Wiping sweat from her forehead, she sank into her lawn chair and kicked up her feet, exposing as much of her body to the ocean breeze as possible. She swished a big gulp of water around in her mouth before swallowing, then poured the remainder of the bottle over the back of her neck. She closed her eyes and let her body relax, hoping the breeze and pounding surf would calm her, giving her some relief from her out-of-control thoughts.
Since Gavin left, her mind had been a whirling dervish of activity, spinning up thousands of questions, but finding few answers. She’d thought working on this new project would help, but that hadn’t been the case.
Several moments into her please-let-me-find-some-peace meditation, she heard the hum of a motor and the crunching of tires on the gravel parking lot. She didn’t want to leave the solitude of the trance, but the motor didn’t sound like Robby’s truck, and common sense dictated she open her eyes to see who’d come to visit.
If she were completely honest with herself, she’d admit to hoping it was Gavin. She still didn’t know if she could trust him, but her sweaty palms and rapid heart rate indicated it didn’t matter.
A red, low-rider pickup with flames painted on the front idled at the edge of the lot. The dark tinting on the windows kept her from seeing inside the vehicle, so she couldn’t make out the driver. She also couldn’t tell how many people were inside.
In all the time she lived on the island, she’d never been afraid. People often pulled into the lot to check the hours of the bar or to turn around. But everything about this vehicle, from the red paint and flames, to the dark windows, to the way it sat unmoving, screamed danger. Even though she couldn’t see into the vehicle, she had the sense the driver was watching her, sizing her up.
Gavin’s words came rushing at her… He can make your life hell.
She hoped she was being paranoid, allowing Gavin’s ominous warning to overtake logic and freak her out unnecessarily. But in case this wasn’t runaway paranoia, she got up from her chair and stepped backward into the workshop.
She didn’t want to take her eyes off the truck, but she needed to search the workbench for something that could be used as a weapon. With shaky hands, she grabbed her cellphone and a long piece of pipe she could swing like a baseball bat.
The engine of the vehicle revved and the truck pulled farther into the parking lot. The building blocked her view and kept her from seeing them or what they were doing. The upside was they couldn’t see her either. She sprinted toward the stairs and climbed them two at a time, not slowing until she was in the kitchen with the door locked behind her.
She ran to Robby’s room, her only view of the parking lot, and yanked up the blinds. The truck was making a slow circle in the gravel. From the corner of her eye, a flash caught her attention.
She whipped her gaze to the road and saw Robby pulling into the lot. Panic for his safety seized her. She fumbled with her phone, trying to open it, so she could call him and warn him to stay in his truck.
The mysterious vehicle's motor revved, and when she looked out the window again, all she saw was the tailgate as the truck disappeared down the road, heading south toward the bridge. She snapped the phone closed and, with shaking knees, made it from Robby’s room to hers.
She hadn’t believed Gavin’s boss would actually inflict physical harm, but maybe she’d been wrong. What kind of man did Gavin work for? And what kind of person was Gavin to condone such behavior?
While working in her shop, she’d begun to consider that Gavin made a few valid points. The money she and Robby would receive from selling the property would pay for Robby’s schooling, saving them years of student loan payments. She was concerned about running the bar by herself. If she sold, she could work for someone else and not have the stress of being a business owner.
But she had just as many valid reasons for not selling, and this latest development pissed her off. Selling because she wanted to was one thing. Selling because she’d been bullied?
Hell, no.
She stripped out of her sweaty clothes and jumped into the shower. By the time she finished, she had a firm plan. It was time for Robby to teach her the ins and outs of computer research. However, rather than researching Gavin, she wanted to know everything possible about Max Holden.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Callie’s call sent shockwaves of rage through Gavin. An hour later, he’d calmed slightly but still felt the sharp sting of reality. Funny how a person’s world could change in an instant. Gavin had made the decision to quit his job before Max made that call. But finding out just how far Max would go had cut him to the core.
He was also fully aware his world hadn’t been the only one to disintegrate with that call. Callie was devastated, and Gavin was worried about her. He’d called to check on her several times and had even offered to let her stay with him for a few days while she sorted things. But she declined, saying she planned to spend the night with Tiffany.
After Max left for his golf game tomorrow, she’d go back to the house and finish her detective work. She’d already proven herself valuable to Gavin’s efforts by slipping into Max’s office and retrieving the last number dialed from his phone.
Since Max had given both Gavin and the hired gun forty-eight hours, Gavin felt as if everything—meaning Sunny and Robby—would be okay tonight. First thing in the morning, Gavin would call his friend Marty, a private investigator, and have him track the number. If they could find the person Max called, then maybe they could figure out his plans.
Gavin picked up the bottle of Crown sitting next to his chair and threw back another long swig. He’d started off using a glass, but decided a shot at a time wasn’t getting the job done. Tonight, he needed heavy-duty firepower to kill his demons.
After leaving Max, he’d gone to the gym, but quickly lost interest. Rather than calming him, it had the opposite effect. So, in lieu of being healthy, he headed for the liquor cabinet.
Sitting in his perfectly manicured backyard, watching the crimson sky turn dark, had also proved agitating, at first. But the bottle of Crown had mellowed him out, allowing him to contemplate his future.
Although the idea seemed crazy on the surface, he’d always wanted to run a restaurant. He loved to cook and, at one time, considered culinary school. Every time he closed his eyes and allowed himself to imagine that kind of future, he found himself on the beaches of Anticue.
He loved the solitude and relaxed lifestyle the island offered. But that would be lost forever if he didn’t figure out a way to stop Max. Taking another swig from the bottle, he assigned his mind the task of figuring out a solution.
***
“I’m coming. Jeez, knock it off.” Sunny scrubbed the sleep out of her eyes and shuffled through the living room toward the kitchen.
Robby exited his bedroom right behind her. “Who’s beating down the door?”
“I have no idea, but it better be damned important this early in the morning.”
Okay, in all fairness, nine-thirty wasn’t exactly early. But to Sunny, who hadn’t gotten to sleep until after four, it was obscene.
Once she figured out how to use the various search engines, she’d been unstoppable. She stuck with her plan of finding everything possible on Max Holden, but she also broke the plan and did a fair amount of research on Gavin.
Bottom line: Max was a snake. And while she hadn’t been able to find anything concrete about Gavin, she’d come to the conclusion that if he worked for Max Holden, he must be a belly crawler too.
Logically, she knew she was better off without him. Her heart hadn’t gotten the memo, though, because as she turned the corner and saw Gavin standing at the door, it took a flying leap toward him.
“What the hell is he doing here?” Robby asked. He planted his hands on his hips and glared at Gavin through the door’s upper pane of glass.
Spotting the familiar cups they used for coffee at the Anticue Quick Stop, she said, “I don’t know, but he has coffee. I think it’s worth find
ing out.” She opened the door and realized the pounding had been so loud because he’d been kicking the door with his foot. He held a large storage box in his arms, with two cups of coffee sitting on top, and a tower of boxes stood next to him.
“Good morning.” His tone was soft and his eyes held an intimacy only a lover could pull off. He glanced at Robby and said, “I didn’t know if you drank coffee or not, so I only got two. I can go back and get another if you like.”
Sunny took one of the cups but didn’t step aside so he could enter. “What are you doing here?”
He glanced at the boxes next to him. “We have some research to do.” Wicked mischief glimmered in his eyes, and for some stupid reason, hope flared in her chest. “Some of it I need to do, but you and Robby are the only ones who’ll be able to spot the names we need to find.”
Robby stepped up next to her. “What are we looking for?”
“I want you to look through all the donations that have been made over the past several years and through the lists of Holden’s subcontractors to see if you recognize any of the names.”
Sunny took a sip of her coffee and stared at the boxes. “Donations for what? Why would we recognize the names?”
“As you know, the current ordinances won’t allow for a Holden Resort. But Max has several county commissioners on his payroll that will vote to change the ordinances. Once we know who we’re dealing with, we can go from there.”
Sunny gasped. She knew most of the county commissioners. In fact, Ed and Joe were both commissioners. “I don’t believe you.”
Gavin’s face was a blank slate. “Believe it.”
Sunny crossed one arm over her stomach and took another sip of coffee. “I have a question for you. The way you answer it will determine whether or not you come into this house.”
“Okay.”
“How can you stand to work for a man like Max Holden?”
Gavin reacted as if she’d physically punched him in the gut. His breath left in a whoosh, and he slumped slightly forward. When he opened his eyes, the pain she’d inflicted with the question was a tangible, living, breathing thing. “Max has been good to me. He paid my way through college and has always treated me like a member of the family. He offered me a chance to make something out of my life.”
He took a deep breath, then sighed. “I didn’t know Max was capable of some of the things I now suspect. That’s what I’m going to look for. Proof that the rumors I’ve heard over the years are true. Or, hopefully, false.”
Sunny checked Robby’s face, gauging his reaction to see if he trusted Gavin’s sincerity. Apparently he did because he pushed past her, grabbed one of the boxes, and hauled it into the house.
Gavin nodded to his cup of coffee. “I’ll get the boxes, if you’ll carry that.”
“Why are you doing this?”
Gavin picked up an additional two boxes and said, “Because it’s the right thing to do.”
***
From his position in the floor, propped up against the fridge, with an open notebook on his lap, Robby said, “Tell me again exactly what I’m looking for.”
They’d been at this for almost an hour, and none of them had found anything that proved Gavin’s theory of Anticue commissioners being in bed with the bad guys. So far, she seemed to be the only one in bed with someone from Max’s team.
“Any name that sounds familiar,” Gavin said. He put his finger on the page to hold his place. “Max isn’t going to leave a flashing neon sign over the names of the people he pays off. They’ll be hidden. Well… hidden in plain sight to someone who knows what they’re looking for. We have to put the pieces together in order to figure out the puzzle.”
“So what are you looking for?”
Gavin rubbed the back of his neck and leaned back in the chair. “I’m looking at past situations where the landowners were reluctant to sell.” His face contorted and his eyes darkened. “I’m looking for something that might tell me why they had a sudden change of heart.”
Maybe they received a visit from some scary dudes in a red truck, Sunny thought.
She chewed her lip and debated telling Gavin about the strange vehicle. She didn’t know that the truck was connected to any of this. She still hoped she’d been overly paranoid but decided it wouldn’t hurt to mention the incident.
“Do you know anyone who drives a red, low-rider truck, with flames painted on the front and really dark tinted windows?”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Robby’s head snap up. “You think those guys had something to do with this?” When he came upstairs, he asked Sunny about the truck, but she brushed it off by saying people did weird things all the time. Now, he eyed her suspiciously.
Gavin tensed and his blue eyes turned cold and assessing. “What guys?”
“Late yesterday afternoon, a red truck pulled into the parking lot. They sat at the edge of the lot for a few minutes, and even though I couldn’t see in, I had the feeling I was being watched.”
“Where were you?”
“Sitting outside the shop, taking a break.”
“What happened?”
“They just sat there. All of my instincts screamed something wasn’t right, so I got up and went into the shop for my cellphone and…” She laughed, a little embarrassed. “I grabbed a pipe that I could swing like a baseball bat.”
Gavin didn’t laugh. “And then what?”
“While I was doing that, they pulled on up into the parking lot. As soon as they were out of sight behind the building, I took off for the house. I ran up here, locked the doors, and watched them out of Robby’s window.”
“They were turning around real slow,” Robby interjected. “But when I pulled into the lot, they took off. I couldn’t tell much about them, but I did see that there were two men in the truck.”
“Son of a bitch.” Gavin pushed his chair back from the table with so much force it toppled over backward. He ripped open the kitchen door and stalked out, slamming it shut behind him.
Sunny looked at Robby, who sat wide-eyed, staring at her. “I think he’s mad.”
Robby didn’t laugh as she expected. Instead, he stood and followed Gavin outside.
***
“What’s going on?” Robby’s strained voice bled over the sound of the phone ringing in Gavin’s ear. He turned to Robby and held up his finger in the universal just-a-minute sign.
On the sixth ring, the receptionist finally answered, then transferred him to Marty.
While waiting for Marty to pick up, Gavin dug into his pocket for the piece of paper on which he’d written the number. Because Marty often worked vampire hours, he didn’t usually get into the office until late morning. Gavin hadn’t expected to catch him this early but was relieved to hear his voice on the other end of the line. “Hey man, long time.”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” Gavin said, rubbing the back of his neck. He and Marty had been best friends through high school and into college. Then, like everyone and everything else that mattered, Gavin let Marty drift away. “I need a huge favor. Fast.”
“Of course you do.” Gavin heard papers shuffling, then Marty said, “I’m ready.”
“I have a phone number I need you to track. I think you’re going to find it’s a cell. I need to know who it belongs to and everything you can find out about them. I’m especially interested in their occupation and the vehicle they drive.”
“What’s going on?”
He gave Marty the number, then filled him in on all he suspected and the little bit he knew about Max’s dealings. He told Marty to look for anything that would give them an advantage or some leverage in getting Max to back off this deal. And, depending on what they found, they’d turn the evidence over to the authorities, if necessary.
By the time Gavin hung up, he felt better and worse. Better, because he knew Marty would find everything there was to find. Worse, because he had a terrible suspicion Marty would find more than Gavin wanted to know.
Gavin didn’t h
ide any of his conversation from Robby, who patiently waited for Gavin to finish the call. He hoped that gained him some points in the younger man’s eyes, rather than making him an even bigger threat to Sunny.
When Gavin disconnected, Robby said, “You really are trying to make this okay for us, aren’t you?”
Gavin stood and faced him. “Yeah, I am.” He put his hands on his hips and stared at the ocean rolling onshore. “I care about your sister, and you. I’m not going to let anything happen to either of you, or this bar.”
Robby nodded and, although he didn’t exactly smile, the permascowl relaxed. “Sorry for being a prick.”
Gavin clasped Robby’s shoulder with one hand and offered his other for a knuckle rap. “S’all good. You had every reason not to trust me, but I hope that changes.”
Gavin turned the handle on the kitchen door, pushed it open, and had the breath knocked out of him. The crushed expression on Sunny’s face indicated she’d found something. Something awful.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“What’s wrong?” Robby and Gavin asked like a couple of choir boys in perfect harmony.
Sunny couldn’t answer around the anvil in her throat, so she held up the paperwork and pointed to the name on the list.
Gavin sat in the chair across from her and eased the file out of her hands. Robby squatted next to her and took hold of her shoulder. “Sis, what did you find?”
“Ed.” Her voice cracked, and she cleared her throat for another try. “Ed is on Holden’s payroll. Literally.”
“What?” Robby shot to his feet and backed away as if she’d brandished a dangerous weapon. “Show me.”
Gavin rested the file on the table and pulled out the list of subcontractors she’d been studying. Leaning over the table, she pointed to Ed’s name.
She thought this whole thing would be a huge waste of time, unable to believe anyone she knew could be bought. But as she started going through the list of subcontractors, unease stirred in her stomach. She’d found a few names that sounded familiar and wrote them down to check out later.
Last Call (Book #2 - Heat Wave Series) Page 20