Page 23 of Tangled With You

Next, he assigned Mario the task of going deeper into herwork. “Poke through her files. Read whatever she was currently working on.Maybe she was trying to get out of doing fluff pieces. Maybe she was working onsomething investigative that took a wrong turn. Denny, you know what you’redoing.”

“Trying to track the car by that partial.”

“Got it in one.”

“That’s all good and well,” Ollie said. “But it doesn’t feelright. This won’t be about some article she was writing. The note came to mespecifically, but anyone watching her would know we haven’t been close inyears. Somehow, this is tied to my work.”

“What we know,” Trevor said, “is that we don’t know anythingfor sure yet, and so we’re covering all bases. You know the game, Ol.”

“I do.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.

“We’ll get her back,” Trevor said, his voice intimatelysoft. “And we’re definitely playing the Ollie card. You need to be in deep withthat. Going over any intel we get from the firm or the Feds. Letting us know ifanything is missing.”

“I know,” Ollie said. “And I’m all over that. But first, Ineed to talk with her parents.” He gestured at the table and Trevor nodded,clearly understanding him. Trevor would hand out the rest of the assignmentswhile Ollie went to make the call.

It was nice, thatsilent communication. They’d had a rhythm going for a while now, just asfriends. But it had definitely ramped up. And in the midst of a hellish daylike today, that was at least one ray of sunshine.

* * * *

Ollie was fighting a low-grade headache when he walked intothe third-floor kitchen and sat down at the table across from Nikki.

“They’re devastated.” He could still hear the sobs ofCourtney’s mother echoing in his head.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, taking his hand.

“They’re in Europe. Some business trip. I told them theyshould stay put for now. At least they’ll have some distraction from the worry.I told them we’d contact them the moment we knew anything, but they wereworried they wouldn’t be able to get a flight that would get them here fast.”

He stood up, then moved to the coffee machine and programmeda latte. “I told them that we’d take care of getting them home. That Damienwould send one of his jets. I’m sorry. I should have asked first.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. And just like that, he felta little better. No matter what other shit he was dealing with, he knew thatNikki would always be his rock. And through her, even Damien.

“Did they have any ideas as to who could be behind it?” Sheasked as Damien walked into the room.

“The parents?” Damien asked.

Ollie nodded. “Just got off the call. And no. Nothing. Asfar as they know, she’s got no enemies, there have been no new boyfriends, noangry old ones.” He reached up and massaged the muscles in his neck. “Thebottom line is it’s because of me. It must be. Someone is doing this to punishme.”

“Or just for the money,” Nikki said.

“Nikki has a point,” Damien said. “Courtney has a connectionto us, and she’s a lot easier to grab than Nikki or the kids. Especially now.”

Ollie nodded slowly, seeing where they were going with this.“But people know you. They know you’re generous. So it wouldn’t be a bad gamblethat you’d pay the ransom for your wife’s best friend’s ex- fiancée.”

“Which doesn’t help us at all,” Nikki said. “If that’s thecase, it could be any psycho who reads gossip columns. And that doesn’t narrowthe field.”

“No. It doesn’t.” Ollie rubbed his temples, feeling likethey’d come full circle back to nothing, then grabbed his latte. As he did,Bree came into the room. “Sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to get a snack forthe girls.”

“No interruption,” Nikki said. “This is your home, too.”

Ollie had the impression Bree was going to say something elsebut then Damien said a soft, “Damn.”

“Bad news?” Nikki asked.

“Nothing about the case. It’s Ash,” he said, referring toAshton Stone, the adult son that Damien only recently learned even existed. “Hewas going to come in this weekend, but he had to cancel. Then again,considering all we have going on, it’s probably just as well.”

Beside him, Bree shifted and Ollie got a look at her face.There was an odd expression on it, something a little bit soft. It almostreminded him of how he’d felt about Trevor before he could do anything aboutit. Except on Bree’s face, there was relief there, too. And he couldn’t helpbut wonder what she was thinking.

Chapter Eight