Secure Location - By Beverly Long Page 0,23
in town and he’d had plenty of time to prepare for a visit from him or the cops.
“Whatever you’re selling, I’m not buying,” Hawkins said and tried to swing the door shut.
Cruz put his foot out, stopping the momentum. “You used to work at the BJM Hotel.”
The man glared at him. “I can’t imagine what business that is of yours,” he said. Hawkins was trying for tough but it wasn’t working. He’d flinched when Cruz had said the hotel’s name.
Cruz leaned forward, getting in Hawkins’s face. He wasn’t conducting an investigation. He didn’t need to hold his cards close. Myers would kick his ass if he found out about the visit. The detective’s primary motivation would be to gather enough evidence to prosecute someone for the crimes that had been committed; Cruz’s interest was more personal—he simply wanted it to stop before it got more violent and Meg got hurt.
“Oh, it’s definitely my business,” he said, his voice low. “I care about Meg Montoya. And if I was to find out that you had any intent of causing her even a minute of distress, I would be pissed off. Got that? Really pissed off. Then I become your worst nightmare.”
Hawkins’s hand, the one holding the potato chip bag, was shaking. The plastic crinkled. “I gave BJM eight years of my life. They paid me lousy and wasted my talent. I’ve got a master’s degree in accounting and I was paying monthly invoices and processing payroll. A high school graduate could have done it. They owed me.”
“Not my issue,” Cruz said. “Meg Montoya is my concern.”
“I’ve got nothing against her. Her boss, that’s another story. He’s a jerk. Said he was doing me a favor by not pressing charges. I’m about to lose my house and I can’t find another job, not without a reference from the place I worked for eight years. I might be better off in jail.”
“Guys like you don’t do well in jail. You’re dessert after a big meal.” Cruz could tell that Hawkins got the drift by the look in the man’s eyes. He figured it wasn’t the first time he’d reflected upon what his life might be like in prison. That was undoubtedly why he was writing monthly checks to BJM.
Cruz leaned forward. “If I find out that you’re lying to me, I’m going to come back here and strangle you with one of your black socks. Do we have an understanding?”
“I just want to get on with my life,” Hawkins said. He moved to close the door and this time, Cruz let him.
He walked down the sidewalk back to his rental car. Hawkins was bitter and thoroughly convinced that he’d been screwed. That was enough to keep him on the short list of suspects. But even if he wouldn’t admit it, he had to know that he was lucky that BJM hadn’t pressed charges. Would he be stupid enough to do something else that could land him in jail?
Cruz didn’t know. But he thought he’d gotten his point across. Now he needed to keep working his list of suspects.
He used the GPS in his car and realized that Troy Blakely’s apartment was within fifteen minutes of Hawkins’s house. When he got there, he quickly realized that finding this guy might not be quite so easy.
None of the inhabitants at the rat hole of a building in downtown San Antonio had ever heard of Troy Blakely. It took Cruz another two hours to track down the landlord who confirmed that he’d never rented to anyone by that name.
Which meant that he’d falsified his address on his employment paperwork. There was no good reason to do that.
Chapter Six
He called Meg. The phone was picked up on the second ring. “Meg Montoya’s office. Charlotte speaking.”
“This is Cruz Montoya. May I speak to Meg?”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Montoya. Meg is in a meeting. Can I help you with something?”
He debated asking Charlotte for the information but didn’t want to tip his hand to anybody. Who knew if there was any connection between Charlotte and Blakely? Even though Blakely hadn’t worked there long, security personnel did interact with administrative staff on a pretty routine basis. It was likely their paths had crossed. Plus there was something about Charlotte, something that hadn’t seemed quite right this morning. She was nice enough but when he’d mentioned that Slater had assigned a security officer, there had been a strange look in her eyes. It was logical that she was freaked out about the