So, yeah, he was grumpy.
“The Russian’s wife,” Colton repeated. “Have you ever met her?”
Noah side-eyed him. “No. Why?”
“I don’t think she exists.”
Noah snorted and lifted his beer to his lips. “That’s ridiculous. Of course she exists.”
“No one has ever seen her. I think she’s a figment of his imagination.”
Noah rolled his eyes. “He’s a professional athlete. He couldn’t have a fake wife. Just google her.”
“I did. There are zero pictures of her. I mean, zip. Don’t you think that’s weird?”
Noah grumbled again. “Don’t you have any friends? I’m working here.”
“That hurts, man. I thought we were friends.”
Guilt forced an apology from his lips. “Fine. But don’t you have somewhere to be? I thought famous people had to go be famous and shit.”
“Nope.” Colt slung a six string onto his lap and whipped out a quick set of chords.
Noah glanced up. “That new?”
Colt shrugged. “Something I’m working on for the next album.”
His voice had taken on an almost imperceptible tightness. His friend—and they were friends, which was so fucking weird—had a lot riding on his next album. His first two went platinum, but his last release didn’t have a single top-ten hit.
“You could investigate it, you know.”
Noah peered over his glasses. “Investigate what?”
“The Russian’s wife.”
“Why me?”
“Because you work for the CIA, right?”
“Yes,” Noah deadpanned. The guys were convinced his company was just a cover for something much more exciting.
Colton paused in his playing. “Shit. Seriously?”
Noah hit a few more keys. “No.”
“But you’ve got a surveillance van, man.”
“All computer security companies do.”
“Bullshit.”
Noah sighed and leaned back in the chair at the dining table where he sat. “Clients hire me to test the security of their systems. Sometimes that includes communications and surveillance.”
“I think you’re lying. I think you work for the FBI or something.”
Well, that part was almost true. Or it had been at one time. Consulting with the FBI had been the only thing that kept him out of a minimum-security prison.
But those days were over. Now he got paid millions of dollars to help dipshits like Colton Wheeler protect themselves when they clicked on porn links.
His cell phone buzzed in his pocket. Noah pulled it out and saw Alexis’s face on the screen. His mood instantly lightened. He put the phone to his ear. “Hey.”
She barely made a sound. “Noah . . .”
His whole body went rigid. “What’s wrong?”
“Can you—” She made a choking sound.
He stood and nearly knocked over the chair. “Can I what? What is going on?”
“Something happened. Can you come over?”
“I’m on my way.” He hung up and shoved his phone in his pocket as he dug his keys from the other one.
Colton watched him, concern lacing his voice and his eyes. “Everything all right?”
“I gotta go.”
Noah drove across town like he was trying out for Mario Kart. He whipped into her driveway, killed the engine, and threw open his car door. Her front door was unlocked, so he walked in and yelled her name.
She answered from upstairs. “Up here.” Her voice sounded thick.
Noah took the stairs two at a time and then walked down the short hallway to her bedroom. She sat in the window seat overlooking the backyard. At the sound of his footsteps, she turned and looked at him. Her eyes were red and puffy. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a crazy, messy knot, and she wore his sloppy sweatshirt over baggy sweatpants. She looked, in a word, horrible. He would’ve laughed if his heart hadn’t suddenly shattered.
His eyes took in the rest of the scene. A box of papers and photos lay overturned on the floor, and other items were strewn across the bed. He crossed the room in long strides and dropped to his knees beside the window seat. “What’s going on? What happened?”
She handed him a crumpled, yellowed card, like the kind that came with flowers.
A name was scribbled in hurried scrawl.
Elliott V.
Confusion pulled his eyebrows together. Noah looked up. “What is this? Who is Elliott V.?”
“That,” Alexis said, “is apparently my father.”
* * *
It took ten agonizing minutes to get the full story out of her. The young woman, the one Alexis had been hoping would talk to her for a week, wasn’t a survivor at all but was instead Alexis’s sister?
Noah attempted to keep his features relaxed and neutral as Alexis filled in the blanks. Inside, however, heartbreak battled with rage. Pure, white-hot rage. The man had ignored his daughter her entire life but now he wanted a kidney from her?
Noah sat back on his haunches. “How do you know Candi is telling the truth?”
Alexis swiped a hand over her nose. “Why would she lie?”
“People lie for all kinds of reasons.”
“We have the exact same eyes, Noah. And anyway, she says the DNA proves it.”
“Did you see it? The test results?”
“No, but there’s this.” She pointed to the card. “What are the chances that someone named Elliott V. would send flowers to her funeral?”
Noah ran a hand over his hair. “What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did she tell you how to get in contact with her?”
Alexis reached into the pocket of her sweater and pulled out a piece of paper with a scribbled phone number on it.
Noah set it aside and then rested his hands on top of her thighs. “You okay?” he asked as gently as possible.
Her eyes darted sideways. Another swallow.
“Look at me.”
She obeyed, but in the same instant, her back straightened and her face became fixed in a mask of composure.
“Don’t do that,” he said, squeezing her legs.
She cleared her throat, the effort too forced. “Don’t do what?”
“Shut down. Pretend you’re not upset.”
She shook her head, a nervous back-and-forth shake. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’re in shock because your life has once again been turned upside down.”
She crossed her arms across her chest, defensive and protective. “I’m fine. I just . . .
