"A minute," he said, partly covering the mouthpiece, then to me: "I'll try to hurry it up, but no guarantees."

"Do you think Laney's in danger?"

He exhaled softly. "I'm a cop."

"Ergo everyone's in danger?"

"Check your trunk," he said.

I snorted and moved to hang up, but he spoke again.

"Who are you planning to call next?"

"What?"

"To ask 'bout the letters. Who else do you have on your list?"

"No one."

"No one owes you any favors?"

"Besides you?"

"What do I owe you?"

"I saved your father's life."

"And I'm trying to forgive you for that," he said, and hung up.

I sat there for a while, fidgety and fretful, reminding myself that, as Rivera had said, the letters weren't overtly threatening. But sometimes danger isn't obvious. I thought of a dozen such scenarios. Scenarios regarding people who thought they had been perfectly safe.

Rivera's father, for instance. Rivera himself, paranoia personified, had thought the senator was safe. But that hadn't been the case. In the end, I had found the senator held at gunpoint on his ranch in the Santa Monica foothills. And from there things had gone downhill. The gunman had gotten angry, the police had revved their sirens, and I had been shot.

On the upside, the senator had sworn his eternal grat.i.tude.

The thoughts spun to a halt in my head.

Of course, Rivera and his father were barely on speaking terms. Hence, I shouldn't get senior involved in junior's affairs, namely police work. That would be wrong.

Then again, I wouldn't feel all that great about letting my best friend get killed, either, I thought, and picked up the phone.

16.

I believe in s.e.x and death, two experiences that come only once in a lifetime.-Woody Allen That night I was lying in bed, surrounded by ta.s.seled pillows and gorgeous, half-naked guys. One was ma.s.saging my lower back with a scented oil that smelled like man. Another was giving me a foot ma.s.sage. My toes were nestled up against his warm, muscular chest when a bell rang.

The foot man sucked my baby toe into his mouth and I moaned. The bell rang again. Probably summoning the dessert-bearer. But perhaps I would forgo dessert this once. At least until the pedi-ma.s.seur was finished ...

"h.e.l.lo," crooned a voice. I smiled and snuggled a little deeper into my pillows. "Yes," he said, but the voice had morphed from the s.e.xy rumble of a good man-slave to the high, jittery tone of a nerd.

d.a.m.nit! I had been dreaming. Or maybe I was dreaming now. If memory served, and history was repeating itself, I had gone to bed alone.

But the voice spoke again. I reached out, groggy, hair in my eyes. And sure enough, my hand met the body of another human being.

Unusual. I slipped my hand over what felt like a shirt.

"What? Oh." There was relief in the voice, which, now that I was marginally coherent, sounded a full octave higher than that of any self-respecting s.e.x slave. I scowled and slipped my hand down my visitor's spine. It was conspicuously devoid of heaving muscle. And his a.s.s ...

"You're going to want to wake up now, Mac," Laney said.

I opened one immediately paranoid eye.

Solberg turned toward me, his Woody Allen face illuminated by the diffused light of the hallway.

I jerked upright. Harlequin lifted his head, offended that I had yanked my foot out of his tongue's reach.

Laney was staring at me from beside the door. "The man-slave dream?" she asked.

I snapped my gaze from her to Solberg. "What's going on?"

"Phone. I thought it might be important," Elaine said. moving nearer.

Solberg nodded and handed over the receiver. "It's for you."

I scowled, still hoping I could chalk up this late night interruption to just another good dream gone bad. "Is it a ma.s.s murderer?"

"Don't think so," Solberg said. "But it's probably not a s.e.x slave, either."

I shot a jaundiced glare toward Laney, reminding her that best friends keep secrets, but she just shrugged. "Would you rather have him believe you were coming on to him?"

I said something suitably nasty and took the receiver.

"h.e.l.lo?" My voice sounded like a cross between a rusty hinge and a water buffalo.

"Ms. McMullen?"

I glanced around the dimly lit room. There were four articles of clothing on the floor, six half-read novels beside the bed, and a dehydrated philodendron wilting by the window. Probably my house. "I believe so," I said.

"This is Renee Edwards."

I patted the top of my head. The snarl quotient felt about the same as mine usually does at this time of night. Evidence was rising that I was, indeed, Christina McMullen. "Who?"

"I'm a handwriting expert," said Edwards. She had a tough, impatient voice. "I work for the Los Angeles Police Department."

"Oh, yes." I shot my gaze to the twosome near my bed and tightened my grip on the phone.

"I'm told your case is of an extremely urgent nature."

I bit my lip, feeling the slightest twinge of guilt. After some soul-bending deliberation, I had called Rivera Senior. Subsequently, the senator had worked his usual magic. But as with any genie's lamp, there were always repercussions. I was still waiting to discover what they would be.

"Yes," I said again.

"Ergo, I've reviewed the letters in my free time," she continued.

Ergo, she sounded a little miffed about it. "All of them?"

The affirmative seemed to be implied. "And worked up a preliminary a.n.a.lysis."

I was trying to get my ducks in a row, but there were a couple little b.u.g.g.e.rs that kept popping out of line. "What time is it?"

"Four hundred hours."

My mind worked dizzily on that for a while only to realize it was an unG.o.dly time of the night when no one in her right mind should be conscious. What on earth did this gal owe the senator?

"I'll send you a written transcript of my findings, as well, of course, but thought you might like to hear an expedited opinion of my conclusions immediately."

At four hundred unG.o.dly hours? Was she kidding? "Yes," I said, trying to wrestle my hair out of my eyes. "Please."

"It is my estimation that the author knows Ms. b.u.t.terfield personally."

"How personally?"

"An acquaintance."

"A man or a woman?"

"I can't ascertain that with any accuracy at this time. But for the moment let's a.s.sume he is male."

"Okay."

I could almost hear the military-crisp nod. "He has strong feelings of inferiority and an intense need to be accepted."

So he was human, I thought, and tucked my wet foot under the blankets. Harlequin looked bereft, which might mean that the letter-writer could also be canine. Or Great Danish.

"In your opinion is this person dangerous?" I asked.

There was a long pause. For a moment I wondered if she had fallen asleep. It was, after all, UnG.o.dly Hour. But she spoke finally.

"That's impossible to say for certain."

"Let's say for uncertain, then."

"In the wrong circ.u.mstances, I believe he may be."

I glanced at Laney again. "What circ.u.mstances would those be?" I asked.

"If there was a situation that was pushing him to act, perhaps violence would be imminent."

"What kind of situation?"

"Something that needed immediate attention. My evaluation suggests that he is not a person who likes to be rushed."

There were a few more salient pieces of information, but I hung up shortly afterward.

I couldn't help but notice that Solberg was now sitting on my bed. The s.e.xy man-slaves were notably absent. For a moment I questioned the existence of a loving G.o.d.

"A handwriting expert," I said.

Laney nodded. "Who keeps odd hours."

"Maybe she's a night person."

"Or you called in favors," she guessed.

I didn't comment. "Why is Solberg on my bed?"

"I thought maybe you were comatose," Solberg said.

"Get off," I said. "Or someone will be."

He grinned and rose to his feet.

"Rivera's not going to be happy if he finds out you contacted his father," Laney said.

I scowled at her psychic weirdness. "I didn't know who else to call."

"We could have hired our own a.n.a.lyst," she said.

"Or bought one," Solberg suggested.

"Most of those a.n.a.lytic slaves don't work around the clock like they used to in the good old days," I said.

"Plus, doing it this way had the added bonus of irritating the lieutenant," Laney said, watching me.

My first instinct was to brush off her statement, but even at UnG.o.dly Hour, it made a certain amount of sense. So I filed it away for later a.n.a.lysis of my own before recapping my recent phone conversation.

"Inferiority and an intense need to be accepted," Solberg said, ruminating.

"Yeah." I stared at him. "Can I see a sample of your handwriting?"

He watched me for a second, then threw back his head and laughed.

I resisted rolling my eyes as I returned my attention to Laney. "Any ideas?"