“I’m sorry I couldn’t get a better shot of him. My impression from the brief glimpse I got was of a male. Not that it tells us anything. I would assume this person was hired.” She stood by the window where only days ago she’d been with JT, letting the night cradle them, pretending nothing in the world could get to them.
She’d known it was a pretty lie even before she’d realized who her new lover was. She’d known her time with him was probably short.
They’d stolen a few days, but now she wondered if it was coming to an abrupt end. She was surprised at how far she might be willing to go to not allow that to happen.
JT stood across the room from her, still quiet, but she could sense the boiling emotions threatening to bubble over. His tension was etched in the hard line of his expression. He might have faced down pirates before and lots of scary situations, but she doubted he’d done it when he was with someone he deeply cared about. It was a different kind of anxiety, and she didn’t think he was handling it well.
“I’m happy you thought to try to get us a picture of the asshole at all. That was quick thinking,” Tag said. “Also it gave me and Alex the rest of the night off. We were pulling into Alex’s driveway to drop them off when we got the call.”
Alex grinned. “I’ve never seen Big Tag move so fast. Apparently the sitter called and told Charlotte that Travis woke up and won’t go back to sleep.”
“Charlie tried to cover it up, but I could hear that kid wailing in the background,” Big Tag acknowledged. “Before you start writing the Am I the Asshole post, I had him all last weekend while Charlie and Chelsea did a sisters thing that I pray was really about massages and mani pedis, because their sister time used to be spent taking over small countries.”
“And I was just making sure Ian doesn’t get in trouble,” Alex added. “It has nothing to do with the fact that we’ll now have to stay over here and make sure no one tries to kill JT again. Nothing to do with the fact that I can sleep in instead of waking up to a dirty diaper in the face because Eve brings the baby into bed with us thinking she’ll be able to sleep a little longer. Vivian never sticks her stinky diaper in her momma’s face. No. It is always mine.”
“Hey, when you and Theo figure out how to breastfeed, that can change for you,” Tag snarked. “But Alex is right. We’re going to bed down here and make sure everything goes smoothly. There’s room service, right? I’m sure this place has killer room service, and I don’t have to fight the girls for pancakes. They’re surprisingly sneaky when it comes to food hoarding. They do not mind licking things.”
Alex had gotten rid of his tie the minute they’d walked upstairs. “And hey, we’ll need to make sure you two make it to the airport. Are you sure they don’t need a bodyguard, because I could use a tan.”
“Nah, we need to play this off like they’re not worried,” Big Tag said. “We’re going with the police line that it was a drunk driver. We can’t let anyone know you’re worried someone’s trying to kill you.”
“Maybe we should talk to the police here in Dallas about the whole case.” JT finally spoke, the words sounding grim coming out of his mouth. He leaned against the pool table. “Maybe it’s time we bring the authorities in.”
She shook her head. “That’s not a good idea. What can the police do? We filed the accident report because that’s a thing people do. If anyone goes looking for it, they’ll find a report that we were hit. But that’s why we didn’t tell them what we suspected. We can’t open that door. We’re leaving tomorrow. The most they can do is exactly what Adam will do, and he’s got better equipment.”
“So much better,” Alex agreed. “Also, calling in the cops would probably be akin to calling in the press. The minute a reporter gets a whiff that a Malone heir might be the target of an assassin, that story goes everywhere and then we scare off our spy.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing,” JT said. “We scare off the spy and then we’ve got more time to figure out who killed my friend. That should lead us to the spy.”
“The more likely outcome is the spy simply changes the time and place for the drop-off,” she pointed out calmly. “We know who the actual spy is. We don’t know who is working for you. This is our best shot at figuring out who your mole is.”
He was quiet for a moment, but his head came up and a steely glint hit his eyes. “You’re right. This is all about my company. I get to make the calls here. I say I don’t care what happens to that tech.”
Big Tag turned JT’s way, his brows drawn together in obvious consternation. “What are you talking about? You do know how much money you stand to lose if someone else gets this tech before the patent goes through? Hell, even with the patent it can be hard to quash outside of the US and Europe.”
“Not to mention the fact that we don’t know what North Korea will do with that tech,” Alex pointed out. “I know it seems like the only applications are in petroleum and gas, but a material that flexible could easily be used on warheads. From what I’ve read you’ve managed to create a new material that doesn’t corrode the way some of the
