She spun around and groaned when she saw Darren Tabor from the Washington Star rushing down the sidewalk. “What do you want, Darren?”

“A few minutes of your time.”

She kept her back to him. “I’m busy.”

“How close are you to an arrest on Sinclair?”

“Which one?”

“Both.”

“Not as close as I’d like to be.”

“Any suspects?”

Sam stopped and turned to him. “If I was giving out exclusives, what makes you think you’d get one?”

He flashed a smarmy smile. “In other words, you got dick, right?”

“In other words, I’m not telling you.”

“How’s the senator?”

She rolled her eyes. “Go home, Darren, and get a life.”

“Rumor has it you’ve got some interesting skeletons in your closet, Lieutenant. But that doesn’t surprise me.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

He shrugged. “Just rumors.”

“I work in facts, not rumors. I’m going home. I’d suggest you do the same.”

“Have a nice evening, Lieutenant.”

Anxious to get away from the pesky reporter, she dashed up the ramp to her father’s house and opened the door to a dark, empty house. Unaccustomed to her father being out when she wanted to see him sent her even further out of sorts.

So many details and thoughts and ideas were bouncing around in her mind that she couldn’t make sense of or process any of them. And what the hell had Tabor been spewing about? Rumors? What did he have on her? She probably didn’t want to know.

The case was stalled, her body craved caffeine and despite what she’d told Angela, all she could think about was the possibility of being pregnant again. Now she also had to ponder what Tabor had been talking about. He’d been particularly harsh in his reporting about her after a child had been killed in a crack house during a raid she’d supervised. He was the last reporter in town she wanted poking into her business.

Sam decided she needed some time to herself before she saw Nick. Upstairs in her room, she unclipped her hair, stretched out on the bed and stared up at the ceiling, hoping to quiet the chaos in her mind so she could think. Beginning with the discovery of Julian Sinclair’s body, she worked her way through each aspect of the case. The shooting of his nephew had to be related. How could it not be? But why? What possible connection existed between the two men that would generate a motive for shooting both of them? Both were attorneys, both were gay, both were successful men. Where was the motive?

Going on the assumption that the two shootings were related, her most promising suspect had vaporized that afternoon when Devon Sinclair had been shot while his mother was being interviewed.