“Or that he’s in a car.”
Kace sends the nurse’s information to Frank. “Let’s head home and see if we can go find something we missed in the crime scene photos. Or maybe we can do dinner? It’s almost five.”
That’s completely random but my stomach’s not one to silence its protests. “Dinner sounds good. Bag of chips and coffee wasn’t much of a lunch.”
Kace stores his phone in his pocket. “I remember the days where that’s about all you ate for lunch. You never wanted to leave the precinct.”
I wasn’t a victim then. “That was two years ago.”
“I still remember the first day we met.” He leads me toward the car, where he opens the door for me. “Cap brought Frank and me into his office and a couple guys from The Tank, then he took me aside and told me to lie about my family. I had no idea what he was talking about, but I followed orders, and you picked me right out.” Kace’s goofy grin floods me with memories. “That was the first time I ever lied to you.”
The same feelings, as the ones from our first encounter, return and mix with the longing accrued within the past week.
That day, the second I had walked in through the door of Cap’s office, my eyes zoned in on Kace. He held my gaze, clearly stating his intent. He didn’t have to say much, but the way his eyes narrowed and curved upward at the ends, and how he shifted in his chair to take up more space and be the alpha in the room, gave it all away.
I had to pry my eyes off him to gauge the others in the room. Every chance they could, my pupils landed on him. I had never been so attracted to someone in my life, but I had a job to do. Cap told me my job position would be a bit unconventional, and he wanted me to do a small demonstration to get the detectives on board.
Desire aside, I greeted each of them and established a basal line—things they seemed to do naturally—and then I started my questioning. Not only did I find out when Kace lied, but his partner also lied based on him, and one of the two guys followed his lead.
“You lie and get everyone else covering for you.”
“I’m magic like that.” He closes the door and comes around to the other side.
I clutch the seat belt like it’s some kind of barrier capable of protecting my heart from him. “You have a tell when you lie. Like this.” I mimic the expression. He inconspicuously pinches the inside of his bottom lip in his teeth. It’s quick and usually camouflaged by some movement around his mouth.
He swivels his upper body toward me. “I don’t see anything.”
I repeat it and hide it with a smile.
“The smile?” Of course, he’d pick that out. He’s been extremely in tune with my lip movements this week.
“No.” I point to my lips.
He leans closer and zooms in.
I repeat it again, but he doesn’t catch it. I swipe my hand over my face and become stoic. “Observe my mouth carefully.”
“Okay,” he grunts, catching me by surprise when he leans in closer.
“Watch the corners, more specifically, and the way my chin moves.” I repeat the tell three or four times.
His eyes land on mine. “If I keep looking at your lips, Elle, the only tell I’ll be concerned with is…” He cups my cheek in his hand, and his thumb softly slides over my bottom lip, parting my mouth a bit.
Breath escapes me before lips land on mine.
No resistance, because all of that fades away. Moving lips silence thoughts, and gravity—the invisible force pulling between our hearts—doesn’t care for resistance. With distance, the pull had weakened, but here, in the confines of his car with only inches between us, what had once pulled us closer to one another, yanks us even closer.
One of his arms curls around my waist and the other threads through my hair at the base of my head, cradling my neck as he drags me closer. Locked in each other’s orbit, words come undone.
I fall apart at his touch. The woman carved out of pain, collapses into the moment, longing to start over—to cling and try to be the perfect girl in his eyes.
But I’m so imperfect it’s considered damaged.
My lips tremble at the realization, and he steadies them between his before he releases them, ever-so-gently, and touches his forehead to mine.
He pauses and risks it. “Let me spell it out for you. Elle—Oh—Vee—E.”
I sniffle and chuckle at one of the first corniest things he’s ever told me, and grudgingly answer, the same way I always had: a roll of my eyes followed by, “Oh—Kay.”
He holds his breath and releases it in a long exhale. “You haven’t called me Kay in three months.”
My response is lost on his lips again, and even breathless, I can breathe again.
7
Coralee
Dr. Nolan Mills
The application on my phone is up, and I’m sitting in my car, watching the courier pick up my package at the third drop. The bellhop of the five-star hotel opens the door for the petite girl with pixie hair, eyeing her super short skirt suspiciously.
High-class escorts always take the five-star hotel gigs because they think it’s for sex, and this hotel, in particular, attracts girls in need of fast cash.
The courier’s instructions are to wait at the bar for someone wearing a pink tie. Orchestrating these relays is kind of fun, considering how easy it is. Most of the people who pick up these sketchier ads think it’s either drugs or prostitution, or something illegal, so they never open the package or try to take it. It’s dangerous to mess with the underworld of this city, but there is a profit to be made if people know where to look.
Four hundred dollars for wearing a pink tie and delivering the package to someone is worth it. Some of the couriers don’t even make that amount in a week. After the app takes its cut, they still get eighty percent. That’s good money. I’ve seen drug postings up to a couple thousand dollars, but they’re for deliveries or pickup in sketchy parts of the neighborhood, not all people are willing to take that much risk.
Plausible deniability would be put into jeopardy. Treading the border of dangerous and naïve seems to be the sweet spot for getting away with criminal activity.
This morning at the coffee shop, I used the bathroom and left a small package in the trash bin. According to the log hanging on the bathroom door, the janitor usually empties the trashes between eleven and eleven-thirty. I scheduled the pickup from the trash behind the coffee shop at noon.
For six hundred bucks, dumpster diving doesn’t sound so bad.
As told, the courier left the package on booth number three in the coffee shop and left. Another courier, Mr. Pink Tie, was to dress up nice, pick up the box, and deliver it to the hotel by precisely one o’clock.
At three minutes to, he shows up in a taxi. His black suit looks new, but it does the trick. The bellhop even smiles as he lets him in. Through the large mirrors in the restaurant area, I watch him weave between the tables, headed in the direction of the bar at the end. There, a girl with short pink hair waits with a drink in her hand, suspiciously eyeing the crowd.
Her face perks up when she spots him, and she elegantly slides off the stool to saunter over, swaying her hips in the process. Words are exchanged, as is the small pink package, which belongs to Coralee Mitchell, the rich woman whose daughter was murdered in this very hotel.