A Twisted Love Story(39)

And now she has the list.

It took a while to get it. What she had needed was a complete list of all the crimes, attempted crimes, and accidents that occurred the night Ivy’s car was stolen. Fair Valley isn’t a huge city, but this includes everything from fender benders to a pack of gum stolen from a convenience store, and it’s far more descriptive than the 911 call list she had.

Karen is anxious to get a jump on it this morning. Dani, one of the clerks, finally sent it. When Karen had explained to Dani what she needed, and that the data was located in multiple places, she could almost feel Dani rolling her eyes. Karen knew pressing her into doing something that was technically outside the scope of her job wasn’t a good idea. She had to wait until Dani was bored enough to actually do it. Last night, she was. Dani sent it while Karen slept.

Now that she has the list, the first thing she does is scan through it to see if anything jumps out.

It does. Instantly.

The name. Like every other cop who was around seven years ago, Karen remembers it. She can even picture him. Brown hair, freckles, big smile.

Joey Fisher.

Karen googles his name, skimming through the articles to refresh the details.

Joey had been eighteen years old, only about a month away from his freshman year at UC Berkeley. One night, he visited a friend who had his own apartment, and what began as a small gathering grew into a full-blown party. Joey drank quite a bit. J?ger shots and beer, according to his friends. Eventually, he stumbled out of the party and around the corner, where his car was parked. Instead of driving home drunk, he passed out in the back seat.

They said he didn’t feel a thing when someone hit his parked car.





34




Wes sits behind his desk, staring at the closed door of his office. He’s been locked away all morning, trying to concentrate on his work, yet he still managed to be late for a conference call.

And he jumps when someone knocks on the door.

“Come in.”

Abigail walks in. It’s been a week since she started her temporary assignment as the department’s admin. Before she was promoted to the CEO’s assistant, Wes had worked with her for years.

“Good morning,” she says.

“Morning.”

“You’ve been so quiet I wasn’t sure you were here.” Abigail sits down across from him. She’s wearing a grey skirt, below the knees, but it inches up when she crosses her legs. Her long hair is pulled into a bun at the nape of her neck.

“Just a lot of work to get through. I didn’t mean to be rude,” he says.

“Oh, you’re not being rude. I just wanted to see how you’re doing.”

“We should— Maybe we—”

Abigail smiles. “Yes,” she says. “We probably need to talk about last night.”

“Yes,” Wes says. Except he has no idea what else to say. Calling it a mistake might offend her, and Abigail is the last one he wants to piss off. But that’s what it was. A big mistake.

“Everyone’s upset around here,” she says. “Including both of us. The situation with Tanner and Bianca has been so difficult.”

“Absolutely.”

“And we had been drinking. Probably too much.”

“I know I did,” Wes says. He had passed out quick, too. When he woke up, she was gone.

“Wes, we’ve worked together for years,” Abigail says. “I don’t think either one of us wants this to turn into a big thing.”

“I agree.”

“And neither of us wants this to be a problem.”

No. A problem isn’t what he needs or wants—not with Abigail and not at work. “No. There’s no reason for that,” he says.

“Good. Then let’s just write this off as a moment of temporary insanity. Or a night of temporary insanity.”

She smiles, which makes him feel a hell of a lot better. Given that she’s back in the sales department—technically, as the administrative assistant—this could’ve turned into the worst possible thing he had done in his career. He’s lucky that she wants to forget about it as quickly as he does.

Can’t blame her. Given the amount of alcohol he had, it’s a miracle he could have sex at all. And it couldn’t have been good. Well, not bad, but less than great. Slightly.

“Agreed,” he says.

“Good.” Abigail stands up, all six feet of her, and towers over him. “Now both of us need to get back to work.”

Thank God one of them is mature about this. Wes is totally okay with it not being him.



* * *



—

Finally.

Finally.

Heath is back.

Red hair sticks out from under his baseball cap, freckles cover every inch of his skin. Even his ears. He’s wearing khakis, T-shirt, loafers. When they were young, he wore black-rimmed glasses. Not long ago, he got Lasik. Still looks like a teenager, though. Even at thirty. If that kind of magic could be bottled, he’d be a billionaire.

“So what the hell?” he says, waving his arms around. Beer sloshes out of his bottle and hits the concrete patio. They’re at Ivy’s apartment, several drinks into the night, and he has just finished telling her all about his work in Oregon. “What was up with all those messages last week?”