If she could ever afford such a thing, this was her idea of kitchen heaven in a home.
Matt glanced up at her as he poured coffee in a mug. “You like the kitchen, I take it?”
She took the cup from him. “What’s not to like?”
He looked around the room and shrugged. “It’s nice, but a bit overdone for a guesthouse, don’t you think?”
A pint of half and half sat on the island along with a sugar bowl. Evie fixed her coffee and took a sip. Pricey stuff if her taste buds were any expert. And they were.
“Who cares? It’s gorgeous. If you could possibly talk your dad into renting it out cheap, I’d consider staying in Rochambeau indefinitely.”
Matt grinned. “I doubt that. On both counts.”
Evie sighed as the coffee began to hit all the right receptors in her brain. No, she really didn’t want to stay in Rochambeau permanently. And, right now, she had far more pressing things to consider.
“If you could take me to Julie’s house, I’d like to get my car.” She’d left it there last night before they’d gone to the lake. She’d planned to drive herself, but then Julie had pretty much insisted they ride together—most likely because she knew Evie would have ducked out the first second she could have managed it. Since Julie’s house was closer to the lake than Mama’s, Evie had followed Julie to her house before she’d ditched her car.
“No problem.” Matt looked all broody and sexy as he sipped his coffee, and she found herself thinking about his body thrusting into hers. Her breath shortened, her heart flipping in her chest. What a ride it had been, the heat and skin, the passion.
And she wanted him again with a fierceness that shocked her. She bit back a heavy sigh before she made a fool of herself over him again.
“I, um, I should call Julie and see if Sarah might have turned up there.” Nothing like forcing her mind back on track. Her body, however, had other ideas. Desire bloomed in her core, flushing her skin with heat. Her sex throbbed with want.
Oh, but once hadn’t been nearly enough.
Matt looked at her as if he knew what was going on inside her head, his gray eyes narrowing, an answering heat flaring in them that made her want to go over to where he stood and wrap herself around him.
His words, however, dowsed the heat.
“She’s not there, Evie.”
Her stomach sank. “How do you know?”
He set a plate in front of her. A bagel slathered with cream cheese lay on it.
“Eat and we’ll talk.”
She would have argued about his bossiness, but her stomach decided to growl at that precise moment. She took a bite and chewed. Waited. She had the feeling Matt was assessing her, the way he stared hard, his expression giving nothing away. She finished half the bagel before he said anything.
“It’s possible she’s at a friend’s house, or even with the guy Mindy told us about. They weren’t together when Mindy saw him, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t hook up after.”
Evie’s heart pounded. “You think she’s with him now?”
“Could be. I’m looking into it.” He sighed and put both hands on the counter. “There’s something else, Evie. Kyle Jenkins has a criminal record.”
She dropped the bagel she’d just picked up. “Oh my God, I have to find her. Mindy said they were fighting. What if he hurt her?”
“Wait a minute.” Matt reached for her, clamping an iron hand around her wrist before she could take off. “His record is for petty stuff—blowing up pipe bombs in his yard, larceny, loitering, shoplifting, stuff like that.”
“And that’s supposed to make me feel better?” She swallowed against the dread curling in her throat. God, if she’d been here in Rochambeau longer than a month, or at least visited more often, checked in on Sarah and tried to make sure everything was okay with her, maybe her little sister wouldn’t have gotten tangled up with a jerk like Kyle Jenkins.
They’d be closer and Sarah might have confided in her instead of being so openly hostile.
“Yes, it is. The guy doesn’t have a record of violent acts against other people. That’s a good thing.”
Evie was furious. And scared. “Maybe he’s crossed that line now. They were fighting.”
“And they might be making up. She might be scared to go home because she’s afraid she’ll be in trouble.”
Evie didn’t like to think of Sarah making up with some guy the way Matt was suggesting, but if the girl had been out all night with the jerk, that’s probably exactly what was going on. And she had to consider it.
“How do you know all this?” No matter what kind of shark Mrs. Doucet was, she didn’t think Detectives Odell and Proctor had opened up the police files for Matt just because he’d asked.
He shrugged. “It’s my business to know these kinds of things. I’ve got guys checking, but neither your sister nor Jenkins has been seen since last night. It’s possible they’re together.”
“What are the police doing about it?”
“Their resources are engaged with the murder investigation. This is peripheral.” Matt looked grave. “There’s something else.”
Evie didn’t think her stomach could sink any lower. But it did. What more could there be? “Tell me.”
“Jenkins is twenty-one.”
Evie’s jaw went slack. A twenty-one-year-old man was dating her sister? Her baby sister? She wanted to find this Kyle Jenkins and strangle him herself. “So a sixteen-year-old girl with a grown man doesn’t faze the police?”
“If they had more people, yeah.”
Evie stared at him, her chest heaving. “Doesn’t it bother you?”
He slapped the counter hard enough to make her jump. “Fuck yeah, it bothers me. But there’s a lot about what happened last night that’s bothering me.”
Evie felt a shiver slide down her spine. She thought of David’s body lying on the porch, of the blood that looked like oil. He’d looked different than when she’d last seen him—the goatee, a bit more weight than he’d had before—so that for the briefest of moments as she’d stood there, she’d entertained a ridiculous hope it wasn’t him, that it was some stranger who looked like him.
But what kind of stranger would be dead on her mother’s porch after she’d had a call from David not more than a few minutes before? Hell yes, there was plenty about last night to be bothered about.
She lifted her chin. “You can back out at any time if you don’t like it.” And she meant it too. Except that she had no idea how she’d proceed without him.
His eyes flashed. “That’s not happening, Evie. It’s far too late for that now. Besides, you’re in deeper than you think.”
She wiped her damp palms on her pants and looked at him across the width of the island. Morning sunlight shafted through the windows, illuminating the white marble of the island. Matt stood in a nimbus of light. He looked handsome, fierce, and so sexy it hurt.
“And what’s that supposed to mean?”
His eyes were hard. “It means the organized crime connection is no longer a theory. David West worked for Ryan Rivera. Have you ever heard of him?”
The coffee in her stomach was making her queasy. “Should I have?”
“Not necessarily. He’s West Coast, but he’s been moving east for a while. Loans, numbers, money laundering, drugs—you name it, he’s probably doing it. And he doesn’t do it alone. West was one of his guys.”
Evie felt as if her knees were made of water. If she hadn’t been sitting, she’d have sunk into a boneless puddle on the floor.
“I didn’t know.” Her voice was little more than a whisper.
“You weren’t supposed to.”
She closed her eyes and tried to process it all. David had blown into her restaurant one day, tousled from the surf and cheekily handsome. He’d flirted with all the women on staff. And then he’d kept coming back. Eventually he’d started talking about the business, offering advice.
What he’d told her to do worked. She’d hired him a
fter checking out his impeccable references.
“He was an accountant.” She speared a hand through her hair and tossed the long strands over her shoulder. “He had such great ideas for the restaurant, and I needed the financial advice. I started everything on a shoestring, and it was often month-to-month as we struggled to make ends meet. But when David came along…” She shrugged. “The restaurant boomed. He really seemed to know what he was doing. I was looking at paying off my loans early—and then it all ended.”
“I’m sorry, Evie. And I’m sure West did know what he was doing. He also had an influx of cash from Rivera, I guarantee it. They were washing the money through your business.”
The betrayal felt as fresh as that night when she’d realized he’d taken the payroll and wasn’t coming back. “But why me? Why my restaurant? It was just a little bistro near the beach, nothing big and fancy. Nothing with a huge cash flow when David came to me.”
“They didn’t want to draw attention to what they were doing. And I’m sure Rivera planned an expansion once he’d gotten a toehold there. You were the toehold.”
“Obviously, it didn’t go as planned. David robbed me blind.”
“And not on his boss’s orders, I’m guessing.”
“So is that why he was killed?”
Matt looked grave. “Probably.”
As she processed all this new information, she started to get mad. Waves of fury flooded her system, made her want to punch something. Instead, she smacked her palms against the counter. “Damn him! He brought that shit here. To my life, my family’s life. My friends! He didn’t care how it touched me, Mama, or Sarah. He only wanted to use me again.”
“I think you’re right about that.” Matt’s tone was soothing, as if he knew she was on the brink. “But I think it’s more than that too.”
Her throat hurt from suppressing the urge to scream. “What do you mean, more?”
“Think, Evie. Why would he come here? Why would he risk it unless there was a big payoff for him? He didn’t want your protection. And he certainly didn’t want any money since he knew you didn’t have any.”
Evie blinked. “What kind of payoff could there be in just talking to me?”
Matt leaned toward her, his eyes gleaming. “I think you have something, Evie. Something West wanted very badly. Did he give you anything before he left? Leave anything behind?”
Confusion swirled in her brain. “Why would he give me anything? He stole everything I had. He knew he was planning to do it, so I’d be a poor person to entrust with something once he had.”
Matt shrugged, but she didn’t kid herself he was feeling casual about this idea. “He wouldn’t have been overt about it. But you do have something. He wouldn’t have come otherwise. It has to be something small, something easily carried. Something you would overlook.”
Evie frowned as she ran through the last few days with David. He’d seemed stressed. And they hadn’t been sleeping together at all. Not that she’d minded that part. They’d only hooked up a few times in the two months they dated, and while it had been pleasant enough, there weren’t any real sparks.
“I don’t think so…” And then she stopped. Thought about packing her car for the trip back to Rochambeau. The things she’d piled into it. A small cherry box slid to the front of her memory. “Wait, there was one thing. He forgot an old humidor he said was his dad’s. He kept it in his office. But there was nothing in it except a few cigars.”
Matt’s gaze sharpened. “Do you still have it?”
She nodded. “I tossed everything in my car when I left. I don’t know why I kept it.” Except that the box was pretty and she’d thought it might be worth a few dollars if she needed to sell some stuff.
“Where is it now?”
Evie felt the heat of embarrassment roll through her.
“It’s still in the car.” She’d never gotten around to unpacking because she kept hoping to leave again. Kept hoping she’d get that call from somewhere asking her to come work in a great kitchen.
So pitiful.
“We need to go get it. It could be important.”
“You really think the humidor has something to do with this?”
He shrugged as he dug his keys from his pocket. “We won’t know until we take it apart.”
She grabbed her purse and they walked out and got into the car. Matt was backing out of the garage when his phone buzzed. He snapped it up. “Girard… What? You’re kidding? Yeah, we’re on the way.”
“What is it?” Evie’s gut was churning when he tossed the phone down again.
The look he gave her was indefinable. “Kyle Jenkins has been detained.”
CHAPTER TEN
BRIANNA SWEENEY HATED SMALL TOWNS. She was also developing a severe dislike for the South. It was hotter than hell, for one. Louisiana was muggy, the mosquitoes came in supersize, and she couldn’t make sense of the food. She’d bartended at Evangeline’s, and she’d even tried the jambalaya and gumbo, but this thing about boiling itty-bitty lobsters—crawfish—with potatoes, lemons, and corn on the cob was just too weird.
Julian ripped the tail off a red bug-looking thing and sucked on the head before peeling the shell away from the tail meat.
“That shit stinks,” she said, sucking on her cigarette.
“So don’t eat it.”
“I wasn’t planning to.” She gazed out over the water. They’d stopped and grabbed lunch at a roadside stand about twenty miles from Rochambeau. She didn’t like being so far from the town, especially after last night, but you couldn’t disappear in the damn place. Old ladies stared at you. Men nodded and said howdy—or something like that. She couldn’t understand half of what anyone said in South Louisiana. They were speaking English, sometimes, but it wasn’t any English she’d ever heard. It sounded thick to her ears, had a different rhythm entirely, and she often found herself trying to work out the words while people smiled and nodded like she was an idiot.
She felt like an amoeba under a microscope in this town, and she didn’t like the blatant loss of anonymity. And now, shit—
“What’re we gonna do with the girl?”
She narrowed her gaze on the man dripping bug juice from his chin. How had she ever lost her head enough to screw this guy? He was a big hunk of masculinity, muscular and full of stamina, but he was the male equivalent of a bubble-headed blonde. So long as he didn’t talk, she’d been able to ignore his deficiencies. She was fast losing patience. The sex was good, but not that damn good.
“We’re going to trade her for the information, just like I said before.” About a million times before.
“What about George?”
“What about him? Nothing we can do now.” George had fucked up and there was nothing for it now. He was gone and they had to work without him. Which they damn well would do without issue.
“Rivera call yet?”
“Yeah. He wants us to finish the job.”
“So we finish it then.”
Yeah, shit-for-brains, we finish it. Brianna forced smoke from her nostrils. God, how had she ever gotten herself into this mess? And how could she ever get out? Working for Rivera wasn’t exactly a walk in the park. She was tired and getting more worried by the day that she’d be the one to take the hit the next time. If she could deliver what Rivera wanted and walk away, she’d consider herself lucky.
But they’d never let her out.
David West—now that guy had balls, that’s for sure. He stole all that money—not only from Evie Baker’s place it turned out—and stashed it in offshore accounts. Then he systematically collected as much dirt on Rivera as he could and built a database.
Too bad he’d been stupid enough to leave everything where they could find it in New Orleans. Everything except one last puzzle piece, which was the source of her freaking headache now. Rivera didn’t know what it was, but he knew West had something else that contained all that evidence. And she wasn’t leaving here without it.
If only she knew wh
at to do with the information once they’d gotten it, and how to access that money, she might have been tempted to keep the computer instead of shipping it off so fast. She could be on an island somewhere, sipping a tropical drink. David had once told her the same damn thing when he’d tried to recruit her into his schemes. She hadn’t believed a word of it, or maybe she’d have warned Rivera.
Then again, maybe not.
“We need to find a place to stay,” she said, making a decision. Last night’s little fuck up made it necessary to lie low for a while, and staying in town wasn’t going to cut it.
Julian wiped his chin and fingers. “We got a place.”
“We can’t stay in the motel any longer. We need to check out. And then we need a base of operations. This job could take a couple more days.”
“Where you planning to go?”
She motioned toward the bayou. “In there. I saw an advertisement for fishing cabins on the bulletin board at the general store.” She stubbed out her cigarette in the metal ashtray. “We’ll get a cabin and stash the girl there, then make contact with Evie. Once she knows we aren’t playing around, she’ll give us what we need.”
*
Kyle Jenkins stammered and sputtered and swore he hadn’t seen Sarah since he’d left her at the gas station outside of town. Matt had glared at the guy with his best elite-soldier stare, but the story never changed.
“You believe him?”
They were exiting the sheriff’s office where Kyle had been detained for questioning in a complaint lodged by a neighbor of his mother’s. Evie looked as if she could chew nails. They’d come straight here after Kev’s call, hoping to find out where Sarah was. Matt had had to sweet-talk the deputy into letting them in. Having Evie along didn’t hurt. She was pretty damn pleasing to the eye, especially when she smiled and flirted the way she had with Deputy Boudreaux.
She was also pretty damn pleasing in other ways. Matt shoved thoughts of a naked Evie out of his head—no mean feat—and concentrated on what was happening right now.
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