by Regan Black
“Your mom can’t take over? Isn’t she involved with the planning?”
Paige shook her head. “She’s working on the itinerary for their second honeymoon in the spring.”
Still bitter. She was on her feet again, but at least this time she wasn’t shouting. “Can we table this for a while? I’m a wreck.”
“Sure.” He stood as well. “Go do what you need to do, as long as you don’t leave the house alone. I understand how restrictive that must feel. There are two reasons,” he continued before she could ask. “First off, I don’t want the police to be able to surprise you and try to speak with you alone. There are rules now that you have an attorney, but no one can guarantee they won’t get bent. Secondly, we’ll stick together because it’s possible someone has framed you, which makes you a target.”
“I understand.”
He doubted that, but he took her at her word. “I’ll get my gear and get to work.”
“Great,” she said. “Thanks.”
He waited until she reached the hallway. “Be sure to look up the details on that one o’clock, all right? You can fill me in when you’re rested.”
Paige stopped moving and when she replied, it was a quick answer over her shoulder, “I’ll do that.”
He reset the security system on his way out and followed the gravel path from her front porch to the driveway. When he was well out of earshot and on his way to where he’d parked near the front of the main house, he called Jenna.
“We have a problem,” he said when she answered.
“A killer-client kind of problem?”
“No.” He paused thinking it over. “No,” he said again. “She didn’t kill her friend, but she is definitely hiding something.”
“That big event is a retirement party for her dad,” Jenna said. “That’s all hush-hush.”
No surprise Jenna had found that detail. “Paige told me. This is something else.” Something she did not want anyone poking into. “She had a meeting at one o’clock the day of the murder,” he said, lowering his voice. “She claims she can’t recall the details about who she met where.”
Jenna snorted and Carter agreed with her skepticism. “See what you can find and let me know.”
“You got it.” She paused. “Do you want the good news or the bad news on this video?”
“Good news.” Please let it be something helpful.
“It isn’t doctored,” she said.
At his car, he pulled the phone from his ear and stared at it a moment. “Isn’t that bad news?” If the video wasn’t manipulated somehow then the police would be convinced Paige was at the scene.
“Maybe it’s both?” Jenna didn’t sound as certain as usual. “I labeled it good news because we needed some. Really, this means the time stamp is accurate. Narrows down my search window.”
“I guess that is good news,” Carter agreed reluctantly. “Keep me posted.”
“Be safe out there,” Jenna said, ending the call.
At the driveway, Carter looked through the iron fencing to the police car keeping tabs on Paige. Safe seemed doable. Proving her innocent, not so much.
Chapter Four
A bodyguard was living with her. Not a situation Paige had ever imagined. She had no etiquette training for this and no idea what to expect. Worse, what did he expect? The only silver lining she could see was that her father had to explain it to her mom. Cora held onto some very traditional values about propriety.
She wasn’t sure what to do with Carter’s insistence that she was his top priority. That felt significant. A simultaneous pressure and relief. Sure her criminal defense team—another unanticipated scenario—had sent Carter out to protect and investigate, but was he limited to the scope of that assignment? She had no idea how to find answers that wouldn’t turn her life upside down, but maybe he could make some suggestions.
If only she knew how to ask without making a fool of herself.
She had tried to take a nap and when that proved futile, she’d considered an at-home spa day. But the idea of pampering herself with a facial or a long soak in the tub put a pinch between her shoulder blades. Melissa would never enjoy those things again.
Her mother had called twice and Paige couldn’t bring herself to pick up. Maybe it would’ve been better if she’d surrendered her phone to the police along with her passport. She didn’t want to talk about party details or dinner plans. She wanted—needed—to wallow, to let her mind and heart process all these momentous changes.
Curled up in the glider swing on her back patio, she watched dusk fall over the marsh and decided not to talk about the case until tomorrow. Carter would respect that. She’d given him everything he needed about the day of the murder.
Tomorrow was soon enough to figure out how to confirm or adjust the catering situation. Maybe it would be better to call it off. Not like she was in much of a mood to celebrate her father’s accomplishments with these questions rattling around in her mind.
“Paige?” Like a good bodyguard, Carter had been close, keeping tabs on her.
She didn’t turn around, blatantly ignoring years of manners and courtesy.
“It’ll be dark soon and I need you to come inside.” He huffed. “I sound like your mother. But it is a necessary precaution.”
He was the expert and she really should comply without an argument. Standing, she tried to smile. “You don’t sound anything like my mom.” Although she could only assume. What she meant was that he didn’t sound like the woman who’d raised her.
And that was way too much misplaced bitterness, even for her, even right now.
Cora Coker had been a wonderful nurturing mother, aside from a few episodes of depression and a serious overprotective streak. What mother worth her salt didn’t have imperfect moments?
“How is your investigation going?” she asked as she followed him back into the house, by way of her office.
He gave her a nod of approval as he watched her lock the back door. “We’re only a few hours in, but we’re making progress.”
That didn’t sound promising, but why dwell on one more thing she couldn’t control? “I guess we need to pull something together for dinner,” she said when they reached the front room. His laptop was on the coffee table, closed, so she had no idea what he’d been working on.
“Your father called me and invited us to the house,” Carter said.
She cringed. “And you accepted.”
“No. He mentioned that your mother hadn’t been able to reach you, so I assumed you’d rather not go. I told him we’d be staying here.”
She gaped. She’d been attracted to him from their introduction. Now, he’d just leaped into legendary hero status. Her breath backed up in her lungs. “You said no. For us.” She couldn’t believe it.
“For you,” he corrected. He cocked his head. “Did I do the wrong thing?”
“No.” She felt like dancing a jig. Or kissing him. Better to stick with the jig. “You did the best thing ever.”
“I’ll make myself a note that you’re easy to please.”
“Is that part of the deal? Making me happy, I mean.”
“In a way.” A wariness came into his golden-brown eyes. “Always harder to wrangle unhappy clients.”
“I bet.” She might’ve given him the wrong impression about what she wanted. She didn’t want to jump him. Well, she did, but she wouldn’t. Grief was ridiculous. She had self-control. Somewhere. “You’ve said I’m the priority and I’m not used to that.”
“Then let’s make food the first priority for right now,” he suggested.
“I can work with that,” she agreed, eager to find the quickest route back to solid footing. She went to the fridge and did a quick assessment. “We can keep it simple with grilled cheese and soup or order in.” She sighed. “Or ask for leftovers from whatever Mom and Dad are having.”
“Grilled cheese works for me.” He turned to the pantry and pulled out a can of soup.
“You learn your way ar
ound a place fast,” she observed as she pulled bread, butter, and cheese from the refrigerator.
“Part of the job,” he said. “Am I making you uncomfortable?”
“No,” she replied.
It wasn’t much of a fib. Years of practicing poise through dance classes, cotillion and public speaking classes gave her the ability to suppress the alternating tremors of panic and shivers of awareness that kept rolling through her. Panic that her days of freedom were numbered and awareness of the hunky guy helping her fix dinner. It was such a familiar task, but it felt new and different to tackle it beside Carter.
“I do appreciate your help with all of this.”
“Haven’t done much yet.” He set the soup on the stove and stirred it as it heated through.
He’d asked her about the afternoon meeting and he wasn’t the kind of man to forget she owed him an answer. How was she going to explain that meeting? She sensed he would see through any attempt to lie and if his assistant could track her text messages, Paige was sure they’d tracked her phone’s location too.
She decided to focus on that technical aspect when they sat down to eat at the kitchen island. It was roomier since her dining room had been adjusted for the Christmas tree and she didn’t have to look him right in the eyes.
“The police can track my cell phone location and the GPS on my car, right?” she asked.
“That’s right.”
“Then why isn’t that information good enough for the police to clear me?” Ronnie especially should have more faith in her. “Aside from the video.”
“You were alone, here, right?” At her nod, he continued. “That doesn’t make for a strong alibi, even with your parents backing you up.” Carter paused to eat before he continued. “There are other vehicles you might have borrowed to get back to Melissa’s kitchen and a phone can be left anywhere. Three weak verifications aren’t enough for any good cop to rule you out.”
“What will be enough?”
He arched an eyebrow. “Ideally, we’ll find another suspect. Is it possible someone is framing you because of something else in your life?”
“Like what?”
He set down his spoon and stared at her. It was all she could do not to squirm under that intense gaze. “I’m here to help you, Paige. I don’t believe you killed your friend, but that means I need to find the person connected to both you and Melissa who has a reason to frame you.”
It took her a second to drag her attention away from his hands resting on the countertop. He had strong hands and muscled forearms, revealed now that he’d rolled back the cuffs of his shirt.
“If you can’t find that person, what do you expect from me?” she wondered.
“The truth,” he said, returning his attention to his meal. “You don’t know me, but I’m a vault. Discretion is an agency requirement. Unless you tell me you killed her—in which case I have to report that to the police—your secrets won’t leave this room.”
“Is that a warning?” she wondered.
“Just giving you all the facts.” He popped the last of his sandwich into his mouth.
“I was here at the time of Melissa’s murder. That is the truth.” She just hadn’t been working exclusively on party plans. She’d been obsessing over the pictures and receipts from thirty years ago that she’d found in her father’s belongings from the office.
She’d never know if Carter could help with that if she didn’t ask. It was one question that most likely would have an immediate answer. She could do with a quick win.
“When my father hired you did he make any suggestion about who was in that surveillance video?”
Carter shook his head. “Should your dad know the woman at the scene?”
She had no idea how to answer that question. The scrapbooking and the interviews and the random comments were messing with her head.
“What did you think when you saw the surveillance video?” Carter asked.
“My first thought was that it was impossible,” she said.
“And your second thought?” he pressed.
“That someone had disguised themselves to look like me. What was your first thought?” she dared to ask.
She admired the way he held her gaze, stoic and steady. Unflappable. That word wasn’t in her vocabulary often, but it fit Carter. It seemed as if nothing would surprise him or dent that composure. A nearly irrepressible urge to hide behind him until all of this went away left her breathless.
“My first thought was that I had been asked here to find a way to keep you out of jail,” he admitted.
“Is that often part of your job?”
“No. Our agency is very selective and while we often have to get our clients out of sticky situations, I’ve never known about a case where we worked hard to clear someone who was guilty.”
“So you believe I’m innocent because of your agency’s record?”
He gave her another one of those half-smiles. “It’s a factor. Having only a brief overview of the situation it’s easy to believe that’s you in Melissa’s kitchen. But it wasn’t,” he finished before she could declare her innocence once more.
“Because you need to believe your client?” She wanted to understand him. She needed to believe that he was invested for more than a paycheck. Maybe that was too much to ask for a professional investigator hired by her father, but the weight in her chest, the pressure building to a crescendo and threatening to explode insisted she find out before she revealed everything.
“Call it gut intuition at this point,” he said. “Although the woman on that video looks a lot like you, there are subtle differences.”
“Why don’t police see the differences?” Ronnie had been her friend for years.
“They will,” Carter promised. “We’re going to show it to them.”
Those words, the conviction behind them, eased the pressure just enough for her to get a deep breath. He was staring at her as if she was about to reveal the secrets to the universe. She felt as if she was about to leap off a cliff. An irrevocable choice. “The one o’clock meeting?”
“Yes?”
“I was at the hospital getting the results of a paternity test. I used the ancestry kit excuse, but I had a friend process the cheek swabs rather than send them back in with the kit.” She bit her lip. “He is my father.”
Carter scowled. “Why did you have doubts?”
“Because of what I found in the oldest files from Dad’s office.”
He had no idea what else she might have said. A ringing phone interrupted the conversation and he was left with a sudden onslaught of questions.
“It’s Mom.” She stepped aside to answer.
He watched in fascination as she conversed with her mother. When she ended the call, she sighed heavily. “We’re invited to drinks at the house.” She turned the phone over in her hands. “Attendance isn’t optional.”
“You were expecting this,” he guessed.
“My mother must have protested about you staying out here with me. She has a thing for optics and rumor.”
“Having a bodyguard staying with you is bad optics and fodder for the gossip chain.”
“Exactly. Although I don’t know who she thinks would tattle. We have all kinds of privacy. Or we did until the police decided to park out front.”
He thought maybe a change of subject would help. “Why don’t you tell me more about what you found while working on the party?”
“You really think it could help identify who shot Melissa?”
He nodded. “I don’t want to overlook anything. We need to give the police another theory. Another tree to go barking up. We know it’s not you in that video and we need to make sure they don’t get tunnel vision.”
“Right.”
There was a world of doubt in her response, almost a defeat in her body language. He didn’t blame her. They had a great deal of work to do.
“It’s all back in my office.”
He followed her back, taking note of the box s
he pulled out from under the worktable.
“Dad’s assistant gave me this to sort through for the scrapbooks and videos we’ll share at the party. Most of this is from his early career. This is the picture that got my attention and launched a thousand questions.”
She handed him a photo. Despite the red-eye effect and the glare of the flash bouncing off something in the background, it was clear the woman was happily draped all over Jack Coker.
“Company Christmas party?” Carter asked.
“Yes. The year before I was born,” Paige replied. “You don’t have to be polite. I know what it looks like.”
“Obvious conclusions aren’t always correct,” he reminded her.
“True. But this is the only Christmas party without any pictures of my mom and dad together at the event.” She gripped the edge of the table. “I went back through the family albums, looking for pictures of them together that year. They always take a picture in front of the tree. It’s been their tradition since he proposed to her on Christmas Eve. There are no pictures of them in the holiday season before I was born.”
“What does that mean to you?” he asked.
“Based on receipts I found, I think mom must’ve been hospitalized for depression or a suicide attempt. According to Gloria, who has been with the company from the start just like Dad, this woman was a notorious flirt, trying to sleep her way into a better life. Gloria thought she took a run at Dad, but she didn’t come back to the company the next year. Gloria specifically asked me not to use this picture in the scrapbooks.”
“Doesn’t look like your dad’s finest hour and it could upset your mother.”
“Agreed.” She seemed to have some internal debate as she chewed on her lip. Then she handed Carter another photo. “Flip it over. There’s a note on the back.”
He stared at the image first, keeping his surprise in check. Jack Coker and the woman from the Christmas party picture wore swimsuits and sat hip to hip at the edge of a swimming pool, a line of short palm trees behind them. The note on the back of the photo had clearly been written by a woman, complete with flowing script and flourishes: For sunshine on a cloudy day call me. –Y.S.