Holy shit! The names of those dead men Nash gave me the other day to look up their relatives… Were those cash payments some sort of restitution from him for killing their loved ones? I just can’t believe he would do such a thing – the man who has been heartbroken over his wife divorcing him and mourning their deaths. Unless…was Nash depressed and feeling guilty because of the killings, and his ex-wife was just the cherry on his fucked-up cake?
“That’s right, six homicides,” the officer explains. Pulling out a notepad and pen, he asks, “When was the last you saw your neighbor, miss?”
“Saw him? Well, I couldn’t tell you that,” I lie. Even though my neighbor, the man I’ve been crushing on, cooking and cleaning for these past weeks before kissing this morning could be a killer, for some reason, I can’t yet betray him; nor do I want to actually admit that we’re friends. Are we still friends? Does the fact that I’m not afraid of him mean I’m certifiably insane? Very likely. “Um, like I told you, officer, I just hear whenever he’s moving around up there, you know? I think I heard his door shut and bike crank up from the parking lot an hour or so ago.”
He dutifully jots down my lie.
“Have you noticed any strange behavior from him?” the officer asks.
“No.”
Thankfully, his questioning ends there when one of the men busts through Nash’s apartment door with a swift kick that splits the wood, making me wince. Putting away his notepad, the officer pulls out a business card with his name and information all in gold and offers it to me. “Here’s my card with my cell phone number on it in case you think of anything or if you see him around here. He’s a dangerous man, so do not under any circumstances initiate contact. Just call me right away.”
“S-sure. Absolutely,” I agree with a nod when I take the card. “Homicide. That’s just…that’s crazy.”
“Take care of yourself and lock up,” he replies before he jogs back up the stairs to go into the apartment with the other three, all of their guns raised just in case they find Nash inside.
Jesus, Nash! What is going on?
Rather than call Malcolm right away since he obviously knew something was up when Nash had to leave earlier, I phone Jetta.
“Hello?” she answers calmly, which means she probably hasn’t heard that one of her boyfriend’s buddies is fucked.
“Jetta, hi, it’s Lucy.”
“Lucy! How’s your hair doing? Do you still like it, or are you calling to ask for a redo?”
“No, no, my hair is great,” I answer before lowering my voice. “But, um, I think Nash is in trouble.”
“What do you mean in trouble? Is he depressed again?”
“The depression seems…better, but right now, there are four sheriff deputies upstairs with a warrant to search his apartment. They said he’s a suspect…for six homicides!”
“Oh my god!” Jetta exclaims. “Is Nash home?”
“No, he’s not right now. He left a little while ago…”
“Shit! I need to call Dev and let him know so he can warn Nash!”
“I have a feeling Nash may already know by now,” I whisper. “He got a call from Malcolm a few minutes ago, something urgent because he left here in a hurry.” In the middle of what was almost us getting naked together, I withhold. Talk about bad timing. If Malcolm hadn’t called, we would have probably been doing it in the kitchen when the sheriffs showed up.
“Crap!” Jetta says, and then I hear her sniffles. “This is all…it’s all my fault!”
“What? Your fault?” I say in surprise. She doesn’t look like the type of person to harm a hair on anyone’s head, other than for a trim.
“It’s…a long story. Please, please don’t think bad of Nash! Anything he did, it was to help me out of a shitty situation that my brother got me into. Trust me!”
“I do,” I say without hesitation, knowing in my gut that Nash isn’t just some sort of stone-cold killer. He’s loyal and protective of the people he cares about, even me who he hardly knows. If he was heartless, he wouldn’t have been so depressed about what he did. “I’m starting to get to know Nash pretty well, and I don’t think he’s capable of going around hurting people without a damn good reason.”
“You’re right. He’s not. But…things happened a few weeks ago…and now they’re coming back to bite him in the ass and possibly…all of the guys,” she says through sniffles. “I’m sorry to cut you off, Lucy, but I need to call Dev and warn him in case they’re coming after him too!”
“Okay, sure,” I tell her. “It’s going to be okay,” I say to try and assure her since she sounds upset.
“I don’t know about that,” Jetta replies. “I’ll call you if I find out anything else.”
“Thanks,” I say, biting down on my bottom lip and hating that I’m about to leave when serious shit is going down here. “I have to head out of town for my cousin’s wedding soon, but I’ll have my phone near me the entire weekend if there’s anything I can do to help!”
“I really appreciate that, Lucy,” she says. “Thanks for the heads-up.”
“Of course,” I say before we end the call.
I need to pack up and hit the road, but it’s impossible to think or move with my heart racing, worried about Nash as a herd of footsteps move around above my head, searching Nash’s things, trying to find evidence to prove he’s a murderer.
Chapter Fifteen
Nash
* * *
“What the hell is going on?” I ask Malcolm when he finally strolls up on the pier thirty minutes after Dev, Wirth, Fiasco, Silas and I arrived.
“Sorry it took so long. I had to make sure there were no bugs or trackers on my bike or phone.”
“Bugs?” Fiasco asks.
“The ones police use as fucking listening devices,” Malcolm mutters. “Right before I reached out to you all I got a call from Daisy in the clerk’s office, criminal division. We hooked up on the regular back before Naomi and I got together; and, thankfully, she’s still loyal. She wanted to give me a heads up that she had just seen some warrants come across her desk with Nash’s name on them.”
“I fucking knew it!” I mutter. I’ve had a bad feeling for weeks. Not just the guilt, but the paranoia that eventually we would get caught and thrown in prison for life. This is another reason why I held back with Lucy. “Let me guess – murder?”
“They’re only search warrants right now. But apparently, you’ve been named as a suspect. They want you to come in for questioning,” Malcolm says, making everyone curse.
“Just Nash?” Dev asks in surprise, his face paling. “Not all of us?”
“Just Nash for now.”
“Maybe they want to try and set him up to rat,” Wirth grumbles.
“That will never fucking happen,” I assure them.
“We know that, dickhead,” Malcolm replies with a shake of his head. “Anyway, as soon as I called you all, I reached out to Jay Hughes, the criminal attorney we keep on retainer. He says he needs a few days to find out what the district attorney has on you as far as evidence, how strong the case is and all that shit before you go in to answer their questions. He doesn’t think he’ll get anywhere until Monday or Tuesday. He was able to confirm that the sheriff does have a warrant to search your apartment and vehicles, but no one else’s yet.”