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“I do, but...why do you want it?” she asked. “I’ve blocked him.”
How could they get rid of this guy without any more problems? “Maybe you should unblock him and send him a message. See how he responds.”
She cast him a dubious look. “What kind of message?”
“Tell him you saw him in town and are wondering what he’s doing here. I’d like to get a read on how hostile he’s feeling. It might give us an indication of just how nasty he might get.”
He expected her to argue. She definitely had a mind of her own. But she surprised him by saying, “I suppose more information is better than less.”
“Not knowing will only make us both imagine the worst,” he said.
After she unblocked Jordan’s number, he watched her type out a message:Hey, I thought I saw your Audi. Are you by any chance in Coyote Canyon?
A ding sounded a few minutes later. “He says it’s none of my business,” she told him.
“Of course it’s your business,” Hendrix said. “You live here and want to feel safe. Tell him to go back to Libby.”
She hesitated. “If I want this problem to disappear, it wouldn’t be smart to antagonize him. Why make him any angrier?”
“If he drove five hours, and he paid for a motel so he could stay the night, he’s angry already.”Somethinghad motivated Jordan to return to Coyote Canyon, and since Ellen was the only person he knew here, it wasn’t difficult to guess that his presence had something to do with her. “See if we can draw him out, learn what he intends to do,” Hendrix added.
Her chest lifted as she drew a deep breath, but she started another message.I can’t imagine why this small town would hold any interest for you, she wrote and then showed it to him.
He nodded, she sent it, and he stood next to her while they waited for the reply.
There’s a lot here to like, Jordan wrote back with a winking emoji.
“So heishere,” Hendrix said.
“Apparently.” Ellen began to nibble at her bottom lip. “Maybe this is about pride. Maybe he’s just trying to prove that he won’t let us push him around.”
Hendrix shook his head. “I don’t think it’s safe to make the assumption that he’s only putting on a show.”
Not if you came back to cause trouble, she wrote to Jordan.
You’re the one who’s asking for trouble, came his response.
“They’re allowing him to remain on the dating site,” Hendrix told her. “I don’t think they did a damn thing about your complaint, so reporting him hasn’t hurt him. He has no justifiable reason to be mad. He’s the one who acted out, which is why I hit him—and you reporting him didn’t make any difference.”
“How do you know they’re letting him stay on the site?” she asked. “I wanted to check but decided not to. I knew if he was still there it would only make me mad.”
“I created an account so I could take a look.”
“You were that concerned?”
He probably shouldn’t have revealed that. It told her he’d been thinking about her way too much. In an attempt to downplay it, he answered without directly addressing her question. “I get the impression he doesn’t like anyone finding fault with him. I mean...no one enjoys criticism, but he seems to take greater exception to it than most. There’s something wrong with him.”
“There’s definitely something wrong with him,” she agreed and texted Jordan again:The complaint I lodged hasn’t gone anywhere. Why don’t you just move on with your life?
You’re the one who started this.
What are you talking about? We had dinner together. It didn’t work out. Time to see who’s behind Door #2.
Except it didn’t go quite like that. You didn’t even give me a chance. And then that friend of yours jumped me.
That’s not true!
He didn’t argue. In his next text, he wrote,I met someone who knows you last night.
