Chapter 3 #2
She took a sip of her drink before responding. “I didn’t have any reason to stay in Paris, and I felt the need to be closer to my sister, even if she wasn’t here. I figured I’d come a few days early, get over jet lag, explore her new home, that sort of thing.”
“I’m glad she did,” Lovell said. “She overheard two men at Maggie’s talking about me. Targeting me.” The room stilled, and all eyes landed on her.
“I wasn’t sure exactly what they planned, but knew it wasn’t good,” she clarified.
“Walk us through it?” Mantis requested. Daphne scanned the faces and bodies in the room. They might have their feet kicked out and hands wrapped around coffee mugs, but the sharp edge of battle vibrated through each.
It didn’t take long, but she relayed everything she overheard and saw, then answered a few questions about what she’d done after leaving the diner.
Lovell picked up the narrative from the time the shot was fired, giving her a chance to sit back and assess the situation for the first time without fear or adrenaline coursing through her body.
When the talk shifted to Daisy, and who she might have hired to do her dirty work, Daphne still wasn’t sold on the theory.
None of the stalkers she’d had over the years had outsourced their work; obsession was a very personal emotion.
Still, she didn’t know Daisy, nor did she know the full story—the thirty-second summary Lovell gave her in the car didn’t count—so she held her tongue.
Instead, she silently asked Amber if she could use her notebook.
Her friend raised a brow in question, but slid it over, along with her mechanical pencil.
As theories and voices flowed around her, Daphne did her thing—she plotted. And drew. And plotted some more.
When she was satisfied with one of those two things, she tore the page from the book and handed it to Lovell, without lifting her eyes from her lists.
Lists of questions, possible next steps, motivations, fatal flaws, and everything else she could think of about Lovell’s situation.
She knew the difference between reality and the fiction she wrote, but more than once, she’d found that putting a story around something helped make it make sense.
“What’s this?” Lovell asked, the warmth of his breath tickling her neck.
She shifted. “The two men in the diner. The driver and the shooter. I think the white guy was the shooter, but I didn’t get a good glimpse when they passed by me.
The make and model of the car is there, and an educated guess as to the year, but not the license number. The plates were from Nevada, though.”
She felt his gaze linger on her before he leaned away and handed the paper to Scipio, who sat on his other side.
“When’d you learn to draw?” Gabe asked, studying the picture when it reached him.
She looked up and shrugged. “I picked it up a few years ago.”
“Looks like you more than picked it up,” Mantis said, eyeing the images Gabe handed over.
She went back to her plotting, jotting down random thoughts and questions, as the brothers discussed sending the information to HICC. Daphne recognized the names they tossed around—Leo, Sabina, Ava, Chad, and a few others—but mostly tuned them out as she focused on her own musings.
Until Lovell said the dumbest thing she’d heard in a dog’s age.
“I’ll head out tonight. Maybe find a place near Redding or Ashland. Lure them away from Mystery Lake.”
“Now that’s a dumbass idea if I’ve ever heard one,” she muttered. The room stilled.
“Excuse me?” Lovell said.
She exhaled and shifted her attention to him. “Why would you leave?”
“They took a shot at me. On a public street. I’m not going to put people in danger by sticking around,” he responded, speaking slowly, as if his reason was obvious.
She rolled her eyes. In her experience, it was rarely worth having a debate with a man when he’d taken the position of being the “logical” one.
“What’s your concern, Daphne?” Gabe asked. Except Gabe. He’d always been reasonable. Even as a teenage boy. And she doubted that had changed much, or Callie wouldn’t have put his ring on her finger.
“You obviously have thoughts on this,” Lovell added.
Her gaze swept the room; nine pairs of eyes watched her.
“If you leave, you’ll be on your own, with no one to watch your back, and in territory that’s either new or less familiar to you.
And if they took a shot at you in public, do you think they’d be above using someone here as leverage to get you back?
Not likely one of you,” she said, gesturing to the men.
“But someone like Amber or Dottie or even Juliana or Helia. Or Kendall,” she said.
Callie and Lina, Viper’s partner, were nearly as well-trained as the club members, so wouldn’t make good targets.
But Dottie, their house mom; Stone’s fiancée, Juliana; and Helia and Kendall, Monk’s girlfriend and half-sister, weren’t.
She turned to Scipio. “I assume, based on your name, that you’re the top strategist of the group.” He hesitated, then nodded. “You know I’m right.”
Intense blue eyes stared back at her, but she saw the wheels turning. “She has a point,” he said.
She turned to Lovell. Had he ground his teeth loud enough for her to hear?
“What do you propose then?” he asked.
She tilted her head. “It’s funny, your words sound reasonable, but your tone makes you sound like a condescending dick. Oh, and you might not want to grind your teeth so much. Bad for the enamel. Not to mention the headaches.”
Gabe wasn’t the only one to snicker or hide a laugh.
The look Lovell leveled on her would fell a small forest, but she’d learned a few survival skills from growing up with the parents she had, then working in the industry she did.
Sure, some supermodels were bitchy, but most of them were just labeled that way because they’d gained enough power to stop taking shit from people.
And she’d stopped taking shit over a decade ago; she had lots of practice.
Lovell’s nostrils flared as he took a deep breath, then another. She gave him props for reaching for his calm.
“What would you suggest?” he asked again, his tone softer.
“Stay in Mystery Lake where you have the advantage of knowing the land, of knowing the rhythms of the town and the people. You need to make yourself almost reachable. You need to make them think that if the time is right, they’ll have a chance to do the job they were sent to do.”
“Keep them here, where we can have eyes on them, but lead them on a merry chase,” Gabe said.
She nodded. “And while they focus on hunting you, you use the time to do whatever you need to, whatever HICC can, to figure out who they are and how to stop them.”
When she stopped talking, her eyes held his.
His were green, but sitting this close to him, his attention on her, she noticed they weren’t just green.
They were soft, almost hazy, swirled with touches of brown.
The thought of giving one of her characters the same color flitted through her head, but she immediately dismissed the idea, knowing she’d never really be able to capture it in words.
Mantis cleared his throat. Both she and Lovell jerked their attention back to the room. He shifted beside her, the jeans he’d changed into sliding over the surface of the chair.
“It’s not a bad idea,” Lovell conceded. “There’s only one problem.”
This situation was a whole slew of problems, but she appreciated his minimization attempts. “What’s that?”
“You.”
“Me?”
“They saw the car you drive, and if they are any good, they will have noted your license plate. They may not know your name, not yet, but they will.”
“That’s not a unique problem. They probably know everyone in the Falcons’ orbit,” she replied.
“But you’re the lone wolf,” Gabe answered.
She turned to face him. “The club is secure; Dottie and Amber will be fine if they stay here or, if they need to leave, take one of us. Helia isn’t in town this week, and every single one of us will surround Kendall, if needed.
As for Juliana, when she isn’t working, she’s either here or with Stone, or occasionally on a girls’ night out, but Lina and Callie are there, too. ”
Callie had taken a few days off to spend with her while she was in town, but her caseload didn’t allow for the full three weeks Daphne had planned. And Gabe needed to work as well. Leaving her unprotected during the day once Callie went back to work.
It sounded dire, and if those were the only facts she had, she’d be concerned, too. But there was more to the story.
She hated giving voice to the words she’d say next—they made her sound either self-important or paranoid. But the problem Gabe had called out wasn’t really a problem, and she needed to take it off the table.
Bracing herself, she ripped the Band-Aid off. “I learned long ago never to rent a car or a house under my real name. They can look all they want, but they won’t ever find me.”