“I know.” He tilted his head, and the spark in his eyes flared tender. “You’re smiling again. I’ve missed that.”
That pulled me up short. He was right, of course. I hadn’t been feeling very smiley. But now…the light bill was still overdue. The DNA results were still in the drawer. The hornet’s nest of complications still hung from my family tree, poisonous and tricky and dangerous as hell. And now I’d heaped a new mess of complications on my plate. But strangely enough, I felt energized instead of worn down. I wasn’t sure what this said about me except that perhaps Eric was right—we all needed an outlet.
“In the meantime,” I said, “we’ve still got a case to solve.”
“Two cases,” he corrected.
He was right about that too. The Talbots wove a tangled web spanning almost four years. But it was also the first time he’d called what we were doing a case.
“And you,” I said, “need to buy a cheap suit.”
“Apparently so.” He looked toward the door as the rest of his class streamed in, then back at me. “Are you staying here tonight?”
Traffic from Buckhead to Kennesaw would be a nightmare in the morning. I’d have to get up stupid early. But the bed at Trey’s place was bigger and softer and full of Trey. And once he went to sleep, I would have free run of his employment files. I decided rush hour was Tomorrow Tai’s problem, not mine. She could deal with it in the morning.
“Of course I’m staying,” I said.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Of course I regretted my decision to stay over once I was in the morning commute, relentless as usual. The weather was glorious as long as I kept the windows rolled up and pretended that the air quality index wasn’t creeping into the red zone. I checked the traffic on my phone. Two accidents, a gas leak, and construction. I was going to be on the road a while.
Spending the night had been worth it, though, even if all we’d done was catalog the massive amounts of information we’d collected. I’d enjoyed watching Trey put it together, aligning this evidence with that circumstance. I hadn’t asked him any further questions about the firing, and he hadn’t offered any further information. At breakfast, he’d barely raised an eyebrow when he saw his employment folders sticking out of my tote bag, which told me two things: one, he was enjoying watching me scramble, and two, I wasn’t going to find the answer in the paperwork.
Which reminded me.
“Call Ritz Carlton Buckhead,” I said, and my phone dialed me through. I had to go through a receptionist, the bell captain, and a mid-level manager before I finally got to the assistant human resources supervisor. It took me thirty seconds to realize he was going to be of no help whatsoever.
“Can you at least verify the dates that Mr. Seaver worked for you?”
“No, ma’am. We are not authorized—”
“But—”
“Good day, ma’am.”
The guy hung up politely but definitively. This was not surprising, but calling them had been a necessary first step. Now on to the second step…whatever that might be. I drummed my fingers on the dashboard. Traffic ground to a halt yet again, suddenly, illogically. I caught the reek of burning tires. It was going to be a long morning.
At work, I sold ten boxes of shot cartridges to the same guy who bought them every week and who insisted every week that the government was rationing ammo. A reenactor client picked up his priming wire and blasting caps. Around lunchtime, I made another pot of coffee and jumped into an online auction on my computer, setting my sights on a left-handed officer’s sword with a presentation inscription, an unusual bit of militaria.
My assistant Kenny watched the bidding with some interest. “That for Mr. Reynolds?”
“It is.”
“That means you can bid as high as you want, right?”
I laughed. That was the fine thing about shopping for Reynolds, his wide-ranging tastes and generous wallet. Kenny put down the boxes he was unloading and peered over my shoulder.
“What is that mess you’re watching on your phone?” he said.
“Season One of Buckwild in Buckhead. In fast forward.”
The show was as bad as I’d expected—pixilated nakedness, bleeped expletives, corn pone accents, and over-the-top theatrics in every way except for the fights. Those were honest-to-goodness redneck scrapping.
Kenny scratched his head. “Looks like a bunch of people who weren’t raised right.”
“Three seasons of it. Wanna grab some coffee and join me?”
“No, ma’am.”
He picked up his load, and I went back to the show. Somehow the producers had managed to find the crassest collection of Southerners to ever walk the green earth. They poured champagne in the hot tub. They made out on the buffet table. There were slapfights aplenty, mostly between Daizie and Daiquiri over Braydon, a tanned roughneck with a three-drink-minimum leer and a bleached-blond ponytail.
I shook my head. “My people, my people.”
I quickly discovered that the footage fell into four categories. The first two—confessional single-camera monologues and videos of the Buckwilders out on the town—were useless to me. There was also indoor video, courtesy of the cameras that Quint insisted the production team had stolen. I was interested in the fourth type, the outdoor scenes.
“Come on,” I said. “Show me the corner behind the pool.”
The camera operators were not cooperating. They trained their lenses on the parade of cleavage and ass, not the pool decor. Kenny brought in the last of the boxes.
“What’s this show got to do with this weekend?” he said.
“Background investigations.”
“Oh.” He pushed his glasses higher on his nose. “I thought you said you were done messing with other people’s problems.”
“Trey’s the one messing, and he has his reasons. I’m supporting him. That’s all.”
Kenny dusted off his hands. “Whatever you say, Miss Tai.”
He headed for the storage room, whistling. He was such a cheerful presence, good-natured and smart, a member of the local historical society and a skilled reenactor,
