Sin And Bone

Deep inside she fully comprehended that she would need every part of her professional armor to protect her from his dark lure. She was well aware that her obsession with him hovered on a very narrow ledge. One wrong move and she would slip.

Even as the warning echoed in her brain, her gaze swept over his handsome face. Square jaw darkened by the stubble of a day’s beard growth, dark blue eyes analyzing her even as she did the same. He wore a tailored charcoal suit, probably silk. A paler gray shirt peeked from between the lapels of the jacket. He had dispensed with his tie and left a couple of buttons undone. The platinum cuff links remained nestled at the center of his perfectly folded French cuffs. Bella suspected this was as relaxed as he allowed himself to be in front of company.

“Ms. Lytle.” He opened the door wider in invitation.

She concentrated her attention on the details of his home rather than on the man. This was the one aspect of Dr. Devon Pierce that remained private. Though there had been plenty of photos of the exterior of the home on the internet, there was none of the interior.

Black and white marble flowed across the floor in a diamond pattern. The walls as well as the ornate trim were coated in an old-world white paint, the aged matte finish an elegant contrast to the glossy floors. A chandelier drenched in crystal hung twelve or so feet overhead. The rich, ornate mahogany table to the left and the cushioned gray bench to the right lent a warm hue to the boundless canvas of sleek black and white.

“I have coffee waiting,” he announced.

She nodded. “Lead the way, Doctor.”

The large entry hall flowed straight ahead. Some twenty or so feet from the front door, the hall parted to the right and left. On each side, a grand staircase led up to the second level. A wide door beneath the staircase on the right provided a glimpse of the kitchen—opulent wood cabinetry, acres of sleek granite and an expansive wall of windows. The double doors to her far left were closed. A library or his office, she supposed.

Moving straight ahead, the entry hall progressed into a truly stunning great room. The whitewashed walls soared to a vaulted ceiling, complete with rustic wood beams that looked as though they might have held up a bridge somewhere in the Mediterranean in another century. The stone fireplace was huge. The marble floors of the entry hall had given way to gleaming hardwood. The furnishings were upholstered in sophisticated burgundies and golds. To soften the hard surfaces, a classic Persian rug was spread over the center of the room, the burgundy and gold yarn so muted it had surely been washed out by decades of wear in a castle somewhere.

Whatever charm the man lacked in demeanor had been infused into his home. The place was utterly breathtaking. Massive and yet somehow intimate. Nothing like the cool, distant man.

Two sofas faced each other in the center of the room. The silver coffee service sat on the cocktail table between them. As Bella settled onto the edge of one of the sofas, she shifted her gaze and full attention to him. Not an easy feat with so many striking pieces of art she’d only just noticed on the walls.

“Please, have a seat,” he said, his voice as terse as it had been when he answered the door. “Do you take cream or sugar?”

“Black is fine, thank you.”

She wondered if there were half a dozen housekeepers and a couple of cooks hidden somewhere in the house. God only knew how many gardeners the property required. She glanced around. Surely a member of staff lurked about someplace. She couldn’t imagine Devon Pierce using his skilled surgeon’s hands to perform such a menial task as preparing coffee.

Former surgeon, she amended. Though his license and hospital privileges and credentials remained in place, he did not routinely practice medicine.

He placed a cup and saucer in front of her, the rich black coffee steaming. Vintage china, she noted. His wife must have been a collector. He poured himself a cup and sat down on the sofa opposite her.

“Victoria tells me you’re very good at solving mysteries.” He sipped his coffee.

“I’m very good at seeing the details others often miss.” The coffee warmed her. From the moment she’d stepped into the house, she’d felt cold. Liar. Meeting the man she’d been cyberstalking had sent her temperature rising. Foolish. “I spent seven years with the Alabama Bureau of Investigation. I never failed to solve the case I was assigned.”

He seemed to consider her answer for a time, his eyes probing hers as if he intended to confirm every word by looking directly inside her soul.

“You graduated from the prestigious University of Alabama with a psych undergraduate degree and a master’s in criminal justice,” he continued. “Two years as a victim counselor with Birmingham PD and the FBI wanted you but you chose the ABI over the better opportunity.”

There it was. That arrogance she instinctively understood would be a part of his personality. She had zero tolerance for it. “The FBI isn’t better, Dr. Pierce. It’s merely larger with a broader jurisdiction. The work I did for the ABI was immensely important. Had I chosen the FBI, I would have spent a great deal of time working toward the opportunity to be a field investigator. Instead, I went straight to the work that I wanted to do—solving crime in the field.”

He set his coffee aside. “I appreciate a stellar résumé, Ms. Lytle, and yours is quite good. But I always look at the person behind the credentials. The heart of the person begins with their roots.”

For the first time since she was eighteen, Bella felt the heat of shame rush along her nerve endings. The idea that this man held that much power over her further flustered her. “Not everyone is born into the perfect scenario for who and what they want to become, Dr. Pierce. Some of us had to fight our way out of where we were before we could reach where we wanted to be.”

“Your father murdered your mother when you were ten and your thirteen-year-old sister shot and killed him in self-defense,” he stated as if she had said nothing at all. “According to the police reports, he was coming at you next and your sister protected you.” He studied her a long moment. “The reports also said that the two of you couldn’t keep your stories straight. In the end, you seemed to agree with whatever your older sister said.”

The blast of a shotgun echoed in Bella’s brain followed by screaming...so much screaming. She gathered every ounce of self-control she possessed to prevent her hands from shaking when she carefully set the cup and saucer on the table. “That’s right.” She held his gaze without flinching. “My father was an alcoholic with a mean streak a mile wide. It would have served my mother far better if she had blown his head off long before he decided to wash his hands of the three of us. My sister was forced to protect us when our mother failed.”

Unfortunately, their mother had been weak. Bella blinked once, twice. So weak.

He stared at her for a long time. Pierce was forty-five, ten years her senior, but he didn’t look more than forty. His dark brown hair was thick and trimmed in a distinguished yet fashionable style. A few strands of gray had invaded the lush color at his temples. Blue eyes, the color of the sea. Chiseled jaw with a nose that was ever so slightly off center, probably from the car accident when his wife was fatally injured. He’d suffered a broken nose, a fractured jaw and collarbone as well as a gash in the head. Despite his rigorous work schedule, he kept his tall, lean body in excellent condition. She imagined the female nurses and doctors on his staff spent plenty of time discussing the handsome administrator. Particularly since he was single.

Sadly his personality reportedly left a great deal to be desired.

“You narrowly avoided foster care,” he went on with his well-prepared monologue of her early history, “but an estranged aunt, your mother’s sister, came forward to whisk the two of you to Mobile. At sixteen, your sister dropped out of high school and took a job at a local hair salon. She married and had three children by the time she was twenty. If I counted accurately, she’s on husband number five now. You didn’t appear very happy in school either. The school counselor documented bruises on several occasions. She listed you as withdrawn and lacking the ability to make friends. Child services were called to your home on more than one occasion.”

The shame faded and fury took its place, igniting a blaze that rushed through her veins. “My aunt had rigid religious and disciplinarian views. As for the other, most children go through times in school when making friends is difficult.”

Bella had nothing else to say about that part of her life. Her aunt hadn’t really been the problem. It was her husband. Bella was fairly confident he got off on beating her and her sister. The slightest infraction required a trip to the woodshed. After her sister left, Bella had tolerated his beatings for a couple more years. Eventually, she’d had enough and she’d got her hands on the ax and threatened to kill him the same way she and her sister had killed their mean-ass daddy. From that point forward, they’d had an agreement of sorts. He didn’t touch her and she didn’t cut off his head in his sleep. He never touched her again.

Funny how the tendency to choose the wrong kind of man seemed to run in families sometimes. Her mother, her aunt and then her sister. The three looked right over a nice guy and went for the jerk every time.

Bella never intended to allow a man to rule her. Never. If Dr. Pierce was under the impression that his extensive knowledge of her past would somehow put her off, he was mistaken. Her past wasn’t something she cared to discuss and, frankly, it still embarrassed her to some degree, but this man would need a lot more than humiliating backstory to undermine her determination or her confidence.

Pierce stared at her for a full minute before he spoke again. “My wife died six years and five months ago. My hands were inside her body when her heart stopped beating. I did everything humanly possible to stop the hemorrhaging but I couldn’t. She died on the operating table in a hospital that didn’t have the proper equipment or the necessary staff. The only surgeon within an hour of the hospital couldn’t get there fast enough because of the record-breaking snowstorm that had hit the area. I was the only chance she had of surviving and I failed. I have no idea why someone would use her to rattle me now, but that’s precisely what happened today.”

Victoria had briefed Bella on the incident. According to her employer’s second conversation with Pierce today, he’d examined today’s patient after she was placed in the ICU. She had blond hair and pale blue eyes, like his late wife. Similar build. But she was, of course, not his wife. Her face was different though there were definite similarities. Shoe size was wrong. Her fingers weren’t as long as Mrs. Pierce’s had been.

Not that there had ever been any question. The point was that someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to find a woman who, on first look, greatly resembled Cara Pierce.

“You were able to speak with her.” It wasn’t a question. Victoria had told Bella as much. She simply wanted to watch his reaction as he answered.

“Briefly. She claimed not to know her name or mine. She couldn’t say where her home was or what had happened to her.”

“Which could be as a result of her injuries,” Bella suggested.

“It’s possible but doubtful, in my opinion. There are also certain drugs that can produce the same effect. We’re running new screens for those substances.”

“Did you tell the police?” Bella knew he had not. She’d spoken to a contact at Chicago PD and nothing else had come in about the accident. As far as the police knew, the woman hit the guardrail. The accident was her fault. No alcohol in her blood. She would survive and the only property damage was her own.

“No, I haven’t spoken to the police about the matter.” He crossed his arms over his chest in a classic defense gesture. “Since the situation is obviously very personal, I intend to conduct my own investigation first.”

Bella wasn’t surprised. He wasn’t the sort of man to turn over control of something so extremely personal unless he had no other choice. “You do realize that legally you have an obligation to inform the police about the patient’s situation.”

Another of those long staring sessions came next. Finally, he said, “I do and I will, when I’m ready.”

“This is your dime, Dr. Pierce, so we’ll play your way until I am compelled to take a different tactic. If at any time I feel the woman in that hospital room is vulnerable to the situation in some way, I will go to the police myself.”

“I’ve assigned security to her room,” he said, his tone flat. “She’s completely safe.”

“As long as we’re clear on that point.”

“We’re quite clear, Ms. Lytle.”

She straightened her back, squared her shoulders. “Is there anything else you should tell me before we begin?”

He shook his head, the move so slight she would not have noticed had she not been watching him so closely. “Nothing at all.”

Something else Bella had learned during ten years of investigative work, seven at the ABI and three with the Colby Agency, was that when a man could look you straight in the eye and lie without a single tell, he was dangerous.

“Tell me about your enemies, Dr. Pierce.”

“When I first began the development phase of the Edge, two years before my wife was killed, I had a couple of partners. Jack Hayman and Richard Sutter. Both eventually fell off the project.” One corner of his mouth lifted as if he might smile. “Jack knew basically nothing about what I was doing. He simply wanted to invest part of his vast fortune in something useful.”

“What about Richard Sutter?”

Pierce lifted one shoulder in a negligible shrug. “Our parting was less than amiable. He filed several lawsuits but all were dismissed as frivolous.”

“Less than amiable” was a vast understatement. “He suffered tremendous financial losses when the two of you severed your business relationship.”

A single nod. “Our visions for the project turned out to be vastly different. Severing the relationship was his choice, not mine.”

Bella held back the laugh that tickled her throat but she couldn’t completely hide the smile. “My assessment of those events is that you left him no other choice.”

He stood. “There are always choices, Ms. Lytle. Perhaps limited, but choices nonetheless. I think I’ll have something stronger than the coffee. Would you like a drink?”

“The coffee is fine.”

She watched as he crossed the room, then opened a cabinet that revealed a bar lined with mirrors and glass shelves. He reached for a bottle of bourbon and poured a significant serving into a glass. His every move was measured, elegant, like the suit he wore.

Bella had read many articles about Pierce before tragedy sent his life on a different path. She’d even watched a couple of television interviews. Dr. Devon Pierce had been a real Chicago hero at Rush University Medical Center. He’d smiled often in the interviews. He’d spoken like a man determined to help others...determined to do good. He and two partners were developing a new kind of ER model. He had been a man with a mission. A happy man.

This was not the same man. He’d resigned from his position as head of surgery at Rush. He’d become completely obsessed with his mission to create a better ER. He’d withdrawn from society beyond the necessary appearances at fund-raisers. But he had completed his mission. His prototype, the Edge, was an unparalleled emergency department dedicated to his late wife.

When he’d taken his seat once more, she asked, “Assuming his goal is to ruin you or perhaps worse, do you believe Mr. Sutter would go to these extremes to have his vengeance?”

“Richard is an extremely intelligent man with vast resources. He certainly possesses the means to carry out such an elaborately planned plot, but I would prefer to think not. Yet here we are.” He sipped his drink.

Bella watched him savor the taste that lingered on his lips. Her throat parched and she had to look away. “You knew the man—like a brother, you claimed in one of the interviews I watched. Would he want to simply damage your reputation? Or is he capable of far worse?”

That blue gaze trapped hers once more. “Powerful men rarely have set boundaries, Ms. Lytle.”

She didn’t have to ask if he fell into that same category. “Would he overstep the bounds of the law? Risk criminal charges and perhaps jail time?” As Pierce pointed out, setting up a woman who resembled his wife, complete with similar physical injuries, and delivering her in such a way as was done today was not a small thing. And certainly not one that was legal under any circumstances.

“I believe that may be the case.”

“Was a lack of resources why he didn’t come after you before? Five years is quite a while to wait for revenge.” Sutter and Pierce had broken their partnership five years ago. Sutter had seemingly fallen off the face of the earth until about eighteen months ago. Bella had tracked his return back that far. He stayed out of the public eye these days.

“His resources took a hit when our association ended but he was far from devastated financially,” Pierce explained. “It was likely the failed legal steps and the cancer that kept him from making a move like this before. Rumor is he found a private hospital in some country not burdened by the FDA’s restraints to seek treatment. I have no idea how long he was out of the country.”

A near-death experience like surviving cancer often changed a person’s priorities. It was possible that survival had sent Sutter on his own mission. “This might be the most important question I ask you tonight, Dr. Pierce,” she warned. “Does Sutter have a legitimate reason to want revenge?” She waited, watched his face, his eyes.

One, two, three seconds elapsed. He downed another sip of bourbon. “Yes.”

“All right.” Bella appreciated that it hadn’t been necessary to drag that answer out of him. More than that, she was grateful he answered honestly. “Does he have some sort of information or evidence that could hurt you?” After all, the message left in Pierce’s office had been pretty clear: I know what you did.

“Professionally, no.”

“What about personally?” Bella waited, suddenly unable to breathe.

He finished off the bourbon before meeting her gaze. “He believes I killed my wife.”

There was an answer she hadn’t expected. “Does he have tangible evidence or probable cause to believe you wanted your wife dead?”

Bella was certain her heart didn’t beat while she waited for him to answer.

“Have you ever loved something so much you would do anything to possess it and, once it was yours, to keep it?”

His words were spoken so softly, she’d had to strain to hear. As for his question, if she was completely honest she would confess that she felt exactly that way about her work. Her career defined her. There was nothing else. Her sister and she rarely talked, never visited each other. Basically she had no family. No real love life. Her career—her professional reputation—was everything. She would do anything within the law to keep it.

“I suppose so,” she said at last.

“I loved my wife, Ms. Lytle.” His fingers tightened on the empty glass. “More than anything. I thought giving her everything her heart desired was enough, but it wasn’t. She wanted more and I didn’t see that until it was too late.”

“She turned to someone else,” Bella supplied. It happened to career-focused—obsessed—people all the time.

He placed his glass on the table next to the deserted coffee. “She did indeed.”

“What did you do about that?” The urge to feel sympathy for him hit her harder than it should have.

“Nothing. I ignored it. Hoped it would go away.”

An odd answer for a man who prided himself on keeping his life in perfect order. “Was Sutter the other party involved?”

He turned his palms up. “I have no idea. She took that secret with her to her grave.”

The idea that Sutter remained Pierce’s partner for a while after her death seemed to negate that possibility. “You never hired a private investigator to look into her extracurricular activities?”

“I did not.” He cleared his throat. “I had no desire to confirm my suspicions. I loved her. As I said, I hoped if the worst was true that it would pass.”

As heartfelt as his answer sounded, Pierce was the sort of man who generally kept tabs on all aspects of his world. Why would he ignore some part he believed to be out of sync, or worse, out of his control completely?

“How did you come to learn that Sutter suspected you killed your wife?” A good deal of time passed before the two ended their partnership. If Sutter truly believed such a thing, why wouldn’t he have brought it up sooner? Weeks or months after Cara Pierce died? Particularly if there was a possibility he had been in love with her.

“Perhaps he thought if he stayed close to me that I would eventually confess to him or that he would find some sort of evidence.” He stared at the glass as if weighing the prospect of having a second drink. “I really have no idea what he was thinking. Or why he thought it.”

“Did he know you were aware of your wife’s affair?”

“I assume he did. He would likely see that as a motive for me wanting her dead. Frankly, there is nothing else his message could have meant.”

“But your wife died in a hospital after a car crash. What’s his theory about how you murdered her under the circumstances?”

Bella had read the reports. The accident was caused by a horrendous snowstorm. As he said before, the nearest hospital was not adequately equipped. There was no one to do the surgery his wife needed. There was only Devon Pierce and he’d had a broken collarbone, a gash in his head requiring twenty stitches, a broken nose and a fractured jaw. He’d refused to allow them to see to his injuries until his wife was stabilized. When no one could help her, he’d tried. He’d just completed the repair to her ruptured spleen when the bleeding in her brain sent the situation spiraling out of control. According to their statements, the medical staff at the hospital had all agreed: there was nothing else Dr. Pierce or anyone on-site could have done.

Nothing to indicate foul play.

Pierce stood again. “I have no answer for that question. I can only presume Sutter has lost his mind. If you have no other questions, I have work to do.”

His sixteen-to twenty-hour-a-day work schedule was something else she’d read about the man. “I’ll meet you at your office first thing in the morning,” she said as she pushed to her feet.

“I’m usually there by seven.”

“I’ll be there as well,” she fired back without hesitation.

They didn’t speak as they walked side by side to the front door. Bella’s mind kept going back to the seemingly unfounded idea that anyone could think he murdered his wife. Nothing she had read suggested outbursts or trouble handling his temper. She’d investigated her share of domestic violence cases and he didn’t fit the profile. The wife, on the other hand, fit the profile of spoiled rich wife perfectly. Not that Bella had discovered anything overly negative about her, but she had a penchant for spending and self-indulgence.

At the door, she couldn’t leave without asking again. “This makes no sense. The person coordinating this threat to you, whether Sutter or someone else, is smart.” She waited until he met her gaze. “He must have some reason to believe there was foul play on your part.” And some reason to think resurrecting Devon Pierce’s dead wife would somehow drive him to drastic measures.

There had been an investigation into his conduct as a physician in the situation. Standard procedure. But the extenuating circumstances warranted the steps he had taken that night.

The eyes that had scrutinized her so intently before abruptly looked away. “We made the trip to see her family once a year, so I had been there numerous times. I was aware of the meager health-care services available in the area.” He shrugged. “Perhaps he believes I chose a sedan at the rental car agency rather than an SUV equipped with four-wheel drive and then took that particular road in the storm for the very purpose of ensuring an accident. It was the most treacherous, curvy and hilly. But it was also the shortest route. It felt like the right decision at the time.”