“Ms. Whalen, can you tell me what’s going on here? Isn’t this the man who was just released from prison, Steve Carlson? And why are you here?”

  Kelly didn’t want to talk to the eager-beaver reporter, but had discovered the hard way the more you tried to dodge the press, the more they pursued you. She walked to the front door. “Hello, Amber. I accompanied one of the detectives here.” Kelly didn’t mention she and Ash were the ones who had found the body.

  “Is Steve Carlson dead?” Amber shoved the microphone in Kelly’s face and the cameraman behind her started taping.

  It was better for the situation if Kelly gave the reporter a minimum of information. Squinting because of the camera light, Kelly answered, “Yes, Steve Carlson was found dead in his apartment.”

  “Was he murdered?”

  “At this point, I don’t feel free to supply any more details. The police haven’t finished working the scene. Further details will be released later.”

  Amber frowned. “Can you comment on the method of death?”

  “You’ll get all the information you need from the police information officer,” Ash interjected, his tone hard and professional. He stood behind Kelly, a solid, welcome presence.

  Amber ignored his silent warning. “Can you tell me anything more?”

  “No.”

  Any sensible person would have understood the danger in pressing her case. Apparently Amber didn’t fall into that category.

  “But this is important for the public to know. What happened?”

  Ash glared at young reporter and said nothing. He pushed his way through the reporter and her cameraman. Kelly followed.

  “Damn press,” Ash grumbled as he walked down the stairs. He stopped by his car and glanced around the parking lot.

  When the captain had mentioned that Ash was good at dealing with the press, Kelly had wondered what the man had been drinking. She felt fortunate that Ash had simply walked away from the confrontation instead of blistering the young woman for her stupidity. He had done so in the past with other reporters.

  He ran his fingers through his hair. “Sometimes I wonder where they dig up these little wonders.”

  “I’ll give you brownie points for waiting until you were out of earshot to make your comment.”

  His head came up and his eyes locked with hers. A hint of humor twinkled in his eyes. “Yeah, well even this old dog can learn a new trick.”

  He didn’t look like an old dog. Instead, he looked like a strong presence that she could depend upon. She shied away from the thought. “You going to interview Carlson’s neighbors tonight?”

  “Yes. I’m waiting for my partner to help.”

  “You have a new partner?” Of course he had. The last partner she knew about was now a lawyer with HPD, advising the department on legal matters. She purposely had not kept up with Ash’s career.

  Suddenly two sedans pulled into the parking lot. From one car emerged a well-muscled man in his early forties with a steely-eyed gaze. A woman got out of the second car. Tall, shapely and very pretty, the woman’s blond hair was pulled back into a ponytail. Was this Ash’s partner? A stab of jealously knifed through Kelly.

  The captain over Homicide nodded at them. “Ms. Whalen.”

  “Captain Jenkins.”

  “Ash, what do we have here?” Captain Jenkins asked. He wore a want-to-chew-nails expression.

  “Kelly and I wanted to talk to Carlson. When he didn’t answer the door, a neighbor—” he glanced at Kelly to see if she would point out their witness was a little girl, but she remained quiet “—assured us that he was there, that she’d seen Carlson and another man enter the apartment, then heard them argue. The other man left. I felt the circumstances warranted entrance. We found Carlson dead on the floor of his bedroom.”

  His expression hard, Captain Jenkins turned to Kelly. “Detective Ashcroft had your opinion on the exigent circumstances?” The good captain wanted the department’s rear covered.

  “He did and the circumstances were urgent.”

  Captain Jenkins nodded. “Show me where you found the body.”

  Ash, Captain Jenkins and the woman turned and started back toward the building. Ash paused. “Kelly, are you coming?”

  She wanted to go, to make sure everything was seen to, but she wouldn’t appreciate the cops trying to tell her how to try a case. “What’s happening is your job. I’m going home. I’ll let the D.A. know about Carlson.”

  A gleam of admiration flickered in his eyes, then he nodded and turned. As she watched him go, Kelly knew things were going to get ugly if they continued the investigation into Catherine Reed’s murder. Everyone would expect the inquiry to stop with Carlson’s death, but neither she nor Ash wanted to let it go. It wasn’t finished. The case had just taken an unexpected turn.

  Ash didn’t understand why he was here, parked in front of Kelly’s house—their home pre-divorce.

  His skin prickled as the air of familiarity washed over him and a thousand memories assaulted him. What the hell was he doing here?

  He came to fill Kelly in on what he’d discovered from the neighbors, he told himself. Share with her what the lab techs thought about Carlson’s death, and nothing else.

  Liar, a voice in his head whispered. You could’ve done all that with a call tomorrow morning.

  He didn’t have an argument against that truth. Instead, he walked to the front door. The color had changed. It was no longer a mud-ugly brown. Now a soft peach graced the wood.

  He knocked and heard steps in the entranceway, then the door opened. Kelly stood there in a robe of some soft material that clung faithfully to every curve. He cursed under his breath.

  You’re batting a thousand, Ashcroft.

  “Ash, what are you doing here?” She held a cup of coffee.

  “I thought I’d fill you in on what we discovered.” It sounded lame to his ears.

  Her level of interest intensified. “Did you turn up something significant?”

  “No.” He felt as if he was six years old and had stumbled in front of the entire school at the Christmas pageant. “It seems no one saw anything, but that didn’t sit right with me or my partner, Julie.”

  “Julie?”

  “You goin’ to make me stand outside for this entire conversation? I doubt the neighbors want to hear about the Carlson murder.” He glanced around at the other homes.

  “You’re wrong, Ash,” she grumbled. “Everyone wants to hear about it, from my boss to Mrs. Schattle.” The elderly woman was the neighborhood’s busybody.

  Apparently things had already gotten sticky. “So you want Mrs. Schattle involved?” he asked.

  Her cheeks reddened. She stepped back and motioned him inside.

  Ash glanced around as he walked into the living room. She’d replaced most of the hand-me-downs they’d been given. New sofa and chairs.

  “You mentioned Julie. I assume that was the woman who arrived at the crime scene with Captain Jenkins.”

  Julie had laid into him for his lack of manners in not introducing his partner to his ex. He’d argued there hadn’t been time, but his conscience hadn’t bought that excuse. When Julie left the crime scene, he told her he would introduce her to Kelly at their next meeting. Julie had laughed and told him she was over the slight. She assured him that she wouldn’t introduce him to her former boyfriend and to forget it.

  “Yes, it was,” he answered.

  “What did she think about the crime scene? She think it was a suicide or murder?”

  “She agrees with our conclusion.”

  “It’s nice to know you and I aren’t that far off the mark.”

  He leaned against the wall inside the door. “Both of us had the feeling that our little witness wasn’t the only one who overheard this exchange between Carlson and the other man, but no one is talking. I think we might have better luck in a couple of days when the entire building isn’t crawling with cops. Julie is good at putting witnesses at ease and getting them to talk.”

  Kelly held the cup close to her chest. His gaze locked onto her chest. “You want a cup of coffee?”

  He thanked heaven she misinterpreted his gaze. “Sounds good.”

  He followed her into the kitchen. Kelly poured him a cup, then opened the refrigerator door for an exotic-favored coffee creamer. “Want some?”

  He frowned and stepped closer, grabbing the cup. “No.”

  She shrugged and poured a little more into her cup.

  He didn’t remember her liking her coffee smothered in cream. It emphasized that time had moved on and they were both different people. “Why even drink coffee if you put that much funny milk into it?”

  She glared at him. “Because I’m an A.D.A. and not a cop. And I need the caffeine to stay awake. I’ve got work.” She took a sip and sighed. “What did the lab guys say?”

  “They were going to run tests on Carlson’s hand and temple to see if there was any gunpowder residue. But they agreed with us that it didn’t look like a self-inflected wound. The body position looked staged.”

  He took a sip of the dark roast. “You mentioned you heard from your boss. What did he say?”

  She shook her head. “When I got home, I found a message on my machine from Jake. It appears he saw the news flash earlier in the evening. He wanted an explanation for what we were doing at Carlson’s apartment.”

  From her expression, Ash guessed that Jake Thorpe might have done more than politely ask for an explanation. “What’d did he say?”

  She hesitated.

  “You might as well tell me it all. We’re in this together, and I’m sure I’ll get mine tomorrow.”

  “You mean your boss didn’t nail you tonight?”

  “He wasn’t happy that it was me who found the body.” Damn fool had been Jenkins’s exact comment, but Kelly didn’t need to know that.

  From her expression, she knew he had gotten grief but didn’t press the issue. “I think Jake talked to your boss, because I got the same reaction. He wanted a report from the scene. He didn’t want any more trouble with this case than we’ve already had. Apparently, the news flash on the local stations reached a lot of people. Carlson’s lawyer called, upset. And the Procters also called.”

  “I’m sure they weren’t upset.” He leaned back against the counter.

  “He didn’t say.”

  “It seems like all the little parties in our case have checked in.”

  “Except—” Her eyes met his.

  “The grieving husband.”

  It spoke volumes about this mess. It made Ash want to gnash his teeth. Damn, Carlson had gotten the short end of the stick, again.

  Kelly wrapped both hands around her mug. Her fingers flexed, making Ash wonder if she was that worried about the case, or maybe it was something else.

  Yeah, like sex. He shook his head. It just proved that men never grew out of their youthful fantasies.

  “There are any number of reasons why Andrew Reed wouldn’t have seen that broadcast,” she said. “I’m sure he’ll know within a few hours. But I won’t be surprised if he never contacts the D.A.’s office again.”

  “You nailed it.” He studied her, wanting to know if she still felt the same way she had at the crime scene. “You still want me to look into this, Kelly?” He wanted to hear her confirm her earlier desire to unravel the inconsistencies of this case.

  She put down her coffee cup but didn’t look at him. “I remember times when you pursued a case where the evidence indicated one thing, but you went with your gut feeling. It was a headache for the D.A.’s office, but you were generally right. This just doesn’t feel right, does it, Ash?” She raised her head and her gaze locked with his.

  His entire body went on alert. This was not the time to be thinking with his hormones. But deep inside, he felt a certain satisfaction that she had acknowledged the validity of his hunches. “No, it doesn’t feel right.”

  She nodded. “Okay. Let’s get the autopsy reports and see where it takes us.”

  “You got it.” He downed the last of his coffee and set the cup in the sink. A memory of another time, when he and Kelly were married, washed over him. He’d come home late after a brutal investigation. They’d shared coffee, then had fallen into bed together. She’d made him forget for a few hours the ugliness of the crime.

  As he walked to the front door, he caught a glimpse of her bedroom off the main hall. From what he could see, that room hadn’t changed. Odd.

  What was even worse was his reaction to that knowledge.

  The door beyond their bedroom was closed. That was the nursery. He wondered what he would find if he opened that door. He didn’t want to know.

  He reached for the front door. “I’ll give you a call when the reports are back in.” He didn’t turn around to look at her. He didn’t want to see the light shining through that robe again. He’d already had too many shocks tonight. He didn’t need another one.

  Captain Jenkins appeared at the door of his office. “Ashcroft.”

  Ash glanced up from the morning report. His partner hadn’t come in yet. He moved to the captain’s office. The corner room had windows and natural light, but files and papers cluttered his desk.

  “Yeah, Captain, what can I do for you?”

  “Since the D.A. doesn’t need you anymore, you can go back to your caseload. Julie’s been assigned a couple more cases since you’ve been working with the D.A.”

  “I plan to follow up on the Carlson case,” Ash informed him. He might as well alert his captain to what was going down.

  Jenkins went still. “Why?”

  “Because, Captain, Kelly and I both suspect Carlson was murdered to shut him up.”

  “And why do you think that?”

  “Because our investigation was making folks uncomfortable. I know Andrew Reed hated my questions about his relationship with his wife. And he definitely didn’t like questions about the night of the murder. Acted like I was out of line to be questioning him again.”

  “I want to read the file.”

  Ash nodded. “Carlson would’ve been indicted again because of the social pressure, but now that he’s dead, people will assume the Houston PD won’t need to investigate any further into Catherine Reed’s murder. I’m sure Andrew Reed is breathing a sigh of relief, along with the Procters. When I talked with those fine, upstanding citizens, they were ready to take out Carlson themselves—or have it done.”

  Captain Jenkins sighed. He was the one who caught the fallout of the politics of the situation. “You’re a pain in the butt, Ash.”

  “I know, but I’m right.”

  Jenkins pointed his finger at Ash. “You just be sure I’ve got paper to shove in the elected guys’ faces when they come and complain to me.”

  “I’ll do it.”

  “The D.A. on board with this?”

  “A.D.A. Whalen is on board if I can show her evidence.”

  “I also want the D.A. apprised of this. I don’t want any of us to get our necks chopped off.”

  “You got it.” Ash walked back to his desk. He’d just opened the newspaper when Ralph Lee walked into the room. He paused by Ash’s desk.

  “How’s the Carlson investigation going, Ashcroft? Turn up any new leads?”

  Ash looked into the older man’s face. In his eyes was a certain satisfaction. “You haven’t seen a newspaper or the TV?”

  “No. I just got back in from my vacation in the Big Bend area. I stayed away from all media for good reason.”

  Ash picked up a copy of the Houston Chronicle and pointed to the story below the fold on the front page.

  Ralph raised a brow and glanced at the story. “I guess the little rat couldn’t take the heat anymore.”

  Ash didn’t comment. The statement didn’t deserve a comment.

  Ralph turned and walked to his desk, leaving a bad taste in Ash’s mouth.

  Ash slipped into the back of the courtroom and sat in the last row. Kelly stood before the witness stand, interviewing the middle-aged man.

  “So, Mr. Jones, you say you saw the defendant arguing with his wife.”

  Ash watched as Kelly walked toward the witness. Her dark navy suit couldn’t disguise her curves. The simple lines only emphasized her figure. She still had the best-looking backside he’d ever seen.

  The first time he had laid eyes on Kelly, he’d watched her walk down the stairs in a lecture room where they had both attended a criminal justice class. She’d brushed by him as she slipped into the row of seats. That good-looking backside had been shoved in his face. If she’d known what he’d been thinking, she never would’ve agreed to go with him to get coffee afterward.

  “What did you hear the defendant say to his wife?” Kelly asked the man.

  Her legs, encased in dark hose, were a man’s fantasy. They certainly had been his.

  Enough, Ashcroft, he commanded himself. You keep that up and you won’t make it through this case with all your marbles.

  “He said that he’d rather kill her than let her have all his money.”

  She nodded. “Thank you.” Turning, she glanced at the gallery and saw him. She hesitated, then walked to the prosecution table. “I don’t have any further questions for this witness.”

  The defense attorney questioned the witness but couldn’t shake the man’s story. Kelly had probably prepared the man for this line of questioning. She was good in the courtroom. And passionate. She believed in the law, in doing what was right. In that, they thought alike. Their passions ran the same.

  And in bed—

  He stopped the thought. He kept running over this track again and again. What was wrong with him? It shouldn’t have mattered after five years. He didn’t need any more grief than he already had. Why didn’t he just shoot himself in the foot? It would probably be less painful in the long run.

  “We’ll adjourn until two,” the judge said, bringing his gavel down.

  Kelly stood and glanced over her shoulder. She nodded to him, then collected her papers. He waited for her by the door.

  “What are you doing here, Ash?” she asked as she met him at the double doors.

  “I’ve got the autopsy report on Carlson. I thought we might go over it.”