Lucius frowned as he watched. “How am I supposed to know that’s Blake instead of Ty here?”
“Well,” I said. “See the glint of the sun on the watch?”
“Yes?”
“Come on, Grandpa, you know I don’t wear a watch,” Malone said as he held up his arm.
“And you can see Blake is wearing his watch on his left wrist. Which wrist would you wear your watch on, Malone?”
“My right.”
Because my Malone was a leftie. Not that there was a tan line on either of his wrists to show he was in the habit of wearing a watch.
“Okay,” Lucius said, but it didn’t sound as though he believed me.
“Also, if you look at the length of the hair here”—I paused the video—“it’s longer than Malone’s and straighter. I mean, Blake’s hair is shorter now because he was getting a haircut when I served divorce papers on him, but—”
Lucius’s eyes bugged out. “Youserved him?”
“Sure did,” I said with a grin. “Bet he didn’t tell you that because then you’d know he had a reason to get back at both me and Trista.”
“Huh.” Lucius looked from Malone to me and back to Malone. “And you can show me how he made those reports? They look official to me.”
“I’ll need to go into the office to use the computer since he stole mine, but I can show you almost all of it,” Malone said. “Blake managed to erase some of my work, but I make backups periodically and was in the process of restoring the original from the backups. I didn’t want to come to you until I had everything in order.”
Lucius looked from him to me. “And I guess Ms. Stark here washelpingyou with that?”
Malone gave him a lopsided grin. “Come on, Grandpa, I was hanging with Stella because, well, look at her.”
I blushed. It was an unfamiliar sensation.
“Damn good at the foxtrot, too,” the older man said. “That’s not something you often see in a young woman.”
Young? Well, bless his heart.
“I, uh, if you have everything you need, Malone, then I’ll excuse myself,” I said.
“Thanks, Stark,” Malone said. He looked as though he wanted to say something more, but he shook the thoughts away, and I retreated.
I was fumbling with the key to my apartment when his door opened and then closed behind him. I turned to see what he wanted, and he drew me to him for a searing kiss.
“This is not how I anticipated this day would go.”
“Me neither,” I whispered. Somehow, resting forehead to forehead with him was almost as hot as the kiss had been.
“I’m going to be regrettably busy for the next few days, but I will be back. I will rent a hotel room again if that’s what it takes. How do you feel about living on room service?”
“I’d be willing to give it a whirl.”
He grinned before kissing me once more and then returning to what was, no doubt, going to be a lot of work.
I closed the door behind me, touching my fingers to my tingling lips.
Snap out of it, Stella. Malone may need your help again. Trista might, too.
Blake had been busy while we were, well, getting busy. But the very idea that Malone could be framed for Blake’s nefarious activities? My stomach roiled.
And speaking of Blake, it would probably be wise to see why Trista was calling me. Technically, my work for her was over and done. And if it weren’t for the petty business, we probably would’ve never met.Usually, Attorney Lawless kept her clients from speaking to me if I was serving papers on a spouse. Legal technicalities and all that.
