Murder Notes (Lilah Love #1)

Sometimes you get further with sugar than salt, even if the sugar has a few slips of the tongue that start with the letter F. If I want to empower my brother, I need to fade to the center of the Hamptons crowd. I need to be Laura Love’s daughter, not the outsider with a badge. Setting that tone is really as easy as adding a little flash. I dress to impress, which means brand, brand, brand. My jeans are expensive. My boots, purse, blazer, and coat, all classic Louis Vuitton. Even the briefcase I fill with all my notes and documents to keep sticky-fingers Junior from reading them is Louis Vuitton.

I’m just heading to the kitchen to make my way to the garage when Tic Tac calls, and I know what he’s going to say. “Woods is now on the Emerson client list,” I supply, grabbing a bottle of water for the road.

“He is. I’m baffled as to how anyone thinks we wouldn’t have the original records.”

“Sometimes people throw a web so wide they get caught themselves,” I say, leaning on the kitchen island. “It’s going to be interesting to see if I’m suddenly told Woods killed Emerson as well today. Even more so if that net is wide enough to include the LA cases.”

“I’m rechecking every Woods connection to those victims to see if they, too, have a sudden link that didn’t exist before.”

“Text me if you get a hit.”

We disconnect and I pull up my e-mail on my phone, and sure enough. Now that Detective Moser has doctored the records, he’s sent me the Emerson file I’ll read before the party tonight. Right now, I deal with my brother. I take a step for the garage again and pause with a thought that sends me back to the living room, where I grab the camera and remove the tape inside. Sorry, Junior. The only person watching my skin flick is me. My debut on Pornhub hopefully avoided, I finally make my way to the garage, open the door, and stare at the empty space. My rental is still at the train station. Apparently I can be trusted to solve murders but not to keep track of a giant steel box on wheels. I dial a driver, and while I wait for the car, I pull up the security footage on my computer and delete the footage of Kane and me without looking at it. I have the original if I get lonely.

Thirty minutes later, a driver drops me at my rental, and just when I was thinking Junior was sleeping late for the weekend, I find a note on my car. The impact is not dread but a deep sigh of not again, and I wonder if Junior knows the impact is diluted at this point. I don’t even bother with gloves. I snatch the damn thing up and read:

B is for Body.

B is for Buried.

And I know where.

Do you?

Junior followed Kane and therefore knows more than me. This irritates me rather than scares me. I’m going to make my brother feel like a king, but Junior is another story. Certain I’m being watched, I crumple the note in my hand, open the car, and toss the paper onto the back seat. I hope my message is clear. I’m not going to cower.





CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Turns out my brother isn’t at the police station but rather at Goldberg’s Famous Bagels, a hopping weekend breakfast spot not far from the station. And because what’s a sister for if not to show up unannounced, I decide to surprise him and drive that way. Since a white, generic rental doesn’t exactly scream Laura Love’s daughter, I park at the side of the building, and it’s still packed with cars. I head inside, and as much as I don’t want to lug my briefcase with me, I don’t dare leave it behind with all my case notes, and, of course, the sex tape. It goes with me.

With it and my purse in tow, I enter the weekend hustle and bustle of the restaurant, most of the wooden tables filled, a selection of famous faces in the crowd to include DiCaprio and two of the Real Housewives of someplace. I know the Botoxed faces but not the places. The hostess greets me and I spy my brother, and the company he’s keeping tells me why I didn’t get an invite. Samantha is on his left, while Alexandra is in front of her and Eddie across from Andrew. At least I’ve told Alexandra we won’t be playing nice; therefore, my hostility won’t be suspicious. She’ll never know I now have reason to believe she could have been a part of a plot to rape and kill me.

I motion to their table, and the hostess nods. I start walking that direction, silently cheering myself on as I do. You will not hit anyone, punch anyone, kick anyone, and most definitely, you will not armbar Alexandra and demand she spill her secrets, secrets she might not even have. That would be very un-FBI-agent-worthy behavior. And no matter what my sins—or fetish for an off-limits man—are, I love the honor of the badge. I will be good, I vow one last time as I pull up a chair and sit down at the table between Eddie and Andrew.

“Damn, Andrew,” I declare, setting my bags on the back of my seat. “I’m your sister. I can’t get an invite for a bagel?”

Andrew, in uniform, as is Eddie, fixes me with a mock-stunned look, his lips barely containing a smile. “She eats. She talks. She can be social. Are you my real sister?”

“I thought you knew me,” I chide, shrugging out of my coat. “I do those things on Saturdays. On Sundays, however, it’s all about sleeping late, cursing at strangers, drinking booze, and smoking cigarettes, in case you want to join me.”

“You always curse at strangers,” Samantha offers, flipping her long, blonde hair. “And everyone else.”

“She likes the F-word,” Alexandra says. “It’s really all she ever says, and that’s not even cussing in New York City.”

In moments like this, when Alexandra manages to look and sound every bit the brunette schoolgirl next door, it shows that she didn’t make assistant DA for no reason. She uses her sweet persona against people. Maybe even to convince people they’re her friends before she helps get them murdered.

I tune her and Samantha out and focus on my brother. “How bad was the press spin on what I said yesterday?”

“We answered more calls in person and on the phone about it than any real work,” Eddie says, his blue eyes locked on me.

“Sounds more interesting than the standard keys-locked-in-cars calls you get here,” I say dryly, and watching the table carefully, I add, “Thankfully M is not for Murder often in this town.”

Eddie bristles under the nerve I’ve hit. “Protecting the security of the high-profile residents of this town does not equate to keys locked in cars,” he states, while no one else blinks at my murder note reference.

“Though,” Alexandra offers, “Riley Aster did lock her keys in her car last night.”

Eddie looks at her. “What the hell, Alexandra?”

And I swear, I almost give Alexandra the satisfaction of laughing, but then she pats his cheek and does this baby-talk voice and says, “You were so good to help her,” and those Cheetos start churning in my stomach.

“M,” Andrew says, “is for mac n’ cheese. Mrs. Smith called and offered to bring you mac n’ cheese after you accused me of depriving you of that necessity on camera.”

Laughing, I say, “Score for me. There’s a reason her show competes with Martha Stewart. I’ll stay an extra day just to take her up on that.”

“Well, get it fast,” Eddie says. “Turns out we’ve connected Woods to the case you were looking into in New York as well. Detective Moser called this morning with compelling evidence.”

I cut him an irritated look and then eye Samantha and Alexandra. “I wasn’t aware that we decided who was privy to our casework based on who gets naked with who.”

“She’s right,” Andrew says. “This is internal business.” He leans over to Samantha and whispers in her ear, his head low to hers, intimate, and I swear, seeing my brother with this woman, I think day and night could be switched at any moment. It’s just unnatural.