Page 7 of The Negotiator

Chapter Three

Garrett stood to the side of Lauren’s living room with his friend Matthias Clarke and looked over at Carl’s body. Time seemed to blur and bend but Garrett guessed almost two hours had passed since the discovery. The bag of Thai food sat unopened on the counter as the forensic and police teams worked the room. The small space was alive with activity and noise.

“I hate when the dead don’t stay dead,” Matthias said in his typical deadpan voice. He’d been called in from his new house, the one he shared with Lauren’s best friend, Kayla, about twenty minutes away. It was late but Matthias still wore a suit and tie... because of course he did. The guy owned a security company and lived his life as if he were permanently on call.

“Lower your voice.” Garrett glanced across the room to the kitchen where Lauren stood, answering questions about Carl’s brother and anyone else who might need to be contacted. “But yeah.”

Matthias crossed his arms in front of him. At six-four he was formidable enough that seasoned police officers with impressive weapons on display gave him room when they walked by. “So this fucker appears out of nowhere after thirty or so months, makes demands and then shows up bleeding out on her floor.”

That’s one of the many things Garrett liked about Matthias. The guy didn’t pick and choose his words. He just plowed ahead. Matthias and Garrett’s boss and friend, Wren, spent a lot of years together in their twenties. Garrett knew Matthias through Wren. Garrett actually knew a whole group of guys who once called themselves the Quint Five in deference to the mentor who took them all in and saved them from everything ranging from prison to sure death.

He trusted all of them. None of them knew he’d been dating—or not dating, depending on who you asked—Lauren, but they would soon. Matthias would see to that. Talking shit would come in waves after that. Garrett seriously considered throwing away his cell.

“I should probably remind you to show some respect for the dead, but damn, I hate this guy.” A kick of guilt smacked into Garrett as he said the words. Carl’s body wasn’t even cold but with the way the guy had lived his life, Garrett didn’t have any trouble imagining someone wanting him dead.

“Hated.”Matthias made an odd sound. “And maybe don’t volunteer that information.”

“Why?” Garrett asked, half listening to Matthias while keeping tuned into the conversation Lauren was having. He really wanted a lawyer with her, but she seemed to be holding up just fine, not giving one bit of important information away.

Damn, he loved smart women.

“You’re dating Carl’s ex and happen to be in town rather than on your planned trip to California right when said ex rises from the dead and someone slams him in the head with a cast-iron frying pan.” Matthias’s voice dropped lower, inching as close to a whisper as Matthias ever got. “There’s a word for what you’re about to become here.”

“Clue me in.”

“Suspect.”

“Oh, come on.” Garrett tried to scoff the idea away but it settled in his brain. He hadn’t even kissed Lauren yet and he could wind up as the target of police interest. Wasn’t that just fucking great? “But we’re barely...”

“Yes?” Matthias put a finger behind his ear and leaned in. “What words are you looking for? Sleeping together? Dating? See, I’m your best friend—”

“You’re actually not.” Wren was, but even Garrett had to admit that Matthias had grown on him. The gruffness, the demanding nature, how stupid in love he was with Kayla and how fast he fell. It was hard not to like the guy.

“—and I didn’t know you and Lauren had a thing. Imagine what the police are going to think. Add in the absence of a break-in and the presence of the murder weapon, which appears to be the bloodstained pan in the sink, and you’ve got a perception problem.” Matthias smiled, which was never a great sign for the person on the receiving end of it. “Lucky for you, Wren found another way of helping.”

Wren worked miracles but the slamming in Garrett’s gut didn’t ease. “How?”

Matthias nodded in the general direction of the older man, the only one not in uniform, coming in Lauren’s front door. “Detective Rick Cryer.”

Garrett knew him, had worked with him before on the case where Wren met his girlfriend, Emery. “He’s retired.”

This wasn’t his jurisdiction or even his job. Thanks to the media firestorm following Emery’s case, Detective Cryer was now considered a cold-case specialist and in high demand. Garrett couldn’t imagine how many favors and how much maneuvering and ego-stroking Wren had done to get a friendly ear like Cryer on this case.

“I guess you owe Wren.”

Understatement. Garrett owed Wren—all of the Quint Five—for a lot more than this. “He should just clear me, so we can get on with finding out what really happened here.”

“Any clues?”

“None. I’ve heard mumbling that the area around the body and in the kitchen had been wiped free of fingerprints, including Lauren’s, which should logically be in her own house. She has an alarm and locks and someone got around all of it.”

Matthias exhaled. “Well, I think Cryer would be more amenable to making your presence here go away quietly if we weren’t also dealing with the dead guy’s former silent business partner, his brother and his girlfriend, the same woman Carl left Lauren for.”

That last part struck Garrett as out of place with Carl’s insistence he be allowed to move back in with Lauren. “That woman is in town?”

“Yes, as are the other two. Apparently all three of them are demanding answers.”

“Great.” Garrett’s mind flipped to the people he saw huddled outside. Some were neighbors. Others demanded to speak with someone in charge. He’d bet at least one of them had a vested interest in Carl.

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