by Joss Wood
“Nothing?” Sawyer demanded.
CJ shifted in her chair, looking frustrated. “Seriously, nothing.” She sent Knox a quick smile. “I swear you are the most boring celebrity ever. You don’t date that much, you mostly socialize with friends you’ve known for the best part of your life. You’re not a prima donna on set so you are well liked by your fellow actors and the crews you work on. Out of the camera you live a quiet life.”
Knox just tapped his fingers against the table and Reagan could see the tension radiating from him. His next words surprised her. She hadn’t thought that he would go there. “Could this be linked to Sula?”
CJ pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. “I thought about that but I didn’t find anything to back that up. She died, tragically, but there was nothing suspicious about her death.”
Sula’s death had been cut and dried. Postpartum depression and a fast car and a bad decision. They all knew that his dead wife was a subject best left alone, and since CJ hadn’t found a link there didn’t seem to be more to say.
“Could the motive have been robbery and when the perp didn’t find what he was looking for, he got pissed and torched the place?” Axl asked, his forearms resting on the conference table. Although he wasn’t touching her, she could feel the heat of his thigh next to hers, smell his soap, shampoo and sexy Axl scent.
Knox looked skeptical. “What did he think I had in the trailer? I don’t keep personal stuff, or valuables, with me on set.”
“Was your kid supposed to be with you that night?” Kai asked, his pen tapping the cover of his tablet.
Knox shook his head. “My parents-in-law dropped him off earlier in the day. He spends a lot of time with them and with my folks, when I am on location.”
“So, nobody but you and them would’ve known that he was with you?” Axl stated.
“The trailer was supposed to be empty. Reagan and Coe were only there because Coe was exhausted and she offered to stay with him.” Knox scratched the top of his head. “It still doesn’t answer the question . . . what did he want? What is he looking for? And why does he think it—whatever the hell ‘it’ is—is with me?”
“Depends on what he thinks you have,” Sawyer said.
Reagan sat up straighter, excitement buzzing up her spine. Could what the burglar was looking for be in Mr. Brown? The thumb drive hidden there by Knox’s troubled wife? Reagan bit the inside of her lip, deciding whether to say something or not. No, she couldn’t, she couldn’t blurt out this information without telling Knox first. The odds of what was on the thumb drive being connected to their UNSUB were astronomical. Sula placed the thumb drive, and died, over three years ago, and Knox’s break-ins only started six months ago. There were two and a half years of nothing between the two events.
It really wasn’t likely the drive and the UNSUB were connected . . .
“What, Reagan?” Axl asked.
Reagan felt five pairs of eyes on her face and it took every bit of her willpower not to blurt out her thoughts. She dropped her hands and under the table she clenched her fists. “Nothing, just thinking.”
Axl knew that she was lying. She saw his disbelief in his eyes. “Care to think out loud?”
“Nope. I’m good,” Reagan replied.
Axl’s hand covered her clenched fist and squeezed. She felt rather than heard the liar that drifted toward her.
CJ rested her chin in her hand. “The reality is that it could be a disturbed fan, someone far off our radar. I can keep investigating, but if it is someone who has no connection to you, then I doubt I’ll find him. Or her.”
Kai shook his head. “This doesn’t feel like a stalker. Breaking and entering is risky and, from what I understand, your place in LA is not easy to break in to. This feels personal, organized. This feels like someone who knows you.”
Sawyer looked at Axl. “What do you think, Axe?”
Axl lifted his hand off hers. “I agree. This is someone who knows you, someone who is looking for something. Something that he perceives as being important.”
Something like a thumb drive. Shit, she had to tell them. Now. If Knox erupted and fired her, or them, they’d deal with it, but at least they would have a lead.
Reagan stood up and looked at Knox. “Is Coe around, Knox?”
Knox nodded. “He’s out back, with Bryn. And that huge dog from the bakery.”
Reagan nodded. “Did he bring Mr. Brown with him?”
“Sure. The kid doesn’t go anywhere without him. Why?”
“It’s easier to show you than explain. Give me five minutes.”
Reagan ran out of the room, jogged downstairs and out the back door that led to the obstacle course and, farther along, to the outdoor target range. She found Coe halfway up the net, Bryn standing below him in case he fell, Mr. Brown tucked under his brawny arm. She asked Coe if he could borrow Mr. Brown, and he reluctantly agreed but not before Reagan promised to return the bear in ten minutes, in case, as Coe explained, Mr. Brown got lonely without him.
Reagan promised, belted back up the stairs, and hurried into the conference room. She put the bear on the table and placed her hands on the flat surface, her eyes on Knox. “This isn’t easy for me and, because I know that I signed an agreement to never mention your wife, I’ve been trying to find a way to tell you about what I found.”
“What did you find?” Knox looked from her to the bear, and she easily identified the fear and dread in his eyes.
“After the fire, I realized that it could do with a damn good wash. I wasn’t sure whether I could shove the whole bear in the machine so I started to look for a label. This is what I found.” Reagan turned the soft toy over and ran her finger along a seam under the bear’s arm. She located the tiny tab and pulled the zip down. She ignored the eyes on her and located the second even smaller zipper that kept the bear’s head attached to its body. She pulled the tab, the head flopped sideways, and Reagan placed her hand inside the cavity of the bear.
“It’s such a cliché but . . .” She quickly found the thumb drive and placed it on the table, thinking that her finger had brushed something else that was small but hard. She peered into the stuffing-filled cavity. Seeing nothing, she jammed her hand back into the cavity and moved her fingers around. Her fingers caught the object and Reagan pulled out a massive diamond-and-sapphire ring.
“This is Sula’s.” Knox reached for ring, picked it up, and looked at the stones. “I thought that this was at the bottom of the ocean, that it slipped off when she drifted from the car.”
“So these items belonged to Sula?” CJ asked, her tone empathetic but lacking pity.
“Yeah. Definitely. I gave her that ring when Coe was born.” Knox ran his hand over his face. “This bear, it was with Coe when she died. I’d never seen it before. Makes sense now.” Knox looked at Reagan. “Good find.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know how to tell you.” Reagan placed her hand on his and squeezed his fingers. “And I signed that agreement not to talk about her . . .”
Knox’s eyes returned to the ring. Reagan couldn’t help but notice that he had yet to touch or ask about the thumb drive. All his attention was on the ring. “My manager put in that clause. It’s not that I don’t let people talk about her, it’s just easier not to.”
CJ pushed her chair back and paced the area behind the conference table, her slim frame crackling with energy. She gestured to the items on the table. “So, it goes without saying that the burglar might be looking for that thumb drive.”
Knox muttered an obscenity and gripped his head in his hands. “We’ve been concentrating on the recent burglary attempts, but I had another a few months after she died.”
Reagan frowned. “What was taken?”
“Some electronic stuff. Thinking back, I think one of the cops said that it was a hell of a mess for such a minor haul.”
Reagan click
ed her fingers and pointed at Knox. “That was the first attempt.”
He nodded. “Makes sense.”
“Were you and your wife close, Mr. Callow?”
Knox took a long time to answer CJ. “I thought we were, but the drive proves that we weren’t, not really. I have no idea what’s on the drive, why she hid it,” Knox said, eyes and voice bitter. “I sometimes wondered, after she got out of therapy, whether she was pretending that everything was fine. I dismissed my concerns because I wanted my wife back, our life back, and I had it . . . sort of.”
“We have to explore what’s on that drive.”
“I just don’t want to . . . it’s just too much. I’ll keep the ring, for Coe, but . . . honestly, I don’t think I want to know,” Knox muttered.
“It’s not going away, Knox,” Reagan said.
“I can look into it for you,” CJ quietly offered.
Knox looked at her and Reagan saw his anguish and fear at what they would find. He wanted to protect his wife’s memory but he needed to protect his son. It was a hell of a dilemma. And he didn’t know CJ. Reagan touched his hand again and felt his fingers slide into hers, looking for a connection, for someone to hold on to. “If you’d like, I can see what’s what and then we can decide what needs further investigation. We can then take that information to CJ.”
“You’d bring it to me first?” Knox asked.
“I would.” Reagan nodded, not bothering to look at her bosses. This was her client, he deserved to see what was on that drive first.
“I don’t want to do this.”
“I know,” Reagan answered him, leaning her elbows on the desk so that her eyes were level with his. “But it’s the only way we’re going to get to the bottom of this mess. It’s the only way to make sure that you and Coe are safe, Knox. He’s lost one parent. Nothing on that drive would be worse than him losing another. Or you losing him because this perp is desperate.”
Knox swore again before standing up so fast that his chair flew backward. He placed his hands on the table and nodded to the broken bear. “Can you fix him?”
Reagan reached for Mr. Brown and quickly zipped his head back in place.
“Will you take care of that?” Knox nodded to the thumb drive on the table.
“Yep.”
Knox picked up the ring and took Mr. Brown, clothing restored, and tucked him under his bicep. “Get cracking, then.”
Knox, looking five years older than the man who stepped into the room an hour before, pulled the door shut behind him. Reagan stood up, stretched, and plopped herself down into the nearest chair and closed her eyes.
“Are you sure you want to do this, Reags?” Axl asked.
Reagan rolled her head along the back of the chair and opened her eyes to look at him. She shrugged and blew out a long breath. “Honestly? No. But he doesn’t want to do it and somebody needs to. He trusts me.”
“I’m heading back this morning but I’m only a phone call away, Reagan,” CJ told her, and Reagan appreciated the support she heard in her voice.
“Thanks.” Reagan picked up the thumb drive. It was a kind offer but she knew that if she ran into problems or needed help, CJ wasn’t who she’d call. Reagan met Axl’s eyes and saw him nod his agreement. It was as if he knew that he’d be the first person she ran to and that he was happy to let her.
Reagan looked down at the table as Sawyer and Kai stood up and left the room. A ring and a thumb drive—and a beautiful little boy—was all that was left of stunningly beautiful and incredibly talented Sula.
That thought made Reagan felt incredibly sad. If she died tomorrow, what would be left of her?
***
That evening Reagan, sitting on the huge double bed in one of the many guest rooms, heard the knock on the doorframe and raised her head to see Knox standing in the doorway, shoulders hunched and his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. His eyes darted to the thumb drive in her laptop and she knew that he was bracing himself for what was to come.
“Coe is in bed. He asked if you’d read him a story. I know it’s not your job but . . .”
Reagan waved his words away. “Of course I’ll read to him. Any chance of it being anything other than the Berenstain Bears?”
Knox managed a smile. “Sorry. He’s obsessed.” His eyes darted to the drive again. Reagan decided to put him out of his misery. “There are four videos on the drive but I can’t open any of them. They are either encrypted or very corrupted.”
“Do you think that’s what the burglar is after?”
He knew the answer but she sensed that he wanted to articulate it. “Yeah, it’s what the burglar wants. It has to be.”
“So you can’t get any information off it?”
“Sorry.”
Knox dropped a few f-bombs before tipping his head back to look at the ceiling. Knox never swore, so hearing the obscenity drop from his lips was a surprise. But the guy had had a hell of a day, and if anyone was entitled to drop a couple swears, he definitely was.
“I tried various programs but I’m not great at computers. The videos and the code need someone with a great deal more skill than me.”
“The reason I asked you to look into this is because I trust you to keep quiet about what you find.”
Reagan bent her legs and wound her arms around her knees. “Yeah, I understand that, but I’m not good enough to find this information.” He could only say no, but she’d never know for sure unless she asked. “If anyone could, it’s Axl.”
“The big dude?”
That was one way to describe him. “He can find anyone. And if he can’t, he knows people who can.”
Knox looked stubborn. “I don’t want this getting out, I don’t want to hand this over to people I don’t know.”
“You can trust my bosses, Knox. Keeping their clients’ secrets is an essential part of what they do; if they didn’t, they wouldn’t have a business.” Reagan dropped her feet to the floor and stood up. “And if Axl subcontracts the work, his people will keep their mouths shut. They wouldn’t want to piss Axl off.”
“I don’t know, I’m not comfortable with the idea.”
Reagan slipped her feet into her boots. “Why don’t we take it step by step? Let me take the info to Axl, see if he has some fancy software that can restore or decrypt the video. If not, we’ll have another discussion about what to do next. What do you say?”
Knox stared down at the floor, thinking hard. It wasn’t easy for him to trust, Reagan thought. In that regard he wasn’t unlike half the population of the world.
“Okay,” he eventually agreed. “Can you get it to him tonight? I want this over with, as soon as possible.”
“I’m not comfortable leaving you here, alone,” Reagan pointed out.
“There are four Cas agents outside, Reagan. And Bryn is here,” Knox told her, impatient.
“Okay, I’ll get it to Axl. But first, a bedtime story.”
Reagan walked to the door, and as they stepped into the hallway, Bryn bounded up the stairs, Knox’s fancy cell phone held tight against his thigh. “Hey, Knox, Marina Black is on the phone. Do you want to speak to her or shall I take a message?”
Reagan saw the spark of excitement in Knox’s eyes and didn’t blame him. Marina Black was a sexy, sexy woman and he was a man in his mid-thirties who appreciated sexy. She was also his costar in his latest movie and currently single.
Add one movie star plus another movie star, and fireworks invariably happened. Knox held out his hand for the cell and pointed his finger at Reagan. “Talk to Bryn about being on duty and get that drive to Axl. But first—”
Reagan grinned. “Those damned bears.”
Knox smiled for what she thought might be the first time today. “I’m really starting to hate bears in general and a certain bear in particular.” He lifted his cell to his ear. “Hey, Mar
ina, good to hear from you.”
***
Reagan pulled the heavy door shut and, feeling the icy air, she stopped to zip up her hooded jacket. It was just after eight and Coe was finally, thanks to two stories and a cuddle, asleep. Her own sleep was a distant prospect. She still had to deliver the thumb drive to Axl.
“Hey, Reagan.”
Reagan turned at the deep voice and she peered into the shadows of the veranda, finding Knox sitting in a wicker chair in the far corner, his feet up on the wall. Reagan moved to the grouping of chairs and looked down at her client, dressed in battered Levi’s, thick socks, and a sleeveless jacket over a flannel shirt. “God, aren’t you cold?”
Knox shrugged and gestured to the seat opposite him. As she sat down, he leaned sideways and picked a bottle of whiskey up from the floor. “Want a belt?”
“Not for me. Why are you out here?” Reagan looked at him and noticed the frown between his eyes, his tight mouth. Coe’s dad looked mentally whupped. Knox tapped the screen of his phone, which rested on the arm of his chair.
“Waiting for a call?” Reagan asked, knowing that she was being nosy but thinking that Knox looked like a man who needed to talk.
“No, thinking about Marina’s earlier call, actually.” Knox pushed his hand into his overlong hair. “She wants to visit.”
Reagan sat back in her chair and crossed her legs. Well, hell, this was interesting. Marina was a small, petite brunette who was the current darling of Hollywood. Reagan hadn’t had that much to do with her while they’d been on set, but whenever they crossed paths, Marina was the star and Reagan, as a lowly bodyguard, was beneath her notice.
Reagan didn’t think that she could straight out ask if he was banging her. This man was, after all, her client. “Uh . . . are you seeing each other?”
Knox twisted his lips and shrugged. “Meh.”
That was such a man answer, Reagan decided. “Okay, multiple choice. Are you just friends, friends with benefits, no benefits but hoping there can be benefits, in like with her, in love with her . . . ? Which one?”
