“No pictures with guys. Lots of pictures with Ginger at the diner. Also, an older woman. Her mother lives here.”
“Any dicks in suits?”
“Nah.”
Dawson claps my shoulder. “I won’t have to spend my retirement money on your jail upkeep.”
“She said she doesn’t have a babysitter and that the baby daddy is out of town temporarily. See if you can find the father.”
“I can’t hack into Social Security right after I hacked them last week. They need to cool off and drop the search for my code.”
“But you will.”
Senator closes the computer. “There’s no baby daddy, Cap. I know a single mother when I see one, so she’s lying.” He props his foot on the desk. “Can we get on the housing thing we came here for? We need to find the handler and get the keys.”
I tap the gun tucked neatly in a holster on my belt, grab an extra magazine and drop it into my jacket, then sling the jacket back on. “Check out the houses without me. Dawson, take over.”
“Are you kidding me?” Senator protests. “You know the layout of the land. You said so yourself. No decision-making without you.”
“I still know the layout and will make decisions, but I’m gonna do it after you do the groundwork.”
“It’s all in the specs.” He yanks out a folder from his briefcase. What kind of rock star carries a briefcase? Senator is having an identity crisis.
I shake my head and open the door. “Layout matters, and for that, we need recon.” I close the door.
“Where the fuck are you going?” rings out behind me, but I get on my bike, rev it up, then shut off the engine. I get off the bike and open the seat, grab my Yankee ball cap, and put it on. Gonna go stealth mode for a bit, do my own recon. Stealth mode is also sounding better than stalker so I’m feeling good as I walk back to the diner and take position across the street inside the local market.
After spending a few hours staring out the window, watching her talk to the Suit, who’s still there as if he lives there, I’m annoyed as fuck and wanna get Dawson’s sniper rifle and off the dude. But I can’t do that because…no good reason comes to me. I mean, I could off him. Hm.
An elderly man approaches. Vaguely, I remember him from when I was a kid and used to come into this store. Stole an ice cream one time, and he called my dad, who picked me up and grounded me for a month after.
“Reed MacLoyd?”
Surprised, I turn my face toward him. “That’s right, sir.”
“Is the reason you came back to town working in our diner?”
It is now. “No, sir.”
“Then stay away. She don’t need a man on a bike leaving her pregnant. You understand?”
“I do.” I process his words and presume the baby daddy was a man on a bike, and that’s fine as long as he’s not coming in and out of her life, and even if he was, I brought my Sig and my men. “Can I grab a chair?”
“For eleven ninety-nine. Aisle three in the back. Can’t miss it, but if you think our Tammy is gonna jump on the back of your bike, you got it wrong, boy. She won’t do it.”
“Good thing I walked, then.”Fuck off,I wanna say, but I don’t because I can’t risk an argument with an elderly man.When I’m on a recon mission, anything that’s not the mission itself gets my temper revved to that of an annoyed tiger and drops my patience to that of a roadrunner.
Do not fuck with me while I’m on a mission, though I’m inside his store and he’s letting me stand here, which makes me wonder what he’s really up to. “What do you want?” I ask.
“I want that Suit out of town.”
Is he hiring me? I blink. “Why?”
“Because he’s trying to turn this place into a metropolis.”
“How so?”
“Put up a monstrosity of a housing development not two miles from here.”
