Chapter 20 #2
I didn’t like losing those cases. But it wasn’t about me or Ethan or our desire to get justice for the woman who died.
Me being involved would be a defense attorney’s wet dream.
Dylan knew this.
Which meant his call was hopefully about Julian Calloway.
Monday night after she went home and after the kids were in bed, I’d called her and asked more about Zoe, including her last name and where she and Julian had lived.
Tuesday, I’d called Dylan and asked him to look into Julian and Zoe’s accident.
He told me he would and would call when he had something.
“Hey, Dylan.”
“You somewhere where you can talk?”
“In the car. Alone. So, yeah. What’s up?”
“Couple of things, but we’ll start with Zoe Calloway.
I pulled the files on her accident, including the maintenance records.
Luckily, Julian’s loaded so he wasn’t getting his hands dirty changing oil or rotors.
Her car was regularly maintained at the BMW dealership.
Zoe also had a three-million-dollar life insurance policy with her husband Julian the sole beneficiary.
So you better believe the insurance company pored over the accident reports before they paid out.
Don’t know if this is good or bad or if it will help your woman, but there was no foul play.
Zoe was T-boned in an intersection—driver’s side.
If that impact wasn’t the cause of the bilateral fracture of the C2 vertebra that killed her, when her car slammed into an F350, that impact caused the injury. ”
Well, fuck. I didn’t know how Rainy was going to react to that news.
“Julian has more money than brains. The affair his wife found out about wasn’t the first. The guy’s gotta have his escort service contact saved to his favorites with the frequency in which he uses it.
Before Zoe’s death, going back to before they were married, he calls for service once a week.
There have been times in the months right before Zoe died he was getting it three times a week. ”
“Let me get this straight,” I grunted. “You’re telling me this asshole was married, had a woman on the side he was fucking, and he was still buying pussy three times a week?”
“That’s what I’m telling you,” he confirmed.
“I’m disgusted while at the same time wondering what the fuck this dude eats if he’s got the energy and stamina to bang five different women at the same time.
With the possibility of fucking two of them in the same night if Zoe was still screwing him.
Not to mention, when the hell did he find the time to fuck these women? ”
I was making a joke, but it wasn’t funny.
And while I would tell Rainy that Julian wasn’t responsible for Zoe’s death, I wouldn’t tell her the extent of his betrayal.
“Don’t know. I love my wife, which means I wouldn’t step out on her, so I have no clue how cheats find the time to cheat.”
I knew he loved his wife. But Dylan wouldn’t cheat because he was not that kind of man.
“I just pulled into my driveway,” I told him. “Appreciate you looking into this. Tell me what I owe you.”
“Fuck off with that noise. Got one more thing to tell you.”
Shit. Depending on what it was and how long it was going to take, I wasn’t going to be able to squeeze in a shower.
“Whatcha got?”
“I found the connection between Ashley Monroe and Tyler Mercer.”
I was glad I had my car in park, because every muscle in my body went tight.
“You know I’m off that case.”
“Yep, but you’re the only one I called. You’re gonna need to pass this on. Ashley Monroe’s ex-boyfriend, Josh Holman, frequents a bar called the Bluebird. I’ve found charges on Tyler Mercer’s credit card from the same bar a week after Josh and Ashley’s breakup.”
Fucking shit.
“Your connection between Mercer and Samantha Williams is in the same vein. Tate Hendrix and Tyler Mercer were at the same bar, this one called Dutch Courage.”
Fucking, fucking shit.
“You think Mercer’s a hitman?”
“I don’t know what he is, but you’ve got him in the same place with the ex-boyfriends. Both women strangled. Both women dumped in water. Mercer shot you not even five hundred yards from where Ashley lay dead. He’s your man, Jase.”
Fucking, fucking hell.
“I’ll put a bug in Elias’s ear about the bars. He’ll catch my meaning and run with it.”
“Elias Radcliff caught the case?”
It didn’t surprise me Dylan knew of the other detective.
“Yeah.”
“Thank fuck if it’s not you and Ethan, it’s Radcliff. The dude is relentless.”
Elias had earned that reputation from years of good policing.
“If that’s all you got, I gotta change and get my family to Rainy’s mom’s house for dinner.”
“That’s all I got. Talk soon.”
“Thanks, Dylan.”
I grabbed my phone and rushed into the house.
I yelled out my hellos as I bounded up the stairs to change.
When I was done, I passed out proper hellos, including a lip touch with my woman and a hug from my daughter. The boys were bouncing at the door, raring to go, so they got the order to get into my SUV.
I was getting ready to close Rainy into the car when she asked, “Ready for this?”
And that’s when it hit me—she was nervous.
I could remind her that I already knew her mother, that I’d sat at her mom’s table hundreds of times, hung out on her couch, spoken to her on the phone countless times, hell I’d even run into her at the store in the last sixteen years.
But instead, all I said was, “Absolutely.”
I knew I’d made the right decision when Rainy smiled and I watched the nerves slip away.