A Chip and a Chair (Seven of Spades, #5)
Cordelia Kingsbridge
“Shame you gotta ruin the view,” Martine said.
Levi turned from the heavy mesh grating Dominic had installed over the glass door to their new balcony. “It’s only temporary. The minute the Seven of Spades is in cuffs, this thing is coming down.”
She grinned. “That’s what I like to hear.”
He meant it, too. Although the Seven of Spades had been inactive in the month following Carolyn Royce’s live-streamed murder, he knew the investigation was closing in. He felt the inevitability of the killer’s capture in his bones-it was only a matter of time.
Two men came through the apartment’s front door, carrying a couch between them-Antoine Valcourt, Martine’s tall, laconic husband, and Ezra Stone, husband to Levi’s friend Natasha. They almost tripped over the four-year-old boy who barreled around the corner of the island in the center of the room, screaming and laughing at the top of his lungs.
“Jack!” Natasha exclaimed from the kitchen, where she was unpacking boxes of plates and silverware. “What did Mommy say about running inside?”
“It’s okay, Natasha, I’ve got him.” Adriana scooped a giggling Jack off the floor, tossed him in the air, and then swung him around with the easy strength built by almost a year of rigorous training with Levi. She’d spent most of the afternoon playing with Jack instead of moving anything, but that was just as helpful.
Trusting Martine’s judgment, Levi left her to direct the placement of the couch while he headed out to grab another load from the moving van. Right in the doorway, however, he had to quickly sidestep another couple carting boxes-Carlos and Jasmine, Dominic’s now former next-door neighbors.
“It’s a good thing one of you is so organized.” Carlos nodded to his box’s neatly printed label, which read LIVING ROOM in bold type above a detailed list of the contents. “Dom would have just thrown his crap into random boxes and marked them all ‘Stuff.’“
Levi chuckled, took the box Jasmine was holding, and followed them into the living room.
Planting her hands on her hips, Jasmine stood in the center of the open floor plan and looked around with an artist’s critical eye. “This is a nice place. Tons of natural light, and I love these hardwood floors.”
“Levi, you want this in the spare room, right?” Dominic said behind them.
Any response Levi might have made died when he turned around. Dominic was standing in the entryway, holding one end of a bulky armoire. Underneath its weight, the brawny muscles of his shoulders and arms stood out in sharp relief, glistening with sweat and straining against the sleeves of his T-shirt. Beneath that, basketball shorts clung to the rock-hard ass and massive thighs that gave him the thrusting power of a jackhammer.
The other end of the armoire was supported by Dominic’s brother Vinnie, who was similar to Dominic in height and build. But Vinnie and everyone else in the room might as well have ceased to exist for all Levi was aware of them. His mind went blank.
Dominic cleared his throat. “Baby, this is kind of heavy,” he said, his warm eyes crinkling at the corners.
“Sorry.” Levi snapped himself out of it, his face flushing. “The spare room, yeah.”
He and Dominic had chosen a two-bedroom apartment so Levi could use one room as an office-and, honestly, an escape route for when he needed to be alone. He was far more introverted than Dominic, who thrived on personal connections with everyone from the mailman to passing strangers.
As Dominic and Vinnie carried the armoire away, Dominic flinched and subtly shifted more of its weight to his right arm. Levi’s eyes narrowed. Dominic had been fine when they’d gone their separate ways this morning, but since they’d reconnected in the afternoon, Levi had noticed him favoring his left side three times now.
Levi’s thoughts were interrupted by the entrance of the last member of their moving party, Leila. “What about these?” she asked. “They’re the only things that aren’t labeled.”
His breath caught when he saw the two file boxes she was holding, one stacked atop the other. They were locked, but if Leila of all people somehow got a glimpse of what was inside-
“I’ll take those.” He snatched the boxes out of her arms so fast he almost knocked them to the floor. “Actually, I’ll deal with all the boxes that look like this. Don’t worry about it.”
She gave him an odd look. “Okay,” she said slowly, before returning the way she’d come, accompanying Carlos and Jasmine on another run to the truck.
Martine appeared at Levi’s side. “You need to get your shit together,” she hissed so that only he could hear. “If you keep acting so weird around Leila, she’s gonna figure out something’s up.”
“I’m not good at hiding things.”
“Try harder.”
Levi sighed. Given their recently aroused misgivings about Leila, he probably shouldn’t have asked her to help today, but that would have been just as suspicious.
He brought the file boxes into the spare room. They were the first two of more than a dozen identical containers; each was crammed full of his and Dominic’s independent investigation into the Seven of Spades, which properly belonged in the armoire Dominic and Vinnie were placing against the wall. Most of the work in these boxes had never been seen by eyes other than Dominic’s, Martine’s, and his own, and he planned on keeping it that way.