Keeping 6 (Rock Point Book 1)

by Freya Barker

  DAMIAN

  “You’ve got it bad.”

  I turn away from the view over Durango through my window to find James leaning against the doorpost. I shrug my shoulders in response. I’m not about to deny the obvious, I know I have it bad. James closes the door behind him, saunters in, and takes a seat on the other side of my desk.

  “No progress on locating Willoughs?” he asks.

  “Durango PD found his Suburban parked at the far end of the Mild to Wild parking lot.” At his confused look, I clarify. “A rafting company on the north end of town. They have a couple of old school buses to haul people to and from the river, and he’d slipped the truck between them. The place is always packed this time of year, so they didn’t notice until early this morning. Blackfoot is out there to see if anyone remembers when it was left there.”

  “So he switched rides. Not like we weren’t expecting that. He’s probably long gone,” James concludes.

  “I don’t think so,” I disagree. “I’ll be the first to admit I never liked the guy—mainly because he thinks he can own everything he sets his mind to, treats people like belongings, too— but didn’t make his fortune by running scared. As long as that damn box is out there, he’s not going to go far.”

  James nods in understanding. He walks to the window and stares out. “Is it?” he asks cryptically.

  “Is what?”

  “Is it still out there? The stolen goods?” He doesn’t turn to look at me, but I can feel the tension coming off his back.

  “Not sure if I understand the implication.” The hair on my neck stands on end as I burn holes in his back with my eyes. Finally, he turns around.

  “Easy, my friend,” he folds his arms in front of him and gives his head a little shake. “You can’t blame me for asking. It’s what I would try, if I thought someone close to the investigation might be involved, I’d be careful what I shared and didn’t. I’d even hold back evidence to try and shake them loose.”

  “I thought we’d covered that already?” I point out, but my tense shoulders relax. I trust James. His calmly observant demeanor, keen deductive skills, and sharp intuition have always been attributes I’ve strived for. Even the parental way in which he calls me out when he has concerns is something I’ve tried to implement since I was handed this field office. An example and father figure.

  He doesn’t even blink.

  “We don’t have it. Blackfoot suggested at some point having Kerry pretend she had it—draw the players out—but...” I clarify.

  “I’m sure you knocked that idea down fast,” James chuckles. “Not a bad idea, though,” he continues, holding his hands up defensively when I threaten to come out of my chair. “Relax. I think that ship has sailed. We’ve got Sinclair down and keeping a close eye out for Willoughs. We’re left with two obvious problems. Who killed Sinclair? It’s clear someone other than the man himself pulled the trigger, but are we comfortable with Bruce Willoughs in the role of cold-blooded killer? And where the hell is that damn shipment? We can safely assume Sinclair is the one who ran her car off the road. Doesn’t make sense he went back to retrieve it from the wreck, or he would’ve been gone a long time ago.”

  “By the same reasoning, we know Willoughs obviously doesn’t have it.” I hesitate, uneasy about bringing up the elephant in the room again. “What if it was taken after it was towed? Blackfoot had it locked down in the forensics lab, which is under camera surveillance, but what if it was someone who has reason to be there? Someone they wouldn’t look at twice? No one may have actually looked at those tapes, just taken the word of whomever was manning the cameras.” I don’t mention names out loud, but James is keen enough to figure those out by himself. Both Boris Parnak and Doug Browns would be frequent visitors there.

  “Call Blackfoot. See if they have surveillance tapes of that night. I have to meet with Ella, try and calm down some jurisdictional bullshit around Sinclair’s body. She wants him put on ice and shipped back to the UK. Feels our local law enforcement is not equipped to deal with a high-profile case like this.” James rubs a hand in the back of his neck. Looks like he’s starting to feel the strain of this investigation, as well.

  “Bet that went over well with our local PD,” I say, with a heavy load of sarcasm. I know for a fact that that would not only piss off Parnak, but Blackfoot, as well.

  “You’re not lying. Bedside manner is definitely not one of Ms. Friesen’s strengths. I’ve called in our own forensics investigative team to go over the findings to date. She’ll have to learn I’m not the right guy to play hardball with; she’ll lose every time.” With a half-assed wave, he opens the door and walks out, before sticking his head back in. “By the way—how’s Agent Roosberg doing? If you need an extra hand in the meantime, let me know. I can probably spare Dylan.”

  Dylan Barnes is technically one of my agents who was last to join the Durango field office. As youngest of our team, he’d had the least opportunity to get some field experience under his belt. When James mentioned he could use some help in Denver on several active cases, I’d offered it to Dylan. He jumped at it and had been there for almost a year now.

  “Luna should be back in a day or so. She’s impossible to keep away from the job, and I’m tempted just to give in and give her the green light so I don’t have to deal with the constant phone calls. We’ll manage until then, although, you know I’ll want Dylan back at some point, right?” I shoot James a sharp look, which he shrugs off smilingly.

  “Turning out to be a good agent, that boy.”

  “Hardly a boy anymore,” I point out.

  “Hmmm. I guess.” He straightens away from the doorpost he’s been hanging on to. “No worries. A few months more on the case he’s been involved in and you can have him back.” He raps his knuckles on the door. “Well, I’d best be off. I’ll be in touch.”

  I get up and close the door behind him before pulling out my phone to call Blackfoot. When I tell him what I want from him, he bristles at first, just as I would’ve done had the loyalty of my colleagues been called into question.

  “Goddammit, Gomez. You’re killing me here.”

  Instead of responding, I just wait. I know he’ll find his way there on his own. He doesn’t keep me waiting long before he gives in.

  “I’ll get on it,” he bites off before ending the call. I know he will.

  THE REST OF MY DAY is hectic.

  Jas and I spend a couple of hours chasing down a lead on Willoughs that goes nowhere. One of the employees at Mild to Wild remembered seeing a man walking away from the Suburban and crossing the road to the Hampton Inn on the other side. She swore she saw the guy getting into a red Ford Ranger, with an upside down wheelbarrow in the back of the pickup. A patrol car spotted a truck matching the description heading south, and we caught up to it just past Aztec. The old, nearly toothless gardener we found behind the wheel looked nothing like Willoughs. He’d been at the Hampton to see if they needed a landscaper.

  The entire time we were chasing the truck, Luna was blowing up my phone. She’d picked up that initial call over the scanner, and I barely managed to hold her off from coming. It ended up taking me to concede to her returning to the office tomorrow. The woman drives a hard bargain.

  I haven’t heard back from James yet but assume he is either still furiously negotiating or has already won the jurisdictional battle. Otherwise, someone would’ve informed me by now.

  Blackfoot was undoubtedly busy with the home invasion that was discovered this morning, which left one person dead at the scene. A problem that was fast getting out of hand in Durango. A case, now that they’ve graduated into murder, I’m sure we will end up getting called in on sooner rather than later.

  Jasper’s already gone when I leave for the day at a little after five. He’s been burning the candle at both ends, so I’m glad to see his desk empty. We all carry a set of keys, and as long as everyone spends some time in the office each day for briefing, we usually let the workload guide our hours. I turn the
lights off and lock the door behind me.

  As usual, when I turn off the highway toward my house, the view and the silence seems to melt away the stress of the day. So much so, that when I pull up in front of the house and get out, I don’t really feel like going out. I’d much rather spend the evening with Kerry on my lap in the lounger on the back deck. Then I remember the excitement in her voice at the prospect of a genuine date and realize she’s been cooped up inside the house for days.

  The decision is easily made; I’ll take her out for a nice meal, maybe drive her up to the overlook at Fort Lewis College to watch the lights. After that I’ll take her home—to bed.

  The moment I open the door and see her coming down the stairs, every thought I just had evaporates from my head, leaving only one—to bed. Her hair piled messily on her head, large silver hoops in her ears, her dress looking like something painted on and only made passably decent by the floral thing she is wearing over it. She looks like a fucking wet dream.

  I don’t even slow down but keep walking until I meet her at the bottom of the stairs. Standing on the last step, her eyes are level with mine. Her hands are tangled in my hair and her mouth is on mine before I even have a chance to wrap my arms around her. When we come up for air, her face has that gorgeous flush and her lips are wet and slightly swollen.

  “Hi,” she says breathily, a soft smile playing on her lips.

  “I may have changed my mind about going out,” I inform her, my voice hoarse with passion, but the look of disappointment ghosting over her face has me quickly change direction. “But we’ll need some nourishment for what I have in mind for you.”

  The blinding smile she rewards me with is worth every second of discomfort my raging hard-on will cause me tonight.

  CHAPTER 23

  “They found the box.”

  He was surprised when the burner phone rang. As far as he knew, only Sinclair had that number and he hadn’t used it since the last time he’d contacted the Brit. This voice was unfamiliar, yet he knew instinctively this was the Brit’s, to this point, silent partner. A shiver of fear, or maybe anticipation, ran down his spine. Whoever this was, there was only one person they could’ve gotten this number off of and he is dead.

  “Where was it?” he wanted to know, excitement starting to crowd out any fear.

  “That’s irrelevant. More important question is, where is it at now? I have reason to believe the woman had it all along.”

  “The bookstore owner? That doesn’t make sense,” he points out.

  “No? She disappeared right after Sinclair so clumsily botched up yet another attempt at retrieval. Any and all attempts by law enforcement to find it have been fruitless. But perhaps I made an error in judgment in contacting you,” the voice sounds derisive and slightly threatening.

  “I know where she is,” he blurted out before thinking. He’d been able to keep a low profile and at the same time keep an eye on the house. No one was looking much further than Durango at this point. Amateurs. He made looking like the typical, spoiled millionaire into an art. “Have had an eye on her this whole time,” he boasted. “Have you heard of geo tracking software? It’s something I used for years in my company. Very effective. It took me all of five minutes to install on Ms. Emerson’s laptop.”

  “Ingenious, but isn’t there a limit to the range?”

  “On the old versions, but not on this one. It uses the same framework as any GPS. I had no trouble pinpointing her just north of Hermosa. Agent Gomez has kept her at his place this entire time.”

  A LOOSE CANNON, BUT one that would serve the purpose well. Pompous beyond belief at the careful strokes to his ego and therefore not as careful as he should be. The suspicion he might be used to advantage is nicely confirmed—he bites immediately when presented with the retrieval of his treasured manuscripts.

  From here it would be simple.

  “So Gomez has known the shipment was under his roof the entire time.” This is said as a foregone conclusion, and the rich idiot swallows it down whole.

  “Would seem that way, wouldn’t it? To think it was under my nose the entire time.” He’s eager, as expected.

  “I would suggest giving it a day or two, make sure you plan carefully, and—”

  “What’s in this for you?” he interrupts.

  “I’d like to continue our business relationship, it’s mutually profitable, so let’s just call it customer service. If you give me an hour notice before you go in, I will make sure law enforcement is duly distracted. It’s the least I can do.”

  “Of course,” he swiftly agrees, not knowing that in doing so, he’s signed his own downfall.

  CHAPTER 24

  Kerry

  I can hear the familiar piano melody as we walk into the Diamond Belle Saloon, and my eyes are immediately drawn to the old man behind the keys. His eyes are on the door and he smiles in recognition when he spots Damian. For me, he has an almost lascivious wink, and I can’t hold back a chuckle when I hear Damian growl under his breath behind me.

  “Dirty old coot,” he mumbles, causing me to laugh out loud. One of the waitresses turns her head at the sound and moves in our direction, a smile on her face.

  “Regular booth?” she asks Damian, who gives her a friendly nod.

  “Bring all your dates here that you have a regular booth?” I tease him over my shoulder. The hand he rests on my hip as he guides me through the restaurant squeezes slightly. Once we’re seated and left with menus and an order of drinks on the way, he grabs my hand over the table.

  “I don’t,” he says with a serious face. “The only people I’ve ever brought here have been my sister, Gus once, and Jasper and Luna for lunch at Christmas. Mostly I come alone because no one seems to appreciate the music.”

  “Are you serious?” I blurt out, a tad skeptical.

  “As a heart attack. Gus would rather have found a quiet spot to talk, Bella almost walked out until Clive started playing modern songs she recognized and Jasper...let’s just say Jasper is more of a hardcore rocker. The manly music, as he so often likes to remind me.” The look of horrified disbelief on his face is comical.

  “Well, I love it. Mind you, I love all kinds of music. Don’t have any one particular style preference over another,” I admit with a shrug of my shoulders.

  “I’m glad,” he says, bending toward me. “I much prefer sitting here with you than anyone else.”

  It occurs to me that we have much left to learn about each other. The unconventional progress of our relationship is a lot like being thrown into a pressure cooker. Intense circumstances, high levels of chemistry, and close proximity have brought us to a point that would normally take months to grow.

  This place really has a fabulous atmosphere and not just because of the music. I’m surprised how easy and effortless conversation flows over dinner, from favorite movies to first childhood memories and from fears to family dynamics. It seems we’ve covered it all.

  I shove my plate away from the edge and put my hands over my stomach in the universal sign for stuffed. “I’m thinking I need to find a dress like this,” I announce, loving the way the stretchy material simply stretches a little more to accommodate my food gut. I’m glad I threw my kimono on over top since it hides a lot of sins.

  “Don’t remind me,” Damian groans across the table. “I’ve been working hard to try and ignore the fact, that thing leaves nothing to the imagination.”

  I catch some movement from the corner of my eye and turn toward it. Fucking hell. I don’t know who this person is, but from the look on her face, she’s bringing trouble. Her eyes are shooting daggers at me. Tall, busty, heavy on the makeup and with a mane of sleek, almost-black hair, the woman virtually charges at our booth. For some reason, the name Cora comes to mind.

  “Darling,” she purrs when Damian finally turns his head in her direction. His initial shock is quickly replaced by a narrowing of his eyes as she closes the distance. Once close enough, she has the gall to run her hand proprietarily
through his hair. Oh, this is going to be fun. Damian grabs her firmly by the wrist, pulling on her hand and moving his head out of the way at the same time.

  “What the fuck, Cora?”

  Bingo. I give myself a little round of applause and sit back to watch the fireworks. There was a time when a display like this would have me sick with insecurity but not anymore. And certainly not with Damian’s anger at the intrusion permeating the air. Yeah, I’m good.

  “I just popped in for a quick drink and noticed you sitting here. Thought you might like some company,” she simpers. Sure, I bet she spotted him through the window and decided to try and stake a claim. Damian’s eyes flick to mine, and I smile encouragingly.

  “As you can see, I have company,” he bites off.

  “Ah, yes.” A smile as fake as her massive tits accompanies the hateful glare she directs at me. I smile broadly, which immediately has her turn the charm back on Damian. She plants a hand on the table and leans forward, her assets almost piling out in front of us. In a voice that’s dropped so low I have to strain to listen in, she says, “I’m afraid I was referring to the kind of company that has me on hands and knees and you trying to decide which end to fuck first, my ass or my mouth. Somehow she...” She throws me a pitying look. “...seems a little too vanilla to give you what we both know you need.”

  Alrighty, then. A little more information than I banked on.

  I watch in fascination as Damian rises to his full height from the booth, causing Cora to stumble back a little. He’s intimidating, to say the least, with barely contained rage rolling off him in thick waves.

  “Enough,” he barks.

  I vaguely notice Clive’s earlier ballad transition into a hefty ragtime, drawing the attention from some of the patrons whose ears and eyes had started pointing in our direction. Bless his heart.

  Damian grabs a firm hold of Cora’s arm and turns to me. “Excuse me while I take out the trash, Gypsy.” His voice is angry, but the look he shoots me is soft and pleading.