Page 35 of Diamonds (Aces Underground #2)

I rub the back of my neck. “I always wondered why he left me this car. And you heard what my mom said, that he was absolutely adamant about me getting the car. No conditions. I didn’t even have to wait for probate.

I walked out of my father’s funeral with the keys in hand.

We weren’t on good terms when he died. There was no reason for him to leave me the car, unless he had some kind of underlying reason. ”

She unbuckles her seatbelt. “Well, let’s see where that odd raindrop trail goes.”

“You’ll get wet.”

“Who the bloody hell cares? I’m going to take a shower once we return to my place anyway.”

“Fair enough.” I reach into the back seat and grab two fedoras I keep there for emergencies, hand one to her. “At least wear this. It’ll keep the rain out of your eyes.”

“What a sweetheart.” She puts the hat on.

I put on my own fedora and get out of the car. I close the window and watch the trails of raindrops as they cascade down the driver-side window.

Alissa joins me on my side, rubbing her arms against the chill. “Anything?”

I point to the sideways trail. “Yeah. Right here.” I watch as the rain flows toward the side-view mirror and then makes a right-angle turn down the side of the door.

It then pools about two inches before the bottom of the door.

“That’s weird, too.” I gesture to the car door.

“See how the other trails of raindrops go all the way to the bottom of the door and then just drip down to the ground? This trail is accumulating unnaturally two inches before it hits the bottom.”

I poke my finger where the raindrops are pooling.

Sure enough, a small dent has been made in my door.

Completely unnoticeable in daylight because the car is black.

Even if I did notice it, I would think it was just a small ding caused by an unruly shopping cart in a grocery store parking lot or something. Easily buffed out by a body shop.

I open the car door, place one hand on its exterior and the other on the interior. I find the dent with my index finger of my left hand, and then meet my right finger to it. The dent is situated right over the little interior pocket, where the driver might keep maps, loose coins, and the like.

I let out a sigh. The side pocket of the car is empty. Has always been. I don’t keep anything there, and if there had been anything there, I would have cleared it out when I inherited the car.

Fuck. Fuck.

I thought we were on to something. I sit back down in the driver’s seat, keeping the door open, and clunk my head against the steering wheel.

“Maddox, it’s all right,” Alissa says. “I thought we might have figured it out, too.”

“No. I think I did figure it out. But the message was clearly alluding to something being in this pocket. I would have cleared out everything that was in it when I inherited the car. I wanted to rid the car of any evidence that my father ever owned it. Expel all the evil.”

“And you weren’t on very good terms, right?”

“Right.”

“So he might have foreseen that you’d throw all his trash away. If he even left anything in the pocket. Do you remember throwing anything away?”

I swallow, bite my lip. “Honestly, I don’t remember. It was so long ago. I had just gotten dumped by Laurie. A lot of the time after my father’s funeral is a blur.”

Alissa drops her jaw. “Laurie broke up with you right after your father’s funeral?”

“ At my father’s funeral, actually.”

She winces. “That’s terrible.”

“Yeah, but she’s forgiven after last night.”

Alissa taps a finger against her cheek. “I suppose… Still, just leaving something right in the driver-side door pocket, where anyone could see it, seems a trifle irresponsible.” She kneels, places her hand in the pocket, feels around. “Aha!”

“What?”

She beams as she pulls out a small gray piece of flat plastic. The exact shame shade as the rest of the car door’s interior. “A false bottom!”

“Holy shit, Alissa.” I jump out of the car. “What’s in there?”

“It seems only fair that you do the honors.” She grabs her phone out of the pocket of her sweatpants and shines its flashlight into the pocket. “Look inside.”

I reach inside. There’s something small, cold. Metal. Covered in small studs. Round on one end and pointed in the other.

I pull it out and I drop my jaw.

It’s a key.

A key encrusted in rubies.

Rubies, which I associate with one person and one person alone.

I hold it in front of me, catching the light off Alissa’s phone. “This must be a key to something Rouge owns!”

“What makes you say that?” Alissa asks.

“Who else do you know who would take the time to glue precious stones to her personal effects?”

“Good point.”

I pace outside the car, completely ignoring the rain as it pelts against me and soaks through the T-shirt and sweats I’m wearing. “This means that we can finally end this. That we can?—”

I shut my mouth.

The fireworks of joy that have been exploding in my brain from the unraveling of this decade-old clue from my father are snuffed out in an instant.

Because those little plans Alissa and I bandied about just now? The little trip to the UK to visit her father?

Those are going to have to be put on hold.

“Alissa,” I say, turning toward her slowly. “We have to go back to Aces. Tonight.”