Chapter 4
CHAPTER 4
COLE
I f Hannah Grace thinks I’m leaving for long, she’s out of her goddamn mind.
I pull down the street and turn off the lights, waiting for her boyfriend to leave.
What if he doesn’t?
I flip the bird to the insecurity that voices that question. I have no right to Hannah Grace. I gave up any and all claim on her emotions when I broke up with her.
Why do I care if he’s there?
But it didn’t sit right. She didn’t act like he was anyone to her.
It might have had something to do with you showing back up in her life after four years of no contact .
But I’d used my gut more times than I could count to tell me things. To keep me safe.
And my gut was telling me that there wasn’t anything between them.
Fortunately, I don’t have to keep trying to convince myself of their relationship status when Lover Boy’s truck pulls past where I’m parked. I wait several beats, putting enough distance between us in the neighborhood to not appear suspicious, then blending into the other cars once we hit the main roads. Forty- five minutes later, he pulls into an apartment complex, and I circle the block and pull in, finding his truck parked in front of one of the buildings.
He’s already climbing the stairs to his unit, and I make a note to look up the address and find out who he is. Had I not been so focused on Hannah Grace, I may have gotten his name. He’s close to her, so I want to know who the fuck he is.
I don’t need a pic of his license plate since I grabbed one as I was walking up Hannah Grace’s driveway.
I wait until he’s in his apartment before pulling back out of the lot and retracing my route back to Hannah Grace’s house. The lights are all off, and I recline the driver’s seat and try to stretch out in the little compact they gave me. I hate small cars for the size, but I love them for how well they blend into the world around them.
I opt not to go check around the house since I’d rather not deal with the local cops if a neighbor sees me poking around. The neighborhood is quiet, and all the lights are off except for the front porch lights that wink at each other across the wide street. In some ways, this place reminds me of home.
Is that why Hannah Grace moved here? Close enough to home for the good feelings and far enough away to avoid the bad memories? Hell, more power to her. Los Angeles, California couldn’t be any more different from Mistletoe Creek, Tennessee if it tried. Which meant little chance of memories of Hannah Grace sneaking in, even though they did every once in a while.
The sneaky bastards would come out of the blue, the guilt riding the wake like a skilled surfboarder to pull me into a riptide of second-guessing the decision I had made.
The only one I could.
My gaze flicks from window to darkened window. The living room windows are easy to pick out, but does Hannah Grace’s bedroom face the street? Or off to the side? Her bedroom in high school had been a mix of her mama’s floral wallpaper, remnants of her tomboy stage in a mix of college football and concert tickets pinned to a bulletin board, and her own style of posters tacked to the wall.
Not that I was allowed in her bedroom much when we transitioned from friends to dating.
What is her bedroom like now?
Danger, danger, Will Robinson .
The alarm blares in my head, and I blink before continuing to scan the quiet neighborhood. There’s nothing. Leaning my head back, I marvel at the fact that no cars go down the street—this one or the one visible running perpendicular at the end of the block. No alarms, no animals, no rustling of wind through leaves.
It’s the sound of silence.
And not one I’m familiar with anymore.
It’s peaceful.
Retracing my pattern, there’s still nothing, and I lean my head back against the headrest. I’ll just rest here for a few minutes and then I’ll keep my vigil.
A dog barking wakes me just as the sun is changing the color from light blue to peach-tinted pink. I’m parked in the perfect spot that the shaft of sunlight hits me square in the face.
“Christ,” I groan and attempt to stretch.
My phone pings and I lift it and note the time. Shit. I need to leave soon or risk Hannah Grace seeing me camping out in front of her house.
SAWYER
Just checking in.
How’s it going?
It’s going.
She’s not super happy I showed up.
SYDNEY
She has good taste.
SAWYER
Sydney.
Did you tell her?
SYDNEY
Her who? Her me?
SAWYER
No.
SYDNEY
What don’t I know that you two do?
If I’m doing my job, I need the details.
SAWYER
This detail didn’t matter.
SYDNEY
It might.
SAWYER
I don’t think so.
It’s fine.
Hannah Grace is my ex.
SYDNEY
What?!
How did I not know this?
You were married?
I sigh and shake my head at Sydney’s rapid-fire questions.
Not married.
Not quite. Not even engaged. The memory of my clasping the necklace around her neck the day before I left for boot camp swims to the surface, and I clear my throat and glance up to clear the memory with the presence of reality.
SYDNEY
So why does your ex-girlfriend care that you showed up?
Shouldn’t she be happy you’re there to help?
It’s complicated.
Not important.
SAWYER
Was she able to share anything more than what the pageant people gave us?
Negative.
I do have a plate and address check I need Sydney to run.
Boyfriend.
The word is harder to type than it should be.
SYDNEY
Awkward.
SAWYER
Focus, Sydney.
SYDNEY
Ugh. Fine.
I can multitask.
SAWYER
Multitask later.
Focus now.
I need to go soon. Gotta go find a hotel.
SYDNEY
Why? What’d you do? Stay in your car in her driveway like a creeper?
Not exactly.
I refuse to admit she’s almost right on the nose.
Just run this plate info and address please without commentary.
Also a full background on whoever the owner is.
SYDNEY
Me digging up dirt on your ex’s new boyfriend doesn’t sound related to the case.
Fuck. Leave it to Sydney to create a migraine where none existed before. Reaching up, I rub the bridge of my nose and pray for sanity.
I’m not asking for that.
I want to know if he’s a suspect.
SYDNEY
You want to know if he’s a suspect or you want him to be the suspect?
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change and the reminder that if I murder Sydney, Sawyer will have to hire a new hacker. Fortunately, he steps in before I have to.
SAWYER
Sydney.
Please pull the background check Cole is asking for.
SYDNEY
You never let me have any fun.
SAWYER
Elevating Cole’s blood pressure is not fun I’m going to allow.
SYDNEY
Spoilsport.
Normally, I have more patience to deal with Sydney. But today, I’m running out of time as the eastern sky continues to brighten.
Did you pull one on Hannah Grace when the pageant people called?
SYDNEY
Contrary to both your opinions, I know what I’m doing.
I already emailed that to you after I ran it last night. It’s in your encrypted files.
This is why we put up with Sydney despite being on the verge of strangling her on an almost daily basis. She’s fucking amazing at her job and anticipates whatever we could ask for—and it’s been that way since it was just Sawyer, her, and me, to now with how large the company has grown.
Thanks.
A door across the street opens and closes with an early morning commuter heading to their car.
I need to find a hotel close by and clean up.
You’ll send me the info once you have it?
SYDNEY
Don’t I always?
And here we go.
SAWYER
I want those files as well. I’ll do a review and see if anything stands out to me.
Sawyer’s instincts are more honed than mine, and I’ll take all the help I can get. The sooner I can help Hannah Grace the sooner I can go back to attempting to forget her.
Thanks.
SAWYER
Let us know if there’s anything else you need.
Will do.
Another car pulls past me in the street, the driver moving slow enough to do a thorough inspection as they pass.
Time to go.
???
Despite the burning need to drop my shit and turn back around for Hannah Grace’s house, I take my time and force myself to lie down. I’m not going to be any good to her if I’m falling asleep—literally—on the job.
Years of training from the military and the need to sleep when I could allow me to catch a few more hours of sleep. I wake up still stiff thanks to the plane ride and sleeping in the car this morning, but it’s not as bad as I’ve had before.
Stretching, I stand and stagger my way to the in-room coffee maker and brew a cup.
It’s late morning edging into lunchtime, and I want to make it back over to Hannah Grace’s before she gets home from school. As the coffee brews, I grab my laptop and boot up to log into the server Sydney set up for our encrypted files. For once she hasn’t named the file something to fuck with me.
“I wonder if Sawyer had her rename it,” I mumble aloud.
Since it’s later than I anticipated, there’s a higher likelihood of that than of Sydney not taking an opportunity to bust my balls. Ignoring the documents with HW–Hannah Grace Whittaker—in the title, I click on the others. The first is a background check for Zachary Nolan. He rents the apartment I tailed him to last night and the car is registered in his name. He must own it outright since there’s no loan on it.
The apartment history goes back a few years as does his employment history.
Fuck.
He works at Hannah Grace’s school.
Jealousy sits like an unwelcome rock in my stomach, but I continue to scroll instead of slamming the lid of my laptop closed like I want to.
There are no credit cards in his name, and there’s a note next to the education info Sydney pulled.
This was harder to find than normal .
Next up are his socials. I click on one of the links and it’s picture after picture of him and Hannah Grace. Hiking, bowling, hanging out in different locations. Granted, the profile is locked down pretty well, but it doesn’t change the way my gut churns.
But is it personal? Or is this professional?
Don’t kid yourself, Strickland . With Hannah Grace, it will always be personal .
“No,” I tell the empty room.
Pushing the voice away that wants to argue, I key in a note to Sydney.
What do you see on his socials?
Sydney’s ability to dive below the normal locks put into place by the apps means she can see more. And I need that insight right now. Something is niggling at me. I don’t like that his history is so spotty and almost nonexistent before he came into Hannah Grace’s life.
You don’t like it or the green-eyed monster doesn’t?
I reach the end of his report and shut it down, sliding the mouse to hover over Hannah Grace’s file. A part of me doesn’t want to open it. Doesn’t want to read through everything I’ve missed over the last few years.
Had I not broken up with her, I could have lived it with her firsthand.
In a different life. A different universe.
One where I didn’t break her heart and mine in the process.
“Fuck,” I grit out and lift a fist to my chest, rubbing at the pain where my heart thumps with a pitiful, limping beat.
Quit being a pussy and click the fucking button .
It’s like the voice takes control of my body, depressing my finger until the arrow spins in a circle before opening to the same type of report I just read. There are pictures and the information on her winning Miss Tennessee at the top, and I find myself studying the picture. Tracing the way her curls wave around her face to tease her arms. My hands have tangled in the softness of those curls. I’ve breathed in the citrus and coconut scent of the strands as they wrapped themselves around us. My fingers and then my lips have memorized that smile.
But it’s not one hundred percent. There’s something missing from her smile.
Something very few people would notice.
The smile doesn’t create the crinkle next to her eyes that I’m used to. There’s a spark missing. I’m not conceited enough to think it’s because the pageant was shortly after we broke up, but the guilt eats at my stomach.
Swallowing, I continue to scroll, skimming over her graduation from Vanderbilt. Getting the job at the elementary school where she teaches kindergarten.
The grade she always wanted to teach.
It looks like she and her parents cosigned for the house, but she’s the only one listed on her car. I keep scrolling and find her socials. These are more open than I wish they were, and I make a note to ask Sydney what the status of locking down Hannah Grace’s accounts is. But not before I glance at her relationship status like the masochist I am.
Single .
Not in a relationship with Lover Boy.
Zach .
Whatever. Like I care what his name is. It doesn’t change what I already figured out—I could read him like a book. There may not be anything between them, but not for lack of desire on his part. He wants something more. Who wouldn’t?
You, remember, asshole? You broke up with her .
Not because I wanted to.
I had to.
She didn’t deserve who I had become. Everything that had shaped me when I was deployed. I wasn’t the same man who left her when I joined the army. The same one who promised her forever.
And she deserved more.
There was another note from Sydney under the socials that I skim over.
Lots of acquaintances but more from her pageant life than anything else. Lots of people from Mistletoe Creek and Vanderbilt. A few other pageant contestants. Some seriously hot guys…she dated you? P.S. Ask Hannah Grace about the other apps she subscribes to. Dating apps, find friends apps, etc.
Thanks, Sydney. Way to make a guy feel good and be cryptic all in one. Two for the price of one. A part of me wants to dive further into her friends list, but I don’t have time. I also want to grill Sydney about the cryptic comment. But again, time. I need to stop my hike down memory lane and focus on the task at hand. And not the one where I demand Sydney tell me what the hell she meant. I was going to make sure Hannah Grace got the life she deserved. The one I broke my heart to give her.
Glancing at my watch, I have a few hours before she’s set to be done with school. More than enough time to check out the house without nosy neighbors calling the cops like some Neighborhood Watch on steroids.
It doesn’t take me long to shower, and the only other thing I do before I leave is brush my teeth, leaving the two days’ growth covering my cheeks. I hate shaving. I pack up my laptop and drop it in my bag before swinging the worn leather of the messenger bag over my shoulder. I don’t leave my laptop anywhere. Something Sydney taught me after she hacked into my locked laptop in less than five minutes and changed all my systems settings.
It took Sawyer threatening to fire her before she finally put the original settings back.
My keys are the last thing I slide into my pocket before leaving the room.
I take a different route back to Hannah Grace’s, memorizing the secondary route just in case I need it. It’s not as direct, but the secondary path doesn’t need to be.
The sky is a brilliant blue, and I lift the aviator sunglasses to my face to avoid squinting into the brightness when I exit the car. The chill in the air reminds me that the holidays aren’t far off, and I pull the collar of my jacket up around my neck, wishing for the warm California weather about now.
I scan each house in my line of sight before moving away from the car. Her neighbors across the street still have curtains closed over the main window, and a late model Jeep I didn’t see last night is parked in the driveway.
“May work nights,” I murmur and move to the next house.
There’s nothing different in the neighboring houses, and I close my car door and take the walkway to the front door. Flower beds border the path, and I can’t help but imagine the weathered concrete surrounded by bright pops of color next to soft green grass even though the beds are currently empty.
Because that’s what there would be. Those bright pops of fragrant color.
So Hannah Grace that it creates a lump in my throat.
Coughing to clear the ball of emotion, I reach the porch and check under the doormat and breathe a sigh of relief when I don’t find the key. The Hannah Grace I remember was too trusting and would have left a key in plain sight. There’s also no sign of any hiding rocks or planters.
“That’s good, Honey Girl.”
The nickname slips from my lips easily, and I’m relieved no one is around to call me out on my slip.
I try the front door, relieved when I can tell both the regular lock and the deadbolt are engaged. The curtains are open, but the blinds are closed enough that I can’t see in when I try to peer in the window that doesn’t move when I try to push it open.
I don’t like the lack of security system, but I’ll talk to her about that later.
The side of the house looks into an empty dining room since the blinds are open wider here.
The backyard is fenced in, but it’s easy enough to hop since the gate must be on the other side. The back of the house holds the kitchen and a door that leads out here to the detached garage. On the other side of the door is her bedroom. The blinds and curtains are both wide open.
“Fuck.”
The room is feminine, decorated in hues of soft pastels and completely vulnerable to anyone who could get back here.
“Because I’m guessing the gate isn’t locked,” I say, already heading to the other side of the house.
I hate that I’m right.
Doubling back, I walk by what I’m assuming is the bathroom window when something on the ground catches my attention.
If the day were any more gray, I might not catch it, but the sun glinting off a coin catches my attention where it lies innocently between two deep footprints. They line up perfectly with the angle into the window that can also see into the bedroom, and I snap a pic with my phone and text it to Sawyer.
Looks like Hannah Grace had a reason to be concerned.
SAWYER
I’m going to reach out to the NPD.
There’s nothing more and I pocket my phone, searching along the ground for any other signs that someone has been watching her. It doesn’t take me long to find one now that I’m searching for it. In front of one of her bedroom windows are two more areas where a print could have been but instead there are rocks that seem to be pressed deeper into the ground. Someone stood here for a while. Looking directly at her bed.
The hair on the back of my neck stands on end and I spin, half expecting someone behind me.
But there’s nothing except the sound of the dog barking against the fence from the house behind hers.
I don’t like my body’s reaction to the indentations.
It’s telling me there’s danger.
And Hannah Grace is in the crosshairs.
The need to see her, to confirm she’s safe, overwhelms me.
Forget later.
Right the fuck now.