Damsel in Danger (Danger Incorporated Book 1) (9 page)

Jason looked down at the canine sleeping at his feet. “What do you say, Huck? Should we pop a movie in and see who falls asleep first? My guess it will be the dog.”

“I think you’re right. What movie should we watch?”

It didn’t matter. She’d taken her pill and would be asleep before long. Maybe he could sleep as well with her beside him and the noise of the television in the background.

“Pick anything out you like,” he offered, tucking a blanket around her as they settled on the couch. “I’ll even watch a chick flick.”

She rolled her eyes and chose
Weekend at Bernie’s
but the movie had barely begun before her head drooped onto his shoulder, fast asleep. Jason listened to her even breathing as her palm settled on his chest, right over his heart. Like it belonged there.

This woman had wormed her way past all the defenses he’d so carefully erected around him, knocking them over effortlessly. Jason didn’t know her well but already she was important to him. She meant something, although he had no clue exactly what. Or even if he was in any shape to find out.

But he liked her.

She made him laugh and she made him think.

When she touched him her fingers felt like flames licking the flesh and made it hard to breathe.

Lust or something else didn’t change the mission.

Keep Brinley Snow safe. And alive.

‡

B
rad Enright was
everything Roger Gaines wasn’t. Handsome, fit, tanned, charming, and successful. From the little Brinley knew of Roger it was difficult to imagine the two men being friends. They seemed to have nothing at all in common.

“How long did you know Roger?” Jason asked as they settled into Enright’s large and extravagant office. Dressed in an impeccably cut blue suit, expensively styled dark hair, and diamond cuff links, Brad was the epitome of the prosperous businessman. Their research had revealed that the dealership had been in the Enright family since the 1940s with Brad taking the helm a few years ago when his grandfather retired.

Showing off blindingly white teeth, Brad smiled as he unbuttoned his suit jacket and settled into the huge black leather chair. “Since kindergarten. The teacher put us in alphabetical order and there was no one in the class who started with ‘F’. The rest is history. Of course I haven’t seen much of Roger these last few years. I’ve been busy here.” Brad picked up a glass statuette from his desk and held it up proudly. “We’re the number one dealer in luxury automobiles in the state of Montana. Say, what do you drive? You know your vehicle says a lot about who you are. What statement do you want to make, Mr. Anderson?”

“I’ll have to give that some thought,” Jason answered smoothly when Brinley might have stomped on the man’s shiny black shoes. He seemed awfully happy despite losing a close childhood friend. “So you’ve known Roger since kindergarten but you haven’t spent much time together lately. When was the last time you saw him?”

Brad sat back and gazed off into the distance for a moment. “I guess it was about six months ago. My daughter had her second birthday and Roger came to the party.”

“Did you notice anything strange?” Brinley found herself asking, only to be on the receiving end of a quelling look from Jason.

Oops. I was supposed to be quiet.

“About Roger?” Brad chuckled and began to play with a couple of paper clips on the desk. “Roger has always been a little strange. Smart but strange. But I guess he was acting weirder than normal. He was pale like he hadn’t seen the sun in months. He didn’t bring a gift which I thought was kind of rude. Well, at least my wife Trudi thought it was but it didn’t surprise me all that much. But the strangest thing was all he could talk about was murder. The guy was obsessed. From what he said he hung around other people just like him. They talked about blood spatter and autopsies. My mother-in-law said she found him gruesome. The way he was that day? I can’t say I blame her.”

“Was he always like this?” Jason asked, leaning forward. “Had he always fixated on murder?”

“Hell, no,” Brad declared, shaking his head. “Roger was a normal kid. We built forts and played baseball. Ate popsicles and rode bikes. Nothing unusual. Shit, he lettered in three sports in high school. He dated the prom queen and was valedictorian of our graduating class.”

That didn’t sound like the slacker who lived in filth in his brother’s bonus room over the garage.

“When did Roger change?”

Shrugging his shoulders, Brad shifted in his chair. “I’m not sure. In college, I guess. He got more and more involved with life on the Internet. That’s where he met his latest girlfriend. He talked about her at the party.” Brad tapped his pen on the desk. “What was her name? Let’s see… Anita-something. Yes, Anita Hazlitt. He said she lived in a little town near here but I don’t remember what it was. She probably knows more about Roger these days than I do.”

Jason finished scribbling down the information. “So everything was normal in high school but he changed in college. Are you sure it was college? Did anything traumatic happen in high school? Like did he break up with the prom queen or anything?”

Brad stiffened in his chair, his back ramrod straight. “They broke up right after graduation when Roger visited his grandparents in Florida for the summer.”

“Was Roger upset about that?” Jason persisted. “Did he talk about what happened in Florida?”

Brad stood up, clearly indicating that the interview was over. “No, he never did talk about Florida. Now if you will excuse me I do have to get back to work.”

As a teacher Brinley was a student of body language, and this guy was lying about the dog eating his homework. It was written all over him. And it had started with breaking up with the prom queen.

She and Jason stood also and she followed him to the door. She was supposed to be quiet and not ask any questions but Jason was already mad at her. One more probably wasn’t going to make any difference.

“Whatever happened to the prom queen, Mr. Enright? Does she still live in Billings? Is she still in touch with Roger?”

Enright’s lips flattened and he slowly and deliberately buttoned his jacket. “She’s my wife Trudi. So I guess you could say they were still in touch.”

*

Jason hadn’t said
a word to Brinley since they’d left the office of Brad Enright and climbed back into the truck. After Enright’s admission that Roger had dated his wife years ago, Jason had turned on his heel and sat right back down. He’d peppered the car salesman with several more questions until the man finally admitted that things had been very tense between the two of them all through high school and college.

They were more frenemies than friends – constantly competing and trying to one-up the other guy. But at the end of the interview Enright insisted he didn’t have a motive for killing Roger.

Because he’d won. Roger’s life sucked and Brad’s was a dream come true.

“So will you just yell at me and get it over with? I was supposed to stay quiet and I didn’t. I’m sorry.”

Jason pulled out into traffic before answering. “I’m not mad.”

“You look mad.”

A muscle was ticking in his jaw and he hadn’t made eye contact for several minutes. In her book that meant he was pissed off.

“I’m not mad,” he repeated. “At least not at you. More at myself. I knew he was hiding something but I was going to let him off the hook today and come back another time when he’d had a chance to stew about things.”

“And I ruined that.”

Jason laughed and finally turned to look at her. “You could have really messed things up. But this time you didn’t. You got lucky. We know much more now than we knew before.”

Turning into the parking lot of a chain restaurant, Jason put the truck in park. “So you aren’t mad?”

“I’m not mad.” He shook a finger at her playfully. “But that doesn’t mean you have free rein. We might not be so lucky next time.”

“There’ll be a next time?”

She didn’t want to sit at home waiting for him to fill her in. She needed to be a part of this with an urgency that shocked her. After the attempted burglary or whatever it was last night this had become personal.

“I’m not letting you out of my sight so you’re stuck with me. Now let’s go have something to eat and call West. He should have the autopsy results by now. Then we’ll call Jared and have him find out about Trudi and this love triangle.”

That sounded like a good plan. She hadn’t eaten much this morning, still upset about someone breaking into her home. “What about Anita Hazlitt?”

Jason chuckled and reached under his seat, pulling out a tablet computer. “Let’s hope she doesn’t have an unlisted number.”

“And if she does?”

“That only means it won’t be easy. Are you ready to go inside?”

She was ready to get some answers. It was beginning to feel like the more they learned the less they knew.

‡

A
nita Hazlitt wasn’t
going to be easy to find. A quick Google search didn’t turn anything up, but then they didn’t know her address or even the town she lived in. Jason needed to call Jared about doing a quick search for the woman. Unless she was deliberately hiding it wouldn’t take long to locate her.

Back in Tremont Jason was sitting at his kitchen table with a beer and a stack of mail that he’d neglected for too long. It was going to be another long night. He could already tell. With the television on and Brinley beside him on the couch he’d managed a decent amount of sleep. He doubted he would be so lucky again this evening. He was wide awake, his mind working on the puzzle of Roger Gaines. So far Brad Enright seemed the most logical suspect but it was still early in the investigation.

Brinley joined him in the kitchen, snagging the last root beer from the refrigerator. “Fran and Richard are sitting on their deck. I’m going to go say hello. I don’t remember if I even thanked them last night so I should probably do that too.”

She was spending the night with Jason again. She’d been disappointed when they’d driven up and her front door was still plywood. There had been a note on the porch that the handyman had to order a new one and it might be in tomorrow. Jason didn’t bother telling her that he probably would have made her stay in his home anyway. Somehow she was the key to this mystery and until he figured out why he planned to keep a close eye on her.

“If you wait a minute I’ll go with you.”

“I’ll be fine.” She put her hands on her hips and gave him a disgusted look. “I’m going two houses down. I’ll be within shouting distance. Do I have to be babysat every single minute?”

No, he simply liked her company.

“It’s fine if you want to talk to them. I have a phone call to make and then I’ll come down and join you.”

Visibly relaxed, she practically skipped out of the front door with glee, apparently fed up with only Jason for company. With a room full of kids all day long she probably needed more extrovert time than he did. As much as he liked socializing with people it also mentally exhausted him. He needed alone time to recharge his batteries.

Pulling out his cell phone, Jason punched in a few buttons and waited for West to answer.

“It’s about time you called me. I’ve been waiting to hear from you.”

And West gave Jason shit about how he answered the phone…

“It’s nice to talk to you too, bro. I’ve got information for you. What do you have to tell me?”

Jason heard West snapping at someone, his tone short and impatient. Whatever West had to say wasn’t good news. He would have made a terrible poker player.

“Roger Gaines died from a gunshot wound to the heart. Thirty-eight caliber. Coroner confirmed death to be around eight at night.”

“Nothing we didn’t know,” Jason observed. “Is that it?”

“Pretty much. Roger Gaines was in mediocre health for a man so young. His weight was too high, his muscle tone terrible, and his arteries already showed the effects of a junk food diet paired with a sedentary lifestyle. Add twenty years to his age and he would have been a ticking time bomb.”

Those facts went along with what they’d found out from Stuart Gaines. Jason quickly filled West in on what he’d learned today.

“What about forensics?”

“I don’t have it all back yet but I can tell you that you were right about one thing. The standard is for every room to have six plastic cups on the counter.”

“So he did have company. The killer was someone he knew.”

“Or he could have used the cups earlier and threw them away,” West pointed out. “It gives credence to your theory but it doesn’t prove it. I will concede that I agree that the killer was someone he wasn’t afraid of. He didn’t fight or struggle. As for finding any trash from the room in nearby dumpsters? We came up empty.”

Jason growled in frustration. “This guy isn’t stupid. I feel like he knew what he was doing. He planned it out. This was no spur of the moment thing.”

“But why would someone plot to kill some guy who is basically a nerd. The most dangerous thing Gaines did was read about murder from the safety of his brother’s home. That’s not going to get you killed generally.”