Five
Women never fucking listen.
My instructions couldn’t have been clearer – here’s an address. Take your computer here to get fixed.
But no.
No.
She couldn’t just roll with it. So instead of taking herself to the colleague I knew and trusted to fix her hacking issue, Sandy had waltzed her fine ass right into the very last place I needed her to go.
My bad – Monica had.
I’d been in the shop when she walked in – fine as hell in dark pink slacks that fit her thick thighs and ample ass like they were made just for her, and a navy-blue sweater that plunged low enough in front to show the generous swell of perfect breasts.
“Damn,” the customer I was supposed to be helping muttered, confirming my thought that she’d probably pulled the attention of everyone nearby. I didn’t know who she was then – she was just a gorgeous woman with a laptop in her hands, obviously needing help. When she stopped to watch Quentin interacting in the classroom, I thought it was going to be my opportunity to finish with my customer and go to her rescue.
Of course, his ass wanted to talk.
By the time I sent him off to the register to check out, Renata had already gotten to her. And just when I was about to take it as a sign of something not meant to be, Renata stepped out of the consultation office to talk to me.
She had a customer who needed my help.
I tried my best not to let my giddiness show as Renata explained that the woman needed a security clean-up for home and office.
I was great at security clean-ups for home and office.
“The way she found out about it all was really bizarre,” she’d said, gesturing toward the woman sitting at her desk, waiting. “Some guy she’s been talking to online, warned Monica that he thought she was hacked, because whatever virus was trying to use the video chat connection to access his computer, and…”
Renata kept talking, but I wasn’t really hearing it. Because, as I looked at the woman in the office, her hand went up to a tiny platinum cross around her neck, twirling it between her fingers, running her perfectly polished navy-blue nails along the outline.
I knew that cross.
I knew that hand.
Had seen that cross laying between those flawless breasts, had watched those nails – a different color every time – disappear into the valley between those voluptuous thighs.
It was her.
Right there.
She must have felt me looking at her, because her gaze came up to mine. Those big brown eyes didn’t show any sign of recognition, but her high cheekbones lifted even more as succulent, pretty lips curved into a dimpled smile, and she… waved.
Fuck.
I forced nonchalance as I looked away without reacting, as if I hadn’t noticed.
“Yeah,” Renata said, touching my arm, which brought my attention back to her. “So do you think you can come and talk to her about it?”
“I actually have something else on my plate right now, but um… get her information, we’ll run it against the schedule, and see when we can get her fixed up. In the meantime, get her set up—”
“With a new phone and laptop, have her tether the laptop to the phone for internet, and talk to her cell company about a temporary data increase. Duh.”
My mouth dropped open. “Damn, Ren, why you gotta “duh” me?”
“Because, you’re being weird and she really needs help.”
“And we’re going to help,” I assured. “I just… I have something else to take care of first, and then I can get on board.”
Renata sucked her teeth. “You’d better be.”
“And now you’re trying to punk me? I thought we were better than that?”
As she stopped to grab a cell phone from one of the supply carts before she headed back to the consultation office, she tossed me a grin. “Trying, Chad? Pretty sure I did.”
I laughed as she went back into the room with Monica, then took the opportunity to observe while their attention was on each other.
So this is Sandy…
Since becoming friends – before the webcam stuff – I’d considered Sandy beautiful, sight unseen. Call it corny or whatever, but I was easily swayed by an intelligent, driven woman, with a great personality. That shit was beyond attractive to me.
But goddamn.
This woman was flat-out striking.
I knew better than to think it, but my mind took me there anyway – What the fuck is her husband’s problem? I quickly arrived at an answer though: Stupidity. Not that a woman’s looks made it okay to be an asshole, but shit. Men with good sense didn’t screw over women who looked like that.
She had dimples.
On her face and on her ass.
The shit just didn’t make sense.
All that aside… I had a problem on my hands. I could deduce on my own that recommending a specific computer service company had probably spooked her – I wasn’t supposed to know where she was. And in my defense, I hadn’t known where she was, until the hacking attempt exposed her IP address and location.
The fact that she was right here in the same city had been news to me too.
Hell, the not knowing had been part of the appeal of the whole thing – a nice bit of excitement for my everyday life. Still… I’d be lying if I said that seeing her in front of me wasn’t incredible. But it didn’t mean that I was about to reveal who I was.
It was one thing for our friendship to be housed in phone calls and late-night web chats, with the boundary of anonymity and perception of distance firmly in place. Knowing who she was, knowing that we were right here in the city, possibly knew some of the same people… it felt bizarre.
I didn’t know what to do with it, so I did nothing.
Later that night, when I had the urge to shoot her a text, asking if she was okay – normal shit for us, usually – I found something else to do. Same thing the next morning, when I thought about her as soon as I opened my eyes. When Ren asked for my availability for the upcoming week, I gave it to her, knowing it wasn’t something I could put off.
I was going to have to face it.
Before that though, I googled the hell out of her.
Monica Stuart. Thirty-six years old. Graduated Blakewood State University with honors, owner of Vivid Vixen Cosmetics. Married fourteen years to Kellen Stuart, former financial advisor. No children.
“And fucking fine as hell,” I muttered to myself as I browsed the pictures attached to the article I’d found. Apparently, Monica was some sort of beauty icon – a lot of the hits I got on her name were from write-ups raving about everything from her hair to her clothes. There were hundreds on hundreds of pictures of her on red carpets, in photoshoots as the model, candid shots of her directing, shots of her as the client. Knowing these things about her added a whole other layer to the woman I already knew her to be.
What I didn’t see were many pictures of her actually with her husband.
“Yo!” Quentin called out as he barged into my office with Marcus right behind him. “We gonna have to peel you away from that screen, or what?”
Marcus plopped into the chair across from me. “Come on, bruh. You’re not even dressed, and you know the courts fill up quick.”
Sitting back, I propped my hands behind my head, looking at them. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t you own the gym? It’s never occurred to you to just reserve a court?”
“What’s the fun in that?” Marcus asked. “Part of the excitement is wondering if you’re gonna have space or not. What are you doing anyway? In here pretending to be busy?”
Quentin laughed. “That’s what Ren was fussing about yesterday.”
“Ren never thinks I’m working,” I chuckled. “Nah though, I’m just finishing something up.”
“What you working on man?” Quentin asked, and before I could react or respond, he’d turned the screen to face him. I blew out a sigh as a grin spread across his face. “Oh, I see. That’s what you’re working on.”
I shook my head. “I can explain.”
“Don’t have to explain anything,” Marcus said, with a low whistle. “That explains itself,” he added, pointing to a picture that was a side angle of Monica in jeans.
Quentin laughed. “Sure does. Now I’m even more surprised to hear you didn’t seem eager to help. Ren said “Monica” was pretty, but lawd. That’s a woman.”
“Kayla know you’re in here looking up women?” Marcus teased, and Quentin immediately joined in.
“Whew, I hope not. You know she doesn’t play that shit. Gonna roll up here with that Range Rover on two wheels like she did a couple years ago.”
“Okay,” I said, shaking my head. “So, fuck you, and fuck you.” I flipped both of them my middle finger as they laughed, and I couldn’t help chuckling too as I shut my computer down and stood up. “Y’all go ahead and grab a court, I’ll meet you down there. Who’s our fourth?”
“Sam is en route,” Quentin answered over his shoulder as they left, and I went to my desk for my keys and cell. As soon as I picked it up, I grinned at the message on the screen.
“You’re going to be there tonight, right? – Kay.”
When I opened up the text thread, I laughed at the video clip she’d included after the message – puppy dog eyes.
“Where else would I be?” I responded as I left my office.
“Working. As usual. – Kay.”
I shook my head. “I’m not always working, first of all. Second, I wouldn’t miss seeing you tonight for the world. I’m hitting the court with the guys, and then I’m not even coming back to the office. Washing up and heading your way. Or I could just head your way, no wash-up. I’ll have flowers ??.”
“Ewww. Hard pass. Shower please. And don’t play with me about the flowers! – Kay”
“Not playing. Two dozen roses, just for you.”
“… chocolates too? – Kay.”
I chuckled, then typed out a response. “Obviously.”
“Ahhhh! I love you! – Kay.”
“Yeah, yeah, I love you too.”
Kayla was the best thing in my life.
Full stop.
From the time I met her, her presence had brought about a certain sense of fulfillment and peace – feelings that hit me out of left field, just like she had herself. A funny, brilliant, beautiful smart-ass, she was. Her very first words to me, the first time I saw her, nearly eleven years ago, had been “Oh, your mouth must not work, huh?” And then, after I assured her that it did, “Well, use it. Staring is creepy and rude.”
And so it went, from there.
Over the next eleven years, we grew up together – me more than her, because she was already so damned astute. Kay had never been… idealistic. I attributed that to the years before we met – a nomadic lifestyle, surrounded by people who promoted practicality and nonchalance. She didn’t want big grand gestures, had no use for anything fancy. Kay yielded herself to exactly one hobby – one singular imaginative thing that she did with near-obsessive enthusiasm.
She danced.
And as antithetical as they were to her insistence on – mostly – frugal living, she loved flowers.
So there I was, backstage at the theatre with an armful of roses, waiting to deliver them to her for a job well done. She wasn’t the principal dancer in her ballet company – for now, that title belonged to Anais Campbell, a veteran dancer Kay considered the blueprint of a contemporary Black ballerina.
Her idol.
Kay had been practically vibrating with happiness when she popped up at Five Star Tech to tell me she’d been accepted into the company, and that excitement had been magnified ten-fold once she was promoted from the ballet corps into the position of soloist.
Tonight was the culmination of months and months of hard work for her. The joy on her face when she finally emerged from the dressing room, scrubbed free of makeup and changed into sweats was palpable. As she approached me, stopping to sign autographs from other attendees, the smile on her face grew and grew until she was beaming as she stepped into my free arm for a hug.
“I can’t believe you actually made it,” she gushed, looping her arms around my waist to squeeze tight. “And these flowers are amazing.” Her eyes glittered with happiness as she pushed herself up on her toes to kiss me on the cheek before she pulled the flowers from me, practically burying her face in them to inhale. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. You looked really good up there.”
Somehow, she smiled even brighter. “You really think so? I lost my footing in that twirl in the second act, and I—”
“Don’t even sweat it. It was barely noticeable.”
Her smile faded a bit. “But you noticed.”
“Kay…”
“I know, I know,” she shook her head. “Don’t beat myself up, etc. etc. But you know how important this is to me. I’ll never be principal with that kind of mistake.”
“Fine, so you have a note for improvement for next time. But what you’re not about to do is let a tiny mistake ruin your night.”
She sucked her teeth. “So what am I about to do instead?”
“Well, don’t you have an after-party to go to?”
“Maybe.”
I chuckled. “Okay well then maybe you should get yourself ready, instead of dwelling on small stuff. Cool?”
“I guess…” She rolled her eyes, but couldn’t keep a smile from breaking free as she looked down at the flowers again. “Thank you for coming tonight.”
I shrugged. “Told you… nowhere else I’d rather be.”
We talked for a few more minutes, and she introduced me to some of her peers in the ballet company I hadn’t met. After that, I left her to it, knowing she had a busy night ahead, and made my exit.
The police car out in front of the theatre didn’t immediately raise a red flag. Police presence at large events wasn’t anything to lift an eyebrow at, so I walked right past it, heading to my car when I heard, “Chadwick LaForte, stop right there!”
The gasps from the remaining crowd mirrored my own shock as I stopped walking to turn and see what the fuss was. I took a step back, surprised, as I found myself facing the barrel of several guns.
“Man, what the hell is happening?” I shouted at the police officer closest to me, as the others moved to pin my arms behind my back to strap me into handcuffs. It took everything to quell my immediate reflex to get them the fuck off of me, knowing that local law enforcement tended to be trigger happy.
“Chadwick LaForte, you’re under arrest for the murder of Kellen Stuart. You have—”
“Who the fuck is Kellen Stu—”
Oh.
Oh, shit.
“Wait a minute,” I insisted. “I don’t even know that motherfucker to have—”
“Save it,” one of the cops said, as they shoved me into the back of a police cruiser. “Of course you didn’t do it. That’s what they all say.”
I started to say something back, but he’d already slammed the door, which was probably for the best. I had plenty of smart-ass shit to say, but none of it would help my situation. Sitting back, I closed my eyes, focusing on pulling myself together. There was no point in arguing with the cops when the word “murder” had been thrown around. There was only one thing I needed to say to anyone.
“I want to speak to my lawyer.”
“What the hell have you gotten yourself into?” Demetria asked as she walked into the interrogation room, already looking more exhausted than I was used to seeing her. Working a few doors down from her at Five Star Enterprises made her a pretty regular fixture in my life, and she always looked put-together and ready to destroy someone or something.
She still looked like that now, only… tired.
I shook my head in answer to her question. “Some bullshit. I didn’t fucking kill anybody. You know that.”
Demetria gave me a curious look at she sat down beside me at the table. “I mean… do I? We both know you haven’t always been the computer repair guy, so…”
“You’re pulling my leg right now, right?”
“Not at all. You were good with a trigger, but knives were your weapon of choice.”
I pushed out a harsh breath through my nose as I glared at Demetria. “And I left that life eleven years ago, for Kay. You know that.”
“What I know is that Monica Stuart is a very beautiful woman, and the two of you had a relationship that became sexual in nature. You knew she was married, knew about the drama her husband was putting her through, knew about the latest developments. It’s really not a stretch that you might consider getting rid of him for her.”
“I didn’t even know her damn name until yesterday! And I can account for my whereabouts all day today.”
Demetria nodded. “Good. Great, actually. If both of you have alibis, that’s less the police have to try and make their case.”
“There is no case,” I maintained. “I didn’t even know that motherfucker!”
“But you know Monica. Very, very well.”
“We talked online.”
“You did more than talk, Chad. Now isn’t the time to try to downplay it. They have video. They know you two were more than “friends”.”
My nostrils flared at the word video, and I sat up a little straighter. “Video? How in the hell do they have video, and how the hell do you know about it? What kind of video? From when? Why in the world—”
“Okay, one question at a time please!” Demetria interrupted, then took a breath as she pushed her hair back from her face. “They got the video from Monica’s computer. She says it’s from about a year ago, and it is… an intimate session the two of you shared.”
Goddamnit. She was recording us?
“You said “she says”. That’s what she told the police?”
Demetria shook her head. “No. She told me. Because I’m representing her as well. Chloe called me when they arrested her, two hours before they arrested you.”
“What the fuck Dem! You don’t think this is a conflict of interests?!”
She frowned. “What? No, not at all. The police are trying to railroad both of you, when neither of you is guilty. I can more than handle this.”
I scoffed. “How sure are you that she isn’t guilty, huh? She recorded us together without my permission. Isn’t that a crime?”
“Technically, yes. But it was never intended to be viewed by anyone other than herself, and she’d attempted to delete it. It was recovered from the computer’s hard drive. That’s the only reason they have it.”
“No, they have it because she did it in the first damned place,” I argued, not interested in Monica’s reasons or semantics. “Our text and email correspondences don’t have anything that would make the police arrest me for a fucking murder. The video is what has them thinking things between us are something they aren’t!”
“So what are things between you, Chad? Because you seem pretty upset at the idea of being linked to her at all.”
“Because I’m being accused of murdering this woman’s husband! My face is probably on the fucking news right now – what do you think Kayla is thinking, huh? They arrested me right outside the theater, in full view of everybody. Do you know how embarrassing that could be for her, if anybody knew who I was? How embarrassing the shit is for me?”
Demetria nodded. “Yes, I understand. But I hope you don’t think this is a cake walk for Monica.”
“Right now, I don’t give a fuck what it is for Monica!”
After I made that statement, Demetria’s eyes went wide for a second. I could tell she swallowed her first response, but was still getting ready to say something before a knock sounded at the door. Before either of us could actually answer, it swung open, and two detectives walked in.
“Let me save you fellas some time,” I started, ignoring Demetria’s subtle kick under the table, trying to get me to be quiet. “I did not kill anybody, especially over some pussy I’ve never even had the chance to sniff. You’ve got the wrong goddamn guy.”
The white one chuckled as the other one moved to the back of the room, resting against the wall. “Never smelled it before, huh? That’s an interesting way to put it.”
“Yeah, well, you get the point.”
“Oh yeah,” he nodded. “I get it. And so did Kellen Stuart I bet, by the time you introduced him to the dangerous end of your girlfriend’s expensive kitchen knife fourteen times before you cut his throat. Is that number significant for you? They were married fourteen years, you stick him fourteen times?”
I shook my head. “I have no answers for you about this shit, because I have nothing to do with it. I didn’t fucking stab anybody.”
“This time,” the black detective chimed in from the back. “We managed to find some interesting information in the parts of your history that aren’t redacted, or classified.”
“What does my history have to do with this?”
“Let me answer that for him, Bauer,” the other detective said.
“Go for it, Crowley.”
Crowley grinned. “With pleasure. You see, even if you didn’t ever hold the knife yourself, it seems pretty clear that you have the means and connections to have hired somebody for this type of thing. Now, you may not have “smelled it”, but you damn sure saw it, and had yourself a good time when you did. We’ve got your phone records, emails, texts. You talked to Mrs. Stuart multiple times a week on the phone, and share an email or texts pretty much every day. All of that suddenly stopped yesterday. Why?”
“She got hacked.”
“Huh,” Bauer spoke up. “She got hacked. And you are a former CIA hacker, among other, more hands-on things. That’s a nice little coinky-dink.”
“And that’s all it is,” Demetria chimed in. “That’s all any of this is – coincidence, conjecture, and circumstantial evidence. Either you actually charge my client with something, or you let go home.”
Crowley sighed. “Your alibi checks out anyway, Mr. LaForte. You’re free to go. But you stick around town. I’m sure we’ll have some more questions for you.”
I shrugged. “Anything more you have to say to me, you can do it through my lawyer. You said I was free to go, right?”
Once I got the nod, I stood up, and Demetria followed me out to the hall. “I called Marcus,” she said. “He should be waiting up front, to give you a ride back to your car.”
“Thanks Dem.”
She nodded. “Of course. Five Star Family looks out for each other. I would give you a ride myself, but I need to get back to Monica. They’re holding her overnight. Can’t get traffic camera history until morning, so…”
“Yeah, well. I’ll see you later.”
“Really, Chad?” Demetria snapped at me, and I frowned.
“What?!”
She rolled her eyes. “She said the two of you have been friends for five years. You’re seriously not even going to ask me how she is?”
“She hated ol’ boy. She’s probably celebrating.”
“Actually, she’s distraught,” Demetria corrected, folding her arms. “Regardless of how their relationship had changed, she still lost her husband, in a horrible manner, and now she’s being held for his murder.”
“None of which has anything to do with me.” The look on Demetria’s face had guilt tugging at my chest, but still… “I can’t be involved in shit like this. I don’t need my face on the news. How the fuck would I even begin to explain this to Kayla, huh? I wish Monica the absolute best – she’s a good woman, and I don’t want to see her life destroyed. But I can’t have something I don’t have anything to do with destroying my life either. I have too much to lose.”
“Who says you’re going to lose, Chad?” she asked, then shook her head. “But… whatever. I get it. And you’re not wrong. However, Monica could use all the friends she can get right now. She could use the support. But… I guess we won’t be counting you in that number.”
I raised my shoulders again. “Nah. You won’t.”
I left Demetria there in the hall and headed through the police station toward the front, where Marcus was waiting for me. My head was spinning as I moved, trying to make sense of what had seemed like an eternity of waiting, first for Demetria, and then to be released.
It had actually barely been two hours.
Two long ass hours.
Part of me did feel bad about abandoning Monica, if it could be considered that. I cared about her, cared about her wellbeing, but when it came to being accused of murder, I had to put a pause on that. If my friendship, relationship, whatever with her, was threatening my freedom or ran the risk of exposing the people I loved to unwanted or unwarranted attention… for me, the choice was easy.