Chapter Twenty-seven

You Got Plenty of Game

RILEY

Riley was still too shamefaced to meet Mila’s gaze. So while they waited for Trent Blackwell to get the hex back home, he paced the curb and put as much distance between himself and the witch as he could without being too obvious or rude.

In the car, while they’d been waiting for Mrs. Blackwell’s grandson, he had been imagining touching Mila. Every inch of her body. He’d started at her scalp, walking his way down her arms to the sides of her legs until he’d reached her ankles to then reverse his trail in the opposite direction, moving up her thighs. And if Mila had felt every single one of those touches… Riley suppressed a groan. Well, let’s just say she’d stopped him barely in time before he did something really, really inappropriate.

As they waited, Riley’s mind kept wandering back to that moment in the car. He didn’t know how much longer he could hold out. He found himself almost hoping Trent Blackwell was a homicidal maniac so he could close the case and get back to his simple, Mila-Bennet-free life.

Finally, a dark figure huddled in a long winter coat strutted up Trent Blackwell’s driveway—that must’ve been him.

Riley waved at Mila, and they followed the man to his house.

Ten minutes later, as they sat in Trent Blackwell’s living room, both nursing a much-needed cup of chamomile infusion, it was clear their second suspect was no murdering scumbag. He was practically a saint.

“I understand why you’re here, Detectives,” he said, plunging the chamomile bag in and out of the hot water in his cup. “Someone told you I’m a greedy moneygrubber who spends time with his grandmother only to make sure I’ll inherit her fortune one day.”

Riley waited for him to go on. Asking the grandson to clarify that he was not, in fact, a moneygrubbing leech felt like overkill.

“But that’s not the relationship I have with Nan at all. We’ve always been close, even before I grasped the concept of rich and poor.”

“You mean when you were a child?” Mila asked. She seemed prone to believe the sanctitude act, which, in all fairness, seemed genuine.

Trent Blackwell shrugged. “She basically raised me. My grandfather was the rich one. He died young, and Nan never remarried. So, she came into her inheritance still relatively young, but she never passed any of it on to my father, wanting him to make his own path in life. And that’s exactly what he did”—Trent stared out the window with a regretful expression—“his career has always been his priority. Nan went into teaching because, well, she liked drama and she liked the relaxed hours a part-time job as a drama teacher afforded her, giving her plenty of time to spend with her only grandkid.” He pointed a thumb at himself. “My parents never complained. They liked the free babysitting and added freedom, so in the end, everyone got what they wanted.”

Mila spoke next. “Did your grandmother pass any money on to you, or does she still have full control of her fortune?”

“Good intuition, Detective Bennet.”

The grandson flashed Mila a grin, and Riley bristled. Trent Blackwell would stop looking at Mila with such unadulterated appreciation if he knew what was good for him.

“Yes,” the grandson confirmed. “We don’t like to advertise it, so not many people outside the family know about it, but she’s been looser with me. She bought me this house”—he gestured at the surrounding walls—“And gave me enough financial independence for me to choose a job I love without worrying about money too much.”

Riley was almost afraid to ask. “And what is it you do, Mr. Blackwell?”

“I’m a psychologist. I work with special needs people, children in school in particular.” A saint indeed, Riley thought. “The goal is mainly to avoid having students with disabilities being marginalized from the rest of the student population and reinforce the concept with educators that most special need students can achieve the same academic standards as their nondisabled peers. That’s why I was at the recital. One of my students was in the play. I wasn’t there to kiss Nan’s ass or to kill her to put my hands on the money she’s already given me.”

Oh, at least Mr. Perfect was capable of a little swearing, otherwise Riley was ready to conjure a bona fide halo and place it upon his head.

“Any idea who would wish your grandmother harm, Mr. Blackwell?” Mila asked the next logical question.

“She had recently ended a relationship with one of her Buraco mates, and from what she’d told me, the gentleman hadn’t taken the news too well. But Jacob Sheridan seemed genuinely in love with her, and I never pegged him down as a violent man.”

Riley refrained from saying that poison was the exact opposite of violence. “Did you know if your grandmother had started seeing anyone else?”

“I’m pretty sure she had, and that she was keeping the relationship secret to spare Jacob’s feelings.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Riley caught Mila making a funny face and suppressing a grin.

What in the hex had she to laugh about?

Piqued by curiosity, Riley shifted the beanie off his head and sent her a mental prod. “Why are you smirking?”

Mila’s eyes widened, and she stared at him in surprise. Then she lifted her cup to her lips to hide her widening smirk and sent him a telepathic reply, “Oh, nothing, I just find it ironic that Mrs. Blackwell is closer to seventy than sixty and she’s still got more game at her age than I do a twenty-nine.”

“You got plenty of game, Bennet.”

She crossed her eyes. “Oh, please, we both know that unless I curse unsuspecting inquisitors, I have exactly zero game.”

That’s when Trent Blackwell interrupted their mental sparring. “Is there something else you wanted to ask me, Detectives?”

Riley shot a furtive look at Mila and silently asked, “Do you believe him?”

She nodded and replied equally silently, “I do.”

Riley pushed the beanie back onto his head and stood up. “No, thank you, Mr. Blackwell. That’d be all for today. Thanks again for your availability, and if you can think of anything else, please don’t hesitate to call us. I hope to report progress on the case soon.”

“I’m the grateful one, Detective King, for the opportunity to clear my name. I hope you find the actual attempted killer soon.”

Riley walked out of Trent Blackwell’s house feeling despondent. This had been another giant hole in the water, and they weren’t any closer to solving the case.

But at least now it was too late to go interrogate Mrs. Blackwell’s former lover, which meant he could drive Mila Bennet home and then go back to his place to sulk in misery all night, lay awake tormented by dreams of being with her, and then get up in the morning to go pick her up and start that circus all over again.