"Nick, you're back. What a nice surprise. Did you find the diamonds?"

"Ladybug," he said, taking me away from Werner with an arm around my waist, "I've been looking forward to our reunion."

"After a day and a half?" I asked. "Hey, before I forget, tell the Feds that Victor Pierpont's apartment was bugged and I'm afraid he might have been murdered, too."

Nick sighed. "Shut up, Mad."

I tilted my head. "I'll bug you until you report the bugs."

"I'll do it after our reunion."

"Feeling friskier than when you left, are you?"

"Don't remind me." He lifted me in his arms and headed for the stairs.

"Hey, where are we going?" I asked, suddenly remembering Werner's clothes and luggage in my room.

"To reunite," Nick said, wiggling his brows.

"Nick, I'm pretty wrung out."

He slowed and gave me a questioning look.

I lay my head on his shoulder. "I buried my friend today."

"Ladybug, I'm sorry." His heart beneath my head slowed with his steps. In other words, he stopped thinking with his zipper brain. And after he did, he kissed my brow. "Tough day, hey? I'll take care of you."

We were not talking about the same kind of taking care of. "How did you get back so fast? I thought you were going all the way to Plaidivostock or something?"

"Slovenia," he corrected. "I searched the plane in flight and found what Gregor and I both thought were the diamonds. But, guess what, we didn't know until we got back to FBI headquarters, here in New York, that Gregor had stuffed cubic zirconias into the ceramic vial on his person."

"Ceramic?" I asked.

"Hard to detect in an X-ray."

"Ah." Diamonds fit into small places, like pill bottles that could be stuffed into plumbing traps, ceramic vials that could be stuffed I didn't want to know where, or . . . clear gla.s.s jars, with or without gel, like the ones somebody in a black raincoat watched Dom switch?

If Gregor had the cubic zirconias that I originally put on the dress, what happened to the real diamonds, I wondered, and why did Dom switch the gel jars?

Lightbulb moment: Dominique hid the diamonds-to protect or steal them. Being Dom I suspect she wanted to protect them. Which meant that she had worn cubic zirconias for the final act the night she died. I knew because I'd seen her in her bedroom taking the CZs from their settings and replacing them with rhinestones.

Hah, I finally understood my vision from last night, the night Werner spent with me. Oh sc.r.a.p, I also remembered a kiss, a zing-me-to-my-toes, curl-my-hair, fly-me-to-the-moon kiss, in my bed. I mean, Dom's bed, where I'd slept, and not alone.

Was the Wiener just generally a scrumpdillyicious kisser? Or had he known who he was kissing? Did that have anything to do with upping the sensuality level? Erp!

"You've gone quiet," Nick said.

I stopped biting my lip and focused on my on again's worried face. Such a gorgeous, loyal face. Guilt, guilt, guilt. "Cubic zirconias, hey?"

Dim-witted comeback, Mad, I told myself, feeling like a foolish traitor. "Call the Feds about the bugs on the third floor at Pierpont's now, will you?"

Nick set me on the floor in Dom's bedroom and made the call, and while he did, he looked around.

After he hung up, I saw the room through his eyes. Nick went from holding his hands on his hips to sticking them in his pockets.

His actions sent a mixed message, and I found myself crossing my arms defensively.

We both looked around. Unmade bed. Men and women's clothes, including underwear, strewn everywhere. Yep, we were in a hurry all right.

It looked like hurricane Madeira had gone through here. Good one, Madeira.

Nick went to the bed to touch the indentations in both pillows. "Sleepover?" he asked.

I nodded, a little too enthusiastically, though it hadn't been much more than that.

"I'd buy Eve wearing men's clothes," he said, "but I don't buy her packing a red jock sock."

"Excuse me," Werner said, coming through the door we'd left open and s.n.a.t.c.hing said jock sock from Nick's hand. "I need to pack my bags and move them upstairs."

Son of a st.i.tch!

Thirty-five.

The expression a woman wears on her face is more important than the clothes she wears on her back.

-DALE CARNEGIE Nick paced at the foot of the bed, looking mighty yummy in his scruffy jeans and leather jacket, his dark hair mussed and extra wavy. "Did you two sleep together last night?" he asked.

I winced. "Define sleep."

Werner pointed to his scabbing brow. "I was unconscious. She Tasered me. I figure the floor did the rest. In my book, that's not called foreplay."

Nick's whole body relaxed. "Why did you beat the c.r.a.p out of him, Mad?"

"Because I was half unconscious, myself, and there was a man coming into my room. You had already left."

Nick shrugged. "Why didn't you ask who it was?"

"Panic. Somebody had just called my cell phone and threatened my life." I opened the nightstand drawer. "Then there's this."

"Give me your cell phone. We'll trace the call. I'll get the contents of that drawer to forensics, too."

I gave him my cell phone. "Thanks."

"I don't like that you were threatened."

I scoffed. "It sure weirded me out."

Werner stepped between us. "Don't you think that somebody telling Mad to go home means that she's getting close to the truth?"

"Are you saying, Detective, that you stayed with her to protect her?"

I smacked his arm with the back of a hand. "Cut the snark, Nick."

"Did you Taser him because he got in bed with you?"

"No, I Tasered him then I dragged him to the bed." Nick eyed Werner. "You had to be dragged?"

"This is no joke, Jaconetti." I stamped my foot. "We were both nearly unconscious. First thing we knew, it was morning and Eve was barging in on us."

"Really? What did she interrupt?"

"I was concussed in my suit, thank you very much," Werner snapped.

"And you, Mad?" Nick asked. "Were you concussed in your clothes?"

"I don't like you right now, Nick, just so you know. I was wearing one of Dom's peignoir sets, at her request," I stressed, "if you must know."

Nick looked suddenly sheepish. "Dom's peignoir set? Okay, I get it."

"Well, I don't get it," Werner said. Not knowing about my psychometric ability to read vintage clothes, he wouldn't, of course.

Nick shut the nightstand drawer with the toe of his shoe. "I'm not usually jealous, but with us on again-"

I had to tell him about returning Werner's mighy fine kiss, even if I was half asleep. And I would someday. I crossed my arms and leaned against the window. "We're not on again."

Nick chuckled as if I'd made a joke. "May I see the peignoir set?"

I got the set and the note asking me to wear it, and put them in his hands, trusting he wouldn't give my psychic ability away to Werner. "We're losing track of the murder investigation," I pointed out.

Nick stared at his hand through the fabric then he looked up at me. When Nick is mad, he doesn't think, because he was brought up in a family of hotheads. Usually, he controlled himself, but his silent accusation, this was too much. "I'll thank you to take your bags and go find other accommodations."

Werner was already packing his things, but Nick's expression questioned my statement.

"Both of you," I said. "I'd like to be alone right now."

"Mad," Nick said. "I apologize. I've missed you and I-"

"Don't trust me."

"I trust you, but look at this place. We leave a room like this, after we've-"

My head came up. "Kindly refrain from finishing that statement."

Werner straightened and looked around the room.

Embarra.s.sment warmed my cheeks. Sure, I had some questions about the kiss I remembered from my dreams, or from sleep, or whatever, but, well, Nick should trust me.

I held the door while the two men left with their bags.

"Feel free to take the morning train tomorrow," I said. "I'll be taking a later one. I have some things to go over with Kyle before I leave."

"But shouldn't we discuss what we found in Victor's rooms, if not the entire case so far?" Werner asked. "Not that I'm an official investigator, but then neither are you, Mad."

"Thanks for pointing that out and ticking me off just a little bit more," I said. "By the time I get home, or the day after at the latest, my temper should have cooled enough for the three of us to compare notes. Get one thing clear. I wouldn't feel like talking to either of you if Dom wasn't my friend."

"Where did I go wrong?" Werner asked.

"You have a Y chromosome. Right now, that's enough. And Jaconetti, consider us very off-again."

"I guess I deserve that. Have a good trip home, ladybug."

Thirty-six.

Never let your frog outdress you.

-MISS PIGGY Eve had taken the early train with the two men in my life, about whom I had mixed emotions, which, several hours later, my time on the train failed to clarify.

As we pulled into the station, I saw Werner sitting in his car waiting for me. The Wiener, my frog frickin' prince? No way.

d.a.m.n Eve for putting that shadow of doubt in my mind. I did remember what happened that night. Nothing. Well, a kiss . . .

I stood at the top of the train steps and glanced at the sky. Please G.o.d, G.o.ddess-or whoever watches over concussed sleuths with itchy Taser fingers-let that night have amounted to only one hot kiss. I didn't need any more complications in my life.

Werner took my bag as I reached the edge of the platform.

"I expected Nick," I said, "but thanks for picking me up. Hey, do you have a black eye?"

He led the way to his car. "You should see the other guy."

"Not Nick?"

"No, it's from kissing the floor with my face. You gave me the black eye. I call it Mad Taser blue."

"Oh. Sorry."

He opened his trunk and put my bag inside, then he took a bottle of Dos Equis out of each pocket and gave one to me before he urged me to a nearby bench.