Body Movers: 3 Men and a Body

“You don’t have to protect me, Wesley.”

He closed the refrigerator door, his eyes wide. “These men are dangerous, Carlotta. You don’t know.”

“So stop doing business with them. Get your life together. Think about college.”

He looked anguished for a few seconds, then angry. “I changed my mind about the sandwich. See you later.”

She knew better than to try to stop him. He was through talking. The front door banged, and she only hoped that whatever had happened the night he was gone had scared him straight.

She turned her attention back to the streaked window, attacking it with cleaner and a page of newspaper fished out of the mail basket. When she stood back, the sun shining through the spotless window was almost blinding. “You were right, you little shit,” she mumbled.

Guilt plucked at her for not telling him about the note their father had left and the development in Daytona Beach. She pulled the piece of paper out of her bra and read it again. Randolph had been within arm’s length of her. He could have pulled her aside, revealed his identity … given her a hug and a kiss … and an explanation. Why hadn’t he?

Because he didn’t trust her. He knew she’d gone along with the fake funeral to lure her parents out of hiding. Had he felt betrayed?

Anger whipped through her—he had betrayed them first. He and her mother, Valerie. Her father had left town to escape a trial and, presumably, jail time. But her mother, who always maintained a martini in one hand and a cigarette in the other, didn’t even have an excuse. She had simply chosen her husband over her children. Carlotta had gotten past being angry for herself, but she would never forgive their mom for abandoning Wesley at the age of nine.

He’d slept in Carlotta’s bed for a year, clinging to her, crying for his mother every night until he was too exhausted to stay awake.

Carlotta’s eyes watered just remembering. No one but she knew how Wesley had suffered. He’d been a slight kid, with a genius IQ, and the creative capacity to concoct all kinds of stories about why their parents had left. Eventually he’d decided that their father was some kind of secret agent forced to go underground. She knew Wesley had outgrown the elaborate tales intellectually, but she wondered if he still entertained some of those childhood fantasies emotionally.

Over the years, she’d vacillated between hoping their parents were found and hoping they were lost forever. But she was starting to worry that Wesley would be at dangerous loose ends until there was some resolution to the jagged tear in their family.

Was their father close to turning himself in? Was he growing tired of life on the lam? Was that why he’d gotten sloppy and left fingerprints at a crime scene? She shook her head, trying to imagine her parents as a crime duo—her dad wielding a gun while her mom walked around holding open a designer bag for everyone to deposit their wallet in.

Frankly, the most ludicrous part of it all was the thought of Valerie entering a Holiday Inn. If her mother had any say, they would hold up only five-star establishments.

No, Carlotta couldn’t picture her parents as armed robbers. They wouldn’t have to resort to anything so overt. Randolph Wren could charm anyone out of his or her life savings, and Valerie was the kind of woman that men threw money at. Model-thin and beautiful, with an aura that mesmerized those around her, she was movie-star glamorous, and everyone had been happy to be in her entourage. Carlotta suspected that being on the run had been hard for her mother, who was accustomed to lavish attention. But it only demonstrated how emotionally dependent she was on Randolph … and on her vodka.

The phone rang, rousing Carlotta from her dark thoughts.

“Hello?”

“It’s Coop.”

She smiled into the phone. “Hi, there. You just missed Wesley.”

“That’s okay. It’s you I want.”

She gave a little laugh, enjoying the easy flirtation. “In that case, what can I do for you, sir?”

He groaned. “So many things. Seriously, though, did I catch you at a bad time?”

“Are you kidding? I’m so bored, I’m cleaning.”

“I figured you might be going stir-crazy being off work, so I have a proposition.”

She pursed her mouth. “I’m listening.”

“Well, this isn’t exactly romantic, but I have a VIP body pickup in Boca Raton, and I wondered if you’d like to ride along. We could leave tomorrow and have a couple of days of fun in the sun beforehand.”

“Boca Raton? Oh, my God, is it Kiki Deerling?”

“You know her?”

“Just from television. She’s hard to miss.”

“Yes. This trip is to pick up her body, but no one can know about it. I signed a confidentiality agreement, so mum’s the word.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone.”

“So how about it? Want to hit the road for a few days? Separate rooms, of course … unless I can persuade you otherwise.”

She laughed at his teasing tone, but entertained a little shiver of excitement. A few days alone with Coop, getting to know each other, no pressure. He wasn’t holding a ring for her, and he wasn’t hell-bent on capturing her father. His only angle was tempting her with sandy beaches and icy drinks.

Suddenly Carlotta’s mind raced to assemble disparate bits of information. “I’ve never been to Boca Raton and my geography is a little rusty. Would we be driving close to Daytona Beach?”

“Right through it, as a matter of fact.”

A wicked smile curved Carlotta’s mouth. “What time do we leave?”

7

Wesley squeezed the hand brake on his bike and grunted when pain seized the muscles under the bandage on his forearm. He’d convinced Peter not to take him to the emergency room for stitches, but that meant the wounds would take longer to heal.

His opinion of Peter Ashford had never been high. Wesley had been young when the guy had dumped his sister shortly after their parents had left town. But he remembered how Carlotta had cried herself to sleep holding Peter’s picture, how the man’s absence seemed to affect her more than the absence of their parents. Probably because, like Wesley, she had expected their parents to return any day. Peter, on the other hand, had apparently made it clear he wasn’t coming back.

Carlotta had been devastated, and Wesley knew she blamed their folks for Peter breaking the engagement. She’d said he hadn’t wanted his family name intertwined with theirs, tainted from their father’s behavior. As Wesley had grown older, though, he’d blamed himself for Peter leaving. It seemed obvious that the man hadn’t wanted to be saddled with a kid.

But since Peter’s wife had died, he’d certainly been trying to make up for his past behavior, coming around and acting protective of Carlotta. When Wesley started to feel bad about taking advantage of Peter’s guilt, he told himself that he was doing the man a favor, giving him a chance to get back into the Wrens’ good graces. Peter had agreed not to tell Carlotta about the incident at The Carver’s warehouse—or the money that had changed hands—and for that, Wesley was grateful.

He must have been one hell of a mess judging from the expression on Peter’s face when he’d picked Wesley up at the prescribed badass corner after Mouse had counted the cash with his thick fingers. Ashford hadn’t said, but he was probably glad he’d driven his luxury SUV instead of his Porsche to shuttle Wesley and his bike home. Still, it was going to be hard to get bloodstains out of leather upholstery.

To his credit, the man had asked only if Wesley wanted to go to the hospital, holding his tongue about what had transpired until after Wesley had showered and eaten a pizza that Peter had ordered. Then, while he cleaned the wound on Wesley’s arm and wrapped it with a bandage, he’d extracted the story one well-placed question at a time.

The guy should’ve been a lawyer, Wesley thought wryly.

He wheeled into the parking lot of the building that housed the probation office to which he’d been assigned after his arrest for breaking into the courthouse computer. Once a week he checked in with E. Jones, his surprisingly hot probation officer, who cut him zero slack. His pulse picked up just at the thought of seeing E. In those dark moments when it looked as if he might not get out of that dingy, windowless room alive, he’d imagined E.’s smile and the way her red hair fell over her shoulders. She was way out of his league, but he could dream.

He locked up his bike and slung his backpack over his shoulder with his good arm. His cell phone rang. Both the movement of retrieving it and the name on the display made him wince—Liz Fischer. He connected the call. “This is Wes.”

“Wes,” she crooned. “It’s Liz.”

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“I was just calling to see if you were okay. After your phone call yesterday, I was worried.”

Right. “I’m fine.”