The reminder of her ex-boss is an unwelcome dose of reality. And just like each time I hear his name, I have to work to tamp down the burst of anger that comes with it. I have to remind myself that showing up at Ken fucking Donaldson’s apartment in Portland to beat the shit out of him might make me feel better in the short term, but it won’t solve the issue of the videos and would probably result in me getting sent to jail for assault.
Although… I bet with a littlecreative interrogation, I could convince him to leave Noelle alone. I could search his apartment and take all his devices to bring back to Tyler, who I’m sure could find those damned videos. I could make sure the evidence gets to the police, so that asshole goes to jail for what he did to Noelle.
Would it be legal? No.
Do I care? Not really. Not when the memories of Noelle crying in the employee bathroom at Doug’s Diner are still so fresh. Not when I know the extent of the harassment she’s been through. Not when I think about how that piece of garbage broke into her apartment to mess with her.
Except according to the police report, there was no proof of an intruder. No sign of the lock being tampered with, no windows pried open—nothing. But our best guess is Donaldson took Noelle’s key from her office while she was busy working in another part of the theater, made a copy, and then he could just waltz right into her apartment whenever he wanted.
That makes me even more furious when I think about it. Donaldson sneaking into Noelle’s apartment, looking at her things, fuck, he could have gone in there at night and watched her as she slept…
Shit. Now I want to beat the shit out of him more than ever.
That’s why Indy’s headed to Portland right now, so he can search Noelle’s apartment. Because we’re worried he might not have stopped at cameras just in the theater. If he had access to her apartment, what’s to stop him from planting some there, as well?
“Webb?”
Slamming the door shut on an all too satisfying image of my fist crashing into Donaldson’s smug face—I’ve seen photos of him, and his facedefinitelymeets the definition of punchable—I turn my attention back to Noelle. “Yes?”
“Are you alright?”
“Yes, of course. Why?”
“Well.” Noelle pauses. “You look upset. And your hand—” She pulls her hand away from mine and flexes it. “You were holding on a little tight.”
Remorse slams into me with breath-stealing intensity. “Shit, Noelle.” I lift her hand to inspect it, cradling it as I search for any sign of injury. “I’m so sorry. Did I hurt you?”
“No, I’m fine.” She touches my cheek. “I could just feel you getting tense, is all.”
I lead her over to the blanket and pull her down onto my lap. Then I peer at her hand again, my stomach plummeting as I spot a tiny red mark on one knuckle. I lightly graze my thumb across it. “DidIdo this to you?”
“Webb, I’m really okay,” she replies. “And no. That was from earlier. While I was getting ready, I whacked my hand on the dresser. It’s nothing.”
I glare at the reddening bruise. “Did you put ice on it?”
“No, I didn’t. And I’m not going to.” As I start to argue, Noelle cuts me off, smiling as she says, “I bump into things sometimes, Webb. And I get bruises. It happens. I’m okay. And you didn’t hurt me. I promise.”
“Still.” I bring her injured knuckle to my lips and kiss it gently. “I don’t like it when you’re hurt. And ifIever hurt you...”
“You didn’t.” Noelle places her hand on my face. Her skin is soft and cool and smells faintly of vanilla. “But are you okay? Really? If tonight’s not a good time, we can?—”
“Of course it’s a good time. I set all this up for you so we could have a nice date.”
“But if you have work to do,” she protests. “Since I’ve been here, you’ve been spending so much time with me. Which I love, but I don’t want to keep you from your work responsibilities, either.”
My heart jolts at the wordloveagain.
“You’re not keeping me from anything,” I tell her. “I still do my training in the morning. And I’ve been keeping up with orders and paperwork on my laptop. I wasn’t scheduled for any out of town jobs, so that’s not an issue.”
And since I wanted to stick close to Noelle in case she needs me, my friends volunteered to take on the surveillance part of her case. Indy’s going to Noelle’s apartment, Ace is tailing Donaldson, and Tyler already hacked into the security system at Donaldson’s apartment building to keep an eye on his activity.
So far we haven’t found anything solid, but like Rafe reminded me, it’s still early days. But still, I wish we’d found something to go on. Tracing the burner phones hasn’t turned up anything helpful, since all the calls have originated from crowded areas of Portland where it would be impossible to tie them to Noelle’s former boss. And the phones were purchased with cash, so we can’t see who bought them.
Tyler’s been looking into the TVs at the diner, but that’s come up empty as well. Apparently, whoever hacked into them—asshole Ken Donaldson, I’m sure—used a program to remotely access the Wi-Fi, then just swapped out the regular programming for a video of Noelle.
“I’m still trying to trace the signal,” Tyler explained during a brief update yesterday, “but this guy is better with computers than I’d hoped. I’ll find something. It may just take a little more time.”
“He’s a sixty-two-year-old artistic director of a theater,” I grumbled in response. “How does he know about remotely accessing a Wi-Fi signal and burner phones?”
