My jaw clenched. If Brickhouse continued working for me I was going to need to get one of those retainers people wear for TMJ. “Messages?”
“No.”
I stabbed the intercom button.
I wondered if Russ’s autopsy had been done yet. It was horrible that I hoped the M.E. would find something. Anything that would exonerate me.
152
Heather Webber
There were plenty of people who hated the man, wanted him dead.
Whoever Russ was blackmailing, for one.
Bill was high on that list too.
His employees hated him.
Noreen hated him.
Even Greta had motive if it was true about her horrible marriage.
Yet the prosecutor wanted to file charges against me.
Ridiculous.
I reached in my bottom drawer for a notepad and my breath caught at the sight of the Almond Joys.
The Almond Joys Bobby sent me weekly.
So far I’d done a good job not thinking about him, his job offer, even though I knew I had to at some point soon.
The phone rang, but I let Brickhouse answer. It was apparently what I was paying her for.
A second later her annoying voice came through the speaker on my desk. “Detective Quinn, line one.”
“Thanks. I’ll take it. Hey,” I said, picking up the phone.
“Hey you. How you holding up?”
“Fine.” Why was Kevin calling? Had he heard something?
“Any word on the murder charges?”
I heard a gasp and yelled, “Hang up, Mrs. Krauss!”
One loud cluck and phone click later, I picked up the conversation.
“Brickhouse is working for you?” Kevin asked.
“Are you laughing? Because it’s not funny.”
“Is so.”
“Tam hired her.”
“Then she’s staying.”
“Pretty much.”
“Good thing Tam’s safe in the hospital.”
153
“Pretty much.”
Because I had to make a decision about Bobby, I asked,
“How’s Parsley?”
I’d caught him off guard. The silence on his end of the line was telling. “Fine.”
It was also telling that he didn’t correct Ginger’s name, his usual habit. “You two still getting along?”
“You know how I feel about you, Nina. I made that clear already.”
A while back he’d asked me, hypothetically, what would happen between us if he realized he’d made a big mistake in leaving.
Even though I still loved him, I hadn’t been able to forgive him.
“And it didn’t change things,” he said, “so what’s changed?”
I needed to decide about Bobby, that’s what. Which meant that I needed to decide, once and for all, about Kevin.
Were we done? For good? Was I just hanging on to broken hopes and crushed dreams?
I wasn’t sure. And I wasn’t sure how to be sure.
Lord, I was beginning to suspect I needed motherly advice.
