Catarina kept her eyes on the floor as Tuttle helped her to stand. Retaining possession of her arm, he walked her right out of her safety zone into broad daylight. She could see the police cars around her warehouse. There was no way this wasn’t going to make the papers in one way or the other. Her heart started pounding hard and her mouth went dry. She wasn’t in the least afraid of the police. But the police had drawn attention to her. And attention was bad. Very, very bad.
5
CATARINA rubbed at her wrists under the table, keeping her eyes down. Her wrists hurt horribly, as did her face from when she had fallen. The cuffs were off, but she kept the pen hidden for two reasons. It was a weapon if she needed one and she could use it to get out of the cuffs if they put them on her again.
She’d been patient, not tipping her hand that she could get loose. She was bruised because she couldn’t keep her hands still with her wrists locked so tightly in the metal. Tuttle had deliberately left her sitting alone in the interrogation room for some time. She knew he thought she would become more agitated and frightened. Unfortunately for Tuttle, he didn’t scare her. She knew monsters, and he wasn’t one.
The door opened and he slipped into the room. She didn’t look up. What was the point? She had nothing to tell him, so as long as this was going to last, and she figured it would be a very long time, she would endure.
They hadn’t allowed her to grab a sweater and she was cold, and feeling a little exposed, which she figured was also part of the plan.
“Ms. Benoit? I’m Detective Frank Tuttle. We’re investigating a man named Rafe Cordeau. I believe you know him.”
Tuttle was dressed in slacks and a jacket and he looked far too slick to be anything but DEA. Not that it surprised her. He carried a folder and set it on the table, making a show of it. The thing was, no matter what he said, he had nothing on her and he would have to make something up, or he would have to let her go.
She remained silent. There wasn’t a question in his statement.
“Ms. Benoit?” Frank’s voice had gone sharp.
“I’m sorry.” She sent him a brief look from under her lashes. “I didn’t know that your statement required any response on my part.”
“Are you acquainted with Rafe Cordeau?”
“You obviously think that I am. Enough that you turned the place where I live upside down. I have no idea what you were looking for because no one had the courtesy to tell me.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
She shrugged. “As I don’t know what you’re looking for in the way of answers, I can’t help you.”
“Do you in fact know Rafe Cordeau?” he thundered.
“Is this where I’m supposed to wince and burst into tears?” Sarcasm dripped from her voice. Rafe could make her wince without even raising his voice, but even he couldn’t make her burst into tears. Certainly no cop could.
She pushed the heavy fall of hair over her shoulder and for the first time looked Tuttle in the eye. She even leaned toward him. “Everyone who grew up in Algiers knows Rafe Cordeau or at least of him. If they say they don’t, they are lying. Yes. To answer your question, I know Rafe Cordeau.”
“And you lived with him for a number of years.”
She stared him directly in the eye and she was very focused. Intense. She waited. She was good at waiting. Good at the silence game. She’d been taught by a master and she’d followed up those lessons with experiences. She could tell Tuttle was buying into her age. She was young. Barely twenty-one. She’d had her birthday just last month. She didn’t look hard, she looked vulnerable. He had no idea the experiences she’d been through had aged her fast.
He sighed. “Ms. Benoit, I’m trying to ascertain how you know Cordeau.”
“I’m sorry. You’re not very good at this, are you? Again, there was no question for me to answer, and I can’t guess at what you want from me.”
Tuttle winced. She kept her gaze from the camera, where she was certain other cops were watching on a screen in a control room. Tuttle was going to take some ribbing over that remark.
“I was given to him when I was eleven years old.”
“Given to him?”
She nodded. “I’m his ward. I was raised in his house.”
“And you’re engaged to be married to him.”
For the first time her heart went crazy, hammering in her chest so hard she feared it would actually break through – or he could hear it. She forced herself to keep her eyes steady on his.
“Why would you think that?”
“There was a write-up in the New Orleans newspaper in the society section that states you are engaged to Rafe Cordeau. Are you saying that information isn’t correct?”
No one would dare write an article about Cordeau without his consent. No one. Not even a reporter who wanted a name for themselves. Rafe had planted that article and he was making a statement directly to her.
She shook her head but didn’t speak, her mind racing.
“Are you his fiancée?” Tucker asked, his voice a whip.
She shrugged. “If that’s what someone wrote in a newspaper, I suppose it must be true.”