Chapter Six #2
For his part, Cooper was less interested in the illegal gambling allegations leveled at Rossovich and more in what role he might have played in Eckhart’s murder.
“Your timing couldn’t be better,” Julia told Cooper. “We were just about to break up Rossovich’s illegal gambling operation when we got your call.”
“Lucky me.” Cooper regarded the tall, thin special agent with black hair in an Italian bob and blue eyes. “But not where it concerns gambling—only in Las Vegas,” he emphasized for the record.
Julia laughed. “Keep it that way.”
Olly, who was at least six five and muscular, with dark hair in a military cut and green eyes, was all business when he said, “Let’s go execute the arrest warrant for Rossovich and see if he may have added murder to his criminal activities.”
Cooper met the special agent’s hard gaze and responded in kind, just as eager to speak with the bookie. “What are we waiting for?”
They entered the somewhat spacious office and the suspect, who was standing near the window and already on the phone with his lawyer, hung up and identified himself as Alphonso Rossovich.
Sixtysomething, short and heavy, with slicked-back black hair in an undercut and a chin strap beard, Rossovich sighed and asked, seeming to accept his fate, “So, am I under arrest or what?”
Olly peered at him and responded, “Yeah, you are, I’m afraid—for illegal gambling activities. Cuff him,” he told Julia.
“Gladly.” She removed the chain handcuffs from her belt and put the suspect’s hands behind his back, while reading Rossovich his rights.
Once he was secure and unable to make a run for it, Cooper walked up to him, standing next to a metal desk and leather chair, and said, “FBI Special Agent Reid. Before they take you away, I need to ask you some questions about Horace Eckhart—”
Rossovich hoisted a thick brow. “What about him?”
“Eckhart was murdered recently,” Cooper answered, lowering his voice.
“So I heard.” Rossovich frowned. “What’s that got to do with me?”
“Phone records reveal that he made numerous calls to your phone number in a short period before his death—including the day of.” Cooper jutted his chin.
“Given that you were his bookie and he may have come up short on payments, maybe you were willing to cut your losses by paying someone to kill him—”
Rossovich snorted. “You kidding me? That’s crazy.
Eckhart was a louse in his line of work and personal life, from what I understood—but take him out…
for what? He was a gambling addict, and always seemed to find a way to cover his bets.
How he got the money was none of my business.
If he happened to get over his head with the wrong lenders—not my problem.
Go after me for illegal gambling, which I’ll fight, tooth and nail—but not for murdering someone. Least of all Horace Eckhart.”
Olly gazed at Julia, then Cooper, and asked him impatiently, “So, we’re done here for now?”
“Yeah, take him away,” Cooper replied thoughtfully. Rossovich’s argument won him over as far as not being the strongest candidate for killing Eckhart, if not eliminated altogether as a possible suspect for involvement in his death.
As Cooper drove from the scene, he believed that moving away from Rossovich’s culpability merely brought him back to his greater instincts in that Eckhart’s death was likely tied in more with his public corruption than personal weaknesses. Even if the two were inexorably joined at the hip.
LEXI GLANCED UP at the rearview mirror. She could have sworn that the dark SUV was following her.
She first noticed this after leaving her studio when it seemed to make a right turn and then a left one just as she had.
Then later, after she had chalked it up to coincidence, she seemed to see the same SUV when she left the supermarket parking lot on East Bell Road.
Now there it was again as she left the development project under way on Seventh Avenue.
Am I losing my mind, or what? Lexi asked herself as she tried to focus on the road. Why would someone want to follow her? A stalker perhaps? In her profession, she came across all types of people—any one of whom could have locked in on her with some unnatural fixation. Was that what this was?
As she allowed fear to get the better of her and had dark thoughts of being abducted, raped and murdered—before being given the chance to find true love again and have a family to cherish—Lexi glanced back up at the rearview mirror as she drove down Washington Street.
Her heart was racing as she fully expected to see the SUV hot on her tail—bumper to bumper.
Instead, there was a red sedan—perhaps a Nissan Sentra—behind her. And not at all threatening.
She looked behind it to the best of her ability and saw what looked like a white Ford F-150. There was no sign of the dark SUV. Maybe it was her imagination getting the better of her.
I guess I am losing my mind, Lexi thought with a laugh, while breathing a sigh of relief. Maybe she was overworking herself to the point of an overactive imagination. She needed to take a chill pill.
Or find a way to channel her insecurities.
When she drove a few more blocks, Lexi ventured another peek in the mirror, almost expecting the dark SUV to have returned and resumed its trailing of her. But it wasn’t there, thankfully.
It had to have only been coincidental that one or more dark SUVs just happened to have followed her from one location or another—if she could even say that. After all, they had just as much right to be on the roads at those times and places as she did.
I’ll try not to jump the gun the next time I see a dark SUV come up behind me, Lexi promised herself. She snapped out of her reverie when her cell phone rang. It sat in the mounted holder. The caller was Cooper.
A smile spread across her face as Lexi put the call on speaker. “Hey,” she said cheerfully.
“Hey,” he said, and paused. “Was just wondering if you’d like to catch a movie tonight? Knowing that you’re into romantic comedies, there’s a new one out.”
How thoughtful of you, Lexi mused, grinning. “Yes, I’d love to go see a movie with you,” she told him, barely able to hide her enthusiasm.
“Cool.” Cooper waited a beat. “So, do I pick you up or…?”
“Yes, that’s fine,” she responded without prelude, feeling comfortable for him to do so. “I’m in my car right now… I’ll text you my address when I get home.”
“Okay.” He paused. “Catch you later.”
Lexi disconnected with a smile still on her face. She did love romantic comedies. However, she hadn’t actually gone to see one at the theater since her husband died. It wasn’t a conscious choice. She simply hadn’t been motivated to take in a movie by herself. Now she didn’t have to.
Almost on impulse, Lexi glanced at the rearview mirror again, as though anticipating that SUV to have sneaked up on her when she let her guard down. Once more, there was no sign of it. False alarm, thankfully.
She sucked in a deep breath and, while continuing to head home, returned to pleasant thoughts surrounding going to see a movie during the holiday season with Cooper Reid.
THE SUV’S SOLE OCCUPANT had dropped back once he sensed that the architect was onto him.
Or at least suspected that she was being followed by the multiple times she seemed to peer into the rearview mirror.
The last thing his employer would have wanted was for him to fail at the simple job of trailing Lexi De La Garza with her being none the wiser.
But he had slipped up in maybe getting a little too close.
Or falling into the trap of following her even when she made obvious attempts to elude him and what her paranoia saw as a threat.
Though he admittedly took the bait almost as a challenge, his better instincts let her believe she was mistaken in being followed.
That way, she would once again let down her guard and not be so cognizant of one vehicle or another as she drove here or there.
Since he knew just where to find her—and when—there was no hurry to catch up to the nice-looking architect. When the time was right, he would be back on her trail and she would be completely unaware of it.
And when and if word came down that she needed to be disposed of, he was up to that task as well.
Or maybe he would take his own initiative where it concerned Lexi De La Garza, with or without his partner along for the ride, and get a piece of her for himself.