Free Be Careful What You Wish For by Sibel Hodge

Are you working on a case?’ he asked.
    I nodded. ‘I’m investigating Levi Carter’s boxing match.’
    ‘Why?’
    I shrugged. ‘He’s got medical insurance with us, and Brad wanted me to check out the injury to his eye.’
    He folded his arms. ‘Yes, but what’s that got to do with Carl Thomas?’
    I was saved from answering by the arrival of the SOCOs and the Coroner’s Officer Carole Blake.
    ‘Hey, girl!’ Carole gave me a huge smile. ‘Long time no see. How are you?’ She gave a tentative glance between Romeo and me. Obviously the police station grapevine had heard that we’d split up. Oops, I mean, we were on a break. Or was that a Freudian slip, I wondered?
    ‘I’m great.’ I hugged her.
    ‘We must grab a drink one night. It’s been ages,’ she said.
    ‘Absolutely.’ I smiled back.
    ‘So, what’ve we got here?’ She pulled on some latex gloves as the SOCO team set down boxes full of equipment on the floor and surveyed the scene.
    ‘Carl Thomas.’ Romeo nodded towards the body. ‘I need an update on anything you find ASAP. I’m working on the robbery case at his bank, and somehow I don’t think this is a coincidence,’ he said to them.
    ‘No problem.’ Carol bent down and examined Carl’s slash wound.
    ‘Well, we’ll get out of your hair.’ Romeo grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the back door. When we were outside, he said, ‘OK, you have some explaining to do. I think we need to have a chat about things.’
    My stomach lurched. I really didn’t want to get into our personal thing at this moment in time. I still hadn’t made up my mind what to do about Romeo or Brad, and this was hardly the time or place.
    ‘Well…’ I trailed off. ‘You know I’m not very good with ultimatums.’ I suddenly found the concrete step I was standing on really fascinating and stared at it. ‘Things are…complicated.’
    ‘I’m not talking about us. I’m talking about Levi and Carl.’ His voice was steady and in control.
    I looked up sharply, my face hot with embarrassment. ‘Oh! Right. Yes.’ Even though I didn’t want to talk about us, part of me felt disappointed that he didn’t want to talk about us. Weird woman logic, huh?
    ‘Meet me in Starbucks in ten minutes.’ He strode towards his car.
     
    ****
     
    I grabbed a monster double chocolate chip muffin, which looked droolingly gorgeous, and a latte before searching out Romeo who was sitting in a corner booth, swirling his coffee around and staring into it.
    I sat down and picked out the chocolate chips without meeting his steady gaze. I’d already embarrassed myself enough for one day so I thought I’d let him speak first.
    ‘So, spill the beans.’ Romeo sipped his cappuccino and gazed at me over the rim of the mug.
    ‘I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.’ I shoved a handful of chocolate chips in my mouth. ‘I’ll tell you what I’ve been doing if you fill me in on the Kinghorn Thomas robbery.’
    He folded his arms and nodded. ‘OK. You go first.’
    Where did I start? I’d only been on this case one day and I already had all sorts of information running around in my brain that didn’t make sense. ‘Well.’ I put the rest of the muffin down and leaned my elbows on the table. ‘It all started with the boxing match between Levi Carter and Ricky Jackson. Brad thought there was something off with the fight and he wanted me to look into it.’
    Romeo flinched slightly at the mention of Brad’s name.
    I pretended I hadn’t noticed and carried on. ‘Carl Thomas turned up at the fight in the sixth round and started shouting something at Levi. Whatever it was got Levi really scared, and he was distracted by it enough to get knocked out, because Ricky managed to punch Levi in the eye, giving him a huge cut and a torn retina. The referee stopped the fight and declared Ricky the winner.’ I took a slug of latte. ‘Now, this is where it gets interesting…Levi’s promoter and manager is Vinnie