He’s on a boat somewhere in the Caribbean sipping daiquiris while I’m dodging cops and robbers and—oh yeah—a murderer!”
Trey almost frowned at that, but caught himself. “As I said—”
“I heard what you said. I just don’t like it” I slapped the folder shut and slid it back to him. “So what the hell were you and Landon doing at the house last night?”
“Your brother requested that Phoenix collect his files and computer records for safekeeping. Simpson is the technical expert, but since I’m premises liability, Landon thought I should assist even though hardware is not my field of expertise.”
“Let me guess. Your ‘field of expertise’ is the James Bond stuff while Simpson gets to rewire things.” And then I remembered. “Until you got him fired.”
Trey narrowed his eyes. “He was negligent enough to desert his post, which allowed you to infiltrate the premises—”
“I didn’t infiltrate anything!”
“—which then created an unpredictable situation that could have ended badly.”
He had a point there. Nothing like an edged weapon through the gullet to end things badly.
Trey continued. “Simpson was entirely unsuited for surveillance work, and I have no idea why Landon assigned him to my cases. However, it’s immaterial now. He’s been terminated.”
I scanned his features. Was he hiding something behind that professional blandness? Or was I just getting paranoid? I rubbed my temples against an encroaching headache.
Trey stood. “I’m fielding a conference call with your brother and Landon tomorrow morning. You’re welcome to join us. In the meantime, wait here. Yvonne is on her way with the last of your paperwork.”
He walked around the desk and stopped right in front of me, uncomfortably close. I stood too, toe to toe, refusing to be muscled.
“Look,” I said, “I want to work with you on this. A woman is dead, and my brother is involved, which makes me involved, like it or not. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is this: I’m sorry I threatened you with a sword, and I’m willing to forget the whole thing if you are.”
He shook his head. “I don’t forget.”
And then he walked out of the office, not even looking over his shoulder, leaving me standing there furious, but unsurprised.
Chapter 7
I had a perverse desire to trash his office, maybe dump his pencils on the floor, toss some paper around. Instead I sat at his fancy desk and put my feet up, then took off the stupid badge and threw it in his in-box.
Trey Seaver. Who the hell did he think he was?
Who the hell was he?
The hallway was quiet, the door half-closed. The opportunity was irresistible. Keeping my eye out for Yvonne, I tried the file drawers on Trey’s desk. As expected, they were locked up tight. But then I tried his top drawer, and to my utter astonishment, it slid right open.
Too damn easy, I thought. Probably a trap, probably being recorded on some hidden camera. I didn’t care. If anyone asked, I would say I was looking for a pen.
There wasn’t much to inventory, however. One bottle of prescription medicine—Topomax, half-empty—and two bottles of over-the-counter pain reliever. A black silk tie, neatly laid out. Four fountain pens. A box of pencil lead. And two manila folders, one labeled LEGAL and the other labeled MEDICAL.
I checked the hallway. Still deserted.
The first folder contained a stack of official papers, including a last will and testament, a power of attorney, and a living will, all of them in Trey’s name and recently updated. In every case, the name Dan Garrity featured prominently, as beneficiary, as executor, as carrier of Trey’s final wishes concerning his departure from this world.
The medical file was even heavier. I paged through an ominous alphabet soup of words: Glasgow coma scale, Serum S 100 B readings, ICP monitor. There were copies of x-rays and MRI scans too, head shots, all of them listing the patient as Trey Seaver, and all of them featuring gray squiggles and gray fuzzy spots and gray blotches.
What was it Garrity had said the night before, about Trey? This explains some things, but not all. I hadn’t had a chance to ask him what he meant then, not with Landon stomping around like Alexander the Great. But I knew one thing—I was gonna make that chance as soon as I got out of Phoenix. Most people didn’t have a desk drawer full of cranial scans, and I wanted to know why this one did.
“Miss?”
I jerked. A man slouched in the doorway, silver hair swept across his forehead, white teeth brilliant under