Page 33 of Shielding Serena

Glad that she was finally truly on board, Walker steered her out of the Sheriff’s Department and they climbed into his truck and headed for the storage unit.

“Why are we doing this today?” he asked, no censure in his voice, just curiosity.

“I needed to get away from the house, and I want to do something with my hands,” Serena replied. “If we find Mr. Higgins’ statue today, I’ll consider it a victory, especially with everything else going on. If we don’t find it today, I’m closed on Sundays, so we can come back.”

“Fair enough,” he said, and he was glad that she hadn’t even blinked when Garrett had suggested sticking to her like glue. Because that’s exactly what he intended to do.

CHAPTER 14

While they were rooting through the storage unit, Walker had Quentin start a background check on both Parker Gates and Marcus Anderson, Serena’s ex, including a deep dive into their whereabouts the night of the assault. Walker didn’t really understand all the intricacies of how to hack into someone’s calendar and phone, but for Quentin it was another Saturday.

Serena had provided Mr. Higgins’ email address, so he’d forwarded it on to Quentin as well. Getting background on Bobby was going to be more problematic, and when he saw the kid again, he’d find a way to grab his coffee cup or something that might have a print on it. If Garrett didn’t come up with something first.

Walker’s phone pinged with an incoming text from Quentin telling him that a full report on Marcus Anderson was in his inbox, with no real red flags. But that Walker would probably want to interview him, in case.

His next text said he was going to work on Parker Gates and then move on to Mr. Higgins.

He’d met Parker Gates exactly once, the first summer Serena had showed up in town out of the blue. Walker had been in The Menagerie, changing out a lightbulb for Madeline when Serena’s father walked in like a thundercloud, demanding to know where his “recalcitrant brat” was.

Madeline had torn him a new one for not only emotionally abandoning his dying wife, but his grieving daughter as well and sent Parker packing with his tail between his legs. Walker had stood there in awe and fallen in love with the woman on the spot.

He’d found out later that she’d heard the whole thing. It was all beyond his comprehension. His family would never have used words like that about him. It would have never entered their minds.

With his knowledge of Gates, he was pretty sure the man wouldn’t lift a finger when it came to Serena, not even to scare her. He didn’t care enough to make the effort.

Garrett would undoubtedly be looking into these men as well, but Walker knew Quentin’s findings would be more comprehensive and likely faster. If there were any gray areas about how the information had been obtained, then Walker could simply mention it to Garrett as an aside and let the law take it from there. He had no desire for credit in bringing down whoever the bad guy was, he wanted to keep Serena safe.

About an hour into their search they finally unearthed the correct box, a massive crate that had what seemed like a thousand bits and pieces inside. Serena unwrapped the figurine of a dancing woman, her skirts held aloft, from the bubble wrap and held it up to the harsh glare of the light bulb.

“It’s pretty. Art Deco, I think,” she said, and pulled out her phone, snapping a picture and sending it to a search engine. “Huh,” she remarked at the results that had come up. “It’s too bad there’s only one, because they’re worth twenty-five hundred bucks as a pair.”

“Could the other one be in another box? Or further down in that one?” Walker asked.

Serena shrugged. “Unlikely. Estate sales are usually pretty anal about boxing everything up as it’s purchased, especially something like this. Also, these are high end. If the other one was available, it would have been sent to a fine art dealer, not an estate sale.”

That made sense, he supposed, as they carefully put the figurine aside.

“I’d like to catalogue the rest of this later, since it had good stuff,” Serena said and looked hopefully at him.

He gave a long-suffering sigh and lifted the crate. When he caught her stare at him flexing and easily moving the big box, it made the pulled muscle he was pretty sure he was getting worth it as he shifted it to the front of the unit.

Albert Higgins had a flawless background that was almost too clean to believe. But having met the man, Walker believed it. He’d figured it was a dead end, but at least now he could take him off the suspect list.

Once they arrived back at the house, Walker excused himself and took a moment to review Quentin’s report on Marcus Anderson. By the time he was done he almost wished Anderson was the perp, because the guy was a cast-iron prick.

According to Quentin’s digging, he had a solid alibi, wherein he was cheating on his own wife with his business partner’s adult daughter. It wasn’t just the cheating, he was also shady as fuck when it came to business. If Walker and Quentin leaked what Quentin had uncovered, the man’s life would be over. He wouldn’t do time, but he’d be ostracized for certain.

When they spoke on the phone ten minutes later, every single assumption he had was solidified.

“Why would I spend any time on that woman?” Anderson asked. “She’s as frigid as they come. I wasted two years of my life on her. The plan was that she was going to reconcile with her father and bring his business our way. Then she backed out.”

Yeah, Walker wanted to hit the guy. Serena was the very opposite of frigid, at least in his experience, and that had absolutely nothing to do with the kissing. She was warm and funny and made it a point to care for those around her. Could she really have been that different in Dallas? Walker doubted it. But he’d also met guys like Marcus before, guys who made Gordon Gekko from the old movie Wall Street look like a charmer, where money was the only thing worth their time or attention.

He was also one hundred percent sure that she’d never, ever thought about reconnecting with Parker Gates and that’d it’d been Anderson’s really, really bad idea.

So he crossed the man off his suspect list, paraphrased Quentin’s report and his observations, and sent it to Garrett via email. There was no reason for the sheriff to do extra legwork on that piece of shit, though he certainly could if he wanted to check Quentin’s work. And if some of that information about his sketchy business deals made it to the right eyes, then it was simply fate.

They scrounged from the fridge that night rather than going out and put together a simple dinner of sandwiches and chips, settling in on the couch in the sitting room.