Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4) - Lauren Blakely Page 0,16

real reason to get out of town without his dad knowing he’s been giving key details to the detectives. He’s looking to go to school in Florida.”

“Smart kid. And that’s where we come in,” Michael said. “We need to pay for his school, his new home, and make sure he’s got round-the-clock security for a while, even if he’s clear on the other side of the country.”

“Absolutely,” Ryan quickly agreed.

“No question about it.” Colin nodded.

Michael pointed at Colin. “You see him the most. You let him know we got his back on this, all right? He’s our brother, and we’ll take care of him. Without him, we might not have a chance at taking down the other men who killed our father. I want them all behind bars. Every last one of them.”

One man—the gunman—was already in prison and had been for eighteen years. So was their mother, who’d plotted the murder. Now, Kenny Nelson was likely on his way to the big house, but Michael wouldn’t rest until T.J. Nelson, the alleged mastermind of the gunman’s hits, joined him there, along with the head of the gang. Michael had a hunch that Luke had been pulling the strings all along, hiding behind his harmless piano-teacher persona as he operated a gang of thieves, thugs, and murderers. The brothers were sure he was part of it, and that was why Michael had hired the private detective, with Mindy’s help, to conduct his own recon, do his part to push things along.

“I’ve got to hit the road. Lots to do in the office,” Michael said, then turned to Ryan. “I’m taking the afternoon off.”

Ryan stopped in his tracks. “Whoa. You never take off. You prepping for your New York trip?”

Michael was slated to meet with some clients in Manhattan at the end of the week. “Nope. Just a meeting locally.”

“With who?” Ryan asked, and the question was perfectly reasonable because he and Ryan ran Sloan Protection Resources together.

Michael didn’t answer. He didn’t like lying, but he didn’t want to get into the details. He reached for his door handle, trying to ignore the question.

“Wait.” Colin’s hand came down on his shoulder. “You’re seeing her.”

He spun around. “What?”

Colin wagged his finger and grinned like he’d caught Michael red-handed. “Yep. I knew it. You told me she wrote to you, and I fucking knew you were going to see her.”

Michael shrugged, trying to make light of it. “Big deal. So I saw her.”

“And now you’re playing hooky to see her again,” Ryan teased, wiggling his eyebrows.

Michael waved him off. “Not playing hooky. I’ll be working late tonight.”

“Or working late on Annalise,” Ryan called out as Michael shut the door.

Michael flipped him the bird, and his brothers laughed. There wasn’t much that got past them. They knew how over the moon he’d been for Annalise back in high school. Hell, they knew her. Everyone knew her—his grandma, his sister, even his father.

His father had thought she was perfect for him.

Michael flashed back to the note in his wallet. The one he kept with him at all times. His father’s last written words to him were about Annalise. As he peeled away from the hills and drove back to his home on the Strip, he replayed the thirty-six hours before his father had been killed. The breakfast with his father the day before was a blur; the next morning with Annalise at the airport as he said good-bye was a smudge in his memory, too.

The one starkly clear event had happened after midnight.

A snapshot blazed before his eyes. He swallowed hard, jammed the brakes, and pulled over to the side of the road.

The image was too powerful to drive through.

He’d been in his bed, trying to sleep. He’d bolted upright, remembering he’d left something in the car that day. He’d barely been sleeping anyway. He got out of bed, padded to the front door, and unlocked it. His father’s car was in the driveway. He’d been driving the limo that night, taking some teens to the prom, and after returning the limo to work, he drove his own car home.

Michael headed for the car door then nearly tripped.

On his father.

His veins ran cold with fear, then denial, then a soul-ripping agony as he fell to his knees, grabbing, holding, clutching the lifeless body in the driveway. Soaked in blood. Heart no longer beating. Wallet open, ID and photos spilled everywhere along with, he’d learn later, a note his father had likely written to him earlier