THIRTY-FIVE

They made it to ICC by four o’clock. Barely.

“I can’t believe we both fell asleep,” she muttered as they hurried through the parking lot and into the building.

“I can. We were tired, we had a good meal—”

“A delicious egg-laden meal.”

“It was a beautiful day.” He showed the guard his badge, she showed her ID; they were allowed to go back. “It would have been odder if we hadn’t dozed off.”

She laughed. “Only you can make not falling asleep in a cemetery seem weird. And I’ve got to get a haircut.” She was trying to scrape her bangs out of her eyes (fashionably long and too long were not the same thing) and repeatedly failing.

“Your hair is lovely.”

“Drake genes—we’re all shaggy. Like bison!” Stubborn, willful, argumentative, meat-eating bison.

Archer and Leah were waiting for them. They must have just gotten there, as they were still holding the forms ICC needed to authorize their visit. Whew!

“Mr. Drake. Ms. Nazir.”

“Hello again,” Leah replied. “I almost didn’t recognize you in jeans.”

Archer was staring at Angela. Don’t squirm. Don’t fidget. Don’t look away. Drakes can smell fear, and also eggs.

“Sorry to keep you guys waiting.”

“We only just got here,” Leah assured her, but Archer was having none of it.

He took a step closer. “You look great. You’re glowing.”

“That’s a disgusting lie and you know it.”

His nose was five inches from her own. “You’re glowing.”

“You’re wrong. That’s not my glow. It’s Leah’s! Because, y’know, the pregnancy. Right?” Not my best off-the-cuff defense.

“What, because one of you is glowing that means nobody else in the vicinity can? And then there’s this clump of”—he reached out and brushed his fingers over the top of her head—“bark?”

“So?”

“In your hair.”

“So?”

“And you seem so . . . Hmm, the word’s on the tip of my tongue.” He rubbed his forehead and gave the impression of someone thinking hard, which was annoying. “What’s the opposite of grimly driven and obsessed?”

“Happily comatose?”

“Happy!” He snapped his fingers. “That’s what it is. You’re glowy and smiley and happy.”

“So?”

“You’re never happy here. None of us have ever been hap— Oh. My. God.” Archer seized her elbow and hauled her a few feet away from Leah and Jason.

She shook free of his grip. “You know they’re only five feet away, right? If your goal is not to be overheard? Because they can hear us.”

“You got laid!” he hiss-screamed.

She crossed her arms over her chest. Wait! Not so much with the defensive body language. Then she dropped her arms and just sort of stood there. Oh, yes, very natural. Cripes. “I did not.”

“I can’t believe this. It’s almost unprecedented. Your sex life—”

“Which I won’t be discussing with you today or ever, so put that thought out of your teeny-tiny mind forever.”

“—is your business.”

“How wise of you to know it.”

“But is he such an improvement over Klown that you banged him within days of meeting him?”

“Technically it’d be within a month of meeting him. And I didn’t bang anyone! In the last month, I mean.” There’d been the lawyer who was clerking for Judge Finney last spring, but Angela had made the classic American error of mistaking an accent for a personality. He had Benedict Cumberbatch’s voice, Moriarty’s conscience, and Mycroft’s bedroom skills: chilly and to the point.

Archer pointed to her head. “Your post-sex hair says otherwise.”

“My hair isn’t post-sex. And even if it was, my hair wouldn’t say one damned word to you.”

“So does your pleasant expression. And the fact that you’re not looking around for a brick to hit me with. You definitely slept with him ow-ow-ow!”

She’d reached out and pinched him on the bicep and, when he jerked back and rubbed his arm, she hissed, “I did not!”

“My fault, I shouldn’t have used the past tense. You are sleeping together.”

“We are not sleeping together! In the present tense or otherwise. We are napping together.”

“Spare me the lugubrious details, pervert.”

“We cleaned up Dad’s grave and had a picnic and fell asleep under a willow tree on an island full of dead Burnhams and then had to sprint to his car so we weren’t late. Which is why I’m a mess.”

“Wow.”

“Yep.”

“So much to process.”

“I’m not asking you to process.”

“Well, you’re a cute mess,” Archer said, smiling. “Listen: I couldn’t give a shit who you’re banging.” When she opened her mouth, he added, “Or nap-banging. I just want you to be with someone who gets how great you are.”

“You take that ba— Oh. And?” She braced herself for the punch line. Great at nagging? Great at obsessing over a decade-old murder? Great at hiding the tape measure from Paul? Great at designing a chore board they all loved and hated in equal measure? What?

“And nothing. You like him, he likes you and gets you, that’s all I’d ever want for you.”

“Oh. Well. Thanks.”

“And I’m not going to ask, because I already know the answer.”

“You’re losing me. Ask what?”

“If you’re nap-banging him because you think it’ll help Dad’s case.”

“Oh. Good call on not asking.” She gave him a narrow look. “I’d hate to break your nose.”

He nodded. “But you know who will assume that. Right?”

She sighed. “Mom.”

“Auntie Em, yup. She’s always so weird around cops, it’s almost like . . .” He trailed off.

“There’s no need to cut yourself off. I’ve been having the same thought lately: It’s almost like she’s afraid they’ll discover a deep, dark secret. But what could be worse than Dad’s murder?”

“That’s nuts and you know it,” Archer told her bluntly. “She was home with all you kids that night, the cops checked her alibi first thing.”

Relieved, she nodded. “You’re right, I remember.”

“For whatever reason, she won’t like you going out with a cop. So here’s some unsolicited advice—”

“Most of what comes out of your mouth is unsolicited. I’ll put it at eighty-five, maybe ninety percent.”

“Keep it to yourself for a while.”

As it happened, she was on board with that advice. Although . . . “Archer, there’s really not anything to keep to myself yet. It was one date. I think it was a date. Maybe it was an outdoor luncheon?”

“On an island of dead Burnhams, yeah, you said. Did you guys really clean up Uncle Donald’s gravestone?”

She nodded. “It was his idea. We met at the cemetery and he had all the stuff with him. Plus a bottomless backpack of food.”

“Hmm. Why aren’t you sleeping with him? I think you should move past naps.”

She had to laugh. “Two minutes ago you were freaking out at the thought of my less-than-vibrant sex life.”

“Two minutes ago, I wasn’t sure if he was taking advantage. Or if you were. C’mon, Angela, you grew up with cousins and brothers. We’ve always been wrathfully, irrationally overprotective of our lone lady wolf.”

“Don’t remind me. Now if you’re finished invading my privacy, let’s go invade your dad’s privacy.”

“Sure, why not? You’re on a roll,” he teased as they came back to Leah and Jason. “Maybe you’ll crack the case.”

She snorted and was about to retort when Leah held up their paperwork. “We’ve got a problem.”

“What? Are they backed up?” Angela looked around; there was only one other family in the area. “Did you not have enough time to finish the paperwork? Or forget your ID? Not enough money for a flimsy lock to protect documents someone could use to steal your identity?” With all the hoops, it was a bit of a miracle that anyone was able to visit a prisoner.

“It’s been finished for ten minutes. The paperwork’s not the problem.”

She looked from Leah’s sober expression to Jason’s and back again. “What? Is Uncle Dennis sick? Or unavailable?”

“He’s refusing to see us.”

“Oh.” A setback, but not entirely unexpected. “Well, sometimes—”

“Ever again.”

Okay, that was new. “What?” she asked, in case she hadn’t heard right.

“He struck all Drakes from his visitors list. We’re permanently banned.”

“Except we’re here on a sanctioned trip,” Archer pointed out, but Angela was already shaking her head.

“No, we’re not. We’re not even here for an open case. If he won’t cooperate, we can’t flash a badge and press the matter. So . . .”

“Roadblock.”

Shit.