Chapter Eighteen #2
“Well, she’s a lying liar,” Ruby quipped, “who should have
paid more attention to what was going on around her. She did a good job of
avoiding security cams, but social media is forever. I don’t have the whole
story, but it seems like she worked at the Dallas office for a time and then
she quit suddenly.”
He knew the story. It was good to know Ruby didn’t know
everything. “She left when Scott Whittiker quit. They had been having an
affair.”
Ruby nodded as though that filled in some missing pieces
she’d been looking for. “I understand. So Jessica could be doing this as
revenge for Scott leaving her and obviously coming back to try again with
Olivia. The man who tried to take her doesn’t match Scott. He’s too short and
much thinner than Scott.”
“You don’t think they could be working together?” He kind of
wanted it to be Scott. If Scott was in jail, he couldn’t cause more trouble for
Olivia.
“I don’t see the point unless this is a full-on kidnapping
plot and the goal is cash. Personally, I don’t see it. This feels like more
than a money grab, and neither Scott nor Jessica have any real criminal records
in their pasts. Just a couple of traffic tickets. There’s usually a more
gradual curve before jumping straight into felony kidnapping. I looked into her
financials and she’s not rolling in cash, but she’s also not in a ton of debt.
Scott has more financial problems, but again, I’m not sure I’m seeing the
purpose. They both know Jack Barnes. Jessica grew up hearing stories about the
man. She would be stupid to think she wouldn’t get caught. This feels way more
like desperation than anything else.”
“And you think the fire at the office is in some way
connected?” Garrett’s brain was starting to work. There were pieces of the
puzzle Ruby couldn’t know about yet. Things he was only starting to put
together to form a bigger picture.
“It’s what I can’t figure out,” Ruby admitted. “I don’t see
how the arson and the attempted kidnapping go together. And then there’s the
incident with the slashed tires. They don’t go together. The tires feel petty.
I could almost believe it was a coincidence, but my gut tells me no. My gut
thinks they’re connected, but how do I get from traffic tickets to arson to
attempted kidnapping in a very short time?”
“What if we’re wrong about what this person wants?” Garrett
stared at the picture of the man who had taken Olivia. There was something
about the way he stood. Slightly hunched over. Something familiar.
Then he saw it. He pointed to the screen. “You can see part
of his watch. Do you see that? The sleeve came up the slightest bit, and I can
see the watch face. Can you make that clearer?”
“You think you recognize him?”
His mind wasn’t on the body or the face. “I think I
recognize that watch, and if it is what I think it is, then she’s still in real
trouble.”
“The watch?” Ruby’s fingers flew across the keys, and she
used her mouse to zero in on that watch.
The same watch he’d seen a few weeks back. It was a Patek
Philippe. Rare. No one in Willow Fork would wear that watch, but he knew
someone who did.
He reached for his cell. Keane needed to know they would
absolutely try again.
* * * *
Olivia stopped at the coffee aisle and sighed. This
store was shabby and sad but it was close, and she wanted to get back to
Garrett before the meeting with Scott, which would hopefully be the last.
Something about Scott. It flickered there in her memory, but
she couldn’t quite catch it. He’d been at The Barn last night, but she couldn’t
remember much beyond that. The doctors told her that her memory might be fuzzy.
But not her memory of being in between her men. No. That was
emblazoned on her mind for the rest of time.
Should she grab a bag of frozen peas? The romance novels
rarely talked about how sore an asshole was when it was invaded by a giant
cock.
“I could take you to the big store.” Keane looked at the small
section that held the selection of coffee and tea.
There was a reason she’d suggested this place. The big store
was the grocery on the other side of town, but Keane needed to get back to the
ranch soon and she had the meeting with Scott. They had a couple of deliveries
this afternoon he needed to oversee, so they’d stopped at the GrabItQuick. “I
just need a few things. This place is barely holding on, but they still have
coffee.”
She selected a national brand and put it in her basket. It
wasn’t what she would usually buy but beggars couldn’t be choosers and she
needed her caffeine. So did her men. Keane had started making a full pot in the
mornings because they were all caffeine junkies.
This morning he’d brought her coffee into the bedroom,
waking her up with soft kisses and the smell of a dark roast.
He would have to make do with a medium roast until they had
the time to go grocery shopping.
They’d cuddled together under the covers while enjoying
their morning coffee and then they’d gotten her in the shower. Yeah, she wasn’t
going to forget that soon either.
Keane took the coffee from her hands and placed it in the
basket. He looked around. “It’s kind of sad. It looks like it got stuck in the
seventies or something.”
She never came here. For her mom this place had bad
memories. She’d heard the stories about the owner of the store refusing to sell
to her mom. At the time, her mom had to drive two towns over to buy groceries.
That owner had retired, but his son was still keeping the place running.
Barely.
“After the new store was built, this place kind of went
downhill. From what I understand it was the only grocery store in town for
decades. They had zero competition for miles around,” she explained, looking at
the sad selection of tea they had. Pretty much black and green, and the green
was out of date. “I almost never come in here. My mom was not treated well by
the owner. His son runs the place now, but they never recovered from HEB
putting a store in close enough we can drive to it.”
HEB was kind of a wonderland. It was a food Disney World. No
one would come to this store except for convenience.
“How did they not treat her well?” Keane asked as they moved
to the next aisle. He grabbed a bag of chips.
This was a story she’d heard from her grandmother. Her mom
didn’t like to talk about that time much. “Back when she was pregnant with
Lexi, they wouldn’t allow her to shop in town. She was dating this guy—Lexi’s
dad. His name was Adam, and he was the golden boy of his wealthy family. He
died in a car accident after he told his parents off and that he was going to
marry my mom.”
Keane whistled. “So they blamed her and they had power. They
blackballed her, and the store owners went along with it.” He stopped. “Does
your daddy know that story?”
“Of course. They weren’t nice to her when she came back
twenty years later. That was when she met my dads,” Olivia explained. “She had
to fight for her right to buy tampons. It’s kind of a legendary story around
here.”
“Did your father buy the HEB?”
It was a good guess, though there were things even her
father couldn’t manage. “Nah. He talked to the CEO and said this would be a
good place for a store.” She hadn’t thought about it that way. Why would her
father try to talk the largest grocery store in Texas into putting a store in
their tiny town? It had worked out for everyone, but since when had her dad
cared about groceries? It all clicked into place. “And he offered them an
excellent deal on our beef. Damn. You’re right. He did that. Dad likes
revenge.”
Keane chuckled. “I’m starting to like your dad. He’s a
long-term thinker.”
She shouldn’t let them spend too much time alone together.
Garrett was her Captain America who would do everything through legal channels.
Keane would learn way too much from her dad. He was the one who could hop onto
the revenge train and ride it for the rest of his life.
And he meant what he said. He really was a lot like her dad.
Overly protective and unapologetic about it. She’d planned to go down to the
office and see if the insurance adjuster had come by, but Keane had nixed that
plan.
He wasn’t allowing her to walk around on her own in her own
town. It was obnoxious. When she realized they were serious about not allowing
her to be alone, Gigi showed them her never-ending array of bejeweled security
devices. They were not impressed. As Gabe was working in the garage on the new
table and Garrett had been on the phone with an overseas distributor, Keane had
been the one to take her into town.
“Anything in particular you’re looking for, Miss Olivia?” a
deep voice asked.
She turned and Stephen Gunderson stood there. Where his
father had been a larger man, Stephen was all lean and wiry. It gave him a
slightly predatory, hungry look. Like a coyote who hadn’t eaten in weeks.
It was that moment that she remembered how much his family
hated hers. She held up the coffee. “I only needed some coffee.”
“I thought you also needed some makeup remover. I need to
pick up some creamer, too. You know Garrett can’t drink coffee the way we do,”
Keane said. “He’s still in his coffee infancy. I don’t suppose you have any
French vanilla?”
Stephen’s expression was a careful blank. Or perhaps that
vacant look was simply his face. She couldn’t judge. She’d been told by many
people she had resting bitch face.
“I think we have some sweet cream, but fancy flavors like
that you would have to go to the grocery at the edge of town,” Stephen said.
“We’re more of a convenience store since they brought in that big place.” He
gestured to the back of the store. “Dairy’s in the back left corner.”
Keane glanced down at his watch. “I’ll go grab the creamer
and meet you at the front. We need to get back. I don’t trust Tim to make sure
the delivery is right. That boy is soft.”
She nodded. “See you in a minute.”
“Personal products are on five. Not that we have many of
them,” Stephen said. “I’ll check and see if we even have makeup remover. I
would think a woman like you would buy your products in Dallas.”
“I buy some there.” She wished he wasn’t leading the way,