“Again, irrelevant. You walked out on him for a reason.”
His hand stilled, then he set the bag down on the bed and fished around inside.
“What?” I asked, watching him as he pulled something out. “Is that… a thumb drive?”
“Found it tucked inside an inner pocket.”
He dropped the bag on the bed beside me, not caring at all for something that cost more than some used cars as we stared at the little memory stick in his hand.
I reached out and took it from him. It was nondescript, like any cheap memory card anyone could pick up at a store or even online. “Oh my God. Hesaid there was something in it that he needed,” I continued. “Thisis why he’s been blowing up my phone? I really did dump out the contents into the trash can outside of his building after I found him with Sheryl. I didn’t search through it that closely. Maybe I was petty, but I didn’t care about what was inside, more that I took something that was important to him.”
“What do you think is on it? If he’s been harassing you for two weeks, then it’s got to be important,” he guessed, crossing his arms over his bare chest.
When I left New York, I’d packed a bag of clothes and all my electronics, including my personal laptop. I hopped off the bed and went to my pile of belongings that was still in the corner and pulled it out. I hadn’t used it once since I got to Montana. I returned to the bed, stuck the drive into the port on the side, flipped open the laptop lid and got it booted up.
Buck dropped onto the bed beside me, the mattress dipping from his weight. I tried not to pay attention to him in only a towel, or how the terry cloth parted to expose one of his muscled thighs.
“The folder’s full of files,” I told him, scrolling to see what they were. I clicked one open and gasped.
“What?” Buck said, leaning to look at the screen.
I opened another file, then another, to be sure. I angled it so the screen faced Buck.
“What am I looking at?”
“What Jackson’s freaking out about. They’re client files of the Mancuso crime family.”
16
BUCK
“Buck saidyou are a big city lawyer,” Hayes said. “Working at the Sip N’ Serv must be a big change.”
As soon as Sage told me what was on the discovered thumb drive, I called my brother. He was also a lawyer and we needed his help. I had no idea how he was going to do that, but I was a fucking rancher. I knew jack-shit about legal things like this. I dealt in cattle and horses and crop rotation, not the New York City mafia. But my woman was mixed up in something because of her dumbass ex and it was my job to protect her.
Sure, she was smart and a lawyer herself, butWilders took care of each other. She wasn’t alone and wasn’t handling this solo. She might be having my fucking baby and there was no way she was being put in any kind of danger.
When I called, I told him to get his ass to my house because I needed his help. He was here within fifteen minutes. I’d barely gotten dressed before he came in the back door.
“Yes, I resigned though and came here. As for the Sip N’ Serv, waitressing is definitely different and I am not very good at it.” She laughed at herself. “I can’t remember the difference between breakfast plate number one and number two. I have no idea how Aunt Mabel does it.”
Hayes grinned. “Mabel’s a gem. She makes it look easy.”
I had to agree, but the diner wasn’t important right now. “Um, the thumb drive?” I prodded.
“Right,” Hayes said, clapping his hands together. “I can’t believe your client was the Mancuso crime family.”
“They weren’tmyclient,” Sage replied. “I didn’t even know the full list of clients the firm had. I ran thepro bonodepartment.”
“I’m sure the Mancusos weren’t getting theirrepresentation for free,” Hayes guessed. “Shit, this is a little crazy.”
He ran a hand through his hair, dropping down into the chair at my kitchen table across from Sage. He was really surprised by this and not much surprised him. Then again, there wasn’t much interaction with the mafia in small town Montana.
When Sage said the thumb drive belonged to the fucking mob, I’d lost my shit, too.
He looked my way and shook his head, then chuckled. “You know how to pick ‘em.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Watch it,” I snapped, even though I knew he was fucking with me. “You’re the only one left single.”
