Black Oil, Red Blood

Chapter 28



Under cover of darkness, we returned to Schaeffer’s house. We parked around the block and walked through the alleyways to his back door. The house was still surrounded with crime scene tape. Schaeffer tried the doorknob.

“Locked.” He stood still and looked at me.

“What are you looking at me for?” I asked.

“Haven’t you got a key?” he said.

I shook my head.

He raised one eyebrow.

I sighed. “Gimme your credit card, and I’ll see what I can do.”

Nash rolled his eyes and pulled out his wallet, handing me a Visa Platinum. “That’s my good card,” he said. “Don’t ruin it.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Fortunately, once again, the police had only bothered to lock one of the myriad locks, so my picking job was relatively easy.

“Where did you learn how to do that?” Nash asked, once we were inside.

“Google,” I said. “Where else? Don’t you know how to do it?”

“Yes, but it was a lot more fun watching you try it.” Nash took his credit card back from me and put it in his wallet. “Next you’ll be making bombs, I suppose.”

“Give me a little credit,” I said. “I’m not really a bomb kind of girl.”

“So what kind of girl are you?” In the darkness, he seemed even taller than usual, his muscular torso framed in the moonlight pooling the window.

“Lately, I’m not sure,” I said. “I used to be the kind of girl who kicked butt and took names. These days. . .” I trailed off. What was I supposed to say? That l was scared? Vulnerable? Tired of fighting? If Nash admired my supposed strength, I didn’t want to rob him of his illusion. I didn’t want to give my true self away.

Nash stepped slowly towards me. His arms encircled my waist, and he pulled me close. “It’s going to be okay, Chloe.”

I felt the muscles in his torso flex as he gently rubbed my back. And his arms—his arms were so strong, so sure, so safe. I was so surprised, I let my hands hang limp by my sides for a few moments before I melted into him and grabbed him tight, hanging on for dear life. I needed a refuge so badly. A rock. An anchor. Something to hold on to when everything else was gone.

And I felt for him and the losses in his own life. I was so grateful that he’d come to Kettle and that he had somehow found it within himself to help me in my fight. Where would I be without him?

Either dead or sitting in Chief Scott’s jail, that’s where.

Against my will, a sob escaped from somewhere deep in my chest. “How do you know everything will be okay? How can you possibly say that?”

His hands found my hair and gently stroked it. “I have a feeling,” he said.

“I didn’t think you were a feelings kind of guy.”

He let his fingers trace the contours of my cheek before wiping away an unwilled tear. “Oh, I have feelings.” His voice sounded soft. Tender, even.

“I can never tell what you’re thinking,” I breathed. “I can never read you.”

“No? Can you read this?” He tilted my chin up and his lips brushed mine—softly at first, then harder. I felt light and floaty. My lips moved in perfect rhythm with his while my hands explored the muscles in his back, shoulders, and arms.

Schaeffer’s house and the tapes and PetroPlex seemed a million miles away. Nash was an island oasis of sanity in a sea of chaos, and I was content to shipwreck on his shore.

Nash pulled away.

I was breathless, left wanting more.

“I owe you an apology,” Nash said.

“What for?”

“For the way I treated you when we first met.”

“You were doing your job,” I said.

“I was, but I was doing it rudely. I confess I had certain. . . preconceptions about you.”

I ran my hand up and down the hollow in his chest. “Such as?”

“Such as thinking you were a greedy, shallow plaintiff’s attorney who didn’t care about anything but designer shoes and handbags and the next big win.”

“And what do you think now?”

Nash touched his forehead to mine and stroked my cheek. He didn’t answer verbally. Instead, he kissed me again, and waves of bliss flowed over my body. The sensation was everything I’d imagined before I’d passed out in front of my burning house—and then some. For the first time in a long time, I felt wholly and completely appreciated for the entirety of my body, brain, and soul. And when he kissed me, I felt as though it was more than a physical kiss. It felt as though his whole being joined mine, intertwined with my spirit, and sent our collective consciousness spiraling into the air in a joyful dance of freedom and joy, youth and optimism.

Nash broke away. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” I breathed. I was better than okay.

“Too fast?” he asked.

I shook my head. A little out of left field, yes, but not unappreciated.

“I just wanted to. . . do that now. . . in case. . .”

In case he didn’t have the chance to do it at all. I lowered my face and pulled away. Suddenly, I was back in Schaeffer’s house, and I was acutely aware of that fact.

Nash pulled me close again. “Not the ideal circumstances for a first kiss,” Nash said. “I’m sorry.”

“It would have been better with margaritas,” I agreed.

Nash laughed. “And enough time for me to kiss you properly.”

My heart fluttered.

“Well, maybe later,” I said reluctantly. “For now. . . what? We didn’t really come here with a plan.”

Nash kissed me quickly one more time. “The plan is to look around. How did you find the file boxes the first time you were here?”

“Schaeffer had a false-bottomed drawer that he’d told me about. I opened it up and found an envelope with my name on it. It contained a piece of paper with a cryptic message, so I had to decipher it and follow the clues until I found the trigger that opened the secret wall.”

Nash clicked on his flashlight and I followed suit. We went into Schaeffer’s study, found The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, and pushed the book in towards the wall. Just like before, there was a soft click and the shelf popped open.

We slid it back and walked into the now empty chamber.

“There’s nothing here,” I said.

“Are you sure?” Nash asked. “If I really wanted to hide something, I would double hide it.”

“Like a hiding place in a hiding place?”

“Exactly.”

“Makes sense to me,” I said. “It’s as good a place to start looking as any.”

We began methodically shining our flashlights over the walls inside the hidden chamber, looking for anything that might indicate a chamber within a chamber. The walls were bare brick—the same that was used on the exterior of the house—so we had to search carefully for cracks and suspicious spots.

We were about halfway down the north side of the room without finding anything when we heard the soft click of a doorknob and the creak of a hinge. I froze.

Nash quickly slid the shelving unit almost closed. I knew he didn’t want to shut it all the way because we didn’t really see a lever we could press to get out once we were stuck on the inside. I shuddered. The implications of that ran through my head, and I imagined all kinds of sinister prisoner scenarios. I had to forcibly shut down those thoughts and attune myself to what was happening outside. I pressed my eyeball to the crack in the shelf and waited. Nash hovered over me, his eye also pressed to the door.

It wasn’t long before a swimming ball of light bobbed into view and started hopping around the room. When my eyes adjusted and I could finally see who was holding the flashlight, I couldn’t believe who I saw.

The very sight of him made me livid.

Unafraid—perhaps stupidly so—I swung open the bookcase and flipped on the overhead light. Nash swore under his breath, but stayed hidden.

“Dorian Saks!” I said. “What the hell!”

Dorian Blinked in the light. “Chloe? Chloe!” He rushed towards me and enveloped me in that same old, familiar embrace. “I can’t believe it! I thought you were—“

He didn’t bother to tell me what he thought I was. Instead, his lips clamped on to mine in a savage, hungry greeting. And Nash was watching from the shadows. Oh boy.

I shoved him away, but he was like a leech, back on me, refusing to let go. I struggled against him as he poured out what were apparently great feelings of relief.

“I heard about your house, and then you were gone, and I kept trying to call you, to call your office! And nobody knew where you were! And I just thought, I can’t lose her again!”

“Again!” I said. “You never got me back, you moron! Let me go!”

Dorian let go of my body and gripped my face in his palms, his eyes boring into mine. “What’s wrong? The other day at Caliente—“

“You slapped me in the face with an offer I couldn’t refuse!” I said.

“I was trying to take care of you, Chloe. I know it can’t have been easy down here. Do you think anyone else would have offered you as much?”

I shoved his hands away. The nerve of this guy! And the timing! Ugh! I could only imagine what must be going through Nash’s mind. “The offer was laughable, and you know it,” I said.

“You always were a fiery little redhead. It’s what I love about you. There’s no one else in the world like you.”

Dorian’s eyes appeared to mist up so that they glistened slightly. If I hadn’t known he possessed the ability to create this effect at will in front of juries, I might have been slightly swayed.

“Come home with me,” he said. “I’ve missed you too much.”

“You are out of your ever-loving mind if you think I’m going anywhere with you!”

“Why the sudden change of heart?” Dorian asked earnestly. “The other day at Caliente, I could tell your feelings were still there. I came over the next day to talk to you, but your house was burnt to a crisp and Dick had no idea where you were. I’ve been frantic ever since.”

He embraced me again, forcing his lips on mine.

What was once familiar and comforting was now repulsive. How could I have ever even thought twice about taking this guy back? The energy I felt from Dorian was a completely different kind of energy than I felt from Nash.

Dorian was powerful and strong, but in a self-centered, egotistical sort of way. He would always be looking for better deals and greener pastures. Nash felt powerful and strong to me, but more selfless. More of just everything that was right and in tune with the universe.

Also, the thing about Dorian was, he was such a good liar that even now, I didn’t know if he was really relieved to see me or just playing off the fact that he got caught snooping around somewhere he clearly shouldn’t be. Maybe he really was relieved to see me. But maybe the whole “come home with me” routine was just a ploy to get me to leave with him so he could deliver me to PetroPlex. That would seem incredibly evil, even for Dorian, but the thing is, with him, you just never knew. Above all else, he loved money, and if the price were right. . .

I twisted my neck away from Dorian’s face. “Nash!” I said. “What are you waiting for? Get him off me! Cuff him to something.”

Dorian looked up, surprised.

Nash launched himself out of the hidden chamber and tackled Dorian, wrestling him to the ground.

“Who are you?” Dorian got his arm free and delivered a punch. Nash caught the punch and expertly twisted Dorian’s arm back down. “Jensen Nash.”

Dorian grunted under Nash’s weight. “The cop?”

Nash rolled him over and cuffed his hands behind his back. “Detective.”

Suddenly, Dorian was all smiles. “Oh, I apologize, officer. Thank goodness you’re around. I don’t know what I’d do if Chloe got hurt.”

Nash rolled him over roughly and dragged him towards Schaeffer’s heavy wooden desk.

“Dorian, shut up,” I said.

Nash pulled out a second set of cuffs and double-cuffed him to the desk leg. Then he pulled Dorian’s cell phone out of its holster and threw it against the wall so that it broke.

The desk leg was thicker in the middle than on both ends, which meant Dorian couldn’t slide the cuff down to the bottom and underneath to get free. He’d have to pull the entire leg off the desk if he wanted to get away, and it was a pretty sturdy leg.

I turned towards Nash to thank him, but he refused to look at me.

My heart sank. I would have a lot of explaining to do here shortly, I was pretty sure.

Dorian. Trust him to show up at the worst possible time and ruin everything. Always.

“What are you doing here?” I demanded of Dorian.

“Trying to find you!” he said.

I resisted the urge to slap him. “You are such a liar. Did PetroPlex put you up to this, or are you just free-agenting, hoping to make a buck?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

“You know the rest of Schaeffer’s files were burned to a crisp in my house, right? They’re not here anymore.”

“Schaeffer’s files? What?”

“Oh come off it,” I said.

“Chloe, I swear. I was here looking for you. God knows I couldn’t get any cops in this town to do it for me. This town is the most backward place I’ve ever been in my life. I don’t know how you’ve managed down here for so long.”

“Why would you be looking for me here?”

“I didn’t know where else to look. I’d already been to your office and to your paralegal’s house and everywhere else in town. There’s not many other places to look. Kettle’s not that big, you know. I figured that since you spent a lot of time here, maybe I could find something that might give me a clue where you were.”

I wasn’t sure whether to buy it. He sounded sincere, but he always sounded sincere. It’s what made him so good in front of a jury. He wouldn’t be near as rich as he was if he also wasn’t such a slick actor. I didn’t know what to do.

I looked at Nash, who was still steadily not looking at me. I grabbed his arm and pulled him into the hallway.

“I don’t know what to do,” I whispered.

“Me neither,” Nash said, still not meeting my eye. “Listen, about earlier—“

“No!” I said quickly. “No! “

“—I rushed into things. I barely know you. It was too early. My wife is still fresh for me, Dorian is obviously still fresh for you—“

I pulled his face square with mine. “Look at me!”

He looked.

“Dorian is ancient history. You can’t believe anything he says. He is the world’s smoothest liar.”

“And how do I know you’re not? You’re a lawyer too, after all.”

My heart started beating fast—too fast. “What? What! Are you serious? I have been to hell and back with you over the last two days! After everything that’s happened, how can you even say something like that!”

“The guy seems pretty sincere. And you were engaged to him, after all.”

“How did you know that?”

“Dorian Saks, right? Miles told me not to ask, remember?”

That seemed like ages ago. Wow, this guy didn’t miss a thing. “Listen to me. The reason I broke up with him is because he was cheating with his secretary and no telling how many other women and lying about it. He is a trial attorney. He’s an amazing actor. He has a gift for making you believe everything he says, but you can’t. You can’t. You just can’t, okay?”

“We’ll see,” Nash said maddeningly.

“I’m telling you, I don’t know why he’s here,” I said. “So we have a problem. If he’s here on behalf of PetroPlex, we could give too much information away by continuing our search. We’d have to do it in front of him. It’s not like we can call the cops to come get him. And as tempting as it would be for me to kill him right now, I’m just really not that kind of girl.”

“But if we don’t finish the search and leave him here, then he gets loose and maybe finds the tapes before we do.”

“If he knows they exist,” I said.

“Do you think he does?”

“I don’t know what to think. But I wouldn’t put it past him. The question is, do we risk letting him know we’re looking for something important? What if we don’t find them? What if Schaeffer didn’t even have them yet?”

“I could interrogate him to try to figure out what he knows,” Nash said.

“Trust me, you’d be wasting your time.” I sighed. Goodness knows I’d tried every interrogation tactic in the book on him previously for personal reasons. “You’ve got no leverage, and he’s a professional prevaricator. We’d be here all night and none the wiser by morning.”

“I don’t see how we have any choice but to finish the search.”

“Okay,” I whispered. “Let’s see if we can find something to blindfold him, at least, in case we do find the tapes.”

I crept into Schaeffer’s bedroom and pulled a t-shirt out of his closet. I felt like I was violating some kind of unwritten rule, crossing some kind of line in rummaging through a dead man’s bedroom, but necessity ruled.

We went back to Schaeffer’s office and tied the shirt over Dorian’s eyes.

“Come on, Chloe,” Dorian said. “What is this? What are you doing here, anyway?”

“Working on my case,” I said. “You think I’m going to let you beat me at summary judgment next week?

“After all that’s happened, you’re still worried about the case?” Dorian asked.

“Why? Should I be worried about something else?”

“I just thought. . . well, with Schaeffer dead, and your house burned down, and your client gone—“

“How do you know Gracie’s gone?” I said quickly.

“Well, you didn’t get back to me about the offer, did you?”

“And you went by her house, I’m guessing.”

“I did, but—“

“That is a violation of ethics,” I said. “Opposing counsel is not supposed to ever speak to the other side’s client directly if that client also has an attorney. And you know what else is a violation of ethics? Snooping around in my expert witness’s house for no good reason.”

“I had a good reason, and you know it.”

“What I know is that you weren’t actually looking for me, so enlighten me. Please.”

Nash and I had walked back over to the hidden chamber and continued our search of the walls. We found a few suspicious cracks, but no bricks that moved or came out of the wall, or pushed in and triggered any other hidden switches.

“What other reason could I possibly have for being here?” Dorian asked.

This was one of Dorian’s signature tricks. He asked a question that seemed innocent but was really designed to get you to give away your position. I wasn’t about to fall for it.

“You tell me,” I said.

Dorian didn’t say anything for a minute. Nash and I finished our search of the chamber without finding anything.

“Where to next?” he whispered.

“Desk,” I said.

We went to the desk and started looking. Dorian squirmed as I pushed and pulled him in different directions to get the drawers out of the body of the desk.

“What are you looking for?” Dorian wanted to know.

“A jump drive,” I lied. “It had Schaeffer’s expert report on it, and I need it to retain another witness. Which, I might add, I’m having an awfully hard time doing in a week, especially under the circumstances. How about a Rule Eleven agreement for a continuance?”

“Why bother with that?” Dorian said. “Just take the settlement offer.”

“I can’t do that without a client, and you know it.”

Nash paused in sorting through the contents of his drawer and looked up. “Are you two seriously negotiating the case right now?”

“Way I like it,” I said. “If only I could always negotiate with opposing counsel tied up and blindfolded. It would make getting a settlement a lot easier.”

“I didn’t know you were kinky like that,” Dorian said. “How come you never told me?”

“Shut up,” I said. “You know what I meant. You want to agree to a continuance, or not?”

“If I do, will you uncuff me?” Dorian asked.

“Maybe, but I wouldn’t count on it.”

I had been through three drawers and found no more false bottoms, no tapes, no mysterious messages, no nothing. Nash looked like he was in about the same shape. We moved back to the bookshelf and started looking behind books. We also randomly opened some and paged through, hoping to find some pieces of paper lodged in there, or a secret hole cut in the paper, or something.

Who were we kidding? There must be hundreds, maybe thousands of books on these shelves, which spanned the whole length of the wall. And the rest of the house was large and equally full of stuff. We couldn’t possibly hope to do a thorough search in the time we had with Dorian in the way.

I could tell by the look on Nash’s face that he was probably thinking the same thing. Nevertheless, we plowed through.

“As a gesture of good faith, I agree to a continuance,” Dorian said. “Do you think a month will be long enough for you to find your client and make the settlement offer?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know where she went.”

“Well, I agree to a month.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “I agree that if I find her, I’ll tell her you made a ridiculous offer and counsel her to refuse it.”

Dorian shifted positions by the desk. “Okay, Chloe. Time to get real. This little verbal sparring match has been fun and all, but let’s be frank. You don’t really have a leg to stand on in this case. You don’t even have an expert witness. In fact, right now, you don’t even have a client. If she never comes back, I can have the case dismissed for lack of prosecution.”

“Is that a threat?” I asked, still paging frantically through the books on the shelf.

“If you’re asking me if I’ll file the motion, absolutely. It’s just business.”

“And what if your client just offs her, instead. Wouldn’t that be much easier?”

“Now you’re being ridiculous.” Dorian shifted positions again. I could tell he was getting uncomfortable—physically, if not mentally.

“Am I?” I asked. “I think you know better than that.”

“I’m not sure what you’re implying,” he said, “but I don’t like the sound of it. It sounds like a defamation suit to me.”

“Another threat?” I asked. “You’re really working hard to get me to come back home with you now, aren’t you?”

“At this point, I think it seems safe to say that’s not going to happen,” Dorian said. “If you were just looking for a jump drive with an expert report on it, you wouldn’t have me cuffed to the desk and blindfolded, would you?”

Nash abruptly slammed the book he was paging through back into the shelf, and Dorian jumped when he heard the sound. Good. I was glad Dorian was jumpy.

Nash moved over to the sofa cushions. I headed to the fireplace and lifted an iron shovel from the rack. Instead of bashing Dorian’s head in, which felt like an attractive option for me at the moment, I opted to poke through some very old ashes from last winter.

“If you were really looking for me,” I said to Dorian, “you wouldn’t be here in the middle of the night, would you?”

Dorian sighed and shifted positions again. “What did Schaeffer have?”

So he really was wise to the situation after all. I was glad I hadn’t expected any less.

“What do you mean?” I stalled.

“Do me a favor. You cut the crap, and I will too. I know you’re here looking for it, just like everyone else has been. This place is like Grand Central Station. You’re lucky it was me here tonight instead of someone else. Unlike Delmont and the rest of them, I really do care about you.”

“I don’t for one second believe you give two cents about me, but how nice of you to stop pretending you have no idea what’s going on.”

I found nothing in the ashes and cast around for somewhere else to look instead. I settled on the piano and started with the bench. Nash had moved on to the chairs. I took comfort in the fact that Dorian had referred to the object of our search as ‘it,’ rather than ‘them.’ Maybe that meant he wasn’t sure exactly what he was looking for.

“I know Delmont is in PetroPlex’s pocket,” Dorian said. “But I’m sure that was obvious even to you.”

“I am so flattered by your estimation of my intelligence,” I said sourly.

“And I know Schaeffer had something on PetroPlex. But I don’t know what it was.”

“Then what are you doing here?” I asked, moving on to search the piano’s plate and fallboard.

“Hoping to find out,” he said. “I don’t like the emotional tenor at the refinery. Something has clearly gotten my client upset, but they’re not talking about it. I can’t adequately represent them if I’m not fully aware of what I’m dealing with.”

“Oh, so you’re just doing your job,” I said. “Going above and beyond.”

“It’s the client of my career,” Dorian said. “They can make me rich.”

“You’re already rich.”

“Okay, richer,” he said. “There’s no such thing as too rich.”

“Yeah, there is actually,” I said. “When you’re so rich you can turn the government into your own personal marionette, that’s too rich.”

“That’s capitalism.”

“Yes, but democracy is better. What good is unchecked capitalism if it threatens democracy? There have to be checks and balances.”

“So you’re a socialist now?” Dorian asked.

“Nope,” I said. “I’m a moderate. In all things moderation. I know you’re not too familiar with the Good Book, but that’s actually Biblical, you know.”

The piano was clean. Nash had finished searching the chairs.

“Now what?” Nash said.

“I’ll take the bedrooms, you take the kitchen.”

Nash nodded and headed for the hallway.

“By the way,” I said to Dorian, “I know you’re dedicated to your career, but I still think you know more than you’re letting on.”

“Which implies that you do too.”

“Get comfortable,” I said. “You’re in for a long night. Maybe the crime scene techs will let you out in the morning.”

I slammed the door behind me. Dorian didn’t even bother to call after me. He knew better.

Our search of the rest of the house turned up nothing.

Not knowing what else to do, we left Dorian there and headed back to Gracie’s root cellar.