“What do you need?” she quickly rephrased.
“Detective Grover is on line five. He tried you on your cell, but didn’t get an answer. He says he needs to speak to you.”
“My cell?!” Maxi rushed to her desk.
“Oh and Alan Turner is on three, he does not sound happy and says Ricco wants to speak to you. Good luck,” Martin mumbled as he shut the door.
Billy had never met Ricco Kingsley or his manager Alan Turner but he already disliked them. From what he’d heard and seen today, they treated Maxi like shit. Every time she was on a call with one of them, Billy had wanted to grab the phone and tell them exactly where they could shove their complaints and issues.
Grabbing the landline off the desk, Maxi picked up a call and Billy wondered whom she answered first.
His own phone buzzed in his pocket and he pulled it out to see that it was Nate.
“What do you got?” Billy asked assuming that Nate had gained some headway on Maxi’s hacked work account or where the feed was going from the cameras that had been put in her apartment.
“Chicago PD just picked someone up on Maxi’s case.”
Billy was just about to ask who when he heard Maxi say in disbelief, “Carter? Carter Simpson?!”
Nate continued, “Carter Simpson. Nineteen. He got hired at The Towers three months ago. They got an anonymous tip and are questioning him now. As soon as they get a search warrant, they are confiscating his computer.”
“An anonymous tip?” Billy heard Maxi repeat what Nate had just told him.
Something didn’t feel right about this. Billy had met the kid a few times and he just didn’t strike him as being the stalker kind. His instinct was telling him that something was off.
“That’s all I’ve got now. I’m going to look into it on my end. I’ll let you know when I have something.”
Nate Holmes was the best at what he did. He could hack into anything. He’d grown up with Seth and had spent eight years in the Navy. Billy knew that he still worked for the government on a contract basis and had top security clearance, but other than that what Nate did and how he did it was never discussed. Not that Billy would understand it anyway.
“Thanks.” Billy disconnected the call at the same time Maxi did.
A panic stricken look was on her face as she hurriedly grabbed her purse. “I have to go.”
“To the event?” Billy asked because she still hadn’t picked up the call from Alan Turner.
“No, to the police station.”
“You want to go to the station?”
“No. I don’t want to. Detective Grover asked me to come down. He said he has questions, things he needs me to see…” She shook her head. “This is crazy. I know he didn’t…he couldn’t…it’s not him. I know it. It can’t be.”
Billy agreed that the kid didn’t seem to fit, but there was something about the way Maxi seemed so sure, that it made him think there was more to all of this than she was telling him. She was keeping something from him. He didn’t know what and he didn’t know why, but he knew she was.
Chapter 10
“I want to see my husband!” A woman demanded, tears falling from her eyes.
“Take a seat, someone will be with you shortly.” The portly, balding officer at the desk gave her the same instructions that he gave everyone.
This entire scene felt like Maxi was watching her life from the outside in. The station reminded her of a television set, complete with all the characters you’d expect to see on a given episode. It even smelled how she would expect it to. The musk of the old building was a combination of urine and cigarettes. Her head was pounding from the pungent scent and the flickering overhead florescent lights weren’t helping.
She was trying to remain calm but her nerves were surfacing in the form of her foot tapping on the linoleum floor as she waited beside Billy for Detective Grover. Her gaze darted down the hallway that led back into the precinct looking for any sign of Carter, Grover or anyone that she recognized. They’d been at the station for almost two hours and still hadn’t spoken to anyone. All she wanted to do was see Carter, talk to him. This was a huge misunderstanding. It had to be.
Her phone buzzed with another message from Alan and Maxi’s entire career flashed before her eyes. Everything she’d worked for was going down the drain. Each minute that passed was cementing her failure.
On the way to the station she’d called her team to let them know that she would be late. Since then she’d been in constant contact with them, checking in every fifteen minutes to make sure that things were running smoothly. And it was. In fact, her social media manager had been live tweeting the entire event and they had already reached hundreds of thousands of retweets, making it one of the most successful events SPC had ever hosted. That hadn’t stopped Alan from leaving her outraged voicemails and texts.
Billy had been on his phone as well. He’d been getting as many messages as she was. She’d resisted the urge to ask if it was his harem of women since the last time she’d traveled down that road it had led to a place she wasn’t ready to visit again. She’d replayed the conversation they’d had on her couch at least a hundred times and she still wasn’t sure why she’d admitted the fact that she dated men that were safe. She’d never revealed that to anyone. It was something that she guarded because the next logical question was why, and that was not something she even let herself think about.
“Rizzo!” The officer at the desk called out.
Maxi sprang to her feet. “Yes.”
Another officer opened the security door and motioned to her as he said, “Follow me.”
Billy stood as well and they both followed the man down a narrow hall. She had so many questions. Where was Carter? Why did they bring him in? Did he have a lawyer? Did he need a lawyer?
The officer stopped in front of an open door. Inside the square room sat a table and four chairs. “You can wait in here. Detective Grover will be with you shortly.”
Shortly. Right. That’s what the front desk cop had told her over two hours ago. She guessed “shortly” covered a multitude of sins. It could mean ten minutes or four hours depending on your perspective. At this point she was just happy not to be seated out in the main waiting area. Hope blossomed that progress was being made and they would soon be seen while at the same time the reality that she was not going to make Ricco’s performance—and would most likely be fired—sunk in.
“This has to be a mistake,” she repeated to Billy as she sat down.
She’d expressed that exact sentiment at least a dozen times since they’d arrived. It wasn’t news to him that that was how she felt, but for some reason it made her feel better to say it out loud.
“It’s gonna be okay,” he responded the same way he had each time she’d made the comment.
Logically she knew that he was just saying words. Realistically he didn’t have the authority to promise that anything about this situation would be okay. But that didn’t change the fact that when he said it, she believed it. Whether it was his unwavering confidence or just his overall air of command, when he said that it would be okay, she believed him. Even if it was only for a second, a calm settled over her.
Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to bask in that peace for as long as it remained.
“Why are you so sure that this is a mistake?” Billy settled into the chair to her right.
Just like that her all-too-brief peace bubble burst.
Her heavy lids opened and she lifted her eyes, studying his features, trying to read between the lines of what he’d just asked. His expression was guarded. She wasn’t sure where this train of questioning was headed but it was definitely on a track to a predetermined destination.
Sounding more defensive than she’d meant to, Maxi snapped, “I just know. I know it’s not him.”
“Is it just a feeling, or is there more to it than that?” His tone was calm but the intensity in his piercing stare pinned her to the back of her seat.
If there were such a th
ing as emotional x-ray powers, Maxi would swear that Billy possessed them. She felt his gaze all the way to her soul.
“More to what?” Her voice wavered with nervous energy. “What are you talking about?”
“Maxi,” his baritone voice rumbled as he said her name. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”
His question was straightforward and so was the answer, but for some reason she just couldn’t bring herself to respond. If she told him the truth about her suspicions, she would be digging up a past that she wasn’t ready to face. And what if she was wrong? Then what? All of those memories, the secret that she’d kept for so long would be exposed and for what? They could hurt the one person she loved the most in this world: her dad.
The weight of what she’d carried around for over a decade and the confusion and fear of what she’d been dealing with for the past few months was more than just an elephant in the room, it felt like that sucker was sitting on her chest.
Tears sprang to her eyes as a lump of emotion formed in her throat. An avalanche of feelings started tumbling over her, smothering her. She was suffocating from them. As much as she’d tried to convince herself that she’d been doing a good job keeping everything together, this moment was proof that pushing things down and ignoring them didn’t actually work.
Note to self: When this is all over, go to therapy.
Unable to face Billy, she stared down at her trembling hands that were folded on the tabletop. Leaning forward he covered her hand with his. The warmth of his palm spread through her entire being. His words had comforted her for a moment, but his touch did more than that. His touch felt like safety. His touch felt like home. His touch felt like love.
Maxi fought the craziest impulse to throw her arms around him and jump into his lap. She wanted more than just his hand covering hers, she wanted to be wrapped up in him. She wanted to absorb his strength and security. She wanted to lose herself in it.
Slowly, she lifted her eyes to meet Billy’s. What she saw there stole her breath away. Billy wasn’t really known for showing emotions. Unless it had to do with fighting or his other favorite f-word, he kept things right at the surface. So seeing the depth of emotional waters crashing behind his eyes was almost more than Maxi could handle.
The door opened and Maxi snatched her hand away, suddenly feeling like they’d been caught in a compromising position. Which was ridiculous. They hadn’t been doing anything, no matter what it felt like.
“Sorry to keep you waiting.” Detective Grover took a seat opposite Maxi. “Thanks for coming down on such short notice. I would’ve spoken to you sooner, but there have been quite a few developments over the past couple hours and I wanted to sort them out before speaking to you.”
“Okay.” Maxi nodded her head anxious to hear what the detective had to say.
Her foot began tapping, the way it always did when she was nervous. She probably wouldn’t even have noticed but when Billy’s large hand settled over her knee beneath the table he stopped it. She waited for him to remove it, now that her heel had stopped moving up and down, but he left it there and she didn’t want to admit how happy she was that he did.
“As you know, we received an anonymous tip that led us to believe that Mr. Simpson was a person of interest in your case. We went to his residence and asked him to come down to the station to answer some questions while we obtained a search warrant. He cooperated. That’s when I contacted you with the development. Once we got the search warrant, we were able to hand Simpson’s computers over to our cyber department. They worked in conjunction with Mr. Holmes from Elite Security and were able to prove that the evidence recovered was not authentic.” Turning his attention to Billy, Grover continued, “Thank you for all of your help.”
“Your help?” Maxi didn’t know what the detective was talking about.
“Mr. Marshall has been coordinating efforts between his firm and the department. Without his efforts, this wouldn’t have been resolved in a matter of hours. It could’ve taken days, weeks even.”
Maxi was so confused. She wasn’t sure what the detective had just told her, or what Billy’s role had been, but she had more pressing questions that needed answered. “Is Carter here? Does he need a lawyer? Bail?”
“Mr. Simpson was never arrested. He was being held for questioning but was released approximately thirty minutes ago.”
“Okay,” Maxi took a deep breath and tried to calm her frazzled nerves. She reminded herself that the most important thing was that Carter wasn’t being arrested and his name had been cleared. But she might lose her job over Grover’s request for her to be here. She had questions and she deserved answers. “Why did you need me to be here? You said an anonymous call, what did they say?”
“They claimed to be a student in one of Mr. Simpson’s classes and said that he’d been bragging about having naked pictures of a hot girl in the building that he works at. They said that he’d shown them pictures of you in the shower and in various states of undress and talked about how he was going to put more cameras in your apartment.
“The pictures from the gym were on his computer, I originally wanted you to verify their authenticity, but with the help of Mr. Holmes our team was able to determine that they were inauthentic, meaning someone put them there. I’m sorry for the inconvenience.”
Maxi couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
Sorry for the inconvenience… She’d just wasted two hours sitting here while her career was sinking faster than a bowling ball in quick sand. Not only that, they were no closer to finding the responsible party. In fact, things appeared to be getting worse.
In an attempt for clarity, she asked. “So someone tried to set him up?”
“It looks that way.” Grover stood when his radio went off. “That’s all we know for now, but we’ll be in touch.”
Both Billy and Maxi stood and shook the detective’s hand.
Maxi felt like she was operating on autopilot as they walked out of the station, her mind was filled with what ifs. What if this was just the beginning? What if they never caught who was behind this? What if another innocent person in her life was targeted?
She didn’t have any of those answers, but she did know that the only thing keeping her from losing her mind was Billy. His constant support and protection would be so easy to get used to, to start depending on. But she couldn’t do that. This was temporary and she needed to keep that top of mind. Unfortunately as he guided her through the station, his hand resting on her lower back, she knew that would be a lot easier said than done.
In the past few days, Billy hadn’t just inserted himself seamlessly into her daily life, he’d shown her things that she hadn’t even known were missing. Like waking up to someone that you’ve spent the night dreaming of. Like having someone to share little moments in your day with. Like having someone that stays after scary movies. Like the tingling sensation that his touch sent spiraling through her. She’d definitely been missing that in her life. And after this was over, never feeling it again scared her more than anything else that was happening.
Chapter 11
Maxi had been on the phone with her team, Jessie, and Martin since they left the police station. Billy knew that she had a lot riding on this preview concert and that her missing it wasn’t good. She was working, doing damage control, and he got that. But he had a strange feeling that there was more to it than that.
He had a sneaking suspicion that she was avoiding talking to him. He wasn’t sure if it was because she was scared he was going to try to continue the conversation that he’d started in the interrogation room, or if she just didn’t want to talk about the case at all. But he was convinced that she was trying to make sure that he didn’t get the chance to find out. Every time one call would end she’d make another one. Maybe he was being paranoid. But other than giving him the name of the venue so he knew where to drive them, she hadn’t said two words to him.
Before Grover had come in, she’d been upset. More upset th
an he’d ever seen her. If they hadn’t been interrupted, he might’ve been able to find out why, but now… He glanced over at Maxi who was on a call as they made their way through the maze of halls in the back of the venue where Ricco had performed six tracks off his new album. From one glance he could see that her walls were back up. She was all business.
He feared that his window of opportunity to find out what she was keeping from him had shut. Being private, keeping things to herself had always been Maxi’s go to move. Which was probably one of the reasons that she was great at her job, but it wouldn’t help him find whoever was doing this.
As they passed a staircase that looked like it was one rusted nail away from falling apart, Billy scanned the area. Other than several groups of girls that were huddled together everyone looked like they were crew or management. Except one. Posted outside a closed door was a tall, imposing looking man that he instantly recognized as Andrew Charles Elliot or “Ace.” He’d seen him in a picture that Seth had on his wall from their days together in Seth’s Marine’s Special Ops unit.
Maxi approached the man with her hand extended. “You must be Ace, I’m Maxi. So good to meet you.”
“You too, ma’am.” Ace nodded as he shook Maxi’s hand.
“Please, call me Maxi.”
Billy knew that it shouldn’t bother him to watch the two of them interacting. It was a pleasant introduction, not anything to be jealous about. So why did he want to pull Maxi to his side and make it known that she was his.
She wasn’t his, no matter what it felt like.
Shaking off the overwhelming bout of possessiveness that had overtaken him, Billy reached out his hand. “I’m Billy, Seth’s said a lot of good things. We’re all happy to have you on the team.”
“I’m happy to be here.” Ace shook his hand.
Maxi lowered her voice and leaned forwards slightly. “How have things been going?”
“We had one incident. A couple of fans from the meet and greet snuck into the dressing room. Other than that, things have been quiet.”
All He Wants Page 9