by Jane Henry
“Does it?” Xavier asked. He sounded genuinely curious.
“Yeah,” I told him, my eyes still trained on Sabrina. “I think it does.”
Sabrina took a deep breath. “Thanks,” she offered quietly. “That helps.”
I nodded. I felt weirdly unburdened just telling her all that, getting it off my chest.
“Now. Why were you guys in the office last night?” she continued.
I looked from X to Walker to Ethan to Caelan. None of them stopped me, so I told her the truth. “You remember last night I told you that we run Masters’ Security? That we run investigations?”
She tilted her head in acknowledgement.
“Well, one of the things we’re looking into right now is my mother’s death.”
“Her overdose.”
“What appeared to be an overdose, yes. Some, uh, information came to light that suggests maybe she was killed in retaliation for her blackmail attempt. But of course, we have no way to prove that.”
Sabrina blinked. “That… is unbelievable.” She shook her head. “Ever since my dad was arrested, I feel like I’ve been transported to some whacked out reality. Does shit like this happen to real people?”
“I feel you,” Walker said glumly. “Welcome to my life.”
“Who was your mom’s boss?” Sabrina asked. “Seems like the obvious place to start.”
“I don’t know. My mom was a waitress,” I told her. “At Silver.”
She frowned. “Is that name supposed to be significant?”
I looked around the table. Ethan was watching Sabrina now. He looked at me and nodded, as if to say that she was telling the truth. But I’d already known that. I was learning to read her myself.
“Silver’s a bar. In Vinegar Hill. And I’ve spoken to her manager a bunch of times,” I said. “Walker’s run their financials. Coworkers too. All of them seem to be clean and none of them have much to say, except that the bar’s owners used to use a room in the back with a private entrance to conduct their business. The room was off-limits to the bar staff and the patrons, but occasionally they let waitresses back there to serve drinks and my mom was one of them. Seems like that’s the most likely place she’d have gotten onto someone’s radar or heard something about her ‘boss.’” I shrugged. “It’s the best lead we have. The bar is owned by BB Enterprises LTD, which probably also doesn’t mean anything to you, but they were a client of your dad’s. He had to know who the owners were… or are.”
“BB?” she repeated, and I nodded.
“It might mean something, actually.” She swallowed hard. “Or maybe it’s a coincidence. But that was my dad’s nickname for me. BeeBee. Because I, um, couldn’t pronounce Sabrina when I was little.”
I sighed. Jesus. Stuart Fowler had created a dummy company for a bunch of criminals and murderers, and named the damn thing for his daughter? I wanted to bring him back from the dead so I could slap some sense into him. And I also realized that this was information we never could have learned on our own.
Being open with Sabrina, sharing my own story with her, was paying dividends I hadn’t expected.
“Well, it turns out that BB Enterprises doesn’t really exist. It’s what’s called a dummy company. It’s possible that your dad was directly involved.” I looked at Walker, who nodded. He’d already looked into this and dismissed it, but now knowing there was a tenuous link between the company and Fowler’s daughter, he’d look again more thoroughly, just to be absolutely sure. “But I think it’s more likely that your dad was acting on behalf of the dummy corporation.”
I didn’t believe Fowler was the power player directly responsible for my mother’s death, not only because the guy had been killed off in prison like the middleman he was, but because we’d already run Fowler’s financials and realized that he didn’t have the money or connections to pull this many strings. “That means I...we… need to find out who’s behind the dummy company. Who really owns it.”
“So you can find out if they have anything to do with your mom’s death.”
“Right. Yeah. And your dad’s death,” I informed her. “We went looking for documents in his safe that might point to the real owners, but they were gone when we got there.”
She grimaced in sympathy and leaned over the table to put her hand, warm and soft, against my arm. “I’m sorry, Anson. That just sucks. Looks like neither of us got what we were looking for last night.”
I nodded slowly and covered her hand with my own. She was right, of course, but I was starting to think maybe I’d found something I needed instead. And I was looking right at her.
Four
I stood in the kitchen, surrounded by these men who knew way, way too much about me, wishing I could disappear. Xavier made me want to punch his throat. Caelan was a doll but in a big-brotherly sorta way. I wanted him to make me a cup of Earl Grey when he made his own, and sit and talk to him about anything and everything. But Anson… Anson made me furious and edgy and horny as hell. My ass still burned from the licks of his belt, and I’d replayed him whipping the leather off his waist in a continuous loop until I fell asleep last night, then picked it right back up this morning. There was a fire in his eyes that kindled something in me, but I was too angry to begin to decipher what.
It was sorta sweet, though, how he defended me and didn’t let that asshole Xavier get away with his cutting remarks. So when he told me about his mother, my imagination went into overdrive. I could see him, the little boy with the tousled hair, hurting because of what his mama suffered. Even now, this man standing in front of me had hints of boyish sadness in his beautiful eyes. I wanted to soothe that sadness.
But I couldn't sit here and dream up fairy tales all day. I had a business to run—and that was pretty much all I had left to my name in this world. I'd be damned if it ran into the ground while these guys pulled their knights-in-tarnished-armor act.
I sipped the hot, fragrant coffee in my mug and looked around the room of men who watched me like I was a bomb ready to blow. God. It burned me more that they found me unpredictable and untrustworthy than it did they knew too much about my life. Ethan walked over to the large, stainless steel fridge, giving wide berth to me and Anson.
“Bagel?” Anson asked me, finally taking his eyes away from mine.
“Yes, please.”
“We have sesame seed and cinnamon raisin bagels,” Caelan offered. “I get them from the local bakery. Fresh, stone-ground wheat and local ingredients.” Ethan snorted and pulled out a box of frozen toaster pastry, but I smiled at Caelan. I liked him.
“Sounds good,” I said. “Listen, guys, I really do need to go, though. I mean, I know you think it’s dangerous for me out there, and I get it, but what’s truly dangerous is me somehow losing my biggest client. I’ve worked too hard and too long to let my business go up in smoke.”
“You don’t have a partner or anything?” Anson asked. “Someone you can call who can pinch hit for you?”
I shook my head. I sorta wished I did, but I was too damn stubborn to work with someone else. “I prefer to work alone. Occasionally, I can call in sick or take a break, but not with this client. He’s an old family friend, and he relies on me. I cook for him and his wife a few days a week and prepare him meals for the next few days. He and his wife are very fastidious about what they eat and how it's cooked." He was also my highest paying client, which they didn't need to know. I shrugged. “Maxwell Pederson is a particular sort of individual.”
The movement in the kitchen stopped. Even ice-cold Xavier froze, his mug lifted to his lips. Anson was the first one who broke the silence.
“Maxwell Pederson.” The way he said it made the hairs on my arm stand on end. I felt suddenly on edge as his eyes cut to Xavier’s.
“Um. Yes? Something I need to know?” I asked him, a little too loudly. “Hello?”
Anson looked to Walker, the guy with the dark hair and accent who’d weaseled out my identity last night on his laptop. “That’s the guy, isn’t it?�
�
What guy? Shit. Everywhere I walked was a fucking minefield.
“Yeah,” Walker replied. “Sabrina, do you know the ties Pederson had with your father?”
Xavier cleared his throat, and all eyes, including mine, went to him. “Allow me,” he said.
Anson took my hand, and even though I was sorta mad at Anson, I liked that he did. Xavier’s jaw clenched, but he carried on as if Anson hadn’t just staked his claim and made it known he didn’t trust Xavier around me. Xavier looked at me and spoke condescendingly.
“Pederson was an attorney who worked with your father.”
“Of course. I know that. He was also my dad’s close friend.” I kept the dumbass off the end of my reply, though I thought it. It didn’t seem to work so well pushing anyone’s buttons. “Listen, I’ve known Max Pederson since I was a baby. That’s how I landed him as a client. You don’t have to go all stonewall and scary because Pederson had an affiliation with my dad. Geez.”
“Last night, after you fell asleep, we debated what the next step in our investigation might be,” Anson said. “Someone stole the original copies of the documents from his safe, and that set us back, but your father was well-known for keeping a digital backup copy of all his documents. He wouldn’t have kept it on his own computer since it wouldn’t be secure. And anything in the cloud could be hacked or compromised.”
“Okay, right,” I agreed, bewildered. “Whatever you say. Still not getting what this has to do with Max Pederson or my job.”
Xavier rolled his eyes, dismissing me, and looked at Anson. “She’ll go to Pederson’s. She’ll cook. You’ll go with her, and do what you do best.” His lips pursed, and Anson bristled. What the hell? “Walker. Chances pretty good we could find the backup copies at Pederson’s?”
“Yeah, I’d say the odds are high. Pederson was a business and personal associate. If I were going to trust anyone with my backups, it’d be someone like that. We just need to get a copy of his hard drive.”
“Alright, so I go with Sabrina, pretend I know how the fuck to cook, and while she’s wowing the guy with strip steak and loaded mashed potatoes, I somehow magically teleport into his office and snag what we need.” He snorted. “Brilliant, X.”
I listened to them in a sort of bewildered silence, as it dawned on me what they were thinking. “Um, no. No way,” I said. “You guys and all your badass high-tech whatever are not going to fuck up the most important client I have. Did you even think to ask me? All of a sudden, Anson’s my assistant? No.” I hated Xavier announcing what we were going to do without even consulting me. I pushed up from the table, angry that they’d brought me here, angry that I was helpless. My father was gone, and now this cryptic bastard was going to mock me and jeopardize everything important to me? Fuck no.
Xavier smirked, his cold gaze leveled on mine. “She seems uncooperative, Anson. Maybe you need to take your belt to her ass again.”
Ice washed over me. Fuck. They’d heard that, too? I wanted to slap his cold, haughty face. My fingers curled into a fist and I glared at him. Though part of me didn’t want him to know he got under my skin, I couldn’t completely hold my tongue.
I turned to Anson. “If you guys want me to cooperate, I swear to God you’ll get him to shut the fuck up. You’d think he wants me to call the police or something. You get Mr. High and Mighty off my ass or I’ll smack the smug look off his face, and you get nothing from me.”
I rose to leave, but Caelan’s large hand came to my shoulder, stopping me. He held a bagel on a plate for me. “Sit, Sabrina,” he said in his gentle, deep voice. But it was Anson who finally convinced me to simmer down.
“Sit,” he repeated. “Caelan’s right.” His gaze focused on Xavier, his voice barely controlled, raspy. “He gives you any more trouble, he answers to me. I’ve been looking for an excuse to beat the shit out of him. He looks at you crosswise again, I’ll knock him on his ass.”
“Cream cheese?” Caelan asked me softly, as if the others weren’t having a pissing match. God, he was adorable.
“Please,” I answered, with a nod.
Xavier smirked, nonplussed by the tension in the air. “Sleep with a girl and now you’re her knight in shining armor?” he asked. “How quaint. The knave thinks he’s the hero.”
Anson was done. He pushed himself up from the table, walked over, and fisted Xavier’s shirt in his hand, lifting the man right out of his chair. For the first time, Xavier’s eyes widened, betraying surprise and something else. Fear? “Shut it, Xavier, or I do it for you.” None of the other men moved to stop him, reinforcing my suspicion that Xavier had this coming.
“Honest to God, Xavier. He’s right,” Walker said in his heavily-accented tone. “Man, you want her help or not? Do you want her to kick your ass? Swear to God, I’ll hold her earrings.” He shook his head.
Xavier glared. “Let go of me,” he clipped.
“You gonna lay off her?” Anson asked, shaking him a little, and something in me felt thankful toward him. He was… protecting me.
“Sure,” Xavier drawled.
Anson released him but glared him into submission, not sitting until Xavier shrugged his shoulders, and settled into his seat. Anson looked from him to me. “The asshole makes a point, Sabrina. We were trying to think up a way to access Pederson’s office. It’s harder since he works out of his home. I could get in there another way, but this is the easiest. We’ll go to Pederson’s. I pretend to cook with you…”
“Why though? So what if Pederson was friends with my father? Lots of people were, and I don’t see you wanting to hide in the bushes at his buddy’s golf tournament. Why Pederson?”
Anson looked at each of the men in turn, and they each nodded to him. “Yeah,” Caelan said. “It’s time, man. Doesn’t make sense to keep details hidden.”
“There’s no way—” Xavier began, but they ignored him entirely, talking amongst themselves as if he didn’t exist. Served the asshole right.
“Tell her,” Caelan said with a nod. Anson turned to me, exhaled, and began.
“Six months ago, I got a mysterious invitation. A summons, you could call it. We all did.” Xavier growled, but Anson kept on. “No idea who it was from or what they wanted, and normally I would have ignored it. But the invitation said my mother’s death wasn’t an accident.”
The hair on my neck stood on end, but I didn’t react outwardly as he continued. “Turns out a woman named Eugenia Carmichael had summoned all of us. She was the one who owned this penthouse, and her husband had been a Federal judge. Her husband was killed under mysterious circumstances, but the police never made an arrest. Turned out, every single one of us lost a loved one for reasons that were fabricated. This woman knew all of the deaths were connected, and she was determined to find the people responsible. And, truth be told, she knew a shit-ton of details. But she trusted the wrong people; she’d made too much noise about what she’d learned. And she knew she’d been targeted. She died just a few days after sending us the invitations.”
This was weird. Twisted. But I listened, needing to know more.
“But she didn’t want the investigation to die with her. So she left us everything she owned.” He cast an arm around to indicate the enormous penthouse suite. “This place, along with more money than any of us had ever seen before... and I’ll be honest with you, babe, none of us were exactly hurting for cash even before this.” His lips twitched, but then he grew serious again. “She also left us with a mission. Find the people who killed her husband and bring them to justice. Get justice for the loved ones we lost.”
He took a deep breath. “Ethan lost his twin brother.” He pointed at Ethan, who didn’t meet my eyes but continued to stare at Anson. “Walker lost his best friend.” Walker nodded, dark hair falling onto his forehead. “Xavier lost his sister. Caelan, his fiancée.” Oh, God. My stomach twisted, as he continued. “And as you know, I lost my mother.”
He let that sink in for a moment, and when I nodded, he continued. “We w
ere told their deaths were accidental, no foul play involved. Our benefactor explained that this isn’t the case at all. So we’ve started investigating each of the deaths again, beginning with my mother’s. We need to know the names of the real people who own Silver, the bar where she worked. Your dad had that information. He may have died for it. We need the backup.”
“Brilliant,” I muttered. “So you mean to tell me, I bring you with me, and you could find out something that leads to information regarding the death of my father?”
Pederson was a man my father trusted. And even though none of this made sense to me, there were two dead bodies—and, a lot more than that if I believed what Anson said—that were somehow connected.
I looked to Anson, as he was the one I almost trusted at that point. “Yeah.”
Didn’t sound like we had much choice here.
“Fine. You’ll be my sous chef.”
His brows furrowed, perplexed, and damn if it didn’t make him look cute. “Sous chef?”
“My assistant,” I said with a sigh.
“Yeah. Okay, so I’m your sous chef. I cook. You cook. Then we find a way to distract Pederson and I get what we need.”
“I could go,” Walker spoke up. “I mean, I’m the hacker. With Fowler, you were cracking a safe for documents. But with Pederson, we’re going to copy his hard drive, so...”
Anson’s eyes pierced his. “No one else goes with Sabrina but me. Yeah, you’re the hacker, so you’ll be on a device with me, telling me what the fuck to do.” His insistence we go alone felt oddly sweet, but I pushed aside the thought as quickly as it came. Silence descended on the room as Anson made up his mind. “I’ll go.”
