“Yeah, that’s not going to help you.” Drew shook her head.
“What if I could offer you another bounty? Someone who’s worth far more than I am. Would you let me go then?”
“Probably not, but maybe.” When he smiled excitedly, Drew arched a brow. “Maybe.”
There was no way she was going to let him go. Absolutely not. Although his bail bond wasn’t worth much, and she felt sorry for him. He was such a disaster, and he didn’t have to be. She’d turn him in—and hopefully help him get out of this mess, or at least point him in the right direction. She wasn’t here to save the world, but this guy… he wasn’t a bad guy, just gullible. No one should have to do jail time for that.
She signed. “So, what’s this bounty? Who is it? What did they do?”
Dunlop struggled to get to his feet. His color had returned, and he looked much better. “See, my cousin—Octavio Rodríguez—he wants this guy found.”
Drew froze. “I’m sorry. Your cousin is Octavio Rodríguez? As in the Octavio Rodríguez who runs organized crime in Miami?”
“Yeah. He’s my cousin.”
“Octavio Rodríguez is your cousin?” Dunlop looked a lot of things, but he didn’t look remotely Cuban.
“Yeah, yeah. My mother and his father are brother and sister, or half-brother and sister. So, I’m sort of his half-cousin. And I didn’t get the Cuban looks, but yeah, we’re cousins.”
Okay. Of all the things, she certainly didn’t expect Dunlop to be Octavio Rodríguez’s cousin. Her stomach tightened. This wasn’t good. She should just walk away right now. Wash her hands of the whole situation. “All right. So, what exactly? Octavio wants this guy—could you be a little more specific?” Why was she even considering this cockamamie idea?
“Yeah, I’m getting to it. Apparently, Octavio’s girlfriend left him, and this guy helped her. O is righteously pissed. No one leaves him. She is in serious trouble. He wants to find her, and he wants the guy because he says if he finds the guy, he’ll find her. And because the guy made O look bad, O wants him found.Really, O wants him dead, but he’ll pay big bucks for him. Bigger money if O gets to kill him personally. You could negotiate more, I’m sure of it.”
“Oh, yeah. I’m not getting involved in this.” Drew shook her head. “No. No way.” This was nothing but bad news. She needed to get out of there. She did not want her name associated with Dunlop in any way. Any way she looked it this, it was just a steaming pile of shit she needed to back away from.
“But it’s worth two hundred fifty thousand?”
“Dollars?” The word slipped out of her lips.
“That’s what O is willing to pay. That’s what he told the guy. He’s told everybody—that’s what he’s willing to pay, but the creepy guy was all about it.”
“Two hundred fifty thousand to find this guy?” She frowned. “Who’s the creepy guy?”
“I think his name was Weasel.”
Her stomach knotted. “Herman Wessel.”
“Yeah. Him. He’s super creepy.” Dunlop shuddered with a grimace.
Dunlop was not wrong. Wessel was a thin, bald, older man with dark, dead eyes and bad teeth. She’d come across him a few times when the guys she’d been hunting had been particularly bad or involved with the mob in some way. If Rodriguez was hiring the Weasel, then he meant serious business, and whoever he was after was a dead man walking. Drew shook her head. “I think Octavio’s girlfriend did the smart thing. Not gonna help anyone find her.”
“Yeah, I get that,” Dunlop said. “And I agree. But you only have to find him, not her, and the two hundred and fifty K would be yours.”
“Yeah, I’m not gonna find some guy who helped her either. No good is going to come of this.”
“But Morgan is worth two hundred fifty thousand dollars.”
Drew froze. She couldn’t draw a breath for a full minute.
“Are you okay?” Dunlop asked. “You don’t look so good.”
“Morgan?” Her voice croaked out as a whisper. “Cross Morgan?”
“Yeah, that’s the guy. O wants him real bad. I don’t envy that guy. Not at all.”
Drew struggled to draw a breath. Cross Morgan had shattered her heart into a million pieces, and now one of the coldest killers she knew was out for his blood. Her world had just spun on its axis, and she knew there was no going back.
CHAPTER 2
