who this is?”
Jerri nodded. “That’s Ken Reed. He’s one of our senior investment advisors. Or at least he was until he decided to take a diner full of people hostage and kill himself. Of all the brokers who work here, he was the nicest by far.” She shook her head. “We’re all still in shock. I have no idea what made him snap like that.”
Bree stared at the photos, her head spinning. The investment broker she was looking for was the same guy who’d held her and Brandon at gunpoint the other day? What were the odds of that?
Her gaze went from the picture of him in a suit and tie to one beside it where he was dressed more casually. His hair was longer in the second photo and he had a mustache. She leaned down to take a closer look at it, abruptly realizing she recognized him.
Ken Reed had worked with Dave six years ago. In fact, he’d tried to drag her ex off the man Dave had beaten to death. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t recognized him at the diner. Then again, she’d pretty much blocked everything out from that night.
Next to that photo was another. In it, Dave and Ken were standing side by side, arms draped over each other’s shoulders like they were the best of buds. What the…?
“Are you okay?” Jerri asked. “You look like you saw a ghost.”
Bree straightened up. “Were Ken and Dave friends?”
“Yeah. Ken got Dave an interview with the senior partners.”
The idea of Ken helping Dave get a job was ludicrous after what had happened at their previous place of employment. But Dave could be very manipulative, so anything was possible.
Bree looked at the photos again, focusing on why she was at Garrett, Wallace, and Banks in the first place. And it wasn’t to figure out why Ken and Dave had been so chummy. Ken had been the investment advisor for four people who’d been robbed, and then he’d ended up dead under the most bizarre of circumstances. Had he been involved in the robberies, then become so racked with guilt that he’d gone into that diner intending to commit suicide? But that didn’t make sense. If he regretted stealing that stuff, wouldn’t he have mentioned it while he’d been ranting and raving like a madman?
She was still trying to wrap her head around it when saw someone approach them out of the corner of her eye. She turned, cursing silently when she saw Dave standing there.
“Bree,” he said, giving her a smile. “What a nice surprise! I was just thinking about you. Let’s go into my office where we can talk.”
Taking her arm, he quickly hustled her the half-dozen feet to his office before she could pull away, closing the door behind them.
“Since you’re here, I guess that means you reconsidered my offer to have lunch.” He walked around his sleek, modern desk to pick up the phone. “Let me have my assistant reschedule my afternoon meetings. I’ll just be a minute.”
Bree fought the urge to roll her eyes. She’d come to the conclusion a long time ago that her ex was dense, but this attitude of his took the cake.
“I’m not here for lunch,” she snapped.
Dave’s eyes narrowed. “Then why are you here?”
It took her a second to come up with an excuse, but when it popped into her head, it wasn’t actually an excuse at all. “I’m here to tell you to stay away from Brandon. And before you deny it, I know for a fact you showed up at the apartment to harass him. Brandon is finally in a good place after all the crap thrown his way, and I don’t need you trying to weasel your way back into his life, confusing the hell out of him.”
Dave’s expression darkened, and it suddenly struck her that provoking a man who’d once beaten someone to death in a fit of anger wasn’t the best idea in the world. But she couldn’t back down, not when it came to protecting her son.
Her ex didn’t explode like she thought. Instead, he simply stood there, the emotions on his face changing so rapidly it was impossible to keep up with them. Anger was quickly followed by frustration, then confusion, and maybe even a little acceptance, strangely enough.
“Brandon is my son, too, you know,” he finally said.
She wasn’t surprised he went there. And if he was even the slightest bit sincere, she would have felt bad about wanting him to stay