Left to Kill (Adele Sharp #4) - Blake Pierce Page 0,80
on a cigarette he was concealing with his body and blowing the smoke out of an open window next to him. Agent Sophie Paige was standing next to him, talking quietly beneath her breath to the Executive. He smiled at whatever she’d said and patted her on the hand.
John pointed, nodding toward the two of them and wiggling his eyebrows.
Adele shielded her mouth with her shoulder and muttered, “Yeah, I see. I’m still saying they’re not lovers.”
“I bet you a hundred euros,” John muttered back.
Agent Paige looked up, and Adele quickly moved to John, her hand tugging at him and directing him toward the kitchen, away from their coworkers. She could hear others entering the house behind them. She heard Robert’s voice from the room next door, laughing. She spotted him talking to another man. She didn’t recognize this man; he had silver sideburns and was quite handsome. He had a hand out, touching Robert’s arm in a gentle sort of way. Robert was telling a story, flashing a smile and revealing the two missing teeth in the top corner of his mouth.
The man he was speaking to started laughing again, and Robert joined in once more.
Adele smiled and said, “We’ll talk to him later. I don’t want to distract him.”
John allowed himself to be guided away like a child at church reluctantly being shoved into a pew. He moved with Adele through the house. As they headed down the hall, he paused and said, “I remember this room.”
He pulled Adele, this time redirecting her, and pushed open a side door made of glass and aluminum with a protruding rectangular handle. Adele allowed herself to be moved through the door, and the two of them came to a halt.
They were assailed by the scent of chlorine. The door clicked shut behind them.
The indoor swimming pool stretched before them. It was shaped like a natural pond, with a faux oak, and some leaves extending from trees overhead. Adele knew that half of the trees were plastic, but in the dark it was beautiful. A slow misting machine was churning out a healthy fog which hovered over the water.
She spotted a couple in one corner, in the hot tub. Drinks with colorful fruits wedged to the lids sat next to the tub. The couple were making out.
“I remember this room,” John murmured. He glanced down at her, a mischievous glint in his eye. “Fancy a swim?”
Adele chuckled. It had taken a lot of convincing to get John to come with her. Even more convincing to have him show up in something nicer than a T-shirt and jeans. Now, though, as she looked at him, she felt half an inclination that perhaps she liked him better without the nice suit and tie.
She had a brief flashback to what she’d seen, back in his distillery. The scar, his muscled chest, the slope of his back.
She returned his mischievous smile, and through hooded eyes watched him. “All right, I could do a swim. We need to talk to Robert at some point in the evening.”
John waved away the protest, already pulling at his tie and tossing it off to the side.
Adele chuckled softly and then began to move toward one of the back rooms.
“Where are you going?” John called after her.
“Robert has swimsuits. I’ll be right back.”
“Ah,” John said, “you don’t need a swimsuit.”
Adele paused, considering the words.
As she did, and inhaled the scent of the fog, and listened to the quiet chatter from the couple in the hot tub, and the gurgle of the steam jets, her mind wandered. She thought of confronting Mr. Gobert, of his wheelchair. She thought of her anger at her father. She started to understand why he had hidden what he had. Collected the notes he did. Adele was at a party with a handsome man. And yet, she still couldn’t shake the thoughts of her mother’s case. It was an obsession, but something she knew she had to do. Her father had just been doing the same. They weren’t really that different after all. But Adele knew she was better.
Where her father had failed, she would succeed.
“Come on,” John called out after her. She glanced back and saw that he was now down to his underwear. He winked at her, then jumped into the pool with a splash. She sighed, turned, and began to disrobe. “Fine,” she called.
“The water is perfect, American Princess.”
Adele let out a small little laugh, and with that sound, some of the worries, some