Kirby aside, he felt for a pulse. “She’s alive.” He pressed more linen to Melanie’s side. “Kirby—”
    Before he could speak again, there was chaos. The rest of the household poured into the dining room from every direction. Polly let out one squeal that never ended.
    “Call an ambulance,” Adam ordered Cards, even as the butler turned to do so. “Shut her up, or get her out,” he told Rick, nodding to Polly.
    Recovering quickly, Fairchild knelt beside his daughter and the daughter of his closest friend. “Kirby, what happened here?”
    “I tried to take the gun from her.” She struggled to breathe as she looked down at the blood on her hands. “We fell. I don’t—Papa, I don’t even know which one of us pulled the trigger. Oh, God, I don’t even know.”
    “Melanie had a gun?” Steady as a rock, Fairchild took Kirby’s shoulders and turned her to face him. “Why?”
    “She hates me.” Her voice shook, then leveled as she stared into her father’s face. “She’s always hated me, I never knew. It was the Rembrandt, Papa. She’d planned it all.”
    “Melanie?” Fairchild glanced beyond Kirby to the unconscious figure on the floor. “She was behind it.” He fell silent, only a moment. “How bad, Adam?”
    “I don’t know, damn it. I’m an artist, not a doctor.” There was fury in his eyes and blood on his hands. “It might’ve been Kirby.”
    “Yes, you’re right.” Fairchild’s fingers tightened on his daughter’s shoulder. “You’re right.”
    “I found the Rembrandt,” Kirby murmured. If it was shock that was making her light-headed, she wouldn’t give in to it. She forced herself to think and to speak clearly.
    Fairchild looked at the empty space on the wall, then at the table where the painting lay. “So you did.”
    With a cluck of her tongue, Tulip pushed Fairchild aside and took Kirby by the arm. Ignoring