Marc (Bowen Boys, #4)(8)

The second pair of boots was it. Marc stood up and backed away, signaling to Eric he’d hit pay dirt. They bagged up the third pair because they had to, and Eric had the officer take them to the lab. As soon as he was gone the door to the bedroom opened and three men came in.

It was the man himself, Jeff Ansell the widower, and his attorneys more than likely. “You have no right to look anywhere but the bloodstains. Anything you find in this house is—”

Eric slapped the warrant against the first attorney’s chest and smiled. “That says I can look anywhere I want, and I did. As soon as the tests come back positive, I’m going to enjoy arresting you.”

Jeff lashed out at Eric. Eric had him on the floor in seconds. The man was screaming about wild animals and such by the time he was being cuffed. When Eric lifted him off the floor, Jeff looked wild, insane, and pissed.

“I’ll sue you for this. I’ll own everything you have by the end of the day.” Eric nodded as he escorted him from the room and told him his rights. “I’ll even own your cat if you have one, and all your pension.”

“I don’t have a cat because my friend there says that they’d be pissy every time he came over. Even if it was a male and a female wouldn’t be much better. I don’t have a pension thanks to my ex-wife’s blood-sucking lawyer, and he is that, by the way. I do have a nice television, but it’s not working so well right now. The football team I was watching the other night made a stupid play and I sort of threw my shoe through it. But it’s yours if you want it. Might get you a nice boyfriend while you’re in prison if you got it fixed up and hung it in your cell.”

Marc spent another night in town after hanging out at the bar until all hours of the night with Eric. The tests had come back positive for blood, and Ansell was being put into an orange suit and taken to the cells by the time Marc had his first drink. Now he was loading his suitcase into the trunk of his car and getting ready to leave.

“You should just move down here. We could get into trouble every weekend instead of once in a while.” Eric had on sunglasses even though it was cloudy. Marc felt the same way, like his eyeballs had been run through salt and put back in his head backwards.

“If I lived here I’d be dead within a month and you know it.” He grinned at Eric. “I’m too old for this shit. Next time let’s just go and get some pancakes with whipped cream and call it a night.”

Eric laughed hard, then snapped his mouth closed and grabbed his head. “Fucking bastard, you did that on purpose.”

Marc laughed as well and hugged his friend goodbye. “I have to get going. I have a very pregnant secretary back home that I have to find a replacement for before her and her husband murder me. I wouldn’t mind it so much right now, but I might in a day or two when my head doesn’t hurt so much.”

It took Marc nearly ten hours to drive home, and by the time he showered and got into bed, it was well after four that afternoon. Knowing that no one was expecting him until Monday and it was only Saturday, he decided to sleep until he woke before he called anyone to let them know he was home.

The pounding at the door made him snarl. He looked at the clock by his bed and had to look again. It had been nearly sixteen hours since he’d gotten to bed. He staggered down the stairs but nearly went back up them when he saw Khan standing on the porch.

“You’ll let me in or so help me I’ll break this f*cking door down.” Marc opened the door and stepped back. “You get back into town after being gone for over two weeks and don’t say a word to anyone? You prick, you have any idea how worried I was when I called Eric and asked him where you were and he said you’d left hours ago?”

“I was exhausted and didn’t think anyone would mind if I slept it off. Want some tea?” He went to the kitchen, knowing that Khan would either follow or go home. He hoped he’d go home but that was just too much to hope for.

“Did you solve the murder?” Marc nodded as he pulled down the tealeaves from his cabinet. “I suppose that’s good. Who did it? Her husband?”

“Yes. He was having an affair with his secretary and his wife found out. She told him she was kicking him out, as she had all the money, and he took exception to that. If they would have divorced, he wouldn’t have collected anything. Murder like this one would have given him everything times two. So tell Monica she was right.”

“No thanks. She’s hard enough to live with right now. She’s mad at me because I haven’t talked to Mom yet.” Marc rolled his eyes. “Speaking of secretary, Mia hired you one while you were gone. She’s a cat.”

Marc nearly dropped his tea maker and turned to look at Khan. “What do you mean she hired a cat? Mia doesn’t know what we are, nor does the rest of my team. Please tell me you didn’t tell them?”

“No, I didn’t, though I think you should. They seem like a great bunch.” Marc sat down, holding onto his pot. “I went to see Joan.”

“And?” Marc got up to finish the tea and then looked into his refrigerator, knowing that he was avoiding his brother. He didn’t come here to tell him about Monica or the new secretary. There was more.

“She doesn’t seem to recognize that we’re the same. Reed noticed it first when he went to set her up with a phone. When I went to see her on the pretense that I needed to see Dewey about something, she didn’t react at all. I thought she was either a good actress or like Reed said.” Khan stretched out his legs as he continued. “I sent Monica over a couple of days later to meet her. She really is clueless.”