Sudden Guilt (A Nick Teffinger Thriller / Read in Any Order) Read online

  He toweled off in front of the mirror.

  Tarzan stared back.

  All muscle.

  Ripped.

  Nothing but rugged jungle looks.

  WITH A CUP OF COFFEE IN HAND, he checked the answering machine and found twelve messages. One turned out to be from Dexter Vaughn, the VP of Three Streets, which was one of the top ten ad agencies, headquartered in New York. He dialed Dexter’s direct number and got him just as he came back from lunch.

  “What’s this message you left about a new project? How am I supposed to spend my life getting laid if you keep cluttering it up with work?” Aaron asked.

  Dexter laughed.

  “Here’s the deal,” he said. “And let me tell you right off the bat, this is huge. The client’s Sensory Perceptions. In four months they’re going to roll out a cologne called Snare, the target market being males between twenty and thirty. They want a seriously edgy image for the product. Whoever wears it is a dangerous bad-boy, that kind of thing. And who does edgy better than you?”

  Aaron chuckled.

  “No one.”

  “Exactly,” Dexter said. “No one. I need you to work up some outrageous concepts for them to look at. The ones they finally choose are going to be everywhere, as in across the nation, on billboards, buses, magazines, the whole bit. They’re going to throw seriously stupid money at it.”

  “So exactly how much of an edge are they looking for?”

  “An edge that’s fallen over the edge,” Dexter said. “The idea is that whoever wears this stuff attracts the most beautiful and dangerous women on the planet. Picture one guy surrounded by five barely-dressed women in heat.”

  Aaron winced.

  “Trite,” he said. “How soon do they need it?”

  “Two weeks, two and a half max.”

  Fine.

  Doable.

  “Later today I’m going to wire you thirty grand in seed money,” Dexter said. “Just be sure to give me something fresh, something no one’s even thought of before, much less seen.”

  “I already have some ideas,” Aaron said.

  AFTER HE HUNG UP, AARON SAT DOWN AT THE DRUMS, put “Sweet Child of Mine” on repeat mode, cranked up the volume and played along. A half hour later he had several pretty good ideas for photo shoots.

  Then he worked the phone to get things in motion.

  Models.

  Costumes.

  Setup.

  Lighting.

  An hour later Del Rae Paris called. He pulled up a mental picture of exotic green eyes and a sensuous curvy body, a picture so vivid that his cock tingled.

  She had news, very interesting news.

  “He actually brought up the idea last night,” she said. “All on his own.”

  She didn’t need to define he—“he” was Robert Sharapova, Esq., the target.

  “So you actually think he’ll do it?” Aaron asked.

  “Yeah, I really do,” she said. “About time, too. I’m sick to death of screwing the guy. I’m coming over tonight so be warned.”

  He smiled.

  “Can’t wait.”

  “Have some coke,” she added.

  “Done.”

  “I love to screw on coke.”

  “Yes you do.”

  Chapter Five

  Day Two—May 6

  Tuesday Morning

  ______________

  AFTER THE WOMAN—TA’VEYA WHITE—BLEW AWAY the fat man’s face last night, Paige brought her back to her one-bedroom apartment at the Silver Reef in Lakewood and gave her a bar of soap, half the refrigerator and the bed. Then, around midnight, Paige drove alone up Highway 6 west of Golden into Clear Creek Canyon, past the second tunnel where the river forges between rock walls. There she threw the gun into the black turbulent water while the storm beat down.

  On the way home she tried to figure out just how much trouble she’d gotten herself into, legally speaking.

  She’d struck the man in the head with her gun.

  Assume that’s what killed him.

  In that case she probably wasn’t in any trouble. It was an act in the nature of a justifiable defense of another person. The other woman—Ta’Veya White—wouldn’t be in any trouble either. Sure, she shot the guy, but if he was already dead then no harm done.

  But on the other hand assume that the blow to the head didn’t kill him. Assume he was still alive when Ta’Veya shot him. That bullet wouldn’t be a justifiable act of self-defense because no one was in physical danger at that point.

  It would be an act of rage.

  An act of murder.

  And in that event, Paige would be an accessory to murder, an accessory-after-the-fact to be precise. First, because she harbored Ta’Veya after the shooting by helping her escape from the scene and then giving her refuge. Second, because she disposed of the murder weapon.

  Being an accessory to a murder is a felony offense.

  So now she might be a felon.

  It all depended on when the man died and that’s something she might never know.

  One thing she did know, however, is that felons can’t be lawyers, meaning that all the brain damage she had endured for the last two years might be for nothing if she got caught.

  Still, she wouldn’t change what she did.

  The guy was dead but he brought it on himself.

  Neither she nor Ta’Veya deserved to be punished for it.

  ON TUESDAY MORNING SHE GOT UP at her normal time and attended classes, not wanting to break her routine just in case it ever became an issue for some reason. In her two-hour afternoon window, however, instead of heading to the Law Review where she had a million-and-one things waiting to be done, she headed back to the apartment to see how her new guest was doing.

  Ta’Veya didn’t just scrub up good, she turned out to be seriously stunning.

  Twenty-six years old.

  Five-foot-ten.

  Bronzed exotic skin and long raven hair.

  “I don’t know an easy way to say this so I’m just going to come right out and say it,” Ta’Veya said. “You’re the new me. I was the designated rescuer for a long time. Then, this last time, I just couldn’t do it anymore. I didn’t go. A woman named Natalie Harwell died as a result. The guy got a lot of pleasure afterwards, calling and telling me her name.”

  “What a freak.”

  “That was six months ago,” Ta’Veya said. “Then I was opening the refrigerator Friday morning. The next thing I knew, I woke up inside the boxcar. The collar was on my neck and everything was pitch-black. I felt around in the dark and found the razorblade. In a spur of the moment decision I threw it as far as I could. As soon as I did it I wished I hadn’t, because now if I wanted to kill myself, I’d have to bang my head on the steel or choke myself or something. I had no idea if he would even send someone to rescue me, much less whether they’d come.”

  “How horrible,” Paige said.

  Ta’Veya nodded.

  “So you’re in the middle of it now,” Ta’Veya said. “You’d have been a lot better off if you hadn’t taken the bait.”

  True.

  “But then you’d be dead,” Paige said.

  “I’ll probably wind up dead anyway. I don’t believe for a second that he’s going to let me live.”

  Paige twisted her hair.

  Then she stood up, walked over to the window, pulled the curtain aside and looked out.

  Everything was normal.

  By the time she sat back down she’d already made up her mind. “In that case we need to find out who he is.”

  “How?”

  Paige frowned.

  “I don’t know, but somehow.”

  “We need to keep the cops out of it,” Ta’Veya said. “I’m not going to prison, period.” She paused and looked Paige in the eyes. “If we do find him, I’ll do it.”

  “Do what?”

  “You know, what has to be done.”

  Chapter Six

  Day Two—May 6

  Tu
esday Afternoon

  ______________

  TEFFINGER KNEW THE SILVER REEF APARTMENTS fairly well because he used to have a bed-buddy there named Dawn, who he picked up at a LoDo club one drunken night five or six years ago. They quickly found that they’d never get serious but had an uncanny ability to lust each other up. So over the years, between significant others, they had standing reservations to call each other. Of course that was before she went off to L.A. to be a star and never came back. In any event, he still remembered the apartment complex well and knew right where to go to find the unit he wanted.

  He checked his watch.

  4:00 p.m.

  He found three empty parking spaces, pulled the Tundra into the middle one and stepped out. Overhead, the morning sunshine had, as usual, given way to thick rolling clouds, which were filling their big black bellies with water.

  Thunder rumbled over the mountains about five miles to the west.

  Rain was coming, which was fine.

  Teffinger never met a rainstorm he didn’t like.

  When he knocked on the door of the apartment something happened that he didn’t expect. A woman answered, a woman so stunning that he actually stopped breathing. Before either of them could say a word he already knew that he had to know all about her.

  What she liked.

  Where she grew up.

  What made her laugh.

  If she screamed in bed.

  Everything.

  She had thick black hair and engaging green eyes that wouldn’t let him look away.

  “Are you Paige Deverex?” he asked.

  The woman shook her head. “No. Paige’s at law school,” she said. “You just missed her.”

  “So who are you?”

  “I’m Ta’Veya.”

  He held out his hand. “Nick Teffinger.”

  “Nick,” she said. “I like that.” Like most people who met him for the first time, she studied his face, trying to figure out what was wrong. Then the corner of her mouth turned up ever so slightly. “Your other green eye’s blue.”

  “Either that or my other blue eye’s green,” he said. “It’s a raging debate. You want to go out somewhere and get a cup of coffee?” As soon as the words came out of his mouth he couldn’t believe it. “I’m sorry. Did I say that out loud?”

  She laughed.

  “Yes,” she said. “And yes.”

  “The second yes is to the coffee question?”

  “Yes again,” she said.

  “Great,” he said. “I’ll buy.”

  She chuckled.

  THEY ENDED UP AT THE BLUE SKY CAFÉ near Colfax and Indiana, sitting at an outside table under an increasingly threatening sky. So far, on the drive over, he discovered absolutely nothing about her.

  She deflected every question about herself.

  The only thing he learned is that he wanted her in his life.

  He explained that he was with Denver homicide and why he wanted to see Paige Deverex. A drifter had been shot in the face last night in a remote industrial area north of town. By their best guess it happened around dark. One of the buildings about a mile down the road happened to have a security camera that recorded an old Ford Mustang in the area, something in the 1964-1968 range. It didn’t pick up the license plate number, because of the rainstorm, but they found out that there weren’t that many light-colored first generation Mustangs registered in the Denver area, fifteen to be exact. They were tracking down all the owners to see if they were there and, if so, whether they saw or heard anything.

  Ta’Veya wrinkled her forehead.

  “All that for a drifter,” she said. “I’m impressed.”

  Teffinger shrugged.

  “A life’s a life,” he said. “But I’ll admit there’s more to it than that.”

  “Unfortunately, Paige won’t be able to help you,” she said. “She was with me last evening.”

  Teffinger raked his hair back with his fingers.

  “Did anyone borrow her car last night?”

  “No. It was right here the whole time.”

  “Figures,” he said. “That’s the way my life works.”

  “Sorry,” she added.

  A strong wind suddenly came out of nowhere and pushed swirling black clouds across the sky.

  “Going to rain,” Teffinger said.

  Sure enough, a handful of heavy splats fell. They were those big suckers, the kind that give a ten-second warning before the whole sky drops down. One landed in Teffinger’s cup and splashed coffee over the edge. He grabbed his cup and started to stand up but Ta’Veya didn’t.

  Instead she cocked her head as if debating something and then said, “How would you like the opportunity to get out of paying for the coffee?”

  Teffinger grinned.

  “You know me already.”

  “The first person who runs for cover pays,” she said.

  Teffinger eased back in the chair, picked up the cup and took a sip just as a strong drop landed on his face. He wiped it off and said, “I hope you brought money.”

  THE STORM GOT MEANER. Neither of them flinched. Finally Ta’Veya laughed and said, “Okay, you win.”

  “So you pay?”

  “No, you win me.”

  Teffinger cocked his head.

  “What do you mean?”

  She stood up, grabbed his arm and led him towards the Tundra.

  “What do you think I mean?”

  Teffinger grinned.

  “I didn’t know that’s what we were playing for.”

  “Well now you do.”

  “Wait a minute.” He ran back to the table, slipped a ten-dollar bill under his coffee mug and then caught up with her. She locked her arm through his and nestled up.

  “How far is your house?”

  “Too far,” he said, and meant it.

  A half mile later they were passing the Jefferson County Fairgrounds. Teffinger gave in to a spur-of-the-moment impulse and swung into the muddiest parking lot he had ever seen in his life. He punched the 4WD button and drove to the far end, over by the Cottonwoods, with “Dancing in the Dark” on the radio. The wind kicked up even more and blew the storm as horizontal as it could.

  The sky had grown so dark that it might as well have been night.

  No one was around.

  Ta’Veya had her pants off before Teffinger killed the engine.

  He couldn’t believe her body.

  Lightning ripped across the sky.

  Then thunder exploded, so close that Ta’Veya jumped.

  Neither of them even looked up.

  Chapter Seven

  Day Two—May 6

  Tuesday Afternoon

  ______________

  SCOTTY MARKS WAS THE BEST GUY in the world to build custom stages for photography shoots, hands down. Aaron called him as soon as he had the concept sufficiently solidified in his mind.

  “What I’m looking for is a giant spider’s web, somewhere in the nature of fifteen feet or so in diameter,” Aaron said. “It needs to be strong enough to hold three or four people at a time. And here’s the most important thing—it needs to look realistic. Go down to Barnes & Noble and get a book on spiders or something. We can’t have it looking like a circus net or anything stupid like that.”

  Scotty chuckled. “Who is this?”

  “Funny,” Aaron said. “I’m really excited about this, so get over here as soon as you can, please and thank you. I want to be sure this is doable.”

  “Anything’s doable.”

  “That’s what I want to hear.”

  An hour later Scotty showed up with some pictures he pulled off the Internet and they went down to the second floor. Scotty looked exactly the same as always, a throwback to the sixties right down to the long hair and the red bandana. He may as well have just come back from Woodstock and lit a joint to prove it.

  Aaron shook his head. “You need to get into coke, man, and quit messing with that baby stuff.”

  “Too expensive,” Scotty said.
r />   True.

  Aaron had to give him that.

  The second floor of the building had been gutted of clutter a long time ago and now pretty much looked like the inside of a giant matchbox.

  “I was thinking we could build it over there,” Aaron said, heading that way. “The lighting will be as good as anywhere.”

  Scotty studied the ceiling.

  “Lots of places to anchor it,” he said. “The best way to do it is build it as a rectangle rather than trying to mess with a circle or an octagon or whatever it is that spiders do.”

  Aaron had no problem with that.

  The edge of the web didn’t need to be in the shoot.

  “It shouldn’t be that hard either,” Scotty said. “I can draw it on the floor in chalk and build it right on the ground. We might need a JLG to hang it, though. I’m not sure how heavy it’s going to be.”

  “The service elevator still works,” Aaron said. “So if we need to get a lift in here, then fine.”

  Scotty smiled.

  “Far out.”

  Aaron slapped him on the back. “And right on.”

  They talked about the schedule, which was ASAP or sooner. And then talked about money until they reached an agreement.

  WHEN SCOTTY MARKS LEFT, Aaron called Suzanne Clark, a 25-year-old Greek bombshell who was extraordinarily talented in the bedroom and also happened to own MOD-ELLES, one of the best modeling agencies this side of the Mississippi—California excluded, of course.

  “I need five or six of your sexiest ladies, early twenties,” Aaron said. “They need to have absolutely killer legs. I’m talking about the kind of legs that guys want wrapped around their faces for three hours straight.” She promised to make some calls and have a crew of lovelies show up at his place tomorrow at noon, all in sleeveless summer dresses that hung above the knee like he wanted.