Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 114820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 574(@200wpm)___ 459(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 574(@200wpm)___ 459(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
She took her hand from the desk, put it in her lap, and straightened her shoulders.
“This business has been in my family for six generations. I grew up learning how to compartmentalize while fostering. My family is my family, Agent Lazarus, and my business is my business.”
“Understandable,” he murmured, holding her eyes.
She didn’t need his validation, she didn’t say that, not audibly, but he got it.
“Do you think she would do something ill-advised if she had money issues?” he asked.
“I haven’t come right out and said it, though I’ve implied it, but I’ll be clear. Brittanie was the master of doing things that were ill-advised. So yes.”
“But she didn’t tell you of anything that might cause you concern.”
She shook her head. “Keyleigh might know something, but I doubt it. Britt was getting old enough to know better. She’d almost lost her job with me, twice. Keyleigh, who’s older than Britt and would definitely cast herself as Britt’s older sister, could get impatient with her too. I’m sure you can guess why, but she’ll also tell you. So if she was up to something she shouldn’t be, I’m not sure she’d confide that in anyone. Though, Keyleigh can speak to that better than me.”
“I’ll need to talk with Keyleigh right away.”
“I can arrange for that while you’re reading Britt’s file.”
“I’d appreciate it.”
She nodded.
“Was Brittanie seeing someone?”
She shook her head again. “She hadn’t been serious about anyone since Jace. And losing Jace was a blow. She suffered for that. But she was a dancer at Bon Amie. If she wanted attention, she could find it. And she liked attention.”
Now they were into something sticky because they were talking patrons.
“Would you have names of those who paid Brittanie attention?”
She leaned forward, put her elbow on her desk and flicked out her hand, palm up.
“Hand me the top file. I’ll write them down. At least the ones I know.”
Again, unexpected.
He handed her the file.
She took it, put it in front of her, then opened the middle drawer of her desk.
She pulled out an iPhone and a gold pen he knew was Cartier, because he’d bought one like it for his wife for their fifteenth wedding anniversary.
She didn’t open the folder and start writing, though.
She remarked, “Polly told me she’d been killed. She didn’t get into specifics.”
Before she could continue, Rus spoke. He did it low and with feeling because he couldn’t talk to her about this, but he didn’t want to rebuff her unduly.
“I’m sorry, Lucinda, I can’t share much about the case.”
“Can you at least tell me she didn’t suffer?”
He couldn’t so he didn’t say anything.
And that was when it happened.
When Lucinda Bonner stopped being the most fuckable woman he’d laid eyes on, including his wife, but only because she hadn’t been a woman when he met her, since they met at fifteen.
It was also when Lucinda stopped being a woman he’d consider proposing a friends with benefits arrangement to, because he wouldn’t mind long weekends in the Pacific Northwest. Not simply because it was gorgeous out here, mostly because she was gorgeous so he’d be spending that time with her.
Instead, she became the first woman since his ex-wife that he wanted to know everything about. What she looked like when she smiled. What she sounded like when she laughed. Both when she orgasmed. And everything else he could learn about a sixth-generation woman who turned catering to the base needs of a man into a living that involved her wearing eight-hundred-dollar shoes and using Cartier pens.
This happened when tears shimmered in her eyes momentarily, before she sniffed, set her pen aside, picked up her phone, touched the screen and put it to her ear.
She said into it, “Call Keyleigh. Tell her I need her up here immediately.”
With that, she put her phone down, picked up the pen, opened the folder, flipped the top page to its back and started writing a list of names.
But even if Rus knew he was in trouble when it came to Lucinda, he also knew that she’d lied.
He was sure she could compartmentalize like a pro.
But Brittanie Iverson meant something to her.
And that didn’t stay within these walls.
FIVE
Give a Shit
Rus asked Lucinda to remain in the room when he spoke with Keyleigh, and she’d agreed.
She’d also gone somewhere and returned with a box of Kleenex, which had been a good call.
Keyleigh wasn’t as beautiful as Brittanie had been, nor was she stunning, like Lucinda, but she was pretty.
She was also a mess.
So much so, he was worried he wasn’t going to get anything from her because she couldn’t talk through her sobs.
It was interesting, however, to watch Lucinda sit on her side of the desk, removed from the emotional woman sitting next to Rus, and yet exuding warmth and understanding even in silence.
“I-I’m sorry, Ms. Bonner,” Keyleigh stammered to her boss. Another something that was interesting, the formal address to a woman who couldn’t be much more than seven years older than Keyleigh.