Becoming Rain (Burying Water #2)(92)

He wipes away a stray tear still sitting on his cheek, vacant eyes locked on the ceiling above. “This just doesn’t feel real. I can’t believe he’s gone.” He shifts until an arm ropes around my shoulders and he curls into me, our noses grazing. I automatically inhale the scent of him, freshly showered and smelling of soap, his skin soft and warm against my body.

Feeling the walls tighten around us, as Elmira’s warning screams inside my head. I’ll never forgive myself if I don’t try to stop this.

“Luke?”

Red-rimmed eyes open to meet mine.

“Whatever you have going on with Vlad and with Aref . . . it’s over. Forget about it. Please, just walk away. I can’t lose you.” I can’t keep my own tears from unleashing, because I know that I’m going to lose him regardless. “Please. Just promise me it’s over.”

He blinks back a fresh wave of tears. And nods, pulling me into his bare chest.

I don’t mean to drift off in Luke’s bed.

“Hey.” I feel someone shaking me awake.

“Hmm?”

A gentle kiss touches my temple. “Your phone’s been ringing nonstop. Do you think it’s important?”

My phone.

Warner.

I bolt up in bed and sprint out of the room.

“I’ve been trying you for an hour,” Warner says, his tone thick with accusation.

I dart toward the small mudroom on the opposite side of the condo. “Sorry, I didn’t hear it.”

“Really? Because I’ve been listening to it ring on the wire. It was pretty damn loud.”

“I fell asleep,” I hiss, checking around the corner to make sure Luke hasn’t appeared yet. I doubt he’s in any rush to move.

Dead silence answers me. Infuriating me. “Any reason you’re calling?”

“Just checking in.”

“I have to take the dogs out and grab a change of clothes. Watch that he doesn’t leave.” I hang up before Warner can argue with me.

Licks trots through my condo, his nose to the ground, oblivious to his master’s devastation. I gave Luke one of the Ambien pills that his mom slipped into my hand as we were leaving her house, a full container from her own medicine cabinet. Hopefully it knocked him out by now.

I didn’t like leaving him but I couldn’t risk making this call from his place, on my phone. It’s just a hunch, one that’s been bugging me, one that may sabotage this case, but it will give me the answer I need.

“Hello.”

The sound of that woman’s crisp London accent triggers my unease. I get the distinct impression that she knows who’s calling, even though the number is blocked on my personal phone. “Hi, Elmira.”

“We’ve been watching the news. How is Luke doing?” Calm, cool, collected. Not the reaction I would expect after a business partner of her husband’s was found murdered.

“As well as to be expected.”

“Please send our condolences. Rust was a good man.”

“I didn’t know him well, but I know he was well liked.”

“How is Luke taking it?”

“Not well. I feel so sorry for him. He’s had such a rough couple of weeks. First, with his car being stolen, and now this.” The two don’t even begin to compare but it doesn’t really matter, for my purposes.

“Oh? I didn’t know that happened. I’ll bet he loved that car.”

“Yes, he does.” I hesitate for just a moment, but then commit fully. “Luckily the cops found it in a storage locker right away.”

There’s a short pause. “Well, that’s lucky.” Is it just me or has her voice risen an octave? I’m sure she’s weighing my words. Wondering if I have my own hidden purpose for telling her.

But I can play the same game that she does. “Yeah. I just wish they’d release it. I don’t know why they’re not. Being *s, I guess.”

“Local police are lazy.”

“Must be it.”

There’s another long pause. “If there’s anything at all that we can do to help Luke during this time, please let us know. We’ll see you at the funeral.”

“Thanks, Elmira.” Now that my small trap is laid, I toss the phone back into the safe, leash the dogs up, and head back to Luke’s.

But not before I find myself standing in the rain, waiting for it to wash away the filthy feeling of my betrayal to my team.

Chapter 49

LUKE

Rain squeezes my hand.

It’s a warning squeeze, signaling that I’m getting too worked up.

I take a deep breath to calm myself. When Rust told me he was making me executor to his estate a few years ago, I didn’t spend too much time thinking about it. I definitely didn’t think that, at twenty-four years old, I’d be planning a closed-casket funeral for him. But now that the police have finished gathering evidence off of him—there’s no need for an extensive autopsy; it’s pretty clear that the bullet through the brain is what killed him—that’s exactly what I’m sitting here doing, with a very calm and collected Rain on my right side and the emotionally unstable duo—Mom and Ana—on my left, fighting me tooth-and-nail for a traditional Eastern Orthodox service.

“Rust didn’t want a service of any kind, or a wake. He made that very clear in his will. Which I spent all morning going through with the lawyer,” I say, tempering my tone. Rust never had much patience for the funeral process and he sure didn’t believe in God.