Cam cursed a blue streak, and Nic was still laughing when his phone vibrated,Unknownlighting up the screen.
The first such call in months.Coincidence?Not likely.“This is Nic Price.”
Dead air.
“Hello, who’s there?”Nic tried again, not expecting an answer.
Cam rounded the kitchen corner, instantly on alert.Nic turned the phone toward him, flashing theUnknownon-screen.Cam took one look, made a keep-the-line-open gesture, then whipped out his own phone, texting rapidly.No doubt getting Mel or Lauren up on a trace.
“You haven’t called in a while.”
He thought to say something about Jacksonville or to ask if it was Nicolette Sare on the other end of the line.They’d traced last spring’s calls to the twenty-seven-year-old woman in North Carolina.They’d also traced the start of the calls to shortly after his father had stopped making deposits into a secret offshore account.He could ask about that instead.But all that assumed this mysterious call was connected to the previous ones, and if it wasn’t, he couldn’t disclose any of those facts, especially if this call was from Vaughn.As far as they could tell, neither Vaughn nor any of Curtis’s other lenders knew about the offshore account or Nicolette, and Nic sure as fuck wasn’t going to lead Vaughn to it either.
“I assume you’re calling about my father,” he said instead.If Curtis’s death hadn’t hit the news yet, it would soon.He wasn’t disclosing any secrets with that statement.“No offer of condolences?A man is dead.”
Click.
“Fuck!”Nic hung up and shoved the phone in his pocket.“Enough?”he asked Cam.
Phone to his ear, Cam raised a finger, motioning for him to wait, as he spoke to someone on the other end.“They hung up.”He listened a moment longer, then his face fell and Nic had his answer.“Too short for an immediate trace,” Cam confirmed.“Mel’s already made the request for carrier records.”
“Timing’s not suspicious or anything.”
“It could be unconnected,” Cam said, approaching.Nic opened his mouth to call bullshit, but Cam beat him to it.“I agree with you, though.It’s too on the nose to be coincidence.It’s likely connected to your father’s death at minimum.”
Nic shouldered his bag again.“And maybe to Jacksonville and those deposits if someone, say Nicolette Sare, wants to make sure they get anything left in that account.”
“Or it could be something more directly related to Vaughn.”Cam reached past him for the doorknob.“Let’s see what Mel finds.”He fought with the uncooperative knob, finally getting it to turn, and swung the door open to a blast of sound that rocked Nic back a step.
“Attorney Price!Agent Byrne!”one reporter called out.
“Mr.Price, care to comment on your father’s death?”asked another.And the shouted questions went on and on...
“How’s it feel to lose your dad?”
“Will you be leaving the US Attorney’s Office to take over the family business?”
“Will you be running the day-to-day operations?”
“What will happen to your father’s real estate holdings?”
“How will this affect your relationship with Agent Byrne?”
Cam’s hand on his back pushed him forward, out the door and off the front porch.It was the right move—ducking back inside would have looked like hiding—but for once, Nic didn’t have the words, other than thinkingNoto every question that was asked and that answer wouldn’t satisfy anyone.
Cam found his press feet faster.“We have no comment at this time.”They pushed past the reporters, along the walkway to Nic’s truck in the driveway.“Attorney Price only learned of his father’s death last night.Please respect our privacy until a statement is made available.”
Fuck, if only they’d cracked the blinds before opening the door or listened more closely, they would have had some clue as to the ambush, but they’d been distracted with the call.
Nic had assumed word of Curtis’s death would get out and be newsworthy—he’d said as much to the caller.Curtis had been a major player in the local business scene, and he’d been an expert at covering up how far out of that scene he’d fallen.But Nic hadn’t expected that many reporters or that word would spread that fast.“Who the fuck tipped them off?”
“Someone at the morgue, one of the EMTs from the scene, Harris.”
Nic wanted to turn in his seat and look back to see if there was anyone suspicious at the scene, but doing so would be too obvious.Instead, he pulled down the visor and flipped open the mirror, pretending to straighten his tie while he scanned the chaos on their front lawn.
Turned out the clue he was looking for was ahead of, not behind, them.“Or it was them,” Cam said with a barely perceptible nod at the chromed-out sedan parked at the corner.
Nic used his side-view mirror to get a better look as they rolled past.
