Chapter 33
LOCKE
It took me five days to track my prey down.
“Jett Talmadge Marian,” Vox said. “Born and raised in Rabbit Island, South Carolina. Son of Maverick and Beau Marian. Graduated from local public high school and attended the University of Virginia, where he double-majored in global affairs and linguistics. Enjoys long walks on the beach and getting caught in the rain.”
I ignored him the same way I ignored the sunlight glinting off the Manhattan skyline outside my office window and scrolled through the information coming onto my screen.
There was a picture of Jett from his student ID card at UVA, a candid shot of him standing on a dock by a marsh, grinning in the sun, a much younger image of him at a podium in what looked like a high school debate tournament.
And then there was an office ID badge photo of him that looked eerily similar to the way he’d looked after Amsterdam. Skinny and tired.
The company name on the badge was ESP.
“What is Ecumene Stability Project?” I asked, squinting at the address in the financial district.
“An Interpol-related agency,” he said before slurping something through a straw. “Buncha do-gooder special agents.”
I closed my eyes and exhaled for the first time in a week. He didn’t work for the Alvarados. Or any other criminal group. He worked for the good guys.
Kind of.
The Paxis Council did what it did because governments were notoriously bad at it. Self-dealing and rarely prioritizing the welfare of the people they purported to protect.
Agencies like Interpol were rife with corruption and bias, and they were often hamstrung by regulations and “official channels.”
Additionally, intelligence agents were often used up and discarded like pawns in a never-ending game. I hated to imagine Jett becoming jaded over time or, worse, finding himself in inescapable danger. I’d already seen the result of his job conditions once before.
“What would ESP have been doing in Amsterdam three years ago?” I asked, almost to myself.
“No way to know, dude. Undercover shit, most likely.”
Undercover.
Fuck.
He’d cried in my arms. Fresh off whatever assignment where he’d pretended to be… what? Homeless? An addict? Or had it been worse? Had he been caught and held somewhere? Interrogated?
I remembered him waking up from a nightmare. The stark terror in his eyes and the thundering of his heart.
My fingers itched to hold him again, comfort him, support him financially so he could quit that fucking job, even if he wanted nothing to do with me ever again.
“Oh, this is unexpected,” the guy said. “His uncle is Jude Marian. You know, from Jude and the Saints? My mom used to listen to them all the time when I was a kid.”
“Uh-huh.” I couldn’t care less about Jett’s famous relatives. “What’s his address?”
“You want the kid’s apartment in New York, parents’ place in Rabbit Island, or—”
“All of it,” I said, standing up and reaching for my suit jacket. “Give me every single fucking place I might be able to find him.”
I threw my jacket on and called out to Minnie. “Get my driver and have my pilot prepare the plane.”
“Wait,” Vox called through the phone. “If you’re looking for where Jett is right now, he’s at his parents’ place.”
I took a breath and thanked him before ending the call. “Minnie, tell the pilots I need to go to South Carolina.”
When I finally made it to the house on Rabbit Island, a younger man opened the door. “May I help you?”
“You must be Gabe,” I said. “Is Jett here?”
He shook his head. “No. Gabe and everybody left for California this morning. I’m just looking after the dog. My name’s Hunter.”
I eyed him. “Cy Berringer’s son? Jett told me you were friends with his brother.”
Hunter nodded, suddenly looking less open and friendly. “And you are?”
“Sorry. Locke Maris. I’ve met your dad at a few industry events.” I reached out my hand to shake, and he took it. My name seemed to relax him, but he still looked at me with suspicion.
“What do you need Jett for?”
“It’s a private matter.”
Suddenly, his eyebrows lifted as if he’d just put two and two together. “Oh, shit! You’re the reason he was crying last night.”
The image of Jett, my Jett, crying for any reason made my stomach turn. “Crying.”
Hunter crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I take it if you’re here, you care about him.”
I opened my mouth and then closed it. How I felt about Jett Dav… Marian was none of his business. “I need to find him.”
He studied me for a moment. “I was just getting ready to take Pepper out. Walk with me. In return, I’ll tell you a story about Jett.”
Maybe the man was as cunning as his father, because he’d effortlessly tied a leash around my throat. Within moments, I was trailing him on the beach, barefoot in the warm sand.
“Speak,” I said when he wasn’t immediately forthcoming.
He chuckled. “You’re not like the guys he usually dates.”
“I thought he didn’t date,” I said, falling willfully into his trap. But then again, I’d thought Jett was a sex worker. A go-go dancer. A player. For all I knew, he was a serial monogamist.
“He doesn’t. I mean you’re not like the guys he dated in high school and college. Other geeky types like him. Sweethearts.”
I clenched my back teeth. Great. So I wasn’t Jett’s type? Didn’t matter. I hadn’t thought he was my type either, had I? When I got a hold of him, I’d convince him to date me anyway. Fuck type.
“Why doesn’t he date?” I asked, assuming it was most likely because of his job.
I felt Hunter’s eyes on me. The dog, a tubby black Lab who seemed entirely too trusting of strangers, loped happily after a group of birds at the edge of the surf, sending them flying and squawking away.
“Did you ever see the viral TikTok of the guy who got broken up with by AI? It was probably five or six years ago now. Maybe seven.”
The idea that I’d ever had much time in my life for social media was laughable, but he didn’t know that. I shook my head.
“Well, that was Jett. His boyfriend used ChatGPT to break up with him after almost a year of dating seriously. It crushed him. He swore off relationships after that, but then he ended up giving another guy a chance. Noah.”
I could tell this was going somewhere I didn’t want to go.
Didn’t want to, but needed to.
“What happened with Noah?”
“They dated for a while. Jett really liked him. It took him a while to trust the guy, but when he finally brought him to meet the family one Christmas in Montana, Noah tried hooking up with Jett’s cousin Wolfe.”
“What the fuck?”
“Yeah, it was bad. I mean, Wolfe’s hot, and he’s got that shy, moody thing going on.
He’s also a celebrity’s son. Best I can figure, Noah wanted to get close to the fame?
The money? I don’t know. But Wolfe’s other dad is an ex-Marine.
Honestly, Noah’s lucky he didn’t get murdered that weekend.
Jett was shocked. Embarrassed. And, well, hurt.
As you can imagine.” He blew out a breath.
“And poor Wolfe was horrified. The whole thing seemed to scare him off men completely, whereas Jett just swore off relationships.”
I didn’t say anything, my mind spinning as I tried rearranging what I knew of Jett now that he was no longer the man I’d thought I knew.
The knowledge of just how much I didn’t know about him enraged me. I wanted to wring the man’s neck.
As soon as I could get my hands on him.
“I need to find him, Hunter,” I finally said.
We’d already turned to head back, the dog running ahead to the house.
Before he could respond, I stopped and stared down at something that caught my eye.
There, in the semi-packed sand, was a tiny, perfect shell. A miniature conch.
A triton.