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“How did you get this number?”
“I found it among my son’s things.”
My body went cold. “Has Colin shown up yet?”
“No,” Ted said, his tone accusatory, “and it seems that you are the last to have seen him.”
“I assure you I have no idea where he is, Ted.” Worry tugged at me. I no longer loved Colin. Hell, I no longer liked him very much. But I didn’t want anything to happen to him.
“I’ve contacted the police. They’ll be in touch to question you since you were the last person to see him alive.”
Alive? Did he think Colin was dead? My heart thrummed wildly. “That’s not true. There were three other people with me the last time we saw him.” I thanked God for the alibi of Talon and his brothers. The way Ted was talking, I thought he might be trying to pin this on me.
“And who would that be?”
“Talon Steel and his brothers, Jonah and Ryan Steel. Colin and I had just come out of a restaurant, and the Steel brothers were coming out of a bar across the street.”
Ted huffed into the phone. “Drunk, no doubt.”
“No, they were not drunk. Also, it was Friday night and it was warm. There were other people walking around.”
“And that’s the last time you saw my son?”
I didn’t like his tone. Ted Morse was a powerful man, and as an attorney, I knew better than to spill my guts like I had. “Ted, if you want to talk to me any more about this, you’ll need to call back some other time. I’m in the hospital right now. My mother’s been in an accident, and she’s currently in ICU.”
Silence for a moment. Then, “I’m sorry to hear that.”
His tone didn’t indicate sorrow at all.
“So I’m sure you understand why I can’t talk anymore. Goodbye, Ted.” I ended the call.
Marj had left a couple hours ago, promising to read Talon the riot act for leaving me here. I desperately wanted to call him just to hear his voice. Instead, I went back to the waiting room where my father sat. “There wasn’t much down there. Here are a couple of ham-and-cheese sandwiches.”
“Thanks, sweetie.”
“No problem.” I unwrapped one and took a bite. I didn’t want to talk about Ted and Colin, so I said something else that had been on my mind. “I can’t get over Mom’s boyfriend leaving her here.”
“That is weird,” Dad agreed. “How much do you know about him?”
“Not much. She said he was a senator from Iowa. I’ve never heard of him. But it’s not like I keep up with who the senators are in Iowa. Honestly, I’m not sure what Mom saw in him. He was good-looking enough, olive skin and a great head of hair, nice build. But he had a slimy look about him, you know? I can’t really put my finger on it, but something about him seemed off.”
“You didn’t like him?”
“I can’t really say that. All I did was have dinner and go swimming with the guy. He was perfectly polite to me, and he had a gorgeous tattoo—a phoenix on his forearm. You know I’ve wanted a tattoo for the longest time, and that image was just so apt for my life right now.”
My dad shook his head. “I’ll never talk you out of that tattoo, will I?”
I smiled. “Sorry, Dad. I’m going to be inked at some point. I don’t know when, though. I had originally planned to come to the city this weekend and scout out some shops, but Mom’s accident obviously superseded that intention.”
“I’m sorry your mom is in here suffering, but if there’s any good in it, it’s that it kept you from getting a tattoo.” He smiled at me.
“Only postponed it, Dad.”
Talon had reacted horribly to the idea of me getting a tattoo. It was the image—the phoenix—that had upset him. What did he have against the phoenix?
I couldn’t be concerned with that now. I was about to take another bite of my sandwich and then get back to the subject of Nico Kostas, when one of the new duty nurses came out.
“Mr. Roberts, Ms. Roberts, Ms. Bailey has regained consciousness.”
