Page 10 of Wicked Sin

“It’s in my car. You dropped it when the explosive device went off.”

She nods.

The bomb squad commander is waiting for us when we get to my vehicle.

“Ms. Reid.” He introduces himself. “We’re going to need to search your office and home. Your apartment building has already been evacuated, but the team there is waiting for my go-ahead to send our dog in.”

Her eyes are as big as saucers. “Okay.”

“Is there anything we should know about before we go in there? Anything that might be dangerous?”

“No.” Her face pinches tight. “I have no idea why someone would do this to me. Do you think there’s really another bomb at my apartment?”

“Let’s hope not, ma’am.”

After he takes his leave, and we’re in the car, she lets out a rough, shaky breath. “He was nicer than you, by the way.”

“Most people are.”

“You threatened to arrest me.”

“I did.”

“That usually leads to a charge of some kind.”

“You’re familiar with the process.”

She shrugs. “Growing up in my family, the threat of police showing up and taking everything away was just a given.”

That’s pretty fucked up. “How often did that happen?”

“Never, actually.” Her voice is distant, and it occurs to me that a lawyer would have a field day with me questioning her in this condition.

But I don’t think that’s going to be an issue, because I don’t think Taylor Reid has done anything wrong here. I’m quite sure forensics won’t find any drugs in her car, and the heads-up from the Secret Service was supposed to be a big, splashy front page oops.

But they bunted the investigation to me, and what’s another car fire in the life of the LAPD? That’s how we’re going to talk about it publicly. The LAPD doesn’t make a big deal about minor vehicle mishaps.

But that means whoever is playing a game with Ms. Reid may—will—try again.

And as I predicted, my vacation plans are toast.

I don’t like dancing that much anyway.

“It was an idle threat,” I admit. “Designed to get a reaction out of you. You seem prickly.”

“I am.”

“That makes two of us, Ms. Reid. Maybe we can lean on that to understand each other.”

Taylor snorts. “Sure. Fine. Okay. Understand this: I don’t want to be dragged into whatever my father is doing.” She looks at me. “Has done?”

I don’t say anything. I can’t.

She frowns. “But I won’t protect him, either.”

It’s a good line. It may even be the truth. But someone planting an explosive device in her car says that she’s involved, whether she wants to be or not. The question is, why? Why try to kill a woman who has distanced herself from her family, on the same day that family is indicted for a host of financial crimes?

The Secret Service may be able to provide more insight into that. There are probably sealed elements of the case that could be shared inter-departmentally now that we’ve got an attempted murder case on our hands. Or depending on how it plays out, a simple case of mischief. Officially.

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