“I forgot how grumpy you are in the morning,” he said.
“You’d better have a good reason for beating down my door.”
“Duty calls.”
“What?”
He looked her over, taking in her sleep-tousled hair, her wrinkled clothes and her makeup-free face. “Griff called. He wants us at Griffin’s Rest ASAP.”
Maleah groaned, and then when Derek’s smile vanished, she asked, “What’s happened?”
“What makes you think—?”
“Damn it, Derek, it’s too early in the morning to play games, so let’s not do twenty questions.”
He clasped her shoulders, turned her around and urged her toward the bathroom. “Toss your clothes out to me and I’ll press them while you grab a quick shower. We’ll pick up coffee and biscuits on the way to Griffin’s Rest.”
She curled her toes into the carpet and dug in her heels. “I’m not moving another inch until you tell me what’s going on.”
“Why do you have to be so stubborn?”
“Why do you have to be such a macho jerk?”
Derek frowned. “Griff and Nic are organizing the task force today.” He paused, studied her expression and then said, “I’m pretty sure they plan to put the two of us in charge.”
She groaned. “Why us? Why not you and Shaughnessy or you and Angie or you and Michelle or you and Luke or—?”
“I get it. You don’t want us to be partners on another case. But I don’t think it really matters what we want. It’s what Griff and Nic want.”
“I can’t believe Nic would pair us up again, not when she knows . . . well, she knows that we mix like oil and water.”
“I thought we made a pretty good team on the Midnight Killer case.”
Maleah huffed, hating to admit that he was right. “Yeah, yeah, I suppose we did.”
“Besides, Shaughnessy is more muscle than strategist. His expertise lends itself to the physical. And now that she’s pregnant, Angie isn’t working in the field. Michelle is on a much-needed vacation after that last two- month case in South America. As for Luke, you know Griff reserves him for special duty.”
Accepting his explanation, she nodded her acquiescence and said, “Give me five minutes.” She turned and went into the bathroom.
She closed the door, stripped hurriedly, and then eased the door open enough to toss her clothes toward Derek. Smiling at the thought of him ironing her slacks and blouse, she adjusted the hot and cold faucets on the shower and stepped under the spray of warm water.
The FedEx truck had been stopped at the front gate by the guards on duty. Shaughnessy Hood had been dispatched from the main house to drive down and pick up the package addressed to Maleah Perdue in care of the Powell Private Security and Investigation Agency at Griffin’s Rest.
Barbara Jean Hughes, Griff’s right-hand man Sanders’s assistant, best friend and lover, took the sealed, insulated shipping box from Shaughnessy, placed it in her lap and carried it with her down the hall to Griff’s private study. The door stood open so that she could see Griff behind his desk, a cup of coffee in his hand. Sanders stood nearby, his gaze fixed on the box she held.
She cleared her throat.
Griff glanced up, saw her, and motioned for her to enter.
Without hesitation, Barbara Jean maneuvered her wheelchair into the study. Sanders reached down, took the box from her and placed it on the desk directly in front of Griff.
He studied the insulated container for several silent minutes. “Did you notice the sender’s name and address?”
“Yes,” Sanders replied. “Winston Corbett, Cullman, Alabama.”
Griff scrutinized the shipping label. “What time frame did the Cullman County coroner give for Winston Corbett’s death?”
“Between midnight and five A.M., yesterday,” Barbara Jean replied.
“Then I’m curious as to how Ben’s father managed to send Maleah a package after he died.”
Chapter 3
Cyrene Patterson stretched languidly on the beach towel, her bikini-clad, five-eight body soaking in the morning sunshine by their pool directly outside the bedroom’s French doors. The deluxe honeymoon package at the Grand Resort there in the Bahamas included not only a luxury villa suite, but butler service. She and Errol had enjoyed breakfast in bed, and then made love as if they hadn’t already spent half the night screwing like crazy. She had left him asleep, slipped into her bathing suit and taken a dip in the pool. Life was good. Just couldn’t get much better. She had waited a lifetime for Mr. Right—thirty years. But he had been well worth the wait.
Neither she nor Errol had been naive youngsters, with stars in their eyes, when they said their I-dos. Both had been married before when they were too young and too stupid to know what they were doing. She had married the first time to get away from home, an alcoholic mother, a father who showed up once in a blue moon, and younger siblings who were more than her grandmother could handle. Her two-year marriage to Polo had proven the old adage about jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire. Thank God she’d been smart enough to leave the abusive son of a bitch before she got pregnant. Errol, on the other hand, had married at nineteen the first time because his girlfriend told him she was pregnant. She had lied to him, but by the time he had found out the truth, she actually was pregnant. He had lived in hell for three years. But before little Tasha’s second birthday, Errol had known he needed to end the marriage and had sued his wife for full custody. Two weeks before their divorce was finalized, Errol’s wife, who had been granted visitation privileges, had taken their child for a joy ride and both had been killed in a head-on collision with an eighteen wheeler. Witnesses had said that it appeared she had deliberately caused the “accident.”
Cyrene lathered SPF 15 sunblock on her arms and legs to protect her golden skin from UV damage. The popular belief that darker skin didn’t need protection from the harmful rays was false. Even the darkest skin could burn.
She intended to do everything possible to take care of her skin and her overall health. That’s why she’d never taken drugs. Sometimes, Errol accused her of being a health nut. If following an exercise routine, being a vegetarian, not smoking, doing drugs or drinking to excess made her a health nut, she would gladly don the label and wear it proudly.
“Any place you can’t reach?” Errol asked her, his voice husky with innuendo.
The moment Cyrene heard his voice, she smiled, but she didn’t look at him. Instead, she held the sunblock bottle up over her head. Once he grasped the bottle in his hand, she untied her bikini top and dropped it to the patio floor. With her breasts bare, she tilted her head and gave him an enticing come-here-big-boy glance.
“Start wherever you’d like.” She loved to tease him. “But don’t miss a spot.”
He came around the back of the lounge chair, knelt beside her, upended the open sunblock bottle and squirted a large dollop of the scented cream into the center of his open palm. After setting aside the bottle, he started at the base of her neck, lathering the lotion onto her skin. He moved steadily from shoulder to shoulder in downward swipes until his big hands hovered over her naked breasts. Her nipples tightened in anticipation. The moment his fingers caressed the hard tips, she moaned with pleasure.
Errol slid his hands beneath her, lifted her into his arms and carried her off the patio and through the open French doors. She laughed with pure delight as he tossed her into the center of the unmade bed, stripped off his bathing suit and came down over her.
Cyrene reached for him, her arms and her heart open wide for the man she loved.
