Page 66 of The Defiant Curse

‘She landed and is situated. We’re good. I’ll update later. We had a situation with the ghosts. For now, it’s under control. She’s heartbroken over what happened with Ethan more than anything. The case bothered her, but whatever went down with him was far more damaging. Tell him that she loves him. Other than that, she’s safe. We’re going shopping in the morning. We’ll check in tomorrow evening, our time.’

With that, he tucked his phone away, knowing that Gene would text when he could.

If he could.

Then, he grinned at his man.

Despite all of the crazy going on there, and the situation with Elizabeth, he couldn’t be a good boy all of the time. In fact, it was time to be very, very bad.

And he was taking Graham with him on that journey.

“Someone’s wearing too many things, Graham, change that for me,” he said bossily.

And Graham knew it was going to be a wild night.

Oh, if he only knew the half of it.

He had no idea.

Chapter Four

Damascus, UT

The Gold Baron’s Mansion

Same Time

Unfortunately for him, someone was a tough nut to crack, and Ethan Blackhawk was NOT living for it. When his husband got back from going out with Elizabeth, he’d simply handed them a letter and tried not to answer any questions regarding her whereabouts.

Mum was more than the word.

It was his whole game plan, apparently, because NO ONE could get any information out of the man. Gene’s mouth was on lockdown, and nothing any of them said made him budge.

Stubborn and loyalty were winning this one.

Gene refused to share her location, and the only thing he would say was she was safe.

And it was damn annoying.

Because of what went down during her last case, Ethan knew that Elizabeth wasn’t in a good place, and the last thing he wanted was her out in the world, alone, and not doing well.

That scared the hell out of him for MANY reasons.

On top of that, the fact that she didn’t take bodyguards was alarming, and even Ivan agreed. While it was very much an Elizabeth stunt, security wasn’t thrilled.

Still, Gene didn’t back down.

No matter how much Ethan begged, pleaded, or asked, Gene wasn’t telling him where she was.

Oh, and they’d tried looking for her. Elizabeth wasn’t exactly a slouch when it came to playing hide-and-seek, as she was now proving.

She was damn good at it, apparently.

How was she evading them?

Well, maybe because she’d taken off her watch, put it in Gene’s pocket, and wasn’t carrying a badge, gun, or anything that Ivan had managed to geo-tag.

She’d taken them all off of her gear, and tagged random things in order to lead them on a wild-goose chase.