Dylan
ADDISON AND I hightailed it home, and then hurried to our respective rooms to dress in something less conspicuous. I was still trying to wiggle out of my black jeans when there was a knock on the door. Since I had a feeling getting out of a bustier had to be more complicated than tugging off skinny jeans, I knew it was on me to keep Asher busy until Addison could change. Which was a problem, since I was in nothing but my bra and panties when I heard Asher unlock the front door and call out our names.
Desperate, I threw a towel around myself and rushed into the living room to intercept him right as he was about to knock on Addison’s door.
“Ash, hey, what are you doing here?” I asked.
He turned and froze. His gaze traveled down my towel before venturing up to rest on my face. The feral, hungry look he gave me made me want to run… or throw open my towel and invite him in. Determined not to do anything either of us would regret, I clutched the towel tighter.
“I was about to hop in the shower.” It wasn’t quite a lie, since I did need to wash off whatever that crazy cleaning lady had sprayed all over me.
“Hey.” He cleared his throat. “I told Addison I was on the way over.” He glanced at her door. “Where is she?”
“Getting changed. Her outfit was…” Ohmigod, how could I tell him his sister had been wearing a bustier without coming right out and saying it? “She wanted to change into something more decent.”
His brow furrowed. “I thought you guys were out.”
I nodded. “We were.”
He started to ask me something else, but thankfully Addison’s door swung open. “Ashey! Hey, how are you?” she asked. Then she looked at me in my towel and added, “Am I interrupting something?”
Asher’s cheeks turned red, which—I’m sure—had nothing on the fire I felt blazing my own face. “No!” we both said at the same time, sounding way too guilty.
“Let me go get dressed,” I hurried to add. Then I escaped as quickly as my legs would carry me.
By the time I reemerged, Addison and Asher were sitting on the sofa with their heads together.
“Dylan,” Addison said, her smile way too wide to be real. “Did you know that Asher has a police scanner?”
Addison was right, he did know about the break-in. My throat suddenly felt like sandpaper. I swallowed so I could speak without croaking. “No. That’s interesting, though. I bet you hear all sorts of wild stuff.”
He eyed me.
“Right?” Addison said. “He was just telling me that tonight someone broke into Bridge City Property Management. Can you imagine?”
“No way.” My surprise sounded hollow even to me. “Do they know who did it?”
“No,” Asher said, eyeing us both. “The witness didn’t get a good enough look to give them much of a description. Just that two people—one dressed as a burglar and the other dressed as a hooker—attacked her.”
“Attacked?” I asked.
Addison snorted. “Dressed like a hooker?”
Asher paled, cradling his head in his hands. “Please tell me it wasn’t you two.”
“This is totally unrelated,” I said. “But do you think the cops have this place bugged?”
“No.” Asher gestured for me to sit beside him, which I did. “Because of the recording Addison got the day she was not supposed to be in your apartment”—he gave her a glare—“Jake knows there’s other people involved, so he’s investigating possible suspects. If you knew who the killer was, you would have told him. He’s not going to waste time and resources monitoring you too closely.” He paused and studied me, taking my hand. “Dylan? Your eyes are red. Have you been crying?”
“No.” I looked away.
“But what about the detail?” Addison asked, rushing in to save me.
I could still feel Asher’s gaze on the back of my head. “That has more to do with Dad than Dylan’s case.”
“What do you mean?” Addison asked. “Did you tell him about what happened at Dylan’s apartment?”
“Not me.” Asher released my hand. “You know he has friends on the force.”
Addison snorted. “Dad’s friends run the force.”
“Exactly. And how would it look if his little girl got hurt? I’m surprised they haven’t been tailing you. Now quit trying to change the subject and tell me what you two were doing at Bridge City Management.”
When neither of us offered an explanation, he stiffened. “At least tell me why you attacked the janitor so I can defend you in court if it comes to that.”
“If anything, she attacked Dylan,” Addison said. “Practically blinded her with some sort of cleaning solution.”
“Addison, shut up!” I hissed.
“I knew it,” Asher said with a sigh.
“He knew all along,” Addison pointed out.
“No, he suspected,” I countered. “You just confirmed.”
Addison bit her lip with a quiet, “Oh.”
“So, I smell vinegar because it’s what the cleaning lady attacked you with?” Asher asked.
“She didn’t really attack me. She was freaked, so she defended herself... defense by spray bottle.”
“Dylan,” Asher admonished, eyeing me again. “You should probably flush your eyes with water. Here, I’ll help you.”
He grabbed my hand again and stood, tugging me into the kitchen where he turned on the water and had me lean over the sink. “Blink a lot,” he said, cupping water over my eyes. I did as he said and, after the initial stinging, it started to feel much better.
“You weren’t… dressed like a hooker, were you?” Asher asked, his voice a little huskier than normal.
Heat crept back into my cheeks. “No. That was all Addy.”
“It was a bustier!” Addison defended from the sofa. “I was making a fashion statement.”
Asher groaned and turned off the water. “Did you at least get anything useful?”
“Yes.” I grabbed a kitchen towel and dried my face. “Despite scaring the bejesus out of the cleaning lady, setting off the alarm, and running from the police, our first B&E went pretty well.”
The panicked look Asher gave me said his blood pressure was on the rise. Worried we might be giving him a heart attack, I plunged ahead. “We think we know what the thugs were looking for in my apartment.”
“What?” he asked.
“How about I go clean up and then I’ll walk you through it?”
He frowned. “Or we can look at it now.”
“She smells like a fish and chips shop, Ashey, let her shower.”
He gave me a reluctant nod and I left him hanging long enough to take a quick shower. Then I rejoined him and Addison on the sofa. Addison popped the flash drive into her laptop and pulled up the spreadsheet.
“What are we looking at?” Asher asked.
“This is the full company budget. My job was to code receipts and enter expenses and make sure nobody went over their allotment. Kirk’s expenses were in this department.” I drew an invisible circle around the cells with my finger. “You should be able to go into the cell and see the formula that’s pulled from the additional tabs—that’s where the detail goes—but the formulas are screwed up. Someone added expenses directly to the formula instead of adding them to the detail.”
“It’s not a ton of money,” Addison said, eyeing the sheets. “A couple grand here, a few grand there. Would someone really kill for this?”
“Uh, that is a lot of money,” I said, doing the math in my head. “It’s close to a million when you add these all up. This is just the quarterly budget for my first quarter there. Who knows how long this has been going on?”
Asher nodded. “And it probably still wouldn’t get them noticed in a company as big as yours. The question is… where’s the money going?”
“I don’t know, but maybe Kirk found out about it and someone off’d him,” I said.
“More likely Kirk the Jerk was in on it and the killer got sick of paying him off,” Addison said.
We speculated a little more before I copied the spreadsheet onto another flash drive and handed it to Asher for safekeeping.
“Had you not broken the law to get this, I could use it to request a review of the financials,” Asher said, stuffing it in his pocket.
“Well, there was a version in my backup files, but it was corrupted,” I said.
He scratched his chin. “Maybe we should let the dust settle on tonight’s felony before we bring it up.”
“Probably a good plan. Wait, felony? I thought B&E was just a misdemeanor?”
“You took something, Dylan. Breaking and entering with the intent to burglarize is a felony.”
“That damn intent. Gets me every time. But honestly, my intent was to find something that could keep me out of jail.”
He rubbed his temples then stretched and looked at his watch. “I need to get going.” He wrapped Addison in a hug. “About this benefit dinner you’ve been planning, Sis. Dad wants you to bring a date. Preferably one with a nice-sized bank account.”
“Well that’s too bad for him, because I’m bringing Dylan,” she said, grabbing my arm and pulling me to her side.
Asher frowned. His sexy, hungry eyes drifted back over my body before he locked gazes with me. “I was kind of hoping Dylan would come with me.” His voice was all low and husky again, making my knees weak and raising my temperature.
“Oh. Oh!” Addison said, practically shoving me into him. “I’ll have to hunt down a sexy detective to bring.”
Asher laughed, pulling me in for a hug and nuzzling my neck. “Poor Jake.”
“Hey!” Addison said. “No need to feel sorry for Jake. I’m gonna rock that man’s world. You just take care of Dylan and leave Jake to me.”
“I can do that,” Asher said. He ran his hands down my arms and grabbed my hands. He tugged on them until I looked up at him again. “Hey. Want to save me from death by boredom at one of my father’s functions next Friday night?” he asked.
“Oh gee, when you put it like that…” I rolled my eyes but couldn’t suppress the smile tugging at my lips. I’m pretty sure I would have gone anywhere Asher asked me to.
“And what about this Sunday? Feel like grabbing a bite or something?”
I frowned. “Actually, I’m busy Sunday.”
“You are?” Addison asked, butting into the conversation. “With what?”
“You know, stuff.” I had planned to slip out without telling her—without telling either of them—because I knew how she’d react.
“What kind of stuff?” Addison asked.
Asher released my hand and took a step back, turning me over to his sister, who was circling me. She finally stopped, planting her feet so she could put a hand on her hip. “If you’re planning to go spy on suspects or follow up on leads without me, you—”
“Neither of you should be doing that!” Asher interjected. “You guys are going to end up in jail. Or worse. You got lucky tonight.”
“Everyone just chill the heck out and take a deep breath,” I said, trying to sound calming. “Quit jumping to conclusions. I’m not doing anything crazy, reckless, or illegal.”
“Then what are you doing?” Addison asked. She clearly wasn’t going to let up until I told her.
So I relented. “I got a job.”
“Congratulations,” Asher said, smiling.
“What? Where? Why didn’t you tell me?” Addison asked.
“You were there when I unofficially accepted it.”
Her face scrunched up. “Where? What are you talking about?”
“Cleaning house,” I said, gritting my teeth. I didn’t want Asher to know I’d stooped low enough to take a job cleaning a pigsty. I had a college degree!
Addison gave me another blank look, still not catching on.
“For Quinton.”
Her eyes widened in recognition. Then in disgust. “No. Oh, hell no. No.”
“Addie, it’s a job, and I could use the money.” And this wasn’t a conversation I wanted to have in front of Asher.
“Who’s Quinton?” Asher asked, leaning against the wall.
“Just a friend,” I said.
Despite my glare, Addison jumped in, “One of Dylan’s friends who’s a caregiver for his disabled mom. He’s really nice, like gave up his life to take care of his mom nice, but the cleaning of his house needs to be left to the professionals, Dylan.”
“It’s not that bad,” I lied.
“You’d have to buy a hazmat suit and those industrial grade cleaning supplies. You’d spend more money buying supplies than he’d pay you to do the work. I know his mom is hesitant to let people they don’t know into their home, but she’s gotta let that go, because Quinton needs help. I could give him some referrals.”
“But I need the money.” I groaned. “My auto insurance is due soon.” Not to mention my other bills.
“And you know what I need?” she asked.
I shut my mouth so I wouldn’t spout out all the rude things racing through my mind.
“I need a cook. I’m getting sick of eating out all the time, but I hate cooking. You’re a great cook, and you like to do it.”
“Addison, you’re letting me stay in your place rent free. You don’t have to pay me to cook for you.”
“No, but if you feel like you need to pull your weight, that would be a great way to do it.” She headed into the kitchen and opened the fridge. “We even have stuff in here to chop and sauté and whatever the hell you do with it. You cook for me, I’ll pay your car insurance and anything else you need.”
It made sense but still, I waffled, knowing I should be doing more. “I’ll clean, too.”
“Deal.” Addison grinned. “Now get in the kitchen and make me a sammich.”
I did as I was told, but not before inviting Asher over for dinner Sunday night. Grateful my friend was bailing me out yet again, I was bound and determined to pay her back by making the best damn meal either of them had ever had.