Deadly Sexy

When sixty-three-year-old Gus Pennington got into
his eight-year-old Dodge Ram and headed off to his janitorial job, he had no idea this would be his last night on earth. He drove the fifteen miles to the L.A. Grizzlies Stadium and parked his truck in the designated space, took out his keys, unlocked the door lettered
MAINTENANCE—AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY
, and went inside. He’d found out that afternoon that the young man who was supposed to have mopped the executive offices last night hadn’t because he’d quit. Apparently the kid hadn’t worked in three days, and Gus refused to let the floors be dirty even a minute longer. A contract service kept the floors of the stadium’s luxury boxes clean, so Gus didn’t have to worry about them, but he and his two-man operation were responsible for the floors in the offices of the president, the GM, and their secretaries.

Gus liked his job. He’d been a football fan all of his life, and during his thirty years of employment with the old L.A. Rams teams, he’d had a chance to meet and greet his heroes up close and personal; he’d also accumulated enough autographs to start his own hall of fame. Coming to work kept him active, and the job made him the envy of his buddies at Wilson’s Barbershop.

Using the mop’s long yellow handle to steer with, Gus pushed the heavy red bucket off the elevator. He was on the third floor, where the offices of the team executives and secretaries were located. Gus took pride in doing a good job no matter where, but up here he did his best work. The place was quiet, the computer screens filled with moving, hushed screensavers. Tiny lights on the fax machines and printers glowed at the ready.

Taking out his iPod, he put on the headphones and clicked on the tunes his grandson Christopher had downloaded into it. The small silver-colored player had been a birthday present—even had the word
POPS
, Chris’s name for him, engraved on the front.

Miles Davis came on first. Gus adjusted the volume to the blaring beauty of
Bitches Brew
, then went to work.

After taking care of the secretaries’ offices, he pushed the mop bucket down the hall to the conference room. Because he was grooving with the music, Gus didn’t see the four men standing around the long table until it was too late to run, back away, or even to pray. The gun fired and his world went black. Miles wailed on.

Seated behind the steering wheel of the big eighteen
wheeler, Reese Anthony checked his outside mirrors for the traffic flowing behind him, then hit the button on the dash to change the CD. Seconds later the first signature notes of “The Golden Time of Day” by Frankie Beverly and Maze flowed sweetly through the cab’s surroundsound speakers and Reese smiled. He was a big Maze fan, and this particular tune was one of his favorites, especially on a long road trip with the day winding down. He was driving north on California’s I-5 on his way to San Francisco, over 150 miles away. It would be dark by the time he made it to the yard, but he didn’t mind. He had Frankie B and a small mountain of CDs to keep him company.

Reese was singing along with the lyrics when the phone rang. Frowning at the interruption, he eased down the volume and engaged the speaker for the communication component also routed through the cab’s high-tech dashboard. “This is Reese.”

“Hey, brother man. How are you?”

The familiar sound of Taylor McNair’s voice lifted Reese’s lips into a smile. “Doing fine. How’re things in Gotham City, Mr. Commissioner? How are Tara and the kids?” Six months ago Tay had been appointed the new commissioner of the World League of Football, but because of killer schedules, the two old friends hadn’t talked in some time.

“Everybody’s doing well,” Tay replied. “How about you?”

“Can’t complain. I’m in California road-testing a new solar engine for Brainiac Bryce.” Bryce was Reese’s thirty-three-year-old baby brother, a mechanical engineering genius and computer geek who’d graduated from MIT at the age of sixteen.

“He still churning out the designs?”

“Yep, and it’s a wonder the boy’s brain doesn’t catch fire. He’s bringing in more money than we can spend.”

Tay laughed. “I wish I had that problem. How’s your pops?”

“Good. Retired a few months back but he’s still at the yard giving Bryce and Jamal fits.” Jamal, sometimes known as Pinky, was Reese’s thirty-five-year-old middle brother. If Bryce could design it, Jamal could build it.

“Make sure you tell Pops and Pinky and the Brain I said ‘Hey.’”

“Will do.” Reese took a moment to pass a small truck loaded down with mattresses, then swung the sparkling green cab with its unblemished silver trailer back into the right lane. “So Tay, you calling just to catch up, or is something on your mind?”

“Got a murder.”

Reese frowned. “A murder? Who?”

“An older brother named Gus Pennington. Head janitor for the L.A. Grizzlies. His body was found a few mornings ago in his truck. Had a gun beside him on the seat.”

“Sounds like suicide.”

“LAPD thought so too, at first, but the gun was on the right side of his body. According to the family, he’s left-handed.”

“Where was the truck found?”

“Grizzlies Stadium parking lot. Police think it might have been a petty robbery, but the M.E.’s saying the body was placed in the truck after the murder. Something to do with blood loss or something. I’m not sure.”

“Not a good way to start your new job.”

“No kidding. I’ve been so busy hitting the ground running there hasn’t been time to pull together an investigative office, but now I have to have one. Hoping you’ll take the head job, at least temporarily.”

Reese went still. Frankie Beverly sang softly against the silence. Reese had retired from the Detroit police force over a decade ago, swapping his Vice Squad badge for a law degree. Since passing the bar, he’d enjoyed a comfortable, albeit boring life coordinating the legal affairs for the family firm, Anthony Trucking International.

“You still there, Reese?”

“Yeah. I’m here. Thinking about your question.” Reese didn’t miss the day-to-day interaction with crackheads, dealers, and prostitutes, but after ten years of being cooped up in air-conditioned offices, he sometimes longed for the chaos and excitement of the good old days. For the last few months he’d felt restless, antsy. Would a change of pace help, even a temporary one? “The police don’t usually like outsiders in the mix when they’re running a case,” he finally said.

“I know, but I’ve already talked to one of the captains. As long as you don’t represent yourself as law enforcement to anybody you contact, the detectives don’t have a problem with you asking questions on behalf of my office. For them, this isn’t a high profile case. As I said earlier, they’re pretty sure it was a petty robbery gone wrong, but as commissioner, I need to be satisfied that Pennington’s death isn’t tied to somebody involved with the league.”

Reese thought that made sense, but did he want the job? Being away from his law office wouldn’t present much of a problem. His staff was well-trained. If something came up that they couldn’t handle, he’d only be a phone call away. Yeah, he needed a break from the corporate world, so why not? “Okay, Tay, I’m your man. Temporarily.”

“Excellent. Let’s go over some of the details.”

Driving I-5 on her way back to her Oakland office, JT Blake snarled into the headset of her phone, “I could’ve killed him!”

Carole Marsh, her secretary, was on the other end of the line. JT was venting about the disastrous meeting she’d just had at the home of a potential new client, a young defensive back named Keith Owens, a recent graduate of USC who’d had the talent and the smarts to go pro. “I was under the impression that the kid and I would be meeting one on one. Nobody said anything about Mr. G3 being invited too.”

Robert L. Garrett the Third—or Bobby G3, as he preferred to be called—had worked for her agency a few years back, but she’d fired him after only six months for a litany of sins. Among them: insubordination, getting in her face, and generally being a pain in the ass. He had his own shop now, and was doing his best to be the best, but because his clients were the selfish coddled young men who passed for superstar athletes these days, he was having trouble getting to the top and staying there.

While Carole asked questions about the meeting, JT reached down and adjusted the air-conditioning. It was a warm, early May evening. She’d dumped the jacket to her gold suit in the backseat and was wearing the slinky but tasteful yellow silk camisole she’d had on underneath. The silver Lexus she was driving was sleek, powerful, and fresh out of the box. She’d picked it up from the dealership yesterday, and it handled like a dream. The smooth ride was almost enough to cool her anger. Almost. “No,” JT replied to the question in her ear. “The parents looked as surprised as I did when Bobby strolled in skinning and grinning and trying to work his way into the mix, but this Owens kid’s future is too bright to turn it over to a demon. I’ll shoot Garrett myself if it comes down to that.”

The car began shaking and howling. A surprised JT fought with the steering. “What the hell!”

“What’s wrong?”

“Car’s messing up. Trying to keep it on the road.” The front end was bucking like a steer at the Texas State Fair, and the noise filling the plush interior was deafening. “I’m going to pull over. Stay with me girl!”

Reese Anthony and Taylor McNair were still talking on the phone when Reese saw a car pull over on the side of the road up ahead. Looked brand new. He hoped it hadn’t broken down. There was nothing on this stretch of road but miles of brown hills topped by sea after sea of white-winged wind turbines. Then the woman stepped out of the car and into view. At first he thought she was a mirage, but when he blinked, she was still there, striding to the front of the car, and all he could see were the sexy stilettos and the sleek brown legs that seemed to reach to China from beneath the short but tasteful gold skirt. He let out an awed whispered, “Wow.” Her arms and shoulders, bared by the soft yellow camisole, looked as sleek as her legs.

“What are you wowing at?” Taylor asked.

Reese saw the car’s hood go up, and he instinctively slowed and began downshifting. “Coming up on a sister with car trouble. I’m going to stop and see if I can help.”

“Okay, man. Call me back when you can and we’ll tighten up the rest of the details.”

“Sounds good. Later.”

When the semi blew by her on the highway, JT swore she saw a brother driving. She probably should have flagged him down, but for the moment she was more concerned with what was going on with her car. With the hood raised and anchored, she looked around inside. It didn’t take her long to spot the problem. A broken drive belt was hard to miss. She picked up the ends of split rubber and stared at them grimly. Belts on new cars just didn’t pop, and this one hadn’t either. The break looked too clean to have occurred spontaneously. “Carole, that bastard cut my belt,” she steamed into the mouthpiece.

“What belt?”

“The drive belt.”

“You sure it didn’t just break?”

“I grew up with cars, Carole. This was no accident.”

“You don’t know that G3 did it.”

“No, but if it stinks like a skunk and smells like a skunk, guess what?”

“Where are you?”

“On I-5, just north of 41.”

“You’re in the middle of nowhere.”

“No kidding.”

“Need some help?”

JT jumped. He was walking toward her with a slow measured stride that could only be described as mesmerizing. Tall, he was wearing a blue T-shirt that showed off hard ebony guns. The jeans were tight and the tan work boots worn. He was dark-skinned and fine. She definitely liked what she saw, but as her mind reminded her, fine men could be axe murders, too, so she grabbed hold of herself, took her eyes off that fluid walk and met his eyes. “Busted belt.”

“Who’s that?”

“A brother trucker,” she told Carole, then said to him, “I’m talking to my secretary.”

He nodded. “Belts don’t usually break on new cars. Let me take a look and see if we can find the real problem.”

It vexed JT to no end to have a man assume she didn’t know what the hell she was talking about, but rather than setting him straight, she coolly gestured for him to make his own diagnosis.

He leaned in, peered around for a moment, then looked up at her.

“Belt’s busted, right?” she asked.

He gave her a ghost of a smile then backed out and straightened up to his full height. JT was five feet eight inches tall, but this trucker man with his beautiful mahogany arms and thigh-hugging jeans loomed above her like the Colossus of Rhodes.

“Looks like the belt’s been cut. Who’d you piss off? Husband? Boyfriend? An ex?”

JT wasn’t pleased by his assumption that she was somehow at fault. “Ex-employee.”

He closed the hood. “Nice person wanting you to be stuck way out here.”

“Yeah, he’s a real piece of work.”

“What do you do?”

“Athlete representation.”

His surprise was plain. “What kind of athletes?”

“Professional. Where you heading?”

“San Fran. You?”

“Oakland.”

For a moment neither spoke. Reese noted how smoothly she’d cut off more questions about her job. He could respect that; he rarely talked about his clients either. Meanwhile, he’d never seen so much beauty in one woman before in his life. He was doing his best not to gawk at her fine lines like a country boy at his first truck show. “I doubt any garages will have a belt for a car like this way out here, but there should be a gas station about ten miles north. If you want, I can give you a ride and you can ask around when you get there.”

JT studied him, then into her mouthpiece said, “He’s going to give me a ride to a gas station.”

“Are you sure it’s safe. Does he have a name?”

“What’s your name?”

“Reese…Reese Anthony.”

“Reese Anthony,” she told Carole, but what she didn’t say was that he had an aura about him strong enough to be felt by sisters in Boston.

“He as fine as his name?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Get me a tag number. If Reese the Fine turns out to be a serial killer, I’ll be able to sic the popo on him.”

JT met his assessing eyes and smiled. “Okay. The tag number on your truck?”

Reese didn’t mind her wanting to be safe, so he gave it to her easily. JT repeated it for Carole.

“Good. I’ll call the dealership and have them pick up the Lexus. I’ll play the dumb woman and tell them we don’t know why it stopped. Do you want me to send a car for you at this gas station? It’s late, so it may take a few hours to get there.”

“Hold on.” She focused her attention on the trucker. “Can I hitch a ride? I’ll pay. Say three hundred, to cover your gas and the inconvenience?”

Reese didn’t need money. Helping her out was something his pops had raised all of his sons to do, no matter the situation. “You don’t have to pay me.”

“Sure I do. Gas isn’t cheap.”

He assumed she assumed he was a trucker. He saw no harm in letting her think that. He also figured her paying him might make her feel safer. They were strangers, after all, and he could always donate the money.” Okay. Three hundred sounds good.”

“Thanks. Carole, Mr. Anthony’s going to give me a ride back to the office. Have a rental waiting and I’ll pick it up when I get there.”

“Sounds good. Stay safe. Scream if you need me.”

“Will do. ’Bye.”

JT cut the connection but kept the earpiece in: one, because Carole might call back; and two, although she didn’t feel threatened by Reese the Fine, if she needed to make a call in a hurry, she could do so.

Reese took in the flawless face framed by the bone-straight, shoulder-length, auburn highlighted hair, and then the expensive-looking gold chains hanging from the alluring sweep of her neck. Being male, he knew that a lot of times beautiful women turned out to be self-centered and crazy. Would she fit the mold? “Ready to ride?”

JT forced herself to look away from the power emanating from his assessing dark eyes. “Let me grab my stuff.” Shaking off the instant vibe she was getting from him, she opened the back door of the Lex to retrieve her briefcase and jacket, slid into the front seat to grab her CD case, and then got her title and registration papers from the glove box. If jackers happened upon the Lexus before the dealer’s people arrived, anything else that might be inside could be replaced. She locked the doors with her clicker. “I’m ready.”