Page 28 of Spark
Making absolutely certain he wasn’t being watched or followed, Simon made his way to the second floor.He headed away from the circus in Leo’s wing of the house, and as soon as he’d reached his own bathroom, shut the door, and turned on the faucet as high as it would go, he took his untraceable burner phone out of his jacket pocket.
When Runner picked up, neither of them bothered with a greeting.“Would you care to tell me why the estate is currently being searched by half of the RPD?”Simon asked.
“I take it you’re not hosting a benefit,” came the wry response, but since Leo had exhausted Simon’s tolerance for bullshit, he wasn’t in the mood.
“You told me they didn’t have anything,” Simon said, earning a soft scoff.
“I didn’t promise.I only deal in facts, and the fact is,whenyou asked me, all evidence was circumstantial.”A few soft clicks of a keyboard later, and Runner let out a breath.“But Leo’s been a bad boy.His DNA was found at the crime scene.”
Simon’s heart punched in his chest, but he held out hope.“Touch?”
Runner trashed it by saying, “Blood,” then vaporizing it completely by adding, “on the body.In three places.”
FuckingLeo.“Chain of custody?”Simon asked.
More typing on Runner’s end.“Looks clean, from what I can tell.”
“I don’t pay you to guess.”
Runner’s voice chilled a few degrees.“You don’t pay me to get caught, either.I have to cover my ass in order to cover yours.”
This was an unfortunate truth.It was another unfortunate truth that if the police had proof of Leo’s DNA on Brinkman’s body, it would only be a matter of time before this search warrant turned into an arrest warrant, and that wouldn’t do.
Again, Simon felt the dark temptation to let this investigation proceed so Leo could finally pay for his arrogance and stupidity.If Leo was going to go down for a crime, it would be because Simon chose it, and he’d go down for a hell of a lot more than one puny murder that the D.A.’s office was hanging on a single piece of evidence.
He exhaled on a count of five, his control kicking back in.DNA was damning, yes, and it complicated things.But if it was the only evidence the police had, Simon could work with that.They wouldn’t find anything in this search.Even Leo had enough self-preservation not to keep a murder weapon or bloody clothes lying around.The house and the electronics would be clean, because Simon made them that way—not that Leo had a fucking clue how much work went into that.The RPD didn’t have a murder weapon, obviously, since they’d been very clear they were looking for one.An eyewitness was out of the question.Leo might be arrogant with a side of impulsive, but he wasn’tthatdense, and anyway, an ID alone meant exactly shit.No, the police must be working with the DNA alone.
Which meant this could be salvageable.
It would take work, Simon thought, fitting the pieces together.While Phil could rely on his usual tactics to make the investigation a nightmare for the D.A.’s office, Simon couldn’t leave Leo’s fate to the attorney.He couldn’t have even a small chance that the authorities would get lucky.Leo was the front that let Simon run everything.This whole thing had to dead-end now, before the police got cocky and issued an arrest warrant, or—worse yet—Leo fucked up by running his mouth and gave them more proof.
No.Theironlyproof was this DNA, and if that disappeared, then so did this case.Which meant Simon was, once again, going to have to take control of the situation.
“You have the forensics report in front of you?”he asked.
“Yeah,” Runner replied, wary.“Why?”
“Because I want to know where the DNA kit is being stored.It’s time to make this go away, once and for all.”
9
Chloe was exhausted, frustrated, and scared as hell, not necessarily in that order.A little over twenty-four hours had passed since she’d gotten the phone call from Addison that Leo Navarro’s blood had been found on Sal Brinkman’s body in three separate places.Given how violent the stabbing had been—she shivered,not thinking about it, not thinking about it one tiny bit—the fact that Navarro had sustained small cuts of his own in the process wasn’t entirely shocking.That he’d been careless enough to leave behind DNA of that nature was a little more of a surprise, although not one Chloe was mad about.
But that the Intelligence Unit had gotten a big enough break to get an extensive warrant, then found exactly zero evidence to put the nail in Navarro’s coffin after a fourteen-hour search?
Thatwasentirely shocking, not to mention a problem of epic proportions.They’d seized plenty of assets to test for the presence of blood, just in case.But Esme had only been able to describe Leo in a dark, “bougie” suit, and Leo owned conservatively two hundred suits in black, charcoal, and navy blue.None of them had appeared bloodstained, and with the amount that Brinkman had lost, it would be impossible to miss on whatever Navarro had been wearing when he’d killed him.The laptops and phones the RPD had seized had yielded nothing that connected to Brinkman at all, so far, and even though Camila had rendered a detailed drawing of the murder weapon per Esme’s description, the search hadn’t turned up anything that matched.
Chloe was trying to be patient, trust the process, blah blah blah.But the search warrant was supposed to seal the deal, not create an opportunity for Navarro’s smarmy lawyer to make enough wiggle room to escape a murder charge.For God’s sake, Navarro’s blood had been found on Brinkman’sbody.
Her heart pounded faster, sweat forming between her shoulder blades despite the air conditioning blasting through her MINI Cooper.Dread, cold and familiar, crept into her mind like a recurring nightmare, but no, no, no.She needed to be strong for Esme.The DNA evidence was solid.Irrefutable.It might be all they had in this moment, but itwasproof.Chloe could do this.She was tougher than she’d been two years ago.
You’re perfectly capable of thousands of things.Tyler’s voice echoed up from her memory, sending a whole different batch of feelings through her chest.As much as she didn’t want to admit it, every time she’d gone to her happy place to re-center over the past twenty-four hours, there he’d been in her head, all calm and cool and I’m-your-wingman.The reconciliation, of sorts, had been overdue, Chloe had known.The couple of months they’d spent giving each other the Heisman had been wearing thin, and as pride-stung as she’d been that he’d practically run screaming from their kiss, she couldn’t marinate in his rejection forever.Theywerepartners, at least temporarily, and she’d actually had a good time with him at the party venue—the first truly good time she’d had since this case had kicked off.
Even if that truly good time had almost ended in another impulsive kiss.
“Nope,” Chloe whispered, leaving the thought behind as she pulled into the parking lot behind Station Seventeen.She and Tyler had a job to do, and that job did not involve their mouths touching in any way.Her ego had already taken a direct hit courtesy of their first lip lock.The last thing she needed was to nuke the fragile truce they’d reached by even thinking about flinging herself at him again.
With her resolve locked in like a laser sight, Chloe scanned the parking lot with care, choosing the closest available spot to the building even though it was still light outside.A little cautious, maybe, but she knew from experience that caution was necessary.Being aware of her surroundings was rule number one in personal safety—even if shewasa few hundred feet from a station full of first responders.
