Chapter Six
CHAPTER SIX
Gage
A fter lunch, Zarah and I stand on the sidewalk outside the restaurant. She wants to ask me to skip work, but the words won’t come. I should let her go her own way this afternoon, call her tonight and wish her a safe flight, and leave it at that. I’m bitter. She might need the space she dumped me to have, but she doesn’t want it.
The wind bites at our skin, and her hair flies into her face.
Zane and Stella ordered a car and went back to the Crowne. I see through Zane’s actions much more clearly than I have since I met him. He’s walking the same tightrope I am, trying to keep Zarah safe without smothering her. I thought it was indifference, or guilt, but he’s only trying to do what’s best without crowding her, same as me.
“I have to go back to the house and pack. I don’t have everything I need at the penthouse,” she says, looking down the block and not at me.
“I squelched on a job last night and it upset Pop, so I should go to the office get some stuff done,” I say, pushing the hair out of her eyes. “I’ll drive out tonight and we can let the dogs run and talk for a bit.”
“Will you spend the night?”
Shaking my head, I say, “No. You don’t need me to get to the airport. Zane and Stella are meeting you there, right?”
“Yeah, but just to say a quick goodbye. Zane’s still nervous around planes and he said he doesn’t want to watch me take off.”
“And Mel’s picking you up when you land?”
“Yes. At LAX.”
“Then you’ll be just fine. I’ll come over tonight and let Lucille feed me dessert. I have plenty to keep me busy while you’re gone.”
She’s reluctant to agree. I shouldn’t use her past words and actions against her, but I’m still pissed she dumped me in the first place. I’m not going to jump in head-first and get smacked by concrete like I did last time. I’m still reeling by how shitty that felt, thinking I was never going to see her again.
“Do you want a ride to your truck?”
“No, I’ll hoof it. The fresh air will do me good.”
It’s too cold to walk that far, but I need it to clear my head.
“I’m not going to convince you to go home with me, am I?”
“Remember you like that I’m a sexy PI?” I try to joke. “That title has work to go with it. I’ll see you later and we’ll have a quiet night at the house.”
She sighs and stands on her toes to give me a kiss. I pull her to me and breathe in her scent. It’s just as hard for me to keep distance between us as it is for her, but I can’t cave in. I don’t want her to cancel her trip, and while she’s visiting Mel, I plan to clean a lot off my plate so I don’t feel guilty spending time with her when she comes back.
“Be a good girl.” I pat her on the ass, and Douglas hides a smile as he holds the door open for her. She waves, and I lift a hand. I trust him to drive her home safely, and I only watch for a second as the SUV pulls into traffic and disappears.
Baby bounds to me when I step into the office, and Pop raises his eyebrows. “I thought I lost you.”
“Can’t get rid of me that easily. I sent Zarah home to pack. What’s going on?”
“The divorcée isn’t up to anything. Baby and I listened to half a James Patterson audiobook and then called it a night. You find out any news?”
“Yeah, as a matter of fact. Zane got us in to talk to Dr. Mallory. He said the good doctor wants his watch back.”
“Huh. I would’ve thought that’d make him run like hell.”
“Me too, but maybe he’s innocent.”
“You believe that?”
“He’d have to be stupid to leave evidence like that behind.”
“If you just tortured someone to death, are you thinking about your watch?”
“I’m thinking I don’t want anyone to find out I did it.”
“True enough. Well,” Pop says, sighing and shrugging into his jacket, “I was about to head home. Quiet afternoon. Might as well go find Zarah.”
“Nah. I’ll do the same. I’m still looking through Max’s things. It will be nice to get his apartment taken care of.”
“You could’ve done it when he passed away,” Pop says, quirking his lips.
“I wasn’t in the headspace to do it, and if you hadn’t forced me to see his attorney, I wouldn’t have done what I have.”
Pop smirks. “And you wouldn’t have met Zarah, either. You’re welcome.”
That sits in my craw the whole way home. If I wouldn’t have gone to talk to Max’s attorney, I wouldn’t have seen Zarah outside his office. I wouldn’t have approached her, rescued her from those vultures, and I definitely wouldn’t have invited her to the café. It’s interesting she said that’s when she started to have feelings for me. That afternoon she could barely look at me, much less hold a conversation. She was so shaken up, she didn’t give me any indication she enjoyed my company at all.
I scoff. Sometimes I still don’t know if she likes spending time with me or if I scare the fuck out of her. I guess at this point, it’s a little of both.
I know for a fact she scares the fuck out of me .
Baby and I go for a run, and she enjoys stretching her legs. We run along the Renegade, the sun that finally came out of hiding gleaming against the water. I feel unsettled in a way I dislike, which is unusual because I can normally shake things off without a problem. One of the few things that tore me up was Viv saying she didn’t want to share her life with me. After that, meeting another woman and starting a family hadn’t been on my radar—I hadn’t wanted it to be on my radar—then Zarah stepped into my path and everything I ever wanted changed in an instant. I want it all and I am one greedy son of a bitch to admit it.
Exhausted, Baby and I head back to the apartment. I shower, and standing under the hot water, get myself off, daydreaming about fucking Zarah against the wall, her slender legs wrapped around my waist. It doesn’t do much to lessen the tension coiled in my body, and after I dry off and get dressed, I pop open a beer and make a sandwich, feeding Baby half.
My apartment feels like a pair of faded, worn-out jeans—comfortable, but maybe not enough anymore. My place has no chance in hell of competing with the Maddoxes’ penthouse, and after spending time with Zarah there and her tub the size of Lake Superior, I’m keenly aware of how small my space is, even if I do have the loft office.
I settle at the table Zarah bought me, Max’s lockbox sitting in the middle of it. I should read more of his journal, but I hate reading the entries that have Zarah in them, no matter how briefly she’s mentioned.
I look to the CD cases instead. They aren’t labeled, and there are several. I run upstairs and grab my laptop and plop back down into my seat. Luckily, my laptop is old and has a disc drive, though I never use it. If I want to watch something, I buy the digital version or check if it’s streaming somewhere, and if it’s not available like that, I don’t watch it at all. The CD whirs in the drive, and I wait for the screen to light up, but it doesn’t. I frown. Are they empty? Max wouldn’t leave me empty CDs. Oh, wait. I never have my audio turned up when I’m online.
The voices are low, and I increase the volume. I still can’t hear anything, and I run back up to my loft and snag my earbuds off my desk.
Going back to the start, I replay the CD, crank the sound as high as it will go, and push my hands over my ears.
“Why is this taking so long?”
Pause.
“The weapons were delivered. My contact said everything went as planned.”
There’s scratching, maybe fabric rustling.
“They can’t have more for less.”
Pause.
“Yes, I know, but Black won’t accept less than agreed upon, and he shouldn’t have to. As soon as the president is declared unfit—”
A sigh.
“I know how long, goddammit. The studies are going well. Quiet Meadows isn’t your concern...I have that under control. The guns are your business. Do your job, or I’ll tell Black, and trust me, unlike me, he’s more than willing to step in the shit.”
The audio stops and the drive ejects the CD.
Even though the voice was faint, it’s clear who was speaking. Max recorded his father on the phone, talking to someone about weapons. He and Clayton Black were working together, and it was something illegal, too. Breaking the law with Black while fucking his wife. My stepfather is a class act.
What would Rourke get out of a black arms deal?
Was Black splitting profits? Rourke doesn’t need the money. I look at the properties of the CD and the date indicates Max created it three years ago. Zarah was still in Quiet Meadows. I wonder if this is why Max decided to look into Lark’s and Kagan’s deaths. If Stella hadn’t busted Zarah out of Quiet Meadows, I wonder if Max would have.
In the three years since Max recorded this, what’s happened? Quiet Meadows was shut down. Did they accomplish whatever it was they were doing there? And once Black was taken into custody, who picked up where he left off? Rourke? Willow’s been under surveillance all this time. She wasn’t selling weapons.
Maybe because of Clayton’s and Ash’s arrests, whatever plan, or plans, Rourke was talking about fizzled out.
Max couldn’t have known I would wait so long to settle his estate. I let a year go by before I went to see his attorney and read his last wishes.
Whatever he wanted me to look into then, maybe all that is said and done.
It wouldn’t hurt to feel Rourke out, but after I listen to the rest of the CDs, I’m turning them over to Zane and he can forward them on to the FBI. I won’t hang on to them like I did Mallory’s watch. I won’t let Rourke go free, not if he was doing something illegal. Politicians are liars, but Rourke never seemed dirty, not if you don’t count him shoving his dick into places it doesn’t belong.
Out of curiosity, I flip to the last entry in Max’s journal.
Tonight, we go to the governor’s mansion. Everyone’s pumped. I’ve written my brother a letter, left it with my attorney, and hid everything vital I want Gage to have in the event of my death. I can’t know what will happen tonight, only that we’re dealing with murderers and I’m no stranger to the wrong side of the law and people thinking they’re above it.
I’ve been receiving death threats since going to the NTSB’s offices in DC. They aren’t anything I haven’t dealt with before—a journalist always shoving his nose into other people’s business will do that. I haven’t told Zane. He won’t let me go if he knew. He’d keep me here at the Crowne or force me to go to the penthouse with Zarah and Ingrid.
Dad’s in DC or he’d be attending the fundraiser tonight. I told him I need to speak to him when he comes back to KC. He knows I know about the weapons and him working with the Blacks. I seriously don’t understand how he knows. He knows I’m seeing Zarah. He knows I’m in love with her and that I don’t care what he thinks. I’ll see this through, even if it means turning in my own father for illegal activity.
Right now it’s early, the sun hasn’t risen yet, and I’m sitting in Zarah’s room watching her sleep. I’m too anxious to go back to bed—my blood’s fizzing. She looks so peaceful, so innocent. I’m going to take a leave of absence and ask her if she’ll go away with me while things settle down. It doesn’t feel safe to be in the city right now.
In my letter to Gage, I asked him to protect her if something happens to me. I hope he will, but he doesn’t have patience for the upper-class. It’s why he’s never liked me. I hope he can see through Zarah’s money and status to the person she is under the billions.
And, if nothing happens, if nothing goes south like I feel it will, I’m going to ask him to be my best man.
I need to try harder to have him in my life. Zarah’s love and her years locked away at QM have taught me time is precious and Gage and I have wasted too much.
Wish me luck.
On the drive out to Zarah’s, Max’s words loop in my head...and in my heart. Zane and Stella are still in the city, and we’ll have the house to ourselves, except for Lucille who’s always puttering in the kitchen forcing cookies down my throat like a well-meaning grandmother. I’m looking forward to a moonlit walk in the woods with the dogs, the simple time with Zarah my most favorite—besides the time we spend in bed, of course.
I didn’t bring a bag, my mother’s warning echoing in my head like I’m still a little kid. It will be nice to get Max’s apartment sorted out, and I’m grateful to have the help. It will disappoint Zarah that I held firm in my decision not to spend the night, but if she wakes up, dresses, Douglas drives her to the airport, and Zane and Stella meet her there to see her onto the plane, she’ll feel like she’s in control of herself and we won’t have any teary goodbyes.
Baby lets out a yip when I turn onto the long drive that leads to Zarah’s mini-mansion, and she’s scrambling out the door practically before I can put my truck into Park. I never did go through with my plan to trade it in, and Jerricka’s disgusting accusation I’m dating Zarah for her money still rubs me raw.
I hate that woman, and somehow, I’m taking her down.
Zarah’s waiting wearing jeans and a copper-colored sweater, her hair swinging around her shoulders. “Hey,” she says, smiling too brightly.
I know her. She’s already sad.
“Hey, you,” I say, throwing my arm around her neck and pressing a kiss to the top of her head like I would a little sister. “You look pretty.”
“Thanks. I took a nap. Are you hungry? Lucille made—”
“Nope. Baby’s looking forward to playing outside.”
“Oh, okay. Maybe dessert when we come back?” she asks hopefully.
I cuddle her to me and brush my lips over hers. “The kind of dessert we eat? Sure. The kind without our clothes on? I’m not going to have time. My mom’s helping me early tomorrow, and I promised her I wouldn’t be late.”
“I guess I need to be a grownup, huh?” she says, her brown eyes liquid like a dark cup of coffee.
“It’s what you wanted,” I remind her as she shoves her boots on and calls the dogs.
Arya and Sansa zoom out the front door and trounce through the snow, Baby following as fast as she can.
The sun set hours ago, and the sky is clear, stars dotting the expansive black. It’s not that cold, but we need hats and mittens, and our boots help us trudge through the drifts.
“I didn’t think it would be so hard,” she says, putting her hand in mine. It doesn’t last long. She waves her arms around for balance, and I grab her shoulders to steady her.
“Growing up is hard. It must be worse for you without your parents to look up to. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have Pop. Sometimes I still feel like he’s smarter than me.”
“Zane had to grow up fast. There’s nothing he doesn’t know, but I hate bothering him and I try not to ask him a million things all the time. I talk to Stella a lot.”
“You can come to me too, for anything you need, I mean that.”
She smiles, her eyes crinkling. “I know.”
The dogs scamper through the snow, startling the squirrels. It’s beautiful out here, quiet. We’re so far from the highway, the sound of traffic doesn’t carry to us. It’s just Zarah and me, our breathing, our boots crunching through the snow.
“Have you found out any more about who killed Ingrid?” she asks, holding on to my arm to keep from falling into the drifts. We try to follow the dogs’ trail, but they don’t leave much of a path.
“Pop and I found a watch at the homicide scene. Pop traced it to a Dr. Stephen Mallory.”
She looks up at me. “The dementia doctor at Quiet Meadows.”
I frown. “Do you know him?”
“I don’t remember him well, but the night I was using Peggy’s computer, I researched him and some of the staff at Quiet Meadows. When I saw his picture, it triggered a few memories. He would push me down to the basement and he always smelled like peppermint and cigarette smoke.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I did, but there’s been a lot going on and you must have forgot.” She screws up her face, teasing me. “Who’s got the bad memory now?”
“I guess that’d be me,” I say, smacking her butt.
She laughs.
“But why would you be under the care of a dementia doctor?” I ask, not liking any explanation anyone could come up with.
“I don’t know. Why was he at the place where Ingrid was murdered?”
“I don’t know, but in a few days Zane and I are going to talk to him.”
She stops. “Is that a good idea? Shouldn’t you tell the police?”
“We want to keep this to ourselves. Zane said we don’t have many people we can trust, and that’s true. Besides, we don’t know where all this points to, and if the police start going in and arresting people, then it’s a little hard to get answers, isn’t it?”
“If he killed someone, he might hurt you, too.”
“Zane and I will be okay, and I have other things I want to ask him now. Like what exactly he was doing to you while you were at Quiet Meadows. If he was involved in your abuse, he should go to prison. I don’t know how this Dr. Pederson managed to find a get-out-of-jail-free card, but anyone who hurt you, they’re going to pay for it.”
“I just want to get better.”
“I know you do. How do you feel after your appointment today?”
“I’m not on the lower dosage yet. I start that tomorrow. Zane called Mel and let her know, but she remembers how I used to be. We’ll be fine.”
“Good. I’d like to meet her someday. We can talk shop.”
Zarah tugs on my arm and leads me deeper into the woods. “I would like that, too.”
The dogs sniff around the trees and we find the log we always sit on. I brush a layer of snow off the bark the best I can and straddle it, and Zarah sits between my legs and rests her head on my shoulder.
I wrap my arms around her. “This afternoon I went through a little more of what Max left me. Rourke was doing more than just sleeping with Willow. He was helping Black sell weapons. He’s in DC now, but I’m going to talk to him when he’s back in the city. Max was doing a lot of digging, and I don’t like what he found.”
“Then he should be in prison.”
“Yeah, he should be. This goes deeper than what Stella and Max found out about your parents, and I’m sorry I waited so long to do what he asked.”
“I’m not.”
Her answer surprises me. “Why? Ingrid would still be alive. Zane and Stella would have been married a long time ago, and maybe, you would have been off those drugs completely by now. We don’t know all that they were doing to you at Quiet Meadows, and it could be the key to your recovery.”
“All that’s important, but if you had gone to see Max’s lawyer right away, we wouldn’t have been ready to meet. You hated me, remember? You blamed Max’s death on us.”
“I was angry and didn’t know any better.”
“But the waiting gave you time to forget you hated me, and you fell in love with me instead.”
“That’s not as important as your future.”
She twists on the log. “You are my future, Gage. Without you, I have nothing.”
Scowling, I pull off my gloves and trap her face between my hands. “I don’t ever want to hear you say that again. I will never be more important than your health. I love you just the way you are, but off those drugs, you’ll be so much more. You have such a bright future ahead of you, baby, and if I had to choose between leaving you for good and you getting better or staying with you and you never having the future you deserve, I would leave, just like that. You could always find another man to love.”
Tears fill her eyes, and they glimmer in the starlight. “You said you would never leave me.”
“I won’t, but there are things more important than us. Your health is one of them. I’m not going to take back my apology. Had I done what Max asked at the time of his death instead of waiting, things could have been better. I resented him, I was jealous of him, and I didn’t settle his estate because I hated him for dying on me and I hated myself for it.”
She burrows into my chest, and I tangle my fingers in her hair. “I still say things happen how they’re meant to happen,” she says.
“People only say that to feel better about the choices they’ve made. I doubt Zane tells himself platitudes like that.”
“Zane’s happy now. He has Stella.”
“And I have you.”
We let the dogs play for a little longer and Zarah and I explore the woods. She tries to draw out my visit, and we end up eating thick slices of Lucille’s French silk pie in bed. She talks me into making love to her one last time, and I do, slow and sweet.
I leave her sleeping, the sheets tangled around her legs, and while Baby snores beside me in the truck, worn out after all that playing, I sit and stare into the dark, worrying about just how true my words really are.