His lips twitch and I want to smack him in the mouth. By no means is any of this funny.
“It’s tellin’ me you’ve pissed someone off. Someone you arrested back when you were a detective. Someone you put away is the most likely scenario, or some disgruntled family member.”
“Great, that narrows it down to about twenty-five thousand people.”
I grip the wheel once again. “Aust, those letters were…”
“I know, disturbin’. It freaked me the fuck out.” He takes a beat. “A person we were lookin’ into was this Aaron Bolt guy.”
“Why is that name familiar?”
“He was one of the fake Cut City Boys.”
“Fake? Why was he fake?”
He waves it off. “That’s a story for another time, but he was inside that compound with you when you were undercover.”
“I remember,” I say. “He was a twisted son of a bitch.”
“He’s dead.”
“No doubt. Did you feed him to the alligators?”
Haze gives me areallylook. “Funny. Assumed he was killed in the shootout but as it turns out, he died in a house fire a year ago.”
“What does this have to do with any of this?”
“His dad was a serial killer.”
My eyes widen. “Who?”
“Nickname was Dead Bolt, from Baton Rouge, he terrorized people for the better part of the early two thousands, and died in prison a while back.”
“Dead Bolt? Wait, I remember reading about him.”
“Yeah, he stalked his victims and left creepy letters similar to the ones you were gettin’,” he says. “We didn’t wanna leave anythin’ to chance, so Star looked into it. She’s also findin’ out if there are any other livin’ relatives. If he had some fascination with you?—”
“As far as I know, he didn’t, we barely spoke,” I say. My time undercover wasn’t pleasant, but I had a job to do. Rescuing innocent people, like Audrina, as well as bringing down criminals is what I do, and that part of my life was pretty crazy. I can’t say I miss those days. “But it’s good to check all avenues.”
“You still mad?”
“Yes.”
“Well, good, but preserve that energy for what we have to do next, which is find this crazy bastard before anythin’ happens to you.”
“It’s weird, I have felt like someone has been watching me lately,” I say, then frown. “Don’t tell me… the fuckingprospects?”
“They were lookin’ out for you when I couldn’t be around,” he blurts. “Cash’s orders.”
“That’s right, because everyone gets a say in how I should be protected.”
“Stop poutin’ and be grateful so many people care about you.”
“I could smack you right now,” I tell him. “Seriously.”
“Like I said, sugar, save all of that energy. Without alertin’ Hally that we’re onto her, we need to figure out if she has anythin’ to do with it, or if she’s an innocent bystander.”
“I get that, and that was my next port of call, thanks for the reminder.” I reach for the handle, then I feel Haze’s hand on my arm.
