Elizabeth Stewart
Harm’s Way

Chapter One

“The End.”

“Well?”

The woman let the final page of the manuscript fall shut and looked across her large, glass-topped desk.

“Beautiful,” she whispered. “Just beautiful.” She dabbed at her red eyes with the remnants of a wadded tissue, honked once and deposited it in the wastebasket behind her.

“I’m glad you approve, Sheila,” the woman on the other side laughed. “I worried about this one.”

“I’m sure,” Sheila grinned, tapping the pages in front of her with a perfectly manicured crimson fingernail. “You always do, although why is beyond me.”

“Because I’m a writer and we’re all basically insecure.”

“Well having published all six of your previous books, I can say without fear of contradiction that this is the best one yet. You’ve really outdone yourself, Ellie.”

“Thanks.”

“I mean it,” she insisted. “Not only is Jill a strong heroine and Ted to die for as a hero, but the story itself is so tender…so romantic.” The grin got bigger and a malicious gleam appeared in her hazel eyes. “Not to mention it’s so hot I thought I’d singe my eyebrows off by the third chapter.”

“Well, you keep telling me sex sells.”

“Lord, Ellie,” Sheila rolled her eyes, “this will fly out of the stores by itself. We’ll have to print it on asbestos and slap an ‘extremely flammable’ warning on the cover. Maybe we should give away a certificate for a free gallon of ice water with every purchase.”

“I think you’re getting a little carried away,” Elgin joked.

“I mean it, El. That part where Jill and Ted are stuck in traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge in that limo and he’s giving her oral sex and the cop car pulls up on the passenger side…I thought I’d wet my pants, literally. When they sneak away for a quickie while they’re touring that redwood forest with his family and end up in a hollow tree… And don’t even get me started about the bearskin rug in front of the fireplace at the ski lodge. Trust me, no one who reads this book will ever think of chocolate dipped strawberries and champagne the same way again.”

“You know Gillian Shelby’s readers always expect something out of the ordinary.”

“Well they’re going to get it,” Sheila agreed emphatically, “in spades. From the first read, I’d say we ought to be able to get this out for the Christmas trade. With A World of Surprise out this summer, it’ll be a sure double winner.

“Which reminds me. We’re launching World with all the hype Fantasy Publishing can drum up and then we’ll sit back and wait for all those women on summer vacation to trample themselves getting to the bookstores. In fact, I want to arrange a short book signing tour for you to hit some of the vacation resorts.”

“Uh-unh,” Elgin shook her head. “This summer I’ve promised myself three full months at the retreat. Rest and recuperate. No television, radio, newspapers, computers or writing. Period.”

“You’ve been saying that since you bought that forest shack,” Sheila shot back. “And in the three years you’ve owned it, as far as I know, you’ve spent exactly four weekends up there. Let’s face it, El. You’re a city girl and a writer. Three whole months of fresh air and no e-mail and they’ll have to cart you away with a butterfly net.”

“Fine,” she sniffed. “But when you can’t find me from the first of June to Labor Day, don’t bother to look ‘cause you can’t find this place unless I give you directions and that’s not going to happen.”

“Just make sure you’re around for the re-writes on this one. And give me an outline on your next project, ASAP.”

“Sheila Forbes,” Elgin pretended to grump, “you are nothing but a money-grubbing pimp preying on my fragile artistic nature for your own gain. You treat me like a literary vending machine.”

“And you, Elgin Collier, AKA Gillian Shelby, are a hack, prostituting your God-given gift for words into piles of money. So if I’m a pimp, I guess we know what that makes you.”

Both women laughed. They had this conversation often, in one form or another.

“Well, I’ve got to be running along,” Elgin said, gathering up her purse and rising. “I’ve got a hundred things to do still and my e-mail’s probably backed up to New Jersey by now.”

“I wish you wouldn’t go on-line like you do,” Sheila told her seriously. “There are an awful lot of weird people running around in cyberspace.”

Elgin laughed, reached out and patted her friend’s arm. “I have news for you, Sheila, there are an awful lot of weird people running around in the so-called ‘real’ world too.”

“I worry about you.”

“You worry about Fantasy Publishing’s biggest asset.”

“Only asset,” Sheila corrected, “but that’s not the point. You and I have been friends since way before we both started out in this whacko business. I sometimes wonder who’s crazier…you for trying to make a living writing, or me for trying to make a living publishing. I’d hate for anything to happen to you.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to me,” Elgin assured her friend. “My e-mail is under my pen name and I never go on-line to chat except through the respectable writers’ boards and only at designated times. After all, one of the reasons readers buy my books is because I’ve tried to make Gillian Shelby accessible to them. Made her a friend. Someone they can care about. The Internet has been a big help there. Besides, I’m a big girl and I know how to take care of myself.”

“All right. I’m taking your Magnus Opus home with me tonight so I can start hacking away at it with my little blue pencil. I should have the rough cut to you the first of next week.”

“Good. Give my poor overworked fingers a chance to cool down.”

“Yeah, well, I have no problem with your fingers cooling down. Just make sure nothing else does.”

They laughed again and shared a hug.

At the door, the two women paused and Sheila stared into Elgin’s face. “Promise me you’ll be careful,” she said seriously.

“Always. Bye Sheila.”

“Bye El.”

Elgin hated elevators, especially crowded ones like this, packed with eager souls escaping their cubicles for their mid-day hour’s parole. She didn’t have any particularly claustrophobic problems; small places had never bothered her. Something, though, about being in such close contact with other people, strangers, made her uneasy although she’d never been able to pinpoint exactly why. Perhaps its very irrationality made it all the more disconcerting.

Stepping in, Elgin instantly found herself crammed backward, finally ending up in the center of the car. Carefully, she raised her briefcase to her chest and pulled her shoulder bag to her front, trying to make room for two burly executive types in matching black power suits. Jostling for position, one of them stepped momentarily on her toe, never glancing at her or offering an apology.

Jerk, she thought disdainfully, I wonder how you’d like a three-inch stiletto heel in your expensive Italian loafers? Accidentally, of course.

As the elevator doors closed and the box continued down, something brushed against her ass. Automatically, she moved her body fractionally forward. There were obviously too many people in too little space. She felt a slight pressure then, like a hand laid lightly on the swell of her cheeks. Again, she shifted her position, but this time, the pressure remained.

A moment of surprise morphed into a flicker of anger. Jeez, Louise, she sighed silently. Some guys were absolutely pathetic. I mean, what kind of a loser is reduced to copping a feel from a total stranger in a public elevator?

But before she could turn around and confront anyone, the elevator shivered to a stop, the doors opened and she found herself pushed out into the lobby by a human tide making for the huge glass front doors and freedom.

Just beyond the elevator doors she paused, turning in all directions looking for…for what, she suddenly wondered. Some stereotypical grinning, leering moron in a raincoat?

The elevator emptied its cargo of perfectly ordinary-looking people, most not even glancing at her. Perhaps she’d been mistaken. Perhaps it hadn’t been anything more than a momentary, accidental contact.

With an internal shrug, Elgin joined the lunch crowd pouring out of the building and into the early April sunshine.

Quickly, she crossed the crowded sidewalk toward the cabstand, glancing at her watch as she stopped. If she could catch a cab and the traffic wasn’t too horrendous, she could make it home, grab a salad on the terrace, and get in a couple of hours at the keyboard. After all, for a writer, one finished book simply meant the start of another.

The start of another book.

Elgin frowned and felt the familiar pang of every author’s worst nightmare in the pit of her stomach. That nagging, aching terror that tugged at a writer’s very soul. The lurking fear that all the words had been spent, used up. That this time, “The End” had truly been reached.

She knew authors who seemed full and running over with an endless stream of new ideas. Always a work-in-progress (sometimes two or three at a time) and characters literally vying with each other for the writer’s time and attention.

But for her, stories only seemed able to come one at a time and then, only after much anxious coaxing. The overwhelming delight she felt at the end of a book was always edged with the stark terror of those words, “So, what’s next?”

“Hey!” someone shouted a few feet to her left.

Several heads, including hers, turned at the sound.

“Gimme money!”

A street person, tall and skeletal, stuck a large, grungy, dilapidated plastic soda cup in the face of a well-dressed young man, slightly shorter but stockier than his own six-foot frame.

“I…I don’t have any change,” he mumbled, turning his head and body a little.

“Don’t gimme that shit!” the beggar screamed, his mop of matted, greasy brown hair moving reluctantly with the violent shaking of the thin skull. “A course you got money! Dressed real pretty,” he put a grimy, fingerless glove on the young man’s lapel. “Gonna eat a big lunch at some fancy place. You got lots a money…way more’n you need. Gimme some!”

Gaunt cheeks flushed red, a spray of spittle flew out from the thin lips, a few droplets landing in the ragged whiskers clinging tenaciously to his pointed chin. Fire blazed out of dark brown, bloodshot eyes.

Quickly, the young man stuck his hand in his right front pocket and emerged with a fist full of coins that he dropped into the cup. With the beggar eagerly examining his prize, the young man made a hasty escape.

Elgin turned back to the street and anxiously scanned the traffic, hoping by sheer force of will to materialize a taxi. She’d lived in the city long enough to know that everyone around the man was evaporating as quickly and inconspicuously as possible and she wanted very much to do likewise.

Her gaze traveled up and down the block but no cab.

A ripple of apprehension fluttered in her stomach; not fear exactly, just a strong desire to avoid confrontation.

With a last hopeless sweep of the traffic, Elgin decided to cross the street to the safety of the cabstand on the opposite corner.

“Hey! You! Bitch!” she heard the angry shout almost in her ear. Instinctively, she gripped her briefcase more tightly, wrapped the fingers of her left hand around the strap of her shoulder bag and took a step.

Instantly, he blocked her way, the stench of body odor, filthy clothes, and alcohol-soaked breath creating their own barrier. At five foot nine in her three-inch heels, she could almost look him in the eye, and with her weight of a hundred and thirty pounds, he probably didn’t outweigh her by more than about twenty pounds. He might be a street bully but she was not some frail, anorexic fashion model. In her thirty-six years, she’d learned to cover fear in many situations, even while shaking like a leaf inside.

“Please get out of my way,” she told him calmly, his smell making breathing, let alone talking, almost impossible.

“Gimme money, bitch!” The cup rattled so close under her nose she could feel the rough edge.

Cold fear warmed a little with a tinge of anger. Elgin stared into his face, her black eyes empty.

“I haven’t got any money,” she replied flatly. “Now if you’ll excuse me…”

Stepping to the side, Elgin intended to go around him but he moved nimbly, blocking her once more. Leaning down, her whole view seemed taken up with him.

“Gimme money, bitch!” he repeated, his rage bellowing out with a force that surprised her, shaking the confident facade.

“I told you, I don’t have any money,” she continued, still trying to remain calm. “But if you don’t let me pass, I will start screaming, and with all the cell phones around here, someone’s going to call the police and I’ll have you in jail.”

Glancing quickly around, he saw several people were slowing to gawk, many of them with phones at their ears, eyeing him suspiciously.

But there was more to his rage than just her refusal to give him money. This was his corner; these were his marks. He knew those who gave freely, from real generosity. And those who gave from a guilt born of too much wealth paid for by others. Most caved in to his dirty, smelly intimidation. If he let this pretty woman, smaller than him, with short, almost boyish black curls and red lips walk away, how much of his power, his livelihood would go with her?

Taking advantage of his momentary hesitation, Elgin took another hurried step and scooted by him. Just as she started to exhale with relief, fingers like a steel vise closed painfully around her left arm between her shoulder and her elbow and spun her backwards.

“Come back here, bitch!” he roared, shaking her like a pit bull with a rag doll. “You give me my money or so help me God, I’m gonna break your skinny little arm!”

Elgin never knew exactly what happened next or even how. Her mind filled with terror, pain, and a hysterical urge to run but almost by themselves, she felt her fingers clutch the handle of her briefcase, her arm raise and her whole body swing forward. As if aimed, the sharp corner of the case drove into the crotch of his baggy, filthy pants.

Another roar erupted, this one of surprise and pain. Dropping to his knees and grabbing his injury, a torrent of obscenities mingled with howls of anguish.

For an instant, Elgin stood there, dazed, even the pain in her arm driven temporarily out of her mind by fear and disorientation.

Another figure appeared at her elbow. Flinching, she raised the case again.

“Hey lady,” she heard a nervous voice beside her, “it’s all right. I’m on your side. I got my hack over here by the curb. I don’t think you wanna be here when Junior comes up for air.”

“Look at that,” Elgin fumed, waving her suit jacket in front of her, “just look at it!” Needlessly, she pointed to the greasy black smudge where her attacker’s big hand had grabbed her and the open gash of shoulder seam.

“As filthy and disgusting as he was, I don’t even want to think what this might be,” she snarled. “God knows, though, whatever it is, it’ll probably never come out.”

“I can’t believe you’d even think about wearing it again,” the other woman replied, wrinkling her nose in disgust. “If I were you, I’d just call the Hazardous Materials Disposal Team and have it hauled away.”

“Do you know how much I paid for this suit?”

“Probably about ten books, retail.”

“Ha, ha,” Elgin told her sarcastically.

“I don’t understand why you just didn’t give the guy what he wanted. I mean, I can’t believe you’d risk your life with some crazed junkie street bum over a handful of change. Suppose he’d had a gun or a knife. Did you think of that?”

“I don’t like being bullied.”

“You mean if he’d been clean shaven, neatly pressed, sober and polite, you wouldn’t have been so stupid?”

“I don’t consider standing up for myself to be stupid, thank you.”

“Yeah, well, just be glad you’re explaining that to me and not St. Peter.”

“Martha…”

“No, I mean it,” she insisted emphatically. “You could have been killed over some pocket change. As it is, your arm looks like a purple tattoo of King Kong’s fingerprints. Instead of being so damned concerned about that stupid jacket, you should be in Dr. Mooney’s office right now. Or better yet, in a police station picking that vermin out of a line up.”

“Oh yeah, there’s a great idea,” Elgin feigned agreement. “I have him arrested and some shyster lawyer finds out I’m a writer with more than ten bucks in the bank and the first thing you know, I’m being sued by that Bozo for damaging the family jewels. That’s five years of being mired down in legal hassles and six hundred-dollar an hour lawyers only to have my insurance company buy him off on the courthouse steps. That, of course, results in my liability insurance premiums being jacked up to roughly the budget of a Third World Country or being canceled altogether.”

She shook her head. “Uh-uh. I have enough troubles without that. I took a couple of painkillers and I’ll stick to long-sleeve shirts for a few days so as not to offend your delicate sensibilities.”

Her tone softened and she smiled. “Look Martha, I appreciate your concern, but you’re my secretary, not my mother. So why don’t you go and see if there’s anything in the ‘fridge for lunch while I check my e-mails?”

“All right,” Martha agreed with a small sigh of resignation. “There’s a pile in your chat folder because of the program tonight but other than that, nothing pressing.”

“Okay then. I’ll be in my study. Call me when lunch’s is ready. Let’s eat on the terrace. And hold my calls this afternoon unless it’s Sheila.”

“Will do.”

“Where do you get your inspiration? Do you research everything, including the sex, yourself? Are you married? Have you ever had sex on an airplane? Do you sleep in the nude?”

Elgin scanned through the papers and took another bite of salad.

“I wonder how many times I’ve answered those same questions?” she giggled.

“Hey, if you wrote cookbooks, people would probably want to know where you buy your eggs or which lemons have the best juice,” Martha replied with a little giggle of her own.

“No doubt. It just gets a little repetitive, that’s all. I sometimes wonder if anyone ever asked Jane Austin about her favorite position. Or Emily Bronte if she’d ever done it out in the English Moors.”

“Well, don’t the chat moderators try to weed out the real perverts?”

“Yeah, but there’s only so much you can do. This chat is supposed to be a purely fun interview. Let the reader’s get up close and personal as it were. Of course, no one wants to know that I work eight and ten hour days just like everyone else and that I wear nighties to bed and I haven’t been with a man in so long, I’m writing purely from imagination.”

“No, I guess that would sort of blow Gillian’s image all to hell.”

“So, I’ll tell them that I have a whole wardrobe of sexy lingerie, depending on my mood and my company and that it’s hot and cold running hunks, twenty-four/seven. I also intend to casually mention that my newest book will be out this summer and that since I’m taking the entire summer off, they better stock up now because it will probably be Christmas before I have anything new.”

“Are you still planning on going up to that place in the country?” Disapproval sounded in Martha’s tone.

“Yes. I need the rest. And no, as I’ve said before, you don’t have to come with me. I don’t want you to come with me. I’m paying you three months’ salary so you won’t come with me. There aren’t going to be any secretarial duties for you and I’m perfectly capable of opening tuna cans and diet soda bottles by myself.”

“I can’t imagine what you’re going to do for three whole months up in that God-forsaken wilderness,” Martha grumped. “I mean, the couple of weekends we went up there, I couldn’t believe how boring the place was. No television. No radio. No neighbors. No nothing. It’s positively dead.”

“Exactly. I’m going to walk in the woods, swim some, maybe rent a little boat and go out on the lake and I’ve got two years worth of books I’ve been wanting to read that I never have any time to start. I’m going to veg out completely.”

“Sounds awful.”

“Sounds wonderful.”

Elgin finished her salad, sat back in the cushioned patio chair and stretched. Immediately, she winced and pulled her arms down.

“You okay, El?” Martha reached out and laid her fingertips lightly on her boss’s right arm.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Elgin assured her. “Just a stitch. No doubt my arm’s gonna hurt for a few days and it’ll probably get worse before it gets better.”

“I wish you’d let me call Dr. Mooney. That maniac could have pulled something or strained something. Even a hairline fracture. I’ve read…”

“I’m fine, Martha, really. I just stretched a little too hard. Now I’m going in and see if I can squeeze out some possible plots for a new book. Sheila says if I’m going to disappear for three months, I have to at least leave her with an outline of my next project.”

“Maybe you ought to take a nap. Or better yet, cancel this whole stupid chat thing anyway. I think people will understand when you tell them that some loony tried to break your arm this afternoon.”

“You don’t know Gillian’s fans,” Elgin laughed. “They do not take disappointment well, especially from their favorite author. If I’d been murdered, someone would be trying to arrange a séance. Now, I’ll help you clear the table and then I’m going to lock myself in my ivory tower and not come out until dinner.”

“You okay?”

“Sure.”

“You look like hell,” Martha observed dryly.

“And a gracious good morning to you, too.”

Elgin eased herself carefully onto the sofa and sighed as she leaned back.

“You get any sleep?” Martha asked, handing her a glass of orange juice.

“Enough. It’s just that the chat ran long and then even with more painkillers I couldn’t seem to find a comfortable position. Not to mention that every time I did manage to close my eyes, that creep was all over me again, stink and all.”

“You oughta see Dr. Mooney. Get something heavy duty for the pain. And you oughta call the cops about that bastard. I’d think with everything else that’s been going on around here lately, you wouldn’t want one more lunatic hanging around.”

“Please, Martha,” she sighed wearily, “not now. The bruises will heal, the beggar’s one of the hazards of modern city living, and you’re making a mountain out of a molehill.”

“What about the flowers?” she insisted. “And the candy? And the bra and panty set? All anonymous and all delivered right here to your supposedly ‘secret’ home address.”

Elgin heard the concern as well as the annoyance in her secretary’s voice. Even though they were virtually the same age, she knew Martha tended to be very protective, almost maternal about her. And while she appreciated the thought behind it, sometimes it did get a little much.

“I’ve told you. The flowers and the candy and even that outrageous lingerie are a gag, no doubt being played out by one or more of my slightly demented friends. Who else would know about the carnations or the peanut brittle or my taste in underwear? Or my home address?

“If I make a big production number out of it, they’ll just keep it up. Believe me, the best way to make it go away is to ignore it.”

“But…” The sound of the intercom buzzer from downstairs interrupted Martha.

The two women looked at each other quizzically.

“You expecting anyone?”

“No,” Elgin replied, “but whoever it is, tell them I died and didn’t leave a forwarding address. I’ve really got to try and rough out a new plot before I’m up to my ass in re-writes or I never will get away to the retreat.”

The buzzer sounded again and Martha hurried through the living room and foyer to the speaker set in the wall just inside the front door.

“Yes?” She clicked the switch from “talk” to “listen.”

“Miss Jackson,” came the warm baritone voice of their doorman, “it’s Ben.”

“Yes, Ben.”

“Miss Collier has a couple of visitors down here…” She thought she detected a note of concern in his tone.

“I’m sorry, Ben,” she cut in, “but Miss Collier’s unavailable today. Please ask whoever it is to call Fantasy Publishing about an appointment.”

A heartbeat pause went by before the voice spoke again, this time a nervous strain clear.

“It’s the police, Miss Jackson,” he told her slowly. “They say they have to speak to Miss Collier right now.”

“The police?” A tiny ripple of fear passed through her.

“Yes, ma’am. They showed me their badges and everything. Should I send them up?”

“Yes, certainly.” She switched off the speaker and waited tensely for the doorbell. When it chimed, she jumped, even though she’d been expecting it.

Opening the door, Martha found two middle-aged, medium height, average-looking men, one in a gray suit, one in dark blue. Both held up gold badges and picture ID’s in small leather cases.

“I’m Detective Sloan,” the man on her right announced flatly. “This is Detective Belknap. Miss Collier?”

“Uh…no,” she stammered. “I’m Martha Jackson, Miss Collier’s secretary. May I ask what this is about?”

“If we could come in,” Detective Sloan sidestepped her question, “we’d like to speak to Miss Collier. It will only take a moment.” He gazed at her expectantly with clear, calm gray eyes as if there might actually be some doubt as to whether or not she’d admit them.

“Yes. Certainly. Please come in.” She stepped back and opened the door wider, closing it carefully behind them when they’d moved inside.

“If you’ll come with me gentlemen, Miss Collier’s in the living room.”

But when they got there, Elgin had disappeared gone.

Martha felt her heart speed up as she glanced around the room and through the open glass doors to the terrace.

“Uh, please won’t you sit down gentlemen?” Martha pointed to the empty sofa. “Let me just go and see if I can find her. I mean…I’m sure she’s here somewhere. That is, I’m sure she hasn’t left. She was right here a minute ago.”

She dashed across the living room, almost tripping over her feet opening the study door and slamming it behind her.

Elgin sat at her computer, scrolling lazily through her e-mail.

“Who was it?” she asked without looking up as Martha came to her side.

“The cops,” Martha replied, the words dropping like rocks between them.

“The cops?” Elgin repeated in amazement, her head jerking up, confusion plain on her face.

Her secretary nodded emphatically. “And not just uniformed beat cops either. These are plain clothes. Detectives Sloan and Belknap.”

“What…what do they want with me?”

“They wouldn’t tell me. Just said they need to talk to you. But from the looks of them, I don’t think they’re here selling tickets to the Policemen’s Ball.”

Standing up, Elgin took a deep breath and released it slowly.

“Well then, I guess we better go and see what they want.”

As they opened the door, the two men who’d been seated side by side on the sofa rose silently and Elgin had the distinct feeling she’d interrupted a serious, private conversation.

Forcing a smile, she extended her hand.

“I’m Elgin Collier,” she told them with as much hospitality as she could muster.

“I’m Detective Sloan. This is Detective Belknap.” They produced gold badges and picture ID’s that Elgin couldn’t read without her glasses.

“Detectives. Won’t you please sit down? Can I get you something? Coffee perhaps?”

“No thank you, Miss Collier,” replied the man closest to her. “We’d like to speak to you if you have a few minutes.” His gaze flickered to Martha. “Alone if that’s all right?”

“Why…uh…certainly.” She turned to her secretary. “Martha, will you please finish going through my e-mail?”

“Sure. Call if you need anything.” And with a last quick glance at the detectives, she disappeared back into the study.

The three of them settled back down, the detectives on the sofa, Elgin across the coffee table in a big high-back, chocolate leather wing chair.

“Now, what may I do for you gentlemen?”

Detective Belknap took out a small, ragged green spiral bound notebook and a cheap looking ballpoint pen. His partner waited as he flipped through until he found a blank page. With an almost imperceptible nod, he signaled to the other detective that he was ready to begin.

“Miss Collier, we have a report that yesterday, a few minutes after noon, you had an…encounter with a street beggar in front of the Riverview Plaza building.”

Shit!

“Why…yes,” she replied carefully. “It was really nothing.”

“Could you tell us, in your own words, what happened.”

“Well, as I said, there really wasn’t anything to it.” Out of the corner of her eye, Elgin saw the detective’s pen moving rapidly across the paper.

“I’d just come from my publisher’s office. Fantasy Publications is in the Plaza One Tower. I came out and while waiting for a cab, a street bum accosted me, demanding money. His intimidating manner naturally frightened me. I told him I didn’t have any change and tried to walk away but he grabbed my arm and threatened to break it. I…I guess I just had some kind of self-preservation impulse because the next thing I knew, he was lying on the ground. A cabby hustled me to his taxi and brought me home.”

“And you never saw this man before?”

Here it comes. They’re probably here to arrest me. And the miserable bastard’s lawyer has probably tipped the media so they’ll be waiting at the precinct house when I arrive.

“No.”

“You’re sure?”

“Positive.” She took a breath. “May I ask what this is about? I mean, if the man has filed some kind of legal complaint against me, I’d like to know so that I can call my lawyer. And I’d be happy to show you the bruises he left on my arm.”

“Why didn’t you call the police?”

“Because I really didn’t see any point in causing a lot of trouble for a street beggar who, from the smell of his breath, had obviously been drinking. And how would it look to the media for a well-known author to be involved in an altercation with…well, it just didn’t seem to me to be worth the trouble. However, if this person is accusing me of something, I’m sure I can find plenty of witnesses to prove that whatever happened, I acted purely in self-defense. Is he accusing me of something?”

“No, Miss Collier,” the detective answered slowly, “you’re not being accused of anything. And we have several witnesses who’ve already corroborated your story, including leaving the scene by taxi.”

“Then what may I ask, are you doing here?”

“Because the street beggar with whom you had your…altercation…was found murdered yesterday afternoon.”