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He opened his mouth to say something more, then snapped it shut, making her laugh. She let him stew in his embarrassment until he was all but squirming in his seat like a teenage boy.
“I’m sorry,” she said, still laughing. “But the look on your face...”
He laughed, too, but was totally relieved when his cell phone rang, saving him from further discussion of her... endowment. But then he frowned when he saw the caller ID. “Burke?” he answered. “What’s wrong?”
“Put him on speaker,” Molly said, suddenly all business again.
“You’ve gotten a number of calls at the Choux this morning,” Burke said.
Fear grabbed his gut. “Is Patty okay?”
“She’s fine. Val’s with her.”
Okay, that’s good.Val was the bodyguard who Burke had assigned to keep Patty safe. “Then who’s calling me?”
“Cicely Morrow and her son, Xavier.”
Molly looked away from the road long enough to meet Gabe’s gaze, hers as startled as he figured his was. “Well, then,” she said. “Don’t keep us in suspense, Burke. What did they say?”
“Not much. I was going to call them but thought you might want to talk to them, Gabe.”
“I do. Give me their number.”
“I’ll text it to you,” Burke said. “Don’t call from your own phone. Use Molly’s burner.”
Gabe watched Molly retrieve a slim smartphone from her pocket. It wasn’t the cell with the pink sparkly case that she’d used to make other calls. This one was a plain matte gray. She handed it to him. “Code is 465329,” she said.
“No face recognition?” he asked.
“Nope. Not secure, and cops can use it to get into your phone without your consent. Anything more, Burke?”
“Only that Cicely was firm but polite each of the four times she called. That was according to your assistant manager. By the time Xavier called, Val and Patty had arrived, so Val answered. She said he sounded scared and told her that it was a matter of life and death.”
“Timing is interesting,” Molly observed.
“Damn straight,” Burke said. “I want to listen in on your call. Call me first, then I’ll patch them in. I’ll call the number that Xavier left with Val. He won’t know that I’m there.”
“Nice trick,” Gabe muttered. When this was over, he was going to ask them to teach him their ways. “I’ll hang up now and call you from Molly’s phone.”
He did so, putting on the speaker, then waited anxiously for Burke to patch them in, relaxing the tiniest bit when Molly reached for his free hand and gave it a squeeze, just as she’d done while they’d sat at his kitchen table calmly talking about whether or not his father had cheated on his mother with Cicely Morrow.
This time, though, when she started to pull away, he held on. She shot him a look that was hard to read until she smiled. “It’ll be okay,” she mouthed. “Relax.”
He tried. He really tried. But then a tremulous male voice answered the phone. “Hello?”
“I’m looking for Xavier,” Gabe said gruffly, hoping his ill feelings toward this kid weren’t too obvious.
The swallow was audible. “Who is this?”
“Gabriel Hebert.”
“It’s him,” Xavier said to someone on his end. “Gabe Hebert.”
“Oh, thank the good Lord,” a woman said from farther away. “Ask if you can put him on speaker.”
“That was my mother,” Xavier said. “Can I? Put you on speaker, I mean.”
“Sure.”
