Deadly Coincidence (Brantley Walker: Off the Books Book 4)

by Nicole Edwards

  She’d convinced Baz to drive her here in order to check on Dante and his family, but they both knew she had really wanted to have a chat with the man responsible for the epic disruption in her life. According to the update from Trey, the Greenwoods had met him at the hospital last night and were utilizing the governor’s security to keep the press at bay.

  While JJ would’ve preferred to move on, to let Dante and his family reconnect and find him the help he needed, she found she couldn’t let it go. Not until she understood why he’d used her to carry out this stupid plot of his.

  “You want me to go in with you?” Baz offered when they came to a stop outside of Dante’s door.

  JJ glanced up at him, shook her head. “I’d prefer to do this alone.”

  He nodded, his blue eyes reflecting his concern for her. “If you need me, I’ll be right out here.”

  Taking a deep breath, JJ stepped up to the door, rapped her knuckles on the metal trim. It drew the attention of Katrina and Corinne, both women hovering over Dante as though he’d been through a horrific ordeal when, in reality, the stupid ass had masterminded the whole thing.

  Katrina was the first to come over, greeting JJ with a firm hug. “I’m so glad you’re all right.”

  JJ couldn’t find words, so she nodded and smiled, hoping that was enough assurance that she really was. As far as her physical condition was concerned, she was all right. Mentally and emotionally … well, only time would tell.

  Corinne hugged her next, then traded a look with JJ before suggesting she and her mother go get coffee, leaving JJ alone with Dante.

  As she walked into the room, she took stock of the man in the bed.

  Dante was reclining, head and injured hand propped on pillows. He looked a little worse for wear, his skin pale, his hair a mess, but he looked like he would make a full recovery.

  “How’s the finger?”

  He lifted a fully bandaged hand. “Gone.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  He lifted his other hand, which held a button that she assumed gave him pain meds when he needed them. “They’ve got me set.”

  Clearly the family was in the denial phase of his addiction. Otherwise JJ doubted they would have him hooked to a morphine pump.

  She ignored the urge to chastise him, opting for, “Your mom and sister are happy you’re back.”

  “I’m just glad you’re all right,” Dante said dramatically. “I didn’t know what was goin’ on or who—”

  JJ cut him off with a hissed, “Cut the shit, Dante. We know you were behind it all.”

  His eyebrows slammed down. “What’re you talkin’ about? I was kidnapped.”

  She took a deep breath but didn’t move closer, fearful she would strangle him if she did. “My house was monitored by cameras,” she informed him. “Those recordings are managed in the cloud, so the explosion didn’t destroy them.”

  And that was only a partial lie. She did have cameras that recorded to the cloud, but she also had hidden cameras that only she knew about, ones that she recorded straight to a cloud server even the best of hackers couldn’t access.

  At least Dante had the decency to keep his mouth shut.

  “We saw you open the door and let Marcus in.” In fact, JJ had watched in horror as Dante had let that bastard in her house, had seen him stroll across the room and grab one of her metal statues off the shelf by the kitchen before disappearing. As for the camera that was set up in there, JJ didn’t know why it had failed, but she wasn’t sure she really wanted to see that man bash her over the head anyway.

  “He made me.”

  “He didn’t,” she countered. “This was your plan, Dante. I just need to know why? Why’d you feel the need to extort money from your parents?”

  Dante took a few deep breaths, and she saw the moment he accepted he’d been caught. His face fell, his defensiveness shifting into a whine. “Because I owe too many people. I had no choice. They were gonna kill me if I didn’t pay them back.”

  “So, what? You thought it’d be fun to include me? Was it your idea to have Marcus hit me on the head?” She fought the urge to reach up and touch the knot that was still there.

  “Of course not,” he hissed. “He was supposed to drug you. That’s all.”

  “Drug me?” Her voice was louder as she took a step forward. “You agreed to let him drug me, Dante?”

  “It needed to look real, JJ. It was nothin’ personal. I just needed my father to believe it. I knew if you were involved, they’d do somethin’ about it.”

  “I was out cold, Dante,” she said, remembering the other video she’d seen, the one from the camera in her bedroom. The one Luca had come across but had kept to himself when he realized what it showed. Rather than watch it, Luca had called her on the phone, told her she might want to see if it had any clues. “Unconscious, Dante. Do you understand what I’m sayin’? Out cold, in my bedroom. Defenseless.”

  Just thinking about what she’d seen, the way Marcus had loomed over her, made her sick to her stomach.

  “I didn’t let him touch you,” Dante choked out.

  No, he hadn’t. She’d witnessed Dante attempting to hold open the door, and that was when she realized exactly what had happened. Dante had been keeping Marcus from closing himself in the room with her. In turn, Marcus had chopped off his finger. The guy was lucky it hadn’t been his whole hand.

  “I protected you, JJ. You have to know that.”

  “What I know is that you need help. Professional help.”

  Dante was nodding his head furiously. “I know. I’ll get it, too. Once I get out of here, I’m gonna turn my life around. I’ll find a meeting or something to go to.”

  JJ shook her head. “That’s not gonna happen.”

  He was frowning again. “My mother—”

  “Brantley and Reese are talkin’ to your parents right now. They’re tellin’ them everything that happened.”

  Dante’s head tilted up in that way that said he was tired of the subject and too good to put up with her any longer.

  “What you did was illegal,” she added. “You won’t be able to simply walk out of here without some sort of punishment.”

  “My father’s the governor, JJ, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “I noticed.” JJ exhaled, tucking her hands in her pocket. “I just have one last question for you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Why’d you blow up my house?”

  Dante held her gaze. “I didn’t. That was Marcus’s idea. I didn’t even know about it until we were back at the warehouse.”

  “Why’d he do it? What did it accomplish?”

  Dante shrugged. “He was talkin’ to some woman he met online. Well, actually, I met her online. Anyway, he said she wanted him to make a big statement.”

  JJ’s eyes widened as his explanation sank in. “What’s this woman’s name?”

  “Katherine,” he said easily. “Katherine King.”

  Katherine King? Was it a coincidence that the name was the same as Travis’s daughter?

  “Did she go by Kate?”

  “No. Kat. Why?”

  JJ ignored the question. “How’d she find you?”

  He smiled. “How’d you know she found me and not the other way around?”

  “I’m serious, Dante. How’d she find you?”

  “Online dating app, okay? But it’s not what you think. I don’t have to use an app to meet women. It’s just—”

  “How’d you communicate with her?” she asked, interrupting his tirade. “Email? Phone?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “All of the above. But I stopped talkin’ to her. She bored me. But I guess Marcus was being nosy. He got my phone one day, texted her back on it. They started talking.”

  Shit. JJ spun around to leave. She needed to get those phones, needed to figure out where the hell Katherine King—a.k.a. Juliet Prince—was.

  “Hey!” Dante called out. “Where’re you goin’?”

  JJ found Baz in
the hallway. “Where’s Brantley and Reese?”

  “They left a few minutes ago. Why?”

  “Because I just got some new information from Dante that might lead us to Juliet Prince.”

  “From Dante?”

  JJ nodded, started walking. “I’m pretty sure it really was a coincidence that she’s involved in all this, but not so much that Travis was lured to my house shortly before it blew up.”

  “She blew up the house?”

  “She had Marcus do it, but yes.”

  “Marcus? The dead guy?”

  “Yep. That one.”

  *

  Baz drove JJ back to HQ while she spent the majority of her time on her phone texting someone. He wasn’t sure if it was Brantley or Reese or Luca, but whoever it was, they were quick with their responses, and JJ seemed happy with the replies.

  No sooner had he pulled into the driveway than she hopped out of his truck, making a mad dash for the barn. Based on the other vehicles, it looked as though the gang was all there. Brantley, Reese, and at least two others.

  By the time he walked around to the back of the house, JJ had disappeared, leaving him to stroll by himself. As he was approaching the keypad to unlock the door, his cell phone chimed.

  He glanced at the screen, swallowed a frustrated groan when he saw that it was once again Molly. She’d been texting him almost once an hour since yesterday afternoon, asking when she was going to see him again. Each text that went unanswered earned him another, more demanding one.

  This one: I think it’s best you come by so we can talk about the other night. I’ll need to know what to do about the pregnancy.

  Baz didn’t want to be a dick to the woman, but even he knew she didn’t know for sure she was pregnant after twenty-four hours. She definitely could be, yes, but he would prefer they wait to have this discussion once she knew for certain. If she was, Baz had every intention of doing what was right by the child. But from the texts he was getting, Molly was expecting more for herself than the baby, and unfortunately, Baz knew that wasn’t going to happen.

  The door to the barn opened and JJ poked her head out. “Hey, you comin’?”

  Tucking his phone back in his pocket, he nodded, held the door, and followed her inside.

  “Luca Switzer, meet Sebastian Buchanan. Baz, meet Luca,” JJ introduced.

  Baz took a single step back when the big man got to his feet, thrusting out his hand to shake.

  He returned the gesture, added a “Nice to meet you,” and earned a smile in return.

  “You look good, darlin’,” Luca told JJ, openly eyeing her. “How long’s it been?”

  “Not nearly long enough,” she said with a chuckle. “Aren’t you married yet?”

  “Haven’t met the ol’ gal who can wrangle me,” he teased. “You up for the challenge?”

  Baz couldn’t help it, he stared at JJ’s face, watched as she smiled, eyes glittering. Clearly she wasn’t bothered by Luca’s flirtatious manner, but Baz would honestly admit he didn’t care much for it.

  She was laughing merrily when she said, “Not in this lifetime, you old coot.”

  “Well, then if you ever meet her, send her my way, will ya?”

  “I wouldn’t do that to any woman, Luca. You know that.”

  Baz turned away, reminding himself he had no right to be jealous and he had absolutely no say in who JJ flirted with.

  “I talked to Brantley,” JJ explained. “He said we should get started without him.”

  “Hit me, woman. Whatcha got?” Luca asked.

  JJ went on to explain what she’d learned from Dante about the woman she referred to as Katherine King, who she was insistent was Juliet Prince.

  “Brantley told me he had the phones they were usin’ at their hideout,” JJ told Luca. “All we need to do is find out her IP address, trace it, and see where she was messagin’ from.”

  “Easy-peasy,” Luca agreed.

  Baz took a seat and fought the urge to roll his eyes.

  Two hours later, after JJ and Luca had worked their magic, the entire team was watching while the Grand Rapids Police Department went to the Lakeside Motel to find Juliet Prince.

  He hadn’t believed it was possible for them to track her so easily, but they were absolutely certain that was where she’d been as of three o’clock yesterday afternoon, when she’d sent the last text to Marcus asking him how things were going.

  “Please, God, let her be there,” JJ muttered to herself, her shoulder brushing Baz’s as they watched a live feed from the scene.

  On the screen, a SWAT officer walked up to the door, knocked. When there was no answer, he motioned for someone to come over. A short, middle-aged man stepped over, swiped a key card, then was ushered back out of the way.

  The next couple of minutes were chaos as they rushed the room, checking under the bed, in the closet and the bathroom. But it hadn’t taken but a second for everyone to realize that the room was empty.

  If Juliet Prince had been there, she was gone now.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Friday, January 8, 2021

  One week after the showdown at the warehouse, finding Dante, and ending up with another dead end on the whereabouts of Juliet Prince, things had returned to normal.

  Well, as normal as they could be, considering.

  After they’d secured Dante Greenwood, returned him to his parents, Brantley had given him one night to recover before relaying the details of what had really happened to Gerard and Katrina. A discussion that went exactly as Brantley had predicted it would: not well at all.

  Needless to say, Brantley was not on Governor Greenwood’s good side. The man did not want to believe his son had masterminded—a term Brantley used loosely when referring to Dante—the kidnapping in an effort to extort one million dollars to cover his gambling and drug addictions. Evidently, Dante had taken out a “loan” with his bookie and his dealer and had been unable to cover the balance and interest of either. When Marcus had been sent to collect the gambling debt, Dante had been able to appeal to his greed, coming up with the plan that would net Marcus five hundred thousand as payment for helping and allow Dante to pay off his debt with the other half.

  When asked why they’d decided to cut off his finger, Dante had explained that hadn’t been the plan. He’d insisted Marcus had gone completely crazy and chopped it off in a fit of rage when he really did take Dante hostage. Of course, that tale had lasted all of five minutes, because Dante’s pain meds had kicked in and he revealed, with a spooky smile, that he’d been the knight in shining armor and had sacrificed himself in order to keep Marcus from raping JJ while she was unconscious.

  Such a fucking gentleman.

  But the worst part had come when Brantley asked Governor Greenwood how he wanted to proceed with Dante’s charges. In no uncertain terms, the governor informed him he would be handling Dante’s punishment personally and there was no need to share the details with the police. Marcus Harris would go on record as having kidnapped Dante, assaulted JJ, blown up her house, and attempted to blackmail him. And since Marcus was dead, there was no one to argue those facts.

  Awfully fucking convenient.

  That had been the icing on the cake for Brantley, and he had refused to listen to any more. Probably the reason he hadn’t gotten as in depth as JJ had with his questioning. If he had, perhaps he would’ve been the one to uncover Juliet Prince’s part in all of this. But like usual, they’d been just a little too late to catch the woman in that shitty motel in Michigan.

  He’d managed to get Governor Greenwood to agree to hold off on cutting off their access, using the excuse that they needed it to find Juliet Prince. After he’d explained that she had played a partial role in Dante’s scheme, the governor had given them until the end of the month.

  In truth, it hadn’t done much more than buy Brantley some time to explain to Reese and the team what was going on.

  Now, as he sat with his back to the wall in a corner booth at the diner, his at
tention on the man sitting across from him, he pondered just how to reveal the news that they were currently in limbo when it came to employment.

  Brantley had been playing it out in his head for a while now. Days, in fact. And it wasn’t so much the revelation that bothered him. More so the questions he would be asked, such as What’s next? For which he wasn’t exactly clear on the answer.

  He and Reese had taken a break to grab some dinner, opting for the diner because it allowed them to get out of the house. It was probably the perfect place to give bad news since it was a controlled environment, restricting an overreaction.

  Hopefully.

  Yeah, he should probably suck it up and tell Reese now.

  “You don’t think you jumped the gun offerin’ Luca a job?” Reese asked, pulling Brantley from his reflective thoughts.

  He took a sip of his sweet tea. “I figure it’ll take him a few weeks to get around to makin’ a decision. Luca’s not the kind to commit to anything quickly.”

  “Probably the reason he’s still single and what? Goin’ on forty?”

  Grateful for conversation that didn’t involve Juliet or Dante, Brantley smiled. “Word is, he’s got a thing for my cousin, Honor. They met at that auction Bianca did back in October.”

  Reese grinned. “I remember that. Kaden and Keegan were up in arms about it. They were auctioned off to Kate.”

  “That they were.” Brantley grinned, remembering the horrified look on their faces when they thought Gage was the one bidding on them. They’d been relieved when they learned they were serving at the whim of a six-year-old who wanted to go to McDonald’s for her “date.”

  “Luca and Honor… It serious?”

  Brantley let his gaze scan the room. “Who knows with him. Or her. Honor’s never been all that big on relationships, either.” Shifting topics, he looked at Reese again. “What do you think about hirin’ Holly to be JJ’s assistant?”

  Reese’s dark eyebrows shot down into a V. “You really are tryin’ to piss her off, huh? You don’t think she can hire her own assistant?”

  “I think she’s a procrastinator. Plus, she’s got enough on her plate, what with her house explodin’ and all.” Brantley broke eye contact, worried he’d be unable to hide his guilt. “I think we need to get things movin’. We already agreed we’d be on the hunt for warm bodies to fill all those vacancies on the task force by the first of the year. We’re there. I don’t have time to wait for JJ to get with the program.”