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Taking the phone, Dom read the lurid headline beneath the picture. Skeleton Found Near Railroad Tracks. Is the Tiny Town of Pike, Wisconsin, Cursed? He handed the phone back to Kaden. “Creepy,” he said, studying Kaden with a narrowed gaze. “And confusing. Are you thinking about starting a new reality show?”
“Absolutely not.”
Kaden had walked away from his show five years ago, and while he occasionally agreed to film a special when he had a famous client wanting a specialized motorcycle, he had no interest in being back in the limelight.
“Then what’s your interest?” Dom asked.
“You remember I told you about my older brother?”
Dom took a second to search his memories. “Darren, right?”
“Yep. He was seven years older than me.”
“You always said he was the smart one in the family.”
“Without question,” Kaden agreed. “He was a lawyer with the EPA.”
Dom nodded slowly. “You were driving back from Darren’s funeral when you called and asked if I wanted to go into business with you.”
“I needed a new challenge.” Kaden struggled to keep his tone light. He’d told his friend about his brother’s death and the desire to move to Vegas and start a new business, but he’d never talked about the soul-deep pain that was driving him.
“Was the challenge building our empire or working with me?” Dom teased.
“Both.”
“Fair enough.” Dom pointed toward the phone. “You think the picture in the article has something to do with your brother?”
Kaden used his fingers to enlarge the image before turning it toward his friend. “Look.”
Dom leaned forward, studying the fuzzy image. “It’s some sort of badge.” He read the words engraved on the badge. “Office of Inspector General Special Agent.”
Kaden pointed to the top of the badge “Environmental Protection Agency,” he added.
Dom straightened, his dark eyes widening. “Wait. I remember. You told me there was a woman who went missing.”
“Vanna Zimmerman.” He had to push the name past his stiff lips. He’d spent endless years blaming her for everything bad that had happened to Darren. “My brother’s fiancée.”
“You think the skeleton might be her?”
“I do.” Kaden tossed the phone back on the bed and moved to the low, sleek dresser to pull open the top drawer.
“Why? There’s no name mentioned,” Dom pointed out, as if logic had any place in the conversation. “They don’t even say if it’s a male or a female.”
Kaden grabbed a handful of underwear. His days of going commando had ended when he moved to a place that could get up to 110 degrees. Nothing sexy about chafing.
“The badge.”
Dom snorted. “How many people work for the EPA? There must be thousands of badges handed out every year.” He nodded toward the phone. “Not to mention the fact you have no way of knowing if the skeleton is even real. People pull pranks on social media all the time. Especially kids.”
Kaden moved to toss the underwear into the suitcase. “There aren’t that many EPA special agents,” he argued. “And the town is just two hours north of Madison. I have to check it out.”
“Check what out?”
“My brother spent years and a small fortune trying to discover what happened to Vanna after she disappeared.”
“That’s rough.”
“I had no idea how rough.” Kaden shuddered. He’d been in Hollywood when his brother called to say his fiancée had vanished. Kaden had met Vanna a handful of times, but he hadn’t been overly impressed. She was pretty enough, but she had a hard-edged ambition that reminded him of the desperate actors who littered the streets of Hollywood. Willing to sell their souls to get what they wanted. That might help explain why he hadn’t been more concerned when the woman had gone missing. Or considered how it was affecting Darren. “Not until I went through his stuff after he died. He must have hired a dozen private detectives to search for her.”
