“Gil threw the grenades. I fired the weapon. Do you need to arrest me?”
“Are you kidding? You’ll probably get a medal. But give me that gun. I need to enter it into evidence.” She handed it over andMorris stomped off, muttering to no one in particular and practically growling at Luke, Faith, Tessa, and Zane as they rushed past him.
Gil stood and helped Ivy to her feet. “It’s over, Buttercup.”
OVERDIDN’T MEANwhat Ivy had always thought it meant. The immediate danger was over. The repercussions of that week never would be.
Ivy and Gil had given their statements. Sometime that morning, they’d fallen into beds at Luke’s house, and when Ivy woke, it was midafternoon. Voices downstairs pulled her fully into wakefulness. There were still so many questions that didn’t have answers, and she needed answers.
Before she’d made it down four stairs, Gil was at her side. “Are you okay? You should sleep more.”
“I’ll sleep tonight. I want to know what’s going on.”
Gil fixed her a cup of coffee—complete with hazelnut creamer, which she was too tired to ask about—then sat beside her at the kitchen counter and alternated between twirling her hair and tracing patterns on her back as she called her mom. She might never know for sure, but her mom insisted she’d known nothing about what Preston was doing and declared that if she didn’t kill Preston in the hospital, she would file for divorce due to irreconcilable differences. Ivy didn’t expect any judge in the land would quibble.
Tessa, Faith, Luke, and Zane were waiting in the den when she got off the phone. “You don’t have to go in there.” Gil looked ready to protect her from all enemies, foreign and domestic, but she had nothing to hide. Not from these people. It was crazy, given that she’d only known them for about a week, but she needed the support and encouragement.
She and Gil settled into an oversize chair in Luke’s den. It was a comfy space, and for the moment everyone was there.
“We’ve been talking,” Luke said from where he sat with Faith. “Our first order of business will be to replace all of Gil’s windows.”
Gil lifted his hands. “You were right. I should have replaced them a long time ago.”
“Let the record show that Gil has come to his senses.” Luke made eye contact with everyone in the room.
“I’m not sure I understand,” Ivy said. “Whyallthe windows?”
“Because.” Luke huffed out an exasperated and overdone sigh. “New windows are double-paned. That means they save a ton on energy bills. But, more important to the current situation, while you can shoot through them, it’s actually very hard tothrow a grenadethrough them.”
“Ah. That makes sense.” Ivy could see Luke’s point. She turned to Gil. “The air pocket between the glass means—”
“I know. I know.” Gil rolled his eyes. “Double-paned windows everywhere. First thing.”
Zane spoke up from where he paced behind the sofa. “Good. Now that we’ve settled that, let me bring you up to speed, then we have to get back to work.”
Everyone nodded. “Preston pulled through. He’s awake but not talking yet. Morris is itching to get a hold of him, but the doctors are adamant that no one can question him yet.”
“Tez is fine.” Tessa’s smile could illuminate a small town. “I talked to his parents, who, of course, are completely freaked out, but Tez is outside playing with his brother.”
Beside her, Ivy could almost see the worry leaving Gil’s body. He kissed the tip of her nose, apparently unconcerned with the presence of four other people.
“I talked to Abott this morning,” Luke said. “He’s a wreck.Worried about you, Ivy, and also worried that he might have given Preston the tools he needed for the attack. He knew Teague and saw him a few months ago. He said the guy had a serious gambling addiction and was in way over his head with the kind of people you don’t get in over your head with. Preston probably offered him a lot of money for his services. Leon Parish and Billy Rice both identified Oliver Teague as the person who hired them to kidnap Ivy. We still don’t know where the third guy who held you hostage is, but we have alerts sent to the local morgues.”
Luke’s expression said he thought the guy was long gone, and not in the trip-around-the-world sense. “Right now, the theory is that Preston left Teague in your bedroom in hopes that it would point a finger at Abott and buy him the time he needed to get the ransomware installed on your systems.”
Zane continued to pace behind the sofa. “We think he expected you to be at the ballpark, and he planned to grab you there. Forensics found three syringes at the house where Tez was located. We’re guessing he planned to drug you, get you to talk, and then leave you with no memory of what had happened. Taking a child probably wasn’t in the plan, but when you didn’t show at the ballpark, he adjusted on the fly.”
Faith tilted a bottle of Cherry Coke in Gil’s direction. “You almost got shot again last night. I’ve told you. I’m done with that. Now, stop it.”
Gil blew her a kiss. “Yes, ma’am.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, then shocked Ivy to her core when she jumped up, came straight at Gil, and threw her arms around him. “I mean it,” she said into his neck. “Don’t do that to me again.” Gil hugged her close and whispered something Ivy didn’t catch. Faith squeezed him tighter, then released him and turned the full force of her presence on Ivy.
“As for you, I don’t know if we should take your weapon away or hire you. You never, ever shoot blind. Never.” Ivy didn’t know how to respond to that, but Faith didn’t give her a chance. “Nice shooting. Tessa and I will take you to a range we like out in the country. We shoot scarecrows and bales of hay. It’s awesome.”
Ivy had no idea how to respond to that either, but there was no way she was going to disagree with Faith Malone when she was clearly fired up about a lot of things, including Gil getting almost shot. “That sounds great.”
Luke, Zane, and Gil all huffed and looked to the ceiling, then to each other.
