months, though, if you can find a place to see you through until then.”
Biting her lip, Harper moved the mug across the coffee table with one finger. “Is Jones Street one of them?”
“I wish it was,” he said, gently. “I got a family in your old place right now. A mother and two little babies. She works downtown so it’s a good location for them. They’ve got six months left on their lease. Seem pretty happy there, though, so maybe they’ll want to stay longer.”
Harper felt gut-punched. She’d known it was crazy to think it might be empty. It was a great apartment in a perfect location. But for some reason she’d thought it would be waiting for her.
“Of course,” she made herself say. “But you have other places maybe coming up?”
“I got a gorgeous place on Huntingdon Street coming up in May.” Instantly he was enthusiastic again. “Big old building. The apartment’s twice the size of Jones Street. Two bedrooms. Lots of light. It’s even got a fireplace. It’s a little more than your rent was, but it reminds me of Jones Street. Got the same feel. Nice neighbors. You come take a look at it whenever you want.”
“Thanks, Billy, I’ll do that.” She forced a smile into her voice. “It sounds great.”
“You’d love it,” he assured her. “It’d be a fresh start.”
A fresh start. But in two months. What would she do until then?
She knew Bonnie would let her stay if she needed to, but she couldn’t. Her presence here could put her best friend in danger. She needed someplace else. Small and hidden.
When she hung up the phone, she sat for a moment, lost in thought. Then she grabbed her jacket and bag, heading for the door. As soon as she was in the car, she called Miles. “I need to pick your brain. Can I come over?”
All he said was, “Bring coffee.”
Twenty minutes later, she stood in front of the warehouse apartment building next to the river holding two cardboard coffee cups. She pushed the button for number 12 and looked up at the little camera above the door, holding the cardboard coffee cups high.
The door lock released with a click.
Harper’s footsteps echoed as she walked into the cavernous lobby of the converted warehouse, with its angular leather sofas and metal coffee tables. She’d always described its cold, modern décor as “serial-killer chic.”
The subtle lighting didn’t disguise the security cameras in every corner. There was no reception desk, but the place was remotely monitored and Miles said the security firm was good. Nobody in the building had ever had a break-in. The elevator opened the second she touched the button.
Maybe she could live here for a while, Harper thought, as the elevator rose. Rent a place.
Miles had left his front door ajar and she pushed it open, calling, “It’s me.”
“In here.”
She followed his voice to the kitchen—a masculine space with tall cabinets painted dark gray—and found him sitting at the dining table, a Nikon camera disemboweled on a sheet of white paper in front of him. A police scanner sat on the kitchen countertop next to the toaster, burbling a steady stream of misdemeanors.
Setting the cup of coffee at his elbow, Harper took the chair across from him, observing the tiny metal pieces with interest. “Is this new?”
“I’ve had it awhile, finally getting to it.” He picked up the body and held it up to the light, peering inside with the same air of professional interest Jerry had shown when studying the Glock the night before. “It has a bit of internal damage. But nothing I can’t work with.”
Buying broken cameras being sold for parts and fixing them was Miles’s hobby. Harper had never known a time when he wasn’t working on one. He found the work meditative. “It’s why my blood pressure’s so low,” he’d told her long ago. “Some people do yoga. I fix things.”
Setting the camera down, he picked up the cup. “What’s going on?”
“I need a place to stay in the city,” she said. “And soon.”
He already knew her history. He listened quietly as she told him the latest in the Martin Dowell case. “Luke and Blazer say the state police refuse to give out his location, or explain why they’re refusing,” she said, when she’d told him everything.
Miles looked at her over the wire-framed glasses he wore for close work. “Why do they think they’re hiding him? It can’t be witness protection, can it?”
“It’s the only thing we can think of,”