Love at First Sight - By B. J. Daniels Page 0,5
uncurled her fingers, surprised to find the latte-stained napkin with Liz’s number on it. She started to put the napkin and number in her purse, but as she took a step into the ballroom, she looked up and saw that the room was empty, the police gone.
No, not entirely empty.
Her feet halted so abruptly she almost toppled forward onto her face. Through the bank of windows facing the parking lot she could see the cop cars pulling away. What had literally stopped her in her tracks was the lone man she saw silhouetted against the window, watching the police leave.
Her heart dropped to her stomach. Could it be? She stared, her eyes widening as she realized he was dressed just as he’d been last night. And there was something about him—
Seemingly unaware of her presence, he pushed open the door and started toward the parking lot.
Karen stumbled back from the doorway, bumping into the wall as she looked around for a policeman. But she saw no one in uniform—and the man was getting away!
JACK WATCHED HER, now definitely intrigued. One minute she was peeking into the ballroom, the next she was reeling back out, looking as if she’d seen a ghost.
What the hell? He moved down the mezzanine to get a look into the ballroom, wondering what she could have seen. Empty. How had he missed Detective Denny Kirkpatrick, the man he’d been waiting to literally grab when the cop came out of his last interview? Because Jack had been watching the Girl Next Door instead of tending to business. And it looked as if the cops had left by a rear exit. Just his luck.
He glanced to where he’d last seen the woman standing just moments before and swore under his breath. She was gone! But something lay on the floor. A round white object the size of a golf ball.
He took the stairs two at a time. In the spot where she’d been standing, he reached down to pick up what appeared to be a balled-up white napkin. Great investigative work, Adams. A dirty napkin. He started to discard it when he noticed what looked like writing on it.
He uncrumpled the napkin. A phone number?
CHAPTER THREE
Karen scrambled out the front door of the hotel toward the parking lot at a run. If she could just get the license number on the man’s car—
Across the parking lot, she saw him get into a large, dark sedan. From this distance, she couldn’t even see the plates, let alone the make or model of the vehicle to give the police. Newer, expensive, American-made, would be her best guess and that, she knew, was worth nothing.
She sprinted to her car, leaped in and started it. All she could do was follow him and hope to get close enough without him getting suspicious.
But as she drove past the hotel, she had the oddest feeling she was being watched. First omens, then bad-luck dresses, clairvoyance, now paranoia? What next?
She sped off after the mystery man, the road dropping down the mountainside in tight switchback curves. In the distance she could see Missoula glittering brightly in the sunshine but ahead on the narrow two-lane road, no sign of the car. Had he seen her? Is that why he’d taken off so fast?
She gripped the wheel, heart pounding, expecting to come flying up on his car around the next curve as she careened off the mountain. He probably wasn’t even the killer. Just some poor harmless man who resembled the man she’d seen with Liz last night.
Harmless. Karen liked the sound of that, she thought as she swerved around another blind curve. Beat the heck out of the alternative: that she was chasing a killer and he’d be waiting in ambush for her around the next bend.
Unfortunately, she didn’t think of the man she’d seen last night in the hotel hallway with Liz as harmless.
She tried to still her hammering heart and quiet the voice of logic yelling Are you nuts? in her ears. Come on, she wasn’t even sure the man was Liz’s secret lover, let alone the murderer. He could be the jealous ex or a man Karen hadn’t even heard of. After all, before yesterday, it had been sixteen years since she’d even seen Liz.
So why was he driving so fast? And what had he been doing in the hotel ballroom? Had he already talked to the police? Wouldn’t that be something if he’d told them everything and here she was chasing down