Armed and Fabulous (Lexi Graves Mysteries) (4 page)

Gathering both sets of papers, I returned to Dean's office, pressing my ear to the door.
All
was quiet inside
.
I knocked on the door and waited. Nothing. I knocked again.

Maybe I'd struck luck
y and
Dean had gone home?
I could ditch the papers and pretend I’d
left
them earlier.
I pushed open the door and stepped inside, the door falling shut behind me with a light click.

The office was empty. I quickly checked the handle
,
in case I'd done something stupid
,
like lock
ing
myself in. Thankfully
,
I hadn't. I wouldn't have to phone the security guards twice in a week. Yay me!

With a bounce in my step,
I strode
up
to the
desk, leaning
over to put the reports squar
e and cent
e
r
on top…
and that's when I saw him.

Sprawled on the floor, not moving.

"Sir?" I said hesitantly, in case Martin Dean was doing some really weird form of meditating. Face down.

No reply. I moved around the desk,
and
slipp
ed
on something
,
sending
my legs in different directions. I landed heavily on my palms, cursing. One hand hit
the
carpe
t
and stung
as I steadied myself
; my other hand
hit something wet.

I raised my hand to my face and my stomach flipped. "Shit
!
" It wasn't just wet; it was blood and it was seeping from under
Dean's body. "Double shit!
"
I squeaked.

I sat on my haunches for a moment
,
too freaked out to move
;
then I shuffled round and saw exactly what had caused Martin Dean to be ly
ing in a pool of his own blood.

His head lay on the right side.
He'd been shot between the eyes
,
a
powder burn marring the ragged wound,
and there was a
second
wound in his back. Point blank range. Well
,
I assumed it was point blank. I'
d
never seen anyone shot between the eyes before.

He'd been alive just a few minutes ago. I'd heard him through the door, his voice
raised
. God, someone had just shot him while I was in the photocopy room! They might still
be
in the building.

Despite my heart racing
and
the blood rushing in my ears, I heard footsteps.

I clutched the sheaf of photocopies in my hand until my knuckles went white while I panicked.

If I went out the d
oor, whoever had just put a
bullet
between
Martin Dean
’s
eyes would see me. And I'd see them. Then they'd probably shoot me too and my mom would cry
the hardest
at my funeral
because
the only thing I would be remembered for was the moment of madness when I ran away to join the
A
rmy. Oh God, I did not want to die
!
I had nowhere near enough good stuff to
put
in my eulogy, which would probably be performed by my
sniveling
sister, after strong
-
arming the rest of my family out of the way
.
Y
ou could just bet she'd manage to work her Harvard degr
ee into the speech
too
, insulting my lack of aptitude
even in death.

W
hat if no one turned up? It's not like I'd made a big effort to stay in touch with school friends or was making a ton of pals at work. My funeral would be social death. Literally.

The footsteps got closer.

I looked down at the puddle of blood underneath Martin Dean as it
bloomed
towards me. Shit
!
I'd left a handprint in it. I'd left fingerprints. Evidence! My TV husband
,
Horatio Caine
,
would be all over that and do his little side-on serious look thing as he
peered
over his sunglasses at me and
told
me my rights. It totally did not go that way in my dreams. Plus
,
all the hot women on
CSI
:
Miami
had their giraffe-like legs clad in white pants and wore ridiculous heels
,
considering they were always getting
messed
up by corpses on murder scenes. I didn't even have any white pants. I was wearing my favorite blue dress with its super-cute flared skirt. And
now
I'd got
ten
blood on it, because like an idiot
,
I put my bloody palm on my lap. My mug shots would look terrible!
They’d think I had killed him.

I’d probably go to prison.

Even more pressing, there was at least one murderer on his
?
—
her?
—
way back to the office and they would see my handprint.
R
eality
hit me
with a thump.

My heart pounding,
I took his warm
—
oh God, dead!
—
hand between my thumb and forefinger and gingerly moved it on top of my handprint
;
then I
pressed down and rubbed
the palm and finger
print
s
out with his own,
all the time trying not to squea
l
like the big scaredy cat I was.
I moved his leg to cover my footprint and sm
oo
shed it in, trying hard not to squeak as I slipped off my heels.

I had officially tampered with my first crime scene. And last, I hoped. Not that it really
mattered. It wasn't like I
popped him anyway.
Surely someone
would
believe me. A second set of footsteps sounded as the murderers made their way to the office.

Standing
up
,
I
looked around for somewhere to hide and finally,
finally
,
clapped eyes on the big wall unit where Dean stored his spare suits and
other
things when he needed to change in a hurry
after a long day
. I knew it was mostly empty because Domin
ic had roped me into cleaning it
out on Monday
,
when Dean was away at a conference in Boston
,
and
I took
the bags to the dry cleaners
.

Trotting
towards the c
los
et, I used a tissue from my purse to pull one slim door open
.
I
backed in, tugging the door shut. Sinking to the floor, I m
ade myself as small as possible
,
hunk
ering
down, my heart beating twice as fast
as normal
, just as I saw the handle to the office door
turn
down
through the crack in the c
los
et doors
.

Which was almost the exact same second a hand clamped over my mouth and my eyes
nearly popped
out
of my head
in fear. So
not
a good look
…
even in a dark
closet
!

Chapter Two

"Stop wriggling," hissed a man's voice
. His breath brushed
my ear
and my heartbeat ramped up to marathon speed
. "If they find us
,
we're
dead
."

Okay. So here's the good news. I was probably not wedged inside Martin Dean's c
lose
t
with his murderer. That, at least, had the potential
for some
reassur
ance
.
P
owerful arms remained clamped around me
, even though I stopped trying to wriggle my way free,
and the hand stayed over my mouth
,
despite my attempts to
stifle my
whimper. For a brief
moment
,
I contemplated licking the hand
because that always made my brothers and sister let go when we were kids, but that was too gross to do to a stranger.
In a close
t. With a corpse a few feet away.

"If you scream, they'll shoot us in the head and you're
far too pretty to die,
"
came the man’s urgent whisper.
Well, I had to agree with that. I really wa
s too pretty to die. Also compli
ments totally work
ed
on me. "I'm going to uncover your mouth. Don't scream.
Nod if you understand.
"

I nodded and the hand slid away
,
while
the other stayed firml
y clamped around my upper body
as we looked through the slim crack in the doors
. T
wo men came into the room and walked over to Dean's body.
I remained huddled against the mystery man, shivering with fear as the men stared down at my boss’ corpse.
The blood had spread a
bit and the carpet was screwed
. I knew that because I once cut my hand in my parent
s’
kitchen
and
ran into the dining room for help
. I
tripped and promptly stained their new wool carpet
with my bloody handprint
. In my opinion
,
there had been too much
whining
about the ruined carpet
, too much giggling about what forensics would make of it,
and not enough sympathy
for my potentially early demise
. Well, not that I would have
actually
died
,
but I was
seven and
a bit
dramatic
at the time. Blood did that to me as a kid. Even so, the stain leaking from Dean was decidedly larger than my splotchy handprint and they would never get it out.

More pressing was Dean's warm corpse on top of it.

"We'll have to get rid of it," said one of the me
n to the other. They were both tall and broad
with shaven heads
,
flat faces
and flatter noses
. They wore
black
suits that hugged brawny shoulders
. Their
ties
matched
.
Slightly less business
-
like were the rubber gloves they both wore.
Despite the
ir effort at business
disguise,
“
thug
”
could have been printed on their foreheads. I was certain I'd never seen them before.

"Can't get it past security," said the second man
, giving Dean’s leg a poke with a shiny shoe
. "There's a twenty-four hour desk."

"Can't leave it here."
The second man shrugged.

They looked down at Dean's body. A bit too hopefully
,
I thought. It wasn't like he was going to oblige them by getting up and trotting
away
.

"Should
a
shot him outside," said the first man. "
Coulda m
ade it look like a mugging. I didn't think of t
hat." He was slightly bigger tha
n his friend and
clearly
the
rough
er
of the two. He looked
like he'd
led
a hard life.
Despite his
smart suit
and
polished
shoes,
just
one wrong look
,
and you'd be in the river
,
wearing a
not-so-
stylish pair of concrete stilettos. I shivered
. T
he arm tightened about me for a moment
before relaxing
.

"Let's see if there's anything we can move him with," said number two
, making for the door
.
Heh
-heh
. Number two.
I know. Immature.
But
I’d take a laugh
any
where I could get it right now.

Number one grunted and followed him out the room,
closing
the door behind him.

Just as soon as the door shut, the man
holding me
whispered, "What are you doing here, Lexi?"

I
twist
ed
my neck and blinked in the gloom. Now
that
I thought about it, that voice
sounded
awfully familiar. "Adam?" I whispered.

"Yeah."

I thought about all the things I should ask next.
"What are you doing in
Dean's c
los
et
?"

"I asked first."

"I was dropping off the report." I still had it clutched in my, literally, bloody hand.

"I thought you'd gone home."

"No. I was working in the library."

"Really?" Adam was incredulous.

Honestly
,
we were stuck in a c
los
et
,
no more than
ten feet away from a man who had just been murdered minutes before, his murderers
now
freely
trotting about the floor and my boss was giving me grief about my work ethic.
Typical.

"Yes, really," I replied with as much indignation as I could
muster
, given the circumstances.

"I thought you went to Starbucks
,
then home."

I gaped into the darkness. "I. Was. Working."

"Really?"

"Oh for G
od's sake." We were quiet for a moment, then, "Adam, what are
you
doing here?"

"Trying not to get shot."

"Oh. Well
…
well done."

"Hmm?"

"
Y
ou've not been shot yet."

"Yet, being the important bit." That was quite a sobering thought.

"Why are you in the
closet
?" I persisted.

"I don't want to say."

"Why not?
Did you have something to do with…
"
I flapped my hand and caught my knuckles on the door. We both froze.

"Okay, fine. I came to talk to Martin. He got a call and told me to get in
here
."

"How...
odd." No one had ever told me to get in
to
the
closet
when a friend came to visit. Well, except that time at college when I was about to get it on with some guy, and his girlfriend
,
(don't judge
.
I didn't know and he wasn't exactly forthcoming)
,
knocked on his door.
I resolved that by
climbing out the
first floor
window
, rathe
r than hide and see God knows—his
idea, ugh!
The perv
—
and walking home. I try not to think about it.

"I'm glad he did."
Adam exhaled softly.

"Yes,
I
suppose you are."

"We need to get out of here, Lexi."

"Any bright ideas?"

"I'm thinking. Shh! I hear something. T
hey're coming back." We fell silent again while the two goons trundled a m
ail delivery cart into the room,
with
a large box balanced on top.
Behind me
,
Adam
shifted
and then
put
both arms around me, and,
oh
, that was quite nice
,
actually.
So long as I didn't think too much about our impending deaths anyway.

I relaxed slightly, partly because I was scared of getting
a
cramp and partly because being cuddled up to Adam
had featured prominently in today’s daydream of choice. Minus
the
corpse.