Marcia Clark - Killer Ambition

We decided tohave dinner at the Biltmore bar-or rather, Bailey decided we’d have dinner at the bar. She said it was because it would be faster, less hassle.

“Admit it,” I said. “You just wanted to come here so you and Drew could coo and slobber all over each other.”

“You really want to say that in front of the person who makes your martinis?” asked Drew, who’d walked over to where we were seated.

“Ignore her, she’s in a cranky mood,” Bailey said. “We’ll have the usual. How was your day?”

“Same-o. But it looks like the loan’s coming through. Just waiting for the broker to okay the deal on the space,” Drew said.

Drew was on the brink of realizing his dream of opening his own upscale bar. Though his place would be within walking distance, nothing beat the convenience of living an elevator ride away. Yet another perk I enjoyed as a permanent resident of the Biltmore.

“How’re you doing? Any leads?” he asked Bailey.

Bailey ran a hand through her short blonde hair and sighed. “Nothing that blows my skirt up at the moment.”

Drew gave her a lascivious look.

I pointed to Drew and Bailey. “No. You may not do that in front of me-” Drew went off to fix our drinks when my cell phone buzzed. It was Graden. The sound of his voice immediately brought a smile to my face. I turned away to take the call. We exchanged brief updates on our day-something I’d sorely missed during our breakup.

“I know you’ll be running hard on this case, but if you catch a quiet pocket, want to do dinner sometime this week?” he asked.

“Love to. If my elopement hunch plays out, this could wrap up pretty fast. Want to play it by ear for this weekend?”

“Sounds perfect. And you’ll let me know if you need anything in the meantime?”

The cool thing was, he didn’t just mean he’d pick up my dry cleaning; he meant knocking around investigative leads and ideas. It was one of the nice perks of dating a smart cop. But it also had a downside. Graden had an obsessive need to know everything about everyone. Bailey and Toni said it was what made him such a great cop, and there was no doubt they were right. But that particular trait was about as incompatible with my privacy issues as you could get. Graden swore he could rein himself in for my sake. Only time would tell. But right now, things were good and getting better by the day. When I ended the call and turned back around, I saw that Drew had delivered our drinks and was about to put our steaks down. Both he and Bailey were looking at me with raised eyebrows.

“What?” I asked.

“Good phone call from the boyfriend, I see,” Drew said.

“I seem to remember someone saying something about cooing,” Bailey said.

I had to laugh.

“Seriously though, you guys are doing pretty well, right?” Bailey asked.

“Yeah, why?”

“Because I think you should consider letting Graden check out those reports Lilah mentioned in her last text.”

Lilah Bayer, née Rossmoyne, was a sociopath responsible for three murders that I knew of, not to mention the near demise of myself and Bailey. We’d set a trap for her majordomo, Chase Erling, that nearly cost us our lives. But the trap had worked. We got Erling. Unfortunately, we didn’t get Lilah. She’d managed to hop a private plane to parts unknown. But on her way out of town, she texted me, claiming to have found two reports filed one month and six months after Romy’s abduction, reports that might prove my sister was still alive. The text was an implicit threat and message: if I backed off and didn’t pursue her, she’d get me more on Romy’s whereabouts-if I didn’t…you can fill in the blank with just about anything, including a biochemical attack, because for Lilah there was no such thing as overkill.

Bailey, taking my hesitation as resistance to the idea of drafting Graden to help with Lilah’s leads on Romy, added, “Graden has the resources, and the time-which you don’t. And take it from me, he doesn’t get out in the field as much as he likes.” She gave me a long-suffering look. “It’s driving some-who shall remain nameless-crazy.”

Bailey knew that since the DA investigators had their hands full chasing down leads on Lilah herself, I’d been doing the legwork to track down the alleged reports on Romy. So far, I’d come up empty. I’d thought more than once about asking for Graden’s help, but after our fight, I hadn’t been sure how he’d react. Hearing Bailey suggest it now, though, I couldn’t imagine him being anything but happy to help. “I think it’s a great idea, actually.”

“Oh.” Bailey looked surprised. Whether it was because I’d responded rationally, or given her props, I’d never know.

“Yeah, I’ll ask him about it tomorrow.”

“Speaking of tomorrow,” Bailey said. We talked about our plans for the next day as we ate. Tired from too many hours chasing down too few leads, Bailey and I were both ready to collapse by the time we finished dinner.

“You should probably crash with me,” I said. “It’s too late and you’re too wiped to drive home.”

Bailey yawned. “I am thrashed. Okay. And I’m never saying no to room service for breakfast.” Drew was at the other end of the bar filling a drink order for a waiter, so Bailey blew him a kiss and we headed for the elevator.

A permanent room at the Biltmore didn’t come cheap, and it would’ve been way out of my league but for a sweetheart deal I fell into by happenstance. A few years ago, I’d prosecuted the man who’d murdered the Biltmore CEO’s wife in the underground parking lot of the hotel. During the trial, the CEO had given me a room so I could stay near the courthouse. After I got the conviction that put the killer away for life without parole, the CEO offered to let me stay on as a permanent resident for a deal no sane person could refuse. And so I’d moved into the Biltmore for good. Last year, he’d upgraded me to a suite with two bedrooms because it got so little use. That meant it was easy to accommodate overnight guests, like Toni and Bailey. It hadn’t yet meant Graden.

We headed for our respective bedrooms, and Bailey warned me we’d be starting the day bright and early. The downside of Bailey as an overnight guest was that when she said “early,” she meant the crack of dawn. She’d yanked me out of bed in the past, and let me tell you, it’s bracing. I set my alarm for six thirty to make sure I didn’t give her the chance to do it again.

I woke up before my alarm, which tells you how much I didn’t want to relive the Bailey Shake. I put on my robe and walked onto the balcony to sample the weather. The sky was an unmarred powder blue and there wasn’t even a hint of a breeze. An early harbinger of yet another cooker of a day. Damn. I’d planned to wear a dress, but that’s such a pain when I’m running around in the world, as I knew I would be today. I pulled out the lightest pair of cotton slacks I could find, a sleeveless buttoned blouse, and a light cardigan to combat the blast of air-conditioning I’d be in and out of all day.

When I came out to the living room, Bailey, who’d left some clothes behind when she’d had an extended stay at my place during our last case, was already dressed and digging heartily into her breakfast. It was a tantalizing stack of pancakes with a side of bacon. Bailey is tall and lean and one of those obnoxious people who can eat anything and not gain weight; and she loves to rub my nose in it every chance she gets. Toni and I have plotted her demise on many an occasion. I noticed that Bailey was dressed in similar attire to mine, except she wore a jacket to hide her shoulder holster. Personally, I preferred to carry my gun in my purse. It accommodated everything from my little.22 Beretta to my.44 Glock.