Клео Коул - Decaffeinated Corpse

“How?”

“I’m pretty sure a police siren spooked the mugger first, and then when this robber came back, I was there with Ric.”

“Then you saw the mugger?”

“No. Before I had the chance, I was introduced to our back wall.” I lifted my bangs, showing Mike my bruised forehead.

“God, Clare...”

I dropped my bangs, but he reached out to lift them again. With one hand, he held back my hair. With the other, he tested the bruise’s discolored edges. The rough pads of his fingers were gentle, but the injury was sore.

I winced.

“Sorry...” he whispered. “Damn that ex-husband of yours. He should have called 911.”

Mike appeared to continue examining the bruise, but the affectionate way he kept stroking my hair was starting to scramble my brains. He just wouldn’t stop touching me, and for a moment I lost my voice along with my train of thought.

“It’s okay,” I finally managed. “Ric was the one who needed the ER. He was pistol-whipped pretty badly. When I first found him, he was unconscious.”

Mike’s hand released my chestnut bangs, but he didn’t pull away. Slowly, gently, he began to curl locks of hair around my ear. As his blue eyes studied my green ones, he seemed to be thinking something over. Then one finger drew a line down my jaw, stopping beneath my chin.

If he had leaned just a little closer, he could have kissed me. But he didn’t lean closer. He leaned back, taking the heat of his touch with him.

“I’ve got news for you, Clare,” he said quietly, “if the mugger hit him that hard, then it’s not a simple robbery.”

“What is it?”

“Attempted murder.”

“Is the flatfoot gone?” Matt asked.

It was almost midnight. I’d just climbed the back stairs and entered my duplex to find my ex-husband pacing the living room like a recently caged tiger. His expensive duds were gone. He was back to the sort of clothes I was used to him wearing—an old, knobby fisherman’s sweater and well worn blue jeans.

“Yes, Mike’s gone,” I said, tossing my keys onto the Chippendale end table. I was grubby and hungry, feeling the need for a jasmine bath and a PB and Nutella sandwich, if possible simultaneously. “Since our talk went on for a while, I sent Tucker home and closed myself. Unfortunately, two NYU Law study groups swung in around ten and nearly drank us dry. I had to kick the last of them out to lock up.”

Matt seemed ready to retort with something snippy but stopped himself. After a few seconds of silence, he said, “You look tired...”

“I am.”

“Are you hungry? I warmed up some of my stew for Ric. There’s some left on the stove.”

“Great...” I turned to head into the kitchen. Matt stepped by me, touching my arm. “Take a load off. I’ll get it.”

I wasn’t going to argue. I’d set the bar low with the PB and Nutella simply because I was too tired to do anything more than slather my plain peanut butter sandwich with hazelnut-chocolate spread. I much preferred a hot, meaty snack—as long as I didn’t have to cook it myself. And, it appeared, I didn’t.

I dropped into a rosewood armchair, pulled off my low-heeled boots, and wiggled my sore toes inside my forest green socks. They seemed to disappear against the jewel-toned colors of the Persian area rug.

Madame had done an amazing job decorating this duplex. The richly patterned carpet provided a lovely counterpoint to the lighter motifs in the room’s color scheme. The walls were pale peach, the marble fireplace and sheer draperies a creamy white. The chairs and sofa were upholstered in a finely striped pattern of mandarin silk. Anchored above my head, in the fleur-de-lys ceiling molding, was a pulley chandelier of polished bronze and six blushing globes of faceted crystal.

Whenever Matt was in town, which was rarely more than one week a month, he had the legal right to use this apartment, too. Neither of us owned it outright. Madame had merely granted us equal rights to use this antique-filled West Village duplex rent free.

I’d tried arguing with Matt, but he wasn’t willing to give up his rights to the tasty piece of real estate with two working fireplaces and a newly renovated bath of Italian marble—and neither was I. Given the high cost of living in this neighborhood, and our own anemic savings accounts, we’d agreed on an uneasy truce.

Matt approached me with a warm bowl of his carne con café , a coffee-infused beef stew. He’d adapted the recipe from a traditional Mayan dish, which he’d enjoyed on one of his trips to El Salvador.

“Mmmmm...” I murmured, “smells like sustenance.”

I dug in with gusto, appreciating the tang of the garlicky tomatoes and the brightness of the poblanos against the earthy combination of beef and coffee. Matt had placed a hunk of crusty French bread on top of the bowl. I dipped the bread in the thick, meaty gravy, and tore off a sloppy mouthful.

“How long have you been back?” I mumbled through my less-than-ladylike chomping.

“A little over an hour,” Matt said. “I saw your cop boyfriend through the Blend’s windows, so we came up through the alley entrance.”

“He’s not my boyfriend... and did you just say we ?”

“Ric and I.”

“Ric’s here?”

“He’s upstairs, in my bedroom.”

“They didn’t admit him at the hospital?”

“His scan checked out okay. No hemorrhaging. They wanted to admit him for observation, but he refused, and I wouldn’t let him go back to his hotel.”

“So we can keep an eye on him? Or because of the stolen keycard?” I asked.

“Both.”

“Keeping an eye on him is easy. What about the keycard? Can the hotel change the locks?”

“They already have.”

Matt moved to one of the windows, pushed back the sheers. Peering past the flower boxes, he surveyed the shadowy street. “Ric notified the Marriott before we left for the ER—”

“So that’s why you lent him your cell phone?”

Matt nodded. “Tomorrow I’m going with him to his hotel. I’m checking him out of that midtown location and bringing him downtown, closer to us.”

“Where exactly?”

“There are a few hotels I used to use regularly before I moved in here. I’ll find out who has vacancies and check him in under my name.”

“Who’s after him, Matt?”

“I don’t know.”

Matt stalked to the fireplace, grabbed a poker, and adjusted the crackling log. The night was cold, the stairwell downright chilly. I was glad he’d warmed the living room with the modest blaze.

“Not a clue? Come on?”

“Ric’s still pretending this is nothing serious, but he admitted to me in the ER waiting room that he felt as if someone’s been following him.”

“Has he seen anyone? Man, woman, old, young, large, small—”

“Just footsteps behind him, sometimes he’ll catch a shadow. He’s actually been in the city about three weeks, but it wasn’t until this past week that he started receiving a number of strange calls at his hotel.”

I sat up straighter. “What kind of calls? Someone with a mechanical voice again?”

“No. Whoever was calling just hung up when Ric answered.”

“So someone’s been watching him? Waiting for a chance to strike?”

“That’s what I think. Even though he still claims tonight was a random mugging, he’s agreed to stay here, as a precaution. He’s had a pretty rough night. I think he’s already asleep.”

“In your bed?”

“Yes, of course.”

I tensed. “And where were you planning to sleep?”

A year ago, Matt had thought that because we were sharing the same apartment, we would also, when the whim struck us, be sharing the same bed.