stared at him.
Rocket spoke first. “So that’s how it is.”
“What? That’s not how anything is. I met her, I spent a lot of time with her, I checked her out. She’s all good.”
“Okay. Fine.” Viper held up his hands. “Back to Dane Hollister. Our dead man. They killed him for something, and being the poster child for good behavior isn’t it.”
Rocket took a bite of sandwich, chewed and swallowed, a thoughtful expression on his face. “What if it isn’t him?” he drawled in his slow voice. “What if it has to do with someone or something at the law firm that he happened on by accident?”
“We need to dig as deep into as we can go,” Blaze agreed. “Lawyers are very good at hiding things.”
“I’ll do it,” Eagle told him.
Rocket leaned back in his chair. “We need to look into the sister. It’s possible Peyton West has no idea what her sister’s been doing from the time she left for college until now. All she saw was what they let her see on her visits.”
“She’s not dumb.” Blaze ground his teeth. He didn’t want to think that Brianne Hollister might have been able to pull the wool over her sister’s eyes.
“I didn’t say that,” Rocket told him. “But sometimes we only see what we want to see. At least let me make sure that’s a dead end. Let me get out my virtual shovel and start digging.”
The other three divided up the rest of the chores and set up to work.
“One thing before we get started,” Blaze told them. “Once we get this information, we’re going to need to interact with these people in person, somehow, some way. You can only find out so much from reading. We’ve done it before, gone into someone else’s territory. We just have to figure out who’s going to do what.”
Viper nodded. “Agreed.”
“I want to bring up one more thing.” Blaze shifted in his chair. “Our client needs protection. She’s been pushing the buttons of people who’ve shown they’ll do whatever it takes to keep their secrets. If I’m satisfied with what she shows me at the range, I’ll see that she’s armed, but I’d rather have eyes on her, and her sister.”
Rocket nodded. “I agree. If Peyton West isn’t with her sister at any time, it means Brianne Hollister is a sitting target. The hospital security can only do so much.”
“We don’t just want to stick an armed guard at the door. For one thing, the hospital might give us a hard time, and for another, I’d really like to draw out whoever might be looking to kill her.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“Oh, wait.” Viper snapped his fingers. “We did that job for the head of internal medicine at the hospital. Last year, remember? He was so grateful he said if we ever needed anything, to let him know. How about if I go see him and find out what kind of arrangement we can work out?”
Blaze nodded. “Sounds good. Thanks.”
Viper wandered into the living room with his cell phone, away from the conversation.
Blaze woke up his laptop. “We need to figure out who’s pulling the strings here. Much as I hate the idea, someone has paid off a lot of people. Cops. Emergency techs. Employees at the restaurant. That has to be the answer, but we also know that’s not easy to do. It has to be someone with enough power to scare the shit out of them if they even think about changing their stories.”
“Shit, Blaze.” Viper ran his fingers through his hair. “That could be anyone. Why don’t we just pull up the whole damn phone book?”
“I hear you, but I don’t think it’s that big a problem. What people with power was Dane closest to? The managing partner of his law firm. Then there are the guy’s friends. His connections. Someone who owes him a favor that he could call in. It takes a lot of money and power to scrub a scene like that.”
“Okay.” Eagle stretched his hands and cracked his knuckles. “I’ll start with that guy. See every place his name has popped up and with who.”
“He has a son with the firm,” Rocket added. “Maybe he’s at the bottom of this. I’ll dig into him as soon as I finish with the sister.”
Viper came back into the room, shoving his phone in his pocket. “I spoke to Dr. Hendry. He has some ideas how we can work the security thing. Meanwhile he’s having hospital security