Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 93984 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 470(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 313(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93984 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 470(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 313(@300wpm)
Gabriel broke off the kiss for a moment and lifted one eyebrow as he looked at the man. “But?”
“But I’m not the type to leave a guy hanging.” He reached down for Gabriel’s sleep pants, but Gabriel captured his wrists and pulled them over his head, pinning them against the overhead cabinet behind Justin.
“Later.”
“Seriously?”
Gabriel grinned at him and took a step backward, releasing Justin’s wrists. “I want something to look forward to later today.”
Justin stared at him, looking utterly dumbfounded. He finally settled on a smirk as he asked, “Not feeling confident about our odds today with Mr. Jones?”
Gabriel nearly groaned with frustration. “You’ve been shot, my hotel ransacked, and your car shot up. Our luck is shit.”
“We had some success with Gretchen,” Justin was quick to point out.
“Not the odds one would call successful.” Gabriel started out of the kitchen toward the stairs.
“You got laid!” Justin shouted, his voice ringing through the house.
Gabriel allowed himself a chuckle as he walked up the stairs. Getting laid while in the middle of a job was definitely a new twist for him…at least since he’d started working solo. His mind shied away from old memories that tried to rise. The past didn’t exist. There was only the present, the job, and the insane man in the kitchen downstairs. The rest could wait.
* * *
Gabriel parked the rental car on the street almost a block away from Dr. Jones’s address and they both sat in silence as they looked around the quiet, wooded neighborhood. It was a family neighborhood with signs warning of kids at play and bicycles in the front yards. The homes looked a little older and the trees were mature. It should have been the place where Kristen Jones had the chance to raise her young daughter while helping to potentially cure one of the deadliest diseases in the world.
But someone had stolen that opportunity from her. As well as from Dr. Weiss.
“It looks like he’s home,” Justin ventured. They’d made one pass in front of the house before going around the block to park. An SUV had been parked in the driveway with the rear door open and a few grocery bags visible. By the time they’d parked, the trunk was closed. They’d just missed him unloading it.
On the drive over, Justin had pulled up some basic details on Devon Jones, widower of Kristen Jones. The man was listed as a data analyst, which he very likely did out of his home now that he was without a wife and was probably struggling to find a new balance in his broken life.
“Let’s see if he has anything useful to say.” Gabriel got out of the car and led the way down the block with Justin hurrying to catch up.
“You are going to play nice, right?” Justin teased, or at least Gabriel hoped that Justin was teasing him. “The guy does have a baby daughter, and he just lost his wife.”
“Well, I wasn’t planning to walk straight in with my gun drawn, demanding to know what secrets his wife was keeping,” Gabriel replied with a roll of his eyes. “Seriously?”
“Sorry,” Justin mumbled. “You’ve just got this dark, brooding, ‘I’m gonna steal your soul’ look to you.”
Gabriel sniffed and tugged at the cuffs of his suit jacket. “I can be nice.”
Justin smirked. “Oh, I know exactly how nice you can be.”
As he rang the doorbell, Gabriel muttered under his breath, “You have no idea how nice I can be.”
“What was that?” Justin asked as he joined him on the porch, but Gabriel refused to repeat it. Now was not the time for that silliness.
Gabriel was just reaching for the doorbell a second time when the front door was jerked open, revealing a young man who couldn’t have been more than twenty-five, maybe twenty-six, but lines of fatigue and grief weighed heavily on his face, making him look much older. His rounded shoulders were slumped, and his T-shirt was stained.
“Don’t ring it again,” he said in a soft rush. “I just got my daughter down for a nap.”
“We’re very sorry,” Gabriel apologized. “We didn’t mean to disturb your baby.”
The young man shook his head, waving off the apology. “You didn’t know. It’s okay. I typically put a sign up on the door, but you showed up before I could. Is there something I can help you with?”
“We’re hoping to have a few minutes of your time to talk to you about your wife,” Justin said.
Mr. Jones’s expression tightened, and the knuckles on the hand holding the edge of the door turned white. “My wife is dead. She was killed in a car accident nearly three weeks ago.”
“We don’t think it was an accident, Mr. Jones.”
He took a step back, his eyes sweeping over their dark suits. “I’m sorry. Who are you? Are you cops?”