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“She’s at the bakery today, just like every other day. Nic’s there with her. They’re not talking about you—in fact,” his office chair squeaks as he sits back and grunts. “They’re not talking at all.”
“They fighting?” I press my back against the truck and hope for five minutes alone. No alarms. No coworkers. No bullshit. “Because of me?”
“Nah. They’re not talking because Hannah’s one of those ‘if I speak, I’ll break’ kinda chicks. She’d rather lock it down and just get the work done. And Nic…” He sighs. “She’s worried about you both.”
“Is she mad at me for fucking everything up again?”
He chuckles, soft and reassuring. “She adores the ground you walk on, asshole. It pisses me off more often than not. You gonna tell me what your fight with Hannah was about yet?” Phones trill on his side of the call. People talk. Others give orders. But the newest member of Checkmate doesn’t seem all that inclined to get back to work. “I could get Soph to pull the street footage, if you don’t wanna tell me. But I’d rather hear it from you.”
“You have street footage?” I narrow my eyes and glance to my left, to the firehouse’s driveway, as kids cut across the corner on their bikes instead of going around. “Why do you have footage of a private conversation on a public street?”
I don’t have to see his face to know his lips peel into a smug grin. “Because we run this motherfucker. Now stop asking questions and start answering them, asswipe.”
I drop my head and rub a hand across my chin. “We were having a good time, Pres. I don’t even know what the fuck went wrong. We were on a date. She was celebrating, because her parents had made contact.”
“Her parents?”
“Mmm. She was upset, because they’d been in town recently, but didn’t come to see her. She was especially sensitive about it since they ghosted your party. I guess it was coming to a head yesterday, but her mom texted and said they’d talk, so she was happy again. Then she was on the phone with her roommate. Her roommate said that prick Raul was at the house. The minute,” I grit my teeth, “the fuckingsecondshe got on the phone with him, shit changed. She was happy before that, Pres, but then he got in her ear, and her mood flipped. Whatever he said set her off, then she was ripping into me.”
“What are her parents’ names?”
“Wh—” My brow furrows. “What?”
“I could find out on my own.” I hear thetap, tap, tapof a computer keyboard. “But it’d be cool if you saved me the five minutes and just told me.”
“Liza and Gerald Sullivan. Why?”
“Because I asked.” His chair squeaks again, and the taps on his keyboard grow faster. “And before I dig in here and violate a few folks’ privacy, do we wanna discuss the fact that maybe you have a problem with Raul purely because you’re jealous?”
“I’m not jealous!” I ball my fist, but snap my mouth closed when my words echo throughout the firehouse.
Lowering my voice and controlling my tone, I grit out, “I’m not jealous. What Hannah and I have goes deeper than the superficial shit others call love. She hates it, but she’s for me. She was put on this planet forme. That’s why it’s so fucking easy when we’re together.”
“You sound kinda entitled, man.”
“Knowing my future isn’t entitlement. It’s confidence. I’m not the guy who’s gonna get mad about his girl having other guy friends, Pres. Just like I have chick friends. Hell, I sleep in a fucking rack beside a chick when I’m on twenty-fours. So zero issue. But there’s something aboutthatguy. He was always around, even before I left. Always skulking on the sidelines. Watching her. Watching Nic. Begging to be a part of the group.”
“Maybe he’s just a nice guy.”
I throw my eyes skyward and groan. “The second I left town, he swooped in and dried her tears.”
“Which was the risk you took when you knew he’d been skulking around, but broke her heart and left anyway.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I bite out. “Whose side are you on?”
He barks out a soft laugh and tilts in his chair till it squeaks again. “Yours, bro. I’m just clearing out the cobwebs to make sure we’re seeing things clearly. Liza and Gerald Sullivan have been in the Maldives for the last three months.”
“They…” I bring my gaze down and narrow. “What?”
“Passports were stamped on the way in. They haven’t left since. And before you ask, I checked their credit cards, just to make sure they haven’t slipped out. Liza charged a mojito to her card at a Hotel Casanova about…” He considers for a beat, thinking. “Thirty minutes ago.”
“So… they were here last week, but they’re in Greece now?”
He chuckles. “The Maldives are nowhere near Greece, stupid. I’ve never even been there and I know that. But no. They werenothere a week ago, unless they have sneaky passports under alias names and like to travel under the radar.”
“They’re not spies.” I push away from the truck and kick a rock as I make my way toward the front of the house. “They’re regular people who had a kid late in age, dumped and ran the second they could, now they’re spending her inheritance and swimming in the tropics.”
“Then you’re wrong about them being in town last week. They weren’t.”
