Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4) - Lauren Blakely Page 0,102
catch some bigger fish.”
“What sort of fish?” he asked skeptically.
“Let’s just say I’m looking into organized crime in Las Vegas. And I would really like to find out if your guns are tied to something a helluva lot bigger.”
“I don’t know, Ms. Reiss. I guess I should think about it.”
She pointed at him playfully and shot him a knowing grin. “Well, you think about it Mr. Foxton. And keep in mind, you’d be doing the city a huge service. Because the more we talk, and the more you share, the better chance I have of putting away the men who are really making Vegas a nasty place. So how about a deal? I keep you out of prison, and you become my informant?”
The only thing he’d ever done was skirt the law. He’d never hurt anyone. Never killed anyone. All he’d wanted was to make a few extra bucks to provide for his family.
He loved his wife, loved his kids, loved his freedom more than anything.
There was really one choice.
* * *
Present day
Goddamn cell phone towers.
As John peeled out of the garage of the federal building, he tapped his fingers on the steering wheel, stealing glances at his phone as he waited impatiently for the signal to return.
“C’mon, c’mon,” he muttered as the wheels met the road, heading toward Michael Sloan’s home.
Soon the bars returned, and the second they did he dialed Michael’s number again. He had to warn the guy. Michael’s White Box client had set him up. John was sure of it now. He’d had an inkling this morning that something didn’t add up, but there was no way to know the specifics before Reiss called.
John’s investigation into the murder of Thomas Paige and the fed’s investigation into organized crime had moved on two separate tracks for the last few months. Over the summer, the murder case had been reopened, thanks to the tip-off John received from Jerry Stefano’s ex-girlfriend about other men being involved. Meanwhile, as he’d just learned, Sanders Foxton had been arrested for speeding four months ago, and in return for not going to jail, he’d started sharing all he knew about the operations at what had turned out to be a very shady company.
The same company where Thomas Paige had worked years ago.
A company that had been washed so clean, it raised no flags in the murder, and showed no ties to White Box in the present day, either. There was no paper trail at all to link the drugs and guns to the limo service—or the murder, of course—but it turned out Sanders had overheard a few conversations in his runs, and those clues had been enough for Reiss to tie Charlie, Curtis, and White Box back to West Limo.
Charlie knew how to operate like smoke, hiding his tracks, never leaving a trail. But at least there was evidence now to bring them in.
As he turned a corner, John tried Michael once more. The phone rang and rang and rang.
He kept dialing, but with each non-answer, John’s senses told him something was dead wrong.
His suspicions were confirmed when a crackle came over the radio. Paramedics were hauling ass to the same building that he was. Words like multiple gunshot wounds and critical pierced his ears.
Oh God. He was too late.
When he arrived, an ambulance was racing away, sirens blaring, speeding faster than he swore he’d ever seen one go.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Colin burst through the doors of the emergency room, his pulse hammering in his throat as he raced to the information desk, Elle by his side. The past and the present slammed into him in punishing jolts with each football—memories of his father’s murder mixed cruelly with this. His oldest brother, the one who’d looked out for him, helped him stay sober when he first got clean, helped raise him…Michael had been shot in the chest and rushed to the hospital. They had no clue what his condition was, or if he was even alive.
Colin choked back that horrific thought as he stopped short at the desk, words tumbling out in a traffic jam. “Michael Sloan. He was just brought in. I’m his brother. How is he?”
The brunette in pink scrubs and wireframe glasses looked up and nodded. “Give me just a minute.”
He turned to Elle, taking deep, sharp breaths, but they barely seemed enough to fill his mouth, let alone his lungs. “Elle,” he said in a whisper. He couldn’t say anything else. If he did, he would break.