Free Time Clock Hero by Spikes Donovan Page B

“But, who knows?”
    Sam rubbed his fingers through his hair, pushing it back over the top of his head.  “I’m sorry.  I just---”
    “If it makes any difference to you, we can burn this – this will,” Phoenix said.  “I don’t want any part of it.  But let me ask you: did she leave anything to anyone else?  Anything like what she left to me?”
    “She … Roxy’s been giving it away for the last couple of years,” Sam said.  “Nashville Children’s Hospital, the Child Rescue Agency, college scholarship funds, things like that.”
    “But you think I have something to do with her disappearance,” Phoenix asked.  “And now I know why.  Let me guess, everybody else knows Roxy put me in her will as the sole beneficiary, too.”
    Sam nodded.
    Phoenix wrote down the charities Sam had mentioned.  “Any other people she’d been giving money to?”
    “I can check.”
    “Do it by tomorrow morning,” Phoenix said.  “You know, I haven’t shot anybody before– I mean, a real, live person.” Phoenix said.  “But it doesn’t mean my gun hasn’t or won’t.”
    Sam narrowed his eyes and his head flinched back slightly.
    “That means if Roxy shows up with a bullet that matches my gun, it doesn’t mean I did it.  My lab guy just showed up with one of my bullets in his chest and I assure you I didn’t kill him until I was sure he was really dead.”
    “Am I supposed to make sense of that?”
    “You get the point.”
    “You don’t think that---?”
    “Roxy? Dead?  Possible.  Me?  I’m being set up because I’m getting close on a case.  Roxy’s doctor is one of my suspects – only thing I can’t figure out is why someone hasn’t killed me yet.  That would have been a lot easier.”
    Sam shook his head.  “I just want my wife back.  I’ve got more money than I know what to do---”
    The doorbell rang, not once, not twice, but three times, like somebody in a hurry would do.
    “Now what?” Phoenix asked.  “Maybe this time I’ll get capped.”  He left his chair, walked through the kitchen and towards the front door.  When he opened it, he froze.  A dark, blue gun barrel touched his forehead, and the pressure of it forced him backwards into the living room.  He followed the slender, black fingers with his eyes all the way up the thin but strong arm, all the way to the face of Alaia Jenkins.
    “I am going to kill you now,” Alaia said.  “And I ain’t playing.  You think I am?”
    “If you’re going to kill me, then you’d better get in line, sweetie,” Phoenix said.
    Sam Cotton entered the living room.  Alaia lowered her gun quickly, dropping it into her large, orange, ostrich-skin purse.
    “Sam’s on his way out,” Phoenix said.  “Isn’t that right, Sam?”
    “I’ll call you in the morning, Detective Malone,” Sam said, with a straight, but tired, face.  He excused himself and left.  Phoenix closed the door behind him and locked it.
    “The autopsy on Dr. Albin Demachi,” Alaia said.  “You were in on that, weren’t you?  You switched the bullets around.”
    “I’ve got enough heat on me already,” Phoenix said.  “Maybe what I did or didn’t do was or wasn’t such a bad thing.”
    “I don’t think you get it, Phoenix!” Alaia yelled.  “Cobb’s got the report on his desk saying I shot Dr. Demachi!”
    “Albin was dead from something else, believe me.  We’ll have some specifics from Dr. Cain very, very soon.”
    “You’re hiding something, Phoenix.”
    Phoenix held his finger up in the air and then he slowly touched the tip of his nose.  “You’re right – why don’t you come in and take a seat?”
    “Just make it fast,” she said, and she followed Phoenix to the table.  She looked at the mess and shook her head, and then she picked up the photo Dr. Cain had given him, the photo of the five friends. 
    “That’s what we need to talk about,” Phoenix said.  “Take a seat.”
    Alaia sat down next to Phoenix.
    Phoenix