Frank locked eyes with Reis and sneered. “So what if I went for a look? I wanted to see if what they’d said was true, that it looked just like Henry Kay’s murder.”
The Sheriff groaned, and Reis flashed the insolent man a grim smile. “I’ll be needing those shoes, Mr. Connor.”
“What for?”
“So that Dr. Fell can make a comparison with the footprint cast.”
“You got a warrant or whatever?”
Reis huffed a laugh. “I can come back with an order for your arrest if you prefer.”
Frank snarled, then went to a locker and pulled out a pair of golf shoes. He took his own shoes off and slipped the others on, still muttering under his breath.
“There. If I get them back with so much as a scratch on them, you tell that Mark Fell he’ll have me to deal with.”
Reis raised an eyebrow at the threat, while Boone bagged the shoes and Sheriff Hardy shook his head in seeming resignation.
“One last thing, Mr. Connor,” Reis said as Frank opened the door and stepped out into the corridor. “What is your view on immigrants?”
“Immigrants. Come here trying to steal our jobs and homes. They should stay on their own damn side of the fence.”
Reis watched Frank leave and shook his head. While the man’s words were harsh, he didn’t yet think that Connor was their man.
****
Rosa bit back another curse as the car hit another rut in the road and her shoulder collided with the door. All she could see was the sky, but they hadn’t been driving for long yet, so she guessed that they were likely still in Naco.
“Hold on tight back there,” called Diego, his head tilting up to the rearview mirror as if he was trying to see her in it.
She muttered an oath, and he laughed, then the blue sky vanished as he pulled into a garage.
“Welcome to my home,” he said, opening the door and helping her out, both removing their sunglasses.
Rosa took in the spacious garage. She eyed the cloaked sports cars lining the far wall, then followed her host through a side door and into a spacious room.
“Come on, we will talk in my office. They should have laid out something to eat and drink there too.”
At the mention of his servants, Rosa let her eyes travel over everything as she followed him down a passageway but saw no sign of anyone else.
They climbed the stairs and entered a room with views out over the backyard, complete with a swimming pool and lush green grass, but her eyes couldn’t stay on the scenery for long. She was looking at a symbol carved into a wooden plaque above the fireplace. Her hand closed automatically over her father’s seal, which bore the same mark—a sealed scroll, lying before an inkpot and quill.
He chuckled again. “Just like Lucia. My brother clearly taught you well.”
Rosa started and turned wide eyes on him. She shook her head automatically. “My father didn’t have any siblings.”
Diego’s lips tilted up on one side. “None he was allowed to mention. And we’re only half-siblings, having the same father, but different mothers.”
Rosa tilted her head to the side. “Why couldn’t he mention you?”
Diego smiled. “We’ll get there. First, you, like Lucia, need to be made to believe that I am not Diego Melbourne, but rather Charles Kay, brother of Henry Kay.”
“How? If you think that,” she gestured at the crest, “will be enough, you’re wrong.”
“Oh, I know that things like that wouldn’t help. I feel a more direct approach is better.”
Rosa took an automatic step back as he reached for a tray on his desk, sliding it towards himself. On it was a small mirror, a plastic case for contact lenses, and some liquid.
He raised an eyebrow. “Scared of everything, aren’t you?” then he shrugged. “Well, I guess I can’t blame you.”
She stood stock-still as he carefully removed his contact lenses and placed them in the case, keeping his eyes downcast. She looked down at the blue-tinted lenses and realized they weren’t vision correction.
When he looked up at her, she couldn’t quite conceal her gasp as she met a pair of eyes the exact same shade as her own, as her father’s. The jade eyes were a rare genetic trait, prized by her grandfather. She looked back at the contacts, then at his jade eyes, and realized the strange turquoise shade was exactly what you would get if you placed blue contacts over such vivid green eyes.
“So what now?”
Charles Kay gave her a long look that reminded her painfully of the way her father used to x-ray them if she came home late from school. She realized suddenly that his voice, while more resonant and robust than his brother’s, seemed to flow in the same kind of way. It is what her mind had been trying to tell her from the moment he had opened his mouth.
“Now, Rosa Kay, we try to finish what your father started.”
She waited, keeping her own gaze level, determined, as she had always been with her father, to be ready for whatever was coming.
“First, we need to get an in with the police team.”
Rosa smiled when Mark came straight to mind. “And after that?”
Her uncle raised one eyebrow. “After that, we solve your father’s murder.”
8
“The shoes are an exact match,” said Dr. Fell, entering the bullpen where Boone and Reis were waiting for his report.
“And the blood?”
“Unidentified.”
“Excuse me?”
“It doesn’t belong to our victim or anyone in the town’s database,” Dr. Fell clarified.
“So what now?” asked Sheriff Hardy, having approached from behind.
Agent Reis turned to look at the man. Ever since they’d returned from the golf course, Hardy had been muttering a continuous string of certainties that Frank was their
