Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter
Forty-Six
I slid into the passenger seat of Wyatt’s BMW with a sigh.
If I ever managed to own a car in the future, it would likely be a secondhand clunker, never anything as new and eye-catching as this BMW.
The cognac-and-black interior was almost as gorgeous as the metallic green exterior.
The seats were comfy, and there was a hint of new-car smell.
I took in my surroundings while waiting for Wyatt to circle around and get into the driver’s seat. The car was pristine. So much for fast-food wrappers and unpleasant smells.
He could still have other gross habits, I reminded myself.
The night was young, after all. Heck, it wasn’t even five o’clock.
We didn’t talk much as I directed Wyatt to Hoffman’s apartment building in Longwood.
I appreciated the time to gather myself.
The fact that my mom had booked an appointment with a lawyer still sent a myriad of emotions—including abject fear—roiling through me every time I thought of it, but I did my best to push that problem to the back of my mind.
Sometime this week, I’d speak to my dad.
That was the only plan of action I could come up with.
My mom tended to plow through people with hurricane force whenever she had a bee in her bonnet, and my dad typically rode along with the storm.
I didn’t want to drag him into the middle of a fight, especially considering his health issues, but I had to at least talk to him.
Even if I decided that Livy was better off with my parents, I didn’t want to be railroaded.
I had a voice, and I intended to use it to advocate for Livy, whatever that meant in the end.
“I guess we could be sitting here for nothing if Hoffman’s already sold the whiskey,” I said once Wyatt had found a parking space down the street from Hoffman’s building. “If he even stole the booze in the first place.”
At least we knew, thanks to his recent social media post, that he was hanging out at home. Or had been an hour earlier, anyway. The chance that he would decide to do something incriminating while we happened to be watching was slim, but I didn’t know how else to find out if he was Freddie’s killer.
“How long did you two date?” Wyatt asked as we kept an eye on the front entrance of the three-story brick building.
I sighed, wishing I’d never crossed paths with Hoffman at the pub trivia night where we’d met. “Eight months. Which was eight months too long. Not that I realized that until it was too late.”
Just as I was about to dive into the box of Milk Duds I’d bought at the convenience store, the door to Hoffman’s building opened.
It was the third time that had happened since we’d arrived.
Still, I couldn’t believe our luck. While I’d hoped that Hoffman would make an appearance, I didn’t think he actually would.
I thought we would end up sitting there in Wyatt’s car until we were half frozen, with no evidence and no leads.
Maybe the universe didn’t hate me after all. Not completely, anyway.
Then again…
“Fudge muffins!” I slid down in the passenger seat until I was below the window.
Hoffman was walking our way, the strap of a slightly bulging messenger bag slung over one shoulder.
“Fudge muffins?” Wyatt echoed with obvious amusement.
“Hide your face!”
Hoffman had met Wyatt only the one time, but Wyatt’s face wasn’t easy to forget. Not for me, anyway.
Wyatt turned his head slightly to the side and looked down at his phone, as if engrossed in whatever was on the screen.
“I’m trying to train myself not to swear in front of Livy,” I explained in a whisper. “Fudge muffins might not have as much impact as an F-bomb, but it’ll have to do.”
“It has impact,” Wyatt countered, not doing a very good job of fighting the grin that was trying to appear on his face. “Maybe just not of the same variety.”
“Is he gone?” I whispered, ignoring his teasing. And the effect his grin had on my stomach.
Wyatt flicked his gaze toward the passenger-side window. “Nope. He slowed down. I think he likes my car.”
I groaned. “I was afraid of that.”
My left leg threatened to cramp as I waited for Hoffman to peer in the window and catch me hiding in the footwell. That would have been so on-brand for my life at the moment.
Instead, something actually went right for a change.
“He’s gone,” Wyatt said.
I wriggled my way back onto the passenger seat and twisted around until I spotted Hoffman disappearing around the corner.
“Let’s go,” I said.
I had the presence of mind to grab the box of Milk Duds and shove it in my hoodie pocket before scrambling out of the car.
Wyatt and I jogged to the end of the street and peered around the brick building on the corner. Hoffman was still in sight. We followed him at a brisk walk, me with the hood of my sweatshirt pulled up. An unnecessary precaution, as it turned out, because Hoffman never looked back.
We followed him to the nearest subway station and hung back while he waited on the platform. I noticed that he had wireless earbuds in his ears, probably playing music. Hopefully that made him less likely to realize we were tailing him.
“How many bottles of booze do you think he could have in that bag?” I asked.
“One or two.”
The train pulled into the station, and Wyatt and I hurried through the crowd of bodies to board the same car as Hoffman, but through a different door.
I had a panicky moment when he turned my way, but I managed to put my back to him.
Wyatt assured me seconds later that Hoffman remained oblivious to our presence.
We nearly lost him when he changed trains a while later, but we managed to get him back in our sights.
Wyatt and I didn’t want to draw attention to ourselves, so we mostly stayed quiet.
Boredom set in quickly, and the trip seemed to stretch on forever, but Hoffman finally left the train in the Sunset Park area of Brooklyn and hoofed it toward the waterfront.
“Any idea why he’d be in this area?” Wyatt asked as we followed at a safe distance behind Hoffman’s loping form.
“Not a clue.”
As we drew closer to the waterfront, the area changed from a mix of residential and commercial to mainly industrial, with warehouses on both sides of the street.
Aside from parked cars and some slightly recessed doorways, we didn’t have much cover.
Fortunately, Hoffman kept up his trend of not looking back.
We passed a warehouse-turned-gym, which triggered flashbacks to my time at Ultimate Beast. I suppressed a shudder and kept walking, ready to dart behind a parked car at any moment if our target glanced back.
When Hoffman stopped, my heart took a leap, and I crouched down behind a dark sedan. Wyatt stepped into a recessed doorway. I peeked around the car to see Hoffman open the door to a brick warehouse and disappear inside.
I straightened up, and Wyatt and I approached the building. I swept the hood of my sweatshirt off my head on the way.
“What the heck is he doing here?” I wondered.
I scrutinized the building. It had a brick exterior, with graffiti-splattered, corrugated metal doors over the loading bays and bars over the second-story windows.
The only windows. So much for peeking inside to see what Hoffman was up to.
Nothing on the outside of the building gave any clue as to what might be going on inside.
“Is there an alley?” I asked, wondering if there might be lower windows around back.
Wyatt pulled out his phone and typed the building’s address into a map app.
“No alley,” he said as he zoomed in on a satellite map. “And all the entrances are out here in the front.”
“Great.” I crossed my arms and sized up the distance from the ground to the high windows.
Was I ready to channel Spider-Man?