Armed and Fabulous (Lexi Graves Mysteries)

by Camilla Chafer

  Solomon considered that as if I had told him something completely normal. "Why would your friend think there was a murderer in the car?"

  I thought about Martin Dean with the bullet hole between his eyes, and his girlfriend with the one in her chest. "It seemed plausible at the time."

  "Fair enough."

  "You can't tell Maddox."

  "We're not drinking buddies."

  "Good job. Two smokin' hot guys sitting together would cause most of the female population of Montgomery to wilt."

  "Smokin' hot, hmmm?" Solomon paid the bartender and took a long sip of his beer, his eyes closing momentarily. Smokin' sexy, I thought, watching him, but somehow kept my mouth shut. Alcohol had an embarrassing effect on me. It made me too talkative and too prepared to do things I would love to do, but regret later. It had no effect on Lily whatsoever, other than making her silly and mooneyed.

  "I won't remember I said it in the morning."

  Solomon smiled.

  "Why don't you like Maddox?" I asked, resting my elbow on the bar, my chin in my hand. I tried, but failed, to stop myself from gazing at him.

  "I didn't say I didn't like him."

  "But you're not drinking buddies."

  "That's right."

  "Why are you leaving the you-know-whos?"

  "The FBI?"

  "Are you allowed to say that?"

  He leaned in, his mouth close to my ear and I held my breath. "Yes," he said, his breath tickling the hair resting at the nape of my neck. "I like this top," he said. "Very feminine."

  I gulped and ignored his comment, for fear of jumping him. He shouldn't make my heart race fast like that. He shouldn’t look so good. Why did fate have to curse me with two of the sexiest men I had ever seen at the same time? "So, why are you leaving?" I asked, moving onto safer ground as the “Blondie” comment popped into my head.

  "I feel like a change."

  "I feel like a change too. I hate temping."

  "Do you have plans to do something different?"

  "No." That was always the fatal flaw in my plan. I had no idea what I wanted to do. Not in college, not in the years after.

  "How come you're not a cop?" Solomon asked, surprising me. Then he added, “I read your file.”

  Of course he had.

  "I didn't like the uniform."

  Solomon laughed and I grinned, thinking how lovely his eyes were when he smiled. They crinkled slightly at the edges, enough that I thought he was older than I, but not so much that fancying him was icky. “So, I’m here to rescue you.” He took another sip. "How do you know I'm not going to take advantage of you tonight?"

  "How do you know I wouldn't let you?" Oops. That just slipped out. A squeak tried to emerge from my throat, but I stifled it and attempted to appear nonchalant. It would have been much easier four vodkas ago.

  Solomon did that sexy half smile thing again, like he was having really dirty thoughts. I felt heat flush through me. My intoxication shut-off point was approximately two drinks ago, and I couldn’t be sure if I were being sexy or just a lush as I met his eyes. I waited for Solomon to offer to undress me and do wicked things to my body, but instead, he sipped his drink, contemplating me. Finally, he said, "What's going on with you and Maddox?"

  "John Solomon, gossip," I laughed. "Who knew?”

  He waited silently and I shifted uncomfortably on the stool.

  "Nothing's going on," I said. At least, as far as I knew, nothing was going on. So Maddox had stayed over a couple of times, politely taking the couch like a decent man. He brought me dinner and made me breakfast, but the “date” word had only just reared its pretty head and wasn’t set in stone. So far as I knew, there was some kissing, and a lot of interest, but nothing that could possibly indicate any kind of girlfriend/boyfriend exclusivity or any promise that there would be some.

  I did like Maddox a whole lot more now that I knew his secret side, but it wasn't just the undercover thing that excited me, and which I found very sexy. I felt like I knew Maddox a little bit. Not his favorite color, or his favorite baseball team, but I knew he was kind and caring and not afraid of bad guys with guns. I knew he had Garrett's respect, which counted for a lot because it meant he could probably survive my family.

  I wasn’t totally sure that he wasn’t just being nice to me so that I would help him on the case.

  "Do you want something to go on?" asked Solomon, appraising me with his dark eyes.

  Now there was a question. Did I want that? Or was it lust? "I don't know. Maybe.”

  "Do you want something to go on between you and me?"

  Oh boy. "I don't know. Maybe," I said, before considering it.

  Solomon arched an eyebrow.

  "Not tonight though. I'm too drunk and I'd rather remember." I don’t know where that came from.

  "You wouldn't forget."

  Oh! Boy!

  Lily took that moment to stumble back, hopping onto her stool and gripping the bar for stability. "I feel less drunk," she said, slowly and decisively, following it up with another hiccup. Somehow, between going to the bathroom and returning to our table, her top had opened a couple of buttons and her face was flushed. Plus, the barman seemed to be wearing her lipstick. I resolved to never use the bathroom here.

  Solomon shook his head, his eyes twinkling with amusement. "C'mon. I'll take you two home."

  "Yay us," said Lily, skipping out ahead.

  "What about my car?" I asked as I slid into the passenger seat of Solomon's shiny, black Lexus. My car might not be chop shop desirable, but I didn't fancy its chances outside the bar overnight.

  "Don't worry about it. I'll deal with it," said Solomon as he leaned around me to reach for the seatbelt. I held my breath as he buckled it after I fumbled it. He pulled away and fired up the engine.

  By the time we got home, Lily was half asleep in the back seat so I woke her up and Solomon helped me walk her into her apartment. He waited in her living room while I rolled her into bed, taking a moment to pull off her shoes and pull up the blanket.

  "You'rez the besht," slurred Lily. "Hunting murderersh is sooo much fun."

  "Yeah. Loads," I sighed as I went to get her a glass of water. She was asleep by the time I got back. Using my key to her place, I locked her door behind us and walked up the stairs, conscious all the time of Solomon just inches behind me.

  "Thanks for coming to get us," I said, unlocking my door and holding it open for Solomon. He slid inside and pushed the door shut behind him.

  "No problem."

  "Do you want a hot drink before you go? Or is this the part where you take advantage of me?" I said, half joking, as it suddenly occurred to me that we were very alone, sobriety was a vague memory, and I had no idea of how to play the situation.

  Solomon moved closer and I took a step back, pressing my body against the wall that divided the small hall from my bedroom. His eyes bored into mine as he placed a hand either side of my shoulders. My heart beat a faster tempo as he stooped, his mouth irresistibly close to mine. He kissed my cheek first, then his lips brushed my jaw, moving closer with each butterfly kiss until his lips met mine, gentle at first, then teasing, then passionate. I responded like kissing Solomon was second nature and his hands wrapped around my waist, pulling me into him. His body was hard and unyielding, and when I ran my hands down his back to rest in the hollow just above his butt, he sighed. His hands edged lower, pulling at my top to run over my bare skin underneath, spanning my waist. Judging by his gentle rocking against me, and the extra hardness pressing into me, he was just as excited as I was about this new development.

  Almost reluctantly, he pulled back, his hands still warmly gripping my waist. "I'm not going to take advantage," he said, and for a moment, my heart fell. "But that doesn't mean this is over."

  "No?"

  He kissed me again, slowly this time, taking his time to suck my lower lip, entangling his tongue with mine. "No," he said, and left, leaving me flushed and panting against the wall. In the mo
rning, I would feel relieved, I decided. Solomon was not a man to get involved with lightly.

  "Wow," I said to the empty hall.

  Chapter Eleven

  It wasn't easy to concentrate on work with the pressure of Solomon's kiss burning my lips, while Maddox smoldered only a few desks away. Maddox struck me as a straight talking type, so when he said nothing about Lily's and my drunken shenanigans the night before, I assumed Solomon simply hadn't told him. A large part of me was quite relieved. However, Maddox also didn't mention our future date. I spent a good few hours having an internal dialog about whether it was just a joke to him, after Vincent's invitation, or he simply didn’t have the time to do anything about it.

  Several times, I hovered the mouse pointer over the IM box, and several times I stopped, telling myself that not only was Maddox my boss here, and sort of my boss on the taskforce—though, come to think of it, I seemed to have unwittingly taken a volunteer position—I had kissed his colleague. I also didn't want to come off as needy. Kissing Solomon—what was I thinking? What was I doing enjoying it? What was I doing analyzing it endlessly when what I clearly needed was a cold shower, not to mention some serious gossip time with Lily?

  "You're looking very serious today.”

  I jumped at the sound of Maddox's voice. Tucking a stray strand of hair behind my ear, I looked up. "I'm very busy," I said, trying not to sound too surly as guilt prodded me. I had kissed him, and then kissed his colleague. Big oops.

  "Do you have time for lunch?"

  Duh. I always had time for lunch. "I guess," I said, looking forlornly at the stack of typing Dominic delegated to me. Seems like he was taking Dean's apparent absence as his opportunity to catch up. I just couldn't get motivated about it.

  "It'll be here when you get back," said Maddox, apparently deciding I had some newfound work ethic. I did too, but not for this job.

  "That's what I was afraid of."

  I grabbed my purse and followed Maddox out, walking abreast across the park to the cafe. We got sandwiches and drinks, Maddox’s treat, and we took a booth in the corner.

  "This is going to start office rumors," I said.

  "Eating sandwiches or… this?" Maddox's hand landed on my leg and slid a little further up, sending tingles through my spine.

  A smile played on my lips. Perhaps the ‘d’ word was back on? "Definitely that."

  "I was going to kiss you, but Anne just walked in and she would probably combust."

  After what I'd seen last night, I doubted a kiss would even raise Anne’s eyebrows.

  "Raincheck," I said, just in case he thought I was passing. Flirting away my lunch hour seemed like a lot of fun, but I had to get serious. I dropped my voice, "So what's happening with you-know-what?" I was going to say “case,” but that sounded too ominous. I knew Maddox was concerned about public conversation, what with the walls having ears and not knowing whom to suspect. Somehow, I didn't believe that there were no suspects at all. I wondered just how much he held back from me.

  "I'll tell you while we walk back." Maddox demolished his sandwich and unscrewed the cap of his mineral water. "In short, not a lot."

  "Is that good or bad?"

  "Neither, so far."

  I ate my sandwich quickly and we gave our table up to a pair of hovering office workers; then walked slowly back to Green Hand.

  "We got the coroner's report back on Tanya Henderson, aka Tallulah. We got her ID from a wallet in the jacket she checked. The shot killed her, obviously, and there weren't any defensive wounds. No epithelials or other trace evidence."

  "She didn't see it coming until it was too late," I concluded and Maddox nodded. "Does that mean she knew her killer? Possibly trusted him?"

  "It's a possibility that she felt certain nothing was going to happen to her. Or maybe she thought she was too valuable to off. We're checking into her history."

  "Did you check her keys?" I asked. "It was odd that one wasn't on the key ring."

  "Everything is being checked. Your lead on the call center was good."

  "Thank you."

  "We have a couple of people looking into what was set up there, but so far, it looks shady. I hope it's the key to blowing open the fraud case."

  "I thought you had a bunch of information." I was fishing and he knew it.

  "Some. Enough to show fraud, but not enough to find the perps, or how they are getting away with it. We always knew there was an inside man, and everything points to Dean. His mortgage, his expensive tastes and habits, the low pension pot all gave him motive to go for a big time payoff from the company he dedicated his life to. He had access to every part of the building and could feasibly have set up a fake office for claims. But without him, we don't have a lot to go on. If he were alive, we could have threatened prosecution and flipped him, like I tried to do the night he died. As it is, we need the rest of the team now. And the money," he finished.

  "Do you have any ideas who they could be?"

  "None. They might work for the company, or maybe not. It's a complicated thing. We're lucky to have the FBI involved. Their pockets are deeper than ours when it comes to surveillance for a case like this."

  I'd heard plenty of times how badly the cutbacks had hit Montgomery. It wasn't just the PD that suffered, but every peripheral service connected to them. Victim support barely supported itself now. Only cut and dried cases were welcome at the precinct; every other resource was stretched beyond capacity. There were plenty of petty crimes that didn't get more than a cursory glance before being filed “unsolved.” They simply didn't have the manpower to pursue everything.

  "Hurrah for the spooks," I said.

  "That’s CIA,” corrected Maddox. “I looked for you yesterday. You leave early?"

  "Who me? No."

  "Didn't think so.” He laughed. I felt certain my timecard would be signed. “Do anything good?"

  "Hung out with Lily. You?"

  "Hung out with the team."

  "Bet I had more fun." I wasn’t sure last night counted as fun. One day, I hoped to look back on it and laugh, or preferably, wipe it from my memory. I wasn't sure about the bit with Solomon. I wasn’t sure Maddox skirted the truth just as much as I had.

  "I can't gamble on a bet I'll lose." We neared Green Hand and Maddox slowed his pace, forcing me to match him. "I want you to be careful, Lexi. Two people are dead. Two people that we know of," he emphasized. "The information you got already is good, but I don't want you asking the wrong person the wrong question. Saturday night could have been a lot worse." Maddox really didn't need to spell it out. A minute earlier and we might have been staring down the barrel of a gun.

  "Are you saying I'm off the case?"

  "I think it's for the best. I don't want you to get hurt."

  "Keep my pretty little mind on typing and filing, huh?" I said, struggling to keep my cool. The only good leads he'd gotten so far had come from me, as far as I could see. "Got it." I heard a huff of annoyance from Maddox as I stalked off, but I didn't turn back or even think about apologizing. So I was good enough to kiss, but not good enough to work with?

  It was petty, but I ignored Maddox for the rest of the afternoon. As soon as I finished Dominic's work overflow, I grabbed my purse, dumped the files on Dominic's desk and left.

  I had to admit I was pretty cross at Maddox. I'd essentially provided him with a bunch of clues, ruined my good taste in fashion with hooker heels, stumbled on two corpses, and there was the small matter of the blood-stained dress, heels and purse that disappeared from my apartment the night Maddox drugged me. I really liked that dress and I was full on “say no to drugs.” If he thought he could leave me out of the investigation, he was wrong. It had already become very personal.

  By the time I got home, I had devised a plan. I went up to my apartment first and poured a glass of water, then pulled the phone book out, flipping through the pages until I found what I wanted. I drank the water, stuffed the phone book back under the couch, and clattered down the stairs to k
nock on Lily's door. Passing me yesterday's newspaper, she sat down. "Do you want to go to the movies Wednesday?" she asked. "That new comedy is out. I just checked."

  "Sounds good." I needed a laugh without the danger of kissing a man. An annoying little voice in my head nagged as to whether I was maybe overreacting a little since I enjoyed kissing Solomon. Perhaps, just maybe, I was having a guilt attack. I told the little voice to shut up.

  "Did you see the headline? There's been another hit-and-run. Mayor Mathis. Just got hit when he was taking an evening stroll and the driver sped off. That's the second one in a week! What's wrong with this town?"

  It struck me that a lot wrong was wrong with this town. My boss was dead, his girlfriend, Tallulah, aka Tanya Henderson, was dead and there was a huge stash of stolen money out there somewhere. Of course, I didn't say that. Instead, I just replied incredulously, "He was going for an evening stroll?"

  "Yeah. Says here. He went out for a stroll after dinner and was struck. Some neighbors found him in the road."

  "That's rough," I said, trying not to imagine Mayor Mathis squished all over the road.

  "Tell me about it. You try and look after yourself, keeping fit, and what does someone do? Run you over, that's what! You want to go spin on Saturday again? Anton will be there."

  "Yes, definitely. You think Mayor Mathis was trying to keep fit?" That struck me as funny. The last time I'd seen Mayor Mathis, he'd been cutting the ribbon of the new public library and his stomach hung pretty far over his pants. I doubt whether he'd ever seen a gym, but I’d bet he'd certainly seen more than his fair share of donuts.

  Lily looked at me as I struggled to keep a straight face. "Maybe he turned over a new leaf. Like a mid-life crisis or something."

  "I guess." It could happen to anyone. I'd already experienced my share of crises and none of them had been mid-life. I could only hope the universe wasn't waiting to whack me with a doozy. I'd take a mid-life sports car though. Not Vincent's Spyder, but maybe a cute little convertible. I shook the daydream from my head and got back on task. "I want to visit Tallulah's family," I told Lily.

  "How come?" she asked.