Elusive (On The Run Book #1) by Sara Rosett Page A

slightly
to look over her shoulder. He was on the other side of a hedge. She could just
see his pale yellow crew-cut and his eyebrows that sloped down to form the base
of a “v” at his nose. Zoe half stood, ready to make a break for her car.
    A woman answered him, but the hedge
blocked her from Zoe’s view. Snippets of her words filtered through the
foliage, “...death ... yesterday around noon.”
    Zoe sat back down as abruptly as
if someone had pushed her. Sharon’s stats showed that Jack had used his
computer at twelve-thirty. If Connor was dead at that time, why wouldn’t Jack
have called the police? Was it possible he hadn’t noticed? Zoe bit her lip. She
supposed it was possible Jack could have returned to the office and not noticed
Connor’s dead body. Possible, but not probable—that’s what the police would
think, Zoe was sure. And why would he leave and drive to Highway 375 with a
storm on the way? None of it made sense.
    She dropped her keys into her lap
and rubbed her temples. She just wanted to go home. So much had happened in the
last day.
    “So, Jack Andrews is your
ex-husband.”
    Zoe looked up. There was a new guy
in a suit seated on the bench that was at a right angle to hers. This guy
didn’t look like the other law enforcement people she’d been talking to. They’d
looked like average folks. This guy looked like he should be staring out from a
billboard in Times Square. He was in his late twenties and had glossy black
hair, a tan complexion, and sharp black eyes. The cut of his charcoal suit over
his broad shoulders shouted designer. He smoothed down his chartreuse tie.
“Ma’am? Andrews is your ex?” he repeated, smirking a bit at her confused stare
as if he regularly had a befuddling effect on women.
    “I’m sorry, who are you?” Zoe
asked sharply. She was hot and tired and stressed. She didn’t need this guy’s
condensation. “I’d really like to go home. I’ve answered all these questions
with Detective Martin. Is he still around?”
    “No idea. I’m sure he’ll be along
soon,” he said as if Detective Martin were a dog that had wandered away but would
return home on its own. “You haven’t answered our questions, yet. I’m Special
Agent Greg Sato.” He pulled out a badge. “FBI”
    “FBI?”
    “Yes, ma’am,” he said as he put
his badge away. “Now, you’re Zoe Hunter, correct?” He asked, his tone implying
she couldn’t handle anything more than simple sentences.
    She sat up straight. Her pulse
thumped, and the spurt of irritation she felt at his self-satisfied expression
burned away some of the lethargy she’d been feeling. “Yes, I am. I don’t know
what happened to Connor. I found him like that this morning. And, before you
ask, he’s made plenty of people mad. I couldn’t even
begin
to give you a list. He
wasn’t the most accommodating person around, if you know what I mean. And as
for Jack,” she shrugged, “I can’t tell you. He’s missing.”
    Sato’s dark eyebrows arched.
“Missing?”
    “Yes. Missing.” His mildly amused
tone irritated her. “The Highway Patrol informed me last night. There is a
search going on for him right now.”
    Sato, who’d been lounging back
with his arm draped over the bench, sat forward and glanced back at an older
guy with a lined face and a head of gray hair, who stood off to the side of the
small park. He leaned toward Detective Martin, who was talking, but he was
watching Zoe’s conversation. His suit jacket was off, his sleeves were rolled
up, and he was moving one hand down over his mouth in a contemplative gesture.
Sato looked at the older man inquiringly. He nodded his head, which Sato seemed
to take as confirmation of Zoe’s words.
    Sato blinked and turned back to
her, his whole demeanor thrown off. He was no longer smooth and arrogant.
“We’ll discuss that...later.”
    “Then I can go?” Zoe said, picking
up her keys again.
    “No, not yet,” Sato said, with
more surety. “How many shares