Page 17 of What We May Be

Chapter Five

Charlie turned into the station parking lot and almost dropped her thermos. Parked between a police cruiser and her uncle’s Jeep were Trevor’s monster truck and a sweet-ass Harley. Recalling Sean’s boots from yesterday and the roar of a bike cruising past the beach house last night, her mind raced and her hand trembled as she lowered the thermos and parked. No one in Hanover had a bike that nice. Vintage, mint condition, expensive. It had to have been Sean who’d driven by the house, taking a trip down memory lane. Unable to sleep after the day’s roller coaster, she’d done the same, finishing the leftover bottle of Ardbeg and drowning in mental snapshots of their night together.

And now the bike was at the station. Sean was at the station. In the same place as Trevor. Fuck. She’d hoped the inevitable explosion between those two would’ve happened last night, after Trevor had left Annie’s house. Or maybe Trevor and Sean were at the station because the explosion had been that bad. Which one had been arrested? Both of them? Why hadn’t anyone called her? In any event, she didn’t relish tiptoeing through an emotional minefield as she tried to solve a case.

Her apprehension grew with each step, increasing exponentially when she reached the main floor. A group was gathered in the large conference room on the other side of the bullpen. Sean and Trevor stood side by side, their backs to her, as the former pointed to something on the conference room table. Jaylen, Abel, and Diego stood on the other side of the table, similarly engrossed in whatever was laid out before them.

Taking a deep breath to calm her tumbling stomach, Charlie crossed the bullpen floor, wrapped her hand around the conference room doorknob, and said a silent prayer. She pushed open the door, and five sets of eyes swung her way. Hers went straight to Trevor’s hazel ones. “What are you doing here?”

Trevor opened his mouth to answer, but Sean beat him to it. “Trevor stopped by to see me last night.”

Her gaze darted between them, noting Sean’s bruised jaw and Trevor’s swollen knuckles. They’d fought, yet now they stood side by side, relatively calm. She sensed an undercurrent of tension, but at least they weren’t still tearing each other apart. What had transpired to warrant a ceasefire?

Before she could ask, Sean explained, “Trevor identified the quote from the crime scene.”

“‘A plague upon you, murderers, traitors, all,’” she recited.

“It’s Shakespeare,” Trevor said. “From King Lear.”

Sean pushed the photo of Jefferson Marshall hanging from the barn rafters her direction. “Lear says it when he finds his daughter, Cordelia, hung in a barn.”

She picked up the photo and studied it anew. There were some similarities, but from what she recalled, it was a young princess in the play versus an older professor in their crime scene. She needed more. “Why?” she asked Trevor.

“Why Jeff, or why Cordelia?”

“Either. Both.” She shrugged and tossed the photo on the table. “You both know I was a math major, not English lit. Someone enlighten me.” She walked to the rounded end of the conference table and braced her palms on the tabletop, tapping her nails on the wood. When no explanation was offered, she glanced at Sean, recognizing a detective’s morbid glint in his eyes. “You’ve obviously got a theory, so out with it.”

He grinned wide, so much like that morning he’d proposed to her and Trevor, a secret he couldn’t wait to share, that Charlie slammed her eyes shut against the suddenly spinning room. She clutched the edge of the table and fought the two-fisted attack of vertigo and nausea.

“Charlotte,” her uncle called, his shout muted by the blood whooshing in her ears. “Sugar,” he said a beat later, closer, his big hand on her arm.

Warmth spread across her lower back from the other side, and the familiar scent of Old Spice wafted around her. The rushing noise faded, the nausea receded, and the world steadied. She opened her eyes to Trevor by her side, right where he always was whenever her life was thrown into chaos.

“Hey there,” he said. “You okay?”

She took a deep breath, released her death grip on the table, and straightened.

He dipped his mouth to her ear and whispered, “Good to know you find Shakespeare so swoonworthy.”

She smiled at his teasing words. “Thank you.”

“Anytime.” He winked, then dropped a kiss on her temple, an extra shot of calm, before returning to his place beside Sean, who was stretched over the table, pointing something out to Diego and Jaylen.

To her left, Abel remained close, his dark eyes full of concern. “All good?”

“Good,” she assured him.

Sean’s discerning gaze snapped to hers. He cocked his head, silently asking for the all-clear.

“Talk to me about this theory of yours,” she said.

As if sensing what had set her off before, he didn’t smile as he began again. “Two things. First”—he held up his index finger—“Trevor reminded me Cordelia was hung in a barn, falsely accused of treason.”

“Treason? Professor Marshall?” Charlie scanned the crime scene photos again. “Guilty or falsely accused?”

“We’re looking into it,” Jaylen answered.

“Does make murder seem more likely than suicide,” Diego added, then glanced at Sean. “If it is murder, I don’t think he’s a victim of convenience.”

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