They nodded, telling me they’d let me know if they got anything useful, then hugged Lauren before taking off.
King, Bull, and Viking stayed with us while I helped Lauren pack a suitcase, plus all the assorted crap the cat apparently couldn’t live without.
“Are you sure we need to take this?” I asked, pointing at the four-foot tall scratching post with a bunch of little shelves sticking out the side and toys and shit hanging from it.
“Definitely,” she said adamantly. “I’m worried that Elvis won’t do well in such a huge place with all those strangers. Plus, the noise may be too much for him, especially after he was traumatized already. The cat tree will help him relax.”
“Traumatized, my wrinkled old ass. That fleabag will be fine,” Viking grumbled, glaring at the cat tree like it personally offended him.
King coughed to hide his chuckle. Lauren rolled her eyes at her uncle, and I wisely kept my damned mouth shut.
“Lauren, we’ll get you set up in the VIP suite in the annex. It’s attached to the main building so you’ll be safe, but it’s quieter than the actual clubhouse so the cat shouldn’t freak out too much.” He gave a ghost of a smile when he mentioned Elvis.
While Lauren busied herself with gathering all the lotions and creams and shit from the bathroom that she wanted to take, Bull filled King, Viking and me in on what he’d found on the custodian from the recording studio.
“Let me pull up my notes.” He tapped and swiped at his phone screen for a few seconds, then gave us the rundown.
“John Darnell, he goes by JD. Born and raised in Indianapolis. Fifty-two, joined the Marines straight out of high school and served 8 years as a mechanic before receiving an Honorable discharge. Married at thirty-three, divorced at forty-one. No kids. Lives alone. No criminal record, aside from a parking ticket ten years ago. Just paid off his mortgage. He has excellent credit and a pretty sweet investment portfolio. We should ask him for some fuckin’ stock tips,” he joked.
“Started working at the recording studio when he left the service and he’s been there ever since. The old lady who owns it is his aunt. He doesn’t have any social media presence that I could find,” he said, then chuckled. “He’s a fuckin’ do-gooder type. I found his name mentioned in a couple of news articles. He won an award as Volunteer of the Year with a group that builds houses for homeless vets and also helped develop a community garden over near Garfield Park.”
“Good to know. Thanks, brother,” I told him.
“Are you thinking he could help us keep an eye on Lauren when she’s working?”
I considered King’s question. “Maybe. One of us still needs to shadow her, especially since that motherfucker’s escalating, but it will be nice to have a former Marine around if we need extra backup.”
I glanced down the hall to make sure Lauren was still in the bathroom, then motioned the others in closer. Keeping my voice low so she couldn’t hear me, I told them about the footprints that Lucky had found.
“I’m gonna wait to tell her until we get her settled in at the clubhouse. I don’t want her looking over her shoulder, afraid that he could still be watching us while we’re getting things packed up.”
“That’s probably best,” King agreed.
“We need to find that walking shitstain she was engaged to,” Viking fumed. “Fuckin’ Peeping Tom pervert. I wanna rip out his eyeballs and piss in the empty sockets.”
That sounded like a great idea to me, especially given what he probably saw when Lauren and I were fooling around on the couch right under the window. I kept that thought to myself, too, of course.
“I haven’t gotten any pings on the alerts I set for his bank account and credit cards, so he must be using cash to travel,” Bull pointed out.
“Keep on it,” King instructed him. “Tracking that bastard down is your top priority.”
“Understood. I’m gonna head back to the clubhouse now to run everything I have on him again.”
“Text me if you find anything,” I told him.
“Me, too,” Viking chimed in.
“I’m planning to pull an all-nighter so it may be late, or really fuckin’ early, depending on how you look at it,” he warned.
“I don’t care what time it is. I want to know the second anything comes up, and thanks, brother. I appreciate you busting your ass on this.”
He looked at me and nodded. “Anything for family.”
He left after that, and Lauren told us she was ready to go just a few minutes later.
Chapter 18
Lauren
