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And still, on top of all that, he’d found his father after all this time.
Why did that seem so much more important than her making a success out of Vanguard?
Everything in her wanted to get lost in how amazing he was, and how confusing the whole situation with him turned out to be, but there was a gunman to find.
She stepped past him. “Let’s go.”
One of his guys raced around the corner of the house, drawn by the shots.
Gage said, “Copy that.” He touched her shoulder. “I go first.”
She caught the expression on his face. “Copy that.”
Blake followed her, Gage went first, and they headed into the house. The gunman— possibly Aaron, but she didn’t know for sure even if this was his parents’ house—had fled into the house after he blew a hole in the door.
Gage pushed splintered sections of the door out of the way. He moved down the hall with his knees slightly bent. She could easily get distracted by the line of his back, and the display of strength. He held his gun up, shifting it as he turned each direction.
They covered each other, and Blake backed them both up.
Entryway. Front room, no TV—just a pool table and a couple of brown leather recliners. Empty bottles and glasses littered the surfaces. Books had been pulled from shelves and tossed on the floor, but it seemed more like hard living than a break-in.
The kitchen smelled like old pizza. Dishes spilled out of the sink, and the dishwasher stood with the door open, ready to catch some unsuspecting person in the shins.
Clare had done that before.
“Clear.” She checked the pantry. “Clear. What about the garage?” They hadn’t had an extra earpiece, so she couldn’t hear what they all had going on over comms.
“Liam is cutting him off, disabling any vehicles so he can’t get out that way.”
She glanced back at Blake. “Good thinking.”
There was something about Blake she couldn’t put her finger on. He lived behind a thick wall of self-protection, and it made her want to dig down to see what was below the surface. Problem was, that wall had a giant KEEP OUT sign tacked onto it. One day a woman would crack the wall and get inside. Clare wasn’t sure she wanted to witness the fallout when that happened.
All Gage’s friends were great. Even Dakota, though it’d been clear he had issues. They’d mentioned at breakfast he’d been put on a two-week suspension, so they were a man down. No one had said why, but she wasn’t sure it was about the van plowing into that department store. At least, not completely.
They continued down the hall to a wider living area. Huge dining table, chairs askew. A cobweb glinted in the light from the patio, a strand that connected the chandelier light fixture to the ceiling.
It bobbed with a breeze of air.
Clare spun.
“Hands up!” Gage approached a young woman, lowering his weapon as he went. She wore a bikini so there were definitely no weapons hidden anywhere.
She stopped halfway in the back door, a friend right behind her.
The friend started to turn.
“Nope!” Clare moved around Gage and grabbed the first one’s wrist. “Go take a seat on the couch.” She dragged the friend inside also and tugged her the same direction. “Where is he?”
“We were in the hot tub. We don’t know anything!”
Blake stood off to the side, where he folded his arms. “Then where are your towels?” They weren’t exactly dripping on the couch. “Tell us where Aaron is, andno lying.”
Clare wandered the room. She wanted to be aware if anyone came in, and she had to defend the two cops in the room from an armed man. One Katrina had described asinsane.They needed to search the rest of the house.
“Blake, stay here.” Gage crossed the room. “They don’t leave. Call in backup and get them dressed and at the station for questioning.”
“I’m not sayin’ nothin’!” one of them wailed. “I know my rights!”
