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“You can call me Robert.”
Robert?The name didn’t fit him somehow. “Robert. How do you know Ryder?”
Robert didn’t answer. Instead, he disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a backpack. He withdrew a dark gray laptop computer, the hard drive he’d stolen from her software lab, and a connector cord, and placed them on the table in front of her.
“Are you the reason Montague joined the military?” he asked her in a conversational tone. “You tossed him aside and broke the poor lad’s heart, didn’t you?”
The blood drained from her face. “How do you know anything about my relationship with Ryder?”
He tapped his ear. “I listened in on your chat.”
The listening devices Nathan found.
Nathalie shuddered. This man had been inside her home. Violated her sanctuary.
He leaned over her and pointed at the laptop. “Let’s go luv. I don’t have all day.”
He’d failed Nathalie.
A gut-churning desperation had Ryder twisted in so many knots it was a miracle he could stand upright.
The medics loaded Angie’s stretcher into the ambulance. Ryder had dispatched Caleb and Danny to look around the apartment complex for any clue where Hadley might have taken Nathalie.
Lachlan was still on the phone with him.
“Call Lucas Caldwell.” Ryder could hear the desperation in his own voice. “Get him to run interference with the local police. I can’t stay here giving statements—I need to find Nathalie.”
“Lucas is going to lose his fucking mind. We need to move fast.” Lachlan’s words echoed with a bone-deep weariness. “Hadley, of all people. One of my own men.”
“He hasn’t been one of your men for a few years now.” Ryder wasn’t about to let his mate go down that dark road of betrayal and regret again. “He chose his own path, just like the rest of us. But if he hurts her…” He left the sentence unfinished.
“If he hurts Nathalie, I’ll help you bury him,” Lachlan vowed. “Let me get in touch with Lucas, and I’ll get back to you.”
Danny and Caleb came to stand next to Ryder. “The Ford Explorer that was tailing you a few days ago is in the parking lot,” Danny said. “And there’s nothing here matching the description you gave us of Angie’s car.”
“Get inside the Explorer before the police get here. See if there’s anything that will lead us to that bastard and to Nathalie,” Ryder told him. “Caleb, text Nathan, get him to hack into the DMV and get Angie’s license plate number. We need to have the police looking for that car.”
A brown Ford Crown Vic pulled up next to the ambulance, diverting Ryder’s attention.
The man who stepped out looked to be straight out of an early nineties American police drama. Under six feet, thinning brown hair, an off-the-rack brown blazer. He had a nine-millimeter holstered to his belt and a world-weary expression that said he’d seen it all before.
Fucking hell.
Every minute Ryder spent standing around here was a minute he could be searching for Nathalie. He didn’t have time for law enforcement bureaucracy. “Go. Now,” he urged his men.
The new arrival spoke quietly to one of the medics, who pointed at Ryder.
The man shuffled in Ryder’s direction. “You the guy who found our victim?” He flashed a badge. “I’m Detective Johnson, Fairfax County PD. How about you accompany me back to the apartment where the young lady was attacked and answer some questions?”
Ryder withdrew the slim wallet containing his executive protection credentials and handed them to the detective, struggling for calm. “Detective, my client,”my life, “was abducted by the same man who attacked Angie Perez. I need to find her, not stand around and answer questions.” He took out a business card and handed it to the detective. “Once I’ve located her, we can talk.”
Caleb pulled up in the Suburban.
Johnson glanced at the idling SUV, then at Ryder. “Tell your buddy to park the gas guzzler. If your client’s been abducted, that’s a police matter and even more reason for you to answer my questions.”
He scrutinized Ryder’s card. “Dìleas Security Agency?” The pained look on his face would have been comical under different circumstances. “You work for Mackay? Please tell me I’m not going to find a dead body lying around with your fingerprints all over the murder weapon.”
Not yet.But if Ryder got his hands on Hadley, there was a chance.