Chapter 25 #2
She frowned, thinking back. “I think so? There seemed to be something going on. He was actually in a pretty good mood. He was going to announce the engagement soon and he said he had another big announcement. I don’t know what that was. But yeah, if anything he seemed happier than normal?”
“Do you think it’s possible?” Kellan asked.
Huh? Did she think what was possible? Then she realized he was looking at Eli, not her.
“What?” she asked.
“I think it is. But the governor . . .”
“We need to find this guy, Lee,” Jake said. “But that’s out of my jurisdiction unless I can find anything to tie him to the break-in.”
“But it’s not out of ours,” Eli said. “Not if we suspect he might have had something to do with giving Arabella’s father the drugs.”
“You think that Lee gave my father drugs?” she asked.
“I really don’t know about that. Lee didn’t seem like a drug dealer.
Why would my father be seen with him if he was?
That could have ruined his career. And I have a feeling that his big announcement .
. . well, that maybe he was running for senator or something. ”
“Perhaps someone didn’t want him running for senator,” Kellan said.
“We need a way to test for these drugs, there’s probably no way of knowing if he took them or not,” Eli said with frustration.
“And if nothing was found on him or at his house, that’s probably a dead end too,” Kellan said. “And you got rid of everything?”
“Well, yes. I don’t understand what you’re talking about, though,” she said with frustration. “What drugs? Why do you think he was on them? And that Lee might have had something to do with giving them to him?”
She’d told them all of this because she thought that Lee had likely trashed her house looking for her.
“There’s a new drug that we’ve just become aware of,” Eli explained. “This is very confidential by the way.”
She nodded. Who would she tell?
“This drug makes people feel euphoric. It gives them a high but without the real low. At the moment it’s also undetectable in the blood stream.
We have people working on a way to test for it but that’s not going to happen immediately.
But the thing with this drug is that it can make people feel invincible,” Eli explained.
“They think they can outrun trains or walk on water or fly.”
She thought about that for a long moment. “As in they might jump off a bridge thinking they could fly?”
“Yeah. That’s right,” Eli said.
“I still don’t understand why he’d take a drug like that,” she said.
“Maybe he didn’t know about the risk,” Jake said.
“It’s only something we’ve discovered recently due to the number of odd deaths in Texas where people seemed to think they could do extraordinary things,” El told her.
“Some family members of the deceased said that they were taking a new drug. We even managed to get a sample of some from one of the family members.”
“Just in Texas?” she asked.
“That we can tell,” Eli told her.
“That’s weird, right?” she asked.
“It likely means the epicentre is somewhere here in Texas. That they are making it or distributing it from somewhere around here,” Eli told her.
“No one in this county or the surrounding ones has reported a similar death that meets these criteria,” Kellan told her.
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“We’re not sure,” Eli told her. “It could mean something or nothing. That’s what Kellan and I are looking into now.
That’s why we got called back to headquarters.
Our boss wanted to let us know what they found and that he was concerned with the pattern of deaths across Texas.
So everyone thinks we’re on leave, but we’re actually doing some investigation into this drug and whether it’s being made or distributed from somewhere nearby. ”
That’s why they were called away? Now she felt terrible. They had an important case with people dying and she’d been upset because she’d pushed them away and then couldn’t find them to apologize.
“Hey, you didn’t know.” Eli reached out to cup her chin in his hand. “All right? We should have contacted you.”
“We thought we’d be gone a day at most,” Kellan added. “Our brothers were mad at us for just disappearing too.”
“I saw Wyatt and Carson yesterday,” Jake asked.
“Uh yeah, they’re home for a bit. All of them are, except Tucker and Pierce,” Eli said.
She got the feeling that wasn’t something that happened often.
They should be with them now instead of looking after her.
“That’s good,” Jake said. “Just as long as no one decides to cause any trouble.”
“Don’t know what you mean,” Kellan said in his dry voice. “My brothers are all upstanding citizens. And Eli and I are FBI agents while Duncan is your deputy.”
Jake eyed him for a moment as though he was trying to figure out whether he was joking or not.
She was coming to realize that a lot of people didn’t understand that Kellan had a sense of humor.
“I’m not talking about you three. I’m talking about Shaw, Remington, and Tucker. If he comes home. And Pierce and Carson. Hell, all of them. Including you two. Duncan is the only sane one out of all of you. I’ll talk to him about you guys behaving.”
“Jake, you’re going to give yourself an ulcer worrying about stuff that won’t happen. Remington and Shaw have been here for a while without creating any issues.”
Jake just grunted. “I guess so.”
“And we’re not the Malones,” Kellan added. “We’re not fucking wild.”
Jake sighed. “Well, that’s true. No one is like the Malones.
I thought they might have calmed down once they all got married and started having kids.
But there have been reports of two men matching the description of Beau and Butch Malone singing about Clive Baxter in a bar in Freestown three nights ago.
It wasn’t a flattering song and he’s looking to sue since it’s now all over the internet. ”
“Clive Baxter is a dick,” Kellan said. “He always has been.”
“Yes, well, there are also some rumors that he was rude to Scarlett Malone the other day when she was walking around in Freestown with her children.”
“There you go,” Eli said. “Justified.”
She wasn’t exactly following what they were saying. Who were the Malones? And why were they considered worse than the Jones boys? Scarlett was obviously married to one of them or a relative. And they were getting revenge for her?
“Clive is humiliated and not happy. Anyway, let’s get back to you, Arabella. Part of the reason you came to Haven is because of Lee? And you haven’t heard from him since your father’s death?” Jake asked.
“No. That’s weird, right?”
“Seems strange.” Jake nodded. “I’d really like a description of him and any more information you have.”
She gave him everything she could think of.
“And you think Lee had something to do with the break-in at your place?” Eli asked.
“Well, maybe not him directly. But what if he followed me? What if he’s angry that I left? There have been a couple of times where I’ve felt like I’m being watched.”
“Watched?” Kellan asked. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“Yes, or about Lee,” Jake said, leaning forward and resting his forearms on his knees. “Both things that you should have told me.”
“I thought I was imagining things,” she said. “And I was starting to think that Lee wasn’t going to be an issue so it seemed pointless to tell anyone.”
“Pointless,” Kellan muttered. “This is your safety we’re talking about, Arabella.”
“I know.” She winced.
“This is the sort of thing that I needed to be aware of,” Jake said. “Even if he’s not a threat, you’re scared of him.”
God. He was right.
She was scared of Lee. And she should start listening to her gut rather than dismissing her feelings as stupid or not important.
The way her father always had.
“I was never allowed a voice growing up. When I spoke up my father would tell me I was an idiot or stupid. You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“It can be hard to believe that someone cares about you, that they might want to help you,” Jake said. “But lots of people here do. And we need to know when you’re in trouble, even if it’s just a feeling and nothing comes of it. Okay?”
She nodded, trying to keep her composure. It used to be easy to keep a mask in place, but it seemed to have become increasingly harder.
“Am I in trouble?” she asked.
“With Jake? No,” Kellan said. “With us? Yes. Since we’re now your guardians.”