Page 18 of Cyn
“I did. You want something to drink? Coffee, tea, beer, wine?” she asked. She pointed him to a barstool as she slipped behind the other side of the island.
“Technically on the clock for another hour, so a coffee would be good. But wouldn’t mind a beer on stand-by for when five o’clock hits.”
She smiled at him. “You got it.”
A few minutes later, she set a mug in front of him. Then, with a glass of wine in hand, she hopped up onto the stool beside his and gave him an expectant look.
“I feel like I should produce this with a dramatic flourish, like pulling flowers out of a hat or something,” he said, reaching into his pocket and producing the slim report on James McElroy.
She took it greedily and spread it out on the countertop. “I’m not really one for flowers. At least not in the winter.”
“Why the winter?”
She didn’t raise her head as she answered. “The only things growing in the region would be hothouse flowers, and if I’m going to have flowers in my house, I want them to smell like flowers. And I’m not into having them shipped from all over the place to suit my whims.”
Yet another piece of information he filed away for future reference as he sipped his coffee and she pored over the papers. When she flipped the final page over, she looked up. “What do you think?” she asked.
“I looked into McElroy last night after I dropped you off and didn’t find anything that would tell me why it was his body that Meleak chose to leave at your doorstep. I don’t think it was a random choice, and I think he means to convey something only McElroy can divulge, but I don’t know what.”
“Did you look on McElroy’s social media sites?”
He nodded. “And his friends’ sites.”
“Did you notice anything?”
He raised a brow. “Sounds like you did. But as for me, it all seemed like regular boy stuff. He didn’t have a lot of diversity in his friend group, but he’s from Western Massachusetts and went to university in Northern Mass. That’s probably not that uncommon. What about you?”
She took a sip of her wine, but before she answered, the front door opened and the now-familiar sound of her friends’ voices carried down the hall to the kitchen.
“I invited everyone over. I need to take a vote on something,” Cyn said, sliding off her stool. She was grabbing wineglasses for everyone by the time Six, Devil, and Nora entered the kitchen. Six and Devil wore suits and sky-high heels—how they walked in them in the winter was a conundrum he’d never solve—while Nora wore jeans and a flannel shirt. They all must have come straight to Cyn’s from work.
They greeted him like he was an old friend, though he had no illusion that their friendliness meant anything more than what Six had said the night before—they wereinclinedto trust him, but he wasn’t a part of their circle…yet.
“What did you find today?” Nora asked once they were all seated.
“Before we go there, I need to take a vote,” Cyn said.
Simultaneously, her three friends set their wineglasses down and looked expectantly at Cyn. Apparently, this was a thing they did, and something they took seriously.
Devil’s eyes darted to him before landing back on Cyn. “What are we voting on?”
“Whether to trust Joe. New Joe,” she clarified.
He nearly choked on his coffee and when he looked up from where he’d clumsily set his mug, all four women were staring at him. No one said a thing, and there was no question this was some sort of test.
He’d withstood any number of interrogations and sticky situations—both friendly and not—during his years in the Navy. This one might be unexpected, but since he was pretty sure they weren’t planning any physical torture, and they were much easier on the eye than those who’d stood in judgment in the past, there was no reason not to have a little bit of fun.
Resting an elbow on the table, he raised his mug and took a sip. Letting his gaze casually travel between the women, he accepted their scrutiny. Nora’s head cocked a tiny bit to the left, and a curl fell in front of her green eyes. Devil’s right eyebrow dropped a quarter inch as she tapped on the counter with a manicured fingernail. Cyn’s expression was blank, but Six’s mouth had tightened a touch as she assessed him. Despite the almost lackadaisical way Cyn had announced the vote, whatever the women were weighing in their minds, they were taking it very seriously.
Devil was the first to make a move. “I vote yes,” she said.
“I agree,” Nora chimed in.
Six’s lips tipped down into a small frown and she didn’t jump in with her vote. Not even when the eyes of her friends landed on her.
“Do you still have your Navy clearance?” she asked after a beat.
He nodded, not at all surprised Cyn had shared his prior career with her friends. “Have you ever worked with Amanda Fitzroy?” Six asked.
