After an hour, I’ve barely made a dent in the emails, mostly due to the fact that I can’t focus. All I can think about is Riley.
I lean back in the chair, drumming my fingers against the armrest, trying to understand what could be going on in her head.
She said she was going to help Ciara with something baby-related, but that was an hour ago, or maybe two. Either way, it’s been long enough that I’ve replayed our last conversation in my mind a dozen times, pulling it apart, looking for the truth underneath the words she threw at me.
Is she actually in there helping Ciara, or is she avoiding me?
My gut tells me it’s the latter.
Before I can spiral too far, my phone starts vibrating on the desk. The name flashing across the screen is the last contact I reached out to for information on Cormac, and I’m hoping he’ll finally have something concrete.
I swipe to answer and put the call on speaker. “Talk to me, Ash.”
“Wish I had better news.” His voice is gravelly from years of smoking cigarettes. “I asked around, but nobody’s seen him. Not even a whisper of a location.”
My jaw tightens. “Nothing?”
“Nothing. It’s like he vanished into thin air.”
No one just disappears. Someone is clearly covering for him, or at the very least, giving him money and a way to stay underground.
The only question is who?
“If you hear anything, you call me first.”
“Of course.”
I hang up the phone and curl my fingers around it, the urge to hurl it across the room almost overwhelming.
It’s been days of chasing threads that lead nowhere but dead ends every single time. And with each day that passes, Cormac inches further and further out of reach.
I push out a breath and drag a hand over my face.
Someone is helping him, that much I know in my gut. Nobody survives off the grid this long without backup. Maybe it’s family or maybe it’s some old contact with a grudge against us. Either way, we’ve got a traitor in our midst.
But it’s not just Cormac I’m worried about. I can’t shake the thought that while I’m wasting my time chasing my brother, Riley is pulling away from me.
She’s hiding something. It was written all over her face when she told me she was turning down the internship. What I can’t seem to figure out is why.
I shove the thought down and open up my documents folder to go through the files on Cormac once more.
There’s page after page of financial reports and surveillance notes, but none of it gives any clues to where he might be hiding.
There has to be something we’ve missed. Nobody slips away without leaving a trace. I know Cormac has left one. I just haven’t found it yet.
My search for answers is short-lived when Ronan storms into his office twenty minutes later, wearing a grim expression on his face.
I swear, I can’t remember the last time my brother genuinely smiled other than when he’s in Ciara’s presence.
I thought putting me in charge was meant to take the weight off his shoulders, but from the shadows under his eyes, it seems to have done the opposite.
I know before he opens his mouth that whatever he’s about to say is bad news, because that’s all I seem to hear lately.
“What?” I demand.
“I just got word from a source that Sean’s planning another attack.”
My stomach drops. “When?”
