Page 23 of Wild Escape

I scoffed. “Tell me where that dagger is. I’ll bet if we hang out there long enough, Dane and Brock will show up looking for it.”

“Not a chance. They don’t know where it is.”

I gave her a doubtful look. “You hope they don’t know where it is.”

She shook her head. “Those idiots will never find it.”

“Let's get down to the business of finding the idiots."

Daphne exhaled a breath. "Fine. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."

"I'm anything but dull," Jack replied.

She lifted a curious eyebrow. "Time will tell." After a pause, she said, "Brock was dating this woman named Nadia. Dating might be a stretch. I don't know if they're still a thing. I've been in jail for a hot minute, and he changes girlfriends like he does underwear."

"Where does Nadia live?"

"I don't know. I never went to her house.”

"Does Nadia have a last name?" I asked like she was five.

"I'm sure she does, but I don't know what it is. You guys have ways of figuring that kind of thing out, don't you?"

"Have you ever met her?”

"Once or twice.”

I pulled out my phone and searched the online portal for everyone named Nadia in the DMV records.

There were three Nadias on the island, and only one was between the ages of 18 and 35. I pulled up Nadia's image and showed it to Daphne. "Is that her?"

She nodded.

I gave Jack the address, and he drove over to the Delphine. It was a luxury midrise popular with young twenty-somethings with upward mobility. Of course, it was also home to plenty of exotic entertainers, low-level drug dealers that catered to high-end clients, and up-and-coming tech types. Maybe there wasn’t that much difference. They all sold dopamine hits.

Jack pulled into the visitor lot and found a place to park. I climbed out of the vehicle, helped Daphne out, and we escorted her to the main entrance.

"You could have just left me in the car. I'm not going anywhere."

I gave her a doubtful look.

I buzzed random numbers on the call box until somebody let us in.

Jack grabbed the door, and we hurried across the lobby to the elevators. I pressed the call button and waited.

The doors slid open a moment later, and an attractive woman stepped off. Her eyes were instantly drawn to Daphne's handcuffs as she passed.

"How about taking these things off?” Daphne asked with a cute face, displaying her stainless steel accessories. “This is embarrassing.”

"Should have thought about that before you broke the law," I said.

“Like you’ve never done anything illegal.”

I gave her a look.

“The average person commits three felonies a day. Look it up. There are over 1,500 sections of the US Code that create federal crimes. Combine that with overlapping regulatory burdens with weak mens rea requirements, and you have a recipe for criminality. It’s all by design. If the feds want to make your life miserable, they can. No one is immune. So before you go judging me, you might want to take a look in your own backyard.”

“What are you, some kind of lawyer?”