“You can’t trespass on your own property,” the aunt says icily.
“It’s not your property! James kicked you and your bratty daughter out!”
“You’re the brat. If your mother hadn’t spoiled you so much and given you every little thing you wanted all your life, you wouldn’t be trying to steal jewelry from nine-year-olds now.”
“That’s my ring, not your precious Ava’s! James said so!” Skinny Jeans insists petulantly, sounding exactly like the spoiled child her aunt just accused her of being.
“You’ll get that ring over my cold, dead body.”
“Your body’s been cold and dead for years, according to James,” SJ retorts, with a smirk.
The older woman’s eyes blaze with hatred and her hands clench at her sides, but her voice is perfectly composed when she says, “Ms. Tobin, if you would kindly step out of the way, I’m going to give my niece the spanking she should have received twenty years ago.”
“Don’t you dare!” Skinny Jeans screeches, ducking behind me again while I wonder how the aunt knew my name. Did Brody tell her?
“What the hell is going on out here?” my guy wonders, appearing just as I was thinking about him. Clearly, we have a psychic connection.
“Brody!” Shaking myself loose from SJ’s grasp, I run over to him and throw myself in his arms. “I was so worried. Are you okay?” I gingerly pat his chest and arms, then touch his face to make sure he’s all in one piece.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” He kisses me on the forehead, then glances over at the policeman. “Shouldn’t you be keeping those two apart?” Brody gestures at the combative women who are giving each other death glares.
“We tried,” says a weary-looking plainclothes officer, with a badge hanging from a silver chain around his neck. “Didn’t we agree you would stay put in the interrogation room, Mrs. Bainbridge?” Placing a hand on her elbow, he prepares to steer her back there.
“I was just trying to assist this young officer who was being harassed by my niece, Detective. I could hear her lambasting the poor man from down the hall, so I stepped in to deflect her nastiness. I was performing a public service.”
“How altruistic. We’ll be sure to issue you a citation later,” the detective snarks. “Now, let’s go. You too, Mr. Wyatt.”
“No!” I protest, clinging to Brody’s arm. I haven’t even had a chance to talk to him about what’s going on, and I really don’t want to be left alone in this lobby with Skinny Jeans. She has such negative energy.
“Sloane? How’d you beat me here? I just called you from the car fifteen minutes ago.”
“Huh?” I turn to see a handsome, dark-haired man, wearing a puzzled expression and a teal-colored polo tucked into belted jeans. He looks like he just stepped out of a Ralph Lauren ad. I can even smell the Double Black cologne wafting off of him. I recognize the scent because it’s the same one my old boyfriend, Mick, liked to douse himself in. Actually, what he wore was a cheap knockoff called “Obsidian x2” that he bought from a guy on a street corner in Chinatown.
“Wrong sister,” says a female voice whose haughty tone I recognize seconds before she steps out from behind the handsome man and I see her face. “Sloane would never wear that ridiculous dress . . .,” her eyes drop down to my feet, “. . . much less those shoes. Red, Willa, really? A bit trampy for the twin who’s supposed to be the sweet, innocent one.”
“Hey!” Brody gallantly objects.
“Ignore her,” I counsel him in an exaggerated whisper. “Thea’s never gotten along with Sloane, and I’m always getting caught in the crossfire between them. She’s Gav’s ex.”
“Am I?” Thea arches one pencil-thin eyebrow.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I frown at her. She’s just messing with me, right? Gav hasn’t even spoken to Thea since they broke off their engagement last year. At least not that I know of.
“Figure it out,” she murmurs, with a mysterious smile.
Maybe it’s because I’m tired or my last conversation with Gav has made me uber-sensitive on the subject of his love life, but these cryptic comments of Thea’s are really starting to get on my nerves. If she has something to say, I wish she’d just spit it out already. “I don’t want to play games with you, Thea. If you think you’ve still got a shot with Gav, you’re mistaken.” Might as well be upfront with her. Gav loves Sloane. Thea can’t change that; she already tried and failed . . . miserably.
“We’ll see about that,” she says defiantly.
Okay, now she’s making me mad. Going into protective Mama Bear mode, I assert, “No, we won’t. Gav’s in a vulnerable state right now, so you need to stay away from him!”
A predatory gleam lights up Thea’s eyes, and my heart sinks as I realize I’ve just revealed too much. Now the great white shark knows the cute, little otter is hurt, bleeding, and defenseless, and I pointed a finger at him and said, “There he is, Jaws! Enjoy your lunch!”
“Ladies, I really don’t think this is the appropriate place for this discussion, and there are more pressing matters at hand,” Brody reminds us in a hushed voice. Oooops. I let Thea get me so riled up that I forgot we were in the middle of a police station with a bunch of strangers.
“Yes, listen to your boyfriend, Willa. What are the two of you doing here anyway? Were you with Sloane when she got the call about the arrest?”
I furrow my brow with confusion. “Why does everyone keep bringing up Sloane? What does she have to do with any of this?”
“She’s conducting the forensic audit on the Bainbridges’ assets for their divorce,” explains Mr. GQ in the polo shirt. “The antique ring that was recovered this evening has been an ongoing bone of contention between the two parties. I’m Josh Finley, by the way, Sloane’s team leader at Ashby, Terhune, and McAllister.” Flashing me a charismatic smile, he extends a hand in my direction.
So this is the guy Sloane was sleeping with, the one who got engaged behind her back, then insulted her by suggesting they continue their relationship as if a fiancée shouldn’t be a hindrance? I don’t like to make snap judgments, but I’m with Gav. Josh Finley is a douchebag. And I am certainly not going to shake the hand of a man who disrespected my sister like he did. No way. Not gonna happen. Oh, who am I kidding? I can’t refuse to shake his hand in front of all these people. That would just be rude.
“Yes, I’ve heard about you, Mr. Finley.” I give the tips of his fingers a very weak shake, then quickly retract my hand, not wanting to touch him any longer than necessary. “I had no idea my sister was involved in all this.”
“Then why . . .” Thea’s eyes slide from me to Brody, whom she’s barely acknowledged up to this point. She scrutinizes his appearance, from the soles of his mud-caked work boots to his mussed hair that has a leaf and some random bits of grass stuck in it. “Oho!” she exclaims gleefully as she puts all the pieces of the puzzle together. “Your boyfriend is Mrs. Bainbridge’s accomplice, the gardener who buried that lockbox in her rose maze and helped her dig it up tonight. This is too, too perfect! Mr. Bainbridge is going to go ballistic when I tell him.” Pulling her phone out of her purse, she starts frantically keying in a text message. When she’s done, she looks up at me and declares, with a smile both wicked and triumphant, “Your sister is screwed.”
Chapter 36
(Sloane)
Worst. Night. Ever.
First, that brutal fight with Gav, which I refuse to think about anymore because dwelling on things that can’t be changed is an inefficient use of my time. Of course, it’s hard not to think about it when I leave my house at one-twenty in the morning. and see that his car isn’t parked on the curb next door like it should be. Where could he be at this late hour? After he stormed out of my place, I assumed he’d go home to lick his wounds, maybe drink a couple six-packs and draw some pictures of Pyro setting Charlatan and Detective Bliss on fire, but apparently not.
Could he have gone over to Willa’s to yell at her for tricking him into coming to see me? Not likely s
ince Gav never stays mad at Willa for more than two seconds. Besides she had plans with Brody, and Gav wouldn’t drive out to Bernal and crash their date. It’s possible he called a guy friend and the two of them went to some dive bar to play pool and commiserate about what heartless bitches women are. Gav’s always been a really good pool player; he can even do jump shots. He’s tried to teach me many times, but I’ve never been able to master the game, probably because it’s too damn hard to focus with Gav pressed up against my back, sliding his hands up and down my arms while murmuring instructions in my ear. Is he telling some bar bimbo how to execute a break stroke right now? I grip my steering wheel tighter at the thought of him getting handsy with another woman. Not that I’m jealous, mind you. It’s just galling that Gav was professing his great, decades-spanning love for me a few, short hours ago, and now he’s out doing God-knows-what and he’s probably not doing it alone. Makes me think his feelings for me aren’t as powerful and all-consuming as he claims they are. Men are so fickle. One minute they can’t live without you; the next they’ve forgotten you exist.
Can Gav really forget me when I live twenty feet from him? Won’t my sister be a constant reminder? I’ve never been through a “breakup” before, so I’m not sure how these things work. Are Gav and I going to share custody of Willa now? How can we both be a part of her life without ever having contact with each other? I suppose we can have separate celebrations for her/our birthday and maybe split up the holidays. He’s not getting Thanksgiving, though. No way. I’m not giving up Willa’s herbed sourdough stuffing. Gav can drive down to Palo Alto and have tofurkey with his brother and sister-in-law and their kids, or as I like to call them, “Shrieker,” “Tattletale,” “Snot Bubbles,” and “Nudey.” At least not having Gav in my life means never having to spend time with those little monsters again. Aha, a plus side to the implosion of our relationship! I knew there had to be some positives to balance out the negatives in this situation. Let me think of some more . . .
Won’t have to feel like an unhealthy slug every time I see Gav going on a run. Unfortunately, that also means I’ll no longer be getting an eyeful of his amazing backside when he bends over to stretch out his hamstrings.
No more teasing about my control freak tendencies, bossiness, bad eating habits, or taste in men. Not that I really minded Gav giving me a hard time about any of those things. I gave as good as I got, and our teasing always felt like flirting to me.
Beard burn won’t be a problem anymore. His stubble really scraped up the insides of my thighs last week when he . . . Okay, now that I’m thinking about it, I actually enjoyed that while it was happening. A lot. So what if my skin was a little irritated afterwards? Totally worth it.
Damn, this list really isn’t helping, and didn’t I promise myself I wasn’t going to think about Gav anymore? I should be focusing on the second reason why this night sucks – that phone call from Josh. I had fallen asleep face down on my laptop and was drooling into the keyboard when I was startled awake by the ringing of my cell phone. I answered as an automatic reflex, without checking Caller ID, and was annoyed to hear Josh’s voice on the other end of the line. I figured he was calling because he had an itch that needed scratching and I was gearing up to tell him to go jump in the bay, but before I could, he informed me that Renee Bainbridge had been arrested by the Hillsborough PD. It seems she snuck onto the Bainbridge property under cover of darkness while her soon-to-be-ex was in Santa Barbara on a business trip. With the help of her landscape architect (or maybe it was her gardener), she dug up a lockbox in the rose maze where she’d hidden the ruby ring Mr. B’s been so hot to get his hands on.
I have to give Renee credit. That was pretty clever. She knew she wouldn’t be able to get out of the marital house with that ring on her person or in her belongings, so she hid it right under her a-hole husband’s nose. He must be so pissed she outsmarted him like that. All the money he spent having his mansion searched, utilizing ATM resources to check banks and self-storage facilities in five counties, and finally hiring a private detective, just to find out the ring had been buried in his back yard the whole time – ha! Score one for ingenious women. Too bad Renee’s plan fell apart in the final stage of its execution, but she really couldn’t have foreseen that her husband would install motion sensor lights in the rose maze she commissioned or that his little chippy would be at home to sound the alarm when Renee and her accomplice accidentally tripped them. Now she’s facing criminal charges, and Bainbridge can put his bejeweled prize on the finger of the girl who broke up his marriage. Doesn’t seem fair. Yeah, yeah, I know I’m supposed to be impartial about this, but it’s clear which party is in the right and which is in the wrong. So, I was really hoping Renee would triumph in the end.
Pulling into the Hillsborough PD parking lot, I turn down the first row and maneuver my car into an empty space between Josh’s BMW and a Grand Cherokee. When I get out of my car, I notice a metallic red Jaguar convertible with the vanity plate “LDY LWYR” parked in the next row over. Thea . . . UGH! I should have known she’d be on the scene. Vultures are drawn to carnage, after all, and I’m sure the Bainbridges are ripping each other apart in there. What fun this is going to be! Stifling a groan, I head for the entrance to the police station. Once I’m inside, I follow the sound of acrimonious shouting that’s echoing down the main corridor.
“If you don’t give me a quick, uncontested divorce ceding your rights to everything but child support, I will see you and your gigolo gardener prosecuted!”
“Then you’ll have to explain to your already traumatized daughter that you sent her mother to jail!”
“It’ll be a good life lesson for her. Don’t take things that don’t belong to you and don’t bang the help!”
“Better the help than a barely legal in-law! And I could have done that if I wanted to, since your cousin George’s stepson propositioned me at our Christmas party last year while you were off playing Hide the Yule Log with Madison.”
“Mr. and Mrs. Bainbridge, please lower your voices. This is a police station, not the Judge Mathis show!”
“Are you forgetting who donated a hundred grand to the HPD Construction and Renovation Fund last year? That was me, so I can speak as LOUDLY as I damn well–”
I walk into the communal area of the police station and all heads swivel toward me – the Bainbridges, their lawyers, some blonde skank, a couple of cops, Josh, Brody, Willa . . . wait, what?! Why is my sister here with– My eyes ping-pong between Willa’s guilt-stricken face and Brody’s dirt-smeared– Oh, fuck me. Brody is the gigolo gardener!
“You!” James Bainbridge’s eyes come close to bulging out of their sockets when he sees me. “You were in on this the whole time. It was a conspiracy from the start. That’s why you showed so little interest in searching for the ring.”
Remain calm, Sloane. You already blew it with one man who was angry and yelling at you earlier this evening; you don’t want a repeat of that debacle.
“Mr. Bainbridge . . .” I approach my client with my hands held out in a conciliatory fashion. “I assure you, that’s not the case. I devoted the better part of a week to searching for your mother’s ring. Remember, it was my idea to check the NorCal branches of all the banks your wife had done business with both before, and after, you were married?”
“It was a wild-goose chase to lead me away from the truth! You knew all along the ring was in the rose maze at my house, because you were in cahoots with Renee and her lawn boy.”
“I categorically deny that. At no time did Mrs. Bainbridge divulge the whereabouts of that ring to me.”
“She’s telling the truth, James,” his wife interjects. “Don’t take it out on her just because you’re embarrassed I put one over on you. I was fully capable of doing that all on my own.”
He scowls, first at Renee, then me, then the room at large. “So, it’s just a coincidence that the man who dug the hole in the rose garden where you hid Mother’s ring is involved with the twin . . .,” he
points an accusatory finger at Willa who flinches, “. . sister of the woman who’s supposed to be totaling up our assets for the divorce? I think these two are a couple of con artists who’ve been Parent Trap-ping me for weeks!”
“Oooo, you’re so smart to figure that out, baby. They totally Lindsay Lohan-ed you,” coos the silicone-enhanced blonde clinging to Bainbridge’s arm.
“That doesn’t even make sense!” I exclaim, forgetting that I’m supposed to be placating this man, not antagonizing him further. “What would either of us have to gain from switching places?”
Bainbridge doesn’t have a quick reply to that question, and I can see from the expression on his face that he’s starting to realize what a stupid theory it is.
Seeing an opening, Thea, in full lawyer mode, jumps into the verbal fray. “Ms. Tobin’s culpability in the crimes perpetrated against my client is yet to be determined, but a thorough investigation will be launched on Mr. Bainbridge’s behalf. In the meantime . . .” She turns to Josh. “I suggest you terminate Ms. Tobin’s employment immediately to protect ATM from a lawsuit.”
The word “lawsuit” makes Josh blanch. “I’m sure that won’t be necessary. This has all just been a big misunderstanding. ATM’s business practices are above reproach, and Ms. Tobin’s work ethic–”
“Don’t waste your breath,” I advise him. “She’s bluffing. Mr. Bainbridge has no grounds for any kind of lawsuit.” This is just Thea being her usual petty and vindictive self. She’s so predictable it’s laughable.
Thea smirks. “Oh, really? What about conflict-of-interest? You should have recused yourself from the Bainbridges’ case due to your connection with a known associate of Mrs. Bainbridge.”
Twin Piques Page 35