Roxie yanked the earbud from her ear and checked their progress. Only a few blocks from Kaniz headquarters and stuck in a jam. Red and blue flashes reflected in bits of windows and metals in the city space. An ambulance, firetruck, too. Must have been a nasty collision.
She still hadn’t gotten word from Grant. Or Sonny. Probably still stuck at the Rohns’ house.
“Never mind,” she told the driver. She craned her head around, checking the opposite side of the street. “Turn around. Pull a U and take me to the arena. Please.”
Protocol would dictate she tell the police about this video, this piece of incriminating footage she daren’t explain how she found. She didn’t think she’d crossed any troublesome boundaries of obtaining it. Steph willingly blabbed. Regardless, she knew she needed to tell Grant. ASAP. So much had been revealed, at warp speed, since she’d started her workday. Overhearing Tara, then the gun, then Ben’s alibi, finding the video.
Why stop when I’m on a roll? Detouring to the arena, she planned to have a lengthy chat with Jaydon. A past due explanation, she was sure. And it wasn’t like anyone knew about the information she was privy to—Amber was dead.
Roxie called the contact for Jaydon. No answer. She tried his assistant and was told Jaydon was in the middle of practice. Nothing could be done. He was not available. Superstar status and all that snazz.
“Tell him I saw Amber with him.”
“Miss Malone, under no circumstances—”
“Tell him! Tell him I saw him with Amber! Mention that one name and see what he says!” she shouted into the phone.
A brief pause followed and Roxie prayed she wasn’t being ignored.
The PA cleared his throat on the other end. “Ma’am? He asked if you could come to the arena and speak with him in private. Immediately.”
Oh. Immediately, huh? Roxie grinned. Damn straight. “On my way now.”
With her phone still in her hand, she checked the other alerts she’d missed by silencing the ringer just before watching Amber’s video. That was why she wasn’t getting news on Grant or Sonny. Shaking her head, she chided herself and worried about the missed calls from both men.
Grant came first. He answered on the first ring.
“Where are you?”
Roxie reared back. Cranky pants he was not. Pissed, more like.
“Please tell me you’re safe.”
She wrinkled her brow. “Of course I am. What’s wrong? I—”
“Did you see Sonny?” he asked.
Her phone buzzed a low battery warning and she winced. “No. I need to though. How did you know I—”
“He’s heading to the ER. He was at Sheree’s with me while the cops tried to interrogate her about the gun. As soon as they seemed to be done, he asked Marcus to stay with Sheree and his backup bodyguard was going to take over. He said he needed to come see you.”
“Yes, I asked to see him.”
“Well, he left before I could. And he was shot on the sidewalk near the building. Someone shot him on his way to see you.”
Blood pumped faster and Roxie breathed in panic. “Shot?”
That was the “accident” that had stalled her taxi. Not a vehicular collision, but a man shot in broad daylight. One very important individual who was on his way to speak to her.
“Oh, my God…”
“I’ve been calling you nonstop. I thought you’d be at the offices, but Lia said she hasn’t seen you all day. What’s going on?”
So much to explain. And not over the phone. “Is Sonny…going to make it?”
Grant sighed into the phone. “I’m on my way to the hospital now. I couldn’t even get in the building because of the EMTs on the scene. As soon as I saw it was him, I called Marcus and he asked if I could follow up for him. One of the cops said he was hit in the back, but it missed his heart. He was conscious when they loaded him up. Rox, where are you? What’s going on?”
What was going on, she had to echo back. Sonny shot just before he came to her? Was someone silencing him? Who? How? No one knew what Ben had told her in the visitation room.
“I have a lead.”
“Lead? How the fuck— What the hell have you been doing? I saw you at the DA’s only hours ago.”
“No, Grant, not a lead. I have proof. I have evidence to prove Ben didn’t kill Josh.”
“Jesus Christ, Roxie, what in God’s name could make you so sure? What are you up to?”
“Not now. Not on the phone. I’m heading to the arena, and as soon as I’m done, I’ll meet you at home.” Roxie checked the time. Already four o’clock. How had the day flown by so quickly?
“I don’t even know what to say to this. The fucking arena? Wait for me, Rox, just wait for me to come with you. After this deal with Sonny, I don’t like the way this is shaping up. I’ll come with you.”
“I’m almost there, Grant, and it won’t take long. Trust me. I’ll explain everything. You go on home to Lucy, please? Kelly expected me to come home by five and I doubt I’ll make it. Please?”
“Okay. Okay. Please, please be safe.”
“I will. Love you.” She barely waited for his reply before hanging up.
Sonny shot? Could it have been random? Roxie couldn’t permit herself that route of wishful thinking. The odds were too stark. Just when he had something immensely important to explain, he was shot? If it were deliberate, how could it have happened in the nick of time, just before seeing her?
Anxiety curdled in her stomach as she dialed Kelly.
“Hey, Kelly,” Roxie said.
“Sweet mother of God. You called. What’s going on? Grant has called me three times asking if I’ve heard from you. Asked if Lucy was safe. What the fuck is going on?”
Tender love warmed Roxie briefly at Grant’s automatic concern for not only her, but Lucy, too.
“I-I don’t know. I’ve figured something out on the case. Something big.”
“Maybe something dangerous?” Kelly snapped back. “Grant never loses his cool. Never. Whatever’s up is scaring a man who’s never intimidated.”
Roxie rubbed her forehead. Maybe she should wait for Grant to come see Jaydon with her. Glancing up, she saw she was nearly in front of the arena. Jaydon was already waiting for her—not that she cared about pampering the celebrity’s agenda, but he was expecting her and therefore likely to cooperate and talk.
“I don’t really know what’s up.” Roxie felt so ignorant to admit as much, but it was true. Unraveling where Ben was and what he had been doing at the precise time Josh was killed could only be a secret that would threaten the real killer. But who that was, she couldn’t pinpoint. All she knew—by the video—was that Ben and Sonny hadn’t pulled the trigger.
“I’ll call as soon as I can,” Roxie said and ended the call.
At the curb before the back entry to the arena, the taxi stood waiting, the driver watching her in the rearview mirror. “Getting out?”
Actually, she really didn’t want to. If Sonny was just shot for information, she’d be next. Forcing her dry throat to swallow, she nodded. “Could you…” She peered out the windows, looking left to right, not even aware of who she should be on the alert for. “I’ll give you a hundred dollars if you walk me to that door right over there.”
“The hell you talkin’ about?”
Asking a total stranger to cover for her? God, she was losing it. Only ten feet distanced her from the door.
“Never mind.” She shoved bills at him and broke into a run for the door.
Just before she reached the doorframe, she caught the blur of someone dashing toward her to her right. Holding in a scream, she slammed herself into the door, throwing it open. The guard on the other side backpedaled with flailing arms at her forceful entrance.
“What the—”
“Lock that door!” she yelled as she fell to the floor, losing her footing.
With a wide-eyed look, he checked the door and Roxie scrambled further inside. “I’m here to meet Jaydon,” she gasped,
trying to explain between breaths. “He’s—”
“Malone?”
Her head bobbed and she swallowed, relieved when not even a knock sounded on the other side of the door. “That’s me. He’s expecting…”
“Chill, all right? He said to watch out for you.” He gestured for another arena worker to come closer. “He’ll lead the way, okay?”
Nodding, Roxie tried to regain air in her lungs as she got to her feet and then let the employee guide her into the depths of the arena. Like the last time she’d come to the Hawks’ ground to interview Jaydon with Grant, she trekked over what felt like miles of hallways and turned through a maze of corners. At last she came to the huge open space of the court where players were scattered, some dribbling balls, a couple shooting, but most of them sitting and drinking from bottles.
Jaydon must have been looking out for her arrival, nervous perhaps, because he immediately strode forth when she stepped onto the edge of the court.
“Over here,” he called. Was he anxious? Instead of the ability to gloat that it was one of the golden-rich celebrity VIP guests waiting on her, rather than the other way around, Roxie’s patience was too frayed to enjoy the moment.
He tilted his head toward the side, and she went to where he’d indicated. She leaned against the back of a chair several rows into the seating area, at least twenty yards from another set of eavesdropping eyes.
“What the fuck is going on?” Roxie hissed as soon as he joined her. Screw the profanity clause. She was out of quarters for the day anyway.
Jaydon wiped his sweaty face with the towel hanging on his shoulder.
“Ben told me what he could remember about that night. Told me she said her name was Amber.” She held her phone up and waggled it at him. “I saw it all. Unedited.”
Jaydon ducked his head lower, gripping his towel between his fists.
“Speak, Goddammit.”
“I needed him gone. Ben, out of the picture. We’re up for new contracts, and if he weren’t here, I’d get more.”
Money, that loathsome motivator. Jaydon didn’t have enough damn money?
“I…I lost a lot,” he said as though he’d read her mind. “Gambling, spending. I needed the most I could get. I just wanted him off the team.”
“So a sex tape. With abuse?” she asked, crossing her arms.
He huffed out a breath and nodded. “Yeah. I thought it would be enough to put him in a bad light. Throw some scandal on him, get him in trouble with the NBA. Kicked off the team, suspended, something. Not…”
“Not arrested for murder?” Roxie seethed.
“I had nothing to do with that.”
“By not telling anyone about this, you did!”
“Look, I arranged for Amber to slip him a couple roofies and make it look like they were fucking. Then I slapped her around a bit—”
“I said I saw the video.”
“So then you know.”
“I know what happened before Sonny smashed her phone.”
“I was supposed to call her the next day, to pay her and get the video to have it cleaned up to share. But Josh was killed. The cops were everywhere. I called her once and her phone was off.”
Destroyed, actually.
“Then as I started worrying that she might have, I don’t know, gotten involved.”
“With what?”
“Josh.”
“That she could have shot him?” Roxie groaned. “How? The video showed her in the room when the gun went off. Right after you left the room.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I never saw the video, remember? I tried to call her and couldn’t. Cops were asking me all kinds of questions. Rumor was Ben did it.”
“Then what?”
“Ben was arrested. I waited a couple days to contact Amber. I didn’t want anything to come back to me and make me look suspicious. Then she called me from her friend’s phone. Told me Sonny discovered her and the phone and broke it. I figured the video was lost.”
“And that was that?” Roxie snorted, not believing him for a minute.
“No. Then she was killed in that accident. I wanted to talk to her again to make sure she’d stay quiet. I didn’t need the video to be exposed since Ben was already in trouble.”
“For something he didn’t do!”
“Well, shit, I didn’t have anything to do with that!”
“How not? You lied to the cops.”
Jaydon winced. “And fuck myself over if I tell them about the video and Amber?”
Roxie took a deep breath.
“And when she died, it freaked me out. Maybe she had talked to someone, and someone got nervous. What if her accident was deliberate?”
Similar concerns had crossed her mind. Roxie leaned over and kneaded her forehead. “Regardless, this is over. I have the video. You’re coming clean.”
Jaydon cursed under his breath.
“Or not. Either way, you’ve already fucked yourself over by not explaining this from the beginning. I have to share this video with prosecution. You say anything or nothing, I don’t care. That’s your problem.”
“I was scared shitless. What else was I supposed to do?”
To that, she had no reply. They sat there a moment more. “You roughed her up and then you left.”
“Yeah, she was supposed to clean it all up and leave Ben to sleep it off.”
“Did you have anything to do with Sonny not being with Ben?” she asked.
He nodded. “Just asked a buddy to chat with him. Amber guaranteed Ben would be feeling the effects quickly.”
“You came into the room,” she repeated, “left Amber to tidy it up, and left.”
“Right. I went back to my room.”
Roxie jerked up straighter. “The second woman who ‘sucked you off’, that was Amber?” Finally, she unearthed his lie.
“Yeah. I left my card in the crack of my door so I could slip back into my room when I was done with Amber.”
“So you were in the hall”—Roxie drummed her fingers on her thigh as she recalled the times of events—“you were in the hall when whoever killed Josh could have been entering his room.”
He avoided eye contact.
“Did you see—”
“Just some guy.”
An eyewitness to the killer. Roxie nearly panted at the anticipation of the missing puzzle piece. “A guy?”
“Just as I was about to go into Ben’s room. Amber had left the card in the lock like I had. I saw a man coming out of a door and into the hall.”
Another VIP guest. Roxie gulped in air.
“A door to the right or left?” She could verify the layout of suites to pinpoint the person.
“I don’t remember. I was having second thoughts about what I was going to do to Ben. I was nervous. I’d never done anything like that before.”
“What did he look like?” Give me more!
“Can’t say. I didn’t see his face. He had his back to me.”
“What clothes? Hair. Anything.”
“Dark clothes? Jeans? I didn’t look long. Had a hat on. It was like a glance from the side. And when I realized someone else was in the hallway, I hurried into Ben’s room. I didn’t want anyone to see what I was up to either.”
Whistles shrilled from the court and they both looked up at the distraction.
“I meant to get him out of my way. That was all. Not for him to go through all this,” Jaydon whispered. “But I didn’t see how I could explain after everything died down. After Amber died, I thought someone might be out to get me next.”
Assuming Amber’s accident was another murder.
Roxie stood after him, shaking her head. “Too late for agonizing over it. I have the video, and I’m showing it to Grant before he takes it to the DA.”
Jaydon frowned. “Then what?”
Roxie shrugged. Her knowledge of the law didn’t extend that far. Nothing too rosy for the backstabbing basketball player, she was sure.
“I’m sure you’l
l find out.”
She watched Jaydon make his way to the court and looked forward to finally exposing all of this to Grant.
To get to Grant, she had to leave the arena. Had someone been chasing her outside? How would someone have even known if she’d been going to the arena? She told Grant, sure, but no one else. Just like the oddity of Sonny being shot when he was on his way to see her. As if—
“No,” she whispered to herself.
As if someone had been listening to her calls. Her phone, Stuart had taken her phone. And bugged it? Nothing could shock her now.
“Wait!” she called to Jaydon.
He trotted back over.
“I think someone is waiting for me outside. Followed me here.”
Stuart. It was the briefest of glances, but the man who had been chasing her after she had exited the taxi was bald. Stuart was already on her shit list. He seemed to be Tara’s choice handyman for her dirty work—taking her notes from Grant’s office. Anyone siding with Tara was not to be trusted. Assumption or not, Roxie wasn’t about to take a chance.
“And you act like I’m an idiot to be scared to confess anything? He’ll come after me next the more you talk about Ben not being the killer!”
“Can you spare a bodyguard, or something? Please?”
It was an unexpected gesture Roxie didn’t anticipate, but several arena employees flanked her as she left the building and got into Jaydon’s car outside. Maybe being caught in his crimes, he was more than eager to be helpful.
“Where to?”
She gave the address for the offices.
Chapter Thirty-Two
For months, Roxie had assisted Grant on a case that seemed fated to never end. Question to speculation, idea to dead end, interviews to notes. All in the span of one single work day, Roxie realized not all legal investigations happened in paperwork and discussions.
Fear. Danger. Violence. Those were coming to play in the most unwelcome ways.
She planned to come home straight to Grant after her meeting with Jaydon, but she felt it wise to make sure she had all their belongings. Grant would have gone straight home from the hospital, and she wasn’t willing to leave their laptops and materials unsupervised. The video she’d uncovered from Amber’s account would trump any notes and documents in the office, but the office was on the way, and she simply couldn’t leave anything to chance. After her own legal woes, and being stuck with Jimmy’s word against hers, safeguarding the proper material to Ben’s case struck a special note.
Resisting Redemption Page 35
