Murder Notes (Lilah Love #1)

He laughs. “I have never been chubby in my life,” he says, already heading to the doorway leading to the foyer.

“You might not be chubby,” I call out, “but you are an asshole. Don’t tell a girl she’s fat or a little thin. You tell her she looks good. She looks beautiful. No wonder you’re single.”

He stops in the archway and turns to face me. “About that. I’m not single and I should warn you before you find out the wrong way. I’m dating Samantha Young.”

I blanch but recover quickly, certain I’ve misunderstood. “What?” I ask, stunned. “As in, the Samantha Young?”

He laughs. “Yes. The Samantha Young.”

He’s amused as if this is nothing, when he knows damn well he’s just punched me in the gut. “For how long?”

“Six months and I know there’s no love lost between the two of you, but we’re going to fix that.”

“She dated my ex. Don’t you think that’s weird?”

“It’s a small town and it was years ago.”

“Andrew—”

“Lilah,” he says firmly, a warning in his tone. “I have to go. I’ll be at the station at seven.” He turns and starts walking.

“That’s it?” I demand to his broad shoulders. “We aren’t going to talk about this?”

“Come lock up,” he calls out, disappearing into the hallway.

I purse my lips and pursue him, fully intending to let him know what I think about this piece of news. But by the time I’ve entered the foyer, he’s about to exit the house when he stops dead in his tracks. I follow his gaze to the corner where Cujo rests, my lips thinning. Damn it, he’s going to make this an issue. Sure enough, he rotates to face me, his blue eyes keenly locked on my face. “Why do you have a shotgun by the door?”

I walk to Cujo and pick him up, facing Andrew. “This is in case you piss me off. You did.”

“Lilah,” he warns again. He’s always warning me in our conversations. It’s his thing. I decide to turn the tables.

“I’m holding a loaded weapon, Andrew. You could at least act a little intimidated.”

“I’m shaking in my size-thirteen boots. But now—”

“Thirteen?” I give him an appalled look, glancing down at the growths at the end of his legs. “Wow. Those really are monsters. When did they get that big?” I glance up at him. “Please tell me you have the equipment to back those up. If not, that would be downright embarrassing. I mean—”

“Stop talking,” he says, clearly not enjoying my attempt to divert his questions. “What is going on with you?”

I stare at him, blinking several times.

“Lilah,” he growls. “Answer me.”

“You said stop talking.”

“Don’t be a smart-ass.” He scowls. “I want an answer.”

“Dead bodies make me nervous,” I lie, though they obviously don’t. Puddles of blood and brain splatter are another story. It’s illogical, of course, that a corpse is fine but other matter is not, but it’s just my reality, one I don’t share with anyone.

“You’ve investigated at least a dozen murders. How can that be possible?”

He’s way off on that number, but correcting him seems counterproductive to my agenda to dodge and weave. “We all have our crosses to bear.”

He narrows his eyes on me. “If you were here—”

“I am home and I still have my shotgun in my hand.”

“Family delivers security.”

His phone rings and he gives me another scowl like I’ve conjured up the interruption. He snatches his phone. “We’re not done talking about this.” He turns and opens the door before I can stop him.

“We need to talk about—”

He shuts it in my face, and I add, “Samantha, Andrew. The woman who fucked Kane this very night.” I take a step and fully intend to talk some sense into him right here and now. Logic prevails, though, and I cradle Cujo, lock the door, and then reset the alarm. Calling him the idiot he’s being wouldn’t go over well, and that’s exactly what I would do. Neither, likely, would me telling him that Samantha is a skank, a bitch, a ho who likes Kane naked as much as she does him. I lean on the door. Samantha Young? How can he be dating Samantha-freaking-Young? This is insanity. The woman fucked Kane. A detail he will find out when presented with Kane’s alibi, which I suddenly need to confirm.

I reach for my phone in my pocket and realize it’s upstairs. Another save I need because I would have called Kane, and I’m not sure that is the right move in this moment. Besides, I know Kane. No matter what he knows or doesn’t know about my brother and Samantha, he’ll tell me he did Andrew a favor by showing him who Samantha really is. But doesn’t my brother already know who she is? Her family’s corrupt. She’s corrupt. What am I missing here? A lot, obviously, that I can’t change right now, which means I need to focus on what I can. Finding my Junior and my assassin.

I push off the door and head down the hallway toward the office. Once I’m up the stairs and back in the heart of Purgatory, I reposition Cujo on the desk and face the wall where I’ve pinned the cards, hands settling on my hips again. My gaze lands on the card that reads SAMANTHA YOUNG. My attention then shifts to the card that says KANE. Then to the one that says ANDREW LOVE. Brow furrowing, I walk to the steps, climb up, and reposition the cards to have Samantha in the center of Andrew’s and Kane’s. I then place my card under Samantha’s.

I’m the common dominator that binds the two men in her life.

I frown, a thought occurring, and I hurry down the step stool and back to the desk, where I sit down and reach for my case file. Opening it, I grab head shots of each victim and several note cards, shoving a pen into my pocket. Walking to the bulletin board again, I pull the step stool with me, and move to the far right to get plenty of naked board space. Climbing the stool, I pin the photos on the board, one row for the LA murders and one row for New York. I climb back down and stare at the problem brewing in my mind and now on my board. Andrew and Kane have Samantha in common. The murders have the assassin in common. But that’s not what is on my mind right now. I am.

I am the only common denominator to every single thing on that board.





CHAPTER EIGHT

I’m not the common denominator, I tell myself, pacing the space in front of the bulletin board. I mean, yes, I’m certainly a common denominator between my idiot, horny brother and my arrogant, dirty-in-every-way ex. But Samantha is a common denominator as well. And yes, the murders connect to Los Angeles and New York, and I could be the link, but so could any one of dozens, or even hundreds, of Hamptons residents with dual residences or business connections to both places. Myself. Samantha. Kane. My father. We all have some dual link. And officially, I’ve now reasoned away my personal involvement in the murders beyond coincidence, something my cranky-ass ex-mentor would say doesn’t exist. Roger would say chance doesn’t happen except in fairy tales. I don’t agree with him. I mean, tell Emma Riley, the college student who just happened to pick the bar where a serial killer was on the hunt, that chance doesn’t become a calculated factor in life and death. And yet there is a nagging voice in my head that says I’m missing something obvious.