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Fuzz let out a low growl, and she put her hand on his head. Not yet, boy. He quieted, and she walked onto the porch.
“Give me your gun.”
“I don’t have one. You’d only take it from me, and I’m partial to my gun.”
“Hands on the wall.”
She’d known one of them would frisk her, but she hated the thought of his hands on her. She almost warned him not to touch her inappropriately, but that would only cause him to do just that. When his hands were on her, she stared so hard at the wall to keep from shuddering in disgust that she half expected to burn a hole in the wood. Her biggest worry was that he’d find the knife in her boot. He did run his fingers around the inside, at the top, and not finding an ankle holster, he stood.
“Go inside.”
There were two windows each on the front and left walls, and the kitchen was to the right with a smaller window over the sink. Viper, after studying the house on some top-secret Army site, had told her not to stand in front of any of the windows, especially the two on the left wall. She paused inside to get her bearings. The cabin was a rental, the furniture the kind that wouldn’t cost much to replace if vacationers ruined something.
The man she assumed to be Thomas Grant stood next to a stone fireplace with his arm resting on the mantel. Danny, the lying bastard, sat on the couch and had his feet up on the coffee table. That was her laptop next to him. At least she knew for sure now who’d set fire to her apartment. She glared at him, then her gaze sought out Tristan. He sat in a dining room chair that had been pushed against the wall. Good. He wasn’t in front of a window. By his scowl, he wasn’t happy she was putting herself in danger.
Fuzz was instantly aware that Tristan was in the room. She’d expected him to be excited at seeing Tristan, and that had worried her. She didn’t want him to bark his excitement and race to Tristan. It seemed, though, that he understood this was an unusual situation, or at least he sensed the tension in the room. With his ears back and after a quick glance at Thomas Grant, then Danny, he took a few steps toward Tristan.
“I don’t recall including a dog in my invitation for you to visit,” Grant said.
Doing her best to appear unafraid, she snorted. “One can refuse an invitation. What I received from you was a command to appear.”
“Told you she had a smart mouth,” Danny said.
“And you’re a lying bastard and the biggest mistake of my life.” She turned her attention back to Grant and gave him the same excuse for bringing Fuzz that she’d given Drake. As they talked, Fuzz had eased over to Tristan. “He knows the chief,” she said.
Tristan stared at the pink collar, then lifted his gaze to her, a question in his eyes. Kade’s here?
Well, Kade sure knew his brother. She gave him a minuscule nod. The relief in his eyes was instant. To keep the attention away from Tristan and Fuzz, she stepped farther into the room. Drake had positioned himself behind her, against the wall. She repositioned herself where she could see all three men.
“Exactly how much do you think I took, Mr. Grant?”
“Well, since you took his money, you would know,” Danny said.
She ignored him. She wanted to know how much Danny had stolen because, assuming she would walk out of this house alive, she was going to make sure his captain and his fellow officers knew what a slimeball thief he was.
Grant’s gaze landed on Danny for a moment, and it seemed to her that he was trying to work out a puzzle. Was he starting to be suspicious of Danny? Grant wasn’t at all what she’d expected. She’d had an image in her mind of thug, a rough bully-looking man. This man could be mistaken for a businessman, maybe a banker. Although he wasn’t scary looking like Drake, she sensed Grant was the more dangerous one, a venomous snake you didn’t see until it was too late.
“To answer your question, Sheriff, there had better be a half million in that briefcase.” He glanced at Danny again.
She almost gasped. You stupid fool, Danny. “Well, I wasn’t able to retrieve it all in the time you gave me, so you’ll have to allow me one more day.”
“Put the briefcase on the coffee table, then step away from it,” Kade said in her ear.
It would be a miracle if her heart didn’t pound itself right out of her chest, she thought as she set the briefcase down. “It’s all yours.”
Chapter Fifty
What was the plan? It was reassuring to know Kade was here, but Tristan wished he’d left Skye out of it and had just come in, guns blazing. There would be a plan, though, that much he knew. Other than a brief glance and slight nod to confirm Kade’s presence, Skye had ignored him.
He didn’t know what the strategy was, but they weren’t going to all smile at each other as he and Skye traipsed out of here. That was a fact. For one, there was no way there was a half million in that briefcase. If he had to guess, it would be that Parker had contributed to however much was in it.
Was Parker here, too? He hoped not. His baby brother was one hell of a fire chief, but a warrior he was not. Not that Parker would agree to stay out of it knowing Tristan’s life was at stake.
Kade, who was an elite warrior, and also devious, had sent a message with the pink collar. All Tristan had to do was interpret it. While no one was paying attention to him, he ran his hand over the collar, startling a little when he pricked a finger on something sharp. He caught himself before he grinned. You really are a devious bastard, brother.
While everyone’s attention was on Skye and the briefcase she was setting on the coffee table, Tristan palmed the blade he found in Fuzz’s collar. Using Fuzz as cover by pretending to pet him, he slipped the hand with the blade down his leg and sliced the duct tape binding him to the chair. Then he freed his other leg. Now to be ready for whatever was about to happen, because something was. Since he wasn’t privy to the plan, his only objective was to protect Skye when the bullets started flying.
The first thing he’d noticed when she’d walked in was that her hair was down. Her hair wouldn’t be down unless there was a reason, and the only thing he could think of was that she was hiding comms in her ears. If so, that made him feel marginally better, as she would be taking direction from Kade.
