Alex drove silently down the highway toward Baltimore, but I wanted to talk about what had just happened. He hadn’t said a word after leaving Derek’s office, other than when he opened my door to get into the car and told me to watch my head as I got in.
For me, talking things out made them better. Sure, nothing much would get solved by us discussing the fact that a person he used to work with and would have put his life on the line for now openly claimed to another police officer that he wished it were me instead of Samuel killed in that jewelry store.
But that didn’t matter. At least talking about it would ease my mind.
The problem was that for Alex, talking rarely made things better. Not really a person who saw much use for discussing painful ideas, he’d much rather say nothing about it, as if ignoring what Stephen said to Craig made it like it had never happened.
I’d stared out the window for nearly fifteen minutes as all these thoughts rolled around in my brain, but each passing moment made it harder to hold back from saying something about it. In truth, I needed to hear Alex say something—anything—that made me feel like I wasn’t alone in this.
Which I already knew. I wasn’t stupid. I knew full well that if he had heard Stephen say those horrible things about me that he likely would have cold-cocked him right there in the Food King. The thought of that actually made me smile. I imagined Stephen standing there in the canned fruits and vegetables aisle with that smug expression I hated on his face and Alex cocking his arm back far enough that when he let his fist fly, it would slam into Stephen’s ignorant face like a brick into cream cheese. The image of him falling into a stack of canned peas and the cans all tumbling down on him as he fell to the floor pleased me more than it should have.
“What are you smiling about over there?” Alex asked, tearing me out of my violent fantasy.
I looked at him and smiled, happy to hear him speaking for the first time on this trip. “Cans of peas. And bricks and cream cheese.”
He made a strange, confused face and then turned his head to face me for a moment before turning back to look at the road. “You mean like cream cheese icing? Are you thinking of that for the wedding cake? Because if you are, I have to say I’m not completely against that.”
Chuckling, I took hold of his right hand and gave it a tiny squeeze. “No, I wasn’t, but we can talk to Sherry about that tomorrow at the Charming Cakes tasting. Do you know how cute you can be sometimes?”
Alex smiled and moved into the passing lane to get around two trucks. “I have heard I can be cute. It’s true. I’m not sure what I said there that was so cute, but I’m glad it made you laugh.”
“I’m just glad you’re talking. I was getting a little worried there for a while,” I said, cautiously dancing around the subject I wanted to discuss.
He squeezed my hand gently and smiled again. “I’m about to marry a woman who is capable of talking every minute of the day. I have no illusions about not talking ever again.”
“Good. Talking is something that I think can help in most situations. You know, like this one,” I said sweetly, taking another step closer to the topic we needed to discuss.
I waited for his smile to fade and for him to fall silent once again, but he surprised me by simply shrugging and then saying, “I’m not sure what can be said other than you were right about Stephen all the while. He was that guy you said he was toward you.”
That wasn’t the direction I’d expected this conversation to take. I didn’t blame Alex for wanting to believe his fellow officer wasn’t actively being nasty to me. He trusted that men like himself would act professionally. I didn’t blame him for that. I respected him for being so noble.
Even if I had been right all along about Stephen.
“Well, even if that is the case, that’s not what I think we should be talking about.”
He didn’t say anything for a long moment, but when he did, it was one of those times that I knew there was nowhere else on this earth safer than right by his side.
“Poppy, I’m not going to let him or anyone else ever hurt you. If he tries anything, I’ll stop him, even if that means he loses his life. I don’t have anything else to say except that and I love you and part of being the man who loves you is protecting you.”
When the final word left his mouth, he lifted our joined hands to his lips and softly brushed his lips over my knuckles before glancing over toward me. “I suspect you, on the other hand, have a lot more to say because that’s who you are, so whatever it is you want to talk about, we have the time now.”
The way he accepted who I was, even though we were so different, made me chuckle. “Well, I’m glad you aren’t as enraged as you were back at the station. I mean, I like the idea of you being enraged to defend my honor and all that, but enraged Alex sort of frightens me sometimes. You get that whole Incredible Hulk vibe to you and I’m afraid you’re going to tear a phone book apart or something.”
He laughed out loud and looked over at me for a second. “Tear a phone book apart? When was the last time you saw a phone book anywhere, Poppy?”
Rolling my eyes, I took his teasing for what it was and said, “You know what I meant. I was channeling 1970s TV Incredible Hulk there more than the movie hulks from a few years ago.”
“Whatever you were channeling, I think you’re saying I have no control over my anger and I’m green. Neither of those things are good, as far as I can tell.”
“Fine. You don’t remind me of the Incredible Hulk. I just get worried when you get angry sometimes. You tend to bottle up your emotions so much that when you let them out, it’s a little unnerving is all.”
Knowing what I said was true, Alex nodded. “Well, I can honestly say that since I’ve been with you, Miss McGuire, I have gotten better about the bottling up emotions business. Remember, before you came along, I spent most of my time alone out at my house.”
As much as I wanted to talk about Stephen and what he’d said about me, the subject of where we would live after we married had been on my mind too, along with about a million other things wedding and non-wedding related, so I took the opportunity to broach the housing topic.
“Speaking of that house of yours, what’s going to happen once we get married? We won’t need two houses.”
He thought about my question for a long moment and shrugged. “I guess we’ll sell it. I haven’t been there for more than a few minutes anyway in the past six months anyway. Or maybe we can sell both our houses and find a brand new one to start our lives in.”
Until that very moment he suggested selling my house in addition to his, I’d never even considered the notion that I wouldn’t live in my house forever. The mere mention of it made me feel queasy, even though I didn’t exactly know why.
“I’m guessing by your silence that you aren’t a big fan of selling both houses?” he asked before glancing over at me.
“I don’t know. I’d never even thought of it before right now.”
Alex raised my hand to his lips again and softly kissed my fingers. “What if we decide to move away from Sunset Ridge at some point? We’d have to sell both houses then.”
Move away from Sunset Ridge? Why was he talking about that? Who wanted to move out of town?
“Is there something you want to tell me about, Alex? Is something happening that means we’ll be leaving Sunset Ridge?” I asked as my mind whirled with a dozen other questions I was too afraid to ask.
He didn’t answer immediately, instead concentrating on the road and driving past a few cars that hadn’t gotten the news that the speed limit had been increased from forty miles an hour. After what felt like an eternity, he drove back into the right lane and said, “No, but you never know what the future holds, Poppy.”
You never know what the future holds? What did he mean by that?
I didn’t know which upset me more—Stephen spouting off in his ignorant way at the Food King that it should have been me who was murdered or the idea that at some point Alex and I would move away from Sunset Ridge. It may have sounded silly, but for all its problems, I loved the town I’d grown up in. I thought he did too.
Well, maybe not loved it but had at least come to see it as somewhere he wanted to live.
“Do you want to move away from Sunset Ridge?” I asked, unsure I wanted to hear the answer to that question.
As he took the exit and began to drive down the ramp, he casually answered, “I don’t know. As long as you’re there with me, I could probably live anywhere.”
Anywhere? I wasn’t sure what he was referring to, but I didn’t think I liked it.
While I stewed over moving from Sunset Ridge and what that would mean, he drove through the streets of East Baltimore until he stopped on East Madison Street. I’d been so lost in thought that when I looked out the window at the place we’d driven to, I wondered if he’d gotten us lost.
“Did you intentionally drive here?” I asked as I stared out at dilapidated buildings and rundown houses I wasn’t sure were even inhabitable.
He turned the car off and nodded. “Yeah. Jefferson Sterling’s office is just down the street.”
Unsure I even wanted to get out of the car, I hesitated as he slammed his car door shut. Alex came around to my door and opened it, looking down at me with confusion as I sat there in the passenger seat not moving.
“What’s wrong?”
I scanned the neighborhood and saw no one particularly dangerous looking, but the entire area just seemed so decrepit I wasn’t sure I liked even being there. Something told me being in that part of the city was just asking for trouble.
“Are we going to be okay here?” I asked, still not making much progress in getting out of the car as my legs were with my head on this place being no good.
Alex extended his hand and nodded. “We’ll be fine. It’s broad daylight, and I have a gun. This place isn’t the worst part of the city, so don’t worry. You’re in good hands with me.”
Sure about only one thing—that Alex would always protect me—I trusted in his judgment and took his hand for help to get out of the car. Once outside, I quickly took a look around and hoped he was right. Wherever we were, I definitely didn’t want to move here, even with Alex.
We walked down the block toward an old building with a red brick façade that had definitely seen better times. I imagined in earlier days, maybe even during the colonial period, it had looked stately and strong like brick buildings always seemed to look. Now, however, it looked like it may collapse at any moment.
I reached down and searched for Alex’s hand as I asked, “Where are we?”
He clasped onto my hand and held it tightly, betraying how little he believed in what he’d said about this place being safe. “East Baltimore. The Old Town Mall area.”
“This place is like a run-down ghost town. I hate being in places like this. It makes me think about what might happen to Sunset Ridge in the future.”
Alex looked at me and frowned. “This place didn’t have what Sunset Ridge has.”
“What’s that?” I wondered as I looked around and saw building after building that looked like no one had been in them in ages.
At least not for anything legal.
“A community that cares about what happens to the town. This area didn’t have that, and once people left for the suburbs, it just kept going downhill until it ended up like you see now. Believe it or not, there was a huge shopping mall just a little ways down there a decade or two before I was born. Now it’s all abandoned.”
“And this is where Jefferson Sterling has his office?”
Alex stopped and pointed at the old red brick building in front of us. “Right here upstairs, if I’m remembering correctly. Ready?”
“The sooner we get done here and I get back to my cozy little town where people care what happens to it the better,” I said, meaning that in more than one way.
I didn’t want to be in this part of Baltimore, but I also didn’t want to move from my hometown. I liked living where people cared. I knew they cared too much about the wrong things sometimes, but it still was a hundred times better than living somewhere that no one cared for at all.
The inside of the building surprised me, thank God, and didn’t feel like it would come down around our heads if a stiff wind blew or if someone slammed a door too hard. The elevator on the main floor looked usable, but after pressing the button and waiting for a few minutes, we decided to take the stairs. I took each step gingerly, afraid one wrong move could land me in the basement, but after a few didn’t even creak much, I hurried up behind Alex to the second floor.
A dark hallway cut the floor in half, and two doors out of four had printing on them to say they were occupied. We passed by the first one that said Dr. Reginald Hunter, Oral Surgeon. Behind the frosted glass, people could be seen sitting down in the waiting room. I cringed at the mere thought of having my teeth worked on in this place.
Further down the hallway past two empty offices was the office of the man we’d come to see. The writing on the frosted glass in his door said Jefferson Sterling, and beneath his name in elegant script were the words Private Investigations.
Pointing at the text, I said, “Fancy. Is this an indication of what kind of person he is?”
Alex shook his head. “No. Think the exact opposite, if I recall correctly.”
He rapped on the door with his knuckles, and we waited to hear someone tell us to come in. But we heard nothing from behind the door. Alex knocked again, this time a little harder, and said loudly, “Mr. Sterling? I’m Officer Alex Montero from the Sunset Ridge police department. I have some questions for you.”
Seconds later, the door slowly opened and there in front of us stood a man who looked to be in his early fifties with greying brown hair who looked like he’d just woken up. Scrubbing his face, he said in a gravelly voice, “What’s a small town cop want with me?”
“Jefferson Sterling, I’m Officer Alex Montero and this is my partner Poppy McGuire. We’d like to speak to you about one of your clients. Samuel Morrow,” Alex said in the authoritative voice he usually only reserved for suspects.
“Samuel Morrow?” the man repeated in a surprised voice.
“Yes. Can we come in? I’d like to ask you some questions about your relationship with him.”
Jefferson Sterling stepped back and opened his office door wide so we could enter. We walked into a dark room with a couch and an old portable TV to our right and a desk and chair on the back wall between two windows that had the shades drawn. He closed the door and walked past us to a small room on the left that looked to be a tiny bathroom.
“Take a seat. I’ll be out in a minute. Make yourselves comfortable.”
Alex and I looked around at the seating options and then looked at each other. With a chuckle, he said, “I guess it’s the couch or the couch.”
I leaned in close to him and whispered, “I think this guy has read one too many Mickey Spillane novels. I’d bet he wanted to put the word gumshoe on the door in that fancy lettering but someone talked him out of it. Maybe some dame he knows and sees sometimes.”
As we sat down on the stiff couch, Alex smiled and said, “You know, I love your imagination.”
“But?” I asked, sensing there was a second part to that statement.
He shook his head. “No but. I just love your imagination. I would have never thought of any of that just by walking in here. To me, this is just some guy’s office in a rundown building.”
I placed my head on his shoulder and squeezed his arm to me. “It’s a gift. And a curse. And I probably just made this guy way cooler than he actually is.”
“Probably.”
Just then, the bathroom door opened and Jefferson Sterling emerged looking slightly better than he had a few minutes ago. His hair, now slicked back off his face, didn’t look like he’d just been sleeping on the very couch where we now sat, and his shirt was now tucked in instead of hanging out over the front of his pants. He didn’t look much better otherwise, but at least he looked dressed and ready to answer Alex’s questions.
“So you want to ask me about Samuel Morrow, huh?” he asked as he grabbed a metal folding chair from the corner of the room and opened it up to sit down.
“Yes. I believe he hired you right after the beginning of this year. I’d like to know what for.”
Sterling hesitated for a moment and didn’t reply, instead walking over to the windows behind his desk to lift the shades. As I sat there examining a room that looked even worse in full daylight, I wondered if there was some private eye-client privilege I’d never heard about. But then he pursed his lips and nodded, as if to say he understood he needed to answer Alex.
“Yeah, he hired me. Wanted me to keep an eye on someone,” Sterling said as he sat down in the metal chair across from us.
“Who did he want you to watch?” Alex asked, and I sensed this meeting would be like pulling teeth trying to get answers out of this man.
But he didn’t hedge his answer and immediately answered, “His wife.”
I sat staring at him, surprised at how easy it had been to get that from him and surprised at the answer he’d given. So Samuel had been having his wife watched. But why?
“Did he tell you why he wanted you to keep an eye on her?” Alex asked.
Sterling nodded. “Yeah. He was worried she was cheating on him.”
Excited by this news, I blurted out, “With who?”
Alex turned to look at me and gave me a tiny smile that said I hadn’t broken any protocol with Sterling. We both waited for him to answer, and I silently bet that he would say the beefcake driver, Bruno.
And then he said it. “He thought she was sleeping with her driver.”
God, I couldn’t wait for this guy to start spilling the beans on Eliza and Bruno!
I sat practically on the edge of the couch as Alex calmly asked, “Well, what did you find out?”
As casually as if he was telling us the time, Jefferson Sterling said with a wide grin, “Well, I guess that depends on what you call cheating.”
Now I was really intrigued.