by Lexi Blake
A little laugh puffed out Brooks’ mouth. “No one is trying to kill her. I hate this. I really do. Serena used to be such a sweetheart, but she’s playing some kind of game. We’re in a little legal trouble, Serena and I, and she’s decided to play dirty. Have you read the police reports?”
Yes, but now that he was sitting in front of Serena’s ex, he could see what the cops had seen. A perfectly dressed, perfectly calm and reasonable man who could make his point in a manner they would understand. And Serena had most likely been a bit messy, a little mousy, and altogether awkward.
“I have,” Jake replied. “I also know that Serena’s been receiving some phone calls from you.”
He’d listened to the one on her answering machine the night before. It had been filled with bile and vitriol. The harsh voice on the machine the night before bore little resemblance to the cultured, smooth tones of the man in front of him. Professor Brooks seemed to have two different personalities.
Brooks had the good sense to flush a little. “I shouldn’t have left that message. It was wrong of me. I should have allowed our lawyers to handle things. Look, Serena and I have some matters to settle, obviously.”
“Your divorce was finalized a couple of years ago,” Liam noted. He had a notepad in his hand, looking to the casual watcher like an assistant.
Brooks sat up a little straighter. “Not everything was made clear to me at the time. My lawyer says this is a long shot, but I’m going to stand up for myself. I supported her while she wrote those…books, if you can call them that.”
“That’s what we usually call a collection of words forming a coherent story.” Yeah, the professor was a pompous asshole.
“I don’t know about coherent. What my ex-wife writes is pure pornography. It’s clogging up the publishers so the real writers can’t get through.”
Liam cleared his throat. It was a clear “I told you so.”
And he had. “Serena explains to us that you divorced her over her first book.”
He took a long breath and sat back. “Well, what did she expect me to do? I had just gotten on at the college.”
“Junior college.” Liam seemed to feel a desperate need to keep poking the professor.
Brooks didn’t acknowledge him. “A professor’s wife is an important asset. She reflects on the professor. If I wanted to move up in my profession, I certainly couldn’t be that man whose wife writes porn. And the acts she described.” His nose wrinkled in distaste. “The book was filth. It shouldn’t be out there. It made me sick and, quite frankly, some of it is demeaning to women.”
That was ridiculous. Jake had read the same book. She used some rough language. She called a cock a cock. She hadn’t used the phrase “honey pot” or “center” to describe a vagina. She’d called it a pussy. Jake had found it refreshing. It had made the whole thing hot. He didn’t see how a woman choosing to explore her sexuality demeaned her. But this wasn’t the time to defend Serena’s work. “Where were you last night, Professor?”
The man seemed a bit startled. “I don’t know that’s any of your business.”
“If you were at my client’s home running a key across her car, it is most definitely my business.” It was time to let this asshole know that someone was looking out for his ex. She wasn’t on her own anymore.
The professor’s fists clenched. “I was here grading papers. And no one was with me. Ginny was at class. The bus dropped her off after ten.”
Liam gasped. “You let that little bit of fluff walk the streets alone? What kind of a man are you?”
“I’m a man who respects women. She isn’t a child. She has a brain, and she can take care of herself.”
Jake sat forward. He understood the man now. “I know men like you. You take and take and give nothing back and call yourself modern or some shit. You won’t open a door for a woman because, according to you, it’s insulting. I’m sure little Ginny in there is responsible for her own orgasm because you can’t be bothered to give her one. You use every excuse in the book so you don’t have to take responsibility.”
He shrugged. “Well, I wouldn’t want to piss off the feminists.”
Jake stood. It was time to end this interview. It wouldn’t go anywhere, and he knew at least one thing about the man. Jake didn’t trust him. He would give Adam the go ahead to hack into every account the man had. It might take weeks to go through everything, but if this fucker had even written a nasty e-mail to her, Jake would take it to the cops. Brooks thought he could annoy Serena. Well, Jake had irritated some of the world’s most deadly men in his time. Professor Brooks would be a breeze. Liam could keep an eye on the asshole for a few days, but talking to him was just pissing Jake off. “Serena Brooks is under my protection now. Do you understand?”
“I understand you sound like a meathead caveman.”
Jake leaned over, using every bit of his military training to intimidate. A wave of pure predatory pleasure overtook him as the professor seemed to shrink right before his eyes. “Remember that. If you call her house again, I’ll be back here, and we’ll have a chat. I don’t think you’ll like how I chat. I don’t use big words.”
“You’re threatening me.”
He smiled, but Jake was pretty sure it wasn’t a happy thing. “Look, Liam. All those degrees really made him smart.” He backed off. “And as for Serena’s books, they’re good. I like them. I can see where you would want to divorce her. She made you look bad.”
The professor’s eyes narrowed. “Fuck. You’re fucking my wife.”
There was the voice Jake had heard on the answering machine. Yep. The professor had a dark side.
“Not yet, he isn’t. But he’ll come around.” Liam stood, gathering his things. He put a card on the professor’s desk. “I want to make it easy for you to call and complain. Ask for Ian Taggart. He owns the company.”
Doyle Brooks’ face was a mottled red. He reached for the card. “Oh, Mr. Taggart will hear from me. Now, I believe I would like for you to leave my home.”
Jake nodded. He had nothing left to say. He wished he could be there when Brooks tried to pull his shit on Ian. Liam was a bastard. Jake was happy to not be on the Irishman’s bad side. He followed Liam out, wondering how hard it had been on Serena to live in this house. She wouldn’t have been able to write in her underwear. She wouldn’t have been able to dance around. She would have felt hemmed in. She had a deeply submissive nature. It didn’t mean she would just let anyone walk on her. She’d proven that. She’d come out fighting. She’d followed her path. But it did mean she would more than likely attempt to please the people around her. Especially her husband. That shit bag in the office had taken advantage of her for as long as he could and then ground her under his overly pretentious loafer when he no longer had a use for her.
“You look like a man ready to take a chunk out of someone.” Liam had a shit-eating grin on his face. “Remember my advice. Fuck her and get it over with. It’s inevitable. Then you would have had every right to punch that bloody wanker in the face. That pussy wouldn’t punch back.”
Jake nodded to Ginny as he strode out the door. He hoped the young woman had enough sense to get out when she could.
He could hear Professor Brooks shouting at someone. God, he hoped it was Ian. The door slammed behind him, just as his cell rang. He looked down at the number.
“Tell me it’s Ian giving us the go ahead to kill the bastard.” Liam’s Irish was back. And there was a grin on his face. He’d enjoyed fucking with the professor.
But Jake lost his smile. “It’s Brighton.” He slid his hand across the bar to answer the call. “This is Dean.”
His police liaison sounded grim. “Hey, Jake. Did you take the Serena Brooks case? You know that writer you called about yesterday?”
Jake got a cold shiver that always went up his spine when the shit was about to hit the fan. “Yeah. I’m out at her ex-husband’s place right now. What’s going on?”
“You should come down to the station. The c
op working her case found something. Do you want me to call her or would you rather do that yourself?”
Fuck. He didn’t want to call her at all, but he didn’t have the right to keep things from her. She had the right to know what was coming for her. “I’ll do it. I’ll be there in twenty minutes. How bad is it?”
“Well, it’s more serious than we thought, or she’s more clever. No idea, man. You need to talk to the cops handling this case. I’ll keep them here for you. I don’t know about this, Jake. It gives me a nasty feeling.”
Brighton was a cop with eighteen years in. Jake trusted Brighton’s gut. Especially when his own was telling him this was more complex than it seemed. “We’ll be there.”
He hung up the phone and called Adam. The whole way to the police station, he couldn’t help the feeling that everything was about to go wrong.
* * * *
Adam looked over the desk at Sargent Edward Chitwood. He was a quiet man with the sort of bland good looks that most people ignored. His desk was neatly appointed, complete with a picture of his perfectly bland wife and kids. In the family portrait, they were all smiling. The perfect American family. But Chitwood wasn’t smiling now.
“Brass is not happy with you, partner.” Chitwood’s partner was a fit-looking man named Mike Hernandez.
Chitwood sighed. “I know, Mikey. It was stupid. It was also kind of instinctive. I had the thing in my hand before I really knew what I was doing.”
“This is the letter you found?” Adam asked. He turned and looked back. Serena was standing at the vending machines. So much for his perfect lunch. She was going to have to eat chips and drink a soda. His gut was in knots. The minute they’d gotten Jake’s call, she’d paled and a fine tremble had hit her. They had been forced to cancel lunch and leave her agent’s office early. Serena’s life was being completely disrupted.
Chitwood nodded. “Yes. I am so sorry to have to give this to her.”
Hernandez looked over at Serena, his mouth a flat line. “I’d like to study her when she reads it.”
He would be looking for anything that wasn’t normal, anything that gave away the fact that she’d set this up herself.
“I’d like to point out the fact that she was with me when the note was left,” Adam said.
Hernandez shrugged. “So she has an accomplice. Have you met those friends of hers?”
No. He was scheduled to have lunch with them tomorrow. Liam had already forwarded files on both Bridget Slaten and Chris Roberts. He hadn’t read them, though. It was easy to see that at least one of the cops working her case thought Serena was a whack job.
He glanced back again. She had a green can in her hands. He could still feel her lips on his. She’d been so fucking sweet, her hands exploring his body with the awe of a woman on the verge of something amazing. He could still hear the hitch in her breath as he’d pulled their pelvises together. If Ian hadn’t stopped him, he would have put his hand up her skirt and teased his fingers into her pussy, rubbing her little clit until she was shaking in his arms.
He wouldn’t have fucked her. He wouldn’t do that without Jacob. The last thing he wanted was for her to bond to only one of them. He’d been down that road, and it led to heartache.
The door to the division office opened, and Jake strode through with Liam in tow. He watched as Serena looked up and almost immediately took a step toward him. And then she forced herself to stop. Jake’s eyes laser focused on her. His hand actually came up and then the big old coward put his hand back down. So close.
They said something, and Jake’s hand finally came up and found her shoulder. It was an awkward touch, but it was there. Liam looked over and rolled his eyes letting Adam know he’d probably already figured the situation out.
“So, she has three bodyguards?” Chitwood asked, studying the scene in front of him. “That seems like a bit of overkill.”
“It’s just me and my partner, Jacob Dean. Liam is our backup. But I think Lieutenant Brighton would prefer you ran everything by me or Jake. We’ll be with her twenty-four seven.”
Hernandez whistled. “That must be costing her a pretty penny. She’s way more loaded than we thought, Eddie. McKay-Taggart is one of those fancy security companies that handle really rich people.”
Adam was getting annoyed with the cops. “She’s very important to her agent. Now, I would like to know what’s going on.”
Jake walked up behind him, Serena at his side. There were only two chairs. Jake held out the remaining chair, offering it to Serena.
“It’s all right. I can stand,” Serena said.
Jake simply stared at her, and she sat down. They would have to train her to accept their courtesy. It went beyond mere politeness. It was their way of taking care of her.
“I would never sit while you were forced to stand,” Jake explained. “And is this the only food you’ve had? A soda and some chips.” He frowned Adam’s way.
Adam held his hands out. His first instinct was to bark back at his partner, but he had to admit he was happy Jake seemed so invested in her well-being. “I had reservations. You’re the one who called and told me to get my ass here.”
“I saw a sandwich place across the street. Is turkey all right?” Liam asked, giving Serena a little wink. “Don’t tell me no. Jake will Dom you to death. Just give in.”
A little smile curved her lips. “Turkey is fine. With mustard. Thank you so much.”
“I’ll take the same,” Adam said. “Except make it pastrami on rye and make the mustard hot.”
Liam shot him the finger. “You’ll be lucky to get anything at all.”
Liam walked off. Adam might have to hope he got a few of those chips of Serena’s. He turned back to the cops. “Now we’re all here. Explain why you called us in.”
Chitwood flushed slightly. He was very pale. Adam bet he burned all summer long. “It’s my fault.”
“Dude, I would probably have done the same thing,” Hernandez said, slapping his partner on the back sympathetically.
Adam was just about ready to scream when the detective started to speak. “I went by to take the report on Miss Brooks’ car.”
Jake stood behind Serena, looking like some sort of protective bird of prey. “Why would you do that? We had an appointment to meet with Brighton at two o’clock.”
“No one told me,” Chitwood explained.
“He was taking care of his wife this morning. She’s got cancer.” Hernandez’s face went grim. “His kids are off at college. He sometimes stays in when she has a bad morning. I cover for him with brass.”
Adam was sorry to hear that. “If you didn’t come in then how did you know anything had happened at all?”
“Mikey forwarded the report to me. I stopped by on my way in to work. I’ll be honest. I would have done it whether I had known about the meeting with brass or not. I would have stopped by to take some photos. But I knocked on the door, and when I did, an envelope fell. It started to drop, and I did something stupid.”
Adam closed his eyes. It was understandable, but didn’t help their case. “You caught it.”
A long huff blew from the detective’s mouth. “Yep. So we’re running it for prints, but you can bet mine will be on there.”
“It’s not a tragedy,” Hernandez said.
It wasn’t. It also wasn’t optimal. “Do you have a copy?”
He didn’t miss the fact that Hernandez focused in on Serena. While Chitwood grabbed a folder, Hernandez never took his eyes off Serena. She sat forward, obviously anxious about whatever was in that report.
“He knows where I live.” Her tone was flat, fatalistic. “I hoped the car was a coincidence, but it wasn’t. He has my home address.”
Adam reached over and placed his hand over hers. “It’s all right.”
She shook her head. “I’m careful. I have a PO box. I never put my real name out there.”
He knew how this asshole had found her. He’d checked up on her yesterday, and with one little piece of
information, he’d found her real name and home address served up right on the internet. “You have an LLC.”
Chitwood nodded. “I’m sure that’s how he found you. The state requires all businesses to have a physical address. If he knows what LLC you publish under, it would be easy for him to look it up on the web and pull your actual address.”
“God, I feel so dumb. Amber Rose LLC. Why the hell did I do that?” Tears were pooling in her eyes.
“You didn’t know,” Jake said. “It’s fine, Serena. Not a lot of people think about it.”
Adam already had a plan in motion. “I changed the address on her LLC this morning. I talked to a nice lady in the comptroller’s office. We’re going to use the physical address of the post office where her PO box is located.”
She turned to him. “You did that?”
Adam shrugged. Some women might see it as meddling. He merely saw it as taking care of a problem she didn’t even know she’d had. “You were working. I didn’t want to bother you. I explained to the woman that I was your assistant. She believed me since I had your passwords and all your information.”
“You do?”
He nodded. “Yep.”
He waited for her to get upset, but the hand under his turned and clutched at him. “Thank you. Whatever Lara is paying you, it isn’t enough.”
Adam breathed a sigh of relief. At least she was reasonable. “Now, let’s take a look at this note.”
Chitwood frowned but opened the folder. “You can’t touch it. It still has to go through some more forensics, but as you can see, someone isn’t happy.”
Adam leaned forward. It was a single sheet of what looked like thick card stock paper. On it was the cover to Serena’s latest book–Their Sweetheart Slave. The cover was vibrant, showing a western setting with the three lovers featured in the center of a field. A man with long, dark hair sat on a horse reaching down to a pretty brunette who stood beside a man adjusting his cowboy hat. And apparently cowboys in Serena’s world didn’t believe in shirts.