Chapter 32
“What’s with the third degree about Bobby’s past?” Ike rested a hand on the safe deposit box.
Adonis sat across from him, one ankle hooked over his knee, with a practiced, nonchalant expression. It was clear why Adonis stayed in the background, cleaning up their messes instead of stepping into the middle of the investigations.
He was terrible at it.
Adonis lifted both hands. “Just curious. I knew Bobby well enough, but not like you and Kane. There’s so much attention on his murder across the islands. Speculation, you know. People wondering if maybe the wife didn’t do it.”
Ike narrowed his eyes, gripping the edge of the safe deposit box.
Had Bobby made more than his fair share of enemies in his life?
Fuck, yes. But that didn’t matter when they all knew that Remi had killed him and the woman she’d caught him in bed with.
Lois Gaston had recently relocated to St. Killian.
Her photo had been plastered across the Palmchat Gazette for days.
She looked every inch like the women Bobby usually chased.
“We know better,” Ike said.
“Do we?” Adonis asked, a hint of a challenge in his tone.
Ike’s fingers tightened on the metal box.
“If you know something, say it.”
Adonis leaned forward, forearms braced on his thighs. “Everett is convinced Remi didn’t stab Bobby.”
Ike went still.
“He thinks she hit her head and was unconscious long enough for someone else to come in and do it while she was out.”
The idea should have sounded absurd.
It didn’t.
Remi killing Bobby over cheating had never sat right with him. If anything, proof of Bobby’s betrayal would have given her the excuse she needed to make a clean break from him. Divorce him and turn her attention back to the man who had always had her heart.
Ike thought back to the last time Bobby had stood in this room, wild-eyed, jittery, half-dressed in lies and panic.
“He was scared of something, that’s for sure,” Ike said.
“How do you know?”
“He was here earlier on the day he was killed. Kane and I tried to get him to tell us what was going on, but he said he was upset because Remi caught him cheating.”
Adonis frowned. “Well, that doesn’t help Remi at all. If you tell the cops that, they’ll add it to the crap ton of evidence they already have against her.”
Ike scoffed. “Do you see me visiting a police station anytime soon?”
Adonis chuckled under his breath. “Right, you’re still a missing person.”
Ike bristled at the words. “The point I’m making is that it was clear to us that he was lying. Some bigger threat had him in a panic. Not his wife.”
Adonis’s expression sharpened. “You think Everett’s theory is possible?”
“I think Bobby knew someone was coming for him.”
Adonis rubbed a hand over his mouth. “So who hated Bobby enough to stab him fourteen times?”
“PC-5 is too easy,” Ike said. “And stabbing isn’t their style.”
“They voted to add him to the death list the day he died.”
Ike’s head snapped up. “What?”
“Ace Spade confirmed it.”
The room seemed to tilt beneath him.
Ike pulled his hand from the safe deposit box and sat back. “That changes things.”
“Maybe. But a Vadaj enforcer wouldn’t butcher him with a machete and leave the body there for the police.”
“No.” Ike’s mind moved through the possibilities. “PC-5 wanted him dead, but that doesn’t mean they killed him.”
“That’s what I think.”
“So what Bobby did to make the island cartel turn on him. Did he betray them? Sell to one of their enemies? Get caught playing both sides?”
Adonis gave a grim laugh. “With Bobby, that list could stretch from here to South America. Colombians. Mexicans. El Sombro. Brazhenskys. Jamaicans. Half the criminal world has either bought from him, used him, threatened him, or paid him to hack for them.”
“True.” Ike’s gaze drifted toward the terrace doors, where the late afternoon light cut across the marble floor. “But the way he died feels personal. Messy and angry. Designed to leave a message.”
His mind flashed to Miami. Brazhensky men dragging him across broken glass before locking hands around his ankles and dropping him from a high-rise balcony.
He should have died that night.
Luck had saved him. So had training.
And Ava.
Her face slipped into his mind with the same unwelcome force it always did. Dark eyes. A smile that made salvation feel heavenly and dangerous.
He missed her, which pissed him off more than he wanted to admit.
Whatever Ava was, she hadn’t entered his life out of kindness. She had an endgame, a plan, a reason for saving him, hiding him, and returning him to St. Felipe.
Adonis snapped his fingers. “Stay with me, mountain man.”
Ike blinked and looked back at him.
“What’s our next move?” Adonis asked. “Everett’s trying to investigate, but he’s got Remi to protect. He’s not useless, but he’s compromised as hell right now.”
“I wouldn’t call him compromised to his face.”
“I’m smarter than that.” Adonis leaned back. “The man has the love of his life back. He’s not seeing straight, and I can’t blame him. Did you hear he got Sebastian to approve retrofitting the old guardhouse in the Breaklands?”
Ike laughed before he could stop himself. “The place he and Remi used to sneak off to and hook up at when we were kids?”
“That’s the one.” Adonis laughed. “Sentimental bastard.”
“From a security standpoint, it works,” Ike admitted. “It’s damn near perfect. Surrounded on three sides with towering, ragged cliffs, treacherous terrain to get in and out, dense jungle cover?—”
“And not a rickety old structure,” Adonis’s smile stretched wide.
Ike smiled back. “Place is better than this one. I should’ve hidden out there, myself.”
“Nah, we needed you close to the compound,” Adonis said, then continued.
“Hunter has a crew out there now adding necessary security, cameras, reinforced doors, ballistic film, motion sensors, independent power, secure comms, concealed perimeter alarms. My guys will handle transport once it’s ready. ETA tomorrow.”
Ike wasn’t surprised Everett had leaned more on Britt’s resources than Stingray. Half the guys still struggled with Bobby’s death and were in no mood to lift a finger to help him protect the man’s alleged killer.
“People in the Tango Lowlands usually mind their business, but this story has the whole island salivating,” Adonis said. “Crime of passion. Heiress of the islands’ most iconic ranch. Dead husband. Mystery mistress. Every nosy fool with a phone will want to be the one who spots Remi.”
“Good point. Every day at the bungalow increases the chances they’ll be spotted.”
“Ain’t that the truth. The Palmchat Gazette is running something every day about the case.”
“That doesn’t leave us much time,” Ike said.
Adonis studied him. “Us?”
Ike looked at the safe deposit box. Bobby had helped him track it down. One of the last things his friend had done before showing up here in a panic was gather information on Mountain Kingdom Bank in Lesotho, and the box his parents had left behind.
A cold thought settled low in Ike’s gut.
What if Bobby’s death had nothing to do with Remi?
What if the target on his back had started with Ike?
“I’ll start digging,” Ike said.
Adonis’s expression softened, but he had the good sense not to make a big thing out of it. “Glad to hear it.”
“Don’t get sentimental.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” A faint smile tugged at Adonis’s mouth. “We’re better with you in the fight.”
Ike swallowed against the pressure building in his chest.
The safe deposit box sat between them, dented from where he’d hurled it across the room.
He remembered the drawer breaking open. Hundreds of diamonds spilling across the floor in a glittering rush, shooting under chairs, tables, and the sofa.
A couple hundred million dollars, in his estimation.
Diamonds that could’ve made Bobby look like a threat that he wasn’t.
Adonis followed his gaze. “You ever going to tell me what’s in that thing?”
“No.”
“Fair enough,” Adonis said, rising from the chair. “Well, I’ve got more important work to do. If you find anything out, let me know, and I’ll get it to Everett.”
Ike nodded, then looked toward the terrace, where the mountain dropped away into thick green darkness.
There was only one person who might be able to connect Bobby’s death, the safe deposit box, Lesotho, and the diamonds.
Ava.
And if she had been watching him as closely as he suspected, she already knew he was ready to ask.