Page 30 of Fallen Hero

“Passport photo and a still from the footage Shep used to run the facial rec. It’s a clear shot. She’s thinner, hair’s longer, but it’s her. She has a mole on the corner of her right eye.”

“So what’s the plan for tonight?” Fallon asked.

“Simple and stupid,” Pete shot back.

“You have the number for the massage service,” I guessed.

“Yeah. I’ll call and find out where the pickup spot is, and we’ll move in.”

Simple and stupid.

There was no reason to overcomplicate things when we had a phone number to call that would lead us right to the girl.

“What about muscle?” Calista asked.

“From what Shep could find, Deepak Bashu, aka Sparkle, runs a crew of ten, with twenty girls working for him. But that’s not confirmed.”

“Sparkle?” Fallon repeated. “Where the fuck did he come up with that, and who told him Sparkle was a good street name? At least go with something like Killer or Blade or Pimp Daddy. Christ, what a tool.”

“Pimp Daddy?” Calista scoffed.

“What? I heard it used on TikTok.”

Calista’s gaze slowly slid in my direction. When she had my attention, she made one of those big-eye faces women make when they find something . . . Hell, I don’t know why they make the bug eyes, but I’ve seen the servers at the Dirty Plank do it plenty.

“I think your buddy has found himself on the wrong side of TikTok if Pimp Daddy’s coming up on his algorithm,” she stage-whispered.

“What? I use it to watch my bagpipe vixen.”

“If you say so.” She pinched her lips and gave me big eyes again. “But if you tell me you only subscribe to the Naughty by Nature website for the articles, I’m not going to believe you.”

Pete chuckled. I was too busy staring at her to make a sound.

“Never heard of it, but now I’m interested in how you know about a website that leads with naughty.”

“Research,” she shot back with a wink.

I was not going to think about Calista poking around the internet on naughty websites. I was not going to think about why I wanted to kick my friend in the dick for being on the receiving end of Calista’s wink. And I absolutely wasn’t going to think about why I found that playful wink so sexy.

Christ, I must be coming down with a brain infection.

“Let’s get this shit done.” Pete nabbed his phone off the cushion next to him and started stabbing at the screen. “I want to order up a woman from a sleazy fucking pimp like I want a hole in my head.”

No more than the rest of us wanted to hear the call, but it was a necessary evil.

Pete put the call on speaker.

Five rings later, a heavily accented male answered, “Hello?”

“I found your card,” Pete said through clenched teeth. “I’m looking for a massage.”

“Yes, brother, come tonight.”

Calista’s head twitched. Twice now. A new tell. I didn’t have to guess what that small tic gave away. Bloodshed would be imminent.

Nice.

Once again, I liked the way the woman thought.