Dangerously Dark, page 25
“Who was driving the MINI cooper?” Danny asked.
Carissa looked irritated. “Who knows? Not me, if that’s what you’re wondering.” She exhaled, exasperated. “Maybe after I set up shop in L.A., I’ll be able to afford one of those, though.”
Danny nodded. “L.A., huh? That’s my neck of the woods.”
Like flipping a switch, he turned on the charm.
Carissa noticed. “Really?” She played with her long auburn hair, batting her eyelashes behind her glasses. “What part?”
He told her. “If you can drag yourself away from your new police officer friend, you should look me up sometime.”
I stood by, befuddled. Why was Danny flirting? Why now?
Don’t get me wrong—it was something to see. Even as a bystander, I felt kind of tingly. But I didn’t get his strategy.
“I just might do that,” Carissa cooed, examining my bodyguard’s muscles and imposing presence with new appreciation. “I’m going to be in Santa Monica. On the Third Street Promenade. I found an investor to help me expand Churn PDX to California.”
“That’s a nice neighborhood to start in,” Danny remarked.
I could have sworn he was ogling Carissa’s legs. Whatever happened to his fling with Lauren? Geez, he was fickle.
It was a good thing I’d never gotten seriously involved with him. You know, in a romantic sense.
“I know. I’m pretty psyched,” Carissa said. “I had my pick of suitors, thanks to all the groundwork Declan did—thanks to him bringing everyone here. He had a lot of access through his Prodigy Group peeps. God knows, I wasn’t going out for drinks with him and all those Seattle dude-bros for no reason.”
Danny nodded. “You had a strategy.”
“Of course. I’m the kind of girl who looks out for number one. I wasn’t crazy about Declan.” She laughed, giving Danny a flirtatious stroke on his bulging biceps. “I wasn’t all mushy about him, I mean. Sorry, Hay,” Carissa added in an aside to me. “I know how much you were into all the engagement party stuff, but I’m just as happy it never happened. All I wanted from Declan was his business contacts. He didn’t know how good they were when he threw them over. I did. But I wasn’t going to let him make it look as if I was being cheated on. I mean, as if.”
With an awful sense of disillusionment, I understood. Carissa wasn’t the friend I remembered from college. She was a lot more grasping and a lot more ruthless. But she wasn’t a killer. At least I’d been right about that much. Yay?
I couldn’t help turning over what Carissa had said, though. Prodigy Group. That sounded familiar. I couldn’t remember why.
The come-and-get-me eyes Danny was giving her didn’t help.
“Declan didn’t know how to handle you,” he said.
“You’ve got that right.” Carissa smiled at him. “I bet you do, though. I bet you’re resourceful in all the right places.”
“At all the right times,” Danny confirmed in a husky tone.
I was starting to feel queasy. I had to get out of there.
“You’re gritty. Real,” Carissa was telling Danny when I tuned back into their flirtathon. “I could use a little of that, after Declan. He was basically a glorified salesman. All the men in Portland are so . . .” She sighed, searching for an apt description. “Tame. Sure, they’ve got their beards and their boots, their flannel shirts and their growlers full of craft beer, but they’re all so sensitive. Or geeky. Austin couldn’t get through a single sentence without talking about some idiotic video game. He dressed up like comic book heroes! What a dork.”
Her tone of derision was hurtful. I clicked off my app’s recording function, then held up my phone. “I’ve got to get this.”
As I’d intended, Carissa assumed I had to answer a call. Most phones these days had a silent-ring function. Mine probably did, too. I wasn’t sure. I almost always used it for texting.
Carissa waved me off. I slipped downstairs, said good-bye to Mr. and Mrs. Jenkins, then stepped into the cool nighttime.
I looked at my phone, debating. Then I started texting.
I know what you’re thinking—that I was texting Travis a cheeky what are you wearing right now? to cheer myself up.
Under ordinary circumstances, you might have been right. But these weren’t ordinary circumstances. Things had changed.
I was technically unemployed now, for starters. I hadn’t expected Carissa to pay me for conducting Declan’s Chocolate After Dark culinary tours, but they had occupied a space on my calendar—a space that Travis would want to fill with something income producing and industrious. Just then, I wasn’t up for it.
Hey, I’m leaving town soon, I typed out. Still wanna meet?
I deliberated for a minute, then glanced up at Carissa’s lighted bedroom window. I could see her and Danny laughing.
My sometime bodyguard really knew how to pick ‘em.
I chose one of my contacts. A second later, my text whooshed through the Internet to Tomasz Berk. Our date was on.
At least it was, if I was half as lucky as Danny was. Seriously—two women, both hot to trot for him in the space of a week? He has his share of reckless appeal, but . . . wow.
Then I sent Danny a text and made him come out. Enough was enough. I wasn’t in the mood to play wingman. Not tonight.
There was nothing but stony silence on the way back to our shared house. I was preoccupied; Danny seemed to be, too. In our defense, it had been quite a day. I didn’t have any claim on Danny; that’s not how our relationship worked. But I was still creeped out by the way he’d flirted with Carissa, after everything she’d said. I figured he’d done it out of boredom. Or perversity. Or maybe a desire to feel wanted, after having (maybe) been two-timed by Lauren with Mr. Cart Pod.
Danny was only human, I reminded myself. Neither of us was perfect. Both of us were given to retreating when upset. I was upset, too. I couldn’t deny it—not to myself. I wanted to believe Danny was a better man than he’d seemed to be tonight.
I also wanted to believe I wouldn’t let my own personal dramas trump the nightmare of what had happened to Declan and, to a lesser degree, to Janel. But I was doing exactly that as I drove toward my foursquare for the night.
I suppose I should have felt sorry for Janel, after what she’d been through. I knew she might not make it. But she’d killed Declan. As much as I try to have faith in my fellow human beings, Janel had stepped over the line. Even my line. I might strive to think the best of people, but I’m no pushover.
My silence with Danny proved it. He knew it, too.
Traffic was light, so the trip was quick. We were arching across Portland’s iconic Fremont Bridge, high above the city lights and the Willamette River, before Danny said anything.
“Just come out with it,” he commanded. “What’s wrong?”
I’m no pushover, but Danny can be a real bulldozer.
I kept driving, pretending a rapt interest in the steel bridge’s tied-arch design. We were zooming along the lower of its two decks as we headed back home. “Nothing,” I said.
My security expert laughed. “You’re a terrible liar.”
“In my world, that’s a good quality.” I shifted him a sideways glance as I changed lanes. “So, got a date now?”
He grunted. “That wasn’t what that was about.”
I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. That was a tactic,” Danny informed me. “You were running out of steam with Carissa—probably because you were horrified by how cold-blooded she was—so I picked up the slack. That’s how we work. As a team. I’m better at gruesome stuff.”
“I’m better at gruesome stuff,” I rebutted automatically.
He didn’t argue. There. I’d just successfully lied. Take that, Jamieson.I sped off the bridge toward home.
Then, “How did you know to use that tactic on her?”
Danny’s sardonic face turned to mine. “Being friendly?”
“Making love to her with your eyes.” I turned. “Yeah.”
“‘Making love’? Ew.” He guffawed, giving me a look. “What are you, a walking self-help book? Who says stuff like that?”
I ignored that. He was trying to sidetrack me. “Well?”
Danny shrugged. “I wanted to make sure Carissa stayed in touch with me. In case you’re wrong, and we find out later that Janel wasn’t the one who murdered Declan.”
We still hadn’t heard how Janel was doing. She might still get out of the hospital. But not before we turned her in.
“Janel murdered Declan,” I assured him. “Everything Carissa told us verifies it. Carissa might still flee, you know. If she does become a fugitive, why would she even contact you? How?”
“You know why.” Danny waggled his eyebrows provocatively. “As for the how . . . Outlaw Meetup,” he deadpanned. “You know, like Match.com or OkCupid. We all use it. Crooks have needs, too.”
“You’re not a crook anymore,” I reminded him.
My security expert went silent. That worried me.
Then, “It’s not a real dating site. You know that, right?”
No. “Of course.” I waved blithely. “I knew the whole time. Just like I knew you weren’t really interested in Carissa.”
“Oh, I’m really interested in Carissa.”
I gulped. Was I supposed to support this? I wanted to always be there for Danny, but—
Danny’s laughter cut me off in mid deliberation. “See?” he told me assuredly. “You’re too nice to track down killers. You should put away your gumshoe sign before it gets tarnished.”
“I’m trying to, believe me.” I felt better having talked to him. I don’t like being on the outs with Danny. “If people would just stop dropping dead wherever I go, I’d have a shot at it.”
“You’ve got to try harder,” Danny urged. “Pretend those dead bodies are me, and you’re giving me the silent treatment.”
“Har, har.” Anyway, it was beyond unlikely that I’d encounter a third murder victim. I didn’t need advice on how to handle something that wasn’t ever going to happen. “I think I’ll call Travis and tell him you’ve finally gotten through to me.”
“You do that,” Danny suggested brashly. “I like the idea of Harvard knowing I’m the one who finally got you to quit.”
Quit. He’d had to use that word, hadn’t he?
I wondered if they’d had a bet going, Travis and Danny.
Well, I was quitting. For tonight, at least. I’d lined up the suspects and knocked them down, leaving us with Janel safely secured in Providence Portland, where she couldn’t hurt anyone else, and all the rest of the Cartoramians accounted for.
“You’d better watch it,” I warned Danny. “I’ll go stirring up some trouble, just to keep things interesting. I promise.”
He shot me a concerned look. Then his dark, rough-around-the-edges features softened. Knowingly. “You mean you’ll flirt with someone, too, just to bug me. Yeah. Good luck with that.”
How did he keep doing that? Reading my mind that way?
“Wouldn’t you like to know what kind of trouble I’m headed for?” I tried to sound mysterious. “It could be anything.”
“It’s flirting. I know it is.” Danny studied me with disconcerting thoroughness—almost as if he hadn’t known me forever. “Just don’t do that thing you do with your teeth.”
“What, you mean smile?”
“That’s the one.” He gazed out the car’s window. “Don’t do that one, or the poor sucker won’t stand a chance.”
I smiled. It was nicer when Danny’s charm was aimed at me.
Then I drove us into our cozy neighborhood, past the rows of Eisenhower houses, all the way to our temporary home.
Sixteen
“You’re not going to believe this,” I told Danny the next morning. We’d both gotten up (relatively) early to hit up one of my favorite Stumptown coffee shops. It was misty outside, but we were warm and dry inside with a quad Americano (Danny) and a cappuccino (me), plus a trio of pastries. I hadn’t been able to choose just one; my sometime bodyguard had urged me to throw caution to the wind. I knew there was a reason I liked him.
“Try me.” With uncharacteristic lightness, Danny glanced at my laptop screen, where I’d been tying up loose ends relating to Portland and the Chocolate After Dark tour. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have thought he was relieved that I’d survived our latest deadly adventure. But Danny never worried. “What’s up?”
I nodded at the digital dossier Travis had sent me—before he’d known that we’d already pinpointed Janel for Declan’s murder. I’d been idly going through it. It wasn’t unthinkable for Travis to decide to quiz me later on its contents. He was pedantic that way. He’d dotted every i and crossed every t; he was particular. The dossier had an index, for Pete’s sake.
Travis had clearly done a lot of work on my behalf. I didn’t want to be unappreciative, so I’d been reading.
Okay, and I was curious. Pruriently curious. Travis had dug up skeletons that even the Cartoramians had forgotten they’d buried. His dossier made entertaining reading—especially when combined with a flaky marionberry hand pie and/or buttery maple twist and/or scrumptious almond croissant. Or all three of them.
I know, they’re not chocolate. So shoot me. Sometimes even I need a break from my dark and delicious specialty.
“Tomasz isn’t your everyday sensitive and penniless bartender, after all,” I told Danny, still reading. “He’s—”
“Secretly a poet? A champion whittler? A cobbler?”
I smiled at my security expert’s attempt at shoe-related humor. “He’s a trust-fund kid from a superwealthy family in New York City.” I kept reading, scanning faster now. “He’s worth . . .” I paused, trying to tamp down my surprise. “He’s worth millions.”
“I knew it. Berk is your dream man, after all.”
I wouldn’t have gone that far. Especially since I knew Danny had an ax to grind against the affluent. But I couldn’t resist teasing him. “Tomasz might measure up, I guess, but you never know. After all, I have some pretty big dreams.”
“Ha. Don’t make me crack a dick joke here. I’ll do it.”
I laughed, unfazed by Danny’s ribald sense of humor. I was used to it. I sometimes indulged, too. Don’t tell my clients.
“Tomasz did a really good job of hiding his wealth,” I mused. I didn’t know what to make of this new information. After all, usually I was the one downplaying my fortune. I’d never met anyone else who was interested in discretion when it came to throwing around the cash. “I really thought he was broke.”
“He obviously wanted you to think he was broke.”
“Me and everyone else. I never suspected a thing.”
Wait. I had to take that back. I had suspected something was up with Tomasz’s very fine Arnys suit—the one he’d worn to Declan’s funeral. I’d obviously noticed his nice brogues, too.
“And that doesn’t seem shady to you?” Danny asked.
I stopped pondering Tomasz’s wardrobe and took a bite of my maple twist. Yum.I shook my head. “No, why would it?”
“Because he was deliberately keeping it a secret.”
“You’re just bugged because you didn’t guess, either.” I scanned Travis’s digital dossier, reading the details. “Tomasz inherited his money.” Just like me. “He’s used to having it.”
“What a problem.” Danny’s expression soured.
I gave him a cheer-up shoulder bump. “An inheritance has its share of problems,” I reminded him. “For instance, sometimes I wonder if people want to hang out with me because they like me or because I can foot the bill for whatever we’re doing.”
“Hey, I paid for breakfast.” His face grew darker.
I smiled. “Plus, having to report my whereabouts to Travis is no cakewalk. Do you think I like having a financial leash?”
It was ironic. For me, the main benefit of having access to all of Uncle Ross’s cash was freedom—freedom that felt a tiny bit curtailed every time I had to check in with my sexy keeper.
“You could have turned down the money,” Danny pointed out.
“What am I, crazy?” I laughed, hoping to ease the tension between us. I kept the details of my financial situation pretty well veiled. Danny knew the bare minimum—such as, I could afford to gallivant around the world . . . luxuriously, if I wanted to. I could afford to fly us both to exotic locations on a whim, then pay for everything once we were there. I could keep myself in Converse and crossbody bags for a very long time. Let’s just say I’m comfortable and leave it at that. “Then I’d have to work harder—maybe even take on more clients. Ugh. Who wants that?”
The funny thing was, most of the time, Danny and Travis were more interested in growing my chocolate-whispering business than I was. I’m not lazy. It’s just that I’m more attracted to the challenges of a particular consulting job than its lucrativeness—or its ability to net me a bigger fish down the road.
I’d stumbled onto chocolate whispering. Serendipitously. I liked it. I didn’t want it to become work in the usual sense.
“You’d have to turn in your reports on time. Impossible.” Danny shook his head, playing along. “You’re right. It’s better to be filthy rich.” He finished his half of our (lip-smacking) almond croissant. “So, why is Tomasz hiding all his money?”
“Probably for the same reasons I hide mine,” I guessed.
It was interesting that we had something else in common.
“You bend over backward to hide your moola because you’re being nice to me.” Danny watched the baristas. “I’m not that sensitive, you know. I can handle your undeserved windfall.”
Right. The fact that he’d called it “undeserved” was a big tip-off. I was edging onto thin ice. My financial situation was a touchy subject between Danny and me. Usually, I avoided talking about it. I’d already put us on uncomfortable footing last night with my unanticipated reaction to Danny’s faux flirting with Carissa. From here on, I just wanted harmony.
