11. Chapter 11
eleven
Better Off - Dead Eyes
Dimitri stopped dead in the front office before Jackie’s. Olivia Vanier sat at Talia’s desk, with Drew leaning over her shoulder, pointing at something on the computer screen.
Her face had filled out. Gone were the hollow cheeks and washed-out complexion.
Her skin looked golden and sun-kissed as it had when he first met her in Florida, and her cheeks were fuller than they had been then.
She had put on a healthy amount of weight, her hourglass figure even more accentuated now.
She looked up at Dimitri as he entered. Her eyes looked clear, and it struck him that her drug problem likely predated her divorce from her Proud Boy ex-husband because he’d never seen such clarity on her face.
“Hi, Dimitri, it’s nice to see you again,” she said warmly, a soft smile on her face.
He examined her face and body language for any hint of ulterior motives.
Her hair was pulled into a high ponytail, and she wore a simple turtleneck sweater and jeans.
Before him was a seemingly totally different Olivia Vanier than the one he’d met in Florida months ago, or who had threatened to dox him and Jackie in November.
“Hi, Olivia,” he said hesitantly. “Um… does Jackie know you’re here?”
Drew looked between him and Olivia, a goofy smile plastered on his face when he looked at his girlfriend. “Jackie offered her a job, remember?” he asked, turning back to Dimitri. “She’s here to manage Jackie’s schedule and mail until Talia is back.”
“Right.” He nodded. He vaguely remembered Jackie saying something about a job during her confrontation with Olivia, but he hadn’t taken it seriously at the time. “Well, welcome,” he said before heading into Jackie’s office.
He found his girlfriend in front of her whiteboard, arms crossed over her chest as she stared at some new additions to their case.
She turned to him when she heard the door close, and he was struck by the stark difference between her and Olivia.
It was as if they had swapped bodies—Jackie’s face now looking gaunt and washed out.
Her clothes were beginning to hang loose on her frame, and no amount of makeup could hide the dark circles under her eyes.
“Drew found the car, and the one they swapped it with,” she said, turning back to her board without noticing Dimitri’s assessment of her.
“Unfortunately, they then drove that car into an alley, and four other cars drove out the other end. We can’t make out which car Talia might be in from the footage, so we’re tracking all of them.
Drew is also looking for footage from that alley because, conveniently, there doesn’t seem to be any. ”
“Are you sure about Olivia working here?” he asked, wanting to get that conversation out of the way before diving into the abduction.
Jackie rolled her eyes. “She can’t encrypt like Talia would, but she can manage a schedule and some mail.”
“Sure, but you’re not worried about her coming on to you?”
She shrugged. “She’s not so much as given me a flirtatious look. She’s just been incredibly grateful for all the help I’ve given her over the last few months.”
“Alright,” he said, still uneasy with it, but trusting Jackie to keep on top of it if Olivia did try anything. “What’s our next move for Talia? I heard back from a few contacts, but they didn’t have anything very useful for me. I’m still waiting to hear back from a few others.”
“Same here. Apparently, when these bratva have revenge plans, they keep them under lock and key,” she said, annoyed by the mobsters' prudence.
“I’ve been thinking about going back to where it all began. You know, back to their club.”
“Where do you think that convenient camera blackout happened?” Jackie replied, pointing at the board. She’d already circled the club's address, four blocks from her condo. Under the list labelled Leads, she’d written the club’s name—Renegat. Under it, she’d written contact.
“You have a contact there already?” he asked.
Jackie hesitated before answering. “Yeah, you actually kind of blew up an understanding I had with someone there when you came barrelling into my condo with his buddies on your tail.”
“An understanding? So you don’t think they’ll be willing to help? You haven’t contacted them yet?”
“No, we had an arrangement. We never even exchanged names or phone numbers,” she said hesitantly, wringing her hands nervously.
Dimitri watched her, a scowl burrowed into his forehead until she elaborated.
“I only ever went in person, and only if I needed specific information or I was bored and looking for a lead to look into. We had an arrangement,” she repeated.
“You exchanged sex for information.”
“Can you not sound so judgmental when you say that? This isn’t news,” she countered, feeling embarrassed about having to admit it to Dimitri.
He was well aware that she’d used sex to get information in the past; he’d even called her on the fact the night they met.
“The sex was good, and the information was usually even better. He usually gave it away without even realizing he was playing right into my hand. I haven’t been back since before we met.
And it became too risky to go back after you conned them. ”
Dimitri chuckled. He hadn’t needed all the details, but he was glad to see the fire still burning within her.
He looked back at the board, examining all of her additions since he’d last been there.
He paused below the club and contact, on JP’s name.
“I thought we agreed we weren’t going there,” he said, pointing at it.
Jackie sighed. “I know, I don’t want to go there, either. But he is an option if all else fails. He’s only on there as a last resort.”
“We will exhaust every single option we have before we even consider going back to him.”