His eyes suddenly sparked with amber fire. "Sorry, but I will never think that anybody shooting at you is a good sign."
"I mean, maybe we're on the right track, because somebody is getting worried. That's our usual strategy—stomp around annoying everybody until the guilty people get nervous."
"They'd have to know we're investigating, first," Jack pointed out.
I gave him a look. "This is Dead End. Everybody in town knew we were looking into this within five minutes of Lorraine being arrested."
"Right. What was I thinking?"
"Did you give him the ledger?"
"No. Not till we study it further and maybe copy it."
My face cracked open in a huge yawn, and I rubbed my eyes. "Okay. I'm going to go wash my face and brush my teeth. I put a new toothbrush and toothpaste for you in the guest bathroom."
I moved the blanket and then stood and stretched. "Good night."
I'd made it all the way to my bedroom door when I realized Jack hadn't answered me. I glanced back at him to find him standing exactly where I'd left him, staring at me with an odd expression on his face.
"What?"
"You realize you've become a person who can get shot at one minute and fall soundly asleep the next, right, Tess?"
"Self defense?"
He muttered something, but I just sketched a little wave and headed for my bathroom. Within five minutes, I was in my pajamas and in bed, and my brain finally caught up with my ears.
He'd said:
"You bought me a toothbrush."
Huh.
I wondered about his reaction for almost five whole seconds before I fell asleep.
When I woke up eight hours later and stumbled out of my bedroom in search of coffee, a computer hacker was wiring my laptop to something that looked like a cross between R2-D2 and a Dalek.
"Pinch me. I think I'm still dreaming," I mumbled.
"Okay," Jack said from behind me, and then he pinched my arm.
"Ouch!"
Tigers are soliteral.
10
"Hi, Dallas," I said to the hacker. "Coffee?"
He grinned at me. "Good morning, Tess. Nice PJs."
"Hey. Donald Duck is good for all occasions."
Dallas Fox and his twin brother Austin were former Army Rangers who now co-owned the airboat company with Lucky. They looked like Idris Elba's even hotter younger brothers; all cheekbones and muscles. They were also both brilliant computer hackers who could probably rewire my computer and turn it into a time machine or a spaceship with nothing more than the tools in my garden shed.
"How's Mellie? I have to call her." Mellie's cousin Vern had held her captive in her own house for a week while he was stalking me. We'd rescued her, but she'd been ill and bruised and needed to go to the hospital. I suddenly felt horrible—I hadn't even called her yet.
"She's fine." His beautiful brown eyes shone with relief and something more. I'd heard he and Mellie were dating finally, after he'd spent more than a year trying to get up the nerve to ask her out. "I brought her home last night. She's coming over for breakfast, in fact. She said she'd stop and pick up donuts."
