Duplicity

By Divamercury

Well, I told myself that this story wouldn't have multiple POV's, buthow can it not? That's what I always do! Sohere we are. Hopefully all the transitions will be rather clear. Let me know if you're having a problem following the flow. Anyway, please, please review and I hope you enjoy the latest chapter! Thanks so much! Love you all!

~DM

Chapter 4

Thanks, Vic, for putting ideas into his head. As if he wasn't curious enoughnow he won't leave me alone about this,' I groaned to myself as Connor and I trooped back to our office. On the way I stopped to grab a cup of coffee because I knew I couldn't possibly survive the eminent bombardment of questions from my rookie partner without the life-giving liquid.

"So, what was Vicki saying about you? That you always get the weird cases or something? What's with that?"

The interrogation has begun,' I thought, wincing. I rubbed the Witchblade absently and tugged on my shirtsleeve, pulling it down over the round red stone of the bracelet that encircled my right wrist. "Just another one of her theories. I do tend to get some weird ones, but that doesn't mean that all of them are. As far as I know there's no conspiracy against me that makes certain I get the bizarre ones."

Connor eyed me warily.

"You know what? It doesn't matter. Now come on. We've wasted enough time for this morning and there's a whole shitload of paperwork in there waiting for us, so we'd better get busy. I haven't seen the top of my desk in weeks," I remarked. We entered our office and got down to business, hoping that a morning of uninterrupted paper pushing would actually make the towers of documents that haunted us day and night shrink. I took a sip of coffee and dove into the pile headfirst.

* * *

I was in the middle of one of my fire-staring reveries, trying to devise a better plan to get Sara Pezzini out of my hair than the ones I had previously used, when the voice of Gina, my receptionist, broke through the silence of my office.

"Mr. Irons, there's a young woman out here waiting to speak to you. A Ms. Avilla, I believe."

I rolled the name around in my head for a moment, wondering why it was familiar. Nothing came to mind immediately. "Does she have an appointment?" I inquired irritably.

"Umno, sir."

"Then we have nothing further to discuss, Gina," I said.

"But, sirshe insists on seeing you."

I cursed quietly to myself. Obviously the woman, whoever she was, was going to continue to drive me crazy until I allowed her to enter. "Send her in."

My office door opened and a tall woman in her mid-twenties entered the room, taking long, confident strides as she approached my desk. As she got closer, her features jogged my memory and relayed to me who the woman was.

"Adela Avilla. What a surprisebut that makes it no less a pleasure."

"I went by Adela in Italy when I was younger but now I prefer to go by Adair; it seems more American. And it's apleasure to see you again as wellFather."

My eyes widened. "Whatever do you mean?"

"You mean to tell me you don't remember that little fling you had in London in 1978? With Aria Avilla the Italian supermodel?" she asked with a fine blend of innocence and sarcasm, but it was easy to tell that she was anything but innocent.

I eyed Adair criticallyand I could see some resemblance to me. She was quite tall, probably because neither her mother nor I were exactly short. Adair's hair was the same pale blonde as mine and it reached her shoulders. Her skin was a few shades darker than mine but the difference wasn't drastic, and her eyes were green—like her mother's—and Sara's, I mused, but shook the thought from my mind as soon as it entered. Adair's eyes were a poisonous, dangerous green whereas Sara's were a morenormal, emerald shade. She was dressed in a beige wool pants suit and would have looked very frail if something hadn't told me that that was just a front.

"I remember quite well," I lied. "I was simply uninformed of your existence. Your mother never notified me of your birth. How is she?"

"She's dead," Adair deadpanned. "Why else would I even bother coming here?"

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said absently. I really couldn't have cared less. "What was the cause?"

"Brain tumor."

"How unfortunate. I offer my greatest condolences."

"I'm sure you do."

I glanced around the room and my eyes fell on the decanter sitting on a table. "Can I offer you something to drink?"

"Yes. Thank you." I got up and retrieved the decanter and two glasses, but she insisted on pouring our drinks. "Toan interesting reunion." She handed me my glass and we drank.

"So, what exactly was it that you wanted to speak to me about?" I asked, and half-listened to what Adair had to say, which took about half an hour. She poured two more drinks and continued with her story. As her tale got longer and longer I began to feel somewhat odd.

"Ms. Avilla—"

"—Oh, please, just call me Adair. Ms. Avilla' is much too formal an address for your daughter."

Luckily Gina's voice over the intercom saved me from having to reply. "Sir, there's an urgent call for you on line 3."

"Thank you, Gina," I replied, and pasted on a look of false regret. "I'm afraid I will have to take this, Adair."

"That's fine. It's probably about time for me to leave. I hope we can do this again sometime soon."

"Yes, wellif time allows." I gave her one of my patented false smiles.

Adair smiled and left.

"Thank you, Gina," I repeated. There was no call on line 3; she had been instructed from the first day of her employment to say that if meetings took too long. I leaned back in my chair and turned to my computer, smiling broadly. I brought up the version of my will that I kept on file and dismay briefly ruined my cheerful mood when I saw that Ian was still my primary heir.

Ha. Not for long.'

I made a few quick changes, renaming my heir. Never know what could happen,' I thought solemnly. I pressed the button on the intercom to summon Gina.

"Yes, sir?"

"Find one other person—it doesn't matter who—and come in here immediately."

"Yes, sir," Gina said, obviously confused. I printed out a copy of the will and looked up when Gina and a security guard entered.

"You wanted to see us?"

I nodded and gestured to the new copy of my will. "I need witnesses," I said, smiling. The pair looked at me strangely but signed the document anyway. Delighted, I dismissed them and drifted off into a pleasant sleep in my chair.

* * *

Mr. Irons hadn't called me for two hours. It was odd enough that he was so cheerful when he summoned Timothy and myself, but what was stranger was the document he wanted us to sign. He had now decided to change his heir from Mr. Nottingham, a devoted (until recently) employee and had now shifted to someone he barely knew. Shrugging to myself, since it wasn't really my business, I decided to buzz Mr. Irons to make sure he hadn't forgotten about his next appointment before I started doing my nails.

"Mr. Irons?" I said into the intercom. I waited several minutes and tried again. "Mr. Irons?" Still nothing. My brow furrowed. Something didn't feel right.

I got up from my desk and went to Mr. Irons's office. I knocked lightly at first, then a bit more sharply. I finally just decided to open the door and found Mr. Irons asleep at his desk. I wouldn't have thought anything about it had it not been for two facts I knew quite well. Number One: Mr. Irons never fell asleep at his desk, and Number Two: He was such a light sleeper that surely my intercom pages or knocks would have roused him. Even though I was afraid of arousing his wrath and putting my position in jeopardy, I entered the office and went around his desk, tapping him lightly on the shoulder. This had no effect, so I shook him.

"Mr. Irons?" I asked rather loudly. When I finished shaking him, his head slumped forward and I cautiously touched his hand. It was ice cold. There was no pulse at his wrist when I checked. I screamed for some help and Timothy ran into the office.

"What's up, Gina?"

I was incoherent but I think he picked "Mr. Irons issomething's not right" out of my jumble of phrases. He rushed over and took the boss's carotid pulse.

"Call the cops," Timothy said tersely. I ran out of the office to my desk and pressed a button on speed dial. For once there was actually a legitimate reason to call this number

* * *

The harsh ring of the phone on my desk broke the silence of our office, making Connor and me jump involuntarily.

"Pezzini, Homicide," I answered, shouldering the phone as I tried to finish up a final signature on a form.

"Detective, there's been a suspicious death," a woman's halting voice said over the line.

"Who is this?" I asked, sitting up straight.

"Detective Pezzini, this is Gina, Mr. Irons's receptionist. I found Mr. Irons in his officeapparently dead. He was fine this morning, I don't know what could have happened—" she broke off.

"All right, Gina, clam down. My partner and I will be right there," I said, and we hung up. "Come on, rookie, we've got work to do." I got my gear together and looked back at Connor.

"What's going on?"

"There's been asuspicious death. Don't know if it's a murder yet. Let's roll."

Connor and I left the precinct and piled into the car. I drove our unmarked Chevy Caprice out of the parking lot.

"Where are we headed?"

"Vorschlag Industries."

"You mean"

"Yeah. Evidently Kenneth Irons was found dead a couple of minutes ago."