Premise of Innocence by Patricia McLinn

Author:Patricia McLinn
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Romantic, Suspence
ISBN: 9781944126889
Publisher: Patricia McLinn
Published: 2022-01-22T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

“Mom, Dad,” Ally said to them when she returned from Iris’, “we have to go to Fairlington tonight to appear at the police department first thing in the morning. You’re welcome to stay here or find a hotel—”

“I’ll come with you.”

“I’ll—”

“It’s official police meetings, Mom. You can’t. Either of you.”

She’d recognized the benefits of going to Fairlington first while Iris went on about the funeral events. Then she’d thought of being away from her parents. And out of this house.

“I’m afraid there’s not room, Aunt Greta,” Jamie contributed. “My house is quite small.”

She didn’t mention that Maggie also had a townhouse or that Wes and Dana planned to spend the night at their home an hour or so south. On the other hand, she doubted anybody could imagine a scenario where either or both of Ally’s parents stayed with Maggie.

* * * *

“Darn.” Jamie tugged at the curtains at the front window of her living room in the narrow historic house she’d inherited from a maternal relative in Old Town Fairlington, Virginia.

They’d entered Jamie’s from the back. As they started to file into the living room at the front of the house, J.D. said, “Curtains,” and subtly blocked Ally, keeping her in the hallway.

Jamie had hurried forward to close them and block the view inside for anyone on the street outside.

The bottom of the curtain moved, but not the rings across the rod. “The rings are stuck where the rod fits into another piece. Bel, can you…?”

“Landis will. He’s taller. Claims all sorts of perks because of that, about time we get something useful from it.”

Landis grimaced at his partner, but immediately went to Jamie.

“I think it’s caught on both sides, Tanner.”

“I’ll get it. Leave the genius to think deep thoughts.”

From the hallway, Ally saw that Belichek had not moved from where he’d stopped in front of the fireplace, seeming to examine the painting she’d done of Aunt Vivian’s park.

“What are you doing?” Jamie asked him.

“Looking.”

“You’ve seen that painting a thousand times.”

“See more every time.”

Jamie turned her beaming smile toward Ally. “That’s quite a compliment to the artist.”

“It is,” she agreed to placate her cousin.

Because he wasn’t just looking. He was questioning the painting — interrogating it.

It unsettled her.

Nothing like the butterflies in the stomach edginess of awaiting a teacher’s comments or a judge’s verdict. Instead, a visceral urge to get between the detective and the painting.

Because, as much as she had no idea what his questions were, she also didn’t know what answers it would give.

“Though I’m worried about the verdict.”

She immediately wished she’d said something else — anything else — to break the silence, because Ford Belichek looked over his shoulder at her with a look that switched the interrogation from the painting to her.

“No need to worry about me. Landis is the aesthetic police,” Bel said.

Ally’s gaze, a little surprised, a little thoughtful, went to Landis’ back, where he’d freed the rings on one side, and was pulling those curtains closed.

“That’s only from the point of view of a heathen.

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