Page 41 of Murder Notes

“Got it. What else?”

In any other case, I’d tell him to include local law enforcement in his checks, but considering they are my family, I move the fuck on. “I have a meeting tonight. Text me if you get anything, and I’ll call you back when I can.” And because I’m really damn tired of being hung up on, I end the call before he can, setting my phone on the desk.

I punch a few keys on my MacBook, scanning the camera feed, wishing like hell I’d been smart enough to have had this in place before now because there simply is no guarantee Junior will show back up here. He, or she, could stick to public places or just go away altogether. It’s then that a thought hits me and I straighten. Kane has cameras all over his properties. I grab my phone to dial Jeff again, fully intending to have him hack Kane’s corporate security system, but stop myself. Junior knows my secret. I can’t risk exposing that to the FBI. I also can’t risk leaving Junior as an unknown, and there is no guarantee that he’ll return here. I consider my options and I have only one.

I dial Kane and I’m not even a little surprised when he picks up on the first ring. Nor am I surprised that his “Agent Love,” hints at a gloat, as if my call is a victory.

“I’m going to need the security footage from your house and your corporate office for the past twenty-four hours.”

“Samantha didn’t back up my alibi,” he concludes.

“No, she did not, and as long as you’re a suspect, my role here is compromised.”

“I thought you wanted to leave.”

“I prefer to do things on my terms, not everyone else’s.”

He gives a low chuckle. “Indeed. Though I did find you to be amenable after some convincing. What happens when your brother sees the footage?”

“I told you. I’ll deal with my brother.”

“How do you know Samantha came here to my home?”

Because everything is on his terms and on his territory. “Did she?”

“Yes, which leads to the question, why ask for the office footage?”

“I believe in covering all bases. Now can I—”

“Yes, Agent Love. You can. I won’t have the office footage until tomorrow. I can bring you a partial disc tonight.”

“No. I have someplace to be. I’ll call you tomorrow morning.”

I hang up before he can. Tomorrow morning, I’ll have my first look at Junior in some way, shape, or form. The problem is, so will Kane. Because there is no way he’s going to hand me that footage and not know exactly what’s on it.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

I intend to be early to dinner, but good ol’ Tic Tac is on the ball and sends me a computer-generated list of hundreds of people that have connections in LA, New York, and East Hampton Village to look over while he’s cross-checking Woods and his client list. And since I learned a long time ago that people can surprise you, I never wipe anyone, no matter how seemingly innocent, off a list of possibilities. Instead, I start highlighting names of people I know and researching those I do not. Looking for anyone who strikes some kind of nerve. I intend for it to be a fast process, but it turns out that’s just not possible, and I lose track of time. When I finally check the clock, I curse when I realize it’s nearly seven. Grabbing my purse, I make a fast track to the closet to pull on my Chanel trench coat and head for the door.

Fifteen minutes later, I pull up to my old family home and punch in a code at the gate. Entering the grounds, I drive a path hugged by bushes on one side and low-lying trees on the other. It’s not a short path, but soon I bring the sprawling white mansion into view, its giant porch running the length of a place where memories were born for me. It was there that I read with my mother as a child. There that I fought with her as a teen. There that I kissed my first boy, thinking my father wouldn’t know, only to end up grounded for eternity, it had seemed. But I’d still kissed that boy again.

Pulling around to the side of the house, I park under a willow tree, not too far from a Jaguar XK120 Alloy Roadster that is an easy cool half a million, if I know my cars, and I do. I’d have that puppy in the garage, but then I’m not looking for attention. Whoever bought that car and left it in plain sight is. A thought that leads me back to the assassin I’m hunting. He got in and got out. He wasn’t looking for attention, and he was smart enough not to get it. He’s a pro. These weren’t his first kills. Kevin Woods, and his bad-ending encounter with his cougar’s husband, says sloppy and inexperienced to me. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t killed someone. It just reiterates my thoughts that he’s not my man. Tonight I plan to find out why he’s Eddie’s.

Rounding the corner toward the front yard, my fingers trail along the ivy my mother had planted to climb this side of the house. Her memory is alive and well in this place. Reaching the stone steps, I climb a dozen up to the wide porch, where two heavy wooden rocking chairs frame the entrance, left and right. More memories threaten to turn me mushy, proving that I might have a human side, and I frankly don’t like it. That’s exactly why I walk right past those damn chairs and straight for the door, at the same moment that it abruptly swings open.

A thin, tall man in his fifties with salt-and-pepper hair appears in the doorway, an air of arrogance and authority to him, which he wears like a second skin. And while I don’t know him personally, I just know of him, my instant inclination is still to hate him in a really big way—a reaction I actually hand out more infrequently than some might believe.

“Lilah,” he greets me, as amicable as I’ve heard him to be, in that snake-in-the-Garden-of-Eden kind of way. “Nice to finally meet you.” He offers me his hand, and the irony of the cross on the expensive black ring his pinky is sporting doesn’t escape me. “I’m Ted.”

“Pocher,” I supply, my hands sliding inside my coat pockets in rejection of fake niceties. “The head of Pocher Industries,” I add. “The billionaire CEO of the world’s fifth-largest privately held conglomerate, with diverse interests that include oil and politics.”

“Of course you know who I am,” he says, pushing the hemline of his expensive blue suit jacket back to shove his hands in his own pants pockets. “Kane Mendez and I have had some business dealings. And, of course, I know from your father that you two are close.”

“And I know that you and Kane are not,” I say, letting him know that I know his business as well as he does mine, and knowing that power fights power, also keeping Kane in my corner.

“Kane dove into oil after his father’s death,” he said. “I admired the direction he was taking the family business and saw a good partnership to be had. He did not.”

Because Kane didn’t like the bastard. “And you didn’t like that, I hear.”