Deadly Coincidence (Brantley Walker Off the Books #4) - Nicole Edwards Page 0,75
goin’ on here.”
The way he said it had Brantley cutting a quick look over. “What’re you thinkin’?”
Reese shrugged one shoulder, continued to stare out the side window. “Without anything to go on, we can’t be sure Dante was the target. It makes sense that he was, yes. However…” Reese looked over. “What if JJ was the target and they used Dante to get to her?”
“Good question. The answer is we don’t know until we work it. And the first thing we have to do is find Dante. Regardless of the motive, Dante’s missin’. Findin’ him’ll give us the answers. We can take Tesha to JJ if you want. If you think she’ll be safer.”
“I thought you didn’t know where JJ was.”
“Technically, I don’t.”
“Technically?”
“They’re holed up at Baz’s father’s,” he told Reese, not wanting to reveal how he knew that. Probably wouldn’t go over well if Reese knew Brantley had a way of tracking all of them.
“Might be a good idea to keep her away from all this for a little while.”
Brantley agreed, but he said, “Just let me know what you decide. For now, I think our only priority is findin’ Dante.”
“How do you propose we do that without JJ?”
“I’ve got a secret weapon,” he admitted.
“Lemme guess. You called Luca?”
Brantley couldn’t hide his surprise. “You know Luca Switzer?”
“Who doesn’t know Luca?”
“Let me rephrase that,” Brantley stated. “How do you know Luca?”
“My sister was friends with Holly. When I came back, I ran into her. We got to talkin’.”
“Holly? Luca’s little sister?”
“Well, she’s all grown up now, but yeah. Why?”
“Small world,” Brantley mused.
“More like small town,” Reese said with a gruff laugh that didn’t quite hide his pain. “How do you know Luca?”
“He used to date my sister.”
“Which sister?”
“Bryn. Back in high school.” Brantley pulled into the driveway. “I guess it’s really true. Everyone knows everyone in Coyote Ridge.”
“I was thinkin’ more along the lines of half the people in Coyote Ridge have dated the other half.”
There was no arguing with that, and still Brantley refrained from asking Reese if he had dated Holly. He honestly didn’t want to know.
“Luca agreed to work with us?”
“He heard about the fire on the scanner. Answered on the first ring.”
When Brantley pulled the truck to a stop, they both got out, headed into the house.
Tesha was there to greet them, her tail wagging. Brantley had to admit, it was a relief to see her. He’d had a morose thought a short time ago, feared that if they were the target, someone might go after one of them. And a surefire way to hurt Reese was to hurt his dog.
And hurting Reese … well, that was a surefire way to have hell rain down on you.
Brantley wouldn’t have to worry about Travis going off half-cocked because he’d take them out without a second thought.
Chapter Seventeen
Juliet stared at the television, watching the breaking news about a house fire in Coyote Ridge, Texas.
Ever since she’d lost access to the live feed from Jessica James’s cameras, she’d had to resort to getting the information from the media. If she could’ve gotten a hold of good old Samuel, maybe she could get access to one of the neighbors’ cameras, but the bastard wasn’t answering his phone.
So here she was, on the edge of her seat, desperately waiting to hear what the body count was from the explosion that had rocked that stupid little town.
Honestly, she’d thought Dante’s kidnapping plan was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever fucking heard. But she considered herself an opportunist, which was why she’d come up with the idea of using Marcus for her own devious scheme. She would even take credit for coming up with the idea to put a bomb in the house, one that would wipe out any trace they’d been there at all. At least that was what she’d told Marcus. Her real plan had been to wipe Travis Walker from the face of the earth.
“Behind me you can see what remains of the house that exploded just a short time ago,” the field reporter announced.
Juliet held her breath, her hands wringing in her lap. “Let them all be dead,” she whispered harshly.
“Despite the obvious devastation, there is some good news.”
“No,” Juliet muttered. “No good news, dammit.”
“We’ve been told by the EMTs that no one was in the house when it exploded, and the injuries to those nearby were minimal.”
“No!” Juliet screamed, not caring if someone in the neighboring rooms might hear her.