Colton's Killer Pursuit

And Everleigh was standing close, helping him right the couch. She’d seen the wrapper fall just as he had.

When she bent to pick it up, he cried out a quick “Don’t!” And then added, “We’ll want it tested for fingerprints.”

She nodded. Stepped around the wrapper to right the cushion.

“It could be from the day he was killed,” Clarke continued because he couldn’t just leave her alone with whatever thoughts might be torturing her. Maybe he couldn’t make things better for her, but she didn’t have to endure them all alone.

“Could be they had sex, something went wrong, and she grabbed the paperweight in a fit of passion...”

“It always sat right there on that table,” she said, nodding toward the end table right next to him. Not two feet from the condom wrapper.

“You said the other day that, while Fritz had seen an attorney and talked to you about divorce, he hadn’t actually filed yet. That he’d been complaining about the paperwork involved...”

“Yeah, and maybe one of his girlfriends wasn’t happy about the fact that he wasn’t getting the divorce he’d said he would.”

They were looking at each other fully for the first time since they’d made love. Thinking together. More energized, he didn’t look away. “So, what if she thought there were divorce papers here? What if she figured she could present them to a court, and without you here to argue otherwise, she could have you removed as his heir, because if the divorce had gone through, you would no longer get everything?”

“It makes sense, I guess.” She was frowning, but more like she was deep in thought, rather than feeling doubtful. “If she didn’t know a lot about the law. His will is the defining document and that hasn’t been changed. I’m sure it would have been in the divorce, as part of the agreement, but it hadn’t been yet. Nothing had changed. Other than him moving out.”

“And still coming home every day to work,” Clarke added. “We’ve seen his apartment...”

“It was more like a generic hotel room.” She finished his thought.

“He was sleeping elsewhere, but he hadn’t really left home.” They were on to something. He knew it. Asked her for a small food storage bag and used the inside of it as a shield for his fingers as he grabbed the condom wrapper and zipped it up.

“Maybe he told her that the papers included new will instructions,” she said.

“Or maybe she’s looking for the will, to destroy it.”

He’d moved away from her. He’d had to. Something was happening between them again and he wasn’t going to let them fall back into that place where they did things that could lead to a future between them.

He removed pictures from the wall, systematically, one at a time, looking at the backs of them for anything that might be attached there, tapped on the walls behind them, checking for hollow parts that could designate access to hidden storage, while Everleigh started going through every tablet of paper, every business card, everything on Fritz’s desk and in his drawers.

Maybe the lover had found things that would have revealed her identity, maybe she’d removed them, but that didn’t mean the perp hadn’t missed something. She’d have no way of knowing what random note Fritz might have made of an upcoming get-together or hotel reservation. What business card he might have pocketed and then kept.

They worked silently again. But more in unison than before, rather than the adversaries they’d seemed to be since they’d come back in contact that morning. She’d given him no sign that she wanted more than they’d agreed was between them. She appeared solely focused on the work in front of her.

That peeved him some, too, which made absolutely no sense. He’d never, ever, ever cared if a woman moved on. Which was part of the reason he knew for certain that he wasn’t meant to be in a permanent relationship. He was always just one step away from the next brief time of sharing that would come.

No strings attached. Because after that first rush, the weeks or months of the love-getting-to-know-you-and-how-great-is-this time, expectations and then failed expectations leading to disappointments would follow. And that was what he avoided at all costs now. It used to be that he avoided being tied down.

He’d spent too many years living with the disappointments of the family he was already attached to. He’d seemingly been the only one to inherit his mother’s artistic gene—unable to stay within the lines, to follow all the rules, because he’d seen life as a creative adventure more than a rigid plan. He was who he was, and he wasn’t siccing that on anyone who wasn’t already bound to him by biology.

He’d searched all wall hangings, behind them, above and below them, between them...and nothing. It was getting to the point where he might have to accept that either the killer had found what she was looking for—unless it was the used condom wrapper—or it hadn’t been there to begin with. Pushing aside a credenza that Everleigh had already been through twice, he was surprised to notice how easily the heavy piece slid. And noticed the wheels at the bottom, attached to the inner part of the piece, embedded so that, hidden behind the legs, they didn’t show.

Heart pounding, he tapped the wall behind it, but saw the slight line in the paneling that told him he’d finally found something of interest. There might not be anything there but a broken piece of paneling, a bad fix job, concealed behind a piece of furniture, but...

“You know of any damage to this wall?” he asked from halfway behind the credenza.

“No.” Everleigh left the last of the cupboards and came over, watching as he tapped along the wall. Middle first, then top. Nothing.

The line had been right in the middle, right on a stud.

So, nothing again?

Kneeling, he checked the wall toward the floor and...

“What was that?” Everleigh came closer, squeezing in behind the credenza enough to see what he’d touched. “It sounded different.”