“I explained that, but Merry, he demanded to have a word, he didn’t back down when I shared that tidbit, and he seems kind of…perturbed.”

Goddammit.

He did not need this.

And what this was, was Mia’s dad coming to Garrett’s place of work to get in his face in an effort to give his daughter what she wanted.

Eyes to Mike, Garrett said into the phone, “Reiterate to him I’ve got important shit I gotta see to in order to solve a murder. I’m comin’ down, but he’s only got five minutes.”

“Will do,” she replied, and disconnected.

Garrett put his phone in the cradle. “Mia’s dad’s downstairs and Kath says he’s ‘perturbed.’ I gotta give him five minutes, then we can go.”

Now Mike was perturbed.

“Her dad? Jesus, how old is she?” Mike asked.

“You spoil a kid like McClintock spoiled his daughter, I’m findin’ she never grows up,” Garrett replied, straightening from the desk, snatching his suit jacket from the back of his chair, and shrugging it on as he headed to the stairs that led down to the reception area.

He saw McClintock pacing just inside the front doors.

Both of Mia’s parents were height challenged—her mom Mia’s height, her dad about five foot five.

In life, this gave Justin McClintock something to prove.

It had served him well, because in business, the man took no prisoners. He wasn’t completely loaded, but he was far from hurting. He drove a Lexus. His wife drove a Jag. They still lived in a big house in a nice development even though their daughter and two sons had long since moved out.

And he gave his daughter a piece of jewelry, the like Garrett learned early he could never compete with, doing that every year, birthday and Christmas.

In the beginning, Garrett had given her other things. He’d made her laugh, made her happy. They were living the good life and he was a part of that, so this wasn’t a problem; if they had that, he didn’t care if her father gave her jewelry.

But in the end, they’d fought about it because he’d used something he didn’t care smack about to drive the wedge he was building between them deeper.

Mia had never asked her dad to lay off, though. She took the diamonds. The emeralds. The tennis bracelets. And she did it with glee, right in front of her husband, even after he’d laid it out—no matter how fucked up it was or how false—that he hated that shit.

Christ, but it seemed he hadn’t paid attention at all.

Walking down the stairs, watching Mia’s father turn angry eyes to him, and all he felt was relief that Cher’s father wasn’t in the picture.

And that he’d finally started paying attention.

He glanced at Kath as he walked by her, giving her a look that said he’d rather not have an audience for this.

She read his look, gave a short nod, grabbed some papers off her desk, and hurried toward the copy machine.