The corner of his mouth hooked up. “I know one or two people who’ve had rather negative encounters with me thanks to their wealth of knowledge.”
Emma shuddered at the implications of that, but she wasn’t about to ask Jace for clarification on what he thought of as “negative encounters.”
“So what’s with all the schools?” he asked. “Are you a PhD or something?”
“Oh no. Three bachelor’s degrees.”
“Doesn’t that seem excessive?”
“It’s not like it’s four years for each. Once I got the electives out of the way at Yale, I only had to take the classes specific to whatever major I was pursuing at the time.”
“So what are these three majors?”
Emma glanced down to the hardwood floor. As much fun as she had at all her schools, she didn’t like talking about them. It was too hard for everyone to wrap their head around her flip-floppy way of thinking about her career. “I’ve majored in business administration, anthropology, and biology.”
“And none of those were interesting enough to keep your attention?”
“It’s not that they were boring. It’s that there’s always something out there more interesting.” How was she supposed to decide how to spend the rest of her life? She had all the money she’d need to live multiple lives of luxury. If she was going to pick a career, she was going to choose one that made her happy. She just had to find it first.
“And Joslyn didn’t share your love of school, I’m assuming,” said Jace.
Emma could feel the tension creep back into her body at the mention of her sister. “She was never really the academic type.” Joslyn had too many other distractions. She was busy cheerleading and going out with all the boys on the football team.
Emma was a cheerleader too, but it didn’t define her high school career. Joslyn was cheer first and foremost. Student came somewhere close to last. But she’d never really had to worry about getting good grades. DevX Tech had taken off before Joslyn even hit kindergarten, so they’d always had the security of knowing they could be whatever they wanted to be. Joslyn wanted to be popular and Emma was still trying to figure that part out.
“So what has Russell found in Joslyn’s laptop?” asked Jace.
“It was delivered to him yesterday, so hopefully we’ll have access to the bank statements sometime today. He works for a software firm during the day, but he should be getting off work around five in the UK.”
“So we’ll do a sweep of the rest of the rooms here and if we don’t see anything suspicious, we’ll agree to meet up once this Russell guy gets you more information to go on.”
Emma really didn’t want to hold off any longer, but she supposed they could wait until they heard from Russell. Maybe then she could even go out to dinner with Luke and Michael so they wouldn’t worry about her as much. “Sounds good. Why don’t we start with the master bedroom?”
Jace held a hand out to signal for her to lead the way. As they walked, her boots clanked against the wood, but Jace’s sneakers made no noise. If she hadn’t known he was right behind her, she would’ve thought she was alone in the apartment. She wasn’t used to feeling like the largest person in the room.
She pushed the door open to the master suite. The entire room was just as pretty and sterile as the rest of the place. A bright pink comforter covered a king-sized bed, and an oversized modern art piece over the headboard contained a mix of pinks and golds. The rest of the room contained pristine white furniture and walls. “Doesn’t look like Terry ever spent much time here.” She took in the feminine aesthetic.
“According to him, he had no idea she even had the place,” said Jace from beside her.
Emma frowned. “Then how did she afford it? This place has to be thousands of dollars a month.”
Jace crossed the room and opened up the top drawer to the dresser. “I guess that’s something we can figure out when we get access to her bank statements.”
“Don’t do that,” snapped Emma as she ran over and pushed the drawer shut.
Jace raised a brow. “Isn’t this why I’m here?”
“You’re here to help me dig into her life, not her underwear drawer.”
“Sorry,” muttered Jace as he backed up. “Why don’t I just sit here and let you do all the work?”
Emma sighed and looked through the drawers. “It seems we keep on ending up in bedrooms today.”
Jace let out a little laugh. “Looks that way, doesn’t it?”
“What was that place you took me to this morning?”
“It was quiet and out of the way,” he said.
Emma shot him a knowing look. He knew exactly what she’d been asking.
“That’s my apartment,” he said. “But when I’m not renting it, it’s where the coffee shop owner meets his mistresses.”
“You brought me to an affair hidey hole?” she exclaimed.
“Quiet and out of the way,” he repeated.
“Disgusting.”
“Convenient and cheap.” Jace stood and crossed to the bathroom. “I guess we’ll agree to disagree.”
Emma would prefer to disagree even more, but decided to let it go and turn her attention to Joslyn’s apartment. As pristine as the place looked, there were a few personal items. A change of clothes in one of the drawers. A pair of sneakers and a pair of black, strappy stilettos. There were no drawers full of underwear, so she’d officially overreacted to Jace doing pretty much exactly what she asked him.
And he was either nice enough to not say anything or he hadn’t noticed. Emma would bet money on option number one, though.
The last drawer Emma pulled open had a small black clutch and nothing else. A quick glance inside the tiny purse showed it was empty, but something was in the outside pocket. “Jace,” she called. “Check out this receipt I found.”
He came out of the bathroom and crouched down next to Emma as he read the receipt in her hand. “Drax Club,” he said. “You ever heard of it?”
“I’m not from here,” she said. “You?”
“Nope.” He pulled out his phone. “Let me look it up.” He took the receipt from her hand and entered information in.
“She wasn’t going there alone,” said Emma. “One of the charges is for whiskey and Joslyn would never drink that.”
“And I can say the bar isn’t a complete dive. Or else it would be cash only, no receipts.”
“There are places that don’t accept credit cards?”
Jace let out a laugh. “You’ve led a very sheltered life, Ms. Devereaux.”
“Doesn’t feel that sheltered,” she said. Both parents dead at a young age. Sister on her way to prison. If Emma had been sheltered, it was a shelter made out of straw instead of brick.
“Looks like an upscale bar in Brooklyn,” said Jace. “I can check it out later tonight and see if it’s worth following up on.”
Emma shook her head. “No. I’m going with you.”
He raised a brow. “Do you think you can find out things I can’t?”
“I think we both know very different sides of Joslyn,” she said. “You think of her as a cold-blooded killer. I think of her as a confused family member. It would be better if we both went there.”