Armed and Fabulous (Lexi Graves Mysteries) (32 page)

"I had a briefing," he said.

I imagined Maddox
wearing
briefs and flushed. "Hot in here," I said
. H
e looked at me oddly as the doors closed. "Did you know Martin Dean
liked to drink
ten thousand dollar whiskey?" I asked.

Maddox whistled. "Must be some nice stuff."

"Are you a whiskey drinker?"

"No. Beer is my poison."

"Dean had some expensive habits."
As we glided up,
I
repeated
what Dominic told me. "Do you think his salary could have supported that?"

"Maybe. We didn't see any red flags on his financials. Not much in the way of savings though."

"What about his pension? Dominic said it was good."

"Basic
would be my opinion
, and a nice kiss
-
off from Green Hand when the time came," said Maddox, confirming
roughly
what Dominic had related from Sally-Anne in accounts.

"I wonder what he
planned to
liv
e
on when he retired. He must have
had
..." I counted on my fingers
,
"
n
ine years to go? He d
id
n't sound like a man who could live on a basic pension, despite the extras, and
Dominic
said his mortgage was
hefty
."

"I agree," said Maddox as the elevator shuddered to a halt and the doors
opened
. I caught him by the sleeve, halting him before we could enter the office. "I just
spoke to Scott in the call cent
e
r downstairs
. He said there was a test process for streamlining insurance claims. It seems like it was some kind of secret
program
. I think it sounds fishy."

Maddox frowned. "I haven't heard anything about this."

"It's supposed to be running out of the Boston office
,
but Scott said when he called
,
they hadn't heard anything about it."

"I'll look into it. Good work, Lexi."

"Thank you. Did you hear anything about Saturday?" Somehow
,
I couldn’t
say
“
murder
” without getting
a lump in my throat.

"I'll get a report later."

"Will you tell me about it?"

"Yes."

The door opened then and Bob plodded out, nodding to us on his way to the men's room.

"Back to work," said Maddox, his voice business-like, and I followed him through the doors, splitting off to head towards my desk.

After completing Dominic's typing and ditching it on his desk, I went in search of Anne
,
but she'd gone home sick
,
so I stopped by Bob's desk.

"Hey, Bob."

"Hi
,
Lexi." He looked over
one
shoulder, then the other one
,
and beckoned me closer. "You any good at cryptic crosswords?"

"I'm craptic at cryptic."

"Too bad. I'm stuck on eight down. What can I do for you?"

"I heard something about
a
new secret insurance process that Green Hand
was
testing. You hear anything about it?"

"Nope. Who told you that?"

"Overheard some gossip."

"Probably just that. Your contract up or something?"

"Or something." It was a rolling contract
,
but once Dean's death was announced, who knew?
I quite liked Green Hand. The work was easy, the people were nice. I might not be so lucky on my next assignment.

After taking a look at Bob's crossword, I gave up and went back to my desk. I had clues, but I didn't know what to do with them
,
so I got stuck into typing
something else
Dominic had sneakily slipped onto my desk
,
a Post-it with a smiley face on top,
and I mindlessly typed
while I worked out what to do next.

~

In all the commotion last week, I'd
completely
forgotten about handing in my time
card
. I didn't even think about it until I rooted in my desk drawer for hidden candy mid-afternoon and saw the
card
flit across the cluttered drawer. After Maddox signed it, ignoring my billing for the afternoon I'd spent meeting his team, he looked it over once more,
and
erased my time out the night we
discovered
Dean's body
. He
carefully wrote in
four p.m
.
and
I blanched at my mistake, but didn't say anything.

One more sign off
to go
and the dollars would be hitting my account. With a glad heart, and the thought of fresh
groceries
and paying my rent, I paused by Vincent's desk and waited. After a moment or two of foot shuffling, I realized he had ear buds firmly wedged in his ears. Tapping him on the shoulder, I suppressed a giggle when he leapt half a foot into the air before
swiveling
around
and
yanking the ear buds out, his face red.

"Oh...
hey, Lexi," he said, a smile breaking out as he ran a hand through his hair.
His bald spot seemed to be
expanding by the day
.
He tried really hard
to be popular
,
but he had an issue with personal space, or more precisely, staying out of other people's. He didn't take hints well either.
I decided to wrap this up quick.

"Hey, Vincent.
I…
"

"I'm rocking out to Nickleback," he
interrupted
, his head making a funny little thrusting movement, like a strutting rooster.

"Sounds like Bon Jovi to me."

Vincent's face fell.

"I like Bon Jovi."

"You do?" His face lit up as he seized
the first thing in common
between us.

"Sure. What's not to love
?
Big hair, big songs." I flapped the
time
card
between us hopefully.

"I think they all got haircuts," Vincent said, ignoring the
card
.

"Too bad."

"I have tickets to
their comeback tour. Do you...
want to go with me?"

"Oh, hey, well, I...
gee," I spluttered, for once
,
at a loss for words. Vincent
and me
out? Together? "Don't they have to go away to do a comeback tour?"

"I have no idea. We could grab some dinner, too, maybe." Vincent shrugged
casually
,
but his eyes looked hopeful.

How hard could it be? Vincent might not be the guy of my dreams, but I could do a concert and a burger without talking commitment. "Sure," I said. "Sounds like fun."

"I'll give you my number and you can give me yours
,
and I'll let you know the deets." Vincent did a funny little hand move
in
his attempt at talking street
. So, he had a haircut geeks wouldn't sport
,
but he was down with the kids, clearly. He scrabbled on his desk for a notepad, then a pen, his hands shaking slightly as he scribbled his number. He tore off the sheet, passed it to me, then extended the phone pad and I gave him my number, hoping I wasn't about to regret it. If Vincent wanted to be phone buddies, I would have to get a new number.

"Cool car," I said, nodding to the neatly clipped magazine pages Vincent had pinned on the felt walls of his cubicle. They all featured the same sleek Lamborghini Spyder in cherry red.

"She's a beauty
,” Vincent said reverently, his finger reaching to trace across the page
.
“
I'll get her right before the concert."

"Wowsers." Wowsers indeed. The car easily cost six figures. I hadn't thought Vincent made that much
,
but clearly
,
company accountants did better than I
assumed
, unless he had a secret family fortune
squirreled
away. It was the
same
car
that
my car grew up wanting to be.

"
Originally I wanted
a DeLorean
,
but she is a million times better."

"Sure is. Can you sign this, please?"

Vincent scribbled his signature next to Maddox's
on my tim
ecard
. "And you'll be the first person I take for a spin in it," he said, looking up.

Well, I was a lucky girl indeed. "Looking forward to it. Later, Vincent."

"The seats recline," he called after me.

Barf.
I pretended not to hear while hoping he was joking.

Maddox was waiting for me by my desk when I got back. "Hot date?" he asked as I dropped into my chair and foot walked to pull myself under the desk.

"Shut up
,
"
I scowled.

Maddox leaned over me, a pile of papers in his hand. That working together ruse was starting to wear thin for me, but as I
spared
a quick look from the corners of my eyes
,
I noticed everyone else focused on their monitors, fingers tapping away on keyboards. Maddox lowered his voice. "Seriously? He asked you out?"

"Yes! At least, I think he did. We're going to a concert."
My voice edged into a higher octave.

"The man has balls."