Chapter Seven
Lexa stood in the observation area, looking at the large monitors that provided camera feed for each of the interview rooms. Wylie, who’d arrived a half hour early, was sitting quietly at the table, waiting for Owen to finish up talking to Brady.
Callie and Shaw had already ended their interview with Hudson, and the man had stuck to his claim that Brady had murdered his sister. Of course, other than that one text from Chloe, Hudson didn’t have any proof of that.
The man had also seemed totally shocked when Callie had brought up his bio-mom’s death and he claimed not to have known about it, that he hadn’t seen her in years. Hudson had also insisted he hadn’t been aware that Brady’s father had been connected to that plea deal that had kept his mother’s killer out of jail.
Lexa had no idea if Hudson was telling the truth, but so far nothing had come up to dispute anything he’d said.
It was the same for Brady. He, too, had seemed surprised when Owen had brought up Wylie’s connection to Chloe’s late mother, and Brady had claimed that Chloe never mentioned her bio-mom. So, the woman’s death might not even apply. It might be one of those odd coincidences.
But Lexa hated coincidences.
And this one didn’t feel right.
The door behind her opened, and she turned to see Aiden. After the interviews had started, they’d decided to split duties, with him finishing up the background searches on Hudson and Chloe and with her observing the questioning of their persons of interest.
“I hope you’ve found out more than I have,” she remarked.
Aiden shook his head and moved to stand beside her so he could also see what was on the monitor. “No social media posts from Chloe or Hudson about their bio-mom.”
“And Hudson denied knowing about her death,” Lexa provided.
On the screen, she saw Owen finishing up with Brady, telling the man he could leave but that he was to stay available to answer any other questions that might come up. Brady practically sprang to his feet and hurried out ahead of Owen who then headed to the interview room with Wylie.
Lexa listened as Owen fed in the pertinent data for the recording, and he then sat across from the man.
“How’s my son?” Wylie immediately asked.
“I’ve finished with the interview, and he’s free to go,” Owen answered, and that caused Wylie to visibly relax. Not for long though. The tension ratcheted up again when Owen added, “For now.”
Wylie muttered some not so muffled curse words. “Brady’s a wreck, and I don’t want him pressured. You have no evidence against him, and you shouldn’t be treating him like a suspect.”
“Means, motive, and opportunity,” Owen reminded Wylie, holding up three fingers. “Brady has all of those. I have to consider him a suspect. I’d be derelict in my duty if I didn’t, and you know that.”
Wylie groaned, a loud, almost feral sound that was loaded with anger and frustration. “I believe Chloe’s alive. I think she set up her own death so that Brady would be arrested for her murder.”
That got their attention—both Aiden’s and her and Owen’s.
“And why would Chloe do that?” Owen came out and asked.
Wylie wasn’t so quick to answer this time, and he glanced around the room as if buying him some thinking time before he finally looked at Owen again. “Because she’s pissed at me. Because she’s so enraged at me that she wants to punish me through Brady.”
“Is this about Chloe’s bio-mom?” Lexa muttered.
But Owen didn’t question Wylie about that particular subject yet. He just waited for the man to continue.
“I know in my gut that Chloe doesn’t love my son,” Wylie finally said. “So, shortly after they announced their engagement, I went to her and offered her money, a hundred grand, to break up with Brady, leave town, and never contact him again.”
Lexa was sure she looked surprised because she was. She glanced at Aiden to see if he’d known anything about that, but he shook his head.
“And, no, Brady didn’t know anything about it,” Wylie went on. “If he’d found out what I’d done, he would have been furious, but he also would have been safe from whatever that woman had in store for him.”
“I’m assuming Chloe didn’t take the money?” Owen wanted to know.
“She did not.” Wylie spat out each word like profanity. “But I tried again to press her to take it during that phone call you found out I made to her. Again, she turned me down because I believe that no amount of money is worth her giving up on revenge.”
“Revenge?” Owen leaned back and folded his arms over his chest. “Does that have anything to do with her mother’s death?”
Wylie’s eyes widened, and he seemed to do some sort of mental double take. Then, he sighed. “Of course, you’d find out about that.”
“I had deep searches done on those connected to Chloe. Including you. I know you were the lawyer for the young man who killed her biological mother. Care to explain that?” And Owen sounded all cop now.
Wylie sighed again. “I don’t want Brady to know any of this.” He stared at Owen and cursed. “You told him?”
“I asked him if he knew about Silby Wight and Miles Bennett. He said that he didn’t.”
“Did Brady ask why I’d agreed to defend Miles?” Wylie blurted the question, and there was now some panic in his tone.
“No,” Owen replied. “I think he was, uh, trying to process the info when I ended the interview.” He paused a moment. “Why did you defend Miles?”
Wylie made another of those sounds of frustration. “Because his mother is an old friend of mine, and she begged me to take the case.”
“And you didn’t know Silby was Chloe’s mother?” Owen asked.
“No,” he insisted. “Brady hadn’t even met Chloe at the time, and Silby had a different last name.”
Owen pinned his gaze to Wylie’s. “But you found out later.”
Wylie nodded. “I learned it about a month ago when I had a PI run a background check on Chloe. The adoption came up, and the PI was able to give me the birth mother’s name. That’s when I realized that Chloe must be up to something. I figure she wanted to punish me for defending the client who killed her birth mom, Silby Wight.”
“Chloe would have had to have been close to her mom to want that,” Owen remarked. “Was she?”
Wylie shrugged. “The PI didn’t find anything about that, but she must have been. That’s what this staged death of hers is all about.”
Owen stayed quiet a moment, no doubt giving that some thought. “There was a lot of blood in the manor,” he finally pointed out.
“Blood that Chloe could have stockpiled and used to set Brady up.” Now, Wylie was the one who paused. “Or me…shit…she could have planted something to make me look guilty.” He took out his phone. “I need to have a conversation with a lawyer friend. Could you give me a minute?”
Owen obliged, getting to feet. “Interview paused while subject speaks with a lawyer.” He gave the time and the verbal command to turn off the audio before he stepped out.
Aiden opened the door to the observation room, and Owen stopped, glanced inside at the monitors. “Did anything else turn up on Chloe or Hudson?” Owen asked.
“No,” Aiden answered. “Neither seem to have many friends, and they aren’t exactly partiers. Most of their social interaction is with each other. Well, they were before Chloe got engaged to Brady anyway. What I don’t know is how Hudson took it to suddenly not being the center of his sister’s world. Did he retaliate? Did he come up with a plan to kill her? Or are Chloe and Hudson together in on whatever the hell this?”
“Yeah,” Owen said in such a way to let them know he was considering any and all of those possibilities. He glanced at the monitor again. “Keep an eye on Wylie. I need to call and hassle the lab about those blood results. If Wylie asks where I am, tell him I’ll be back in about twenty minutes. That should give him enough time to talk with his lawyer.”
With that, Owen shut the door and left them to it. Since there was now no audio in the interview room, the only thing they could do was watch. And what they saw was a very agitated Wylie pacing while he spoke on his phone.
“Everything Wylie said could be true,” Aiden commented, breaking the silence that’d settled between them. “Chloe could have set this up.”
Lexa made a sound of agreement. “But if so, she had to plan it for months. That’s a long time to put up a facade, especially if she had to pretend to love a man she might actually hate.”
“The hatred could all be for Wylie,” Aiden pointed out. “Punish the father by using the son.”
True, that would be the deepest cut for a loving parent, and Wylie did love his son. “Still, that doesn’t rule the obvious here. That Brady and Chloe argued. She tried to end things, and he ended her.” Then, she went with another theory. “I also think we need to consider someone else who lost the center of their world when Brady and Chloe got engaged. Gillian.”
Aiden’s nod was quick, which let her know he’d already considered it. “With the wedding just hours away, Gillian might have decided the only way to keep Brady was to get rid of the bride.”
Yes, so several different motives could be playing into that. And Brady could truly be innocent.
“That look we saw on Brady’s face when he arrived at the manor and since then—that shock could be because he’s worried sick about the woman he loves,” Lexa speculated.
Again, Aiden’s nod was quick, and he took out his phone. “I’ll text Owen about questioning Gillian.”
He sent the text, and within seconds Owen sent back a reply. “Hell. Will do.”
The hell was no doubt frustration over them adding a fourth person of interest to their list of Wylie, Brady, Hudson, and now Gillian. Actually, there were five if Chloe was still alive and had orchestrated this.
Lexa made her own sound of frustration that had Aiden shifting toward her. He frowned. Then, winced, and it took her a moment to realize the movement had pulled at his stitches.
“The numbing junk the nurse put on it is wearing off,” he let her know, frowning at the bandage on his arm.
“I can get you some over-the-counter pain meds,” she insisted, and Lexa went for the door handle.
But he stopped her. Unfortunately, he stopped her by putting his hand overs hers, and mercy, mercy, mercy, even that packed a wallop.
She looked up at him, just as he looked down at her. Their eyes sort of collided and held. Just held. With them making some serious eye contact. That, too, packed another wallop.
“You know if I kiss you, that’s it,” he drawled. “No turning back.”
Lexa couldn’t help herself. She smiled. “One kiss and we have sex?”
“Well, not immediately. Not here for sure. But it’d be a kiss we wouldn’t just enjoy and forget.”
She eased her hand from his and cocked her head to the side. “You must be sure of your kissing abilities.”
He shook his head. “I’m sure of yours .”
She laughed. And he captured her laugh with a kiss.
A soft touch of his mouth to hers. So light it was barely there, but it was indeed scorching. The heat seemed to seep right through her.
Aiden didn’t press harder. Didn’t deepen it. Didn’t go in for anything more than just this. Just this one incredible way of turning every inch of her into a puddle of need.
After a couple of moments of that sweet torture, Aiden eased back and met her gaze again. “Thought I’d get that first kiss out of the way.”
She shook her head to try to clear it. No luck. “You kissed me even after you said there’d be no turning back from it.”
“I was wrong,” he admitted. “There was already no turning back even before the kiss.”
Ah, that. Lexa wished she could disagree. But she couldn’t. Nope. Being with Aiden, becoming his lover, seemed inevitable.
That thought was flashing like neon in her head. The sound of his phone beeping chased the thought away and snapped her out of the daze. Her attention flew back to the monitors, where she saw they hadn’t missed a thing. Wylie was still pacing and on his phone.
“It’s the security system at my house,” he relayed to her. “Apparently, someone or something triggered a sensor in the pasture.”
Aiden clicked the function on the app to bring up the camera feed, and Lexa moved closer to take a look. It wasn’t the grainy image that she’d been expecting from a security system but high enough quality for her to see an amazing view of the picturesque Texas Hill Country. There was a barn surrounded by acres of green pasture, and beyond that, white limestone bluffs.
What she didn’t see was anything that could have triggered the system.
Not at first anything. Then, Aiden zoomed in on one of the massive live oaks. And she saw something.
The woman who was peering out.
Chloe .