If I didn’t know any better, I’d say they’re stalking me.
And if I didn’t know any better, I’d say the guy in the car looked an awful lot like Maverick.
Is that even possible?I rack my brain. The last time I saw him, he was lying in a pool of his own blood. Even if he survived, he can’t have bounced back this quick.
Can he?
Before I can lose my mind, I close the blinds and go to bed.
6
RANSOME
“I found her.”
Maverick’s words come through the phone. I shove away from the breakfast table so I can take the conversation into my office.
Jenica doesn’t even look up from her phone or her fruit salad. It’s ridiculous. The woman we hired makes a full gourmet breakfast every goddamn morning, but Jenica doesn’t touch anything but a half a grapefruit sprinkled with fake sugar and exactly five cubes of assorted melon.
But that doesn’t matter right now. Nothing on the entire planet matters to me more than the conversation on the other end of the line.
I don’t speak until my door is closed.
“When? Where? Jesus Christ, Mav, it’s been almost a week. Was she not in the pinned location?” I demand. I’m pacing the floor hard enough to wear a trench in the wood paneling.
“Oh, no, she’s here. Her and her brother and sisters. Who knew Manhattan, Montana was a real place?”
“Tell me where she lives.”
Not that I care. It’s more than I know she’s been checking in on me and I need to make sure she’s not fucking with things that don’t concern her. There’s too much going on for her to get involved again.
“They have a little house on the outskirts of town. Kind of run down, but not like her last place. More like it was built a hundred years ago. Even has a tire swing out front.”
“I don’t give a fuck about tire swings. What was she doing when you found her?”
“Grocery shopping. Working the front desk at a dentist’s office. Going for long walks around the town park. Getting out of the tub…”
“You better be fucking kidding right now,” I growl.
“Hey, you told me to get eyes on the girl,” he says defensively. “It’s not my fault she doesn’t pull the curtains before walking around the house in a towel.”
I choose to ignore that, but only because climbing through the phone line isn’t an option. I also make a mental note to left hook him in his bad shoulder when he gets back.
“She’s working at a dentist’s office?”
My mind immediately goes to how bad the pay must be. It hurts. Not because I care—I don’t—but because her qualifications are wasted there. I’d give anything to find someone half as competent as her right now. But that’s beside the point.
“Do you have any more information on her?” I press. “Something that could actually be helpful?”
“I just flew across the motherfucking country, rented a car, drove all the way from Missoula to bum fucking Little Egypt and followed her around town for the better part of two weeks,” he rattles off. “I know where she lives, where she works, where all her siblings are. I think I deserve a ‘good job, brother.’ Or at the least a half-hearted ‘thank you.’”
“I’ll thank you when I have information that explains to me why she hacked into our system six months after the fact,” I bark out. I’m making no point of lowering my voice, but considering I can hear Jenica watching the Kardashians on the big screen, I doubt she’s listening to anything I’m saying.
“Again, no credit where credit is due,” he sighs dramatically.
I mentally kick the shit out of myself for not sending Baron instead. I only sent Maverick because he’s been stir-crazy since he got out of the hospital. I figured going on a side quest might do him good. I should have realized no good deed goes unpunished.
“You haven’t shut up long enough for me to tell you what else I found,” he adds.
