Not Exactly Missing
Maddox
As the elevator doors slid shut, I stood staring like they might reopen.
They didn't.
I frowned. The woman's hostility toward me wasn't exactly a surprise. But her interest in Delaney was hitting harder – especially when combined with the woman's not-so-subtle maneuver to get Delaney alone.
My guess? She was planning to give Delaney an earful.
About me?
It sure looked that way.
Fuck.
If I were the type to panic, I'd be bolting for the stairs, looking to cut off Delaney at the pass and undo any damage before it had time to set.
But panicking had never been my style.
Still, I turned and eyed the stairway door with a level of interest that was mildly concerning.
I was still eyeing it when my cellphone buzzed in my pocket. I tore my gaze from the stairwell and pulled out the phone to see who was calling.
Saved by the bell.
Or rather, saved by Ryder Vaughn – the guy who'd gotten me into this mess in the first place.
I answered with a terse, "Yeah?"
"What's up with you?"
I gave the stairway door another glance. "What do you mean?"
"You sound pissed."
Until he'd said it, I hadn't realized it was true.
I was pissed at myself for running out of time. I'd wanted Delaney to hear the rest of my own story from my own lips, not from some stranger in an elevator who clearly had an axe to grind.
Then again, it's not like I'd known Delaney would be leaving. One minute we'd been talking, and the next, she'd been heading for the door. On the upside, at least she was coming back.
I could still taste the sweetness of her lips. She'd felt right in my arms, like a part of me I hadn't known was missing.
I hadn't planned to kiss her.
In fact, I'd planned not to.
But I couldn't make myself regret it.
When she returned, I'd come clean about everything and make it right.
On the phone, Ryder said, "Then again, you always sound pissed."
I pulled my thoughts from Delaney. "What?"
He laughed. "Oh, so that got your attention."
Asshole. "And you called, because…?" As if I didn't know.
Right on cue, he replied, "As if you didn't know."
I knew plenty. And that was the problem. I was still considering how much I should tell Ryder when he asked, "So? Have your people found her?"
My people.
He meant Cal and the team of security experts I kept on retainer. I paused for half a beat. "No. My people haven't."
But I had.
I planned to tell Ryder all about it, just not right now, when who-knows-what was happening downstairs.
On the phone, he said, "I guess I'm not surprised. The way it sounds, she's been missing for almost a year."
Bullshit.
Delaney hadn't been missing. Until just this week, her address in West Haven hadn't even changed. But the way Ryder talked, she'd vanished off the face of the earth.
Was he lying?
Or was Delaney's sister lying?
They could be simply wrong. But that would be one hell of a mistake, because the facts weren't lining up.
I knew Ryder. Lying wasn't his style.
As for the sister, I didn't know her at all.
But I knew Delaney. She was honest to a fault.
Still, somebody was almost certainly lying – including me if you counted lying by omission, which I'd been doing ever since Delaney had walked through that lobby door.
Ryder asked, "So, what about Carver? You still have eyes on him, right?"
Evan Carver. The guy was a world-class douche.
A few days ago, Ryder had asked me to keep tabs on Carver and make sure he wasn't headed for Mackinac Island. He wasn't. If the team watching him had gotten even a whiff, I would've heard about it straight away.
For now, the guy's ass was planted firmly here in Chicago, where he'd been spending his time gambling, womanizing, and keeping several drug-dealers hopping. If Carver so much as sneezed in the direction of northern Michigan, I'd hear about it pronto.
Ryder, meanwhile, was already on Mackinac Island.
I wasn't sure what was going on with him and Delaney's sister, but Ryder's interest was obviously personal.
I could relate. Even now, my thoughts kept straying to the other sister, Delaney, wondering what she was hearing a few stories below.
Whatever it was, it couldn't be good.