Chapter Five
Leaving Baz and JJ’s room, Reese let Tesha lead the way to the elevator. He pressed the button and stood back, waiting for Brantley to catch up. He was there before the ding sounded, signaling the car’s arrival.
“You good?” he asked Brantley, making small talk.
“Yep. You?”
Smiling, Reese nodded as he stepped into the elevator. The doors had just closed, sealing them inside, when Reese’s phone buzzed with another text. He dug his phone out of his pocket and scanned the incoming message, fearing it was going to be another message from Slade.
Brantley leaned against the wall. “Who’s texting you?”
He nearly breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that it wasn’t Slade.
“This time it’s Atticus,” he answered as the doors opened to the lobby.
“This time?”
They walked toward the exit, then stepped out of the hotel into the muggy October morning.
“Slade texted while we were in their room.” Twice. But Reese didn’t bother to clarify that. The text message was bothersome enough.
“What does he want?”
He purposely misunderstood Brantley’s question, answering with, “Atticus says it’s important. It has to do with Violet’s father.”
“We can call him in the truck. What did Slade want?”
Because he didn’t think it was worth discussing, he changed the subject. “I need to swing through PetSmart on the way home.”
Brantley nodded as he walked around to the driver’s side of the truck. Reese helped Tesha in the backseat, then climbed into the passenger seat.
“Don’t think I didn’t notice you deflecting,” Brantley said, starting the truck. “What did Slade want?”
Reese considered lying but knew he couldn’t.
Brantley gripped the steering wheel as he looked over at him. “Is it bad?”
“Well, it’s certainly not good.”
“What does that mean?”
Exhaling heavily, Reese leaned into the seat. “Slade wants us to partner him with Atticus.”
Brantley scrunched his nose. “Why?”
Reese looked at him, cocking an eyebrow. Surely Brantley wasn’t oblivious to what was going on between Atticus and Slade.
“What?” Brantley glanced his way. “Why’re you lookin’ at me like that?”
“Slade’s jealous.”
“Of?”
“Atticus and Archer.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. That’s stupid.”
Maybe, but it was the only explanation Reese had for the number of texts he’d received from Slade asking him to realign the teams so that Slade could partner with Atticus.
Brantley’s gaze remained on the road. “That is stupid, right?”
“Yes. Of course it is.”
“So there’s nothin’ goin’ on between Atticus and Slade?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But there’s nothin’ goin’ on between Atticus and Archer?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Are you gonna do it?”
“What? Shift the team? No,” he said in a huff.
“Good. I think we’ve got strength the way it’s laid out right now.”
Reese didn’t disagree. He didn’t have too much to go on yet, but what he’d seen of Atticus and Archer, they would play to one another’s strengths. And Evan and Slade worked well together.
Plus, that whole mixing business with pleasure didn’t work out most of the time. Of course, it wasn’t a hard and fast rule he would enforce—after all, that was how he and Brantley got together—but he certainly didn’t intend to encourage it.
“You wanna call Atticus?” Brantley prompted when they pulled out of the parking lot.
Since Brantley’s phone was connected to the truck’s Bluetooth, Reese grabbed it and pulled up Atticus’s contact. He tapped the screen to dial the number.
It began to ring. Once. Twice.
“Hey, boss.”
“What’s up?” Brantley replied, stopping at a red light.
“Is Reese with you?”
“I’m here.”
“Okay. Good. It sounds to me like Violet’s dad is missing.”
“Harold?”
There was a slight pause, followed by, “Is that her dad’s name?”
Brantley chuckled. “Yep.”
“Does she have more than one dad?”
“Nope.”
“Then I guess that’d be the one.”
“How long’s he been missing?”
“Damn fine question. No one seems to know anything other than they found his truck abandoned in a ditch, his cell phone and wallet were inside.”
“Maybe he was drunk. Wrecked the truck. Walked to town.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“What do you want me to do about it?”
“Violet would like the team to look into it.”
Reese glanced at Brantley, waited for him to lay out a plan. Only he didn’t.
“Where’re you right now?” Brantley asked.
“Back at HQ with Archer.”
“We’re headin’ that way. We have to make one stop first,” Brantley told Atticus. “We’ll talk more about it when we get there.”
“Sure thing, boss.”
The call ended.
“You don’t seem surprised that Violet’s dad is missing,” Reese told Brantley.
“The man’s a flight risk. Always has been.”
“Meaning?”
“Meanin’ one minute he’d be back in Daphne’s life, pretendin’ to be a doting father to their girls. The next, off on a new adventure with a dozen excuses as to why he couldn’t stick around.”
“They’re divorced, right? Daphne and Harold.”
“Oh, yeah. But she has a soft spot for him.”
“I guess we should check in with Darius, see who’s available to help.”
Brantley nodded. “Let’s get there first. As much as I wanna help Violet, I need as much focus on this case as I can get.”
Reese understood. With the possibility of Kylie being out there, they couldn’t put it on the back burner. Then again, that was why they had a team of people. They could easily assign a couple of them to focus on finding Harold.
Nearly forty minutes later, after stopping at PetSmart to pick up what Tesha needed for a road trip, they were parking the truck in front of the house.
“What’s Luca doin’ here?” Brantley asked as they were getting out of the truck.
That was a good question. Luca worked whenever they needed him to, but rarely did he come to HQ on the weekend. He preferred to work remotely unless it was during regular business hours.
Granted, they didn’t really have regular business hours, did they?
Reese took a detour through the house to drop Tesha’s stuff off so he could pack it in a bit. Once that was done, he followed Brantley out the back door, across the yard, and right into the barn.
The second they stepped inside, Luca shot to his feet. “I need to talk to y’all.”
Reese glanced at Brantley, surprised. Luca was the laid-back sort. Rarely did the man show any emotion whatsoever. Even when things were chaotic, Luca was cool under pressure. Today it looked as though someone was holding their finger on his panic button.
“What’s up?” Brantley prompted.
“Honor’s dad is missing.”
Reese recalled the conversation he’d had with Brantley not too long ago regarding the Anderson sisters.
Brantley’s family had been groomed to protect their cousins—Whitney, Amanda, Violet, and Honor—mainly from their father, since Harold Anderson was prone to breaking their hearts.
The four girls had been raised within a protective bubble, treated as though they were fragile and in need of a knight in shining armor.
Reese didn’t know the sisters all that well, but from what he’d seen of Violet and Honor, they certainly weren’t damsels in distress.
He also remembered how defensive Brantley had been, determined to confront Luca.
Evidently, Brantley had forgotten that he was supposed to be the protective voice of reason because he said, “Do you need our help?”
Luca glanced between them. “I know the team’s focused on Simon’s case, but…”
“You wanna find Honor’s dad,” Reese filled in when he let the sentence hang.
“Yeah.”
“Okay,” Brantley said without hesitation.
Luca seemed surprised by that.
“We don’t really have anyone to spare, so you’ll have to lead the charge. We’re headin’ up to Dallas.”
“Who’s we?” Luca inquired.
“Atticus, Archer, and Simon are goin’ with us.”
“How long?”
“Quick trip. Don’t know when we’ll be back,” Brantley explained. “If you need someone to help, reach out to Slade.”
Nodding, Luca exhaled. “Thanks, boss.”
“Let me know how it goes.”
“Yeah. Okay.”
With that, Luca was out the door, laptop tucked under his arm.
Brantley grinned. “Well that was easy.”
Reese turned to look at him. When he did, he caught a glimpse of the monitor showing the parking area near the house.
“This may not be,” he muttered, jerking his chin in the direction of the screen.
“Shit,” Brantley grunted. “What the hell are they doin’ here?”
Brantley wasn’t surprised to see Travis. After their conversation earlier, it made sense that he had gone home and grabbed reinforcements—namely, his husband.
Then again, he’d been banking on Travis being Travis and keeping the information to himself. If there was anyone who could shut out the entire world and carry the full weight of whatever burden he was dealing with, it was Travis.
Not this time, apparently.
And of course, they decided to drop in without calling first.
Nope. Not at all surprised.
While Travis likely had a legitimate reason for showing up without warning, Brantley didn’t have time to soothe his ruffled feathers or explain why or how they were doing what they were doing.
He preferred to get on the road so he could get this conversation with Max out of the way.
And since Travis and the mob boss exchanged pleasantries and phone calls often, he didn’t care to enlighten his cousin about his plans.
If he thought he could’ve gotten away with sneaking out the back, he would have. Unfortunately, there was nowhere to go, so he stayed rooted to the floor, waiting for Travis and Gage to come in.
“I can tell ’em you’re not here, boss,” Atticus joked as he pushed the door open. “I guess we should’ve catered in breakfast.”
Gage walked in first, his gaze sliding throughout the space. He looked as though he was admiring the decor, but Brantley figured he’d already accounted for every single soul in the place. Those he could see, anyway.
“Hey,” Gage greeted when his eyes stopped on Brantley. “Sorry to drop in like this.”
“Not a problem,” Brantley lied. “We were just gettin’ ready to head outta town. What’s up?”