Protected by a Dangerous Man

by Cleo Peitsche

  “No, he didn’t stop turning tricks,” I said. “He needed more money.”

  “More? On top of what he stole from me?”

  Stole? “Yes,” I said quickly. “I guess it wasn’t enough—”

  There was a furious growl, and Oswald seemed to explode out of the trees. He came at me, and I felt him, felt his hot breath…

  And then he was gone. I could hear him thrashing; the ground fairly shook.

  “Zip tie or handcuffs,” Corbin said, his deep voice lightly breathless.

  “My backpack’s in your truck.”

  “Then I’ll just sit on him until you get it,” Corbin said. “Don’t worry. He’s unarmed.”

  I flicked on the flashlight. Corbin had Oswald facedown in the dirt, and he was kneeling on his spine, his hand on the back of his head. “You’re going to suffocate him,” I gasped.

  “He can breathe,” Corbin said. “Just not very well. If he tries to talk or scream, then he’ll have problems.”

  Light came from below and splashed over the bushes and trees. Two beams. Rob and Jennifer, I hoped.

  “So you know, this is the longest day of my life,” I said to Corbin.

  “You know what, baby? Mine, too, and that’s saying something.”

  Rob appeared beside me. “You got him. Not that I had any doubt.” He pulled a zip tie from the waistband of his jeans.

  “How’s Neil?” I asked.

  “Shaken, but apart from some bruising, he’s unharmed,” Jennifer said. “Oswald pretended to have a gun. That’s how he got Neil out here.”

  “Maybe not unharmed,” Rob said. “Neil’s having some kind of PTSD flashback. He insisted that we lock him in the car, for safety.” He held out the zip tie. “Would you like to do the honors?”

  I was about to take it, but then I considered how this had been a group effort. “You’re already holding it.”

  Rob shrugged, then bent beside Corbin and restrained Oswald’s wrists.

  “Good work,” Rob said. “Oh, and you’re never going to believe what happened the morning of the murder.” He and Corbin pulled Oswald to his feet. Oswald coughed and sputtered. Dirt caked his preppy haircut.

  Before I could ask what had happened—and how Rob even knew—flashing blue light sprayed through the leaves.

  “That’s our cue,” Jennifer said.

  “To do what?” I asked.

  “Pick us up at the park’s main entrance,” Corbin said. He brushed a kiss over my lips, then he was gone.

  Chapter 30

  The sheriff’s department wasn’t happy about having been called out for a terrorist threat. Because Corbin was gone, that left me and Rob to take the blame. More animosity with local law enforcement was exactly what Stroop Finders needed.

  “You can put a trace on our phones,” Rob said. “We didn’t place that call.”

  “Forget it,” I said, disgusted. “They believe what they want to believe.”

  The deputy standing closest to me aggressively pushed back his hat. “Excuse me?”

  I didn’t bother answering him. Instead, I found the city cops. They weren’t happy with us, either, but at least there wasn’t all that poisonous history.

  “Is there a reward?” I asked.

  “Guessing you’d want to talk to LAPD about that,” the officer said.

  Rob came to stand beside me. Despite his protests that he was fine, Neil had been carted off to the hospital in an ambulance, probably because he kept dry heaving.

  “Let’s go,” Rob said.

  “Can we?” I asked.

  The officer shrugged, then nodded. “Someone will follow up tomorrow.”

  Luckily for me, Corbin had left his key fob in the SUV. As soon as I started rolling down the road, adrenaline fatigue hit. What had happened could have been a disaster. As long as I lived, I never wanted to be in a dark forest with a lunatic again. I felt giddy and woozy. Thirsty, too.

  I stopped at the entrance—barely—to collect Corbin, then took off. The truck’s smooth handling almost made up for my jerky driving.

  “Did Rob tell you what happened?” Corbin asked, checking his seatbelt.

  “We didn’t have thirty seconds to talk. The police wanted to question us separately. God only knows if our stories made sense.”

  “How do they think you found Oswald?”

  I groaned. “I said Rob had a hunch. It was pretty obvious I was lying.” I swerved to dodge a deer that wasn’t even there.

  “Baby, maybe I should drive.”

  “No.” I pulled over, though, and switched places with him. Rob and Jennifer sped past. I wondered who was going to make sure Neil’s car was returned to him.

  I cracked the window a few inches to let the fresh air caress my face. Little by little, I started to feel like myself again. “I wonder what Rob found out. About the morning of the murder.”

  Corbin nodded. “Jennifer filled me in. Neil was very talkative because he didn’t want them to leave him alone. All that cash that JD wanted laundered? It came from Oswald, who had skimmed it from his company.”

  “All along, Neil knew it might be Oswald,” I muttered. “I’m going to kill him.”

  “If I understand correctly, he didn’t know. Oswald thought he did, though. Let me back up, start from the beginning.”

  “Please.”

  “Your brother might have oversold Neil on the scheme to trap Oswald. Rather than wait like he was supposed to, Neil called Oswald and said he remembered everything.”

  “Oh, no,” I groaned. “Did he invite Oswald over, or did he simply show up?”

  “He showed up, pretended to have a gun and got Neil into his car. Reading between the lines, this is when Neil recanted his story, but Oswald didn’t buy it, of course.”

  I bet he didn’t. “But what happened the day of the murder?”

  “JD and Oswald had gotten pretty serious. Oswald wanted him to leave the dealing and sex trade behind, and JD assumed that meant his bills would be covered. Part of having a rich boyfriend.”

  “Is it?” I asked.

  Corbin laughed. “I’m happy to pay all your bills. Totaled together, they’d be less than my car insurance.”

  I felt my cheeks warming. “I can pay my own bills.”

  “However you want,” Corbin said. “JD’s rosy view of the future didn’t align with Oswald’s, so JD helped himself. Oswald didn’t even know it was missing until the night before the murder.”

  “How could he not know? Was he storing it in a hole in the ground?”

  “In a safe,” Corbin said. “I think.”

  Now I could see how it had happened. Oswald freaking out about the missing cash, tracking JD to the hotel. “And Oswald told all of this to Neil?”

  “He thinks Neil already knew that JD had been stealing.”

  “Why?” Then I realized. “Because Neil was there when Oswald confronted JD.”

  “Exactly. And he still wants it back. I suspect it’s a matter of pride.”

  Breaking into the storage space had never been about the paintings. Oswald had been looking for his money. “So what happened to it?”

  “The hell if I know. My guess is that Neil and JD stashed it somewhere.”

  I frowned. “Together? How’d you arrive at that?”

  “Neil’s cousin canceled that morning, right? JD and Neil were together. They must have done it after Massimo went to his room.”

  “In which case, Neil wasn’t exactly an unlucky bystander… Oswald attacked him to find out where the money was. So where is it?”

  Corbin started laughing. “I guess if Neil gets his memory back, then we’ll find out what they did with it.”

  The doctors had said Neil would likely never recall the events surrounding the attack. “All the sinners get punished. Poor Massimo. He really was the only innocent one in all of this.”

  “Thanks to you, he’s going to be fine. But your vacation starts now.”

  “Can we renegotiate the ‘no work calls’ clause? I wan
t to know what happens next.”

  “Next you send Neil a huge bill for services rendered,” Corbin said. “But I guess it would be cruel to cut you off.” He nodded. “Fine. You can take a limited number of calls related to this case, but if it becomes excessive, I’m putting my foot down.”

  “My first real PI case,” I said. “Solved. You know, it might be time to retire. That was brutal.”

  “Let me show you something first,” Corbin said.

  “Mysterious,” I said, and Corbin laced his fingers through mine.

  This, the way things were between us… It was enough.

  More than enough.

  Corbin brought the SUV to a stop in front of the Stroop Finders construction site.

  “I don’t recognize the building at all,” I said, gawking at the skeleton of girders. The construction site was quiet. Looking harder, I said, “You demolished everything?”

  “Unanticipated structural problems made it necessary,” he said. “We could have retained a small section of the original building, but it would have limited the design. How do you feel?”

  I thought for a moment before answering. “Fine.”

  “Not stressed?”

  “Not at all. We said goodbye to the old place, and the temporary office is great. Very conveniently located, for me at least.”

  “Glad to hear that—it’s going to be a few months before they’re done here.”

  I sucked down air. “What is all this costing?”

  Corbin grinned and pushed a button to open the back of the truck. “It’s just money.”

  Spoken like a rich man. “Are you going to raise the rent?”

  “It’s more of a long-term investment.” He got out, and I twisted to watch as he went to the back and took out a long tube. Blueprints. He unscrewed the top and pulled out plastic-coated paper.

  I’d seen the blueprints before, as well as an artist’s rendering of what the final building would look like, but it didn’t match what was now being constructed. I slid out of the truck and walked to the edge of the site.

  “You’re putting in underground parking,” I said, shocked.

  “It’s only a few spaces. For security.”

  “A few?”

  He shrugged. “Eight or so. Since we’re discussing security, there will also be a fence around the perimeter.” He tapped the blueprints, and I joined him as he spread them over the SUV’s hood.

  “No barbed wire on the top?” I asked. “I’m shocked.”

  “Of course not. Heat and motion detectors, and cameras.”

  “It’s going to look like a prison complex.”

  “You won’t see any of that,” he said. “Given the hours you work, I’ll feel a lot better knowing you can walk from your office to your car in safety.”

  “But…” I took a deep breath. “You expect to join us, right? I mean, it’s your building.”

  He straightened and looked over at the building. “I don’t need to.”

  “You want to, though.” I touched his arm, felt the warmth of his skin and the hard muscle. “And I want you to.”

  “I never meant to pressure you, and I realize that being your landlord might make you uncomfortable.”

  “No,” I said unconvincingly.

  Corbin smiled. “We’ve got a few months before the building will be ready. Take this time to think about it. If it’s right, we’ll do it. If it’s not right, we won’t. Doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.” He looked toward the building. “Anyway, your father and I worked out a few details already. I’ll lease the bottom two floors to Stroop Finders.”

  “And the others? How many floors now?”

  “Four, plus one level of parking garage. There will be a gym, and I’ve reserved space for future expansion. One of the lease stipulations is that Stroop Finders has the power to veto new tenants, so you won’t have to worry about being saddled with unpleasant neighbors.”

  I scrutinized the blueprints. The part with the gym hadn’t changed much. “So what’s this?” I asked, drawing my fingertip across a section of the top floor.

  “Assuming you don’t retire from PI work, that will be yours.”

  “I knew you were setting aside an office for me, but… it’s huge.”

  He nodded.

  “That’s very generous of you.” Too generous, but I knew arguing wouldn’t do any good. I turned to look at the construction’s gangly frame and tried to imagine how I could ever fill that much space.

  “You see why I want you to take time to think about it,” Corbin said. “I hadn’t planned on the renovations turning into a completely new building, but I’m not going to scrimp on materials. Quality lasts.”

  In other words, this place was going to be expensive, and I’d better not try to talk him out of it. I appreciated the warning. Three months ago, he wouldn’t have thought to do it.

  “I’d rather go slowly and avoid making mistakes,” he said.

  “Thank you,” I said. “You take me seriously. That means a lot.”

  “Of course I take you seriously.”

  If I’d still been angry with him about the locked-in-the-SUV thing, or the Henry thing, he would have earned forgiveness with that statement alone.

  His phone, sitting on the SUV’s dashboard, lit up. Corbin walked to the door and leaned inside to grab it.

  “Oswald confessed,” he said. “The locals were going to charge him with kidnapping, but he wants to go back to California, so he confessed.”

  “Wow. I guess I really chose the wrong angle.”

  “Well, he is under the impression that there’s video and forensic evidence. I’m sure that contributed.”

  I remembered Sara. She’d believed from the beginning that someone powerful was involved in the murder, but I doubted she’d ever suspected it was her own husband. “I should call JD’s sister.”

  “No,” Corbin said. “You shouldn’t. The secret is to know when to walk away. You did your job. You don’t need to follow the court case or update JD’s family. It’s time to live your own life.”

  “Are you talking about me or about you?” I asked, thinking about his ex, the DC trip, the weight of being the best man for an unpleasant job, and the guilt of turning it down.

  “Both,” he said as he rolled up the blueprints and slid them back into the plastic tube. “Now let’s go home. It’s late, and I want to head to the mountains first thing in the morning. But first…” He caught my hand and pulled me toward him, pressing me against the truck.

  My body responded enthusiastically. “We’re not going to get home anytime soon like this,” I murmured.

  “Just one kiss,” Corbin said, his teeth nipping my lips. “You were smoking hot in that white dress. I’m surprised dinner didn’t burn.”

  “Corbin… I know what happened in DC. Jennifer told me.”

  He grew still. “She shouldn’t have.”

  “But she did. And… I’m sorry for not trusting you.” Part of me wanted to ask about what he’d been doing locked in his office, but I knew it wasn’t the right time. This was more important. “I would have understood if you’d gone over.” I struggled not to bite my lip. “You can still go.”

  Corbin rocked back to look me in the eye. “I couldn’t do it, baby.”

  “You can. I’ll understand, and I’ll be here waiting for you.”

  “I think you misunderstood,” he said in his deep, patient voice. “She would have known something was wrong. She would have picked up on… on you. I couldn’t have pulled off the job.”

  I exhaled. “You underestimate yourself.”

  “No one has ever accused me of that before,” he teased. “Sorry to disappoint you, baby, but I’m a one-woman man.” He took his kiss, drawing it out and making me ache for more.

  Then he took me home.

  Chapter 31

  I pulled up my jeans. Because I hadn’t taken the time to dry off properly after my shower, the denim wanted to stick to my skin.

  Corbin
and I were supposed to have left in the morning for the mountains, but we’d gotten… distracted. Then I’d fallen asleep again. Then Massimo had called to tearfully thank me for helping him.

  “You don’t have a dog, but I’ll cut your hair if you want,” he’d said. “The rest of my life, every day, I’ll send good vibes your way. Better yet, I’ll find you the perfect dog.”

  “No!” I said. “I’m allergic.” It wasn’t true, but I couldn’t take care of a dog. Not with my job. It was bad enough that Rob had Millie and had to work his schedule around feeding and walking her.

  I should have asked Massimo to force Neil, who’d been dodging my phone calls, to get in touch with me. Rob had passed by to check on him, so I knew Neil hadn’t died from the stress and shock of his Oswald adventure.

  There was only one reason he would avoid me: because he either didn’t want to or couldn’t deliver on the non-monetary portion of my payment. I pulled on a sweater and called him again.

  Mid-ring, I ended up in his voicemail. “Hi, Neil. It’s Audrey. Again. Please talk to your grandmother. I know you can’t work miracles, but at least try.” The voicemail cut me off.

  Frances was probably still angry with me and refusing to budge, and Neil didn’t have the balls to give me the bad news. Frances had never been a reasonable woman. I shouldn’t have been surprised.

  Stroop Finders would just have to smooth things over at the sheriff’s department without her help.

  One thing I knew for sure: we would land on our feet.

  “Sixty seconds,” Corbin called out. “Do you need to add anything to your bag?”

  “Nope,” I said, walking to the front door. “I’m ready to go.”

  Corbin took my satchel-duffel and pulled the strap over his shoulder, then picked up a large canvas bag swollen with groceries. “Out, out, out,” he said, herding me to the elevators.

  It was a gorgeous day, bright and cool, and best of all, not humid. For the first time in ages, my hair wasn’t trying to be a giant puffball.

  Corbin’s phone made an urgent pinging sound that I’d never heard before.