need the information. We need it.”
“First of all, stop using my hormones against me. I’m fine.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. But I can be recording the call as well. Then we can share it with the guys later.”
“It’ll have to be during the day, while Talon and the boys are gone.”
“Right, which means next week.”
She sighed. “All right. Set it up, Marj. Tell him to come here.”
“Done.”
“I just wish we could all live in peace now, you know?”
“I hear you,” I said. “Totally. But something’s still going on, and we need to get every ounce of information we can.” I pressed Colin’s name on my phone.
He didn’t answer.
Chapter Eleven
Bryce
My heart dropped into my gut. Had I heard Joe correctly? “Excuse me? You’ve been holding out on me?”
“Of course not. We’re in this together.”
“Then what the hell are you talking about?”
“New information.” He looked away for a moment, seeming to focus on a spot above the bar. Then he turned to me, his eyes troubled. “I got a call today.”
“From who?”
“I don’t know. It was a number I didn’t recognize.”
“And…?”
“It was a guy. He didn’t say his name. He just said, ‘I’m watching.’”
Chills skittered down the center of my back. I took a sip of my bourbon, letting its fire dig spikes into my throat. Seemed almost like a premonition.
“Did you have the call traced?”
“No.”
“Stupid question.” Of course he hadn’t. This was between the two of us. No one else knew about Justin. No one we knew of, anyway.
“I did some research on my own with the number. I found nothing.”
“How about we give it to the Spider?”
“Yeah, I will. I’ll send it through the account I set up.” He downed the rest of his bourbon and set the glass back on the wooden bar with a clomp. “I don’t scare easily, Bryce, but I’ll tell you. That phone call freaked me out.”
“It’s freaking me out too.” I finished my own drink and set the glass down.
Len raised his eyebrow at me, but I shook my head. I was done with alcohol for the evening. Maybe for a while. From here on, I needed to keep a clear head.
“Do you think it might’ve been Morse?” I asked.
“Didn’t sound like him, and whoever it was didn’t sound like he was disguising his voice in any way.”
“He could have had someone else make the call. What area code was it from?”
“Somewhere in Iowa.”
I lifted my brow. “Iowa? Why does that sound familiar?”
“Remember when Jade first met Mathias?”
“Yeah. He was dating her mother.”
“He was posing as a guy named Nico Kostas, who was supposedly a state senator from Iowa. That’s the only connection I can think of.”
“Seems pretty farfetched. As I recall, he was not a state senator from Iowa.”
“No, he wasn’t. It was one of his many aliases.”
“He’s also dead.”
“True enough.”
“So I’m thinking this doesn’t have anything to do with a fake name and the profession of a dead man.”
“I don’t know, Bryce. I can give this to the Spider, and I will, but he’s a hacker. He isn’t a PI.”
“Fuck. We need a PI, don’t we?”
“We do, and I know the best PIs in the business.”
“Mills and Johnson.” I looked at my feet hanging below the rung on the barstool. “But that means…”
“We have to tell them. Everything.”
I woke up the next morning with a nasty stiff neck. Saturday dawned with the sun’s rays streaming into the master suite at the guesthouse, but all I could think about was the pain in my neck—both literal and figurative.
Joe and I hadn’t made a decision yet to involve Mills and Johnson in our dilemma. Neither of us was quite ready to tell them. They were the best, according to Joe, but they were also mercenaries. If someone offered them more than we did for any information on us, they’d probably bite.
So maybe we needed to find another PI—one who couldn’t be bought.
The only problem was, as Joe had told me last night, everyone had his price. Everyone except his sister-in-law, Ruby Lee Steel.
But if we told Ruby…
So that was out of the question.
I had no idea where to even begin to look for a good PI, so Joe had taken that responsibility. My plan, for the time being, was to keep tabs on Ted Morse. Stay in the loop that way.
I walked out to the kitchen where Mom was feeding Henry.
“Da-da,” he said happily.
I smiled. This little guy could always get a smile out of me, even when I was feeling like complete and total