Keep It Simple (MMG Series Book 4) (27 page)

I tried to look at her neck and face, but it was too dark to see anything. “Take me inside your place, so I can check out your injuries.” She opened the door and let me in. Of course, the place was furnished to the hilt. “Didn’t you say you were renting?” This place was way too nice for a rental.

“Well, I’m not exactly paying for it. You remember my friend Chelle? Well, she’s modeling in Europe for the month and let me use her place,” she explained.

Not only did I not remember Chelle, but I took a good look at her neck and face and knew she was lying. For one, the bruising was all wrong. The prints on her neck indicated whoever strangled her did it from the front, not the back. She was lying, but why? I needed to make sure my assessment was correct before taking further action.

“You already have some bruising. I highly recommend calling the police.”

“No police!” she shouted, then added, “They’ll just make me feel stupid. I didn’t see anything.”

I decided not to push. “Does anything else hurt?” I asked.

She hesitated before answering, “My arm is sore.”

“Then let’s get you to the hospital and get it checked out.” If I could get her to the hospital, they would see she’d been attacked. Then they would have to follow proper procedure and call in the police.

“It’s not that bad. See? I can move it.” She stuck her arm up and twisted it to show me.

“Okay then, since there’s no need to get a doctor involved and you don’t want to make a police report, there’s nothing more I can do.”

Her eyes widened in surprise and she broke into tears. “You’re just going to leave me here?” she wailed.

“What else would you have me do? You don’t want to see a doctor and you don’t want the police involved. My hands are tied.”

“Someone tried to hurt me, Caswell!”

“I can see that, Alexandria, but unless you make a statement, there is nothing I can do.”

“B-b-but you are a private investigator and own your own firm,” she stated.

I was curious where she was going with this. “I am part owner in a security business, Xan. Don’t make it more glamourous than it actually is.”

“Can’t you find the guy?”

“If I am hired to do so, yes,” I nodded.

Her shoulders relaxed. “Fine, then I’m hiring you.”

Already tired of this charade, I gave her a warning, “You and I both know you don’t have any money, Alexandria.”

“My father does,” she hastily replied. “He’d pay you to find who hurt me, Caswell, you know he would.”

After my stake out, I was exhausted and just wanted to be home in my bed, so I relented, “Fine, meet me in the office at nine in the morning. I’ll have the client contract ready. Make sure your father is there to sign it.”

A panicked look appeared on her face. “You’re leaving? I can’t stay here alone! What if the guy comes back and finishes what he started?” she shrieked.

Good
, I thought,
he can have you.
“He got what he wanted. There’s no way he’s coming back,” I told her.

“You can’t know that! Please don’t leave me here alone.”

The last thing I wanted was Alexandria in my house, but I was dead on my feet. At least if she was under my roof I could watch her. “Fine, but only for tonight. I’ll get Garrett and Bobby over first thing tomorrow morning to go over details with you and then you are on your own. You’ve got five minutes to get your stuff.”

She clattered across the room in her ridiculous heels and disappeared behind a closed door. Two seconds later, she reappeared with a fully packed roll-aboard. I knew I’d been had. What I didn’t know was why?

The next morning I awakened to the smell of coffee and bacon. After throwing on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, I followed the smell to the kitchen where Alexandria was cooking breakfast.

She spotted me coming down the stairs and gave me a bright, cheery smile. “Good morning. Since you were kind enough to let me stay here last night, I thought I would make you breakfast.” I saw she was wearing one of my shirts and scowled. Her eyes dropped to the shirt. “I’m sorry. I forgot to pack a nightie. I didn’t think you would mind if I borrowed one of your shirts.” She pointed to the stairs. “I can go change real quick.”

“Garrett and Bobby will be over soon to talk to you. Since you’ve already made the food, let’s eat and then you can go change,” I told her.

Garrett and Bobby arrived while we were eating and Alexandria offered to make them some food. I was pissed when they took her up on it. However, it gave me a minute to explain to them what had happened.

Alexandria was heading upstairs to change when the doorbell rang. The last thing I wanted was for Sarah to discover Alexandria in my house. I thought I had it in the bag and then Alexandria had to open her mouth and ruin it. Not only did Sarah get a face to face with my wife, but she got one with her dressed in my shirt.
She fucking hates me now and I don’t blame her.

“Who were those women, Caswell, and why was the short, ugly one interrogating me? I mean really, she was so rude,” Alexandria fumed. At the mention of Sally, Garrett flinched and Bobby’s face turned to stone. Alexandria was grating on all our nerves, but we all three of us had agreed to see this through.

I stared longingly at the door.
And once again, Alexandria fucks up my life.
I watched her bat her lashes at Garrett for what had to be the millionth time and wished I’d never set eyes on her. Not able to stand it any longer, I cut her off in the middle of her tirade.

“Shut up, Xan.”

“And did you see the ghetto shoes on the tall one, not to mention her hair. Someone needs to introduce her to some decent product,” she continued.

Her hateful, critical words cut deep and I snapped. “Enough!” She jumped as if I’d struck her
. Good.
I needed her full attention for what I was about to say. “You say one more thing about my friends and you are gone.” Dismissing her wide eyed stare, I turned to Garrett and Bobby, “You got what you need from here?” They both answered yes. I turned back to Alexandria and stared her dead in the eyes. “I will not take your case until you dad is here. Either you call him or you get out. Do you get me?” She nodded her head jerkily. “Good, let’s go,” I directed at the guys, and we headed out the door.

“Caswell, wait!” Alexandria called after me.

Fuck this
. I had way too much shit to do today and zero time to babysit my soon to be ex-wife’s lying ass. I had to find a way to break it to Mrs. Landry about her husband and then figure out what Sarah wanted.

After leaving the house, I spoke with Mrs. Landry and worked on a few other cases. Bobby rolled in around noon and we finally got the opportunity to talk in private. He agreed with me about Alexandria. The prints didn’t match, which meant she was lying about what happened, but why? Something obviously happened to her. Bobby told me she came by the office to see me late yesterday afternoon dressed to kill. When he told her I was on a case, she was a huge bitch and left in a snit.

“You think her coming by the office and what happened after are related?” I asked.

“She wants your attention, that’s for sure, and since you blew off her reconciliation story, she decided to pull out the big guns. She’s definitely up to something.”

“Fuck, Bobby, I can’t seem to win. I can’t have what I want and don’t want what I have.”

“Isn’t that a Crosby, Stills and Nash song?” he joked.

I was not amused. I thought of Sarah’s face when she barged past me to find Alexandria in my living room this morning.
She was jealous.

“Did Sarah and Sally ever say why they came by?” Bobby asked.

“No. Alexandria’s big mouth stopped them.”

“I wonder what they wanted.”

As I tapped my finger on my desk, I noticed a stack of papers. “Didn’t you say Sally was coming by to pick up the payroll papers yesterday?”

“Yeah, why?”

I held up the papers and smiled. “Looks like she forgot. Why don’t you call and remind her, and while you’re at it, see if she will tell you anything about this morning. I’m going home to make sure Alexandria doesn’t make herself too at home in my place. Hopefully, she did what I asked and called her dad. Maybe he can help us get to the bottom of this. I’ll call Tut on the way and ask him to check out the condo Xan is staying in to see if he can find anything there. Keep me posted on Sally.”

When I arrived home, Alexandria was in the kitchen making dinner.
What the fuck?
I watched from the doorway as she scurried around like a good little housewife and a pang of regret swept through me. Not once, in the three years we were together, did she ever cook dinner for me. Such a seemingly normal act was out of place coming from this woman. Too much had happened. She didn’t belong here. We didn’t belong here together.
If she’d been like this when Kalen was alive, we might have had a chance.
As fast as it entered my head, I dismissed it
. Who am I kidding? Alexandria Gibson is and always will be a selfish and self-serving bitch.

“Don’t get too comfortable here,” I growled.

She jumped and grabbed her heart. “Caswell, you scared me!”

“I swear, Xan, you are the only woman in the world who would put on full makeup and heels the day after being mugged and held at gun point.” She opened her mouth to respond and the doorbell rang. She made a move to answer it, but I stopped her. “Don’t even think about it.” I left her wide eyed and slack jawed in the kitchen to see who was at the door. I was relieved to see Sterling standing on my porch.

“Daddy!” Alexandria shouted from behind me. Her heels clip clopped across the floor as she scurried past me, threw herself into Sterling’s arms and broke into heart wrenching sobs. I had to admit, she was good. It made me wonder how many times she’d lied to me while we were living together. I had a feeling it was more than I wanted to know. Sterling and I stared at each other over Xan’s shoulder.

“Cas,” he nodded.

“Good to see you,” I told him.

He pulled away and stared down at his daughter. I could see him taking in her bruised face and throat. “When Alexandria called this morning and said someone tried to kill her, I had to come see for myself she was alright.” Alexandria’s eyes darted to mine and quickly back to her dad.

“The guy wanted her purse, Sterling, not her life,” I told him.

“How do you know?” Alexandria huffed, “You weren’t there. You didn’t feel the gun pressed to your temple.”

“If he wanted you dead, you’d be dead, Xan, trust me.”

She smiled sweetly through her tears. “Well, thanks to you, I’m not.”

I watched her cuddle up to her father and wondered what her game was. We both knew I didn’t save her from shit. Did she think I wasn’t going to divorce her? Did she think I’d forgotten the past four years and our dead son? If so, she was in for a rude awakening.

“I’m not sure if Alexandria told you, but she wants to hire LASH to find the guy who jumped her last night. As you know, this takes time and time is money, which is something Alexandria does not have.” Ignoring Alexandria’s contemptuous glare, I continued, “I had Tut check out Alexandria’s place and, as suspected, there is no physical evidence of an altercation.”

“He strangled me and stole my purse! There’s your evidence!” Alexandria shouted.

“Yes, but you would not let us get the police or the hospital involved, Alexandria, which would have been the smart thing to do, as they have resources we do not,” I calmly explained. I wasn’t about to tell her what all we could or could not do to catch the perp. “In my opinion, it is a waste of your money and our time to proceed, but I will let you decided that,” I directed at Sterling. I glanced over at Alexandria and said, “Tut said your place is safe to move back into.”

“B-b-but, I made dinner for us,” she pouted.

“Thanks, but I have work to do,” I told her.

“Come on, Cas,” Sterling interjected, “One meal won’t hurt you. I need to speak with you anyway. We can do it over a cocktail after dinner and then we’ll get out of your hair.”

“But Daddy, what if the man comes back for me?” she tearfully asked.

“Cas is right. If he wanted you dead, you’d be dead. Come on, let’s eat. Then I’ll talk to Cas and we’ll leave him in peace,” he told her.

Alexandria pouted the entire dinner. I caught through stilted conversation that she spent a week at home before coming to Charlotte. Sterling grilled her about her alcohol and drug consumption since getting out of rehab. She told him she was clean and offered to take a drug test. I was surprised he told her no and let her off the hook so easily. The last time Sterling and I had spoken was the day I checked Xan into rehab. In anger and disappointment, he lashed out and told her he was ashamed to call her his daughter. It looked as if things had drastically changed.

As soon as dinner was over, Alexandria went off to pack. I poured Sterling a drink and ushered him into my office. Closing the door behind us, I watched him take a seat and noticed how tired he looked.

“I’m surprised you didn’t take her up on her offer for a drug screening,” I told him.

A concerned expression appeared on his face. “You think she’s using?”

“No, but we both know how good she is at hiding it.”

Sterling fidgeted with his drink for a second and then let out a tired sigh. “The day I picked Alexandria up from rehab, we had a long talk. She told me she had changed and asked me to give her a chance. After spending a week with her, I could see she was telling the truth, so I decided to do what she asked of me. I’m giving her a chance.”

I thought he was being extremely naïve and short sighted, which was not like Sterling at all. “What? By burying your head in the sand, once again, and believing her without proof? Have you forgotten her lies and deceptions killed my son and your grandson?”

“Her addiction killed Kalen,” Sterling corrected.

“Which is exactly why you should make her take that drug screening,” I shot back.

“You gave your terms, Cas, and so far she has abided by them.”

“Is this what you wanted to talk to me about, my terms?” Something told me it wasn’t.

“No, I wanted you to know that I’ve reinstated Alexandria’s inheritance and have drawn up a new will making her my sole beneficiary.”