“What’s that?”
I handed the story to him and waited for him to read it. When he was finished, he turned to me. “This could be a coincidence.”
“It could be,” I agreed. “We have no way of knowing yet if the two cases are related. One was a single businessman named Malcolm Hopper and one was a mother. They were in two different counties. It could be a copycat, too.”
“It could be,” Fish furrowed his brow. “Mention this shooting in your story, but don’t focus on it. We don’t want to create a panic if they’re not related. That will just make us look like jerks.”
Since the media was often regarded as jerks as it was, I didn’t disagree with him. “I’ll call over to the Oakland paper and see what they have. I’ll dig into that shooting and see what else I can unearth.”
“That’s a good idea,” Fish said. He glanced up at the wall clock. “You probably won’t be able to get anyone until tomorrow, though.”
“It’s just another angle,” I said absentmindedly.
“It’s a good angle,” Fish said. “Just don’t press it yet. We don’t want to do anything that’s going to come back and bite us.”
As a reporter that had witnessed many a story come back and bite me – or try to kill me – I had no problem acquiescing to his demands. I would wait. For now. I needed more information before I picked a direction to go.
Four
I placed a call to the sheriff’s department and found out that a press conference had been scheduled for the next morning. Since no more information would be available tonight, I filed my story and headed home.
A few years ago I had bought a small, two-bedroom home in Roseville. I loved the area because it boasted a bevy of restaurants and easy access to the freeway. It also had a high white trash population that alternately amused and irritated me. I pulled into my driveway and frowned when I saw that my hillbilly neighbors were out in their backyard grilling – without their shirts on. Maybe it’s me, but I never think it’s a good idea to be around an open flame with bare skin. Unfortunately, I would have no choice but to greet them – something I tried really hard to avoid most days.
The brothers had issues, there’s no other way to put it. They lived in the two-bedroom house their mom had left them in her will – with one of the brother’s wife and toddler. That was four people – three of whom liked to drink (a lot) – and a really shrill little girl. When the mood (and the forty-ounce beers) struck, the three adults liked to brawl in the front yard. The police were often called to break it up – and haul belligerent participants away. I liked to think of it as neighborhood theater, only entertaining.
Still, they weren’t my least favorite neighbors. Sometimes that was the pot-addled slackers that lived across the road – but they were mostly harmless. Loud, but harmless. Right now, though, that honor belonged to the new family that had moved into the house on the corner. Sure, the bevy of toys that littered the yard – and blew across their driveway and into the middle of the road during storms – was a constant irritant. The rooster they had adopted and let walk around their yard and crow – at all hours of the day and night, no joke – was the current bane of my existence, though.
When I exited my car, I waved at my hillbilly neighbors and tried to scoot into the house as quickly as possible. Eliot’s truck had been parked out at the curb and, while I was excited to see him, I was more excited to get away from Tweedle-Dumb and Tweedle-Dumber.
“Hey, Avery,” the younger brother greeted me. His name was Larry. He had one of those little shriveled hands from a birth defect and I tried really hard not to stare at it when I was around him. Yes, I’m a terrible person, I’m aware of it.
I inwardly sighed. “Hey, Larry. How’s it going?”
“Pretty good.”
“Any prospects on the job front?”
Larry had been unemployed since I moved in. Secretly, I was pretty sure he was comfortable living on disability and drinking his days away. It was really none of my business, though.
“It’s rough out there,” Larry said.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Cooking dinner?” I hate people that ask obvious questions, but I didn’t have a lot in common with Larry and his brother so I embraced the social nicety that I loathed to ease the conversation lull.
“Steaks,” Larry said happily. “We’re also discussing how to catch that chicken so we can barbecue it this weekend.”
I mulled over the thought. I wasn’t big on animal cruelty. In fact, I abhorred it. That damn rooster woke me up every day, though. “Don’t bother,” I blew out a sigh. “I already reported them to the city.”
“You did?” Larry looked impressed.
“I tried to talk to the woman that lives over there,” I admitted. “She told me to go . . . well, she told me to go have a good time with myself, so I had a good time going and reporting them to code enforcement.”
“How quick will they confiscate the chicken?” Larry asked eagerly.
“They’ve been given ten days,” I replied.
“When was that?”
“About two days ago,” I said. “Trust me, if the chicken isn’t gone, I’ll be reporting them again.”
Fine, I’m a narc. Sue me.
I waved goodbye to Larry and then entered my house. The minute I closed the laundry room door behind me a heavenly smell attacked my olfactory senses. Fajitas! Eliot was cooking.
I climbed the steps between the laundry room and kitchen excitedly and skidded to a halt on the linoleum floor.
Let me tell you, ladies, Eliot Kane is quite a sight. He’s six feet of pure muscle and sex appeal. He has shoulder-length brown hair, bright brown eyes and just enough tattoos to make him sexy instead of trashy.
At the present moment, he had steak, green peppers and onions cooking on my George Foreman grill and he was busily chopping tomatoes at the counter. He lifted his head up when he sensed my presence and smiled at me seductively. “What’s up, chickadee?”
“Chickadee?” I narrowed my eyes. “Is that a crack about the chicken?”
“It’s still there,” he laughed. “I saw it when I parked.”
“It’s the devil.”
“Well, it won’t be here long.”
I moved to Eliot’s side and exchanged a warm and flirty kiss with him – one that held a lot of promise for after-dinner activities – and then dropped my coat and purse on the kitchen floor.
Eliot eyed my discarded items. “You can’t put those away?”
Here’s the thing, Eliot is not a neat freak – but he’s also not a fan of the unorganized chaos I usually embrace. Quite frankly, I’m a pig. Since Lexie had moved in, she did all the cleaning. Before that, I just lived in the mess. What? I need a maid. Since reporters make next to nothing, I can’t afford one. It’s an odd quandary. And no, I don’t want to just clean my house and shut up. Trust me. I’ve heard that from my mother for years. Let’s just say, it’s not my thing.
I blew out a dramatic sigh and then picked up my coat and purse. After putting them away, I walked back into the kitchen to watch Eliot work. “Where’s Lexie?”
“She’s spending the night with whatever loser she’s seeing these days,” Eliot said briefly.
“Devontae,” I supplied.
“What?”
“That’s his name, Devontae.” My cousin, Lexie, is pretty much the closest thing I have to a sister. I’m an only child, but I have a big extended family. My cousins and I are extremely close – probably too close – and we border on co-dependent on a regular basis.
On her best day, you could say Lexie is flaky. On her worst day, you could say she is reckless. Despite all that, I had spent a lot of time swooping in to save her from herself since she was a teenager. This was a fact that drove Eliot crazy. He was trying really hard not to badmouth her, though.
Since she had completed a stint in rehab a couple weeks ago, Lexie had been pretty good. That didn’t mean that her taste in men had gotten any better. Every man she was attrac
ted to was black – which I understood. They were all smooth looking specimens of the male gender. Unfortunately, they often turned out to be dealers or shiftless losers, too. What can I say? She’s got terrible taste in men.
“Is that a real name?” Eliot asked the question in a light tone, but I could see the muscle in his cheek ticking. Lexie wasn’t his favorite person. The fact that she was partially responsible for him getting shot a few months ago had a lot to do with that – but the fact that he spent time with her (against his will) was also part of it, too.
I slipped my arms around Eliot’s waist and rested my head against his muscular back. It was partially a stalling tactic. I also just liked the feel of him. “Can we not fight about Lexie?”
Eliot turned around and wrapped his arms around me, dropping a kiss on my forehead. “That sounds like a good idea.”
I let Eliot finish the meal while I set the table in the dining room. The truth is, I’m not a great cook. My family owns a diner in northern Oakland County, but the cooking gene pretty much skipped me. My best dish is Stouffer’s macaroni and beef. What? It’s delicious.
Eliot and I settled down for dinner, exchanging stories about our day. We were pretty comfortable with each other at this point. I told him about my showdown with Derrick – a story that made him laugh out loud – and then told him about the freeway shooting in Oakland County.
“You think they’re related?”
“Maybe,” I said around a mouthful of fajita. “It could just be a copycat, though.”
“You need more information,” Eliot agreed. “Is the sheriff’s department having a press conference?”
“Tomorrow at nine,” I said. “This is really good. I knew I kept you around for a reason.”
“I thought you were keeping me around for the sex,” Eliot teased.
“Maybe I keep you around for a few things,” I ceded.
Eliot smiled, flashing the dimple in his cheek in my direction. I practically melted when I saw it. He has a certain effect on me. That effect usually ends up with the two of us naked.
I didn’t have a chance to let that thought take me over, though, because the next thing I heard was the backdoor slamming.
“Stupid assholes.”
Lexie was home.
Lexie stormed into the dining room, all four-feet, eleven inches of her. Her long brown hair was wild – and I doubted it was from the wind – and her brown eyes were on fire with rage.
“I hate men!”
I glanced across the table at Eliot. His jaw had clenched at the sound of Lexie’s voice, but he was studying the meal on his plate instead of acknowledging her presence. That was probably a good thing, although I doubted it would last.
“What now?”
“Devontae says that I’m high maintenance,” Lexie slid into the chair beside me and grabbed a piece of green pepper off my plate.
Eliot snorted. “And that’s news?”
Lexie ignored him. “I am not high-maintenance.” I took a bite of my fajita to delay answering her. That didn’t dissuade her, though. “Am I high-maintenance?”
“No,” I said hurriedly.
“Yes,” Eliot said at the same time.
Lexie narrowed her eyes as she regarded Eliot. Despite the fact that he had saved her – several times – over the past few months, their relationship was getting more and more tempestuous.
“What does that mean?”
“It means that you’re the most high-maintenance person I’ve ever met,” Eliot answered honestly.
Lexie pursed her lips angrily. “That’s not true.” She turned to me expectantly. “Tell him that’s not true.”
I swallowed hard. “I promised I wouldn’t lie to him,” I said carefully. “I’m really trying to keep my promise.” And I wasn’t going to break it on something that held absolutely no benefit to me.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lexie screeched.
“Oh, come on,” I sighed. “You know you’re high-maintenance. You get off on it.”
“That’s the meanest thing you’ve ever said to me,” Lexie pouted.
“I once told you that we adopted you from a band of gypsies,” I protested. “You cried for three straight weeks.”
“I forgot about that,” Lexie mused. “You’ve always been mean to me. I was five and I believed everything you told me. For the next two years I waited to grow fangs because you told me all gypsies eventually grew fangs.”
Eliot looked incensed. “Mean? Didn’t she just give you a bunch of money to start a yoga studio?” I guess he was just ignoring the gypsy thing. Despite the uncomfortable situation, it warmed my heart that he was standing up for me.
Lexie looked properly chagrined. “Yes, she did,” Lexie agreed. “She’s also a partner in that business. So, when it makes a lot of money, she’s going to make a great profit.”
“And, if it fails, she’ll lose all that money,” Eliot shot back.
I pinched the bridge of my nose to ward off the headache that was suddenly threatening to ruin the rest of the night. “Can we not fight?”
Lexie and Eliot both pretended they didn’t hear me.
“It’s not going to fail.”
“You don’t know that,” Eliot scoffed. “You know absolutely nothing about running a business.”
“That’s why I partnered with Avery,” Lexie shot back.
“Avery doesn’t know anything about running a business either,” Eliot replied. He shot an apologetic look in my direction. “No offense.”
I couldn’t really take offense since he was right.
“I guess that’s why she’s sleeping with you,” Lexie said angrily. “You run a pawnshop, so you know everything about running a business.”
“I run a private detective business, too,” Eliot reminded her.
“Well, I guess all the pillow talk is about supply and demand then,” Lexie was practically seething.
Eliot regarded Lexie coldly. “Good point,” he said finally, getting to his feet. “And, with that, let’s go to bed.”
Eliot held his hand out to me. I took it, even though the gesture caused Lexie to frown.
“What about this mess?”
“You’re living here rent-free,” Eliot said. “Earn your keep.”
Five
In general, I’m not a morning person. When I wake up next to a warm mass of muscles and tousled brown hair, though, I’ve been known to make exceptions. I blew out a sigh and snuggled into Eliot for a second, basking in the feel of his arms as they tightened around me.
“I can hear the gears in your mind working,” Eliot mumbled sleepily.
“You must be a super hero to hear that,” I replied teasingly.
“They sound rusty.”
“You’re funny,” I said, starting to pull away from him in an attempt to get out of bed and start my day. Eliot pulled me back close to him.
“What were you thinking?”
“I was thinking I have to get ready for a press conference,” I lied.
“That’s not what you were thinking,” Eliot challenged.
“Fine, I was thinking how pretty you are in the morning,” I admitted.
“Pretty?” Eliot’s brown eyes found mine in the early morning light. “I don’t normally think of myself as pretty. Ruggedly handsome? Yes. Pretty? Not so much.”
“Ruggedly handsome? You’ve given this some thought, I see.” I shifted up into a sitting position, catching a glance at my disheveled blonde hair in the mirror across from the bed as I did. “I don’t know how you do it,” I complained.
“What?” Eliot was trailing his hand lazily down my arm but he hadn’t made a move to climb out of bed yet.
“Look so good in the morning,” I said gloomily, running my hand through my snarled hair. “I think that’s another one of your super hero abilities.”
Eliot opened one of his brown eyes again, smiling as he took in my mussed hair. “I think you look cute in the morning.”
“I’m starting t
o rethink that super hero vision thing,” I said.
“Maybe you’re the one that doesn’t see things clearly,” Eliot said. “Because what I see is cute.”
I smiled at him as warmth rushed to my cheeks.
“And mouthy,” Eliot added.
I scowled down at him. “You couldn’t just leave it at cute?”
“You’re not the only one that speaks before they think,” Eliot admitted ruefully.
“And we’re up,” I grumbled.
After showering together – which involved a few wandering hands and lips – we made our way out into the living room and found Lexie doing yoga in front of the television. I had to admit that I was impressed at the contortions she managed to get her small body to conform to, even though it looked more like torture than exercise. I glanced over to see Eliot regarding her curiously. “What is she doing?”
“Yoga,” I said simply.
“Why?”
“It’s supposed to be fun.”
“It doesn’t look fun.”
“Well, it is,” Lexie shot back from her spot on the floor – where her knees were magically behind her ears. “You’re distracting me.”
“From what? Bending yourself into a human pretzel? I have a sudden urge to dump mustard over you.”
“And then eat me?” Lexie asked haughtily.
Eliot looked suddenly uncomfortable. “This conversation took a turn I wasn’t expecting.”
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