“No,” he shouted, jumping to his feet. “I didn’t. You bitch, you’re trying to set me up! Somebody’s trying to push me out. First Moira, now someone else. Tell me who told you those lies!”

He lunged at me. I pushed myself sideways on the sofa. He crashed into the arm of the sofa, letting out an “oogh” of pain. But he kept coming at me, yelling, “Tell me, tell me.”

I couldn’t find enough space to use any of my boxing moves on him. He threw himself on me, gripping me by the throat. His paranoia seemed to lend him extra strength. I’d miscalculated. This was something I couldn’t handle myself. Red spots danced in front of my eyes, and I could feel myself retching and fainting.

Chapter   29

I opened my eyes to a huge, out-of-focus face inches from my own, like a sinister Halloween mask. I blinked and shook my head, and realized it was Richard, his face a mixture of fear and concern. “You all right, Brannigan?” he demanded.

“Mmm,” I groaned, carefully probing my tender, bruised neck. Richard sat down heavily beside me and hugged me. Looking over his shoulder, I could see Kevin’s legs. The rest of him was hidden under Bill’s bulk. My boss was sitting astride Kevin, looking triumphant.

“Would someone pass me the phone?” he said calmly. “I need to call the garbage disposal people.” A muffled grunt escaped from the body under him. He obligingly shifted his position slightly.

“On the table, Richard,” I told him, and he went to fetch it. Bill punched in a number and asked for Cliff Jackson.

“Inspector? This is Bill Mortensen of Mortensen and Brannigan. I’d like to report an attempted murder,” he began when he was finally connected. “Yes, that’s right, an attempted murder. Kevin Kleinman has just tried to strangle my partner, Miss Brannigan.”

I wished I could have been a fly on the wall in Jackson’s office. The news that someone had actually done what he’d been longing to do since the beginning of the case must have provoked a serious conflict of interest. “Well, of course it’s connected,” I heard Bill protest. “They were discussing the murder at the time of the attack … How do I know? Because I was listening at the door, man! Look, why don’t you just get over here and we can sort it all out then?”

Richard, ignoring Bill’s conversation, was fussing over me. “Thank God we were there,” he kept repeating.

Losing patience, I said, “It had nothing to do with God and everything to do with the fact that I told you to be there.” They had been my insurance policy; Richard crouching in the conservatory, Bill lurking in the hall. Arrogant I may be, stupid I’m not.

Richard grinned. “I thought that came to the same thing? You and God?”