Eeny Meany Miny Die (Cat Sinclair Mysteries)

by Carolyn Scott

  He laughed. "And you won't even talk a little bit dirty to me."

  I swung his chair around and straddled his lap. "Actions speak louder than words." I kissed his throat and he groaned.

  "You win," he murmured.

  It wasn't lost on me that I'd just hung up after a flirtatious conversation with Scarface and now I was kissing my lover. I hopped off his lap. He clasped my hand to drag me back, but I pulled away and returned to the other side of his desk.

  "I better get some work done," I said.

  He frowned. "Okay."

  "I'll be out this afternoon."

  "Working on Slim's case?"

  "Um, yeah. First I need to see Jenny about something, then I'll take the van. I'll be sitting outside NTS's office listening to Bankler telling his girlfriend all the weird things he wants to do to her."

  He gave me a flat, closed-mouth smile which wasn't really a smile at all. "Sure. Do whatever you have to do. Report back later."

  I left, feeling a little sick in my stomach. He hadn't suggested we catch up later like he did every other day. It made me realize how much time we'd been spending together lately. Maybe it was a good thing if we had a night to ourselves. I, for one, felt like I was losing touch with Gina. Losing touch with myself.

  ***

  I'd lied to Will. I didn't intend to see Jenny straight away. I needed to get my car fixed ASAP so he wouldn't notice the damage. I took it to the shop, then caught the bus back to High Street and picked up the van. I parked outside NTS's office and listened to silence. I went inside and asked for Bankler, but was told he was out and not expected back for the rest of the day.

  I drove to the Carleton. The parking attendant smirked when he saw the van. "When people get new cars they usually trade up," he said.

  I tossed him the keys. "At least it's clean."

  "How long will that last?"

  "You're mouthy for a parking attendant."

  "You're cute when you're huffy." He winked and got in the van.

  I rode the elevator up to Jenny's floor. The doors opened and I stepped out into the alcove, but got no further. I could hear crying in the corridor. I flattened myself against the wall and listened.

  "Stop the tears," came Angel's gentle voice. "It'll be all right."

  "How?" Jenny cried. "How can it be all right after this?"

  "Shhh, Sweetie. Dry your tears and calm down. You'll see. Everything will be fine. I've got it covered."

  Jenny sniffed.

  "You trust me, don't you?" Angel asked.

  Jenny must have nodded because Angel added, "Good. Go back to the room and pour yourself a drink of something bubbly. I'm heading down to the gym for a workout. See you later, okay?"

  Down to the gym. Crap, that was on the second floor, way below us. She would need to use the elevator. I crouched down behind the potted plant in the corner and hoped she didn't look.

  Angel entered the alcove and punched the Down button. She was as cute as a Barbie doll dressed in her gym gear. Any guys working out would enjoy the tight leggings and low-cut top.

  Thank God the elevator didn't take long to arrive. She got in and the doors slid closed. I headed down the corridor to Jenny's suite.

  She opened the door on my knock. Her puffy, red eyes widened when she saw me.

  "Have you been crying?" I asked her.

  "Huh? Oh, yeah." She bit her lip.

  "Is everything all right?"

  "Fine now. I was just having a moment. It's been a tough couple of days and everything's so uncertain, you know?"

  "I know."

  She stepped aside to let me through. "I was just about to have some champagne," she said, heading into the kitchenette. "Want some?"

  "It's the middle of the day."

  She screwed up her nose. "So?"

  "What the hell. Pour me a big one. I've had a bad day myself."

  "You haven't broken up with that hot boyfriend, have you?"

  "No!" What made her ask that? Was I that easy to read? "Why?"

  She shrugged and poured champagne into one of the flutes. It spilled over the rim and she sipped the excess before it reached the bench. "He just doesn't seem like your type."

  "He doesn't?" That got me thinking about my type. I'd only ever dated wannabe actors, wannabe singers and other losers, so I guess she was right. Will was the first guy who actually had a steady job.

  She handed me a glass and lifted hers in salute. I thought about asking her advice, but I didn't think I wanted to hear it. Jenny's advice came from the point of view of someone who didn't think too far ahead.

  It didn't stop her from giving it anyway. "You should just keep him around for a fuck, but don't let him get too serious."

  "Um, right. Thanks. I'll keep that in mind. So tell me, how is everyone coping?"

  "Angel's been amazing."

  "What about the rest of you?"

  "We're okay."

  "I saw you crying earlier. It didn't look like you were coping."

  Jenny went very still. "You saw me with Angel?"

  "Yeah. She was telling you it would be all right. What was that about?"

  She laughed, which seemed an odd thing to do considering the circumstances and her tears. "The cops have been hammering me about the embezzlement. I was called in for questioning again this morning. That one with the missing eye is really brutal."

  "Yeah, he's thorough."

  "Thorough! He's a mean piece of shit. I hate him." She drained her glass and poured herself another. "Anyway, I just told Angel. I thought it would freak her out when she learned Frank's estate might have to pay back the people he embezzled. Not me!" She held up her hands, sloshing champagne over the rim of her glass. "I wouldn't ask her to repay me. But you said your friend's boyfriend was a victim, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are others."

  "And she was okay once you told her? Was she shocked?"

  "She was surprised, but she didn't have a meltdown. I'm the one freaking out about it. Angel is a rock."

  "How big is Frank's estate?"

  "Huge. He was always splashing money around."

  She should have known better than anyone that splashing money around didn't mean he had it. Some people lived on credit. A lot of credit.

  "And Cindy? Have you spoken to her today?"

  "No, and I don't want to. The less I see of her the better."

  "Don't you want to ask her about her plans for the group?"

  "She told us she's not making any decisions until after Frank's killer has been arrested. I think she'll try to replace all of us, but it won't work. Angel says Play Group is a childhood institute."

  "Institution."

  "She said the kids won't like change, and their parents will hate it even more. They'll stop going to concerts and buying the CDs. Angel's always right about these things. Her business sense is amazing. She could have run Play Group way better than Cindy. Why the fuck did Frank leave it to that bitch and not his current wife?"

  Good question. Angel and Frank may not have had a happy marriage, but to leave his half of the group to his ex-wife was a slap in the face. If he'd wanted to hurt Angel, that was the best way to do it.

  "She should contest the will," I said.

  "She's going to. She's already spoken to her lawyer, and he said he could make a good case. Apparently Frank changed his will only a few months ago. In the old one, Angel got everything."

  Whoa! Now that was interesting. "Was that about the time their relationship turned sour?"

  Jenny shrugged. "I don't know. I didn’t really notice."

  I tried to read her and gauge whether it was a lie, but I couldn't. Either she was a good actress, or she really didn't care. I was going with the former. Jenny may be dumb, but she used to get more callbacks than me. Or maybe that's just because she slept with most of the producers.

  Acting skills would only get her so far, though. I suspected if anyone in the group would break a confidence, it would be Jen. She just wasn't tough enough, or clever e
nough, to keep it up for any length of time.

  "How long have Angel and Corey been having an affair?" I asked.

  She rested her elbows on the bench and stared into space. "I don't know. Sorry, Cat, but Angel doesn't tell me everything." Did my ears deceive me or did she sound hurt?

  "Do you think they're serious? In your opinion," I added.

  "Jeez, Cat, you sound like that cop."

  So Scarface had followed a similar line of questioning. Good. If someone with his experience was asking the same things, then I was on the right track. "Well?" I prompted. "Is it just a casual fling, or do you think Corey loves Angel more than she loves him? It happens a lot where one person in a relationship loves the other more." I swallowed and refused to think about Will and the hurt in his voice when he'd said the same thing to me.

  She straightened and pouted. "I don't like these questions. You sound like you suspect Angel. She didn't do it."

  "What about Corey? Could he?"

  "No!"

  "But if he's in love with Angel, maybe he thought getting rid of Frank would free her to marry him."

  "Ever heard of divorce?"

  "Would Angel have gotten all Frank's money if she divorced him?"

  "Fucking hell, Cat. Stop it!" She set her glass down on the bench so hard I was afraid she'd crack the base. She squared up to me, crossing her arms under her cleavage. "Angel didn’t kill him, and neither did Corey. No one from the group did."

  I let the silence ride out. Just as I expected, she calmed down. She picked up her glass again. "Look," she said, fixing me with a direct gaze. "They aren't that serious. They both sleep with other people in L.A. No way would either of them kill Frank to free Angel. That's just nuts."

  Yeah, but crazy people did nutty things all the time, especially when they were in love.

  ***

  I thought I'd better do some work on Slim's case. After my weird conversation with Will earlier, I still felt like I was on shaky ground with him, and I wasn't sure if that was where I wanted to be. Hell, I didn't know anything about my own feelings when it came to Will.

  I listened in to Bankler's conversations for a while before dozing off. He was actually working and not talking to his girlfriend, but there's only so much talk about shipping containers that a girl can listen to.

  I awoke when my phone rang. It was Will. "How's things?" he said.

  "Slow."

  "You mean you're still at the NTS office?"

  "Yes. Why?"

  "I expected you to find it too boring and go shopping or something."

  "Will," I said heavily. "I'm not like that anymore."

  He grunted.

  "Besides, I haven't got any money, and the Karvea case is taking up my time."

  "If you need money—"

  "Do not offer me money! I don't want your handouts, okay?" I regretted my outburst as soon as I said it. I regretted it even more when he didn't answer me. "Are you still there?"

  "Yeah," he finally said. "Sorry."

  I closed my eyes. "Thanks, Will. It was nice of you to offer, but I've got to stand on my own two feet. Do you understand?" I hated doing this, and I hated doing it even more over the phone. Some things needed to be discussed face to face to get the right intention across. I didn't want to hurt his feelings.

  "I understand. It's okay, and I respect you for it."

  It sounded like a brush off. He may respect me, but he didn't like it. At least, that was my take.

  "So when are you coming back to the office?" he asked.

  "I'll head in now."

  No sooner had I hung up than the phone rang again. It was Scarface.

  "How's the investigation going?" he asked. "Got any new leads for me?"

  "And lose the bet?" I said. "No way."

  "Kitten, I'm a cop investigating a murder. If you've got anything important to tell me, you better tell me. I don't mind playing games with you, but the rest of the police force doesn’t appreciate the finer points of Cat Sinclair like I do."

  I gulped. He must have heard it, because he chuckled.

  "That's not fair," I said. "You're the one who suggested the game. I just got sucked in by your force field."

  "I like it when you talk dirty to me."

  I rolled my eyes. "So have you got something to tell me, or are you just calling me to make my life more complicated?"

  "If your life's too complicated, you need to remove the complication." His voice lowered to the consistency of melted chocolate.

  "Leave Will out of this."

  "Was I referring to him? I don't recall mentioning his name, but it's interesting that he's the first thing you thought of. Calling him a complication is not healthy for your relationship, Kitten. Not healthy at all. I can fix that for you."

  Speaking with Scarface sometimes felt like I was playing in quicksand. I could never get a grip on something solid that gave me the upper hand.

  "Just tell me why you called," I shot back.

  Maybe he got the message that I was pissed off, or he felt bad for touching a raw nerve, but his voice switched to business mode. "I've got some bad news to report," he said. "It's about the black car that followed you."

  CHAPTER 12

  "What about it?" I asked Scarface.

  "The car belongs to a car rental company," he said. "The person who hired it used a false name and paid cash."

  "So it wasn't Cindy?"

  "We checked out the car she's driving. Same rental company, different car."

  Damn. My scalp tingled. I would have been dead if I hadn't jumped out of the way in time, or if Mad Max hadn't scared the driver off.

  I ran my hand through my hair, rubbing away the tingles. "Do we at least know if it was a male or female?"

  "The attendant couldn't remember, and the name on record is Leslie Grant."

  Could have been either. Double damn. "The attendant couldn't give you a description at all?"

  "Nope. I showed him photos of every member of Play Group plus Cindy, Linc, and Max, and he didn't recognize any of them." Scarface sounded as frustrated as I felt.

  "It wasn't Max. He was at The Grotto."

  "Doesn't mean he didn't hire the car earlier and get someone else to drive."

  And then make himself look like the hero by shooting at the car. He'd missed, and the car was a large target. Maybe it had been intentional. Well, crap. There were too many possibilities.

  "They must have used a disguise," I said.

  "Or it could have been someone else altogether."

  That was the most depressing thing he could have said to me. He was right though. I had no other suspects. If it wasn't one of the group, Max, Cindy or Linc, then I didn't have a clue who the murderer was.

  "So I've helped you out," he said, silky-smooth. "Have you got anything for me?"

  "You didn't help me out. You learned nothing. Besides, I told you about Karvea embezzling Jenny's money, so technically, you owe me."

  "We would have figured that out from the bank records we found in his room."

  "Eventually."

  "So I take it you're all out of information." He sounded amused. "Better step up your game, Kitten, or you're going to lose the bet."

  Just for that, I kept the information about Frank changing his will to myself. He probably already knew anyway. The beneficiaries would have been the first thing they looked into.

  "I gotta go," I said. "I'm expected back at the office."

  "Knight got you on a tight leash these days?"

  "No. He's giving me more leeway than ever."

  "You sure about that? You sure he doesn't know that you pretend to be working one case when you're really working another?"

  How the hell did he know that? "All our cases are for Knight Investigations. It doesn't matter which one we work on at any given time."

  "If you say so. Call me if you ever need to talk to someone who won't smother you."

  "He's not—"

  He hung up. I threw the phone into my bag and headed
back to the office, wishing I didn't have so many clever, sneaky men in my life.

  ***

  Will and I worked independently for the rest of the day, holed up in our separate offices. It wasn't until Faith came in to say goodbye that I realized it was five o'clock. I decided to have an early night too. I wasn't getting anywhere with everything playing on my mind. My conversations with Jen and Scarface, the hit-and-run, Will. Even though I'd hardly seen him all day, I could feel the tension between us. It was like a piece of elastic being stretched and stretched. I was waiting for it to break and recoil.

  "Hey," I said upon entering his office.

  He glanced up from his screen. He looked tired. I started to make my way through the mess of papers stacked on the floor, but only got as far as his desk.

  "You okay?" I asked.

  "Yes." His gaze shifted back to the monitor.

  "You look like you need a break."

  "I haven't got time for a break."

  "Oh. Okay. I'll leave you to it. See you tomorrow?"

  He nodded as he typed. His focus was entirely on the monitor again. It was like I'd already left.

  I turned to go, but he called my name. For some reason, my heart was in my throat. I wanted to hear him call me Sweetheart, or flirt with me. That's how our day usually ended.

  "Is there anything you need to tell me?" he asked, his gaze locking with mine.

  Oh-kay. Where was he going with that? It sounded like he knew something, but wanted to hear it from me. Was he referring to our relationship or work? Did he know about my car getting smashed? Or did he know that I wasn't ready to commit?

  And everyone says women are complicated.

  "No," I said with a smile. "Nothing. Why?"

  He shrugged and once more turned his attention to the monitor. "No reason. See you tomorrow."

  I headed out of the office to the bus stop. I felt a little numb as I waited for my bus. It was the first time in ages he hadn't asked me back to his place, or invited himself to mine. I wasn't sure how I felt not spending the night with him. I wasn't sure how I felt about anything anymore.

  ***