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Hunter
Ihad always been a night owl, but I was able to be up early the day after we shadowed Brooke on the casino floor. Maybe it was the adrenaline pumping through my veins making a resurgence from last night. Watching her through the security cameras pointing at the table wasn’t enough to calm my nerves. I was still too far away to intervene.
I got to the office early and shut my door so no one would bother me. Chase had pulled more of the files of the men that had been at the tables, which I opened.
The men who she’d spied on were seriously dangerous. And it wasn’t just that they were dangerous on their own—they were all connected to organized crime in one way or another. Those weren’t the kinds of men who just cleaned up their act after they got out of prison.
I knew the type well—they were the guys I’d grown up with. I hadn’t fallen into the bad crowd entirely, mostly due to the dumb luck of not getting caught. But my friends did, including one of my best friends from childhood, Mac.
He was our inside man with this circle, but calling in favors with him wasn’t something I did casually, even though I’d literally saved his life when he got shot once. His method of getting shit done tended to look like going overboard to anyone outside of his world. The idea of pistol whipping a guy to get him to straighten up was a regular Tuesday. And that kind of thing got the police involved.
If a corrupt cop got involved, they could get in between us and these criminals.
But if this got worse, I’d call Mac. He owed me and always would.
I raked my fingers through my hair and sighed through my nose, scrolling through the files Chase had pulled again. I didn’t see much of a connection between them, aside from their association with the seedy Vegas underworld. Maybe we needed more information.
But that meant sending Brooke back in.
A familiar rhythmic knock on the door pulled my attention away from the computer—it was either Lucas or Chase.
“Come in,” I said.
It was both of them, and they came in and shut the door. Lucas was much more dressed down than he usually was at work, in a dark button-down shirt and jeans, but Chase was in his usual suit.
“You’re here early?” Lucas asked, absently scratching at his dark, heavy stubble as he flopped into the seat in front of my desk. His eyes were tired. “After that late night?”
“Couldn’t really rest.” I shrugged. “You look fucking exhausted for someone who barely has a commute.”
Lucas rolled his eyes and crossed one ankle over his knee. “I had a hard time sleeping after last night, too, but I managed to fall asleep at about six. It’s a little hard to rest when the company you just bought is stuffed to the brim with criminals. I wonder if it’s just us or if they’re doing the same thing at other casinos.”
“I don’t know. But Brooke got us some leads, at least. Places to look.” Chase walked behind me to look at my screen. “She did well.”
“She did.” I let out a breath. “Even though they were fucking creepy.”
Maybe I was being a hypocrite, but the way they were looking at her pissed me off. They weren’t staring straight at her tits, but they were eyeing her just long enough to make me edgy.
I was still going to protect her no matter what, but she wasn’t mine and wasn’t going to be. I needed to take a breath and back off.
“As we expected.” Something crossed Lucas’s expression that I didn’t have a name for. “She looked good.”
We exchanged a glance. His attraction to her was the most obvious of all of us. I didn’t blame him.
“So, what’s next?” Lucas asked after taking a long drink of his iced coffee. “Now that we know they’re up to something and are trading something amongst themselves.”
“We could have more security at the door. Pat downs, maybe, and metal detectors?” I said.
“No, that could tip them off. We want them to still come in,” Chase said, bending over to move my mouse back over the files. “I can try to make some connections between them and look into what could possibly be hiding in those objects.”
“Drugs, probably,” said Lucas.
“Not that much of it, though. So what would be the point, besides personal use?” I skimmed the files again, even though nothing had changed about this. “But I guess it’s a start.”
“It is.” Chase checked his phone. “I have to get on a call. We can talk more about it at our meeting this evening.”
“Sounds good.” Lucas pushed himself to his feet with a yawn. “See you guys then.”
The two left my office, and I tried to focus on work for the casino. It had been a total shit show when we bought it, but nothing we couldn’t handle. Now we were slowly but surely getting it out of the ditch, at least for the most part. The staff still wasn’t perfect, but we didn’t have enough evidence to fire people. I was more than happy to crack the whip, but Lucas and Chase usually kept me from tearing peoplecompletelyto shreds. More than one of my employees had quit on the spot after a meeting with me in the past.
