Murder My Past (eBook)

Chapter
One

Mountains of muscle lumbered behind us, closing the distance as we plunged through the warehouse door. I slammed home the bolt, locking the goons inside. They rattled the handle as we sprinted away. Like most door hinges in Harlem, these were rusted, but the iron bar was solid. The thugs were trapped. I hoped. They banged again, but the metal gate wouldn’t budge. We galloped across the night-draped parking lot to the jumble of old cars, one hundred yards from the stubborn door.

Sabrina Ross flung open the trunk of a pink Pontiac and glared into the dusty interior. Bubblegum-colored rubber mats covered the floor.

“You remember that old movie with J-Lo and Clooney?” Brina said in a low voice. She was a detective, my boss, my boss’s daughter, and a whole lot more in my life. When Brina Ross spoke, SJ Rook paid attention.

I jabbed at my cell phone and listened to the line ring on the other end. “Yeah, I never could figure out how two grown-ass adults fit into the trunk of a car.”

“Unless they’re dead,” Brina muttered. She holstered her gun in the waistband of her jeans.

I hung up, then hit redial. Norment Ross, Brina’s dad, wasn’t answering. The cavalry was not on its way. I heard a noise and stole a glance at the warehouse.

Brina took off her denim jacket and threw it into the trunk. “Yeah, well unless you’ve got a better idea, I say we hide in here. We’re running out of options.” Shouts rose from the warehouse at the far end of the parking lot. “I’ll get in first. Then you…Hey!”

I launched backwards into the trunk, grabbing her wrist as I fell. She landed hard on the rubber mats. I slammed the hood shut two seconds after she snatched her sandals inside. “I told you I’d get in first! What the hell is wrong with you?”

I jutted my chin into the soft braids on the top of her head. “Shut. Up. Now.”

Male voices in multiple languages fanned through the parking lot. Spanish, Portuguese from Newark’s Ironbound district, some kind of Slavic, and a Vietnamese-accented command voice. Crime in Harlem was an equal opportunity business.

My arms tightened around Brina’s back and she pressed her face into my chest. Sunlit amber of forest paths pricked my nose, her fresh scent mingling with sweat and the tang of blood. Her lip was split, matching my eyebrow. We were in a fix.

Angry shouting swelled, the slits of light around the keyhole flickering as the men passed by. Then all fell silent. We waited several moments in the dark, listening to our breaths even out. I reached over her shoulder to push on the hood. It was locked. I muttered a curse into the thick rows of braids above her temple.

“Looks like we may be here for a while.” Her voice rumbled through my chest, amused rather than pissed off. Which I definitely was. When I didn’t answer, she chirped. “I thought you were calling Daddy.”

“He didn’t pick up.” Her father was the head of our little neighborhood detective firm, the Ross Agency. Norment had sent us to collect against an overdue bill. Sixteen months without one dollar paid was too much even for Norment’s over-generous soul. That job led to our confrontation with the multi-culti gang in the warehouse. And to our retreat to this goddamned pink car trunk.

“Well, call him again.”

“The phone’s somewhere in here. But with you taking up so much space, I can’t move enough to find it.” Dammit, was she smirking? “Roll over.” I pushed her shoulder. “Maybe you can feel it.”

She squirmed, shifting to face the trunk opening, and patted the floor mats. Grainy, sticky, wet, rubbery. But no phone. My knees pressed behind her thighs. She was tall, five eight to my six one, so I adjusted my shoulder to cover hers. Might as well make the best of the close situation, George Clooney style. She relaxed into me and I rested my hand on her hip. “Sorry, it’s tight in here.”

“I can’t feel the phone.” She shoved at the trunk lid. Maybe it would open by magic. Two sharp raps from her fist. Or by brute force. Nothing. We lay for what could have been minutes or only seconds.

My hand grew heavy on her hip. Not pressing, but firm and still. “A little privacy, a little quiet.” I whispered across her ear, its rim warm under my lips.

“Look, we’re cool and all that.” She squeaked, a giggle bubbling inside the cheek next to mine. “But I’m not trying for any of that mess in the trunk of a frickin’ car!”

“But it’s got pink floor mats!” I chuckled. “Brina, relax. You’re safe from funky flirtation.” My stomach molded against her ass, my fingers increasing the pressure on her hip. Dipping my face to the soft bend between her shoulder and neck, I inhaled. “You smell good. Now, no talking.”

She harrumphed and lowered her head to the grimy mat. I waited for more movement, her stillness spooking me. The slits around the key hole darkened. Night in August dropped late and sudden, like a heavyweight boxer’s knockout blow. I counted her heartbeats. Strong, slow, steady as a river they came, thudding against my chest until I lost track of time. I counted past one hundred, maybe one fifty.

I slipped my hand from her hip to rest it against her stomach. The t-shirt was damp with sweat, sticking to the spirals of her belly button. She softened under my touch. “We need to get out of here.”

The cell buzzed, a rude hum against my ribs. I patted the grungy mat until I found the phone. I skated my fingers over the slick face to open the line, then fumbled the phone to my mouth. “Norment? That you? Where are you, man!”

“No. Not Norman. Or whatever you said.” A silky female voice drawled through the electronic crackle. “Is that you, SJ?”

I knew that purr. Low, sandpaper tough, devious, enticing. My ex-wife’s voice hadn’t changed since high school. “Annie! Where are you?”

“No need to shout, SJ. I’m right here in New York.”

“You’re here? Where? How?” Stupid, but still better than croaking like a strangled frog.

“Continental Regent Hotel. For the week. Meet me tomorrow in the bar for drinks.” An order, not an invitation.

“Sure, Annie. What time?”

“Seven-thirty too late?”

“No. Fine. I’ll be there.”

Annie hung up. Silence. No greeting, no explanation. No adios or good night. Silence. Payback for the last seven years of our mean marriage. And the three dark years since our divorce.

Brina jumped on the case. “Who was that? Didn’t sound like a wrong number.”

“Ex-wife. Anniesha Perry. She’s in town for the week.” My heart thumped against Brina’s spine.

“She’s from Texas, right?” Her voice was tight and higher than usual.

“No. Florida. Miami.” I swallowed the groan rising from my gut. I wasn’t having this conversation here. Or anywhere in the known universe. My past could stay past. For at least one more day. Or forever.

“We gotta get out of here. Now.” Was that squawk really my voice?

She turned her head; moonlight seeped along the edges of the trunk’s lid. Jutting from her cornrows, a slender metal hook grazed my face.

“Hey! You poked me in the eye with that idiot hairpin!” I sucked breath at the sudden idea. “Give it to me.” With a few twists, I tugged the bobby pin from her braid. I hummed as I bent it. “Switch places with me.”

Brina rolled under me. She snickered as I balanced on knuckles and toes over her. Not going to crush my boss. Unless absolutely necessary. Code of a gentleman, a soldier, and a private eye. I worked the hairpin into the key hole. After a few strokes, the lock yielded.

I eased from the trunk, unfolding the cramped muscles in my torso. I crouched beside the Pontiac to scan the parking lot. Clear. The goons were gone. Straightening, I grabbed Brina’s hand and pulled her out. A smirk creased her face in the humid moonlight. She retrieved her jacket, stained with oil and sludge from the floor of the trunk. As she brushed transparent insect wings from her t-shirt, I punched Norment’s number again. Success.

As I rattled ice in the heavy tumbler, memories washed through me. Out of the cloud-pink past, a woman ambled into a ritzy bar. A guy dropped his jaw, his wallet, his pants. Not necessarily in that order. Rollercoaster soared, swooped, crashed, and trundled on. I swallowed the soda’s fizz. My mind rambled through our shared past, bracing for the ride to begin again.

Anniesha Perry, wife of my youth, was the woman. I was the guy. This swanky hotel saloon was the rollercoaster’s latest stop. I wasn’t the teenager who’d first met Anniesha or the young soldier who’d married her, but the thought of her could still send me to that fine summit where all the time and sex and money and laughter in the world were mine to take. The rollercoaster had crashed, of course. Several times before I reached forty. Our divorce was three years old, after seven years of married strife. But the carnival ride still circled. Not past enough.

Working as a private investigator in New York toughened me against the soaring and crashing. Right? Grew a turtle’s horny shell for skin. And tied a knot of gristle where my heart used to beat. Sure. After two years tackling the grit and grief of neighborhood cases, Harlem sophistication dusted my shoulders. Right? Wrong.

The bar Annie picked was the jewel in a mid-town fortress of luxury I’d never enter on my own. The Continental Regent hotel...