Something About You (27 page)

Maybe Lombard saw him as weak because of Cameron, Jack thought.

But tonight she was his greatest strength.

“Since you’ve been listening, you know what she means to me. I would kill anyone who harmed her,” he said with cold simplicity. “Give me a name, and I’ll make an exception.”

Lombard didn’t say anything. But he didn’t look so smug anymore, either.

Jack brought the gun in closer. “You shot her. I watched as you took this very gun and held it under her chin. Like this.” He grabbed Lombard’s jaw and shoved the gun right under his chin. Lombard flinched, breathing heavily through his nose.

Jack pushed the barrel harder, digging into Lombard’s skin. “Give me an excuse to pull this trigger. I want to do it so badly I can taste it.”

“I want a deal,” Lombard blurted out through clenched teeth.

Jack nodded. “I believe you actually mean that this time.” He pressed the gun to Lombard’s forehead. “Here’s the deal: tell me what I want to know, and I won’t have to tell the medical examiner that I shot you between the eyes in self-defense.”

Lombard swallowed hard. He said nothing at first, but Jack saw it in his eyes.

Defeat.

Lombard sagged against the floor and finally gave Jack the answer he’d been waiting for.

“Silas Briggs.”

LESS THAN TEN minutes after Jack called for backup, the house was teaming with people—some in uniforms, some not. He told the paramedics what had happened to Lombard, then spoke briefly to both Wilkins and the cops.

Jack stood side-by-side with Wilkins, watching as the paramedics placed a neck brace onto a handcuffed Lombard and slid a backboard underneath him. He glanced up at Cameron. She’d been sitting on the steps of the landing ever since the cops and FBI had arrived. He sensed she hadn’t wanted to get too close to Lombard as he lay on the floor at the bottom of the staircase. He hoped she wasn’t trying to avoid him as well.

“I’d like a minute alone with Cameron,” Jack said to Wilkins. “Could you see to that?”

Wilkins nodded. “Of course. I’ll make sure everyone stays down here.”

Jack grabbed a blanket the paramedics had brought in, slipped past Lombard on the stairs, and headed up. He knelt down and wrapped the blanket around Cameron’s shoulders. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head. “No.”

Jack noticed she was trembling. He helped her to a standing position, then led her up the stairs and into her bedroom. He closed the door behind them, took her by the hand, and sat her down on the bed.

“Say something, Cameron. Anything.”

She sounded distant when she answered. “When he called down from upstairs, I was standing right here by this bed.” She frowned. “I was trying to decide what underwear I was going to wear to bed that night, wondering if you liked black or red better.” Her voice cracked. “Then this strange voice shouted down that he had a gun pointed at your head and that you had three seconds to live.”

Jack knelt at the floor in front of her. “You did so great. Cutting off the power was the smartest thing anyone could’ve done in that situation.”

She wiped her eyes. “Right, I’m such a hero. You dove off a thirty-five-foot staircase. I turned off a light switch.”

“It . . . was a very key light switch.”

She sniffed. Her nose was red and her mascara was smudged underneath her eyes. Jack thought he had never seen anyone look so beautiful. When he thought about what could’ve happened . . . how close he’d come to losing her . . .

“You’re doing the serious face again.” Cameron touched his cheek, looking him over with concern. “Are you hurt? You have to be, after that fall.”

“I might’ve broken a few ribs,” Jack said.

“What? We need to get one of the paramedics to check you out. You could have internal bleeding or something.”

“It’s fine. I’ll have someone take a look later, when I’m finished with all this.”

She shook her head. “Not later, Jack. Now. You’re not invincible, you know.”

“Shh . . . I’ve been trying to keep that under wraps for years.”

That finally got a slight smile out of her. Jack got up and sat next to her on the bed.

She leaned her head against his shoulder. “I didn’t go into my room, you know. I stayed in the upstairs hallway to listen.”

“I figured as much.”

Cameron turned her head to look at him. “Those things you said to Lombard . . . were you bluffing?”

Jack thought about his response to this. He’d said a lot of things to Lombard. But right or wrong, the man she’d heard down there was him. “Does it matter?” he asked her.

She paused for a moment before shaking her head.

“No.”

Twenty-nine

“THERE’S SOMEONE HERE to see you, Cameron.”

Cameron glanced at the clock on her desk computer. It was after two o’clock, which surprised her. She’d been so caught up taking notes on the case files she’d been reading, she’d worked straight through lunch.

“Thanks, Elaine. Does this someone have a name?” She checked her calendar—she didn’t have any appointments written down for that afternoon.

Through the speakerphone, the front desk receptionist’s voice lowered to a whisper. “I’m not supposed to tell you.”

After everything she’d been through recently, Cameron wasn’t sure she liked the sound of that. She picked up the phone. “Do I at least know this person?”

“Yes. Definitely,” Elaine said.

“Then why can’t I know who he or she is?”

“I don’t know—he just said I should ask you to come out here. Oh, he’s looking over. I gotta go.” Elaine quickly hung up.

Cameron set the phone back in its cradle. She considered the possibilities.

Jack or Collin?

Whichever of the two it was, he was taking her to lunch, she decided. She was starving.

She got up from her desk and headed out into the hallway, wondering what all the mystery was about. Her instincts told her it was Jack. He had dropped by her office frequently over the last couple of weeks, for both professional and personal reasons.

Thinking about him never failed to put a smile on her face. Since Lombard’s arrest, Jack had spent nearly every night at her house—the only exceptions being the few nights she’d spent at his loft. They were busy during the week, each of them having been thrust back into work after the night of the attack, but they made up for it in the evenings and on weekends. Jack had decided to take on the job of repairing the stairwell banister, along with a few other renovations to her house, and Cameron had decided to assist him—which meant that she sat in the corner drinking wine and reading one of the hundreds of books from his collection that slowly seemed to be trickling into her house. She’d poke her head up every once in awhile and chime in with her two cents, and then somewhere around her second glass she’d start noticing all the ways in which Jack’s muscles flexed under his T-shirt while he worked, and how delicious he looked getting sweaty and mussed, and uh-oh, suddenly they’d be on the floor getting sweaty and mussed in ways that didn’t require a hammer and nails.

Best of all, though, she loved the way they talked—whether it was coming out of the movie theater, at a restaurant over dinner, or lying on the couch with her head against Jack’s chest as he told about his former cases and she shared memories of her dad.

Luckily, the media attention surrounding them finally seemed to be dying down—something they both were looking forward to. The biggest story in the press for the last two weeks had been the indictment and subsequent resignation of the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois. All things considered, Cameron supposed, Silas’s arrest had gone smoothly enough. The Monday morning after Lombard’s attack, she had “happened” to be out in the reception area when Jack and Wilkins had arrived with their arrest warrant. There’d been a lot of yelling and swearing on Silas’s part, particularly as Jack put the handcuffs on him. Standing off to the side with a few of the other assistant prosecutors, Cameron had watched as Jack remained calm and professional. He’d said something in a low voice only Silas could hear, and Silas nodded mutely, his lower lip quivering. Strangely, after that he’d been fully cooperative.

Closely following the scandal involving Silas had been the one with Grant Lombard—it wasn’t every day, after all, that a U.S. senator’s private bodyguard was arrested for murdering a call girl in one of Chicago’s most luxurious hotels. This arrest, unfortunately, had put Cameron and Jack directly in the spotlight: after the attacks it became impossible to keep secret the fact that she had been a witness (sort of) to the murder. The media quickly linked her and Jack together from the apparently never-to-be-forgotten “head up her ass” comment of three years ago. Although the rehashing of Jack’s remarks usually brought on another glowering session on his part, Cameron personally found it amusing to watch. She’d even slipped once—while he was trying to wrestle the remote control out of her hands to turn off the ten o’clock news, she’d teasingly said they should share the footage with their kids someday as evidence of their love at first sight. When Jack hadn’t immediately scrambled off the couch to head for the hills, and instead had gotten quite amorous after her comment, she took it as a sign that she hadn’t completely freaked him out.

Now, looking forward to Jack’s unexpected visit, Cameron picked up her stride and turned the corner into the main reception area of the office.

He wasn’t there. The entire waiting area was empty, in fact.

Over at the reception desk, Elaine held up her hands. “He told me he didn’t want to wait out here—said he wanted to speak to you someplace private. I put him in Silas’s old office since no one is using it right now.”

Very odd, Cameron thought. More intrigued than ever, she cut across the waiting area and through the corridor on the opposite side. When she got to Silas’s former office, she saw a tall, well-built man standing outside the door. He nodded as she approached.

“You can go right in, Ms. Lynde.”

Keeping an eye out, Cameron cautiously opened the door and stepped inside. A stout man with neatly trimmed silver hair and an expensive suit stood before the window, looking out at the view of Lake Michigan. When she walked in, he turned around and smiled at her with a genteel air.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Lynde. Thank you for meeting with me on such short notice.”

Cameron shut the door behind her. “Senator Hodges,” she said with surprise. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. What . . . brings you to our office today?” Despite their bizarre connection, and the fact that she knew far more about the senator’s personal life than she had ever wanted to, they’d actually never met or spoken to each other.

Hodges crossed the room. “I think we both know this visit is overdue, Cameron. Is it okay if I call you Cameron?” He sat down in one of the two leather chairs in front of Silas’s old desk. “Why don’t you have a seat?”

Cameron nodded. “Certainly.”

In light of everything that had happened that night at the Peninsula, it felt weird sitting in Silas’s former office with Hodges. Really, though, it would’ve felt weird sitting with him anywhere.

“I’m greatly indebted to you, Cameron, and I wanted to thank you in person,” Hodges said. “From what Special Agent Davis tells me, you single-handedly kept me from being arrested and undoubtedly saved my senate seat. Innocent or not, I never would’ve survived the scandal of being implicated in a murder. Let alone my . . . connections to Ms. Robards.”

“I appreciate that, Senator. But honestly, the FBI team assigned to the case deserves all the credit. I just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“You were nearly killed for being in that place at that time,” Hodges said. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am for that. How sorry I am for a lot of things, actually. I was a foolish man and my mistakes hurt others. In some cases, gravely so.” His eyes clouded with sadness.

Cameron nodded, unsure how to respond. Talking to Hodges was sobering. Despite the fact that Mandy Robards’s intentions toward the senator had been less than honorable—as Jack had confirmed now that Lombard had told him all about the blackmail scheme—the whole incident remained a sad testament to the lengths some people would go to for money. Or out of desperation.

“I’ve upset you,” Hodges said.

“I’m fine. I’m just relieved it’s all over.”

“Actually, it’s not quite all over,” Hodges said. “Silas Briggs’s resignation means I have an important task ahead. As the senior senator from Illinois, it’s my duty to make a recommendation to the president regarding the person who should be named the new U.S. attorney. And I think I might know of just the right candidate.” He paused deliberately.

Cameron pulled back in surprise. “Me?”

Hodges nodded. “You.”

Cameron tried to decide how best to respond. “I appreciate the consideration, Senator. Truly, I do. But if I can be blunt, I don’t expect you to offer me the job out of gratitude. Nor do I want you to.”

Hodges smiled at this, as if he approved of her answer. “I had a feeling you were going to say that. So let me assure you that this has nothing to do with gratitude. After the allegations being brought against Silas, the last thing I would do right now is risk further potential scandal by naming a candidate who isn’t fully qualified for the job. If anything, your connection to me counted against you.”

Cameron remained skeptical.

Hodges laughed. “Do I need to convince you further?”

“If you’re serious about this, then yes, you do.”

“Good God, they weren’t kidding when they said you were a tough nut to crack,” Hodges muttered. “Fine—I’ll give you the highlights, the facts that most convinced me when my vetting team came up with your name. You have the best trial record among all the assistant U.S. attorneys in this district. The judges—yes, we do talk to judges—say you’re fearless and tenacious in the courtroom. After Briggs, frankly, that’s what this office needs. You look good on paper: you come from a blue-collar background, you put yourself through law school, your father died heroically as an officer of the law, and the media already thinks you’ve got balls made of brass for surviving the ordeal with Lombard. But what most convinced me, Cameron—and I know you’re being very humble and low-key about this—is that, per the request of the attorney general himself, you’ve been temporarily running this office since Silas’s departure. Seeing how you haven’t burned down the place yet, I thought I’d give you a real shot at the job. That is . . . unless you don’t want it.”

Cameron got butterflies in her stomach. Holy shit, this was really going to happen. No need to convince her further. “I would be honored, Senator, to be your nominee for the position.”

Hodges looked relieved. “Good. Whew. I have to be honest with you—we didn’t have much of a backup plan. I’m actually sweating a little under my jacket here.”

Cameron laughed. “I’ll try to be less difficult in the future.”

Hodges smiled warmly as he shook her hand. “You do things exactly the way you see fit, Cameron.”

They rose from their chairs and walked to the door together. “Funny you should mention that, Senator . . . because I hope you understand that, unlike Silas, I don’t plan to be merely a figurehead in this position. I intend to keep trying cases.”

“With your record, you try all the cases you want. Just make sure you win them.” With a wink, Hodges opened the door and nodded to his guard outside.

Cameron watched them leave. She stood alone in Silas’s office, trying to wrap her mind around the fact that there was a good chance it was going to be her office in the not-too-distant future.

U.S. Attorney Cameron Lynde.

That had a nice ring to it.

With a grin, she headed back to her soon-to-be-former office as fast as dignity and her three-and-a-half-inch heels allowed her. Once there, she shut the door for privacy, then sat down at her desk and picked up the phone.

He was her first call, of course, and she told him everything. When she had finished sharing her news, she could tell by his voice that he was smiling on the other end of the line.

“Congratulations, counselor,” Jack said. “You deserve it.”

She could tell from his tone that he was hiding something. “You knew already, didn’t you?”

Jack laughed. “Okay, I knew. Davis let it slip that two agents in our office had been assigned your background check. I’ve had reservations every night this week at Spiaggia, waiting for Hodges to tell you. I figured you should finally get your dinner there, and this was the perfect reason.”

Impossible man—being all sweet and everything. “I’m still trying to decide how I feel about the fact that you knew about this before I did.”

“Don’t be disappointed,” Jack said. “The fact that I’ve been ridiculously proud of you for days doesn’t change how excited you should be about this. Besides, I pretty much know everything. You should probably just start getting used to it.”

“And on that note, I’m hanging up,” Cameron said.

“Rushing me off so you can call Collin next?” Jack teased.

“No,” she said emphatically.

Damn, he really did know everything.