Total pages in book: 54
Estimated words: 51825 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 259(@200wpm)___ 207(@250wpm)___ 173(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 51825 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 259(@200wpm)___ 207(@250wpm)___ 173(@300wpm)
“You are the Feds.”
“We all know I’m a beast of my own name. Get moving.” I disconnect and call the only person in LA I know to call. Rich. Who is probably still in Europe, but I have to try. He knows Tic Tac. He likes him. He’s Clark Kent all the way—never dirty, never bad—which was half our problem as a couple, I suspect. But bottom line, if he’s not stateside, he may have someone he trusts, who I’ll have to trust by default, which sucks, but it’s where I’m at right now. I punch in his number, and he answers on the first ring. “Lilah.”
“Are you in Europe?”
“I just got back to LA. Why? You finally come to your senses and want me over that gangster Mendez?”
I breathe out. “Thank God.”
“Well, that’s not the reaction I expected. Oh, shit. That wasn’t about me. What’s going on?”
“I can’t explain much right now, but I trust you. Don’t trust anyone else, okay?”
“What is this, Lilah?”
“Director Murphy’s dead,” I say.
“Holy shit. What the fuck?”
“A professional hit. Homeland Security called me in to run the case.”
“What the hell?”
Obviously, his vocabulary shrunk while he was in Europe, or it was always smaller than I realized but I push past his limitations. “I’ve been working with Murphy to take down some very powerful, very dangerous people who’ve infiltrated our law enforcement.”
“Don’t trust anyone. Got it. What am I doing?”
“Tic Tac’s been helping me,” I say. “He could be a target. Can you get him and keep him safe?”
“Why the hell would you involve him? He’s not that guy, Lilah.”
“Are you in or out, Rich?”
“I’m in. I love that little dude.”
“Well, then go give him a hug, because that’s just so sweet.”
“Fuck you, Lilah.”
“Finally, we’re talking language I understand. Get a burner, and text me the number. Then I’ll send you Tic Tac’s number. He’s got a burner already. Also, don’t tell him he can’t handle this. He’s strong. He’s not a little bitch.”
“And I am?”
“Guilty much? Get a burner,” I repeat.
“I have one. Give me five. And I was never a little bitch, Lilah, or you wouldn’t be calling me. I just didn’t bury bodies. Apparently, that made me not your type.” He disconnects.
He wants it to be that simple, but it never was. And I don’t like how targeted that comment is, as if he knows bodies were buried. I’ll deal with Rich and Kane’s hatred of him soon enough. For now, I dial Danica Day. She answers on the first ring.
“Agent. What’s going on?”
“Put on your thinking cap, DD. I’m going to need you to prove you’re more brains than beauty.”
“I’m both,” she dares, obviously getting more confident. “Any details you can give me?”
“How far out are you?”
“Five. I just happened to be close.”
“Then you’ll know in five.”
“Okay. Thank you for believing in me.”
“You won’t be thanking me later, but that’s what you get for being a model trying to make it as an ME.”
I can almost see her crinkle her perfect brow. “What does that mean?”
I disconnect and eye the skinny Homeland Security dude walking down the hallway with Jay by his side. “Agent,” the Homeland Security agent greets me. “Your other man says he needs a minute. I cleared him to come up. I’m Agent Taylor, by the way.”
“Did you tell Director Ellis I told him to fuck off?”
“Actually, you told him to fuck himself,” he corrects, “and I do like to get the facts straight. Therefore, I told him to fuck himself.” Unlike pretty much everyone else around me every day of my life, he’s matter of fact about that explanation, no emotion or judgment to be detected.
“I might actually like you, Taylor.”
“Do you want to know what he said?”
“I don’t care what he said.” I reach into my bag and pull out a pair of gloves that I smack into Jay’s gut. With a grunt, he grabs them and curses in Spanish.
“This is not what I signed up for.”
“You wanted me to trust you. This is me trusting you.”
He grumbles under his breath and then asks, “How bloody is it?”
“It’s not, and that’s why any normal human would be scared. But the good news is that I’m not normal.”
Chapter Five
Jay stands over Murphy and stares down at him.
“He didn’t fight,” he says, and glances at me. “I’ve seen men fight. Their limbs were all over the place when they landed, not neatly aligned like this guy’s. Either he didn’t fight, or the killer positioned his limbs just right the way the Umbrella Man did.”
“Fighting was wasted effort and he knew it. He was unarmed and standing face-to-face with a professional killer,” I add and change the subject. “Anything that would be obvious and damaging to whoever hired the killer will almost one hundred percent be gone. Look for things that Murphy might have tucked away—under a mattress, in a pill bottle. Be creative. And do it quickly.”