“I wasn’t trying to be funny,” Emerson said, examining the gold bar. He held it up for her to see. “What do you think? Real or fake?”
“I think she took the real one from the safe.”
“Then this is it,” he said, tapping the gold bar with his finger.
“What do you mean?”
“I switched them.”
“But we were looking at them the whole time.”
“I did it all the same.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“It doesn’t matter whether or not you believe it,” Emerson said. “It is so.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter whether or not you say it’s so. It didn’t happen.”
“Why would I lie about such a thing?”
“Why, indeed.”
His mouth curved into a sly smile for a millisecond.
“And what’s that?” Riley asked.
“What’s what?”
“The smile.”
“I find you amusing.”
Two advanced degrees from Harvard and I’ve got a job amusing a man who steals gold bars, Riley thought.
“The advanced degrees were a waste of time,” Emerson said. “You didn’t need them.”
“How did you know I was thinking about my degrees?”
“It was obvious.”
“You’re a little scary,” Riley said.
“You’re not the first person to express that opinion.”
The front door to Maxine’s townhouse opened, Maxine stepped out, and closed and locked the door behind her. She was still dressed in her workout clothes, wearing Oakley sunglasses and carrying a medium-sized duffel bag. She walked down the sidewalk to a gray Nissan Maxima parked close to the corner, slung her gear in the back, got in, and pulled out.
“Follow that car,” Emerson said.
Riley pulled out, hoping Maxine was going somewhere for lunch. She knew that “irritable” was just around the corner. She kept a car between her and Maxine, just in case Maxine looked in her mirror. At least the muscle car Riley was driving was a conservative highland green, not flaming red. Still, a classic Mustang Fastback wasn’t the most inconspicuous car on the road.
Maxine turned right on K Street just as the light was changing. Riley had to choose between speeding through the red light and stopping. She stopped. Her father, the sheriff, would have been pleased.
“What do I do now?” she asked Emerson.
“About what?”
“I lost her.”