This was some old-school police work, and I actually had a smile on my face as I scanned through page after page.
“Tyson Lokan?” I asked, tapping my finger on a bold signature.
“No, I know that client. Keep looking,” Darcy said, still poking at the keyboard and glaring at the computer screen.
Five more minutes passed. “Tyson Cromill. The asshole used an inversion of his last name. It’s Cromwell. He must’ve thought he was being funny.” I turned the book toward Darcy and pointed out the name.
He chuckled. “Oh, Mother must’ve checked him in. She’ll simply love it when I tell her.” His lips twitched and there was an impish light in his eyes.
“You’re going to get on her case for not making people show their ID and everything, aren’t you? He might’ve had a fake one. This wasn’t her fault, either, and we don’t need her in a bad mood over it.”
He rolled his eyes. “There’s so much paperwork involved that she probably just let him go with a promise to do it next time. If she’d scanned his ID, there’s a good chance she would’ve realized that it wasn’t real.” He tapped his fingers on the desk. “She probably didn’t bother. I always do that, at least, the first time someone is here. We have a bar, for goodness sakes. It’s only a trip across the lobby. She could’ve checked the ID there.” He shook his head and let out a happy little hum. “Okay, here he is. He paid with a check. That’s odd these days, especially for this type of thing.” Darcy wrote down an address on a sticky note and gave it to me. “Does that look familiar? It’s the address on the check.”
For a few seconds I stared because what I was seeing didn’t make sense. “Fuck, that’s Winter’s building. I wonder.... He might be staying in one of the unused floors, especially since the cops haven’t been there yet. Winter left most of the building empty, I think as a security precaution for his shop on the top floor.”
“So, I helped?” Darcy straightened up and gave me a real smile that almost made him seem sweet. Okay, if he acted this way at home, I could see where someone would want to put up with him.
“Maybe. It’s definitely something. Thanks.” I knocked my knuckles on the desk, and he gave me a nod before turning to say something that was undoubtedly nasty to a woman carrying two parts of a broken vase toward him with an apologetic frown.
It was torture taking the elevator upstairs to the room Madam Winters had put me in. My right calf throbbed with pain as I stomped along the hallway. When I got back to the room my stomach fell because Winter wasn’t on the bed and his borrowed PJs were folded nicely on the end of it.
He wasn’t in the bathroom.
He wasn’t anywhere.
He was gone.
“Fuck.” I took my phone out of my pocket to call him, then realized I didn’t have his number and sighed. He hadn’t needed to call me, and I hadn’t expected him to go anywhere. Hopefully he was rattling around in the hotel.
“Well, fuck. Only one thing to do.” I headed off to dig into the clue I’d uncovered.
9
WINTER
I stomped miserablytoward the rear door of the high-rise I rented and rubbed my chest, shivering. Somehow my leather coat was missing and I wasn’t able to find one before I left the Courtesan. As it was, my borrowed purple turtleneck was a little too big and my blue—not black!—pants wanted to slip down my hips. It had been years since I’d worn colors, and I wasn’t pleased with it.
My mind was stuck on the same loop it had been in for days. I’d been happy to think of RJ as my Daddy, buthe doesn’t trust me. Shouldn’t a Daddy trust his boy? I knew something must’ve happened between him and Van because I wasn’t stupid, but I wanted to hear about it from him. Maybe throwing myself at RJ so soon had been dumb, but I’d really loved everything about him being my Daddy. I’d been excited to sleep with him. In the past I’d turned down other men, but there was something about RJ that made me happy inside and out. I patted my phone in my pocket and sighed. I’d asked the police to meet me here, but they’d said they wouldn’t be able to arrive for at least an hour, if not longer.
“RJ doesn’t want to be in a real relationship or he would’ve talked to me,” I whispered, not for the first time. I’d had a couple of hours of insanity, and now I needed to pull my head out of the clouds and get my life back, and that meant filling out a report with the police the way I should’ve the very first night the robbery happened, contacting the insurance company, and then calling clients who had pieces scheduled with me in January. I had no idea what my life was going to be like from here on out and the uncertainty was both scary... and exhilarating. I grinned. When I’d first started my business, I hadn’t known from one month to the next if I would be able to afford to keep doing it, and by luck and with a lot of elbow grease it had all come together.
I could get Beaulieu up and running again.
Yes, I needed to do all those things, and I also needed to pack a bag. If I was going to stay at the Courtesan, which Madam Winters had insisted on, I at least wanted some clean clothes that were mine, rather than borrowing them from one of the men who worked in the hotel.
Glancing up at the building, I fought off a chill that ran down my spine. I didn’t really think Van would be dumb enough to come back here after everything that had happened, so I didn’t bother being quiet as I walked inside the back door and up the drab rear staircase. The floor I lived on was directly under Beaulieu, and I sighed when I reached it and pushed open the door.
“Fuck. Why not burgle the whole building?” I rolled my eyes. My couch was missing. I didn’t own a TV or a lot of other things most people considered to be normal. My bookcases were undisturbed, so apparently Van hadn’t found them interesting. I hadn’t bothered checking this level the other night because there was nothing too important here. I paused, pondering whether or not it meant Van thought my purple Persian carpet was tacky, since it was still on the floor, when I heard a squeaking that sounded a hell of a lot like the old wrought iron bed frame I’d dragged here when I’d first moved in and hadn’t bothered replacing.
I snuck toward the curtain I’d strung across the door. My bedroom mirrored the sales floor above, so it was massive. I peeked around the curtain into the other room and the air leaked out of me. Sunlight streamed in the tall windows and lit up Van like he was on a stage. He was fucking someonein my bed. Sweat glistened on his back, so I assumed he’d been at it for a while. I couldn’t tell who was underneath him, but when he shifted to get a different angle to plow the poor guy, I could see that the man on the bottom’s hands were restrained with cuffs connected to the corners of the bed. Maybe the unlucky man was Pinky? The sounds the smaller guy was making were unhappy, close to sobs.
Then again, maybe I thought Pinky hated what was happening because I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting Van’s cock in their ass. I shuddered, but then fury sparked to life in me. Not only was Van the type of man to steal from his boss, but he was also screwing someone in my bed.How fucking rude.If Van was going to do that, then Pinky should at least sound like he was having the time of his life.
“Oh, fuck do you want it harder? Are you going to take it for me?” Van demanded, shocking me into letting the curtain flutter closed. I was quick to peek again, though.
“Yes, Sir,” Pinky said, but his voice wavered, and I hated what I was seeing. It was nothing like how sweet RJ had been with me. Van smashed his body frantically against Pinky’s.
If Van was here, did that mean everything he’d stolen from me was still somewhere in the building, too? Or was the jewelry gone? I stared at the two men fucking and my brain whirred. If the jewelry was gone and sold, that meant all that was left wasmoney. So where was the cash? My gaze slid to the floor as I contemplated the situation. I considered the possibility that he’d done something as stupid as stuff a couple of sacks full of bills under the bed.
