The three men looked at me. Jack grimaced. “Is that enough to draw any conclusions, though? I wish we had more. Just when we were making headway, they go quiet. Not a single tag this week, so we can’t catch them. Using you as bait only brought out the town crazies.”
Gideon agreed with a grunt. “Connor said it seems like they know our blind spots.”
I looked from one brother to the other to the other to the other, waiting for one of them to state the obvious. When they didn’t, I had to: “Maybe they do.”
Three sets of blue eyes turned to stare at me.
I clarified: “Maybe they know your blind spots.”
“Our systems are secure,” Knox growled like I’d personally insulted his life’s work. And hey, maybe I had.
I nodded. “Right. But what if Mr. Titty is one of your people?”
GIDEON
My ears were ringing, and it took me a second to understand what Sadie was saying.
Then the realization hit me like a sack of bricks.
There was a traitor in our midst.
TWENTY-FOUR
SADIE
My words were met with deathly silence…followed by chaos. The three brothers exploded into action, arguing with each other in half-sentences that only made sense to them.
“If one of our guys has been threatening Sadie, there isn’t a place on this godforsaken earth they can go where I won’t find them,” Gideon finally snarled, silencing the other two.
Jack and Knox exchanged a loaded look. Jack obviously was used to playing peacekeeper, because he lifted his arms in a placating gesture. “Let’s take this one step at a time.”
Gideon vibrated like there was excess tension tightening his body. I stepped up to him and put a hand on his chest. When he met my gaze, his eyes were dark. “I mean it,” he said. “Whoever is threatening you won’t be able to hide from me.”
A tendril of pleasure snaked through me. I’d never had anyone care about me so much. Not to the point that they’d blow up their own business to protect me.
I didn’t want him to make any rash decisions, though. It waslike him giving me the space and time (and snacks) to sew cushion covers with old scraps while I reacquainted myself with sewing; I knew he cared about Marswood Security, and he cared about his employees. I wanted to help him keep everything he loved while figuring out if anything needed to be scrapped. If there was a rat.
“I don’t think Mr. Titty is the person or people who have been threatening me,” I said, keeping my voice calm.
“You have no evidence of that,” Gideon fired back.
“It makes no sense. If it was the same person, why would they keep drawing boobs around town when I got here? Why not escalate further right away? If the goal is to get me away and to stop the arranged marriage scheme, why not move to a bigger target? Why not go after you or your brothers or your grandmother?”
His eyes narrowed. He kept an arm wrapped protectively around my waist, but his gaze shifted to his brothers.
“It’s a fair point,” Jack said, and Knox grunted in agreement.
“The tags stopped after I got the footage from Cash. Mr. Titty knew we had more footage of them, and they got spooked. So, the way I see it, there are two problems here. One, someone in your inner circle is either selling information to Mr. Titty, or one of your employees moonlights as a breast connoisseur.”
“This is not a time for fucking jokes, Sadie,” Gideon growled.
I ignored him. “The way to solve this problem is to look at everything you know about Mr. Titty through the lens of a very short suspect list which includes everyone who works for your organization.”
The three brothers watched me. Looked at each other.
I took a deep breath. “Once you’ve done that, you can determine whether or not that person has been threatening me. If they have been, we go from there. If they haven’t, we start at square one. There are only so many people in this town. It can’t be that hard to find out who’s doing this.”
The temperature in the room dropped a few degrees. Gideon stared at me, then lifted his gaze to his brothers.
