Page 24 of Deadly Sins: Envy
“Is Beck here with you?” I asked. “I need to talk to him.”
“Sure am,” a man’s voice said.
The bathroom door opened, and Beck stepped out. He was bald and had a long, narrow face that reminded me of a weasel. He walked up to Kendra, kissing her in a way that suggested they had a romantic attachment. And though Kendra had aged well, it seemed she was old enough to be his mother.
Kendra poured two shots of Fireball. She handed one to Beck and then blinked at me. “You sure you don’t want one, hun?”
I shook my head. She clanked her shot glass against Beck’s, and they swallowed them back. She set hers back on the counter, looked at Beck, and said, “We best wait at least fifteen minutes before we have another, or we’ll never make it to dinner tonight.”
He nodded. “That’s why there’s Uber, but whatever you say, honey.”
“You have a lot of photos on your walls,” I said.
Kendra pressed her hand against a photo of her younger self. In the photo, she was holding an award of some sort. “I suppose I do. In my opinion memories are all we have in life. The pictures remind me of where I’ve been and where I hope to go before my time’s up.”
I understood the sentiment. When Cade’s daughter Shelby died, I spent a few weeks putting together a photo collage of her at various ages for his office wall. Once he sold the house, he transferred the photos to an album so we could take it with us while we traveled. We may not have looked through the album every day, but it always set on the dresser of any place we went, which made me feel like no matter where we were, she was with us somehow.
“What do you want to talk to me about?” Beck asked.
“Willow’s kidnapping.”
“I didn’t have anything to do with it. I’m with Kendra now.”
He gave Kendra’s hand a squeeze and she giggled.
“Since when?” I asked.
“Ahh ... a couple of weeks now, I’d say.”
He looked to her for verification, and she nodded.
“We kept it quiet at first, you know, after everything that happened with Willow,” he said. “I wanted to tell her the other night so she didn’t think I was here because of her, but when she saw me ... the look in her eye ... I knew nothing I said would make a difference. She’d already made up her mind about why I was here.”
“Why did you lie to her when you first met?” I asked. “Why tell her you worked for a big label?”
He shrugged. “Haven’t you ever wanted to impress someone before?”
“Not enough to lie. Do you work for a management company, or is that a lie too?”
“It’s not a lie. I’m with Goldstein and Associates. Been there six years. It’s a small outfit, but we’ve grown a lot over time.”
“He’s tellin’ the truth,” Kendra said. “I know Kit Goldstein, the owner. He’s how Beck and I first met a few years back.”
There was no reason for me not to believe her, but I didn’t know her. She could have been lying. I shifted my attention back to Beck.
“Did you think Willow would have talked to you if you’d told her the truth?” I asked.
“She comes from ... she’s a different class of ...” He scratched his head. “Aww, hell. No matter what I say about her, it’s not gonna come out right.”
“Shall I try to say it for you?” Kendra said.
Beck nodded.
“I mean this as no offense,” Kendra said, “but when it comes to Willow’s music career, I suspect it’s more about who she knows than her actual talent.”
“Meaning?”
“I’m not saying the girl doesn’t have some qualities. For her age, she’s one of the best guitar players I’ve come across in some time, but a great singer she is not. I mean, her voice is all right, but I don’t believe it’s good enough to land her the kind of record deal she’s after.”