Page 56 of Fluffed and Folded

CHAPTER 30

It only took Tristan an impressive hour to locate the original source of the key, an upscale storage facility an hour away. Eli asked if he wanted him and Darby there for the dramatic unveiling.

“Is that a no, or is that an I’m-going-to-strangle-you-in-your-sleep look?” Eli whispered in an aside to Darby, when Tristan didn’t answer his question.

“Maybe it’s both,” Darby whispered, which made them both laugh.

Tristan rolled his eyes and left them basking in each other’s presence. At another time, he might have been glad that Eli had apparently found someone who found him hilariously endearing, especially when that someone wasn’t Josie. But not when he was this intently focused on ending the case. He wasn’t exaggerating before; he developed a certain level of unease when the end was near, too much to let him unwind, relax, or even smile until everything was tied up. It was as if his brain alone could contain and combine all the various parts and pieces, tying the case up in a nice little bow. Until that happened, all those various parts and pieces floated around in his skull and made him uptight to the point of cranky.

Before he could go to the storage facility and relieve his curiosity, he needed to tie up a few loose ends. He swung by the office and grabbed a yogurt from the mini fridge, while his computer warmed up. He sat down, took his stapler, and placed it in the center of his desk. “Asher,” he assigned it. Then he took other parts and pieces from his office and organized them in a concentric circle around the stapler, letting his mind make connections and try to see the bigger picture.

When his computer was available, he began searching a few ideas the key had sparked, writing down pertinent facts and placing them on the desk beside their components.

After everything was researched and arranged, he made himself take a second look at the various pieces he’d assembled on his desk. Had he allowed bias and the desire to reach a conclusion sway him? That was always a danger, given how antsy he became toward the end of a case. He always made himself pause and evaluate, to take a breath and attempt to be objective.

Was he being objective? Was he missing something? Was he reaching in any way?

He read through the evidence he’d written, stared at the pieces before him a moment longer, and then crumpled the written information, rearranged his desk, stood, checked his gun, tossed the empty yogurt container, sent a text, and left the office.

It was a short drive to the storage facility, a place so nice that it was better than Tristan’s apartment. The security was certainly better, it was temperature controlled, and a sign proclaimed it “pest free.”My landlord could take some notes,he thought, trying not to grimace when he remembered he’d have to return to that hovel apartment after this case was finished. Now that Gaines’s firm was beginning to gain some traction and become stable, stable enough to afford a fulltime hacker, Tristancould probably upgrade his living situation, find somewhere Josie could actually visit without fear of her being kidnapped. But who had the time to hunt for a new apartment? And, if he were being honest, there was a small part of him that didn’t want to move again until he did it with Josie, possibly a home they bought together. If he stayed in the hovel, he could build up his savings, get his credit in order for that eventual day. How great would it feel to present her with a substantial down payment for their future someday? Amazing.

He compartmentalized that thought as he opened the door of the storage facility and stared in amazement at the sight in front of him, a car, so beautiful and perfect and rare that Tristan’s heart stuttered and then stopped for a few beats. This was how he knew he was a clean cop and all around upstanding citizen, because this car, a Bugatti Bolide, was one of the rarest, most sought after, and expensive cars in the world. The particular specimen, now only ten feet away, would probably bring about six million, at private auction.

“Perfect, isn’t she?” The person who arrived behind him and took a step inside sounded as awed as Tristan felt. He shifted aside, turning so his back was no longer facing the newcomer. Not that the man paid any attention to him. His eyes, and now hands, were on the car as he stepped forward and lovingly traced the lines of the polished blue car. “It’s one of the last pure gasoline engines they’ll ever make.”

“It must have been hard to see it go,” Tristan noted.

“It killed me,” Rogan Staats said, a hard expression on his otherwise placid face.

“Why did you place the bet, why did you take the chance?” Tristan asked. That was the part he couldn’t understand. Why would a guy like Rogan Staats, a bigtime baseball player, with one of the larger contracts in the game, place a bet with a guy likeAsher? Why roll the dice with his career, his income, his beloved car?

“Who says I did?” Rogan asked, his tone aimed for nonchalant, but it was hard to pull off when he returned his attention to the car and began petting it like a beloved cat.

“Your record. I pulled your stats. You manipulated them, threw games with heavy bets on them. Asher realized, didn’t he? Because he wasn’t above betting, either. He’d done the same thing, multiple times, to his advantage. He watched you, figured out that you were cheating, and, what, blackmailed you for this car?” Tristan guessed.

Rogan laughed humorlessly. “No. If it were that simple, I wouldn’t have cared. Look, sports betting is an entire industry now, bigger than baseball, bigger than anything. No one cares if a player throws a game, as long as all the right people get paid.”

“Then how did Asher end up owning your car?” Tristan asked.

Rogan rubbed a weary hand over his face, but he smiled, a bitter, cynical smile. “How else? He made a bet with me.”

“And you lost,” Tristan deduced.

“I lost,” Rogan ground out.

“But you paid up?”

Rogan snorted. “I wasn’t going to, believe me. But Asher knew people. The little pipsqueak spent a whole lot of time collecting secrets about a whole lot of people, bigger, scarier people than me. If I didn’t own up and give him my baby, he was willing to call in some favors to make it happen.” He flexed his hand and rotated his shoulder. “He sent someone to give me a taste of what I could expect. They didn’t end my career, but their little message from Asher benched me for three games.” He swallowed hard, Adam’s apple bobbing. “So I had to let her go,” he whispered sadly. His hand ran over the hood like a lover’s apology.

“But you went to retrieve her,” Tristan continued.

Rogan’s throat bobbed again, with renewed anger this time.

“It must have killed you that you took out Asher and couldn’t find out where he stashed this, couldn’t find the key,” Tristan said, watching him closely for a reaction. How far had he gone to threaten Darby? Had he ransacked her house? Sent someone to toss a rock through her window? That was the part he couldn’t figure out, the missing piece of the puzzle.

“That little dictator really covered his bases. But you know what?” He turned a chilling smile on Tristan. “It taught me to cover mine. I did some checking up on you, Tristan Evans from St. Louis. You were a notoriously brutal cop. You’re rogue, a loner. I seriously doubt anyone is going to miss you, after this.”

“Yikes, once again you’ve badly misread the situation,” Tristan said. “First of all, my girlfriend would be devastated, would probably hunt you down and knit you to death. Second, I’m a loner, not a moron. You think I’m stupid enough to confront a murderer without backup?”

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