80. CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX
Icall Jillian but when it goes right to voicemail, I leave a message with restrained fury.
“Call me back, right now, Jillian.” I use her name and not sparkles to let her know I’m pissed and not playing around.
What the hell does she think she’s doing? Is this for a case? I can’t imagine she’d decide she wants to look at women shaking their tits one last time.
I bring up the tracker for her car. Something I haven’t needed lately because she’s not left my side.
Zooming in on the location, I find her Honda parked in front of a building that looks like it’s made of marble. Each window is covered with a black and silver metal canopy, all with scrolling letters saying:
The Candy Store
I jump in my car, and while driving toward the location, I see nothing else unusual on her phone. No strange calls. In fact…no calls at all except mine.
Something niggling me, I log back into the hook-up app as her this time. Not me.
My heart stops seeing recent messages in her inbox.
“What the ever-loving-fuck?” I pull over or I’ll crash into something.
With shaking hands, I open them and see a string of messages from a ’Johnny B. Goode.’
But it’s not me.
Johnny: I need to fuck you.
Gemma7: Hello to you, too. Sorry I can’t.
Johnny: I wasn’t asking.
Gemma7: I used my safe word. And the guy I told you about, the one I felt was off limits? We’re working things out.
Johnny: That’s too bad. I have so much more to give you.
Gemma7: I told him about you. He wasn’t angry, but I’m not going to see you again.
Johnny: One more time.
Gemma7: No.
Johnny: I know who you are Jillian Diamond. Gemma7, very cute, little gem. And I know where you work. I need you one more time. Or I’ll expose you. All the things we did.
Gemma7: That’s shitty of you.
Johnny: You’re on this app for hot fucks. So am I. I gave you all the fantasies you wanted. Now I want one. You owe me.
Gemma7: What’s your fantasy?
I haven’t seethed this way since I dragged those douchebags to their death for laying a hand on Balor. Who the fuck is this?
I click on the profile, and it looks like mine, even the stupid ruler picture is there. But that could have been snipped from my real profile and uploaded to this one.
Johnny: I want to bang a stripper. Go to The Candy Store. You’ll be brought to a private room where YOU WILL STRIP FOR ME.
Gemma7: Okay, one condition.
Okay???
Johnny: You’re skating on thin ice. What?
Gemma7: No mask.
Johnny: No problem.
Sure, no fucking problem, because it’s not me.
Whoever the hell this is, must have also hacked her app. What the fuck kind of shitty service can just be hacked by anyone and everyone?
I rack my brain trying to imagine who this is. She prosecutes criminals. She has enemies all over this damn city.
Is she meeting this guy to do something dangerous like outing someone who threatened her?
She’s there right now. And I’m four miles away.
I pull out into traffic, swerving around a car. I switch to my phone and call Balor.
“You rang?” he chides me, sounding bored.
I’m about to wake him the fuck up. “Get into that hook-up app right now.”
He just exhales, no longer arguing with me. “I’m in.”
“Go to Jillian’s profile. Someone is sending her messages as me.”
“You?”
“The fake profile. Johnny B. Goode. Someone lured her to a strip club. Who the fuck is it?”
“I need a few minutes.” Balor ends the call, before I start screaming.
The Nav screen leads me to The Candy Store where I spot Jillian’s car. I block it in, so she won’t be able to leave without me.
From the back of my rental SUV, I take out my Smith and Wesson, and stick it in my jacket’s side pocket. I couldn’t bring it into the District Attorney’s office building. The ghost gun I bought to kill Cormac’s supplier was destroyed right after the kill.
I’m steps from the main entrance of the club when my phone rings.
“Talk to me, Balor.”
“Where are you?” he says, sounding panicked.
“About to step inside the club. Why?”
“I traced the IP of that other profile.” The dread in his voice stops me in my tracks.
“Yeah?”
“It came from the Millennium Plaza. The penthouse. It’s the Borgia Underboss. And he owns The Candy Store.”