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Daisy’s eyes grew wide as she took in the bowls of colored frosting and sprinkles. “Yes, please! I’m a really good helper, just ask my Daddy. He needs my help when he cooks dinner all the time. He isn’t that great of a chef but he tries,” she whispered behind her hand loudly.
“Hey, don’t go giving away my secrets, kid,” Gray chided his daughter lovingly. “Be good for Aunt Winnie while I am gone, okay?”
“Okay, Daddy!” Daisy shouted but she was already elbow deep into ‘helping’ Lily as rainbow sprinkles flew around my kitchen.
“Yes, yes,” I said, pushing him to the door. “Now get out of here so I can get out the alcohol and dirty movies.” He gave me one more stern look before walking to his truck shaking his head.
I closed the door and skipped back to the kitchen. “Now, Lily, the real question is, how many of these cupcakes are we allowed to eat?”
4
Kane
Igathered up the files on my desk and strode toward the conference room. Once a week, Gray liked the whole team to get together and discuss the cases they were working on and any other outstanding business.
Even though we started Falls Security together, Gray was the natural leader and I was perfectly happy to sit back and let him have that role. He was good at being the front man that talked to clients and schmoozed local law enforcement when necessary. Gray was organized to the point of being anal about every tiny detail that had to do with the business. He had the patience that came with being a single dad of a five-year-old girl and we both knew that if I had to talk to clients on a daily basis, we wouldn’t have any.
When I entered the conference room, Gray was already seated with his laptop in front of him and a neat stack of folders to his left. “You’re late,” he complained, not looking up from whatever he was typing.
“Actually, asshole, I’m five minutes early. If you wanted us all here before the meeting, why didn’t you schedule it earlier?” I dropped my own folders to the table and strolled over to the coffee pot.
Gray sighed tiredly and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Sorry, man, I’m just frustrated because I have to go to Dallas for a whole fucking week and you know how much I hate leaving Daisy for that long.”
Any irritation I felt left me as I took the coffee and sat next to my friend. “You need me to go instead?”
“Nah, I wish you could but they are already expecting to see me. You know how territorial some of these guys can be. I worry that if someone else showed up, they wouldn’t think we were serious and cut us out completely.”
“That’s because you pigheaded men would rather screw everything up yourselves than ask for help.” Sam stalked into the room and went straight to the coffee herself.
“Why are you so grumpy this morning, Samantha dearest? Were you up late having sweet, sweet dreams about me?” Roe dropped into the seat next to me and immediately started typing speedily into his own laptop. I was sure if he could walk and type, he would.
“Roe, if I dreamed about you, they wouldn’t be sweet, they would be nightmares.”
Gage quietly came in last and Gray cleared his throat, drawing our attention. “Sam, you’re up first.”
She straightened and provided a quick report of the surveillance work she had been doing for one of the law firms a few towns over. A young guy in finance had killed a woman while driving drunk, the asshole had miraculously avoided jail time. Probably because of his father, who had more money than God and played poker weekly with two of the most powerful judges in the state. The woman’s family was trying to file a civil lawsuit and we had been hired to see what could be dug up on the guy.
“He is pretty predictable—work, bar, home. Sometimes he convinces a woman to go home with him by flashing his money around, but more often than not he goes home alone. It’s pretty easy work for me but honestly, the piece of shit is drunk every night and I’m worried he’s going to kill someone else while I watch.”
“Gage is free right now, take him with you the next time you go and make it obvious you are there watching. Maybe a little intimidation will get him to screw up and call Daddy.” Sam and Gage both nodded. After discussing the rest of the open cases, we all stood up to leave.
“One last thing,” Gray started, “we got a heads up from the sheriff, someone is robbing mom and pop restaurants and they think that the perpetrators are working their way south.”
“Any suspects?” I asked.
“Nope, only a loose description. Most likely men, always wearing masks and carrying firearms. They are coming in at closing once the last customers leave and subduing the employees quickly, usually by knocking them unconscious and leaving them tied up for someone to find later. They take the money and are gone before anyone notices something is up. The sheriff believes that they are targeting these smaller businesses because they don’t have surveillance systems in place.”
“Fuck. That’s brutal,” Roe said.
“Yeah. The sheriff and his deputies are alerting businesses to stay vigilant, encouraging them put in some cameras just to be safe. But keep an eye out for anyone new in town that looks like they may be surveilling potential targets,” Gray finished.
The rest of team walked out leaving me and Gray alone. “Have you let your sister and parents know about these guys?” I questioned. I didn’t like the thought of Winnie being in danger when she was working. There weren’t a lot of restaurants open later at night in town but the diner was one of them and I knew she closed on her own pretty frequently.
“I called my parents last night and gave them the overview without all the terrifying details. I was going to tell Winnie later today, maybe have Roe stop by the diner and check up on the system there, make sure everything is running like it should and there aren’t any vulnerable areas.”
“I can go,” I volunteered quickly, coughing into my hand to cover my eagerness. “I don’t mind stopping by at lunch and checking the place over. Maybe I can go through the closing procedures with all of them, secure up any weak spots.”
“That would be great, man, it would make me feel much better since I’ll be out of town,” he said, clapping me on the shoulder.
