Page 20 of Justice for Francesca

“He’s not a criminal if that’s what you’re asking.” Triumph’s tone was like acid. “I dove deep on everyone’s background checks, or they never get hired here. I saw his arrest fourteen years ago, but I also saw it was thrown out for lack of evidence. He’s one of the hardest workers I know and one of the most honest. The club and our employee family come above everything else for him. Always have, ever since he started here.Don’t paint him with the same brush as your family, any more than you want to be or should be.”

She felt her spine stiffen at what he meant as an argument and not an insult. It didn’t matter the reason. The accusation still stung. “I’m simply asking because the man is a veritable stranger to me. What about Tripoli?”

“The boss is a former Navy medic who worked special operations with the Marines. What do you think?”

“Marines can do bad things too. Often do.”

“Definitely not Tripoli.” He gestured with his head down to Tilly. “Does bringing her here smack of anything other than decency? Or how he watched over you in the hospital? He was there for a week, Fleur.” It did not escape notice how easily he slipped into her alias from The Library. “He didn’t have to do that, but he felt responsible for your abduction. There was no way he was going to leave before he knew you were okay.”

That week had been a hazy blur in Francesca’s memory. She had thought she’d heard Tripoli’s voice through the sedatives and fogginess of pain medication, but she’d convinced herself it was a hallucination.

“Doesn’t mean that he can’t be a murderer.”

Triumph shook his head, anger clear on his face. “Then you don’t know him at all, and you certainly don’t deserve?—”

“Deserve what?” Francesca asked.

“His attention. He’s never forgotten you.”

When did she lose control of this interview? To hide her irritation, she stood. Before she left, she considered the broken girl in front of her. Her mouth offered the piece of personal information before she could stop it. “I dream about being buried alive. Not as often as I used to, but when I’m overtired or stressed, the dreams come back.”

Tilly’s face reflected surprise and recognition. It was what Francesca expected. Spending too much time in theconfined coffin-like container had not only given the woman claustrophobia, but it had also narrowed specifically into taphophobia. Francesca’s therapist had told her it was normal in cases like hers. Wanting to let the girl know she wasn’t alone, Francesca pulled her card from her pocket and handed it to Tilly. “I’m available if you need to talk to someone who went through it with you.” Once offered, she couldn’t retract the promise. While she didn’t exactly regret what she’d done, it opened a door she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted open. Now she could never close it.

“Thanks,” Tilly whispered, her face flooding with gratefulness that someone seemed to understand.

Francesca spoke to both of them, her special agent persona locked back in place. “You’re free to go for now, but don’t leave the city. We may have more questions.”

With that, she turned on her heel and exited the room. Her thoughts were completely jumbled. Triumph had to be mistaken. Tripoli might have been attracted to her, but he never gave any overt hint he was interested in a date in all of the weeks she was at The Library. Afterward, he could have tried to find her. It’s not like it would have been difficult to find her if he’d tried hard enough. Not that she would have taken him up on a date or something more. He’d been part of an active investigation. That went against the rules. While she would never admit it out loud to anyone, to herself in the moments she’d allowed herself to think about him, she’d always felt hurt that he hadn’t.

She stuffed that problem into another drawer and went to find Cruz.

Cruz was interviewing Michael.Since she couldn’t enter the room and keep herself on the case, she decided to wait in Tripoli’s office and review the guest list from the party the night before. Pulling the list in front of her, she then went to the computer registry and searched for the files she’d need to access the membership list. She began her scan of the names. Tripoli, Cosmos, Triumph, Mila…

Made sense that he’d include the employees' names on the membership list. Tripoli didn’t seem like the type of person to skip that fine of a detail. She bit her lip, her teeth pulling it to the side, as she considered her next action. It made sense, but she wondered if her choice was entirely professional.

She scanned the list for any other Sequeira family members or their associates. Nothing. Only Mila.

She clicked on Mila’s name and read through the membership application, health history, purchase receipts, and everything else that was included. The basics of it was information she knew from the initial research done on her previous assignment. She tried to ignore that the woman’s frequency to the club, alcohol orders, and purchases from the shops at the clubs were irrelevant to anything but personal nosiness about Tripoli’s ex-girlfriend, who he claimed wasn’t really a girlfriend.

She’d been looking at the reports for almost forty-five minutes when Cruz found her, her face scrunched up, her pencil making marks in the margin.

“Find anything interesting?” Cruz asked as he sat across from her.

“Just trying to get the lay of the land. Last night was a private party, so very few of them were actually members.”

Cruz grunted. “That makes things more complicated.”

“Not necessarily. I mean, as long as the club’s security measures were in place with scanning and matching IDs, they’ll be easy to find. Plus, an outside guest would be unlikely to know enough about the club to pull this off in less than two and a half hours, leaving our hunt to a member, an employee, or a former employee.”

“True. What do we know so far?”

She shuffled the papers into a neat stack and consulted her notes. “The club opens at seven p.m., Thursday through Saturday, and the club hosts private events on Wednesdays and Sundays, which it appears they do quite a bit of. They used their normal system to admit guests, with one exception. There was a group of fifty individuals who were invited to a special signature dinner the club does. Seven-course foodie thing. That started at six p.m. Those individuals started mixing in with the other guests shortly after seven p.m. when the first group of guests—thirty people—entered and were shuttled into the bar up front. An emcee named Jessa entertained them with a musical number, then gave them directions for navigating the labyrinth. The last group was admitted at eleven p.m.”

Cruz grunted. “Thirty people every fifteen minutes? That’s six hundred people, plus staff. That’s a huge group of people.”

“And that’s just the night before the murder.”

“What did you learn from Triumph and Tilly?” he asked.

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