A/N: Thank you for the comment, Virtute! I love including real history in stories, because I'm such a history geek. LOL Also, to everyone reading, sorry about any typos you may find. I proofread and then proofread some more, but they STILL manage to show up. Grrr. Thanks again for reading!

Chapter 8

Emily walked through the employees' entrance to the museum the next morning, exhausted. She hadn't been able to sleep despite Stacey's fiancé, Eric, spending the night on their couch. She'd jumped at every little sound and lain awake for hours. The small amount of sleep she did manage to get was fitful and brief.

Stifling a yawn, she went over to her locker. She noticed the combination dial wouldn't turn. Something was jammed. Sighing, she yanked hard on the handle and the door flew open. The books she'd stored for some of her early classes were still in there, but they'd clearly been disturbed. Then she saw it...the pink rose at the bottom of her locker, resting on an index card with her name spelled out in large, capital letters.

OOOOOOoooooOOOOO

Joe entered the Bayport University Art Museum at ten minutes after nine and strolled past the reception desk to the hidden corridor leading to the security office. He knocked on the door and found Mitch giving instructions to two of his guards.

"Hey, Joe." He gestured to the coffee machine on the long counter next to the entrance. "Grab yourself a cup. I'll be right with you."

Joe nodded and picked up a white Styrofoam cup. Filling it with fresh coffee, he dumped in a sugar packet and reached for a plastic stir stick. Leaning back against the counter, he blew on the drink and waited for Mitch to finish.

OOOOOoooooOOOOO

Frank opened the door of Bayport Camera on Main Street, the jingling bells tied to it announcing his presence. A young man with dark, curly hair appeared from the back room.

"Frank, good to see you. I didn't expect you back so soon."

"Am I too early, Steve? Have you had a chance to look at the tape yet?"

"Just got finished as a matter of fact."

Frank leaned on the glass display counter. "What can you tell me about it?"

"Well, I don't think there was anything wrong with the camera. I think it was turned off."

"How can you tell?"

"Let me show you." He gestured for Frank to come around the counter and led him into the back room. "I have it cued up." He hit a button on the video machine and the tape began to play. "Now see, this is the area the camera is trained on." He pointed at the entrance to the exhibit hall under construction. "See these numbers at the bottom?"

Frank nodded at the small white numbers showing the date and the time in the right hand corner.

"Now look. They're gone."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that the camera was turned off. If someone had thrown a towel or something over it, the numbers would have continued, you just would have seen a blank screen. If the transmission failed, you would have had eight minutes of snow, but the numbers still would have been there." Steve pointed to the screen again. "Watch, when it comes back on, the time shows eight minutes later."

"So, this wasn't some sort of equipment malfunction?" Frank turned to look at his friend's grim expression.

"No. This was turned off. And I don't mean the camera itself was physically switched off. That isn't possible. Someone turned it off from the control panel."

Frank sat back in his chair, his hand to his mouth, his face thoughtful. It's definitely an inside job. "That puts an interesting twist on things. Thanks, Steve."

"Glad to be of help." Steve ejected the tape and handed it back to Frank. "Hope you catch this loser. I had Professor Ayres for Humanities. He was a good guy."

"We'll do our best," Frank assured him.

OOOOOoooooOOOOO

Emily gasped and stepped back from her locker. She looked nervously around the room, half expecting to find someone lurking behind her. She stumbled as she grazed the corner of a metal locker, then turned and fled into the hallway. She paused, trying to catch her breath, then ran, as fast as her high heels would allow, up the stairs to the main floor. She reached the reception desk, out of breath and slightly panicked. Kim, who was on the phone, took one look at Emily and hung up.

"What's wrong?"

"Have you seen a security guard?" Emily asked, wishing her heart wasn't beating almost out of her chest. "I need one."

Kim's blue eyes widened. "Has someone else been murdered? Because, I swear, if that's happened again, I am out of here. My mom wanted me to quit when I told her about the professor, but I said she'd never be able to pay tuition without me working, but if there's another body–"

"No, no, it's nothing like that." Emily took a deep breath. "I need someone in security to come with me while I move some artifacts."

"Oh, okay. You had me for a minute there." Kim gestured over her shoulder. "Mitch is in his office. With one of those cute detectives."

Emily paused in mid-stride. "Which one?"

"The blond. Joe, right?" Kim sighed. "He is so dang good looking."

"Yes, he's very handsome," Emily said in a clipped tone. "Thanks for the heads-up." She walked down the corridor and sighed. Okay, pull yourself together, Emily. You are not going to fall apart in front of Joe Hardy for the third day in a row.

OOOOOoooooOOOOO

Joe had been carefully viewing the surveillance tapes from the previous day when he heard a light tapping on Mitch's office door. He turned from the monitor in time to see Emily stick her head inside.

"Is it all right if I interrupt?"

Mitch looked up from some paperwork at his desk. "Emily. You're not interrupting anything. What can I do for you, sweetie?"

Joe bristled at the term "sweetie", and judging by Emily's posture, she had, too.

When she stepped inside and closed the door behind her, Joe felt like he'd been hit by a truck going ninety miles an hour. She was wearing some pink sweater thing. A thin sweater that he knew would be impossibly soft to the touch. It had tiny pearl buttons on it and it covered another scoop-neck top of the same color and material. Her skirt was made of light gray wool and hugged her lower half in all the right places. He swallowed hard and watched as she walked toward Mitch.

"I, um, think I might have another problem," she began, her voice hesitant. "It seems as though my locker was broken into this morning. Or maybe last night, I'm not sure."

"What?" Mitch jumped up from his chair. "Tell me what happened."

Joe found himself on his feet hurrying to her side, in spite of his earlier resolve to distance himself from Emily Clark.

She explained what she'd encountered when she went to open her locker and ended with "and there was another rose."

Her voice trembled and Joe couldn't help himself from reaching out and placing a reassuring hand on her arm.

"Have you mentioned this to anyone else?" Mitch wanted to know.

Emily shook her head.

"Good, then let's get down there."

Mitch started out the door and Emily went to follow when Joe held her back. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," she said, a little too brightly. "I'm sure it's just someone's idea of a sick joke." She walked through the security office door and after Mitch.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," Joe muttered under his breath.

OOOOOoooooOOOOO

Emily shivered involuntarily as she entered the locker room after Mitch and Joe. Mitch immediately moved toward the rose and went to pick it up.

"Don't touch that," Joe warned.

"Why not?"

"It's evidence." Joe walked over to Emily's locker. "I can't have you disturbing the crime scene until we've taken photos and catalogued everything."

"Says who?" Mitch challenged.

Joe sighed and pulled out the badge he'd been given. "Chief Collig. Now, if you wouldn't mind calling the police department and asking them to send a photographer, I'll wait here and guard the crime scene."

Mitch's eyes had a challenging look in them. "The security of this museum is my responsibility, Hardy. Not yours."

"Then maybe you'd better get working on that so we don't have to keep coming here and photographing crime scenes." Jackass.

"Why you..." Mitch made a move towards him, but stopped himself. "You're right." He squared his shoulders. "This never should have happened. I'm going to post a few guards down here to make sure it'safe." He turned to Emily. "I'll have one right outside your office door whenever you're here. This won't happen again."

She gave him a wan smile. "Thank you, Mitch."

The security officer turned to go, pausing as he looked back at Joe. "I'll call the station right away."

Joe watched Emily who seemed to be waiting for Mitch's footsteps to die away before she spoke. She finally moved to his side. "I think he's upset with you."

"Yeah? Well, good. Because I'm upset with him." He shook his head. "What kind of half-assed security team runs this museum? In the past three days there's been a murder and two acts of vandalism."

"But Joe, they're not used to dealing with this sort of thing." She looked at the rose of top of the overturned books in her locker. "I mean, nobody expects stuff like this to happen."

"As a security officer, you have to expect bad stuff to happen. That's his job." He threw his hands up in the air. "He hasn't done one damn thing to keep you safe as far as I'm concerned."

Emily's voice came out very small. "Does all this mean that someone wants to hurt me? It isn't just some information they're after?"

Joe's heart lurched in his chest. She was clearly terrified and all he wanted to do was go over to her, put his arms around her and tell her everything would be fine. He jammed his hands in his pockets to prevent it. "I don't know. There haven't been any overt threats against you, but to be honest, these roses worry me."

She nodded and tried a smile. "It seems to add that psycho touch to the whole thing."

She was trying so hard to be brave. He noticed the dark smudges under her eyes. "Did you get any sleep last night?"

"Not really. I tried, but I couldn't stop worrying."

"Was Eric able to spend the night?" Joe couldn't keep the edge out of his voice.

"Yeah, he was great." She bent her head. "It didn't really help though. I was still scared."

Okay, the hell with this. He began to move close and do what his body kept telling him to do. Hold her. Comfort her. Give her some reassurance.

Emily jumped when Duncan's brogue was heard in the hallway along with two other voices. Joe stopped. Frank, Duncan, Mitch and Chief Collig entered the room. Collig handed Frank the camera he had on him. "Shoot it."

Frank took it and approached the locker. "Another rose?"

Joe nodded as Frank got into position and began to click the shutter.

"I don't like this, Joe."

"Neither do I."