Chapter 23
Summer dragged the mouse around what appeared to be a mishmash of numbers, letters, and symbols and explained in the most confusing technical geek-speak what she was looking at. Taryn’s mind went blank. “In English, please.”
Summer grinned. “I forget you don’t speak geek.”
Taryn imagined what kind of reception her sexy friend would have if she ever dropped into the middle of a nerd convention where everyone spoke her same language. Mixing her brilliance with her pinup looks, Summer would probably give the drooling nerds strokes.
“I’ll speak slowly so you can understand,” Summer teased. “Rick was right about the cyber-stalker. Someone loaded up a program so that anytime a search was made for Teddy Brinkman, any of his known aliases, or Honey, the author got a ping. Then any searches you made after that initial ping were watched by the hacker.”
“Damn. Stalking without hiding in bushes,” Taryn said. She’d have to have Summer clear her laptop of malware. “That’s how the shooters knew we’d be at the storage unit. It wasn’t just a coincidence.”
“They were probably waiting for us,” Rick said. “The question remains, why? Why would they care if we were searching that unit? Other than the car, there wasn’t anything of any worth in there unless you viewed the Pinto as valuable.”
“Unless they didn’t know there was nothing in there to steal,” Taryn said. She paced the room. “Is there any way to link the hacker back to the source?”
Summer shrugged. “I can try, but it won’t be easy. Whoever set this up did an elaborate cover-up. I might be able to get something, but it may take weeks. If ever. The hacker is good.”
“Then we’ll have to narrow down our suspects and find Brinkman and the shooters through deductive reasoning,” Taryn continued without missing a beat.
“Where are you going with this, Sherlock?” Rick crossed his arms and waited.
“Let’s see. Who do we have in play? Brinkman, Honey, her two sons, the former wives and their friends and family. The two sons could be the shooters and our burglar. That fits. The former wives would have every right to be angry and could have hired someone to find and take Brinkman out. ” She shifted her eyes to Rick. “But then they wouldn’t get their money or property back.”
He frowned. “I’ve never denied wanting to pound Brinkman, but trust me, my mom doesn’t have the means or the contacts to hire a hit man on the side.”
Taryn smiled. “We’ll count her out.” She moved on. “We know Jane Clark wants him to suffer and admitted to having friends ready to shoot him, but I think she just wants her painting back. Can we agree that she’s low on the suspect list?”
“I agree,” Rick said.
“The other wives could have motive. However, it’s unlikely a scorned wife from more than, say, five years ago is involved. They’ll cheer if he goes to jail, but probably wouldn’t still be actively searching for him.”
“Good point,” Summer said. “I’ll check on the wife from Arizona with the website and see what she’s been up to, though I suspect she’s not our hacker.”
“Then we’re back to Honey’s sons,” he said. “They’d be protective of their mother and young enough to be in the age group of our shooters. Yet why they’d want to chase us away from the storage unit is a mystery.”
Agreeing with everything, Taryn’s brain seized with the complicated puzzle. Although they’d made progress, there were still a lot of questions remaining.
There was an avenue they hadn’t gone down. “What if they weren’t protecting the car but looking for it?” As soon as the comment left her mouth, the idea took off. “Could they have used us for a lead? If Brinkman stole from Honey, they may be looking for his cache. We led them to the unit.”
“Huh.” Rick rubbed his chin. “They might have been worried we would find his secret stash before they did, and warned us off. It’s a stretch but could fit.”
“Of course it fits. You are a genius, Taryn,” Summer said and clapped. “No wonder Irving hired you. It wasn’t just because you look good in tight pants.”
Taryn’s eyes narrowed. “Thanks. I think.”
“Before we celebrate, we have to figure in the break-in at your house,” Rick said. “What’s the point of that?”
This wasn’t easy to untangle.
“Unless the sons thought we found a secret treasure in the car,” he added without waiting for an answer. “But what would Brinkman have worth stealing?”
“It could be anything,” Summer said. “Or nothing.”
“I think I need an aspirin.” Taryn closed her eyes and rocked in the chair. “I thought having no clues was frustrating. Now we have lots of clues and we’re still missing the middle and hardest part of any puzzle.”
“Like when a third of a puzzle is blue sky,” Summer offered and clicked off the screen. “I’m heading over to see Irving’s new plaid golf balls. Anyone else want to come along?”
“Nope.”
“No.”
Sighing, she left.
Rick took her open seat. “I think we should go home, have sex, and think about this later with clear minds.”
Taryn smiled. “Is that line supposed to work with all women, or just me?”
“Just you.” He nudged her chair with his boot. “Many a crime has been solved after sex, a beer, and a hoagie. Just ask J. Edgar Hoover. He closed some big cases in a post-coital haze. I’m sure I read that somewhere.”
“Wrong. I think he solved crimes while wearing pantyhose,” she said and nudged him back. “That’s why women are premier problem solvers. Wearing too-tight hose pushes all the blood up to their heads for optimal brain power.”
Rick chuckled. “Then no sex?”
“I never said that.” She stood. “I’ll race you to the car.”
* * *
Despite Rick’s assurance that sex would solve their case, they were no further ahead than before. “You lied to me. The case is still stagnant in the water.” Taryn ran a hand over his bare chest and teased his nipple. “I think you just wanted sex.”
Rick kicked the sheet off and dislodged Sweet’ums from the bed. The dog growled from the floor. “It would have been better sex if that dog hadn’t spent half of it sniffing my balls.”
Taryn laughed. “He was just feeling nostalgic and jealous. He’s fixed.”
Laughter deepening, she rolled over and lay half on top of him. He cupped her bare butt. “Next time I’ll lock him out. I promise. He just looked too sad when we went to the office without him.”
Rick lifted his head. “Sad? The dog looks like he was hit in the face with a shovel. How can you tell what he’s thinking?”
“Be nice.” Despite his outward coolness toward the dog, she was sure she’d seen him rubbing the top of Sweet’ums’s head with an index finger when he thought she wasn’t looking. That was progress. Soon they’d be sharing a water bowl.
“I let him sniff my balls. I am being nice.”
Taryn almost fell off the bed. As the laughter died a moment later, she turned serious. “Do you really think Honey’s boys are behind the shooting and break-in?”
“I do.”
This was hard to argue against. They fit the general description of the shooters. “What would be their reason?” She had her own ideas and wanted to know his.
“Like we discussed, the attack might boil down to retrieving stolen property for Honey. Or maybe Honey is missing and they’re trying to find her. This wouldn’t be the first time a corpse was found in a storage locker.”
“Nice. Let’s not go with that,” she said.
“Or Brinkman could have run off with her. If they discovered his con too late, they could be worried for her safety. Or maybe they thought we were stealing the Pinto. At this point, anything goes.”
His thoughts were similar to hers. They made a good team. She laid her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat. Even if the romance was temporary, she’d take what she could. It was better to have loved and lost than to have never had mind-blowing sex at all. Wasn’t that saying embroidered on a pillow somewhere?
For the first time since her divorce, she’d let herself cut loose and have fun with risks. Even Dave the race car driver had been all about getting over her hurt and proving she was still attractive. Now, she was with a man who knew her imperfections and liked her anyway. And she liked him back.
“We need to get up.” She pushed off him. He groaned in protest. “We have thieves to catch.”