Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 30692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 153(@200wpm)___ 123(@250wpm)___ 102(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 30692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 153(@200wpm)___ 123(@250wpm)___ 102(@300wpm)
“No way are you tearing him away from Talia’s side, and they’re all the way out in New York anyway,” Tate pointed out.
Jeremy shrugged. “We came in from LA for the weekend.”
“Exactly. We can bring in whoever the fuck we want. That’s what private jets are for,” Jason pointed out. “I’ll send mine for your brother-in-law and sister, and Jeremy and McKenna can bring her grandfather with them on theirs.”
My phone vibrated on the table and a message notification popped up. “Give me a second, baby,” I murmured to Samantha as I picked up my cell. She looked at me curiously, but I distracted her with a kiss before helping her off my lap and standing up.
“Would you two cut it the fuck out?” Landon grouched.
I flipped him the bird as I kissed Samantha one more time, then strode into the kitchen.
Unknown: Break up with her or she’s DEAD!!! This isn’t a bluff.
My eyes narrowed as I read the message again. Then my blood turned to ice. Fuck! The bastard knew we were at a poker game. They’d somehow followed us from Chicago.
A second text came through, shocking me because they’d never sent more than one from the same number.
Unknown: If I see you two together again, I’ll fucking kill her.
I called Jonah immediately, and he agreed that the stalker had clearly followed us.
“I think you might need to call things off with Samantha until we sort this out,” Jonah advised. “I’ve been doing this long enough to know when it’s escalated to truly dangerous. These aren’t idle threats, James.”
My knee-jerk reaction was to insist that Samantha was safest with me. Except I knew in my heart that Jonah was right. “We’ll have to pretend to break up and lure them out using me as bait.”
“Make sure it looks real,” he cautioned. “If this fucker thinks you’re trying to trick them, it could push them over the edge. Does Samantha have a decent poker face?”
I sighed and hung my head in defeat, knowing that what I had to do was going to rip my heart out. “No,” I admitted. “She’s too real to hide behind a facade. She doesn’t even realize how easy she is to read. It’s one of the things I love about her.”
“Then you’ll have to let her think it’s real, too. But I would tell her brother so she isn’t left unprotected.”
It was a good suggestion. Especially since I wouldn’t live to see tomorrow if Landon thought I’d broken his sister’s heart.
“I’ll have a plan for you by the time you get home tomorrow,” Jonah informed me before hanging up.
I took a few minutes to collect myself, then I peered around the corner to gauge where everyone was. Luckily, Samantha had taken over my seat and had her back to me. Landon was facing me, but he was staring hard at his cards. As if he felt my gaze, he glanced up, and I jerked my chin toward the kitchen, then glanced at Samantha and shook my head.
“Fold,” he muttered, setting his cards down and punching back his chair. I retreated back into the kitchen and waited for him. He came around the corner scowling and muttered, “This better be important because I had a fucking full house.”
I scrubbed my hands up and down my face while I swallowed back the bile that had risen in my throat at the thought of this conversation.
When I folded my arms over my chest and looked at my friend, he observed me for a moment, then mirrored my stance. “What the fuck is going on, James? You better not have dragged me in here to tell me you knocked up my sister before marrying her.”
I shook my head. Not yet, anyway. “Hear me out before you flip your shit. I need a favor.”
He bobbed his chin in acknowledgment and did as I asked, listening to me without interruption as I told him the whole story. Unlike his sister, he had a stellar poker face, so I had no clue how he was going to react.
I’d barely finished when my phone began to vibrate, dancing around the granite countertop where I’d set it down. Jonah’s number flashed on the screen, and I practically dove to answer it. “Jonah,” I told Landon before swiping to answer the call.
“Do you know a Cheryl Novak? Worked as a forewoman for Heath Construction?”
“You have to be fucking with me,” I fumed.
“That’s what I figured. We pinpointed the phone signal, and since I assumed it had been trashed again, I sent someone to retrieve it. There was a crumpled-up plane ticket from Chicago dated this morning. When I looked her up and saw she’d been employed at one of your locations, I thought I’d run her name by you.”
“Samantha fired her a couple of weeks ago. But she’d been a little over friendly with me before that, so I was relieved to see her go.”